#14 - Brand Storytelling, Messaging, and Wisdom on Starting a Podcast For Your College w/ Ross Romano of September Strategies
Getting clear on your college’s messaging, telling your brand’s story, and should your college start a podcast? Why or why not, and what should you talk about if you do? These are all things we cover in this episode with Ross Romano of September Strategies.
Test transcript of episode below (made by AI so only about 80% accurate).
Links:
-September Strategies
-Connect with Ross on Linkedin
-Pricing for Video Storytelling Subscription: pricing.unveild.tv
-Download "3 Absolutely Crucial Components Every Compelling College Student/Alumni Testimonial Needs"
Transcript:
00:00:00:07 - 00:00:17:06
Speaker 1
Getting clear on your college's messaging, telling your brand's story, and should your college start a podcast, why or why not? And what should you talk about if you even do? These are all the things we cover in this episode with Ross Romano of September and Strategies.
00:00:19:20 - 00:00:41:12
Speaker 1
Hey, welcome to the Higher Ed Storytelling University Podcast Podcast dedicated to helping higher ed marketers tell better stories, create better content, enroll more students. My name is John Azoni. I'm the founder at UNVEILD. We're a video production company working specifically with college marketing teams on automating their video storytelling content through a subscription approach. You can learn more at UNVEILD TV thats U-N-V-E-I-L-D.
00:00:41:22 - 00:00:58:06
Speaker 1
If you're listening to this podcast for the first time, go ahead and subscribe. And if you've been listening for a while now and haven't left to review, I'd love for you to do that. My guest today is Ross Romano from September Strategies. And so in keeping with the streak I have going on here of having guests on from outside the literal higher ed bubble.
00:00:58:21 - 00:01:20:08
Speaker 1
Ross brings us wisdom from working with companies in the K through 12 space. September Strategies helps organizations and high performing leaders in the K-through-12 education industry communicate their vision and make strategic decisions that lead to long term success. And I wanted to have him on because he's a well-respected thought leader in the education space in general. And I was intrigued by what September Strategies is about.
00:01:20:11 - 00:01:36:23
Speaker 1
But also I was intrigued by the fact that he's the co-founder of the B Podcasting Network, which is a network of podcasts in the education space, because I've connected with more than one person lately that's either starting a podcast at their school or wants to start podcasts at their school. And so I think this is a really relevant topic.
00:01:37:12 - 00:01:57:15
Speaker 1
And by more than one person, I mean two people, but two people that basically qualifies me to be like an influencer and say, everybody's been asking me. So I just figured I would just make an episode about it. Anyway, let's dive in. Here's my conversation with Ross Romano of September Strategies. We are here with Ross Romano from September Strategies.
00:01:57:15 - 00:01:58:19
Speaker 1
Ross, thanks for being here today.
00:01:59:13 - 00:02:00:23
Speaker 2
Yeah, John, thanks so much for having me.
00:02:01:17 - 00:02:04:00
Speaker 1
So tell me, tell me what September Strategies is.
00:02:05:03 - 00:02:42:16
Speaker 2
Yeah, Excellent. So we are a consulting firm that works almost exclusively with organizations in the K12 space. Sometimes we go a little bit beyond that, but we're all in the learning world with any type of company or organization that serves schools right. So we work on overall management strategy as well as storytelling, marketing and sales strategies and kind of that whole picture of helping a company define and then communicate its vision and go out there and connect with the people they want to connect with.
00:02:43:02 - 00:02:52:17
Speaker 1
Cool. I like it. So how did you get to where you are? You said you told me that you were sort of in the higher you were in the higher ed industry for a little while or you have worked in higher ed at some point.
00:02:53:16 - 00:03:15:19
Speaker 2
Yeah. So I have a history over the past several years of having done PR and marketing work in the education field and have worked somewhat in the higher ed a little bit. I have been primarily K-12, but when appropriate and relevant, we've kind of expanded some of our projects into the higher ed field, particularly with companies that are serving universities and colleges.
00:03:16:14 - 00:03:36:12
Speaker 2
And when those principles are underlying right, because there's some pretty significant differences between K-12 and higher ed, and yet there's other things that are universal across the education spectrum, and particularly when it comes to highlighting student success and understanding the support that educators need. Right. And these foundational principles that we'll talk about today around storytelling and communications.
00:03:37:02 - 00:03:44:23
Speaker 1
So tell me how some similar September strategies works. So it says you work with high performing leaders. What does that actually what does that look like on a day to day basis?
00:03:46:04 - 00:04:12:18
Speaker 2
Sure. Yeah. So we're working with, you know, founders and C-level leaders of these companies. So, you know, just to put a little more definition around what these organizations are, it's ed tech companies, it's publishers, it's PDD providers, it's nonprofits, it's all these various organizations that are providing products, services, support to schools and school districts and educators. Right. So we're working with the leaders there, whether it be the founder, whether it be the rest of the sea level.
00:04:12:18 - 00:04:36:02
Speaker 2
And the way I describe it is we we work from vision to decision. And what that means is we help to identify, define and articulate the leader's vision for that company, what they're trying to achieve, what are the goals, what are our values, and then ensure that they're sound decision making with fidelity to that, the vision, right? So we don't see that as just, you know, mission, vision and values.
00:04:36:02 - 00:04:56:01
Speaker 2
It's just words that live on your website or in a Google Drive folder somewhere that really should be the guiding principle on a day to day basis and understanding. Okay, where do we have opportunities for new partnerships, for new, you know, product launches or features for new markets we can serve? And is that consistent with that vision for what we're trying to go?
00:04:56:07 - 00:05:18:20
Speaker 2
Is our team on the same page there? Are we kind of revisiting that and making sound decisions? You know, we work to kind of form the foundation for success through messaging. A lot of times, even companies that have been around for 20 plus years haven't really engaged in that foundational messaging work of deeply understanding their audience, their pain points, the things they need to know about.
00:05:18:20 - 00:05:45:01
Speaker 2
Right. Being able to stand up those pillars of their communication strategy. So we start there and we work through thought leadership strategy, the various ways we need to get the word out. Sales enablement is a big thing. That's all the collateral materials, whether it be podcast case studies, white papers, one pagers, whatever, right, all that collateral that you want to have at the ready to be able to make those connections to your customers.
00:05:45:12 - 00:06:12:02
Speaker 2
And then we see it through with strategic advisement and adjustment as we go. It's not just a situation where we create a bunch of stuff, drop it off to the client and say, Here you go, good luck. I mean, we really are working to say, okay, are we using these things? Are we maximizing it? And that's something that I learned a lot from earlier in my career, where I would do similar type of work with clients and then realize whatever happened to that stuff, right?
00:06:12:06 - 00:06:42:15
Speaker 2
We did all that messaging work and their website doesn't doesn't have any new messaging on it or, you know, one of the biggest things being those silos that exist in organizations where, hey, you've contracted with a marketing firm or a PR firm, but your sales reps don't know that. So your CEO was just quoted in some article today and your sales rep had a meeting today and they didn't know about it to bring it up to say, Hey, did you know that our CEO was just featured?
00:06:42:18 - 00:06:59:14
Speaker 2
You know, all of those things to say? Look, that's the overall strategy, right? And that's why it's it's critical to not just leave them with the things and walk away, but to really say, look, everything doesn't work the right way. The first time you adjust it, you evolve, you adapt. And so that's what we try to do.
00:06:59:14 - 00:07:21:06
Speaker 1
I love that I'm laughing because I've just been there, you know, as a as a business owner, I've been there in terms of like putting all this work into something and then it just sits on the shelf because they get busy with something else, you know, putting all this work into, Yeah, like you said, I mean, I don't really do white papers, but that type of stuff, you know, that kind of collateral, right.
00:07:21:07 - 00:07:39:05
Speaker 2
Previous the same thing applies to video, right? Because I heard one of your previous episodes. Okay, we will you create these videos and then they just kind of pop them up on YouTube and they didn't do anything else. Okay. Well, you have to continue to to utilize that collateral, leverage it to your benefit. It's only as good as the people who see it.
00:07:39:09 - 00:07:58:10
Speaker 2
So, you know, that's kind of part of that is just trial and error and learning from experience and seeing where those things sometimes fall apart and then being persistent and saying, you know, look, it's actually really important that you do this and kind of seeing that through.
00:07:58:21 - 00:08:06:14
Speaker 1
Yeah, I think there's some comfort, though, in in that like sameness across a lot of organizations just have trouble starting something but then seeing it through.
00:08:06:14 - 00:08:08:09
Speaker 2
I think it's just progress.
00:08:08:13 - 00:08:28:02
Speaker 1
Everywhere I've worked in my in my career in video production and also I worked, you know, with nonprofit, same thing. It's like big idea. Everyone's excited about it. We have ten meetings about it. We we do the thing like a little bit and then we get swept up and then something else and it's like, whatever happened to that?
00:08:28:10 - 00:08:46:05
Speaker 1
But it is so helpful to have someone, an organization like you guys just saying, hey, like, let's stay on track here. Let's let's see this through to the end. See if we even see if it works, like get to the point where it either worked or it didn't work. I think a lot of organizations don't even get to the point where they know if it works right?
00:08:46:05 - 00:08:48:23
Speaker 2
Right. Well, that's yeah, that happens a lot. Yeah.
00:08:50:09 - 00:09:14:22
Speaker 1
Cool. So tell me, I want to go back to the messaging that you guys do. We talk a lot about messaging and differentiating, you know, your, you know, for us higher institutions, differentiating their schools. And when you work with with companies in the education space, what what are some of those conversations like what's the process that you take people through to develop their messaging?
00:09:15:14 - 00:09:41:11
Speaker 2
So sure, Yeah. So, so one of the things that I have taken to saying recently is that, you know, the difference between a great product and a great company is a great story. And and because I've seen it all over the spectrum where the best products aren't necessarily the ones that are winning in the marketplace, right? Sometimes it's just because there's competitors that are super well funded and they could just buy up market share and and kind of work backwards from there.
00:09:41:11 - 00:10:09:02
Speaker 2
But a lot of times it's just that there's a disconnect between the product, its features and the product vision or how it actually relates to the customer. So where I start is always where the consumer of course, in education, a lot of times that is students, it is parents, it is educators, it's administrators. You know, if it's a product you're selling to a school district, of course, that's the administration.
00:10:09:02 - 00:10:29:16
Speaker 2
But those are all audiences that either are that direct or an influencer audience. So we start right there and go down and identify what are their pain points, what are they need, what do they want, what are their ambitions, what they aspire to? Right? It's not a strictly deficit minded around things that are challenges, but it's also like what really gets them going?
00:10:29:16 - 00:10:52:14
Speaker 2
What do they want out of an organization that's that's supposed to be helping them and really dive into that? Oftentimes, you know, I will then take that develop initial draft messaging around the value proposition and then stress test it by going out and talking to people that are actually in those roles and saying, look, if a company is talking about this, this and this, how does that resonate with you?
00:10:52:22 - 00:11:19:09
Speaker 2
What what would that mean to you? Does that speak to the things that you actually care about? And then we find from there, okay, yes, we're on the right track here or no, we need to go and make some adjustments. You know, one of the big things as far as kind of what happens to often the status quo is that and companies do this a lot, especially if they are, you know, the founding team is more from the product side.
00:11:20:03 - 00:11:48:07
Speaker 2
Overemphasis on features. Mm hmm. You know, relates to what you were just mentioning, where you just get overloaded, you get bombarded. There's all these things that sound great upfront, but then you realize you can't actually use them all or figure them out, or it just becomes too much. And it's not any and it's not really motivate you as a customer to say, I need to commit to this and stick with it because I see the outcomes, right?
00:11:48:07 - 00:12:19:11
Speaker 2
There's over promising of uniqueness. Everything is revolutionary, everything is, you know, and there's these overused terms, innovative, creative, you know, in education, one of the terms that gets overused a lot that to the point of becoming a cliché is equity, not because it's not critically important, but because companies just throw it out there because they know they're supposed to say it and they don't actually define, in the case of their solution, what they are doing to make a true impact on that so that it has meaning.
00:12:19:11 - 00:12:50:13
Speaker 2
And then it just becomes these words that everybody's using, you know, companies that that haven't necessarily spent a lot of time paying attention to who are their competitors in the space of their auditor defining their competitors way too narrowly. Right. Like nobody does exactly the same thing we do. So that means we're the only ones. Well, right. No, because again, focus on the outcomes, focus on the audience, what are the things they want to achieve and what are other companies that are setting out to help them achieve that?
00:12:50:20 - 00:13:15:10
Speaker 2
And then how are you describing yourself, you know, in contrast maybe with those other solutions, Right? And so, you know, it's all of those various things that we start with and kind of really strip out those cliches, take it down to the to the foundation and the roots, and then usually try to figure out, okay, what are the three or four or five tenets or pillars that were built around.
00:13:15:15 - 00:13:42:05
Speaker 2
These typically are some type of articulation of the values of the company, but also the value proposition. What are the key areas that if you if somebody is thinking about what we are, they can remember, okay, they help with this, this and this. And that's why I care about it. Right? It's because it's all about making them care planning with the end in mind around the customer and the outcomes that they will achieve if they stick with you.
00:13:42:14 - 00:14:12:15
Speaker 2
And then finding that sometimes the most aha moment for clients is I usually I'll interview them a couple of times about their their product, their company, what they do, and that will record this conversation and then I'll go back and review it and that'll be part of my process as well. And then I'll come up with the messaging and say, Look, this should sound familiar to you, right?
00:14:13:23 - 00:14:44:08
Speaker 2
It should like, it shouldn't sound like I just made this stuff all up out of nowhere. But also what you'll recognize is that this is distilled and communicated in a way that you've never done before. Yeah, because a lot of times what you realize is you're already doing the things you're supposed to be doing as a company, but you haven't quite tethered it to, you know, the audiences that you need to be tethered to or how you do it.
00:14:44:09 - 00:15:01:17
Speaker 2
Sometimes you find that you're not doing the right things and then you need to go back and say, okay, is this actually, you know, a good product or not? But a lot of times it's just talking it through really helps to distill those things that and companies realize, Oh, this is okay, this is what we need to say about ourselves.
00:15:02:00 - 00:15:22:14
Speaker 1
Yeah. And just getting, just getting clarity. I find that, you know, so many organizations could really benefit from just taking some of the art scene this out of their marketing language and just getting clear about what it is that that you do. I had an Instagram ad come across yesterday is Instagram ad for something video related that obviously got served.
00:15:22:14 - 00:15:44:20
Speaker 1
To me, it was a product that actually kind of looked interesting while they were doing it, but they the whole ad, like no one said what the product did or product actually did. It was just people that were like, this is life changing. This is this is going to change your whole workflow. And I actually emailed them like, I might have bought that from you guys, but I skipped it because you didn't tell me anything.
00:15:46:00 - 00:15:51:15
Speaker 1
I was like, Maybe try again, sir, it's me again. But like, actually, you know, tell me what you do.
00:15:52:07 - 00:16:20:13
Speaker 2
Yeah, it's that that push and pull where sometimes I feel like the best way to go about it is to try to develop your unique and almost proprietary definition around a key term that you know matters, right? Sometimes you'll see it on a website, for example, on the menu, and sometimes it's even a web developer that'll say, Well, we don't want the menus to just sound like every website, right?
00:16:20:13 - 00:16:35:03
Speaker 2
So we come up with our own term, right? I'm like, Well, if I'm navigating that website, how do I know what I want to click on? Because I don't know what any of this means. Yeah, right. So like you need to use words that people will recognize, but you also need to say why they have meaning to see you.
00:16:35:17 - 00:16:44:12
Speaker 1
Right? It's like if you know ten different companies may DVD players, they're not all coming up with different play button symbols.
00:16:45:08 - 00:16:45:14
Speaker 2
No.
00:16:47:06 - 00:16:49:21
Speaker 1
You know, it's like, oh, ours is going to be a circle.
00:16:50:15 - 00:17:15:05
Speaker 2
All right. That would be very frustrating. And you would say, I mean, even for me, you know, I've traditionally been a PC user, and then when I switch over to an Apple device, I'm like, I don't know what I'm doing here. Yeah, Like even that with devices that are not brand new to me and that have been around, it's like, man, this is completely different and I'm frustrated.
00:17:15:05 - 00:17:21:05
Speaker 2
So, you know, if you're a new product coming to market and that's the first thing people feel, you probably will make it very far.
00:17:21:09 - 00:17:45:03
Speaker 1
Right? Exactly. I mean, I like I like that you test the messaging out, too, because I think I've been in enough meetings to know that, like, there's a lot of assumptions that go into branding and, you know, just coming up with brands Rebrands, who are we who are retargeting, what are their pain points? And it's nope, nobody in that room is the actual customer.
00:17:45:03 - 00:18:10:19
Speaker 1
And so we're just assuming a lot of stuff, you know, and I always find that my assumptions are usually wrong. So when I, when I started my company, I wanted to really make sure that I wasn't just assuming what my customers wanted and needing and what their pain points were. And I, you know, called a bunch of, you know, people and I was really surprised to learn that like, I was like kind of on the right path.
00:18:10:19 - 00:18:28:19
Speaker 1
But like there were there were other things that that I wasn't saying or that I was saying that wasn't resonating. And it's a whole different ballgame when you're when you're just you know, when you're writing on a whiteboard, you know, in a in a bubble. But then when you're actually testing that and and validating those, those findings.
00:18:29:10 - 00:18:56:16
Speaker 2
Yeah. And this is why I do think sometimes it's, you know, the way that I go about it and the way that we work is is nontraditional in the sense that we're not exclusively like a communications firm, right. Because we're engaging in that strategic advisement and management consulting and, you know, earlier in my career, when I was more into, you know, communications and publicity role, and it made me think a lot about the communications really needs to be a two way process.
00:18:57:00 - 00:19:18:01
Speaker 2
And a lot of companies think about it as our communications unit is here to figure out what we want to say and say it. And it's a one way direction versus saying. But they're also the people who are out there engaging with the marketplace, right? So they should also be bringing intelligence back to you and saying, look, you know, this things this is not resonating.
00:19:18:01 - 00:19:51:19
Speaker 2
This is I was I'm talking to the media and here's the things they care about and we're not talking about those things. So why not? Right? There needs to be that dynamic. So now doing it in this sense, it hopefully helps to at least illustrate to these two companies that this is it's not superficial, it's foundational. If you think about the, you know, in leadership and companies that became really successful, like a lot of times those leaders were they weren't the technical experts, they were the visionaries.
00:19:51:19 - 00:20:12:15
Speaker 2
The Steve Jobs is Walt Disney right today it would be probably Elon Musk. You know, when you think about what is the thing that he's bringing to his companies, it's that he's going out there and he's telling a story that people find interesting and they're saying, you know, now he's not a he's not the communications person or he he might be the chief storyteller in a sense, but he's the CEO.
00:20:12:20 - 00:20:25:10
Speaker 2
But it's because you really need to interconnect those things and not just think about it as, okay, this is something off to the side and right, let's just, you know, have somebody do that and, you know, and then their job is done for sure.
00:20:25:10 - 00:20:42:19
Speaker 1
Yeah. The face of the company is the mirror. You know, the the, the back end sort of strategies to what what does it mean to you when you work with a company on their brand story? What does it mean to to you to tell them to tell a brand story.
00:20:42:19 - 00:21:05:21
Speaker 2
Yeah, absolutely. So I think the way I would define it is that a brand's story? It's your customer story, right? It's the story of their life and how you fit into their goals and their dreams. And if you can't find that entry point to how you fit in, then you're. Then what? Then why? Why would they care? Yeah.
00:21:06:11 - 00:21:33:05
Speaker 2
So in education, I think I mentioned this like your consumers, their students, their parents, their educators, and you're talking about, you know, in the higher ed world, for example. Yes. Things like campus life and, you know, are important. But ultimately, especially in the current economic climate, about making decisions around, okay, tuition is this and, you know, the jobs outlook is this.
00:21:33:05 - 00:21:51:02
Speaker 2
And I have these different choices. You know, I need to be hearing about what is my future going to look like, be way past the time when I'm enrolled. Yeah. Like, what is my financial outlook? What kind of work am I going to be doing? Is it going to be meaningful to me? How am I going to get there?
00:21:51:02 - 00:22:33:07
Speaker 2
Am I just going to graduate with that diploma? And then I get to put that on my resume and I have to go out, find a job? Am I going to be learning about career opportunities and building a network as I go? There's certain things there that I that I found that community colleges are doing really well compared to a lot of four year universities, because they understand that they have to demonstrate that value proposition to students and they have to focus on those outcomes, whereas there's that kind of middle class of for you universities especially, you know, especially not the elite, elite schools that people will want to get into no matter what, but
00:22:33:07 - 00:22:58:01
Speaker 2
also not the, you know, lower cost public schools that are you know, but it's those ones in the middle that are expensive, but they're not the Ivies. And now they're like, look, you really need to redefine. Why should I come there? Because if I'm graduating with a bunch of debts and my job outlook is really no different than if I went to the local state school or, you know, whatever.
00:22:58:01 - 00:23:15:02
Speaker 2
I mean, there has to be something more to it than just campus life and it's the dining hall and that kind of thing. It has to really you have to understand me, right? So what are the needs and ambitions? What are their pain points or their dreams? How will they be successful? So I think I think that applies to any company.
00:23:15:15 - 00:23:37:22
Speaker 2
Of course, we're talking about within education, but it's any any tool. I mean, there's a obviously a huge surge right now in A.I. tools in the marketplace. Right. And there is a tremendous disparity in how well they are not telling any kind of story around their relevance. And so there's a lot of skeptics out there that are doubting them and there's others that are gaining a lot of user base.
00:23:37:22 - 00:24:10:01
Speaker 2
But it's because, like the tools that I use that incorporate, I don't think about them as I think about them as how they help me. Noise cancellation, right? Auto transcription. That's A.I.. But I'm not sitting here thinking, Oh, isn't A.I. cool? I'm joking. All these are, you know, these are things I need in my business. So. Right. You know, until they start to really go out there and and understand their customer and then speak to their needs, it's just going to be a lot of those shortcomings.
00:24:10:18 - 00:24:31:13
Speaker 1
Yeah. And I think that, you know, I talk about like this there's kind of two ways that that schools use the word storage, but really brands in general use the word telling. Our story in there is you know, there's there is telling a singular actual story like maybe maybe the school comes from a you know, rich heritage history.
00:24:32:12 - 00:24:58:17
Speaker 1
Some famous guy started it in the Civil War or whatever. You know, maybe there is a story there. But I think in a lot of cases, you know what it really is, is finding what resonates with your students and and speaking to those things over time in in in in small, you know, gestures of story and drips of communication.
00:24:58:17 - 00:25:18:13
Speaker 1
I think in what I think people get wrong is, you know, a lot of the story, the storytelling types that are beating the storytelling drum will say, oh, tell your story, tell your story. But I think we need to frame that. And I just think it needs to be tell your customer story because because people don't care about your story.
00:25:18:13 - 00:25:41:12
Speaker 1
Like, not like I'm not going to go to your school because you achieved this or this or whatever. Like I care about what's in it for me. You know, I think that I think there needs to be that shift in. Really? Yeah. It's thinking about your customers being the story and how are you going to feed into that story with the content that you put out.
00:25:41:20 - 00:26:04:07
Speaker 2
Right? And it's not an invention. It is. It should be, you know, proactively talking about things that are already happening, the things that you're doing, the things that you know, that are happening for your educators, your students or your customers in the case, if you can't tell that, it means that you're probably not doing the right work or you're not having the impact you need to have.
00:26:04:23 - 00:26:23:16
Speaker 2
But a lot of times, you know, it's community engagement, it's getting out there, It's understanding that we do a lot of good things and we do nine good things. And then one thing that doesn't work out and, you know, people will hear about that one thing regardless and they can't contextualize it if that's the only time they hear from us.
00:26:24:02 - 00:26:50:22
Speaker 2
Right. Because they haven't heard about these other things. And you could see that as well, that things like you know, crisis management, which is another another form of this that is, you know, effective crisis management is happens every day is what it is, because it's telling a positive story all the time when there is no crisis. And then you know that things in context and it says, okay, you know, this this isn't so great.
00:26:50:22 - 00:27:09:16
Speaker 2
But I do know that all this other stuff is happening. So it's an opportunity for for companies and organizations to create a much better relationship to their audience. But, you know, it does require some persistence.
00:27:09:20 - 00:27:20:14
Speaker 1
A quick break here. Speaking of telling stories and communicating your school's impact, to share with you some thoughts from one of our subscription clients who is the photography and video producer for Baker College here in Michigan.
00:27:20:16 - 00:27:46:04
Speaker 3
The video subscription idea was a real godsend for me. It's been kind of life changing in a way. I don't know if that is too strong of a statement. There's a lot of content to produce and not a lot of content creators here. So having somebody who can take that portion off my plate, it's allowed me a little bit of room to breathe and maybe focus on some other projects.
00:27:46:04 - 00:28:24:00
Speaker 3
Not only do you get a fully edited testimonial, but you also get a delivery of all of the B-roll that was taken of that student. For instance, we have this culinary institute, and one of the projects we wanted to do is to create just a short little video connected to a QR code on all the little chocolates that we that we give out in the restaurant or if they make chocolate for a special event or for our board members or for any meetings or graduation, they can scan this QR code and up pops this video of some like really beautiful slo mo hands making chocolate and that sort of thing.
00:28:24:00 - 00:28:43:10
Speaker 3
And I was able to go into this B-roll and find some fantastic dick shots of one of our students who did a testimonial creating these bonbons and creating cakes. And you've got the batter going and you got the chocolate drizzling. So I know that I'm going to be able to take that footage, resize it. I can I can resize it vertically if I need it.
00:28:43:10 - 00:29:06:10
Speaker 3
I can resize it into a one by one. If I need it, I can color grade it. However I need to fit my needs. And I really don't have to travel across the state to our culinary institute to do a whole new shoot because I've got that be footage at my hands. So really, that's something that I could sit down, edit for a couple of hours and have it done and check it off the list, which is fantastic.
00:29:06:20 - 00:29:26:23
Speaker 1
We love internal video teams here UNVEILD because we know what it's like to be in their shoes. We've been there. We've been those people before. It's a lot of work and it's not enough. Hands on deck to handle all of the content needs for a whole freaking college. So we're here to make not only the marketing team's lives easier, but the video people's lives easier too.
00:29:26:23 - 00:29:47:03
Speaker 1
And free up their time to be more productive and do other pressing stuff. So head over to our Web site, UNVEILD TV that's UNVEILD D TV and book Call with us. And if you're like me and you want to know how much something costs before you have to talk to a real person, you can go to our pricing page and download our pricing guide, which has obviously pricing.
00:29:47:03 - 00:30:06:19
Speaker 1
And also just like how this whole thing works affects all that stuff. So go to pricing UNVEILD dot TV and download that. Okay. Now back to my conversation with Ross Romano. Cool. I want to shift gears and talk about your involvement in podcasting. So you co-founded a podcasting platform. Tell me about that.
00:30:06:19 - 00:30:35:00
Speaker 2
Yeah, so we are called the B Podcast Network and it is right now, I think 14 shows and counting. You probably will have a few more signing on very soon. But we are exclusively dedicated to, to learning and education. So our mission is to support transformative change in formal and informal learning environments. And so the majority of the shows right now are focused on K-12, K-12 leadership educators.
00:30:35:00 - 00:30:57:07
Speaker 2
But we also have learning and development inside the corporate learning environment and some that are a little more around parenting or general leadership growth. But it's all kind of in that realm. And, you know, our vision is to catalyze a collaborative community, a lot of sees, but creators, partners and listeners to rally around the common goal to make change.
00:30:57:07 - 00:31:23:07
Speaker 2
I call it this like triangle of impact with the creators, the listeners and the sponsors and understanding what are the common challenges that each of those audiences faces with respect to podcasting specifically and what we can do as a network to help that. And then of course, their needs overall. But none of this will be super news to you.
00:31:23:07 - 00:31:49:19
Speaker 2
But as a creator, right, It can be. It's a lot of work. It can be isolating because the technology that's out there doesn't necessarily support community. It's hard to know what other people are doing. You know, the the average podcast or the medium podcast lasts three episodes. I think only half of podcast series make it more than three episodes because you start doing it, you realize, I don't really know how to build an audience.
00:31:50:08 - 00:32:14:08
Speaker 2
There's no way to do that natively. This is a lot of work and I just can't really stick with it, right? I think it's something like 1% of podcasts make it to 20 episodes or more. Wow. Because all those challenges so. So that's creators, right? And also, you know, most of our our hosts being having another day job, being a an educator or some other type of role.
00:32:15:23 - 00:32:38:12
Speaker 2
They're not primarily in it to make money. But that's also nice, right? At least if you're not losing money on it. Right. Because there are expenses costs. So how do we be a part of kind of an organization that helps with that? Because that's not my expertise, you know, is what they might say for listeners. A lot of the same things apply with those stats around podcasts that don't really last one.
00:32:38:12 - 00:32:57:05
Speaker 2
How can I find something I like? Once I find something? Well, I will keep coming out routinely. Or will it go away? Will the quality control be there? Can I get relevant recommendations to me if I like this, Can I get that? Especially in any kind of a niche because I see this every single day. You know, our stuff is in the education field.
00:32:57:13 - 00:33:15:23
Speaker 2
Every time I go on Apple Podcasts, the recommendations below say popular podcast in education, and it has nothing to do with our content. It's Duolingo and it's TED talks and it's yeah, you know, Mel Robbins, Jordan Peterson or whatever, you know, whenever somebody claims is education. And so if I'm Jordan.
00:33:15:23 - 00:33:19:04
Speaker 1
Peterson, too, I get that too. When I look when I look right.
00:33:19:08 - 00:33:48:05
Speaker 2
It's like, well, this has nothing to do with anything. And yet because you can yourself tagging it is education it's getting pushed that may you know for sponsors you know each individual show in the entire ecosystem let alone niches but even you know shows that are more consumer, you know, the individual audience for one podcast is typically not big enough that I want to spend all of my time dealing with them.
00:33:48:05 - 00:34:09:03
Speaker 2
And then there's, you know, as far as finding who's relevant to me going out there, you know, I want to I mean, I don't work with a group. It's much easier. I get a more comprehensive service. I get to reach the people I want. I get more touchpoints and more engagement, and I don't have to have a full time, dedicated team whose entire job is going out and discovering podcasts I might want to partner with.
00:34:09:21 - 00:34:30:07
Speaker 2
So, you know, I kind of we try to think about it in those terms and and so we do that. And then we also do, you know, part of the thing we're wrapping up now being production services for companies that want to do branded podcasts in the space and that, you know, we'd need support with that. So that's that's a big growth area.
00:34:30:07 - 00:34:38:10
Speaker 2
That's something I've done a lot of in my previous life. So we we've kind of developed the experience there to create those series as well.
00:34:40:00 - 00:35:06:03
Speaker 1
That's great. So who should start So thinking about higher ed a little bit, what kind of schools should start a podcast? I've been hearing, you know, people that listen to my podcasts and friends that I make kind of in this, this whole industry and stuff like that. Some rumblings of like, we want to start a podcast. We're kind of like getting on that train in the higher ed space if you're a marketing leader or whatever, who should start a podcast and what should that be about?
00:35:06:07 - 00:35:23:12
Speaker 1
Because a lot of education podcasts are kind of just talking to other other other education leaders, you know, not so much like prospective students, but I don't know, I guess it's a really broad question, but my own. So going back to the broad question, who should start a podcast?
00:35:23:21 - 00:35:45:18
Speaker 2
Yeah, yeah. I think the simple answer that I would give around this is anybody who wants to do a good job. I mean, I had the experience. Yeah. Like if you don't want to commit to it, you're not really sure that just don't do it because it is. There is work to do it right and it does take a plan of action and it can be super worth it to do that.
00:35:45:18 - 00:36:11:17
Speaker 2
But if you're like, you know, if you're not ready to invest, then just kind of maybe not, But assuming you do want to, you know, one of the things I think it goes back to a lot of what we talked about, if your objectives are around, you know, enrollment, marketing, student recruitment, talk to students, talk to highlight their stories, talk about the things that matter to them.
00:36:11:17 - 00:36:33:09
Speaker 2
And you have unlimited inventory. You can do as many episodes as you want to. So really drill down on specifics. It doesn't have to be okay. Tell me about your entire life. I mean, talk about specific programs, extracurriculars, courses, you know, like all the things that we know students how how your school helped the student navigate the financial aid process.
00:36:33:09 - 00:36:53:14
Speaker 2
Right. I mean, all the things that I might be concerned about if I am a kid and I want to say, well, I don't know this place. See, this is a whole new world for me. And once I go out there, I'm not going to know what's going on. I'm a first generation college student. My family, you know, doesn't know that much about what I'm going to encounter when I get there.
00:36:53:14 - 00:37:20:21
Speaker 2
And I don't know. I mean, I don't necessarily know if I have a community or alliance. Tell me the stories that are going to help me feel like, yes, this is a place that knows and cares about me. Right? There also are other directions to go with them. I mean, there's it kind of depends on your objectives and, you know, so but podcasts also are the supercharged networking opportunities, aren't they?
00:37:20:21 - 00:37:40:05
Speaker 2
I mean, if you reach out to somebody and say, would you like to be on my podcast, it's a lot more interesting than let's set up a meeting. So you know, the people you can meet and connect with and learn from when you're doing it in that you still want to be mindful of that. The end result of the content is worthwhile and is serving a purpose.
00:37:40:05 - 00:38:06:11
Speaker 2
But there's so many creative ways to use the medium. But yeah, I would definitely think of it in terms of I need to, I need to hear from my peers. I need to hear from somebody who's relevant to me. So I don't need to hear the dean of, you know, whatever, telling me how great the school is. I want another student to tell me how great it is right?
00:38:06:11 - 00:38:08:11
Speaker 2
So, you know, I would certainly start there.
00:38:09:02 - 00:38:39:09
Speaker 1
Yeah, that's a great that's a I was thinking about that, too. That's a great idea for for a podcast to just get other students who have been, you know, alumni or whatever, who've been successful and who have gone through challenges. You know, when I was when I was going I remember when was going from elementary school to middle school, I was so nervous and my sister's two years ahead of me and I was just peppering her with questions constantly, like, what if I can't find my locker?
00:38:39:09 - 00:39:16:06
Speaker 1
What if I go, Well, what do I do if this happens? How do you get to the cafeteria? What do I do? And she would get so annoyed with me. But I'm like that. That's and that's that was that was that was me in high school getting ready to go away to college, too. It's just like wanting to wanting to know from someone that's been there, you know, what are these what are the answers to these these challenges and, you know, navigating big things for the first time, you know, new job, being away from your parents, being, you know, maybe paying for your own groceries for the first time, you know, managing your own schedule.
00:39:22:17 - 00:39:41:18
Speaker 2
So with things like high school. Right, I was kind of figuring it out. And then it got easier for each successive brother. And now with college, you know, my parents had gone to college, but they went at a time when you, you know, more or less applied to one school and went right. It was what it became later with the whole process.
00:39:41:18 - 00:40:07:10
Speaker 2
So completely different time of figuring it out. Eventually, you know, you may figure it out, but you may realize, okay, my first year it was kind of just like I didn't know what I was doing and then I figured it out eventually. You also may, but there, you know, serious, you know, times when when it may not happen that way, where a student comes in, they struggle their first year.
00:40:07:15 - 00:40:32:02
Speaker 2
Maybe they struggle so much academically that they end up out of school or they run out of money right in the middle of their sophomore year. And I now I've left school with debt and without a degree. Okay? And that was totally avoidable. Right. But they because the school didn't anticipate, understand and support that need. I mean, this, of course, goes beyond communications.
00:40:32:03 - 00:40:57:02
Speaker 2
This goes to their actual programs. But this I mean, it is their obligation if I'm going to take hundreds of thousands of dollars from you, it's my obligation to support your success. It's not a for sure all here. And so I think that's when I was going back to kind of that, you know, I'm just referring to the middle class, you know, the the four year universities where tuition is up.
00:40:57:02 - 00:41:29:00
Speaker 2
And I mean, it really it should apply to every school. But to really think a lot harder about having a hand in that student's success more explicitly rather than just saying, well, we have great faculty and great programs and anybody can you know, it is what you make of it kind of thing, right? Yes. You know, for some people that'll totally work because they already know what they're doing or they're super self-motivated driven or they have a support system or whatever.
00:41:29:00 - 00:41:41:19
Speaker 2
But for most it will not because, you know, most kids are 18, 19, 20, 21 and beyond have not totally figured it out for sure.
00:41:42:06 - 00:41:59:13
Speaker 1
Yeah. So you so a lot of our listeners are marketing leaders, communications leaders. And I was curious, I'm curious to know what goes into implementing vision. What what's what kind of conversations do you have with with leaders when you talk about formulating and implementing vision?
00:42:00:19 - 00:42:22:12
Speaker 2
Sure, Yeah. So I talked a little bit about, you know, we always kind of think in the in terms of mission vision and values and and, you know, sometimes they all are they're sometimes one or the other takes the place of the others. Right. But, you know, realistically, when you think about it, it's like your vision is it's your anticipated vision of the future.
00:42:22:12 - 00:42:42:12
Speaker 2
Right. What you want society to look like, what you want life to be for your customers. If you execute on your mission. It's the thing that can be the most compelling and can really, you know, keep people interested in what you're doing. And, you know, it really does start with that process of beginning with the end in mind and thinking about who am I meant to serve here?
00:42:43:01 - 00:43:14:18
Speaker 2
What is their situation currently and what could it be like or what do I wish it were like in the future if we're able to support them and really illustrating that. And that's the thing, right? That guides your company as you go. The implementation piece is both internal and external and internal. First, really it's that obligation, but also opportunity of the leadership to be communicative.
00:43:15:23 - 00:43:41:16
Speaker 2
That helps you earn buy in around what you're doing. It helps your team members understand how they can positively contribute to success. So you're going to get the best out of them and you're also going to, you know, get some leeway when the results are ambiguous because people know what you're trying to do. Yeah, and they can work.
00:43:42:00 - 00:44:08:15
Speaker 2
So it's like that, that word transparency, I mean, that that can be done strategically. There's certain things that people are not necessarily need to be privy to. But what it means is making your motivations transparent, making your intention and your thought process transparent so that others can learn from it. They can see what you're thinking. They can see why you are in the role that you're in.
00:44:08:15 - 00:44:35:15
Speaker 2
Right. This person seems to have an idea here of what they're doing and also kind of goes back to that, that point about breaking down those silos of, okay, these folks over here, these folks over there, they're you know, they're not operating off the same information. Right? They're they're doing what they think is their job, but it's not really connected to what we're doing here as a whole.
00:44:35:15 - 00:45:21:21
Speaker 2
And, you know, and a lot of times it's I I've seen it. I'll talk about one example, communications and marketing. Right now. A lot of people call it Mark com and they go together. But sometimes that's not really the case. Right. You could companies like they they're not exactly working on the same team necessarily so I've been in organizations where that that you and you're going to see this a lot in education they do a variety of mission oriented work each of which if you distill it down to its specific unit level or, you know, it's it's PNL area is not necessary highly revenue generating, right?
00:45:22:04 - 00:45:53:13
Speaker 2
There's organizations that engage in legislative advocacy or they do other community programs and things like that. And then they also sell products or they have conferences and events or they, you know, provide. PD I'm in organizations where it's like, you can look at the chart and the marketing department would just draw a big X through all of those things they define as non-revenue generating and say we don't have to support them, know about them or care about them because we're here to sell products.
00:45:53:21 - 00:46:21:15
Speaker 2
Yeah, well, why should I buy this product versus one of your competitors? I mean, that's part of your value proposition as part of your story is to say, look, we're not exclusively focused on making money here by selling these things. We're doing all these things that they all support one another. This is the impact we make versus, you know, communications often has more insight into all of those things and kind of synthesizes and blends them all together.
00:46:21:20 - 00:46:55:05
Speaker 2
Now when it's working the way it should, both those units are doing that and working together. But, you know, that's not necessarily the case. You know, a lot of that comes from the top, right? That comes from the leadership creating those norms and expectations and assertions around what we're meant to do here. But if you're allowing a culture to kind of thrive whereby we're writing each other off and saying, wow, you don't really bring in money, so it's not important, well then that's how it goes.
00:46:55:14 - 00:47:02:10
Speaker 1
Yeah. Okay, cool. Well, I think that's a good place to stop. Where can people connect with you?
00:47:03:14 - 00:47:29:11
Speaker 2
Sure. So I'm on LinkedIn that Ross Romano could search for me. I'm on Twitter at Raspy Romano, and my website is September STRATCOM. Or you can also check out B Podcast Network to learn about the podcasting thing. So there's a lot going on there. But yeah, LinkedIn, Twitter, I'm pretty easy to find or email raw sent September STRATCOM Cool.
00:47:29:18 - 00:47:31:21
Speaker 1
Awesome. Ross thanks for coming on the show. Appreciate it.
00:47:32:06 - 00:47:33:15
Speaker 2
My pleasure. Thanks so much for having me.
00:47:33:23 - 00:47:51:01
Speaker 1
Thank you so much for listening. Definitely go connect with Ross on LinkedIn as he's got a lot of good content he puts out that will be relevant to our audience. In other news, three things I want to give you before you go. Number one is having a lot of student and alumni stories at your disposal is something that you would love to have if you could just snap your fingers and have what you want.
00:47:51:07 - 00:48:11:06
Speaker 1
And if you want to have all that B-roll and build a big massive B-roll and interview library of content that you can just just dominate social media with, I've got something great for you with our student testimonials, subscriptions. You've heard a bit about them already. So if you are interested in more, including pricing, go to pricing.unveild.tv
00:48:11:07 - 00:48:30:11
Speaker 1
UNVEILD is spelled U-N-V-E-I-L-D. Number two. If you want to take the storytelling you're already doing to the next level, I have a free resource for you. It's a three part framework for creating compelling student and alumni testimonials you can get at unveild.tv/studenttestimonials. It doesn't even have to be for video, it works for written content.
00:48:30:11 - 00:48:46:08
Speaker 1
Your next TED talk, whatever. So go pick that up. Number three, leave a review for this podcast. Helps us out a ton. Thanks for listening. My name John is only go connect with me on LinkedIn and in the meantime I'll catch you on the next episode of the Higher Ed Storytelling University Podcast. Thanks.
