#86 - The Hidden Costs of Higher Ed Social Media (And How to Plan for Them)
w/ Maya Demishkevich
Marketing Strategist and CMO at Carroll Community College
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SHOW NOTES
In this episode, John Azoni chats with Maya Demiskevich, a higher ed CMO, marketing strategist, and social media consultant. Maya shares how she overcame imposter syndrome and fear of judgment to start posting on LinkedIn—an intentional decision that changed the trajectory of her career. Since then, she’s presented at over 10 higher ed conferences, landed podcast features (including this one!), and built a thriving community.
John and Maya dive into the mindset shift that helped her start creating, how she balances LinkedIn content with a busy life, and the power of staying curious and authentic online. They also explore Maya’s entrepreneurial ventures—from a food business to higher ed analytics—and how experimentation fuels her creativity.
Whether you’re trying to grow your LinkedIn presence or find the courage to start sharing, Maya’s story will inspire you to take the leap.
Key Takeaways:
Start Before You’re Ready: Maya started posting on LinkedIn just two years ago by putting aside perfectionism and focusing on curiosity.
Let Go of Imposter Syndrome: You don’t have to be the expert in everything to contribute meaningfully. Share what you know.
Consistency Is Personal: Maya posts when inspiration strikes, proving that you don’t need a rigid schedule to grow your presence.
Career Growth Through Visibility: From speaking at AMA to podcast invites, visibility on LinkedIn has led to real-world opportunities.
Entrepreneurial Spirit: Maya shares how trying new things—from vegan snacks to social media analytics—has helped her stay engaged and creative.
Balancing it All: With a full-time job, side businesses, and a family, Maya explains how collaboration with her entrepreneurial husband makes it all work.
Resources & Links:
Check out the Social Media Calculator here: https://mycollegecrusader.com/social-media-calculator/
Connect with Maya on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mayademiskevich/
Follow John on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/johnazoni
Learn more about UNVEILD: https://www.unveild.tv
Subscribe to the Higher Ed Storytelling Newsletter: https://unveild.tv/newsletter
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Transcript (done with AI so only about 90% accurate):
00;00;00;04 - 00;00;09;27
John Azoni
My guest today is Maya Dimension, which Maya is a marketing strategist, higher ed CMO and social media expert and consultants. Welcome to the show, Maya.
00;00;10;20 - 00;00;11;07
Maya Demishkevich
Thanks, John.
00;00;12;02 - 00;00;23;22
John Azoni
Great to have you here. I see your stuff pop up on LinkedIn all the time and I always think I need to get her on the show. And I finally have an idea for an episode to get you on here. So glad to have you here.
00;00;24;21 - 00;00;29;03
Maya Demishkevich
So I think we have a lot of cool stuff to discuss, so looking forward to our conversation.
00;00;29;23 - 00;00;32;28
John Azoni
So tell me something people might be surprised to know about you.
00;00;34;02 - 00;01;02;03
Maya Demishkevich
Well, the first thing you mentioned, you you found me on LinkedIn. You saw my post on LinkedIn. And I think a lot of people don't know that. I've only started posting on LinkedIn less than two years ago, and I started presenting at higher ed conferences. Two years ago was my first presentation and I've been in higher ed for almost 15 years and I've been so focused on raising my family, raising my kids that it wasn't a priority for me.
00;01;02;08 - 00;01;27;02
Maya Demishkevich
And now that I have more time, I can dedicated to sharing and learning from others. So two years ago I actually made a conscious decision to kind of put aside my imposter syndrome, the self-doubt, the fear of judgment, and kind of open myself up to possibilities and approach social media with curiosity. Before that, I always felt like to post on social media.
00;01;27;02 - 00;01;48;10
Maya Demishkevich
You have to be perfect, you know? Yeah. I don't know if you ever felt this way. Yes. Like you have to know everything before you post. But then I realized that, yes, some people have expertise in certain areas, but I also have expertise in other areas where I can share and contribute to the higher ed communities. So I think a lot of people don't know that it's the reason for me.
00;01;48;15 - 00;02;00;17
Maya Demishkevich
And since then I've presented at ten higher ed conferences. I've been featured on multiple podcasts. I was invited to speak at a may, which was like on my bucket list to go.
00;02;01;02 - 00;02;03;04
John Azoni
The Super Bowl of rice.
00;02;03;13 - 00;02;15;14
Maya Demishkevich
It was amazing. And just so many opportunities have opened up because I joined the Higher Ed community on LinkedIn and became more, I guess, more open to sharing.
00;02;15;29 - 00;02;35;18
John Azoni
That's great. I just checked out your link and I'm kind of like my I kind of follow the same path for like a couple of years ago. Got real serious about LinkedIn and been posting every day probably for the past year. Mm hmm. Before that, I was a little more sporadic, but I noticed we have a very similar amount of followers.
00;02;35;18 - 00;02;40;27
John Azoni
So you know, let's get both of us over that 2000 followers.
00;02;40;29 - 00;02;41;18
Maya Demishkevich
Right.
00;02;42;04 - 00;02;43;17
John Azoni
Right. I'm like, Oh.
00;02;44;29 - 00;02;50;12
Maya Demishkevich
I'm not as dedicated as you are. I can't post every day yet, but maybe I'll get to that point.
00;02;51;02 - 00;03;20;11
John Azoni
So I take my strategy is Mondays are my content creation days. Mm hmm. So I usually schedule out my newsletter and I'll take a couple hours and schedule out LinkedIn posts. And usually I'll write like a couple new ones, or I'll go into Riverside and like, pull a clip from a podcast or something like that. And then the rest are honestly just like repurposed from, you know, months ago, just popular posts that just deserve a second chance.
00;03;20;29 - 00;03;21;09
Maya Demishkevich
Right.
00;03;21;21 - 00;03;34;18
John Azoni
Yeah. So it's a mix of repurposing and new, you know, new stuff. So that helps a lot. It helps it, you know, not be like every day trying to like, say, some genius thing from scratch. Mm hmm.
00;03;35;06 - 00;03;56;02
Maya Demishkevich
I mean, you're doing a great job. I enjoy your content. My strategy is a bit more fluid. I post as inspiration strikes. So if I do something that really inspires me or excites me, or if I have an idea, I want to share. So I try not to force LinkedIn on myself and not to stress myself out too much because, you know, I have a lot going on.
00;03;56;22 - 00;03;58;23
Maya Demishkevich
So I enjoy those inspiration moments.
00;03;59;12 - 00;04;18;13
John Azoni
Yes. And on that note of you having a lot going on, you are quite the entrepreneur. And I, I didn't know this about you until we had our pre call. So I wanted to I wanted to just touch on this. Tell me about all of your business ventures.
00;04;18;21 - 00;04;39;13
Maya Demishkevich
Yeah, they're more like side projects, I would say. But, you know, I do have a lot of interests and I think that I enjoy trying new things and I enjoy solving problems. So when I come up with a solution, I am the type of person who learns by doing and I really need to see it through. It's not the idea that's just keeps floating.
00;04;39;13 - 00;05;11;27
Maya Demishkevich
Like I really need to see if it's actually a good solution. So I like to implement those ideas and this mindset kind of over time led me to starting a web marketing consultancy, Wholesome Nibbles, which has begun gluten free food business. Now College Crusader, which helps colleges with social media analytics. And fortunately, my husband is also very entrepreneurial and he manages those businesses on a day to day basis.
00;05;11;27 - 00;05;26;05
Maya Demishkevich
So that allows me to still be creative, you know, support him in growing those ventures, but still have my job in higher ed, which I also enjoy and love. So yeah, that's all a bit about those ventures.
00;05;26;05 - 00;05;48;05
John Azoni
Yeah, that's great. Yeah, I kind of resonate with that because I have a lot of little hobbies and I'll always come up with ideas. I'm like, How can I monetize this? Like, you know, just like I also love solving problems. I was very intrigued by the wholesome nibbles. So tell me, like great tasting, plant based, no sugar added gluten free, vegan raw.
00;05;48;06 - 00;06;12;00
John Azoni
So my wife is gluten free and dairy free. And so any time she finds something that she can eat, that's good. Mm hmm. It gets hidden in a cabinet away from my daughters who will just devour and me. Honestly, I have no self-control. If there's something good to eat in the house, Laura will bring home a box of, like, Honey Nut Cheerios or something like that, and they're gone.
00;06;12;05 - 00;06;26;23
John Azoni
Like, Yeah, Nice try. Nice. Try it. If you wanted to have a bowl of that, you better get in there quick. Mm hmm. But, yeah, she's a big fan of the sort of alternative, you know, health food with food sensitivities and stuff like that. How did that come about for you guys?
00;06;27;01 - 00;06;56;03
Maya Demishkevich
Yeah, well, this one was after giving birth to my second child. I was home for, like, three months, and I realized that now health is more important than ever. Now I'm responsible for two kids, and I want to make sure that they grow up with good, healthy habits and that I stay healthy myself and active. So, you know, I decided to adjust kind of our diet and how what type of food we eat.
00;06;56;14 - 00;07;20;19
Maya Demishkevich
And it was relatively easy to find like grass fed meats and vegetables. But I had a really hard time finding good desserts because usually they have tons of sugar, tons of ingredients that are not real good for you. So I started experimenting, making those small I call them blitz bowls or truffles, using different seeds, nuts. And I loved them.
00;07;20;19 - 00;07;42;08
Maya Demishkevich
My kids loved them, and our friends came to me and they said, Well, those are amazing. You should go and like, try selling them. So I'm like, okay, maybe I should. So I went to a farmer's market. I got a stand and I started selling them and people enjoyed those products. So and then later on we were at meal markets and coffee places, and during COVID, we transitioned to selling completely online.
00;07;42;08 - 00;07;56;27
Maya Demishkevich
So it's all online now, but yeah, so most of my business is and meeting my own needs, you know, I identify what I need and I try to solve my problem and happen so that other people have the same problem very often.
00;07;56;27 - 00;08;16;03
John Azoni
So yeah, well, I think that adds a level of dynamic to your value as a higher ed marketer. I think, you know, when you're also actively, you know, marketing a business outside of higher ed, you're sort of like able to bring a lot of that, you know, stuff to your clients and do you find that to be true?
00;08;16;16 - 00;08;41;26
Maya Demishkevich
Yeah, no, definitely. I feel like I learned so much by doing those businesses from even like doing events at Farmer's Market, you know, doing a great table to nurturing those clients and into making additional purchasing decisions, you know, to nurture email sequence. Yeah, I definitely learned a lot. So it is, I think, helpful in my current role.
00;08;42;19 - 00;09;12;13
John Azoni
Cool. We started talking on LinkedIn when you sent me your social media cost calculator, so that's kind of what we want to, you know, for people listening, I usually introduce what the episode is about, which I didn't do. So we're not here to talk about gluten free, dairy free, wholesome levels. But that's what we got off on because I like to start on a tangent, but we are here to talk about social media cost calculator that you built.
00;09;12;13 - 00;09;37;12
John Azoni
And really just like the theory behind why we would need a calculator, because as I was, I was looking at it and I was like doing, you know, playing with the sliders and things like that and I was like, this is really brilliant because this is forcing me to think about how much time is actually going to take to do a social media effort or something like that.
00;09;37;12 - 00;09;55;00
John Azoni
And I have this one friend who I used to work with and he's very like very analytical and he used to be the producer at the company I worked at. And he used to always drive us nuts because we'd be like, We have a client that's like, Hey, we got this like real simple projects and.
00;09;55;06 - 00;09;56;00
Maya Demishkevich
Simple and quick.
00;09;56;28 - 00;10;11;09
John Azoni
And he would sit there and go, Okay, well, it's going to take 4 hours to do this. It's going to take 8 hours to do this. It's going to it. And like he would map everything out and it would get so, like, complicated. But then and we would you know, we would just be like, I thought it was simple.
00;10;11;09 - 00;10;28;15
John Azoni
Let's just get this out. You know? And he would be like, well, wait a minute. Like, you're going to spend the time doing these things right. You need to actually make sure that we're covering the costs of doing those things. And I always think of that when I'm like really trying to map out like, how much time did something actually take?
00;10;29;03 - 00;10;44;24
John Azoni
You know, it's often more than it's never just a simple thing, like, let's just jump on, you know, let's just jump on Tick Tock or Instagram and just let's just start posting some stuff. So, yeah, I mean, tell me about like, what was the inspiration for the calculator?
00;10;45;13 - 00;11;12;07
Maya Demishkevich
I mean, I think what you just talked about is exactly what I was trying to address. I mean, social media management as a field emerged more than 15 years ago. So it's not new. It's not last year, I mean, relatively new, but still a lot of people think that it's quick and easy and just post the video. And I hear at the lot from faculty and staff, the social media is underestimated in how much time it takes.
00;11;12;07 - 00;11;40;14
Maya Demishkevich
And because it's underestimated, you can't get additional resources because people think it's quick and easy. Right. But social media, I think, is one of the most important communication tools for higher ed institutions to not only increase awareness but also build community and drive retention. And I've seen firsthand at my institution the impact of managing social media as well, and our brand awareness and engagement in our student body.
00;11;41;04 - 00;12;05;25
Maya Demishkevich
But it's very difficult to demonstrate the time commitment it takes and the effort it takes to create something good. So let's take TikTok, for example. You know, how much time does it take to create a video? It's not just taking a camera and going to shoot it. You have to think about what are the trends, what is the message, what is your strategy, what is the script, Who is going to be shooting it?
00;12;05;25 - 00;12;50;11
Maya Demishkevich
I'm going to be inviting students of faculty to participate, editing, selecting music so just one video can take up to 2 hours minimum, right? To do with all the thinking behind it. And people don't realize that. So this cost and time estimator was created to allow social media managers and marketing teams to be able to assess the true effort it requires for them to manage a certain number of platforms at a certain frequency and then leverage this information to advocate for more resources, or maybe to advocate to scale back, to say, Hey, we don't have the resources to add another channel and here's why.
00;12;50;11 - 00;13;08;09
Maya Demishkevich
And I think having this third party tool really adds credibility and value. So that was kind of the reason behind it. And working with community colleges and other institutions, I rarely see colleges have a dedicated social media person.
00;13;09;01 - 00;13;09;18
John Azoni
Mm hmm.
00;13;09;18 - 00;13;49;15
Maya Demishkevich
Very often it is someone who has it part of their responsibilities. And maybe if they're lucky, they can allocate 20% of time to manage social media. So 20% of a full time employee to manage six different channels, for example, which most colleges expect, right? Facebook, TikTok, Instagram, X, LinkedIn, YouTube, maybe. So to cover the basics just in minimum frequency for those channels, you need at least 2000 hours a year, and that 2000 hours equals 1.85 full time employees.
00;13;49;15 - 00;14;13;15
Maya Demishkevich
And if you only have 20% of one person, that's 200 hours. So your institution is only able to cover 10% of what you need to cover. And you have a gap of 90% that you are not able to cover. So what happens in scenarios like this, people usually take the same content and post it on all the channels, and it's not their fault.
00;14;13;15 - 00;14;45;09
Maya Demishkevich
It's just humanly impossible to create custom tailored content for different channels for different audiences at 200 hours a year, right? So by estimating your time, not only it gives you a realistic picture of your resources, but you can also start thinking about how can I augment it? Where can I maybe get help? Maybe you think about adding student ambassadors, maybe you think about including faculty and staff.
00;14;45;19 - 00;15;08;12
Maya Demishkevich
Maybe you started developing your own ambassadors, had other departments to help contribute to your social media efforts. So having I think quantitative data is really helpful. Instead of saying, well, it takes a lot of time, you know, so be more specific. And then I also when I developed this tool, I found it useful, but I also send it to generally.
00;15;08;12 - 00;15;10;02
Maya Demishkevich
Fowler I think, you know.
00;15;10;02 - 00;15;10;29
John Azoni
Hirsch Yeah.
00;15;11;21 - 00;15;37;06
Maya Demishkevich
She's the author of Organic Social Media, and she liked it and she found value in this. And I ran my assumptions by her just to make sure that, you know, I'm not missing something. And I posted those assumptions. So when you go to the calculator, you can see assumption and what time I allocated to different channels and different tactics so I can be more transparent and you know, what are the inputs I use.
00;15;37;06 - 00;15;39;24
Maya Demishkevich
So that's kind of the idea behind this calculator.
00;15;40;12 - 00;16;03;25
John Azoni
Yeah. Jenny Lee Fowler Is she on social media at MIT? Right, Right. And then she also wrote, yeah, organic social media, great book on social media and systems and creating systems and things like that. And that's the other thing too is like when we think about getting on a platform, we're thinking about the time it takes to like, let's say, hit record or type of the post out and hit post.
00;16;03;25 - 00;16;32;00
John Azoni
But we're not thinking about all of the systems now. You've inherited all of these problems or, you know, not problems, but like you've inherited hurdles now that you need to figure out. So like, how are you going to govern? Like, what's your governance going to be like? What are the boundaries going to be for? What type of content, What legal things are you going to run into when you're on, You know, Instagram and TikTok, They're using all these like popular songs and copyrighted things.
00;16;32;00 - 00;16;43;25
John Azoni
And where is the line now between a commercial use and a personal use? And, you know, there's all this small stuff that you've got to start figuring out that just actually just posting the thing.
00;16;43;25 - 00;17;07;20
Maya Demishkevich
Yeah. And I would add crisis management is one of those other things that's social media now dealing with community engagement, responding to all the comments, to all the inquiries. It's a lot of time outside of just posting and I did allocate this time in my calculator, so I subtracted time from meetings, time for social media management from the time to actually create.
00;17;07;20 - 00;17;16;09
Maya Demishkevich
So what you see in the calculator is the time you need to just create without approvals or meetings, etc..
00;17;16;09 - 00;17;34;27
John Azoni
Yeah, cool. I like that. And you know, as a business owner it is, it does take a lot of time and I'm mostly just active on LinkedIn, but even just like you're right, even just like the time it takes to stay on top of comments and things like that because I'll post something and then I'll go start editing some video or like I'll just go do something.
00;17;34;27 - 00;17;59;07
John Azoni
And I'm like, Oh shoot, I got to like, I got to keep the algorithm fed here. I got to respond to the comments and things like that. It can get stressful and, you know, yeah, I mean, that's a small portion of the time that I spend, you know, in my business. So it's all these platforms are so nuanced to like, I find because I kind of take a lazy approach to short form video, you know, to be fully transparent.
00;17;59;07 - 00;18;17;15
John Azoni
I will post a snippet from the podcast and I'll just blast it to YouTube, TikTok and Instagram reels all at the same time. So I don't really I know that the best practice would be to customize everything. I just know that I don't have time, right, to keep that up. So I'm like, Well, get it out there. It's better than nothing.
00;18;17;15 - 00;18;43;17
John Azoni
But I do notice that, like, it's so different between Instagram, YouTube shorts and TikTok, like what takes off and what doesn't. The same video could have drastically different results depending on the platform because the algorithms are different and I haven't taken the time to like really understand what's going in to all that. But like someone that is, you know, doing social media, you know, management should know that stuff.
00;18;43;17 - 00;18;45;28
John Azoni
And that is constantly changing.
00;18;46;13 - 00;19;00;18
Maya Demishkevich
Right? So you are a great example of a full time employee who has social media is just one of the responsibilities. Maybe you allocate 5% of your time. Obviously you can spend it researching and understanding the nuances, right?
00;19;01;04 - 00;19;24;02
John Azoni
So yeah, my research is actually I mean, it dovetails with my personal interest because I'm like always on TikTok and scrolling funny stuff. So I'll naturally get some higher ed stuff in my feed. I'll be like, Oh, that's a good idea and I'll set myself and hmm, but yeah. So based on your experience, what do you think are some of the biggest inefficiencies in how higher Ed handles content creation?
00;19;24;28 - 00;19;45;26
Maya Demishkevich
In terms of inefficiencies, I would say very often they focus on creating one piece of content instead of taking a step back and thinking, okay, we have this topic, we have this subject, how can we scale it across multiple platforms? One video is not going to go anywhere, right? You posted. People see it once and it's gone from your feed.
00;19;45;27 - 00;19;56;18
Maya Demishkevich
So you need to think about multiple pieces of content from one effort. And I think it's a hard adjustment for many institutions to make. So that's in a way inefficient.
00;19;57;06 - 00;20;14;01
John Azoni
Yeah, that's true. And it really makes a difference when you stick with a piece of content. And I find that that's very hard for a lot of organizations that I've noticed to put a lot of effort into one long form piece of content, video or a blog post or something like that. And they say all right, we did that under the next thing.
00;20;14;01 - 00;20;38;01
John Azoni
But it's like, Oh, wait a minute. Like, there's so much that you can do to spread the reach of that, like breaking it up into different things, smaller posts, different breakout videos. I mean, for example, we just released 100 interview questions like better interview questions than your standard sort of status quo. You know, that you would ask a student and I was talking to my business coach who helps me with a lot of content marketing.
00;20;38;01 - 00;20;58;17
John Azoni
She's like, You can make one YouTube short for each one of those questions. Yeah, you know, and just expand on it and like, but for me, I'm kind of like, All right, I did it 100, 100 questions. We figure it out. We got it out there. What's next? Yeah, So it's like really like sticking with a piece of content and really milking it for all you can.
00;20;58;21 - 00;21;03;03
John Azoni
But that, yeah, that takes a lot of time, but it is a better use of resources.
00;21;03;25 - 00;21;23;19
Maya Demishkevich
Yeah. So one thing we started doing is faculty and staff and student interviews. So we usually would invite a faculty, let's say for an hour, we'll set up the video shoot, they'll ask them 20 questions, and it could be a variety of questions for LinkedIn. It could be about why. Carrel It's a great place to work for Instagram.
00;21;23;19 - 00;21;46;02
Maya Demishkevich
We could ask him a question about who did you want to be when you were growing up. So Facebook it could be something else. So we would make sure we asked the right questions so we can repurpose this content on different platforms and still make it interesting to different audiences. And then take this content, create an article about this particular faculty member or a project they're working on.
00;21;46;12 - 00;22;09;23
Maya Demishkevich
Take this information and turn it into a LinkedIn carousel. So just thinking about how can you take this one hour of person's time and turn it into a lot of different assets that you can use throughout the year? Obviously, you wouldn't want to post them all at once, right? You can use them on an ongoing basis, like you probably do a lot of this for your clients where you build the library of assets.
00;22;10;01 - 00;22;22;15
Maya Demishkevich
So that's the same, the same idea. And this way people don't feel like they're giving us too much time because it's just one hour. Yeah, right. And we take the heavy lift on creation.
00;22;23;00 - 00;22;54;05
John Azoni
Right? And I find that the not enough organizations higher ed and non higher ed included really understand distribution and really are working backwards from there in their content creation. I don't think I've really ever come across a client that was like, Hey, we need a video. And then when I ask them, where is this going to live, they gave me a really concrete answer about the, you know, the platform this is going to go on and the messaging structure for that platform for this student to see.
00;22;54;13 - 00;23;16;03
John Azoni
Like, I can't think of one client in 15 years that had a distribution plan. By the time they were like, we're ready to make this video. So a lot of our work is getting them to slow down. And because when you do, we worked with the school recently where we looked at all of their email comms flows like, for example, for admitted students.
00;23;16;03 - 00;23;51;05
John Azoni
And the goal was like, how can we use video to increase yield? And we found all kinds of opportunities to replace blocks of text in those emails with a short video and that informed, like all the questions that we were going to ask these two students that we were going to interview, you know, for this purpose. So we ended up with a list of like 15 different little topical videos that we can just get out of the interview that weren't even part of the story that we're telling is just like, Hey, let's just take 20 minutes, you know, to get a bunch of these, you know, FAQs answered while you're sitting here, right?
00;23;51;05 - 00;24;08;19
John Azoni
And it had we not understood, you know, the opportunities in these communication touchpoints, we probably would have just gone in there. But like, what's your story? What are you like what's you know, like we would have gone for the story and like, what's interesting, But, you know, you have such an opportunity when you have a student that's giving you an hour of their time.
00;24;09;00 - 00;24;13;14
John Azoni
Yeah. To get a full funnel, you know, content collection. Mm hmm.
00;24;13;27 - 00;24;19;11
Maya Demishkevich
I was looking at my desk because I had this whole chart for the distribution I wanted to show you, but I can't find it.
00;24;19;17 - 00;24;22;10
John Azoni
Oh, I'm sure it's brilliant.
00;24;22;10 - 00;24;35;12
Maya Demishkevich
Really hard on trying to figure this out because we are building out workflows in our project management system to make sure we get all the pieces created and distributed in the right way. So it's a big undertaking.
00;24;35;27 - 00;24;57;25
John Azoni
Yeah, it really is. And to me it's like one of the more fun things. I feel like every six months or so I have a new whiteboard of a, you know, just laying out like distribution and top of funnel and, you know, all this stuff. That's fun for me, but it's not fun for everybody, Right? Right. So tell me about what's your relationship with Carroll Community College?
00;24;57;25 - 00;24;59;01
John Azoni
How did you get connected with them?
00;24;59;12 - 00;25;21;03
Maya Demishkevich
I'm full time at Carol, and like I said, I do help other colleges as well. I do a lot of presentations. I do a lot of podcasts, and I do encourage people to invest in social media. And I show them how to measure it the right way. Because what I found is institutions are more likely to invest if they know that it has an impact and it's tied to their strategic goals.
00;25;21;12 - 00;25;53;02
Maya Demishkevich
So how do you ties social media to strategic goals? It's not just of use and engagement, right? You have to take it to the next level and figure out how can you measure it to demonstrate this impact? And I think that's another missing piece that many colleges have. They just don't have the time to measure it, just to give an example, I think it was about two years ago, we do post a lot of content for current students on our Instagram because it's one of the channels that our students follow the most and enjoy receiving content that way.
00;25;53;14 - 00;26;27;25
Maya Demishkevich
And one of the campaigns we had was about promoting academic services at our institution, because we know if students are doing good in classes, they're more likely to retain. And since we have the tutoring services, why not help them do better, right? So we want to have more students use the services. So we post a lot of entertaining content, fun reels on Instagram and we saw a jump in the number of students using the services, but people were doubting, Did the Instagram really have an impact on the number of students going to the tutoring center?
00;26;28;10 - 00;26;46;13
Maya Demishkevich
So what I did is I got a list at the end of the semester of all the students who used the services, and they sent them a survey and the survey asked them, Do you follow us on social media? If you do, which channel do you follow us on? Have you seen the content about tutoring on our Instagram?
00;26;46;27 - 00;27;18;16
Maya Demishkevich
Did it help you to encourage you to use the services? And the results were great. So from those who responded, 82% said that they have seen the posts and stories on our Instagram, 98% that they found this informative, 81% said that social media influenced their decision to utilize academic support services, and 96% believe that social media increased their awareness and accessibility of student services.
00;27;18;29 - 00;27;42;21
Maya Demishkevich
So this is huge, right? So they are seeing it, they like it, and they are taking action and actually going to get the help at the tutoring center, which translates to them doing better in classes, which translates to retention. And then you can show, okay, social media has an impact on your retention strategy and your strategic plan and the challenges.
00;27;43;06 - 00;27;55;02
Maya Demishkevich
Many departments don't have the time to do this type of research, but really you only have to do it once. You do it once you show the impact, and then it helps them see social media in a different way, you know?
00;27;55;11 - 00;28;21;10
John Azoni
Yeah, for sure. Do you have any I know this is an issue that comes up for a lot of schools is like, how do we balance the internal content, like letting current students know about events and resources available to them With the external facing content, it's like, do you have separate account like channels or like, I don't know, how do you guys manage that at Caral and what are your thoughts about that?
00;28;22;11 - 00;28;47;00
Maya Demishkevich
So we have a student engagement account that is more specific for current students who are already at the college, but on Instagram College, its flagship account, we do a mix of entertaining, fun, informative content that might appeal to prospective and current students. So a prospective student, seeing that we have tutoring services, might be helpful for them to make a decision to enroll.
00;28;47;00 - 00;29;01;01
Maya Demishkevich
To say, Well, makes me feel more comfortable. They have the services I need to succeed at the institution. The current student will see it and say, Well, I didn't know they had this. Maybe I should go and use it since it's free for sure. So it's a mix.
00;29;01;26 - 00;29;23;12
John Azoni
Yeah, I like that. You know, you can only create so many accounts. You know, I think there's value in, you know, creating a separate account that's like really strategically for current students. But at a certain point too, yeah, it's like a lot of the stuff that you post internally, the prospective students are going to see a window inside of what's really going on at the institution, and that's probably going to be persuasive to them.
00;29;23;22 - 00;29;53;05
Maya Demishkevich
And speaking of new accounts, another thing we didn't mention is many institutions have dozens of different accounts that social media need to monitor right? Athletics might have an account theory, department might have an account, and social media manager needs to be aware of what's happening. Are they still active? Are they still posting and very often we get requests from faculty and staff to say, Hey, I want to start my own Instagram account for my automotive program.
00;29;53;05 - 00;30;09;25
Maya Demishkevich
You know, we get those all the time. So what I'm seeing, people are using this calculator to have them take a look at how much time it will take for them to post on a certain channel. And then they say, Do you have the time to allocate to manage this account and to have it grow and be successful?
00;30;10;07 - 00;30;20;17
Maya Demishkevich
And very often the answer is no. Like what's the actually see the number? So that helps. You also manage new accounts and prevent them from opening.
00;30;22;08 - 00;30;25;12
John Azoni
Yeah, because you don't want a bunch of dead accounts. All right.
00;30;25;19 - 00;30;40;22
Maya Demishkevich
Right. But if you're really dedicated and you say yes, then we'll support you. Usually what we do is we ask you to create some content for our flagship accounts so we can test it and see that you can maintain the frequency. And if you can, then yes, let's go ahead and open the account.
00;30;41;09 - 00;30;59;29
John Azoni
That's cool. I like that. And that's a great use for the calculator too. Yeah, because that can get messy with a lot of people. A lot of different departments starting their own accounts, the posts a few times and then it's just a ghost town from there. And then you just have this like sort of landfill of accounts, right?
00;30;59;29 - 00;31;05;06
John Azoni
That sends the wrong message that the school isn't actually active, you know?
00;31;05;06 - 00;31;37;20
Maya Demishkevich
Yeah, Yeah, exactly. And then it takes time to deactivate it to find the order, you know, all of that. Another good use case would be a new platform comes along and your manager says we should be on this platform. A senior leader heard that this is growing and very important. So the calculator helps you estimate the time and shift the conversation from can we be on this platform to do we have the resources to be on this platform and that helps you make a more strategic decision with your resource allocation?
00;31;38;05 - 00;32;01;21
John Azoni
Yeah, I think embracing new platforms, in my opinion, needs to come down to like what percentage of time can you allocate to experiments? Mm hmm. Because everyone looks back and goes, Man, if we were just on Tik Tok in 2020, I mean, our school would be, you know, enrolling like Harvard numbers here, you know, because you think like, wow, we missed the wave, you know, And that's the fear of missing out.
00;32;01;21 - 00;32;21;23
John Azoni
And but I think you have to just like, put it in its proper place of saying a lot of social media hype around new platforms comes and goes like threads. Threads was the thing I hate, like clicking on something interesting in my Instagram feed and it's like, Oh, you have to sign into your threads account. I'm like, I don't want to.
00;32;21;23 - 00;32;39;06
John Azoni
I just wanted to see it in Instagram. Like I'm not interested in threads. I posted a few things on there, but yeah, I like to encourage people with like if you have time to experiment in a new platform, go for it. Like, hmm, yeah, I mean, get on the early wave and you know, what's the one that's.
00;32;40;03 - 00;32;40;25
Maya Demishkevich
The blue sky?
00;32;41;00 - 00;32;52;02
John Azoni
Blue sky? Mm hmm. Yes, I see some higher ed folks moving over there, and I've considered getting over there, too, but I'm kind of just like I. I'll probably just not not be able to keep up with it. But.
00;32;52;20 - 00;33;09;22
Maya Demishkevich
I mean, I think that's a smart strategy for someone who doesn't have a lot of time to dedicate to social media. Pick one channel in your case, LinkedIn. In my case, LinkedIn. Don't spread yourself thin. It's better to be effective and good on one platform than to try to be mediocre everywhere else.
00;33;10;06 - 00;33;21;18
John Azoni
Yeah, absolutely. And a lot of the same people are on both platforms anyway. Yeah. You know, so it's not like someone is necessarily fairly Tik Tok exclusive.
00;33;21;28 - 00;33;36;04
Maya Demishkevich
Right? And people just check cross-platform. If somebody sees good content on Tik Tok, they might be shared on Instagram. So the goal is to create great valuable content that people want to share regardless of the platform.
00;33;36;27 - 00;33;49;03
John Azoni
Absolutely. So I want to ask you to tell us about the college Crusader platform I thought was just an interesting concept of providing community colleges with ready made social media content. So tell us about that.
00;33;50;01 - 00;34;16;28
Maya Demishkevich
So one of the challenges I found is community colleges are understaffed. They're funded, especially marketing departments. So while social media is extremely important, they're not able to keep up with it because of the time required to manage it. So since all community colleges are very similar, we serve a specific area, just, you know, one county. And very often we're not competing with each other.
00;34;16;28 - 00;34;50;18
Maya Demishkevich
We have similar programs and services and we are serving the same audiences. So why would we create content if you could create it once and use managed science? Yeah, so that was kind of the idea behind it is what if I create the content for different platforms? I create reels and tic tac scripts that colleges can just purchase and tailored to their institution, but they would have a calendar of content available so they wouldn't have to think about trends.
00;34;50;18 - 00;35;08;02
Maya Demishkevich
They wouldn't have to think about what should we say to a particular audience in this particular month. It will simplify the decision making process and make their job easier, and it's very cost effective compared to hiring a new person or outsourcing. So that was the idea behind it.
00;35;08;08 - 00;35;19;16
John Azoni
It's so brilliant. I just think it's very brilliant. How do you manage it? So like if it's a different brand, you know, is there putting in a different logo or like how do you manage across different brands?
00;35;19;28 - 00;35;41;22
Maya Demishkevich
So let's say you have multiple colleges in different counties, so they could use the content they may change and they highlight some of the names or department names that might be unique to them. So they can change the name of the program, they can change the name of the mascot if they have one, but then they use their own visual assets.
00;35;41;22 - 00;36;09;09
Maya Demishkevich
So they would upload a photo of their institution. They would use their faculty and staff and students to record the videos. They would use their own videos for content, so it would still look like them. But the captions the scripts that they might be using are more standardized, but they can tailor them to their own institution. And they would get a lot of different scripts so they can pick and choose what makes sense so they don't have to use them all.
00;36;09;09 - 00;36;16;11
Maya Demishkevich
They don't have to post on the same days that I suggest. So it's very fluid, but it's almost like a good foundation.
00;36;16;11 - 00;36;32;16
John Azoni
Yeah, it's brilliant because if you're going to get honest and you're going to go on this calculator that you built and you're going to see, you're probably going to see that it's going to take whatever you're trying to do is going to take more time than you thought. I mean, doing something, doing something is better than just deciding to do nothing.
00;36;32;16 - 00;36;50;08
John Azoni
I mean, like social media isn't really optional, you know, in higher ed. So I just love that you've solved that problem and just made it easy for people because I think that's where so much of the mental load comes in is like, What do I post? How do I do this? What are the trends Like, What should we say?
00;36;50;18 - 00;36;52;04
John Azoni
Mm hmm. Yeah, that's brilliant.
00;36;52;20 - 00;36;55;29
Maya Demishkevich
Thank you.
00;36;55;29 - 00;37;04;21
John Azoni
All right, let's see. Winded down here. So if a school is just starting to get serious about social media, what's the first thing that they should focus on?
00;37;04;21 - 00;37;06;10
Maya Demishkevich
They should go to the calculator.
00;37;06;28 - 00;37;08;26
John Azoni
Yes. No, seriously.
00;37;09;18 - 00;37;36;00
Maya Demishkevich
No. They really should figure out what their goals are and how those align with their strategic plan and then kind of go backwards and see what resources they need to meet those specific goals, how much time it will take, what current resources they have in house, how can they supplement. So I do encourage colleges working with students. I think social media ambassadors are a must have for any higher ed institution.
00;37;36;11 - 00;37;56;28
Maya Demishkevich
I know it does take time to manage them and train them and I do have some resources for that as well. But it will add authenticity. It will help you make stronger connections with your audiences. It will elevate your whole brand because now they are speaking to your students, not the brand, you know, and they like to hear from real people.
00;37;57;16 - 00;38;27;16
Maya Demishkevich
Work with your faculty and staff, train them to be your ambassadors on social media. I do think that with so many as that we are seeing right now, with all the clutter, it's becoming more and more important for higher ed institutions to break through and people are more likely to listen to people they know and trust. So, for example, if I see your post about a video and I know you, I'm more likely to engage with your content versus an ad I see on LinkedIn.
00;38;27;18 - 00;38;51;13
Maya Demishkevich
Right? The same idea applies to colleges. If you see an academic advisor posting Instagram about deadlines, financial aid information, and then you come into the college and you see that person, you're already familiar with them and you almost feel like you know them and you're more likely to develop those stronger relationships that will help you stay at the institution and start building those connections.
00;38;51;21 - 00;39;16;25
Maya Demishkevich
So really looking to employ advocacy program student ambassador program to supplement your internal resources that you have because they are limited and you want to think outside of your flagship accounts and think about think broader. How can your employees and influencers help you reach new audiences and grow your social media even beyond your flagship account?
00;39;17;15 - 00;39;42;09
John Azoni
Yeah, that's super smart too. Yeah, I think we think about social media as just the flagship accounts, but it's a whole culture, right? And I would think, and I've never really tried to address that, you know, I've never really been in the position to. But I would think that that's a tough problem to solve, to get employees to embrace their own brands or to like their personal brand connected with the institution.
00;39;42;09 - 00;40;00;29
John Azoni
I know when I was at I worked at United Way, a nonprofit fresh out of college, and Twitter had just come out. And so, you know, our marketing person there was trying to get all the employees on Twitter, and I was super into it. Like I was like trying to be a social media like manager or whatever for, you know, I love it.
00;40;00;29 - 00;40;26;24
John Azoni
So you didn't have to ask me. But, but like, I remember the grumbling of like some of the older generations of like, I don't want to post anything. Like, it's just like, I don't get it. I don't care. Mm hmm. I mean, have you seen there be any ways of getting, you know, or is it just like you just focus on the ones that the employees that care to do it or, like, have an existing, like, passion for.
00;40;26;24 - 00;41;03;20
Maya Demishkevich
It? Yeah. We at my college, we actually started an employee advocacy program two years ago, and it's a voluntarily training program where we invite faculty and staff who are interested in building their personal brand on LinkedIn and we train them on how to do it. It's about three days, two and a half hours each session, and we start with identifying their values, tying those values to the institution, defining content pillars for each individual, training them on how to create content for different pillars, figure out what is it that they want to be known for, who is their target audience.
00;41;03;20 - 00;41;29;00
Maya Demishkevich
So doing all the steps that you would do when you do marketing right, and they find it extremely insightful and helpful, some choose to continue and actually start posting, and we explain that by being active on social media. Yes, you open up many doors for you professionally. Maybe someone wants to coauthor a research with you or invite you to a conference, or even just learn from others.
00;41;29;00 - 00;41;57;03
Maya Demishkevich
It's a huge opportunity to be present on social media, but also it reflects well on our institution because we do want to attract the best talent we can. And when new prospective employees see active, happy employees on social media sharing about institution, they're like, Well, maybe they got something there. You know, maybe I should join them. So it's a great win win opportunity.
00;41;57;09 - 00;42;25;14
Maya Demishkevich
But yes, it's not right for everyone. And we do hear faculty and staff, you know, sound like, well, I don't want to be overly promotional. I don't want to be talking about myself. I feel weird. So we coach them on how to say it in a way that makes them feel comfortable and they don't feel like they are promoting themselves, but they speak from their experience that reflects well on them and the institution at the same time.
00;42;25;14 - 00;42;47;23
Maya Demishkevich
So this program has been going on for two years and some people choose to post, some people choose not to, wants to take a training. It's completely voluntarily. But I do know that people I see the difference. At the last board of trustees meeting, my supervisor came back and she said, Well, why don't the board of trustees said, Wow, you guys are doing a great job on LinkedIn.
00;42;47;23 - 00;43;05;12
Maya Demishkevich
I'm seeing more employees posting and sharing information and that that makes me feel so good, like they're noticing the impact. And of course, all of those employees have their own influence, their own network, their own connections. So it really helps build that digital virtual community.
00;43;05;27 - 00;43;12;05
John Azoni
Yeah, awesome. Love it. Well, it's been great having you, Maya. Where can people connect with you at?
00;43;12;24 - 00;43;18;13
Maya Demishkevich
LinkedIn is the best way. Let's get those 2000 followers.
00;43;18;13 - 00;43;22;03
John Azoni
We'll have a race. Who? Just get it.
00;43;22;28 - 00;43;23;21
Maya Demishkevich
Okay, let's do it.
00;43;23;28 - 00;43;36;04
John Azoni
Yeah. Who can be the quickest over the 2000 follower? Mark? No, Go follow Maya on LinkedIn for sure. And if someone is like, you know, gluten free, dairy free, or something like that, where where can they buy wholesome nibbles at?
00;43;36;16 - 00;43;39;02
Maya Demishkevich
It's wholesome nibbles that come.
00;43;39;14 - 00;43;40;16
John Azoni
I'm going there right now.
00;43;40;26 - 00;43;53;04
Maya Demishkevich
And if you guys want to check out the calculator, I'm sure you will add it in the show notes. But yes, my college crusader that come forward slash social media dash calculator.
00;43;53;15 - 00;43;53;27
John Azoni
Okay.
00;43;54;20 - 00;43;57;14
Maya Demishkevich
Create a short URL.
00;43;57;14 - 00;44;06;05
John Azoni
Yeah, we'll put the link in the description and yeah, this is great. Super, super loved having you and hearing all your wisdom. So thanks for coming on the show.
00;44;06;05 - 00;44;06;25
Maya Demishkevich
Thanks, John.
