The quickest way to my heart is through a good Q&A.
That means I kind of “heart” Erica Moss.
She is a Michigander-turned-New Yorker who is the community manager for Georgetown University’s Master of Science in Nursing program.
But when she’s not leading that community, she’s interviewing people on her blog. I suppose it’s the journalist in her that continues to seek out interesting people to talk to. The requirements to be featured are strict: you have to be cool and have the ability to answer ten questions. She’s highlighted some people who are, indeed, cool, and can answer a question.
Oh, and when she’s not doing that, she runs a feature on the Western Michigan University alumni page called “MyWMU Minute” where she interviews alumni who have gone on to do great things in life.
Needless to say, she’s pretty busy.
I decided to flip the tables and interview her. We’ll discuss what it was like going to the dark side, why PR people made her feel small, and why there’s no way to compare Michigan to NYC.
Brad: You are a former journalist. When PR people pitched you stories, did it matter if they had a compelling story to tell? Or were you only concerned with how it fit into your beat?
Erica: Perhaps it was because I was never considered a “seasoned” or “veteran” reporter, but I, honestly, can’t point to one pitch that ever truly wowed me. I think PR has evolved a lot, even since then, and is much more personable than it ever was, but I rarely received anything that didn’t make it blatantly obvious I was on a big list of contacts.
As a reporter, it’s always important to keep your beat in mind when reading pitches and press releases, but even if it wasn’t directly related to me, if it was well-written and I thought there was a true story to tell, I’d take the time to forward it to a more appropriate colleague. Non-tailored, generic outreach usually means you’re dead in the water.
When you moved from journalism to PR, how did your impression of us change?
The switch from journalism to PR was an interesting one for me because, to be quite honest, when you’re in J-school, public relations is often viewed as the “dark side.” I still had a lot of misconceptions about what it was: Was I going to have to bend the truth to help position my client in the best light? Was I going to have to badger reporters until they finally gave in to writing a story, just to make me go away? Would I even get to do much writing anymore?
Of course, the more I entrenched myself in the role, the more I realized how important public relations really is. Just as when I was wearing my journalist cap, I was meeting fascinating people and helping them share their stories with the world.
I never viewed PR pros as malicious or ill intentioned, but it was hard to ignore the ones who don’t always give the field a good name, either by being less-than-honest or overly aggressive in their approaches. Once I switched sides, I gained a whole new appreciation for what they do, however, and finally understood how integral they are in helping to shine a spotlight on the stories we read and see on the TV every single day.
You’re now the community manager for Georgetown University’s online masters in nursing program. I’ve heard of entire schools having community managers, but never specific programs. I assume it’s done, in part, to boost enrollment. Does it seem to be working? Do you think this is a trend?
Bottom line: We’re an online master’s degree program that boasts a state-of-the-art learning management system aimed at fundamentally disrupting higher education. If we didn’t place a large emphasis on building relationships online, people would probably start to question our credibility. Each of our partner programs are so unique that there’s no way one person could manage it successfully.
Our current and potential students are no different than a customer at Zappos: They expect us to be where they are and have their questions answered by a human being and in a timely manner, whether that’s on Twitter or a forum on AllNurses.com. Because a lot of our students find us through search, we also appreciate the value of a solid SEO strategy, which is completely integrated into our social media efforts.
We seem to be leading the charge in terms of this strategy, so I haven’t seen a lot of other schools executing it successfully, but I think you’ll absolutely start to see others having that a-ha moment. It’s so imperative to have someone on your team that has his or her finger on the pulse of your target audience, who knows how to speak to them in a real, authentic way, and who can also point to analytics that back up their efforts.
What are some of the digital tools you use to increase the school’s community?
Health care is a challenging vertical, but I’ve taken the approach of going where our community is, as opposed to trying to build something and asking them to come to it. There is a fairly healthy group of registered nurses who are active on Reddit, believe it or not, which was totally unexpected, but a great case study for how important it is to listen and learn before you jump in.
Facebook is our most vibrant community, by far, with almost 2,900 fans. We use it as a way to talk about new program offerings, trends in nursing and health care, and also to ask questions. It’s fun to discover passion points from our fans, even if it’s something as simple as pens (Nurses really have a point of view about them!) We’ve also hosted several chats in conjunction with NurseTogether.com that allow us to talk in real time with people who are interested in our program and share some of our personality with them.
It doesn’t matter where we are, though — it’s all about positioning ourselves as a helpful resource as opposed to a megaphone that wants to sell you on an advanced degree.
When you’re not handling that community, you’re the question-asker behind the “MyWMU Minute.” Getting alumni to talk about how they got to where they are is, in my opinion, a great way to instill confidence in others who are following the same path. How did you get involved in this project?
You’d be hard-pressed to find a more hard-core Bronco (except maybe Beth Kostecki), and I think a lot of schools struggle with how to tell the individual stories within their alumni base. You hear about the high-profile stuff (Oprah’s all-time favorite guest was a WMU alumna), but I knew of so many people in my own personal alum network that were doing cool things, too, and I wanted to give them a platform to shine.
I still have great relationships with many faculty members, so I reached out to the owner of the school’s MyWMU blog to gauge her interest in an ongoing series like the “MyWMU Minute.” She was more than excited, and soon I began sending her the Q&As from my network. I’ve been told the feedback from other faculty members has been overwhelmingly positive, and I appreciate the opportunity to give back to my alma mater, even in a small way.
Finally, the random question: What’s the best part about living in New York City that you didn’t expect when you moved there from Michigan?
It’s important — and obvious — to note that Michigan and New York City are polar opposites of one another. But I was in a sink-or-swim situation, and I opted to make the best of it, and there are, of course, a lot of perks to living here. The best: at any given time being 20 minutes away from some of the coolest landmarks in the world. In one day, I could visit the State of Liberty, stand in the middle of Times Square and visit the Metropolitan Museum of Art — and still have time to visit the Empire State Building.
And I’d be remiss if I didn’t mention the food — there are more five-star restaurants than you can shake a stick at, and I’ve had some of the best meals of my life here. The bottom line, however, is that I’ve got mad Mitten love, and Michigan will always be my No. 1.
***
There you have it, folks. Six questions with Erica Moss that capture the very essence of her existence. I very much appreciate her taking the time to do this.
If you liked this interview, you’ll love the rest of the interviews in this series.
