00;00;00;09 - 00;00;23;13
John Azoni
Well, geez, this episode took some effort to bring this one to you because this is actually take two. So we recorded this episode with Brant and Patrick several weeks ago and great conversation. Got to the end of it and you know, we're waiting for all the cameras to upload whatever the do the stuff that Riverside requires. And for some reason Brent's camera's not uploading.
00;00;23;22 - 00;00;50;05
John Azoni
And I'm like, Oh, it's probably fine, it's there. Long story short, Riverside lost the entire episode. So we had to get Brett and Patrick back on the show to have another conversation. And so I very much appreciate them coming back To rerecord. And actually the second conversation is quite good compared to the first one. But we are talking about University of Maine's video series called Life in the Pines and it is really cool.
00;00;50;05 - 00;01;15;03
John Azoni
I stumbled upon this video series and thought it just felt like very fresh and it was just like a new way of telling program overviews of students stories, student perspective, that kind of thing. So if you get a chance, go to you. Maine's YouTube channel. Check out the series. Really cool would be great to have that context going into this episode, but if not, we're going to try and explain the episodes for you if you're just listening.
00;01;15;08 - 00;01;41;13
John Azoni
So in this episode we talk about the series, how it came about, how it fits into their marketing enrollment strategies. We talk about what success looks like for the series, and we talk about how the series helped them get students to raise their hand and say they wanted to be part of this and they wanted to be filmed themselves, which is a big barrier for schools, is trying to find students to be in these videos, you know, to be in videos in general.
00;01;41;19 - 00;01;57;00
John Azoni
And we also take you behind the scenes of how the production went down and how they achieved the look and the feel that they're going for and why. So all of that makes for a great episode. Hope you love it. Here's my conversation with Brant Borer and Patrick Wine. All right, Brant and Patrick, welcome to the show.
00;01;57;11 - 00;01;58;03
Brenn Borror
Thanks for having us.
00;01;58;18 - 00;02;25;02
John Azoni
Well, we are back again. You know, full disclosure, we recorded this episode a couple of weeks ago and four people are listening and Riverside just crapped the bed. And I was really excited coming off of that interview. Like that was just everything I wanted it to be. And then I like, went to go download all the cameras and I had none of Brennan's camera and 8 seconds of Patrick's camera and no audio from anyone except for me.
00;02;25;02 - 00;02;28;10
John Azoni
So all you could hear is me going, Huh?
00;02;28;28 - 00;02;31;09
Patrick Wine
Honestly, that would survive so well as a meme right now.
00;02;31;09 - 00;02;50;22
John Azoni
So yeah. Yeah. So these guys have graciously come back. So if you, you know, just wanted to give you that context in case I'm sure something someone at some point will be like, as we said a couple of weeks ago, you know, blah, blah, blah. So anyway, but we're talking about University of Maine's YouTube channel, specifically their life in the Pine Series.
00;02;50;22 - 00;03;18;05
John Azoni
And I think I came across Umaine through doing a Claude Search for schools that have like really active YouTube channels and that are doing good stuff because I was researching for a different episode and Umaine was on there and that's how I discovered Life of Pine. So whatever you guys are doing is, is working for the I. So it's good to hear a whole whole other episode about what you're doing for the Geo or Geo, wherever it's called.
00;03;18;16 - 00;03;35;13
John Azoni
But anyways, I'll let you guys describe the life of Pine series for people who haven't seen it. And then just, you know, this is one of those episodes where it would be helpful if everyone had watched the videos before they before they left. But most people are just listening. So we'll do our best to just kind of like describe what they are for the listeners.
00;03;35;13 - 00;03;57;12
Brenn Borror
Yeah, absolutely. So Life in the Pines at its core is really a student story series. So we are featuring various students, predominantly undergraduate students, but the way we try to position this in a more unique way or a way that feels like the University of Maine is to really try to produce it in a way that feels kind of unfiltered and right.
00;03;57;12 - 00;04;31;22
Brenn Borror
So like we're not telling the students what to say. We're not asking them canned questions. We're really trying to get them to share their personal stories and kind of the highlights of their time at Umaine in a way that feels personal and authentic as possible. So these stories don't just kind of connect with their academic life, but we're also trying to showcase the things that they do outside of the classroom, whether it be like intramural sports or, you know, a research opportunity that they have or like the favorite thing that they like to do in Maine if they're like going hiking or whatever it might be.
00;04;32;08 - 00;05;01;25
Brenn Borror
And so we work with Patrick to produce this series to try to capture a genuine look at what it looks like to be a University of Maine student, but at the same time really focus on the place setting. And you know, for our students that either are coming from far away in state or are coming from out of state, giving them a really concrete understanding or a sense of place for the state of Maine, because to be totally candid, the University of Maine is not necessarily close to any other major metro area.
00;05;01;25 - 00;05;19;09
Brenn Borror
Right. And so, you know, for the most part, we're asking students to come a far way to attend the University of Maine. And what we're trying to do with this series is capture the essence of what it's like to be here, showcase that in an authentic way, and then, you know, if people get an opportunity to go and watch these videos, you'll see the way they're presented as unique to right?
00;05;19;09 - 00;05;38;17
Brenn Borror
There's a kind of film esque look to the videos, the interview sessions with the students, feel like they're, you know, entering a journal entry or like doing a vlog or something like that. It feels really personal. And so, yes, Student Story series kind of at its core, but we try to add these dimensions that make it feel unique and specific.
00;05;39;01 - 00;05;47;12
John Azoni
Mm hmm. Cool. So how did this series come about? I know you got the idea from, like, a cold email or something like that. Yeah, Yeah, absolutely.
00;05;47;16 - 00;06;04;02
Brenn Borror
You know, I think folks that work in higher education are really used to getting outreach from different firms or agencies or production groups that do kind of their thing for higher education. They've got like a solution in a box and they reach out to different administrators and try to see who's going to who's going to take the bait.
00;06;04;11 - 00;06;30;07
Brenn Borror
I don't mean that in a negative way. Those services can be really powerful. But when we had outreach for this particular service, it was essentially like a tour, like a package for a video tour through the university with some student features. And that cold call didn't come through our office. It came through another division on campus and we had the opportunity to kind of intercept that moment and say, Hey, this is a great opportunity for the university.
00;06;30;07 - 00;06;49;29
Brenn Borror
It's something we haven't done before. But is there a way that we can take that same base concept and turn it again into something that feels a little bit more bespoke or a little bit more unique to the university? And so that is how we got that kind of original buy in. And I know there's always this conversation in higher ed about like, how do you get the resources for that or who did you have to sell on that idea?
00;06;49;29 - 00;07;10;16
Brenn Borror
And this was really jumping on an opportunity that came our way to really pivot and make something that was unique and really make it feel like umaine. And so we ended up partnering with enrollment management in the production of this series. And then when we were kind of figuring out who's the right person or is this something we want to do internally or externally.
00;07;10;23 - 00;07;19;27
Brenn Borror
We have worked with Patrick in the past and he was really just the right person for this particular thing that we wanted to pull off. And so that's how it all came together.
00;07;20;11 - 00;07;22;16
John Azoni
Awesome. Patrick, tell us about you and your work.
00;07;23;05 - 00;07;42;09
Patrick Wine
Yes. So I actually used to work at the University of Maine. I moved to Maine in 2021, fresh out of college from the University of Colorado and worked at Umaine as a videographer for them for a while and then went out on my own, started my studio back in 2024. But Umaine has always been near and dear to my heart, and so I've been working with them since.
00;07;42;09 - 00;08;00;22
Patrick Wine
And when I was approached about this project, I was very jazzed because a lot of what I do is centered around like tourism type stuff. That's what my background was in. And this project is essentially tourism for the University of Maine in a way, because, you know, we're selling Maine and we're selling the University of Maine together, we're bottling up together.
00;08;00;22 - 00;08;22;26
Patrick Wine
So it was pretty awesome to do those like combined. Also, like the studio that I started is called Story Straw, and the focus of the studio is to do story driven content only. So we won't do any sort of commercial that is not telling an explicit story. So this was like right up the studio's alley because all we're doing is telling the real raw stories of University of Maine students.
00;08;22;26 - 00;08;39;24
Patrick Wine
You know, we're letting them kind of we direct it, but we let them say how they feel and kind of tell us what they do day to day. If they go to this restaurant, we follow them there and film them there. And and we're letting them kind of shape the story and how they've experienced umaine. And so it's almost like documentary filmmaking.
00;08;39;24 - 00;09;04;22
Patrick Wine
I went to film school. I have a Hollywood style filmmaking background. And so bringing that to like university marketing has been really fun because a lot of university marketing is not done in that manner. And so also kind of bringing some of the aspects that I love in filmmaking. So I love stuff shot on 16 millimeter. So this has that film quality to it, which also brings a sense of nostalgia to these videos for anyone that goes and watches them.
00;09;04;22 - 00;09;21;17
Patrick Wine
We emulate film. When we shoot, it would be like $5 million to shoot the series on 16 millimeter film. So we do not do that. But you know, that's kind of how I kind of go about this project, and that's kind of how I got started with the studio. And I spent a great time shooting the series with Umaine and Brant and the team over at the University of Maine.
00;09;21;17 - 00;09;42;27
John Azoni
Yeah, that's awesome. That was the thing I responded to, was it was a very filmic style but also like vlog style. So I just like wrote this line of being very approachable and almost user generated. But like if all the people generating the content were like good filmmakers, you know.
00;09;43;06 - 00;10;09;21
Patrick Wine
When we started going about the style of it, my kind of idea for it was, you know, especially with everything going, I know. And how like you watch Tron, the newest Tron movie Tron Legacy, and then the old Tron, the newest Tron movie, has amazing effects and it's amazingly beautiful. Everything looks crystal clear, Everything is polished. You go back and watch the the old original Tron and it is so fun and it's nostalgic and it's because it's got that texture quality to it.
00;10;09;21 - 00;10;27;27
Patrick Wine
Now I kind of equate it. This is a new one that I just came out with like two days ago, but I bought a typewriter recently and I would equate the life in the Pine Series to producing a video series with a typewriter and not using A.I. to write everything. It's got that texture to it. It's got something, you know, someone is behind it doing it.
00;10;27;27 - 00;10;36;16
Patrick Wine
And it's not just crystal clear AK video, you know, which gives it a uniqueness, you know, a tactile quality, one could say. So yeah.
00;10;37;00 - 00;11;10;02
John Azoni
Yeah. And the other thing I responded to was the walk and talk interview format, because, you know, the typical interview format is, you know, sit down. A couple of cameras cut back and forth between cameras. It's tried and true. It works. And I found this to be really cool because it was almost like because you had an interview in these videos, you do have them doing a more static interview that they're sitting down And but then you have this this element where they're walking around and just saying whatever, almost as if no one's asking them questions like they're just walking around.
00;11;10;02 - 00;11;23;14
John Azoni
And I think that just gives such a great sense of movement, but also just authenticity to, you know, you feel like they're not being guided by the marketing team behind the camera. So that's what I love about it. How did you achieve that look?
00;11;23;14 - 00;11;44;10
Patrick Wine
Patrick Yeah, So when we were thinking about how we wanted to film it, the first rule that I wanted to have for this was it's one person, one crew only because, you know, college students having been on that, you know, videographer for Umaine and at CU Boulder before that, as a student, you know, you get a whole crew there with like ten people and all the big lights and cameras and stuff and people start to clam up.
00;11;44;10 - 00;12;00;11
Patrick Wine
They get nervous. And I didn't want that. So the whole time I was like, I just want one camera, one live mic or, you know, and a shotgun mike for safety. And that's it. And so for the walk and talk part, we wanted to have, like you said, exactly what you're saying is what we want it. We wanted them to be real, you know, and not feel guided.
00;12;00;11 - 00;12;20;19
Patrick Wine
So I put the camera on a tripod and emulated the what we call like a Snorri cam. And in cinema, typically, we use that to show, like when people are under the influence or like drugged or you really want to get into the space of that person. And so we emulated that because it really puts you in that space in that headspace of them, you're with them.
00;12;21;00 - 00;12;36;02
Patrick Wine
So the camera was on a tripod. The two arms went under their underarms and then one just right in their stomach, and they just walked around holding it like that. And the only rule is they have to move the upper body as one piece, because that's how you get that. If you don't do that, then it just looks like a vlogging camera.
00;12;36;14 - 00;12;52;00
Patrick Wine
So you have to move. Everything is one. Then I said, All right, here's the questions that we've talked about. Go out and tell me about you, Main. Tell me what you loved. Tell me what you hated. Tell me what you, you know, maybe not hate it, but tell me what you loved to tell me, what you maybe had trouble with when you started.
00;12;52;10 - 00;13;10;04
Patrick Wine
Give me all of it. Spill the beans. And oh, so in season one, actually, if you go watch Haven, Jones was a phenomenal. He was one of the first people we actually filmed for this entire project. And he it was a beautiful fall afternoon. And I said, All right, Haven, here you go. This is the set up. And he goes, All right, this is so cool.
00;13;10;11 - 00;13;24;10
Patrick Wine
And he gets on his one wheel, which is like, for those that don't know when, we like a kind of like a skateboard thing, but it's got a giant like offroad wheel in the middle of it and it's electric and you ride around. Anyway, he got on this one wheel, was holding the tripod like this. And I said, Just talk about you mean.
00;13;24;10 - 00;13;35;12
Patrick Wine
And then he went off and rode all over campus for like 20 minutes. And I just sat on the mall looking at the trees. Oh, well, this kid's rolling around campus on his one wheeler with a camera talking about his day.
00;13;35;12 - 00;13;37;00
John Azoni
Hoping he didn't crash with your camera.
00;13;37;00 - 00;13;54;17
Patrick Wine
Yeah, no, exactly. That's what I've got insurance for. Yeah. Yeah. You know what? I've never had anything happen yet, so that's lucky. And we're on season three anyway. That's kind of how we went about it. And then they'd come back. Then I just listen to what they have to say and we might do one more like that. We might do two different walking talk styles.
00;13;54;17 - 00;14;07;02
Patrick Wine
And then like you said, there is one sit down that I typically do, and I mainly do that one for safety. I do that in a spot where I know that I have control over the wind, control over sound. So I always have a backup to cut too, but that's mainly the reason I do that one.
00;14;07;04 - 00;14;24;13
John Azoni
So yeah, it's good to have a safety and you know, you do want the marketing team to be involved at some point, you know, and there's nothing wrong with the marketing team being involved. You want to make sure you're getting the messaging right. Obviously, there has to be a business purpose for these videos. They have to influence enrollment in some way.
00;14;24;13 - 00;14;40;02
John Azoni
So that's that's all fine. But I like that balance of like, yeah, we got that. But also let's just let them go go rogue and talk about whatever they want. Yeah. For a little bit. For people who are trying to wrap their heads around, I think it's hard to wrap your head around if you aren't seeing the video.
00;14;40;02 - 00;14;55;12
John Azoni
But for people who are trying to picture this walk and talk angle, it's almost as if someone on LinkedIn described it as a selfie stick. They thought it was a selfie stick if you had like a selfie stick, but it was like permanently attached to their body. So it just kind of moves with them. It's kind of like that.
00;14;55;17 - 00;15;18;22
John Azoni
Yeah. Okay. So the other thing too, and I'd love to get your take on this brand is because the editing style has a lot of personality. It has this filmic quality and it has this vlog quality that honestly, like I feel like a lot of higher ed would not allow. You know, there's a lot of personality in it that I think a lot of higher.
00;15;18;22 - 00;15;39;13
John Azoni
Ed Markham leaders in enrollment leaders they want that they like it when they see it in other schools. But when it comes to them doing it for their brand, they're like, that's too out there. We have to use these know specific font, these specific colors, this exact, you know, this blah, blah, blah. But so, Bren, what was your thinking with just allowing that sort of like, loose editing style?
00;15;39;25 - 00;16;04;22
Brenn Borror
Yeah, absolutely. I mean, I think it's important for me that these videos feel genuine and a lot of the work that we do, I mean, it's beautiful, it's stunning. It's cinematic. But like if you see it, you know, it's a commercial. Like, you know, it's an advertisement for the university. And in some ways that's a really helpful tool at certain times and other times it feels like what people are seeing right through that, right?
00;16;04;22 - 00;16;23;11
Brenn Borror
Like you're selling me something. And for me, it was important for this series to not to feel that way. And that's part of the reason why we didn't end up pursuing that kind of like boxed option that was pitched to us is because the students were pretty obviously reading off of a teleprompter or had been kind of like prepped with questions.
00;16;23;11 - 00;16;56;06
Brenn Borror
And I want to make sure if a student struggled through something or it was a hard transition into university life or they moved from far away and they miss their family, or there's the first time that them moving in was the first time they were ever on campus because they chose to come sight unseen. Those are the really interesting human parts of the experience, and they're the part of the experience that students need to to feel like, Oh, I can overcome that too, because nobody's like choosing to go to university is a big life decision no matter what.
00;16;56;07 - 00;17;12;29
Brenn Borror
Whether you're a first generation student or everybody in your family's gone through college like it's a big life decision and we want to showcase that. Like these students that are here now have been right where you are and have overcome those things. And I think it just breeds that kind of sense of like, Oh, they're not selling me something.
00;17;12;29 - 00;17;22;21
Brenn Borror
They're willing to show that behind the scenes a little bit. And I feel like I can trust these student voices more than I could. Something that feels overtly like a commercial.
00;17;23;10 - 00;17;30;07
John Azoni
Yeah. And how were the videos received from leadership? Was there any challenges to them that you had to overcome or.
00;17;30;21 - 00;17;57;26
Brenn Borror
That's a good question, and maybe Patrick has a different perspective on this. But, you know, we started producing the series in my kind of like after I've been here for a year, and when I started at the university, we started doing a lot of things that were new and very different. So I kind of spent that first year building trust with other folks on campus that like the ideas that are coming out of our office, even though they might not look the way they have in the past, are still effective and can still be successful.
00;17;58;05 - 00;18;13;27
Brenn Borror
And so with that kind of like bedrock and place, we went into this knowing it was going to be kind of exploratory. And I think you guys go into those first review meetings with a little bit of like, I don't know what people are going to think about this, especially when you're partnering with like another office on campus, right?
00;18;13;29 - 00;18;26;28
Brenn Borror
It's not just our team that's calling the shots on this one. And you might remember this differently, but it felt like everybody was bought in like right after they watched the first episode, even though it was different, it was like, oh, like I never imagined it could feel like this.
00;18;27;10 - 00;18;27;19
John Azoni
Yeah.
00;18;27;27 - 00;18;45;14
Patrick Wine
Oh, no, I remember it like it was yesterday because this was one of the first really like, good sized contracts that the studio got was working with you on this. And so I was obviously, you know, floored and I was like, okay, let's do this. We were in the meeting and it was the matches episode. So season one, Patrick Viola to match.
00;18;45;14 - 00;19;06;00
Patrick Wine
I mean, it's the satellite campus out on the coast and I was expecting like some comments here and there, you know, because it was like Brand said, it was exploratory. It was, you know, different. And I took some creative ideas like making it look super filmic and like we had talked about that. But, you know, I did it like I was thinking and, and everyone was just like, Yeah, cool.
00;19;06;00 - 00;19;34;23
Patrick Wine
I love it. And that was that, you know? And now I would say like building off of what Brand said. I mean, we're on season three now, so, you know, it seemed like it was very well received in that meeting. And I think one of the things that I remember people feeling was exactly what I wanted it to, like, evoke and people is that feeling of like even though most of the time, you know, the people that are at the flagship campus in or know aren't out in matches doing the stuff out there, you know, because it's like 2 hours away.
00;19;35;06 - 00;19;51;16
Patrick Wine
I still was like, Oh my gosh, I love it there. You know, that place is amazing. This is somewhere I love. I get to be part of this like I am part of that college. And I made an impact on that student. You know? So I think that was I remember that really clearly from that meeting. That was Yeah, yeah, that was a good meeting.
00;19;51;17 - 00;19;51;28
John Azoni
Yeah, I.
00;19;51;28 - 00;19;59;16
Brenn Borror
Think it's always a good sign for me, like when I watch a video like that and I'm like, man, I wish I went here for my undergrad, like I'm selling myself on the school, you know?
00;19;59;19 - 00;20;19;10
John Azoni
Yeah, yeah, yeah, for sure. That's always the, you know, we do a lot of videos and that's one of the things that I say, you know, after a good interview is like, makes me want to go like, leave my job and go study that thing. Yeah, You know, I've experienced that a handful of times where people are just really good at just talking about it and being excited about it and there's just something special about that.
00;20;19;18 - 00;20;38;09
John Azoni
And the other thing I wanted to point out that I really responded to was the fact that you're calling these a season and episodes and, you know, whatever I'm browsing the Internet or just whatever, I'm always kind of like the part of my brain is like the marketer in me. That's like thinking, like, why did I like that?
00;20;38;09 - 00;21;07;09
John Azoni
Or like, why didn't I like that? And I'm always like, kind of analyzing and I'm like something about just calling it a season made me want to watch multiple episodes, you know? And it's almost like, I mean, it's literally a one word addition or a change, and suddenly I feel like you're giving my brain the cue to go down a rabbit hole, which is different than having a playlist that's like, Well, here's the the arts program and here's the this program.
00;21;07;09 - 00;21;22;00
John Azoni
And then that program, which, you know, can function as a rabbit hole as a lot of playlists do. But something about calling it a season and episodes, I just noticed in my brain, I was like, oh, like I kind of want to, like, watch this whole series, you know? Yeah.
00;21;22;13 - 00;21;35;27
Brenn Borror
Yeah, I wish I could say that that was like a master stroke of, like marketing genius and that we were like, Oh, if we say season, then they'll want to watch all of it. But like, you know, when you're putting these things together, you're trying to find a way to package them and like, put together your release strategy.
00;21;36;07 - 00;22;10;16
Brenn Borror
And it's what made sense at the time. But I know something that was really in my mind as we were working on the first season, and that still is kind of a hallmark of how we do this is like even if a student isn't interested in a particular major, we still want that video to have something for them, whether it be you know, like a students really into intramurals or they always wanted to see this part of main and this video showcases that part of main or the student is from this state that I'm from and I can better understand what my experience relocating is going to be like, even though they're into whatever forestry
00;22;10;16 - 00;22;12;04
Brenn Borror
and I'm into marine biology, Right?
00;22;12;14 - 00;22;35;06
John Azoni
Yeah. The fact that I mean, because the first one I watched was the forestry one and I noticed myself like and Bren, you and I were talking before we started recording about gardening. That's my latest obsession is just like being out in my yard and like, just tweaking. Just like looking like, watching paint dry, like looking for sprouts to come up and but I watched that forestry one.
00;22;35;06 - 00;22;51;23
John Azoni
I'm like, I'm not a forester, but like I could get into that. And the fact that, like, this guy is taking me around the forest and I'm seeing like the stuff, like the culture of Umaine here is like very nature that made me want to go there even just to be in that environment. Yeah, you're so cool.
00;22;51;23 - 00;23;11;04
Patrick Wine
Because it was just an internship that. I'm guessing that was Allan's outlet. Yeah. And that was like two and a half hours away. And he did an internship. We just lived out there for like two months and we connected and we were like, Yeah, we definitely want to show that. And so we went out and got in a truck and drove like 30 miles into the pure Northwoods.
00;23;11;04 - 00;23;19;15
Patrick Wine
Nothing around and just like walked into the woods, couldn't see nothing. And it was cool to like, that's what these students get to do, you know? So I think it's.
00;23;20;06 - 00;23;21;12
John Azoni
You know, this is something.
00;23;21;12 - 00;23;53;16
Brenn Borror
We didn't get to talk about when we first recorded this, so maybe I could take the opportunity. But, you know, one of the things that I think makes us unique is that we don't have a set plan for how the story is going to go. We pre interview all of the students who we work with, and we're really trying to find like what are the three unique and identifiable pieces of their story that just come through conversation that we want to make sure we can highlight whether it's like an internship or the fact that they play in a band or like one of the students who came to Umaine is an international student who came
00;23;53;16 - 00;24;09;20
Brenn Borror
without like a car. Anything he had. I can't remember who was a professor or somebody, a staff member, but they ended up bartering with him. They were like, If you give me a chocolate bar, I'll give you this bike that I had it. And so like we ended up like Patrick ended up recording him, like riding the bike around and telling that little story.
00;24;09;20 - 00;24;15;24
Brenn Borror
But we wouldn't have known that had we not done that kind of pre interview and specifically sought out those things that are unique details.
00;24;16;00 - 00;24;26;12
John Azoni
Yeah, I'm always collecting good interview questions. What was the question that you used to arrive at that story of like trading a chocolate bar for a bike? That's a great question. I don't know. I don't.
00;24;26;12 - 00;24;38;23
Brenn Borror
Remember. Yeah, I don't remember. I wish I do because like, you know, you're just always waiting for those, like, little things to come out that it's like, okay, that's going to be the linchpin that's going to help connect like the community life, you know, whatever it's going to be.
00;24;38;23 - 00;24;56;27
Patrick Wine
Yeah, I can't remember if that came out of a pre-interview or because lots of times, like weird moments pop out because I like, we'll do the pre-interview questions and then when I'm actually interviewing them, I go down the rabbit holes and try to find tangents and, you know, use my way into their stories. And I cannot remember because that was, gosh, two years ago at this point too.
00;24;56;28 - 00;25;13;16
Patrick Wine
Yeah, yeah. He traded a chocolate bar for a bicycle with a professor and he's so funny. I love keytar, but yeah, I know their favorite question. Actually, it's their least favorite question, if you like. A good question is describe the University of Maine poetically. And that's how we get our best quotes. I would say is.
00;25;13;21 - 00;25;15;09
John Azoni
Oh, I would hate that one too. Yeah.
00;25;16;03 - 00;25;24;12
Patrick Wine
Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's it's tough. I'm like your Thoreau kayak or, you know, canoeing through the wilderness. What do you do? You know? So, yeah, sometimes I get good answers.
00;25;24;12 - 00;25;48;03
John Azoni
What the responses would be on that. Yeah. Yeah. It's funny when you embrace those things that initially make you like cringe a little bit, like they can kind of be the best exercises I had. I used to have this business coach and we would do this workshop every year like goal planning for the next year. And it's this big long process of, you know, that you go through this like formulated process of structuring out your goals.
00;25;48;03 - 00;26;07;29
John Azoni
But one of the part is write a letter to yourself from last year describing how that year's going to go and what you need to watch out for and stuff. And I was like resisted that. So hard. I'm like, I can't it's so corny. I can't like my coach is going to see this. So yeah, yeah, yeah. It's like weirdly intimate.
00;26;08;02 - 00;26;30;27
John Azoni
But then I wrote it and I was like, Oh, I actually, like, I actually discovered something about myself and about my goals by doing that. Yeah. Yeah. Okay, well, we've got about 20 minutes and we've got a lot of questions, so I want to happen to the Q&A here. I often post when I remember to to post on LinkedIn and ask people to submit questions and sometimes they do and sometimes they don't.
00;26;30;27 - 00;26;49;05
John Azoni
Sometimes we get one, sometimes we get none. In this case, I think we had six or seven. So and then all the agencies that are listening to this episode in the car all just went six seven urgent alphas. I guess that would be. Yeah, I said this when we recorded the first time, but I apologize in advance if I mess up your name.
00;26;49;17 - 00;27;10;09
John Azoni
I intended to, like, reach out individually to each of these people to, like, ask them to pronounce their name for me. And then I realized that I never did. So Dustin Ramsdell higher ed EdTech content creator. I'd want to know more about the launch process. Did they have to do a prototype to justify the investments or did they have the freedom to enable this vision on their own?
00;27;10;26 - 00;27;30;12
Brenn Borror
Yeah, I mean, I think we spoke to this a little bit. This series came together after I'd already been at the university for about a year, and so we had that level of trust and buy in. That just comes with time and continued connection. And then we did this opportunity where there was some level of buy in on this concept of like a video tour series through campus.
00;27;30;23 - 00;27;50;04
Brenn Borror
And because, you know, there was already kind of an idea of how much that might cost and what it would take to produce it, we were able to leverage that information. The fact that people already were kind of into it and pivot it into this thing that was a little bit more brand aligned for the university. So not really any tricks to justify the investment.
00;27;50;04 - 00;28;08;25
Brenn Borror
I think, folks, you know, this is true and higher ed in general. I think people really understand the power of video now at this point. And so it's like they've got this idea for what it could be. We know what it can be and how do we bring people along for the ride. And the fact of the matter is, you just kind of have to back it up with the quality of the work, right?
00;28;08;25 - 00;28;19;29
Brenn Borror
Like that first episode that we went in and showed like that speaks to Patrick's talent for capturing these stories. Like, you know, there was after that first videos like No Reservations, like, let's go finish off the season.
00;28;20;10 - 00;28;27;20
Patrick Wine
And I would kind of say, I guess the first I don't remember when we did the first season, if there was a plan for second, third, fourth, fifth at all.
00;28;28;05 - 00;28;28;17
John Azoni
No.
00;28;29;15 - 00;28;30;02
Brenn Borror
Not really.
00;28;30;08 - 00;28;31;07
John Azoni
Yeah, I think it.
00;28;31;07 - 00;28;31;22
Brenn Borror
Was like.
00;28;31;26 - 00;28;33;15
Patrick Wine
The season was a test, I guess.
00;28;33;16 - 00;28;35;03
Brenn Borror
Like, yeah, in some ways, yeah.
00;28;35;10 - 00;28;35;18
John Azoni
Yeah.
00;28;35;26 - 00;28;36;26
Patrick Wine
Unexpectedly. Yeah.
00;28;37;22 - 00;28;50;11
John Azoni
Yeah. Okay. Aaron Valente, content creator at University of Kansas, says Great chair and great video content. Wow, I love their tour, my major series and I'd love to know how they approached that.
00;28;50;21 - 00;29;12;10
Brenn Borror
Yeah. So two of my major as another video series that we produce which actually came after we did the first season of Life in the Pines, and we saw how much people resonated with the kind of like handheld camera, you know, student kind of leading the interview. And so, you know, we often have different departments on campus come to us and say, Hey, can you highlight X program?
00;29;12;10 - 00;29;28;11
Brenn Borror
We're really trying to make a push this year for this enrollment cycle. And so one of the things we're always trying to do in our shop is think, okay, how can I solve this kind of like a common or universal problem for campus through a solution that's you know, that can either become a series or it can be a little bit more turnkey.
00;29;28;11 - 00;29;54;07
Brenn Borror
So we're not reinventing the wheel every single time somebody comes to us with a need like this. And so two of my major was really born out of that. And rather than trying to do the fall like all encompassing, this is the story of the student, the student into or my major really becomes an ambassador for the program and they speak through their experience and we take them really specifically through classroom environments or training environments or research labs or that kind of thing.
00;29;54;07 - 00;30;10;03
Brenn Borror
So it's a little more academic in nature, but it still has that kind of handheld blog feel where it's the student telling the story and it's not, you know, faculty or somebody else. And it's it's short form, too. That's another another element here. We're trying to keep these things at least pretty concise.
00;30;10;17 - 00;30;16;29
John Azoni
Awesome. That's helpful. Samantha Perry for Main Says Brand borrower is the goat. Yeah.
00;30;16;29 - 00;30;28;00
Brenn Borror
So Sam oversees social media strategy for the university and she's great. She's excellent. So always good to have very smart and social media strategist in your camp. So appreciate the shout out.
00;30;28;17 - 00;30;53;05
John Azoni
I originally reached out to Sam about this episode and then she told me to reach out to you. Brand So thanks for the assists and so Mikki Bodell or Bodell, hopefully one of those is right. Formerly at Dartmouth College and now senior social media manager at King Arthur Baking Company, which I have in my pantry, the flour. I'm going to shorten this question a little bit.
00;30;53;05 - 00;31;11;01
John Azoni
What are the YouTube analytics look like behind the scenes? This is the kind of work that the whole industry seems to aspire to. Beautifully produced. The styling is great. Love the selfie stick and the cinematic B-roll combo. Most comms teams can't pull the resources together for this stuff. Anything converting for admissions or reputation?
00;31;11;14 - 00;31;33;12
Brenn Borror
Yeah, absolutely. It's a good question and I think it's something that's on everybody's mind when they're trying to kind of wrap their head around the investment of a series like this. And truth be told, we're not laser focused on performance with series like this. If you're measuring by overall like organic views and that kind of thing, and particularly not on on YouTube.
00;31;33;12 - 00;31;54;17
Brenn Borror
So like the second season of Life in the Pines, the viewership on YouTube comprises like less than 2% of our overall view count. If you're considering like Instagram or TikTok or whatever, and something that's been, you know, a little bit of a paradigm shift for us is we're not considering these videos to be the place where we're going to convert a student, right?
00;31;54;17 - 00;32;17;20
Brenn Borror
Like I don't think somebody is going to see one of these videos and then go, you know, submit their application to come to the university. What I'm always thinking about is like, how do we continue to like, pull prospective students into our orbit and get them closer and closer to the university? And so I think of these videos as like a little stepping stone and movement toward us, you know, particularly for these videos.
00;32;17;20 - 00;32;52;12
Brenn Borror
And when I think about our YouTube strategy in general, I'm not thinking about them as tools for awareness generation or that kind of like first time they're going to interact with you, man. I think of it as like an opportunity to connect with the student that's maybe midway through their search process. Kind of has seen what's out there, and these videos get to be a really unique, different and kind of like uniquely identifiable opportunity to understand what the University of Maine is, what it's like to live in Maine and help distinguish Umaine from the other schools that they're looking at.
00;32;52;12 - 00;33;11;21
Brenn Borror
And as much as I want, you know, a video like this to move a student toward the university, I also think it's just as helpful for students who are making that choice to say, okay, that's probably not the right school for me, right? Like the marketer in me always is trying to move a student toward us, but the human in me is like I also want people to figure out if this is the right place for them, right?
00;33;11;21 - 00;33;20;19
Brenn Borror
Umaine is not going to be the right choice for every single student. And I think videos like this help students make that that decision, you know, a little bit easier.
00;33;21;21 - 00;33;36;13
Patrick Wine
And I think it's like virality versus evergreen, you know, because video that might grow super viral on YouTube may only survive being viral for a month. And then it has no purpose. But something like this is evergreen. And it's going to I mean, ten years from now, these videos are going to do the same thing that they're doing today.
00;33;36;24 - 00;34;04;22
Patrick Wine
And I think one of the other aspects of that we talked about this last time a little bit, but is it's also helpful for students that are already at UMAINE for retention, because I've talked to a lot of students on campus doing other projects outside of life in the pines, and most people know about it. They watch it and the people that I've talked to about it are like, Oh my gosh, it's so cool to go to a school where I get to see that stuff for like, Yeah, I saw this episode and that was my friend and I think Brant can probably talk to this a little bit more, but like I think it
00;34;04;22 - 00;34;19;27
Patrick Wine
does a very good job at that to the point where they don't actually have to go find students anymore. Like, do you want to bring that up? Because I feel like that's better for you to talk about. But I think that's a good example of how this benefits the students already here too, and keeping them from like going somewhere else in years or whatever.
00;34;20;10 - 00;34;51;03
Brenn Borror
Yeah, I mean, there's always that question of like, how do you get students that are going to be good on camera or like, how do you go and actively recruit students? And to be honest, the first season was really a proactive outreach process for us. So we were working with our colleges and the deans and other faculty and staff members to identify students that are good representatives of their area and then we do the interview, that kind of first interview, to make sure, okay, there's something here that we can work with and the student's going to be engaged with us in the process, but we never know exactly how they're going to be on camera
00;34;51;10 - 00;35;09;26
Brenn Borror
and that's really Patrick's, you know, one of his unique skills is really making people feel comfortable and kind of getting the best out of them when they're behind the camera or in front of a camera. And then after the success of the first season, for the second season, we were basically able to do an open call through Instagram and say, Hey, if you've seen these and you want to be part of the next season, let us know.
00;35;09;28 - 00;35;31;09
Brenn Borror
And so we had students reach out to us that way, and that's pretty much how we cast the entire second season. And then now two years into this process, we've done it again for the third season, but we actually upped our ask little bit. And for students that were interested, we asked that they submit like a little 62nd video of themselves answering a question just again to try to get a sense of like how they feel on camera.
00;35;31;09 - 00;35;51;07
Brenn Borror
But also it's really important for us to have students that are really committed to being part of the process because these shoots are typically not one day. Sometimes they but that's typically multiple days, you know, where it's like, okay, I'm going to connect with you and early in the semester and then maybe I'll check back in with you a couple of weeks later when you're doing this like unique, specific activity.
00;35;51;15 - 00;35;57;05
Brenn Borror
And so we need students that you're going to be in it with us and willing to to work on a little bit longer time horizon.
00;35;57;19 - 00;36;13;19
Patrick Wine
Yeah. And I think that kind of showcases the, you know, how it's affecting people on campus as well, you know, or even freshmen like we have sophomores doing it and, you know, people are seeing it and applying and I don't think they do that, especially doing those second videos. If they didn't like the series, you know what I mean?
00;36;13;19 - 00;36;27;14
Patrick Wine
Or it didn't affect them in some way. So I think it's fun to see that. I think we lots of times look at I mean, obviously I'm not on the marketing team, but I would think, you know, a lot of times we're looking outward like getting students to come to your main, but also or any college. But it's also about keeping students there.
00;36;27;14 - 00;36;39;06
Patrick Wine
I can say when I was at CU Boulder, I love to see you, but I looked at switching to UT Austin when I was there my freshman year. I decided to stay, but it crossed my mind. And I will say that some of the videos I see you put out kept me there.
00;36;39;09 - 00;36;40;27
John Azoni
So yeah.
00;36;41;05 - 00;36;42;18
Patrick Wine
Yeah. And I ended up working with that team.
00;36;42;18 - 00;36;58;10
John Azoni
So I'll send that to our friends at CU Boulder. Yeah, I'm sure they'll be glad to hear that. Yeah. I mean, we don't think about retention enough because I, you know, I've mentioned a number of times on this podcast, I went to a school, my first year of art school was in Baltimore, and then I ended up transferring back home.
00;36;58;17 - 00;37;17;03
John Azoni
And so like I was one of those students that like bailed and, you know, there are things that could have been done to keep me there. And it's important. It's important to to keep students, current students engaged. And I think when they they can see themselves in a thing, when it's a thing like a series, you know, an episode, whatever, now it's like, okay, now I want to be part of this.
00;37;17;09 - 00;37;46;26
John Azoni
And the other thing you mentioned is like the time commitment. And that's the one thing that I've learned from casting a lot of these types of things. For our own work. We have a whole process that we do with every school that we work with, that we do casting for. We always like continue to refine the process. And one of the helpful things has been adding in like just setting expectations for like how long we're going to need them for because we've had it happen where they're like really excited and then they're like, All right, well, I've got an hour for you.
00;37;47;08 - 00;38;09;14
John Azoni
And I'm like, Oh, we're like really far into this. For you to be telling me now that you only have an hour to film. So it's good to set those expectations upfront. Okay. I want to combine two questions here. So Elias Moser from University of Kansas asks, I'd love to hear more about what they view as a successful video series.
00;38;09;22 - 00;38;32;01
John Azoni
While they have a great subscriber count, it seems like they don't get many views. That's the one thing we all kind of talked about that. But coupling that with Matt Haimes from three Enrollment Marketing says What are the implications of managing a feed that went viral 15 years ago? How does it impact planning and reporting? So I think what some people might be responding to is the high subscriber count.
00;38;32;17 - 00;38;39;19
John Azoni
Are these videos driving that or was something else driving that? And these videos are being used for something else. So give us some context about that.
00;38;39;20 - 00;39;18;25
Brenn Borror
Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. I often feel like our YouTube subscriber count does us a disservice because there's maybe maybe 38,000 or 40 subscribers on our YouTube channel. And really those predominantly came from a series of videos that were produced by the university's Cooperative Extension Program many years ago, like early 20 tens. And they're great videos, but they're all focused in this kind of like how to style, whether it be like how to prune your raspberry bushes or how to get your garden ready for the winter, or like it's those kind of like life life things that a lot of people are interested in.
00;39;18;25 - 00;39;43;05
Brenn Borror
And the extension just did an excellent job during that period of time and they still release great instructional content. But that period was really of YouTube culture was like YouTube as a search engine to figure out how do I solve this problem? And they played right into that. And so, you know, I still think the most viewed video on our YouTube channel is like instructional on how to cook a lobster, which, you know, that feels kind of on brand for me.
00;39;43;05 - 00;40;07;27
Brenn Borror
And so I'm not mad about that. Yeah but you know so that's where a majority of those subscribers came from. And we're glad to have those people around, but they're not necessarily the ones that are watching the Life in the Pie and series, Right. And so, yeah, you know, the question about like impacting planning and reporting, YouTube is not necessarily pillar platform for us and that we're not expecting that to be the place where we're getting the majority of our viewership.
00;40;08;09 - 00;40;40;06
Brenn Borror
We know that Instagram and TikTok and Facebook are platforms for us where we can reach both our existing audience, but also new audiences just more effectively than we can on YouTube. So, you know, we spoke about that a little bit. But to me, YouTube is really helpful for that middle section of the buying decision process where you're like, okay, I'm already pretty bought in on the idea of this school and now I want to go on the rabbit hole, like down the rabbit hole and, learn everything that there is to know and really get a sense of this place.
00;40;40;14 - 00;40;52;29
Brenn Borror
And I find that students are really doing that before they, like come for a visit. Right. So I think we've seen the stages of the enrollment process kind of flip around a little bit in the past few years where like, you know, students really apply.
00;40;52;29 - 00;40;53;20
John Azoni
First.
00;40;54;00 - 00;41;13;07
Brenn Borror
And wait to see if they're in and then they'll go for like a campus tour or a campus visit or something like that. But I still think there's that in-between part where they're trying to get a sense of the place before they even get there. I know I do that myself with like buying decisions like I'm a nerd about, like researching the things that I buy because, like, I just want to know everything that I can know before I make that choice.
00;41;13;18 - 00;41;22;17
Brenn Borror
And I think videos like this and the way I see our YouTube channel is like it's an opportunity for people that are in that stage of the buying process to go and learn as much as they can.
00;41;23;09 - 00;41;56;09
John Azoni
Yeah, and I actually after the first time we recorded this episode, I wrote a whole newsletter based on this, that topic of our conversation last time about, you know, low value accounts don't tell the whole story or don't even tell the story at all because, you know, I think people are looking for the wrong story. They're looking for like view counts equals success and actually, a lot of times, you know, I've heard, you know, people say that like you actually like going viral hurt me, you know, or something like that, you know, because we now we got all these viewers that are completely irrelevant.
00;41;56;16 - 00;42;18;25
John Azoni
The algorithms all screwed up. It's delivering our stuff now to all these random people that came from the virality. And no one's buying our stuff and so and it made me reflect on my journey as a content creator. I'm on LinkedIn every day, and I'm very consistent with this podcast and a newsletter. You would look at my follower, count on LinkedIn and not bat an eye.
00;42;19;03 - 00;42;40;04
John Azoni
It's not that impressive. You would look at my subscribers on my newsletters, not that impressive. And my YouTube. Ah, I'm a my podcast analytics under the hood also bordering on embarrassing if you're to like, you know, how many downloads do you get or whatever. I mean, this pack has been around since 2021, so five years in and it really like the under the hood numbers haven't budged much.
00;42;40;13 - 00;43;06;18
John Azoni
But what I do get is like a lot of number one, I can point to many amounts of dollars that I've booked as a result of certain podcast episodes where I would not have gotten that opportunity outside of that. So number one, that's the thing. I don't care about views. I care about putting food on the table, you know, And then also, you know, I'm going for deeply engaged people.
00;43;06;21 - 00;43;26;03
John Azoni
I'm creating a library for the higher ed marketer or enrollment management leader that has these problems and is looking at how to solve them. And they're going to land on my YouTube or they're going to land on, you know, Apple Podcasts or whatever and go, Oh my gosh, there's a whole library of problems that are being solved. Episode after episode.
00;43;26;09 - 00;43;47;28
John Azoni
I want to go down this list and I get that kind of feedback a lot where it's like, Oh my gosh, I discovered your podcast and there's so many great topics, like I have all these problems. Like we need to reorient ourselves to what success looks like because a lot of the marketing work that Higher Ed teams do is really living in that middle funnel because a lot of times the top of the funnel is taken care of by whoever's running the ads.
00;43;48;10 - 00;44;10;22
John Azoni
You know, maybe they're creating a top of funnel, you know, series organically, but the general like we're marketing this program and we're creating this anthem video and stuff. Like there's not millions of people that that's even going to apply to, but there are millions of people, 3.5 million people who viewed this video of yours. Your top video is how to look for and avoid bedbugs.
00;44;10;22 - 00;44;17;09
John Azoni
Is it the hotels or or motel rooms? That applies to literally everybody, you know.
00;44;17;11 - 00;44;17;23
Patrick Wine
You know.
00;44;19;19 - 00;44;20;11
John Azoni
The bed bugs.
00;44;20;11 - 00;44;22;22
Brenn Borror
Video. Yeah, yeah, yeah. No. And you know.
00;44;22;22 - 00;44;23;28
John Azoni
And I'm not mad about.
00;44;23;28 - 00;44;27;00
Brenn Borror
It right. Like I'm glad for people to have that information.
00;44;27;12 - 00;44;27;24
John Azoni
And.
00;44;28;01 - 00;44;42;12
Brenn Borror
You know on the off chance someone watches that that has like a kid that's in high school right now and they're like, oh, the University of Maine is like doing interesting stuff. Like, that's not such a bad thing. But I'm not expecting that to be the default scenario by which we obtain a student Right.
00;44;42;27 - 00;45;10;26
John Azoni
Yeah. And the other thing I mentioned to in, in my newsletter about this was like when you're doing distribution properly because distribution is like one of my huge pillars, like, why are you creating this thing if you're just going to let the algorithm like blow it into the wind and see what happens if you're doing proper distribution in your hand, delivering that or a hand embedding that into specific spots where people are going to see it, you know, low view account is to be expected because thousands of people aren't getting this email or, you know, whatever the context is.
00;45;10;26 - 00;45;28;11
John Azoni
So it's actually kind of a sign that you're not playing to the algorithm. You're actually playing to like what is going to actually get us results in the in the door with this video. And this has to be used as a tool for enrollment. It's, you know, it's not a just a bragging thing of company, you know, comments and likes and stuff we got.
00;45;28;11 - 00;45;30;19
John Azoni
Yeah, if no one's signing up for anything.
00;45;30;19 - 00;45;52;00
Brenn Borror
Yeah. Like, I don't want people to listen to this and then think, okay, I'm going to go pitch this same kind of thing and like, sell it based on viewership or like the opportunity to go because there is no world where a three minute student story from a university that most people don't think about in their day to day is going to take off like it's just yeah, it's just not what's going to happen.
00;45;52;03 - 00;46;09;18
John Azoni
Yeah, Yeah. Awesome. All right. Well, this has been great. Thanks for humoring us a second time here. And I feel like this episode was as good, if not better, than the first time recorded because we got a lot of practice. Yeah, there we go. I see numbers still rolling on Riverside. That's a good sign. I see.
00;46;09;18 - 00;46;13;21
Patrick Wine
I'm in the pines march on, too. So, you know, little shout out there.
00;46;14;19 - 00;46;16;24
John Azoni
Yeah. Yeah. Patrick really came prepared. Yeah, Yeah.
00;46;16;24 - 00;46;20;24
Patrick Wine
Universal Store. Yeah.
00;46;20;24 - 00;46;29;20
John Azoni
Yes. All right, well, where can people connect with you guys if they want to reach out and, I don't know, hire you for video Patrick, or work on your team or whatever brand Yeah.
00;46;29;20 - 00;46;30;05
Brenn Borror
You go first.
00;46;30;05 - 00;46;45;05
Patrick Wine
Patrick All right. Yeah. So my studio is called Story Store. We're here in Bangor, Maine, but we do stuff all over so you can reach me at Patrick at Story Store, all studios dot com or look us up pretty much on any social media or the website at story store studios. And yeah, we do all sorts of stuff.
00;46;45;05 - 00;46;53;24
Patrick Wine
We do original storytelling for ourselves and people to enjoy as an and commercial, and we apply the same original storytelling to our commercials. That's specifically what we do.
00;46;54;27 - 00;47;11;13
Brenn Borror
And then, yeah, if you want to connect with me on LinkedIn, if there's opportunities on my team, I'll share those there. We're hiring right now for a few positions. And also it's great to work at Umaine even if you don't work in marketing or enrollment. So and then follow the University of Maine on Instagram or LinkedIn or TikTok.
00;47;11;13 - 00;47;13;13
Brenn Borror
If you want to see more of the stuff that we get up to.
00;47;13;25 - 00;47;26;21
Patrick Wine
Yeah, you should definitely go work at Umaine with them. They're awesome. I actually worked in Maine, but it was before Bren started. He started like the same week I left and I love when he's awesome, so definitely go join the team there. Everyone on that team is awesome.
00;47;27;04 - 00;47;38;24
John Azoni
Cool. All right, well, if this doesn't work out for me with the video thing, owning my own company, I'm coming on Bren Street. Yeah, right. Yeah. Yeah. All right. Well, thanks, guys. I appreciate it. Yeah, it sounds good. Thank you.
John Azoni
Well, geez, this episode took some effort to bring this one to you because this is actually take two. So we recorded this episode with Brant and Patrick several weeks ago and great conversation. Got to the end of it and you know, we're waiting for all the cameras to upload whatever the do the stuff that Riverside requires. And for some reason Brent's camera's not uploading.
00;00;23;22 - 00;00;50;05
John Azoni
And I'm like, Oh, it's probably fine, it's there. Long story short, Riverside lost the entire episode. So we had to get Brett and Patrick back on the show to have another conversation. And so I very much appreciate them coming back To rerecord. And actually the second conversation is quite good compared to the first one. But we are talking about University of Maine's video series called Life in the Pines and it is really cool.
00;00;50;05 - 00;01;15;03
John Azoni
I stumbled upon this video series and thought it just felt like very fresh and it was just like a new way of telling program overviews of students stories, student perspective, that kind of thing. So if you get a chance, go to you. Maine's YouTube channel. Check out the series. Really cool would be great to have that context going into this episode, but if not, we're going to try and explain the episodes for you if you're just listening.
00;01;15;08 - 00;01;41;13
John Azoni
So in this episode we talk about the series, how it came about, how it fits into their marketing enrollment strategies. We talk about what success looks like for the series, and we talk about how the series helped them get students to raise their hand and say they wanted to be part of this and they wanted to be filmed themselves, which is a big barrier for schools, is trying to find students to be in these videos, you know, to be in videos in general.
00;01;41;19 - 00;01;57;00
John Azoni
And we also take you behind the scenes of how the production went down and how they achieved the look and the feel that they're going for and why. So all of that makes for a great episode. Hope you love it. Here's my conversation with Brant Borer and Patrick Wine. All right, Brant and Patrick, welcome to the show.
00;01;57;11 - 00;01;58;03
Brenn Borror
Thanks for having us.
00;01;58;18 - 00;02;25;02
John Azoni
Well, we are back again. You know, full disclosure, we recorded this episode a couple of weeks ago and four people are listening and Riverside just crapped the bed. And I was really excited coming off of that interview. Like that was just everything I wanted it to be. And then I like, went to go download all the cameras and I had none of Brennan's camera and 8 seconds of Patrick's camera and no audio from anyone except for me.
00;02;25;02 - 00;02;28;10
John Azoni
So all you could hear is me going, Huh?
00;02;28;28 - 00;02;31;09
Patrick Wine
Honestly, that would survive so well as a meme right now.
00;02;31;09 - 00;02;50;22
John Azoni
So yeah. Yeah. So these guys have graciously come back. So if you, you know, just wanted to give you that context in case I'm sure something someone at some point will be like, as we said a couple of weeks ago, you know, blah, blah, blah. So anyway, but we're talking about University of Maine's YouTube channel, specifically their life in the Pine Series.
00;02;50;22 - 00;03;18;05
John Azoni
And I think I came across Umaine through doing a Claude Search for schools that have like really active YouTube channels and that are doing good stuff because I was researching for a different episode and Umaine was on there and that's how I discovered Life of Pine. So whatever you guys are doing is, is working for the I. So it's good to hear a whole whole other episode about what you're doing for the Geo or Geo, wherever it's called.
00;03;18;16 - 00;03;35;13
John Azoni
But anyways, I'll let you guys describe the life of Pine series for people who haven't seen it. And then just, you know, this is one of those episodes where it would be helpful if everyone had watched the videos before they before they left. But most people are just listening. So we'll do our best to just kind of like describe what they are for the listeners.
00;03;35;13 - 00;03;57;12
Brenn Borror
Yeah, absolutely. So Life in the Pines at its core is really a student story series. So we are featuring various students, predominantly undergraduate students, but the way we try to position this in a more unique way or a way that feels like the University of Maine is to really try to produce it in a way that feels kind of unfiltered and right.
00;03;57;12 - 00;04;31;22
Brenn Borror
So like we're not telling the students what to say. We're not asking them canned questions. We're really trying to get them to share their personal stories and kind of the highlights of their time at Umaine in a way that feels personal and authentic as possible. So these stories don't just kind of connect with their academic life, but we're also trying to showcase the things that they do outside of the classroom, whether it be like intramural sports or, you know, a research opportunity that they have or like the favorite thing that they like to do in Maine if they're like going hiking or whatever it might be.
00;04;32;08 - 00;05;01;25
Brenn Borror
And so we work with Patrick to produce this series to try to capture a genuine look at what it looks like to be a University of Maine student, but at the same time really focus on the place setting. And you know, for our students that either are coming from far away in state or are coming from out of state, giving them a really concrete understanding or a sense of place for the state of Maine, because to be totally candid, the University of Maine is not necessarily close to any other major metro area.
00;05;01;25 - 00;05;19;09
Brenn Borror
Right. And so, you know, for the most part, we're asking students to come a far way to attend the University of Maine. And what we're trying to do with this series is capture the essence of what it's like to be here, showcase that in an authentic way, and then, you know, if people get an opportunity to go and watch these videos, you'll see the way they're presented as unique to right?
00;05;19;09 - 00;05;38;17
Brenn Borror
There's a kind of film esque look to the videos, the interview sessions with the students, feel like they're, you know, entering a journal entry or like doing a vlog or something like that. It feels really personal. And so, yes, Student Story series kind of at its core, but we try to add these dimensions that make it feel unique and specific.
00;05;39;01 - 00;05;47;12
John Azoni
Mm hmm. Cool. So how did this series come about? I know you got the idea from, like, a cold email or something like that. Yeah, Yeah, absolutely.
00;05;47;16 - 00;06;04;02
Brenn Borror
You know, I think folks that work in higher education are really used to getting outreach from different firms or agencies or production groups that do kind of their thing for higher education. They've got like a solution in a box and they reach out to different administrators and try to see who's going to who's going to take the bait.
00;06;04;11 - 00;06;30;07
Brenn Borror
I don't mean that in a negative way. Those services can be really powerful. But when we had outreach for this particular service, it was essentially like a tour, like a package for a video tour through the university with some student features. And that cold call didn't come through our office. It came through another division on campus and we had the opportunity to kind of intercept that moment and say, Hey, this is a great opportunity for the university.
00;06;30;07 - 00;06;49;29
Brenn Borror
It's something we haven't done before. But is there a way that we can take that same base concept and turn it again into something that feels a little bit more bespoke or a little bit more unique to the university? And so that is how we got that kind of original buy in. And I know there's always this conversation in higher ed about like, how do you get the resources for that or who did you have to sell on that idea?
00;06;49;29 - 00;07;10;16
Brenn Borror
And this was really jumping on an opportunity that came our way to really pivot and make something that was unique and really make it feel like umaine. And so we ended up partnering with enrollment management in the production of this series. And then when we were kind of figuring out who's the right person or is this something we want to do internally or externally.
00;07;10;23 - 00;07;19;27
Brenn Borror
We have worked with Patrick in the past and he was really just the right person for this particular thing that we wanted to pull off. And so that's how it all came together.
00;07;20;11 - 00;07;22;16
John Azoni
Awesome. Patrick, tell us about you and your work.
00;07;23;05 - 00;07;42;09
Patrick Wine
Yes. So I actually used to work at the University of Maine. I moved to Maine in 2021, fresh out of college from the University of Colorado and worked at Umaine as a videographer for them for a while and then went out on my own, started my studio back in 2024. But Umaine has always been near and dear to my heart, and so I've been working with them since.
00;07;42;09 - 00;08;00;22
Patrick Wine
And when I was approached about this project, I was very jazzed because a lot of what I do is centered around like tourism type stuff. That's what my background was in. And this project is essentially tourism for the University of Maine in a way, because, you know, we're selling Maine and we're selling the University of Maine together, we're bottling up together.
00;08;00;22 - 00;08;22;26
Patrick Wine
So it was pretty awesome to do those like combined. Also, like the studio that I started is called Story Straw, and the focus of the studio is to do story driven content only. So we won't do any sort of commercial that is not telling an explicit story. So this was like right up the studio's alley because all we're doing is telling the real raw stories of University of Maine students.
00;08;22;26 - 00;08;39;24
Patrick Wine
You know, we're letting them kind of we direct it, but we let them say how they feel and kind of tell us what they do day to day. If they go to this restaurant, we follow them there and film them there. And and we're letting them kind of shape the story and how they've experienced umaine. And so it's almost like documentary filmmaking.
00;08;39;24 - 00;09;04;22
Patrick Wine
I went to film school. I have a Hollywood style filmmaking background. And so bringing that to like university marketing has been really fun because a lot of university marketing is not done in that manner. And so also kind of bringing some of the aspects that I love in filmmaking. So I love stuff shot on 16 millimeter. So this has that film quality to it, which also brings a sense of nostalgia to these videos for anyone that goes and watches them.
00;09;04;22 - 00;09;21;17
Patrick Wine
We emulate film. When we shoot, it would be like $5 million to shoot the series on 16 millimeter film. So we do not do that. But you know, that's kind of how I kind of go about this project, and that's kind of how I got started with the studio. And I spent a great time shooting the series with Umaine and Brant and the team over at the University of Maine.
00;09;21;17 - 00;09;42;27
John Azoni
Yeah, that's awesome. That was the thing I responded to, was it was a very filmic style but also like vlog style. So I just like wrote this line of being very approachable and almost user generated. But like if all the people generating the content were like good filmmakers, you know.
00;09;43;06 - 00;10;09;21
Patrick Wine
When we started going about the style of it, my kind of idea for it was, you know, especially with everything going, I know. And how like you watch Tron, the newest Tron movie Tron Legacy, and then the old Tron, the newest Tron movie, has amazing effects and it's amazingly beautiful. Everything looks crystal clear, Everything is polished. You go back and watch the the old original Tron and it is so fun and it's nostalgic and it's because it's got that texture quality to it.
00;10;09;21 - 00;10;27;27
Patrick Wine
Now I kind of equate it. This is a new one that I just came out with like two days ago, but I bought a typewriter recently and I would equate the life in the Pine Series to producing a video series with a typewriter and not using A.I. to write everything. It's got that texture to it. It's got something, you know, someone is behind it doing it.
00;10;27;27 - 00;10;36;16
Patrick Wine
And it's not just crystal clear AK video, you know, which gives it a uniqueness, you know, a tactile quality, one could say. So yeah.
00;10;37;00 - 00;11;10;02
John Azoni
Yeah. And the other thing I responded to was the walk and talk interview format, because, you know, the typical interview format is, you know, sit down. A couple of cameras cut back and forth between cameras. It's tried and true. It works. And I found this to be really cool because it was almost like because you had an interview in these videos, you do have them doing a more static interview that they're sitting down And but then you have this this element where they're walking around and just saying whatever, almost as if no one's asking them questions like they're just walking around.
00;11;10;02 - 00;11;23;14
John Azoni
And I think that just gives such a great sense of movement, but also just authenticity to, you know, you feel like they're not being guided by the marketing team behind the camera. So that's what I love about it. How did you achieve that look?
00;11;23;14 - 00;11;44;10
Patrick Wine
Patrick Yeah, So when we were thinking about how we wanted to film it, the first rule that I wanted to have for this was it's one person, one crew only because, you know, college students having been on that, you know, videographer for Umaine and at CU Boulder before that, as a student, you know, you get a whole crew there with like ten people and all the big lights and cameras and stuff and people start to clam up.
00;11;44;10 - 00;12;00;11
Patrick Wine
They get nervous. And I didn't want that. So the whole time I was like, I just want one camera, one live mic or, you know, and a shotgun mike for safety. And that's it. And so for the walk and talk part, we wanted to have, like you said, exactly what you're saying is what we want it. We wanted them to be real, you know, and not feel guided.
00;12;00;11 - 00;12;20;19
Patrick Wine
So I put the camera on a tripod and emulated the what we call like a Snorri cam. And in cinema, typically, we use that to show, like when people are under the influence or like drugged or you really want to get into the space of that person. And so we emulated that because it really puts you in that space in that headspace of them, you're with them.
00;12;21;00 - 00;12;36;02
Patrick Wine
So the camera was on a tripod. The two arms went under their underarms and then one just right in their stomach, and they just walked around holding it like that. And the only rule is they have to move the upper body as one piece, because that's how you get that. If you don't do that, then it just looks like a vlogging camera.
00;12;36;14 - 00;12;52;00
Patrick Wine
So you have to move. Everything is one. Then I said, All right, here's the questions that we've talked about. Go out and tell me about you, Main. Tell me what you loved. Tell me what you hated. Tell me what you, you know, maybe not hate it, but tell me what you loved to tell me, what you maybe had trouble with when you started.
00;12;52;10 - 00;13;10;04
Patrick Wine
Give me all of it. Spill the beans. And oh, so in season one, actually, if you go watch Haven, Jones was a phenomenal. He was one of the first people we actually filmed for this entire project. And he it was a beautiful fall afternoon. And I said, All right, Haven, here you go. This is the set up. And he goes, All right, this is so cool.
00;13;10;11 - 00;13;24;10
Patrick Wine
And he gets on his one wheel, which is like, for those that don't know when, we like a kind of like a skateboard thing, but it's got a giant like offroad wheel in the middle of it and it's electric and you ride around. Anyway, he got on this one wheel, was holding the tripod like this. And I said, Just talk about you mean.
00;13;24;10 - 00;13;35;12
Patrick Wine
And then he went off and rode all over campus for like 20 minutes. And I just sat on the mall looking at the trees. Oh, well, this kid's rolling around campus on his one wheeler with a camera talking about his day.
00;13;35;12 - 00;13;37;00
John Azoni
Hoping he didn't crash with your camera.
00;13;37;00 - 00;13;54;17
Patrick Wine
Yeah, no, exactly. That's what I've got insurance for. Yeah. Yeah. You know what? I've never had anything happen yet, so that's lucky. And we're on season three anyway. That's kind of how we went about it. And then they'd come back. Then I just listen to what they have to say and we might do one more like that. We might do two different walking talk styles.
00;13;54;17 - 00;14;07;02
Patrick Wine
And then like you said, there is one sit down that I typically do, and I mainly do that one for safety. I do that in a spot where I know that I have control over the wind, control over sound. So I always have a backup to cut too, but that's mainly the reason I do that one.
00;14;07;04 - 00;14;24;13
John Azoni
So yeah, it's good to have a safety and you know, you do want the marketing team to be involved at some point, you know, and there's nothing wrong with the marketing team being involved. You want to make sure you're getting the messaging right. Obviously, there has to be a business purpose for these videos. They have to influence enrollment in some way.
00;14;24;13 - 00;14;40;02
John Azoni
So that's that's all fine. But I like that balance of like, yeah, we got that. But also let's just let them go go rogue and talk about whatever they want. Yeah. For a little bit. For people who are trying to wrap their heads around, I think it's hard to wrap your head around if you aren't seeing the video.
00;14;40;02 - 00;14;55;12
John Azoni
But for people who are trying to picture this walk and talk angle, it's almost as if someone on LinkedIn described it as a selfie stick. They thought it was a selfie stick if you had like a selfie stick, but it was like permanently attached to their body. So it just kind of moves with them. It's kind of like that.
00;14;55;17 - 00;15;18;22
John Azoni
Yeah. Okay. So the other thing too, and I'd love to get your take on this brand is because the editing style has a lot of personality. It has this filmic quality and it has this vlog quality that honestly, like I feel like a lot of higher ed would not allow. You know, there's a lot of personality in it that I think a lot of higher.
00;15;18;22 - 00;15;39;13
John Azoni
Ed Markham leaders in enrollment leaders they want that they like it when they see it in other schools. But when it comes to them doing it for their brand, they're like, that's too out there. We have to use these know specific font, these specific colors, this exact, you know, this blah, blah, blah. But so, Bren, what was your thinking with just allowing that sort of like, loose editing style?
00;15;39;25 - 00;16;04;22
Brenn Borror
Yeah, absolutely. I mean, I think it's important for me that these videos feel genuine and a lot of the work that we do, I mean, it's beautiful, it's stunning. It's cinematic. But like if you see it, you know, it's a commercial. Like, you know, it's an advertisement for the university. And in some ways that's a really helpful tool at certain times and other times it feels like what people are seeing right through that, right?
00;16;04;22 - 00;16;23;11
Brenn Borror
Like you're selling me something. And for me, it was important for this series to not to feel that way. And that's part of the reason why we didn't end up pursuing that kind of like boxed option that was pitched to us is because the students were pretty obviously reading off of a teleprompter or had been kind of like prepped with questions.
00;16;23;11 - 00;16;56;06
Brenn Borror
And I want to make sure if a student struggled through something or it was a hard transition into university life or they moved from far away and they miss their family, or there's the first time that them moving in was the first time they were ever on campus because they chose to come sight unseen. Those are the really interesting human parts of the experience, and they're the part of the experience that students need to to feel like, Oh, I can overcome that too, because nobody's like choosing to go to university is a big life decision no matter what.
00;16;56;07 - 00;17;12;29
Brenn Borror
Whether you're a first generation student or everybody in your family's gone through college like it's a big life decision and we want to showcase that. Like these students that are here now have been right where you are and have overcome those things. And I think it just breeds that kind of sense of like, Oh, they're not selling me something.
00;17;12;29 - 00;17;22;21
Brenn Borror
They're willing to show that behind the scenes a little bit. And I feel like I can trust these student voices more than I could. Something that feels overtly like a commercial.
00;17;23;10 - 00;17;30;07
John Azoni
Yeah. And how were the videos received from leadership? Was there any challenges to them that you had to overcome or.
00;17;30;21 - 00;17;57;26
Brenn Borror
That's a good question, and maybe Patrick has a different perspective on this. But, you know, we started producing the series in my kind of like after I've been here for a year, and when I started at the university, we started doing a lot of things that were new and very different. So I kind of spent that first year building trust with other folks on campus that like the ideas that are coming out of our office, even though they might not look the way they have in the past, are still effective and can still be successful.
00;17;58;05 - 00;18;13;27
Brenn Borror
And so with that kind of like bedrock and place, we went into this knowing it was going to be kind of exploratory. And I think you guys go into those first review meetings with a little bit of like, I don't know what people are going to think about this, especially when you're partnering with like another office on campus, right?
00;18;13;29 - 00;18;26;28
Brenn Borror
It's not just our team that's calling the shots on this one. And you might remember this differently, but it felt like everybody was bought in like right after they watched the first episode, even though it was different, it was like, oh, like I never imagined it could feel like this.
00;18;27;10 - 00;18;27;19
John Azoni
Yeah.
00;18;27;27 - 00;18;45;14
Patrick Wine
Oh, no, I remember it like it was yesterday because this was one of the first really like, good sized contracts that the studio got was working with you on this. And so I was obviously, you know, floored and I was like, okay, let's do this. We were in the meeting and it was the matches episode. So season one, Patrick Viola to match.
00;18;45;14 - 00;19;06;00
Patrick Wine
I mean, it's the satellite campus out on the coast and I was expecting like some comments here and there, you know, because it was like Brand said, it was exploratory. It was, you know, different. And I took some creative ideas like making it look super filmic and like we had talked about that. But, you know, I did it like I was thinking and, and everyone was just like, Yeah, cool.
00;19;06;00 - 00;19;34;23
Patrick Wine
I love it. And that was that, you know? And now I would say like building off of what Brand said. I mean, we're on season three now, so, you know, it seemed like it was very well received in that meeting. And I think one of the things that I remember people feeling was exactly what I wanted it to, like, evoke and people is that feeling of like even though most of the time, you know, the people that are at the flagship campus in or know aren't out in matches doing the stuff out there, you know, because it's like 2 hours away.
00;19;35;06 - 00;19;51;16
Patrick Wine
I still was like, Oh my gosh, I love it there. You know, that place is amazing. This is somewhere I love. I get to be part of this like I am part of that college. And I made an impact on that student. You know? So I think that was I remember that really clearly from that meeting. That was Yeah, yeah, that was a good meeting.
00;19;51;17 - 00;19;51;28
John Azoni
Yeah, I.
00;19;51;28 - 00;19;59;16
Brenn Borror
Think it's always a good sign for me, like when I watch a video like that and I'm like, man, I wish I went here for my undergrad, like I'm selling myself on the school, you know?
00;19;59;19 - 00;20;19;10
John Azoni
Yeah, yeah, yeah, for sure. That's always the, you know, we do a lot of videos and that's one of the things that I say, you know, after a good interview is like, makes me want to go like, leave my job and go study that thing. Yeah, You know, I've experienced that a handful of times where people are just really good at just talking about it and being excited about it and there's just something special about that.
00;20;19;18 - 00;20;38;09
John Azoni
And the other thing I wanted to point out that I really responded to was the fact that you're calling these a season and episodes and, you know, whatever I'm browsing the Internet or just whatever, I'm always kind of like the part of my brain is like the marketer in me. That's like thinking, like, why did I like that?
00;20;38;09 - 00;21;07;09
John Azoni
Or like, why didn't I like that? And I'm always like, kind of analyzing and I'm like something about just calling it a season made me want to watch multiple episodes, you know? And it's almost like, I mean, it's literally a one word addition or a change, and suddenly I feel like you're giving my brain the cue to go down a rabbit hole, which is different than having a playlist that's like, Well, here's the the arts program and here's the this program.
00;21;07;09 - 00;21;22;00
John Azoni
And then that program, which, you know, can function as a rabbit hole as a lot of playlists do. But something about calling it a season and episodes, I just noticed in my brain, I was like, oh, like I kind of want to, like, watch this whole series, you know? Yeah.
00;21;22;13 - 00;21;35;27
Brenn Borror
Yeah, I wish I could say that that was like a master stroke of, like marketing genius and that we were like, Oh, if we say season, then they'll want to watch all of it. But like, you know, when you're putting these things together, you're trying to find a way to package them and like, put together your release strategy.
00;21;36;07 - 00;22;10;16
Brenn Borror
And it's what made sense at the time. But I know something that was really in my mind as we were working on the first season, and that still is kind of a hallmark of how we do this is like even if a student isn't interested in a particular major, we still want that video to have something for them, whether it be you know, like a students really into intramurals or they always wanted to see this part of main and this video showcases that part of main or the student is from this state that I'm from and I can better understand what my experience relocating is going to be like, even though they're into whatever forestry
00;22;10;16 - 00;22;12;04
Brenn Borror
and I'm into marine biology, Right?
00;22;12;14 - 00;22;35;06
John Azoni
Yeah. The fact that I mean, because the first one I watched was the forestry one and I noticed myself like and Bren, you and I were talking before we started recording about gardening. That's my latest obsession is just like being out in my yard and like, just tweaking. Just like looking like, watching paint dry, like looking for sprouts to come up and but I watched that forestry one.
00;22;35;06 - 00;22;51;23
John Azoni
I'm like, I'm not a forester, but like I could get into that. And the fact that, like, this guy is taking me around the forest and I'm seeing like the stuff, like the culture of Umaine here is like very nature that made me want to go there even just to be in that environment. Yeah, you're so cool.
00;22;51;23 - 00;23;11;04
Patrick Wine
Because it was just an internship that. I'm guessing that was Allan's outlet. Yeah. And that was like two and a half hours away. And he did an internship. We just lived out there for like two months and we connected and we were like, Yeah, we definitely want to show that. And so we went out and got in a truck and drove like 30 miles into the pure Northwoods.
00;23;11;04 - 00;23;19;15
Patrick Wine
Nothing around and just like walked into the woods, couldn't see nothing. And it was cool to like, that's what these students get to do, you know? So I think it's.
00;23;20;06 - 00;23;21;12
John Azoni
You know, this is something.
00;23;21;12 - 00;23;53;16
Brenn Borror
We didn't get to talk about when we first recorded this, so maybe I could take the opportunity. But, you know, one of the things that I think makes us unique is that we don't have a set plan for how the story is going to go. We pre interview all of the students who we work with, and we're really trying to find like what are the three unique and identifiable pieces of their story that just come through conversation that we want to make sure we can highlight whether it's like an internship or the fact that they play in a band or like one of the students who came to Umaine is an international student who came
00;23;53;16 - 00;24;09;20
Brenn Borror
without like a car. Anything he had. I can't remember who was a professor or somebody, a staff member, but they ended up bartering with him. They were like, If you give me a chocolate bar, I'll give you this bike that I had it. And so like we ended up like Patrick ended up recording him, like riding the bike around and telling that little story.
00;24;09;20 - 00;24;15;24
Brenn Borror
But we wouldn't have known that had we not done that kind of pre interview and specifically sought out those things that are unique details.
00;24;16;00 - 00;24;26;12
John Azoni
Yeah, I'm always collecting good interview questions. What was the question that you used to arrive at that story of like trading a chocolate bar for a bike? That's a great question. I don't know. I don't.
00;24;26;12 - 00;24;38;23
Brenn Borror
Remember. Yeah, I don't remember. I wish I do because like, you know, you're just always waiting for those, like, little things to come out that it's like, okay, that's going to be the linchpin that's going to help connect like the community life, you know, whatever it's going to be.
00;24;38;23 - 00;24;56;27
Patrick Wine
Yeah, I can't remember if that came out of a pre-interview or because lots of times, like weird moments pop out because I like, we'll do the pre-interview questions and then when I'm actually interviewing them, I go down the rabbit holes and try to find tangents and, you know, use my way into their stories. And I cannot remember because that was, gosh, two years ago at this point too.
00;24;56;28 - 00;25;13;16
Patrick Wine
Yeah, yeah. He traded a chocolate bar for a bicycle with a professor and he's so funny. I love keytar, but yeah, I know their favorite question. Actually, it's their least favorite question, if you like. A good question is describe the University of Maine poetically. And that's how we get our best quotes. I would say is.
00;25;13;21 - 00;25;15;09
John Azoni
Oh, I would hate that one too. Yeah.
00;25;16;03 - 00;25;24;12
Patrick Wine
Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's it's tough. I'm like your Thoreau kayak or, you know, canoeing through the wilderness. What do you do? You know? So, yeah, sometimes I get good answers.
00;25;24;12 - 00;25;48;03
John Azoni
What the responses would be on that. Yeah. Yeah. It's funny when you embrace those things that initially make you like cringe a little bit, like they can kind of be the best exercises I had. I used to have this business coach and we would do this workshop every year like goal planning for the next year. And it's this big long process of, you know, that you go through this like formulated process of structuring out your goals.
00;25;48;03 - 00;26;07;29
John Azoni
But one of the part is write a letter to yourself from last year describing how that year's going to go and what you need to watch out for and stuff. And I was like resisted that. So hard. I'm like, I can't it's so corny. I can't like my coach is going to see this. So yeah, yeah, yeah. It's like weirdly intimate.
00;26;08;02 - 00;26;30;27
John Azoni
But then I wrote it and I was like, Oh, I actually, like, I actually discovered something about myself and about my goals by doing that. Yeah. Yeah. Okay, well, we've got about 20 minutes and we've got a lot of questions, so I want to happen to the Q&A here. I often post when I remember to to post on LinkedIn and ask people to submit questions and sometimes they do and sometimes they don't.
00;26;30;27 - 00;26;49;05
John Azoni
Sometimes we get one, sometimes we get none. In this case, I think we had six or seven. So and then all the agencies that are listening to this episode in the car all just went six seven urgent alphas. I guess that would be. Yeah, I said this when we recorded the first time, but I apologize in advance if I mess up your name.
00;26;49;17 - 00;27;10;09
John Azoni
I intended to, like, reach out individually to each of these people to, like, ask them to pronounce their name for me. And then I realized that I never did. So Dustin Ramsdell higher ed EdTech content creator. I'd want to know more about the launch process. Did they have to do a prototype to justify the investments or did they have the freedom to enable this vision on their own?
00;27;10;26 - 00;27;30;12
Brenn Borror
Yeah, I mean, I think we spoke to this a little bit. This series came together after I'd already been at the university for about a year, and so we had that level of trust and buy in. That just comes with time and continued connection. And then we did this opportunity where there was some level of buy in on this concept of like a video tour series through campus.
00;27;30;23 - 00;27;50;04
Brenn Borror
And because, you know, there was already kind of an idea of how much that might cost and what it would take to produce it, we were able to leverage that information. The fact that people already were kind of into it and pivot it into this thing that was a little bit more brand aligned for the university. So not really any tricks to justify the investment.
00;27;50;04 - 00;28;08;25
Brenn Borror
I think, folks, you know, this is true and higher ed in general. I think people really understand the power of video now at this point. And so it's like they've got this idea for what it could be. We know what it can be and how do we bring people along for the ride. And the fact of the matter is, you just kind of have to back it up with the quality of the work, right?
00;28;08;25 - 00;28;19;29
Brenn Borror
Like that first episode that we went in and showed like that speaks to Patrick's talent for capturing these stories. Like, you know, there was after that first videos like No Reservations, like, let's go finish off the season.
00;28;20;10 - 00;28;27;20
Patrick Wine
And I would kind of say, I guess the first I don't remember when we did the first season, if there was a plan for second, third, fourth, fifth at all.
00;28;28;05 - 00;28;28;17
John Azoni
No.
00;28;29;15 - 00;28;30;02
Brenn Borror
Not really.
00;28;30;08 - 00;28;31;07
John Azoni
Yeah, I think it.
00;28;31;07 - 00;28;31;22
Brenn Borror
Was like.
00;28;31;26 - 00;28;33;15
Patrick Wine
The season was a test, I guess.
00;28;33;16 - 00;28;35;03
Brenn Borror
Like, yeah, in some ways, yeah.
00;28;35;10 - 00;28;35;18
John Azoni
Yeah.
00;28;35;26 - 00;28;36;26
Patrick Wine
Unexpectedly. Yeah.
00;28;37;22 - 00;28;50;11
John Azoni
Yeah. Okay. Aaron Valente, content creator at University of Kansas, says Great chair and great video content. Wow, I love their tour, my major series and I'd love to know how they approached that.
00;28;50;21 - 00;29;12;10
Brenn Borror
Yeah. So two of my major as another video series that we produce which actually came after we did the first season of Life in the Pines, and we saw how much people resonated with the kind of like handheld camera, you know, student kind of leading the interview. And so, you know, we often have different departments on campus come to us and say, Hey, can you highlight X program?
00;29;12;10 - 00;29;28;11
Brenn Borror
We're really trying to make a push this year for this enrollment cycle. And so one of the things we're always trying to do in our shop is think, okay, how can I solve this kind of like a common or universal problem for campus through a solution that's you know, that can either become a series or it can be a little bit more turnkey.
00;29;28;11 - 00;29;54;07
Brenn Borror
So we're not reinventing the wheel every single time somebody comes to us with a need like this. And so two of my major was really born out of that. And rather than trying to do the fall like all encompassing, this is the story of the student, the student into or my major really becomes an ambassador for the program and they speak through their experience and we take them really specifically through classroom environments or training environments or research labs or that kind of thing.
00;29;54;07 - 00;30;10;03
Brenn Borror
So it's a little more academic in nature, but it still has that kind of handheld blog feel where it's the student telling the story and it's not, you know, faculty or somebody else. And it's it's short form, too. That's another another element here. We're trying to keep these things at least pretty concise.
00;30;10;17 - 00;30;16;29
John Azoni
Awesome. That's helpful. Samantha Perry for Main Says Brand borrower is the goat. Yeah.
00;30;16;29 - 00;30;28;00
Brenn Borror
So Sam oversees social media strategy for the university and she's great. She's excellent. So always good to have very smart and social media strategist in your camp. So appreciate the shout out.
00;30;28;17 - 00;30;53;05
John Azoni
I originally reached out to Sam about this episode and then she told me to reach out to you. Brand So thanks for the assists and so Mikki Bodell or Bodell, hopefully one of those is right. Formerly at Dartmouth College and now senior social media manager at King Arthur Baking Company, which I have in my pantry, the flour. I'm going to shorten this question a little bit.
00;30;53;05 - 00;31;11;01
John Azoni
What are the YouTube analytics look like behind the scenes? This is the kind of work that the whole industry seems to aspire to. Beautifully produced. The styling is great. Love the selfie stick and the cinematic B-roll combo. Most comms teams can't pull the resources together for this stuff. Anything converting for admissions or reputation?
00;31;11;14 - 00;31;33;12
Brenn Borror
Yeah, absolutely. It's a good question and I think it's something that's on everybody's mind when they're trying to kind of wrap their head around the investment of a series like this. And truth be told, we're not laser focused on performance with series like this. If you're measuring by overall like organic views and that kind of thing, and particularly not on on YouTube.
00;31;33;12 - 00;31;54;17
Brenn Borror
So like the second season of Life in the Pines, the viewership on YouTube comprises like less than 2% of our overall view count. If you're considering like Instagram or TikTok or whatever, and something that's been, you know, a little bit of a paradigm shift for us is we're not considering these videos to be the place where we're going to convert a student, right?
00;31;54;17 - 00;32;17;20
Brenn Borror
Like I don't think somebody is going to see one of these videos and then go, you know, submit their application to come to the university. What I'm always thinking about is like, how do we continue to like, pull prospective students into our orbit and get them closer and closer to the university? And so I think of these videos as like a little stepping stone and movement toward us, you know, particularly for these videos.
00;32;17;20 - 00;32;52;12
Brenn Borror
And when I think about our YouTube strategy in general, I'm not thinking about them as tools for awareness generation or that kind of like first time they're going to interact with you, man. I think of it as like an opportunity to connect with the student that's maybe midway through their search process. Kind of has seen what's out there, and these videos get to be a really unique, different and kind of like uniquely identifiable opportunity to understand what the University of Maine is, what it's like to live in Maine and help distinguish Umaine from the other schools that they're looking at.
00;32;52;12 - 00;33;11;21
Brenn Borror
And as much as I want, you know, a video like this to move a student toward the university, I also think it's just as helpful for students who are making that choice to say, okay, that's probably not the right school for me, right? Like the marketer in me always is trying to move a student toward us, but the human in me is like I also want people to figure out if this is the right place for them, right?
00;33;11;21 - 00;33;20;19
Brenn Borror
Umaine is not going to be the right choice for every single student. And I think videos like this help students make that that decision, you know, a little bit easier.
00;33;21;21 - 00;33;36;13
Patrick Wine
And I think it's like virality versus evergreen, you know, because video that might grow super viral on YouTube may only survive being viral for a month. And then it has no purpose. But something like this is evergreen. And it's going to I mean, ten years from now, these videos are going to do the same thing that they're doing today.
00;33;36;24 - 00;34;04;22
Patrick Wine
And I think one of the other aspects of that we talked about this last time a little bit, but is it's also helpful for students that are already at UMAINE for retention, because I've talked to a lot of students on campus doing other projects outside of life in the pines, and most people know about it. They watch it and the people that I've talked to about it are like, Oh my gosh, it's so cool to go to a school where I get to see that stuff for like, Yeah, I saw this episode and that was my friend and I think Brant can probably talk to this a little bit more, but like I think it
00;34;04;22 - 00;34;19;27
Patrick Wine
does a very good job at that to the point where they don't actually have to go find students anymore. Like, do you want to bring that up? Because I feel like that's better for you to talk about. But I think that's a good example of how this benefits the students already here too, and keeping them from like going somewhere else in years or whatever.
00;34;20;10 - 00;34;51;03
Brenn Borror
Yeah, I mean, there's always that question of like, how do you get students that are going to be good on camera or like, how do you go and actively recruit students? And to be honest, the first season was really a proactive outreach process for us. So we were working with our colleges and the deans and other faculty and staff members to identify students that are good representatives of their area and then we do the interview, that kind of first interview, to make sure, okay, there's something here that we can work with and the student's going to be engaged with us in the process, but we never know exactly how they're going to be on camera
00;34;51;10 - 00;35;09;26
Brenn Borror
and that's really Patrick's, you know, one of his unique skills is really making people feel comfortable and kind of getting the best out of them when they're behind the camera or in front of a camera. And then after the success of the first season, for the second season, we were basically able to do an open call through Instagram and say, Hey, if you've seen these and you want to be part of the next season, let us know.
00;35;09;28 - 00;35;31;09
Brenn Borror
And so we had students reach out to us that way, and that's pretty much how we cast the entire second season. And then now two years into this process, we've done it again for the third season, but we actually upped our ask little bit. And for students that were interested, we asked that they submit like a little 62nd video of themselves answering a question just again to try to get a sense of like how they feel on camera.
00;35;31;09 - 00;35;51;07
Brenn Borror
But also it's really important for us to have students that are really committed to being part of the process because these shoots are typically not one day. Sometimes they but that's typically multiple days, you know, where it's like, okay, I'm going to connect with you and early in the semester and then maybe I'll check back in with you a couple of weeks later when you're doing this like unique, specific activity.
00;35;51;15 - 00;35;57;05
Brenn Borror
And so we need students that you're going to be in it with us and willing to to work on a little bit longer time horizon.
00;35;57;19 - 00;36;13;19
Patrick Wine
Yeah. And I think that kind of showcases the, you know, how it's affecting people on campus as well, you know, or even freshmen like we have sophomores doing it and, you know, people are seeing it and applying and I don't think they do that, especially doing those second videos. If they didn't like the series, you know what I mean?
00;36;13;19 - 00;36;27;14
Patrick Wine
Or it didn't affect them in some way. So I think it's fun to see that. I think we lots of times look at I mean, obviously I'm not on the marketing team, but I would think, you know, a lot of times we're looking outward like getting students to come to your main, but also or any college. But it's also about keeping students there.
00;36;27;14 - 00;36;39;06
Patrick Wine
I can say when I was at CU Boulder, I love to see you, but I looked at switching to UT Austin when I was there my freshman year. I decided to stay, but it crossed my mind. And I will say that some of the videos I see you put out kept me there.
00;36;39;09 - 00;36;40;27
John Azoni
So yeah.
00;36;41;05 - 00;36;42;18
Patrick Wine
Yeah. And I ended up working with that team.
00;36;42;18 - 00;36;58;10
John Azoni
So I'll send that to our friends at CU Boulder. Yeah, I'm sure they'll be glad to hear that. Yeah. I mean, we don't think about retention enough because I, you know, I've mentioned a number of times on this podcast, I went to a school, my first year of art school was in Baltimore, and then I ended up transferring back home.
00;36;58;17 - 00;37;17;03
John Azoni
And so like I was one of those students that like bailed and, you know, there are things that could have been done to keep me there. And it's important. It's important to to keep students, current students engaged. And I think when they they can see themselves in a thing, when it's a thing like a series, you know, an episode, whatever, now it's like, okay, now I want to be part of this.
00;37;17;09 - 00;37;46;26
John Azoni
And the other thing you mentioned is like the time commitment. And that's the one thing that I've learned from casting a lot of these types of things. For our own work. We have a whole process that we do with every school that we work with, that we do casting for. We always like continue to refine the process. And one of the helpful things has been adding in like just setting expectations for like how long we're going to need them for because we've had it happen where they're like really excited and then they're like, All right, well, I've got an hour for you.
00;37;47;08 - 00;38;09;14
John Azoni
And I'm like, Oh, we're like really far into this. For you to be telling me now that you only have an hour to film. So it's good to set those expectations upfront. Okay. I want to combine two questions here. So Elias Moser from University of Kansas asks, I'd love to hear more about what they view as a successful video series.
00;38;09;22 - 00;38;32;01
John Azoni
While they have a great subscriber count, it seems like they don't get many views. That's the one thing we all kind of talked about that. But coupling that with Matt Haimes from three Enrollment Marketing says What are the implications of managing a feed that went viral 15 years ago? How does it impact planning and reporting? So I think what some people might be responding to is the high subscriber count.
00;38;32;17 - 00;38;39;19
John Azoni
Are these videos driving that or was something else driving that? And these videos are being used for something else. So give us some context about that.
00;38;39;20 - 00;39;18;25
Brenn Borror
Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. I often feel like our YouTube subscriber count does us a disservice because there's maybe maybe 38,000 or 40 subscribers on our YouTube channel. And really those predominantly came from a series of videos that were produced by the university's Cooperative Extension Program many years ago, like early 20 tens. And they're great videos, but they're all focused in this kind of like how to style, whether it be like how to prune your raspberry bushes or how to get your garden ready for the winter, or like it's those kind of like life life things that a lot of people are interested in.
00;39;18;25 - 00;39;43;05
Brenn Borror
And the extension just did an excellent job during that period of time and they still release great instructional content. But that period was really of YouTube culture was like YouTube as a search engine to figure out how do I solve this problem? And they played right into that. And so, you know, I still think the most viewed video on our YouTube channel is like instructional on how to cook a lobster, which, you know, that feels kind of on brand for me.
00;39;43;05 - 00;40;07;27
Brenn Borror
And so I'm not mad about that. Yeah but you know so that's where a majority of those subscribers came from. And we're glad to have those people around, but they're not necessarily the ones that are watching the Life in the Pie and series, Right. And so, yeah, you know, the question about like impacting planning and reporting, YouTube is not necessarily pillar platform for us and that we're not expecting that to be the place where we're getting the majority of our viewership.
00;40;08;09 - 00;40;40;06
Brenn Borror
We know that Instagram and TikTok and Facebook are platforms for us where we can reach both our existing audience, but also new audiences just more effectively than we can on YouTube. So, you know, we spoke about that a little bit. But to me, YouTube is really helpful for that middle section of the buying decision process where you're like, okay, I'm already pretty bought in on the idea of this school and now I want to go on the rabbit hole, like down the rabbit hole and, learn everything that there is to know and really get a sense of this place.
00;40;40;14 - 00;40;52;29
Brenn Borror
And I find that students are really doing that before they, like come for a visit. Right. So I think we've seen the stages of the enrollment process kind of flip around a little bit in the past few years where like, you know, students really apply.
00;40;52;29 - 00;40;53;20
John Azoni
First.
00;40;54;00 - 00;41;13;07
Brenn Borror
And wait to see if they're in and then they'll go for like a campus tour or a campus visit or something like that. But I still think there's that in-between part where they're trying to get a sense of the place before they even get there. I know I do that myself with like buying decisions like I'm a nerd about, like researching the things that I buy because, like, I just want to know everything that I can know before I make that choice.
00;41;13;18 - 00;41;22;17
Brenn Borror
And I think videos like this and the way I see our YouTube channel is like it's an opportunity for people that are in that stage of the buying process to go and learn as much as they can.
00;41;23;09 - 00;41;56;09
John Azoni
Yeah, and I actually after the first time we recorded this episode, I wrote a whole newsletter based on this, that topic of our conversation last time about, you know, low value accounts don't tell the whole story or don't even tell the story at all because, you know, I think people are looking for the wrong story. They're looking for like view counts equals success and actually, a lot of times, you know, I've heard, you know, people say that like you actually like going viral hurt me, you know, or something like that, you know, because we now we got all these viewers that are completely irrelevant.
00;41;56;16 - 00;42;18;25
John Azoni
The algorithms all screwed up. It's delivering our stuff now to all these random people that came from the virality. And no one's buying our stuff and so and it made me reflect on my journey as a content creator. I'm on LinkedIn every day, and I'm very consistent with this podcast and a newsletter. You would look at my follower, count on LinkedIn and not bat an eye.
00;42;19;03 - 00;42;40;04
John Azoni
It's not that impressive. You would look at my subscribers on my newsletters, not that impressive. And my YouTube. Ah, I'm a my podcast analytics under the hood also bordering on embarrassing if you're to like, you know, how many downloads do you get or whatever. I mean, this pack has been around since 2021, so five years in and it really like the under the hood numbers haven't budged much.
00;42;40;13 - 00;43;06;18
John Azoni
But what I do get is like a lot of number one, I can point to many amounts of dollars that I've booked as a result of certain podcast episodes where I would not have gotten that opportunity outside of that. So number one, that's the thing. I don't care about views. I care about putting food on the table, you know, And then also, you know, I'm going for deeply engaged people.
00;43;06;21 - 00;43;26;03
John Azoni
I'm creating a library for the higher ed marketer or enrollment management leader that has these problems and is looking at how to solve them. And they're going to land on my YouTube or they're going to land on, you know, Apple Podcasts or whatever and go, Oh my gosh, there's a whole library of problems that are being solved. Episode after episode.
00;43;26;09 - 00;43;47;28
John Azoni
I want to go down this list and I get that kind of feedback a lot where it's like, Oh my gosh, I discovered your podcast and there's so many great topics, like I have all these problems. Like we need to reorient ourselves to what success looks like because a lot of the marketing work that Higher Ed teams do is really living in that middle funnel because a lot of times the top of the funnel is taken care of by whoever's running the ads.
00;43;48;10 - 00;44;10;22
John Azoni
You know, maybe they're creating a top of funnel, you know, series organically, but the general like we're marketing this program and we're creating this anthem video and stuff. Like there's not millions of people that that's even going to apply to, but there are millions of people, 3.5 million people who viewed this video of yours. Your top video is how to look for and avoid bedbugs.
00;44;10;22 - 00;44;17;09
John Azoni
Is it the hotels or or motel rooms? That applies to literally everybody, you know.
00;44;17;11 - 00;44;17;23
Patrick Wine
You know.
00;44;19;19 - 00;44;20;11
John Azoni
The bed bugs.
00;44;20;11 - 00;44;22;22
Brenn Borror
Video. Yeah, yeah, yeah. No. And you know.
00;44;22;22 - 00;44;23;28
John Azoni
And I'm not mad about.
00;44;23;28 - 00;44;27;00
Brenn Borror
It right. Like I'm glad for people to have that information.
00;44;27;12 - 00;44;27;24
John Azoni
And.
00;44;28;01 - 00;44;42;12
Brenn Borror
You know on the off chance someone watches that that has like a kid that's in high school right now and they're like, oh, the University of Maine is like doing interesting stuff. Like, that's not such a bad thing. But I'm not expecting that to be the default scenario by which we obtain a student Right.
00;44;42;27 - 00;45;10;26
John Azoni
Yeah. And the other thing I mentioned to in, in my newsletter about this was like when you're doing distribution properly because distribution is like one of my huge pillars, like, why are you creating this thing if you're just going to let the algorithm like blow it into the wind and see what happens if you're doing proper distribution in your hand, delivering that or a hand embedding that into specific spots where people are going to see it, you know, low view account is to be expected because thousands of people aren't getting this email or, you know, whatever the context is.
00;45;10;26 - 00;45;28;11
John Azoni
So it's actually kind of a sign that you're not playing to the algorithm. You're actually playing to like what is going to actually get us results in the in the door with this video. And this has to be used as a tool for enrollment. It's, you know, it's not a just a bragging thing of company, you know, comments and likes and stuff we got.
00;45;28;11 - 00;45;30;19
John Azoni
Yeah, if no one's signing up for anything.
00;45;30;19 - 00;45;52;00
Brenn Borror
Yeah. Like, I don't want people to listen to this and then think, okay, I'm going to go pitch this same kind of thing and like, sell it based on viewership or like the opportunity to go because there is no world where a three minute student story from a university that most people don't think about in their day to day is going to take off like it's just yeah, it's just not what's going to happen.
00;45;52;03 - 00;46;09;18
John Azoni
Yeah, Yeah. Awesome. All right. Well, this has been great. Thanks for humoring us a second time here. And I feel like this episode was as good, if not better, than the first time recorded because we got a lot of practice. Yeah, there we go. I see numbers still rolling on Riverside. That's a good sign. I see.
00;46;09;18 - 00;46;13;21
Patrick Wine
I'm in the pines march on, too. So, you know, little shout out there.
00;46;14;19 - 00;46;16;24
John Azoni
Yeah. Yeah. Patrick really came prepared. Yeah, Yeah.
00;46;16;24 - 00;46;20;24
Patrick Wine
Universal Store. Yeah.
00;46;20;24 - 00;46;29;20
John Azoni
Yes. All right, well, where can people connect with you guys if they want to reach out and, I don't know, hire you for video Patrick, or work on your team or whatever brand Yeah.
00;46;29;20 - 00;46;30;05
Brenn Borror
You go first.
00;46;30;05 - 00;46;45;05
Patrick Wine
Patrick All right. Yeah. So my studio is called Story Store. We're here in Bangor, Maine, but we do stuff all over so you can reach me at Patrick at Story Store, all studios dot com or look us up pretty much on any social media or the website at story store studios. And yeah, we do all sorts of stuff.
00;46;45;05 - 00;46;53;24
Patrick Wine
We do original storytelling for ourselves and people to enjoy as an and commercial, and we apply the same original storytelling to our commercials. That's specifically what we do.
00;46;54;27 - 00;47;11;13
Brenn Borror
And then, yeah, if you want to connect with me on LinkedIn, if there's opportunities on my team, I'll share those there. We're hiring right now for a few positions. And also it's great to work at Umaine even if you don't work in marketing or enrollment. So and then follow the University of Maine on Instagram or LinkedIn or TikTok.
00;47;11;13 - 00;47;13;13
Brenn Borror
If you want to see more of the stuff that we get up to.
00;47;13;25 - 00;47;26;21
Patrick Wine
Yeah, you should definitely go work at Umaine with them. They're awesome. I actually worked in Maine, but it was before Bren started. He started like the same week I left and I love when he's awesome, so definitely go join the team there. Everyone on that team is awesome.
00;47;27;04 - 00;47;38;24
John Azoni
Cool. All right, well, if this doesn't work out for me with the video thing, owning my own company, I'm coming on Bren Street. Yeah, right. Yeah. Yeah. All right. Well, thanks, guys. I appreciate it. Yeah, it sounds good. Thank you.
