Great Social Media Idea: Parental Advice

Hey now, hey now... your blogger's back! But you don't have to look out - I'm not coming for you. (No no... it's Murdock that I'm coming to get.) I had a wonderful time in San Francisco with my very best friends from college, but I'm back in the Rose City and it's time to get back to this bloggy grindstone.

Continuing the trend of beginning-of-the-year/orientation posts (it's hard to find anything other than that type of stuff being posted in higher around this time of year), here is a content goldmine explosion of a video if I ever saw one from the brilliant web team at Oberlin College.  (No seriously - they are brilliant. Go read their blog. Leaps and bounds doesn't even come close to describing how much better it is than this one, but I've always thought "leaps and bounds" was a snazzy phrase, so I'm sticking with it.)

And what is this content goldmine explosion of a video, you may be asking? Well well well - it features parents giving advice to the new students while helping move their own child into the dorms. It's heartwarming, gives great advice, and features adorable shots of families together. Ginger, get the kleenex! (And popcorn, sure.)

I have seen lots... and lots... and LOTS of videos from move-in days across the country being posted over the past few weeks, and none hold a candle to this one. It captures the emotions of move-in day so pitch perfectly, and it taps into all the wonderful things that make us feel warm and fuzzy: nostalgia, love, family, happiness, pride... the list goes on.

Just stop for a minute and think about how much more effective this is as content than a two minute video of people lifting boxes and waving at the camera, set to a snappy copyright free jingle. While something like that does capture some of the flavor of move-in day, it won't come anywhere near to matching the emotional impact this video from Oberlin College has. Those slow-mo shots of families hugging!!! Incredible.

I've said many times on this blog that our ultimate goal as social media managers should never be to get engagement. We could all just post memes and cat videos every day and accomplish that. Instead, it should be to make our community feel something. To produce and provide content worthy of bringing about an emotional reaction. It doesn't always have to be a tearjerker... it can be humor, school pride, whimsy, whatever... as long as it connects on a deeper level. Which this video from Oberlin does in spades.

Major props to Oberlin College for standing out from the orientation video crows so distinctly! Really a wonderful bit of true social media success. Here here!