Lauri Nilo, Social Media Manager at Simply Measured
By Cheval John
Today’s episode features Lauri Nilo, social media manager for Simply Measured.
This interview was recorded months before Simply Measured got acquired by Sprout Social.
You will hear
-how Lauri’s entrepreneur mindset led her to start her blog
-how she helped grew the readership of the Gonzaga University Student Publications’ Bulldog Blog by 1,141 views
-the importance of studying abroad
-the one person she admires past or present who she would spend one day with
Snippet on Vallano Media TV
Full episode on BlogTalkRadio
Simply Measured’s website: www.simplymeasured.com
Lauri’s LinkedIn Page
Quotes from Lauri Nilo On
COLLEGE STUDENTS GETTING INTERNSHIPS
I think it’s really important for college students to have an internship before they graduate so that they can see what it’s like in the working world.
A lot of times what you learn in the classroom can be different from how things are actually implemented in the real world.
Let’s say for example, I anted to be a social media manager when I was in college and I thought that this is what being a social media manager meant and then I just went straight into this position and I found out like, “Oh no, this is not what I want to do.”
That’s why you need to have an internship before you graduate so that you have a better realization I guess of whatever it is you want to do.
STARTING THE TWITTER CHAT #SIMPLYCHAT
I started #simplychat because I really was looking into engaging the community that we have on twitter.
When I looked at the data, I found that impressions were not the roadblock for us, it was getting the people to engage back with us.
So I started asking questions in the tweets I posted and then I was like, “Okay, what can I do to really get this community together?”
Then I learned about twitter smarter and I was like, “Okay, how can I create a community like twitter smarter” because that’s an example of an amazing community.
I was like, “Well, why can’t simply measured start their own twitter chat?”
So I talked to my manager about it and wrote up this whole proposal of expected outcomes and why we should do this.
Together we decided to give it a try.
It’s going pretty well.
OVERCOMING DOUBTS
I think it’s natural for people to have doubts when they are taking a step in what they consider a risk.
So I definitely had some doubts but glad I took this opportunity at simply measured.
MENTORSHIP
My main mentor is actually my manager.
I remember talking to her about this during my interview process and she mentioned that it’s really important for her to not really be seen as a manager, but as a mentor.
So she is my biggest mentor right now.
There’s so much I can learn from her.
For example, anytime I write copy for twitter, sometimes I’ll mull over it for like 15-20 minutes and then I realize, “This is 120 characters, I probably should not be spending fifteen minutes on it.”
So I’ll send it over to her.
She’ll look at it and ten seconds later, it’s ten thousand times better.
FAVORITE SOCIAL MEDIA PLATFORM
I like twitter in my role as a social media manager because it’s easy to learn from other people about building relationships on social media in general.
On a personal level, my favorite is definitely instagram because it really challenges people to present their best side which is a good thing and a bad thing.
I think it’s really fun to look at other people’s lives through this curated fashion.