On campuses across the country, some college students are transforming their social networks, digital and analog, into powerful marketing tools.
They’re called brand ambassadors, and large companies — like major retailers and well-known apps — have been utilizing these students to promote their brands to college-aged consumers.
“I did go through an application process, but the way that I heard about it, they reached out to me,” said Savanah Macdonald, an Aerie student brand ambassador and junior in the College of Communication.
Macdonald said she thinks Youth Marketing Connection, the firm that coordinates Aerie’s student ambassador program, found her on social media. For Julia Hess, a YouTube TV student ambassador and sophomore in COM, the experience began with a LinkedIn message.
“They basically said, ‘We’d love to talk to you if you’d be interested in this’ and through the campus agency,” Hess said. “I guess they found me through my work and stuff I’ve put that I’m interested in doing on LinkedIn.”
While companies often reach out to students to gauge interest, the screening process potential ambassadors go through can be extensive and highly competitive.
“I’m not exactly sure how competitive it was,” Macdonald said, “But I know that I had to have a phone interview where they wanted to know all about my student involvement and making sure that I’m involved in a lot of different organizations across campus … That’s very important to them because they want me to be able to reach as many audiences as possible at Boston University.”
During her application process, Hess was tasked with creating a team of student ambassadors, which was weighed against teams created by other students, before she was given her position.
“I had to find five more people to build a team that I thought would be great brand ambassadors also on campus,” Hess said, “They reached out to a few different people on campus … us and at least two others. They said that we were their top choice for the job, but that they had to basically present us to YouTube.”
Once they’ve been selected, ambassadors are responsible for consistently promoting their brands on and offline.
“For Aerie, I have to post on social media and I have certain requirements that I have to fill each week,” Macdonald said, “A certain amount of Snapchat stories, a certain amount of direct messages through Snapchat, a certain amount of Instagram stories, a certain amount of Instagram posts.”
Hess said she’s supposed to promote YouTube TV for seven hours each week.
“A lot of it is supposed to be very personal and not me sitting at a table, so it’s me talking to someone in line about it,” Hess said, “I should spend technically an hour of my day doing that, so that adds up when you spend 10 minutes in line with someone at Starbucks and talk to another person in the dining hall.”
Barbara Bickart, an associate professor of marketing and department chair at the Questrom School of Business, said brand ambassadors’ peer status and autonomy make them especially effective marketing tools.
“Any time that somebody is similar to you and somebody that you know and trust tells you about a brand, you’re more likely to believe what they have to say about it,” Bickart said, “When somebody is a brand ambassador, they’re probably likely to say mostly positive things, but the brand doesn’t have complete control over what they say.”
However, not every student buys into the ambassador advertising strategy. Paige DiToppa, a graduate student in COM, said she would prefer less interactive marketing.
“I would be more inclined to use a promo card,” DiToppa said.
But Hess and Macdonald are going strong, reporting that their roles as brand ambassadors have had little impact on their social lives on campus. According to Macdonald, however, her job has changed her experience on social media.
“I’m getting more followers, people that I don’t know are following me, girls around the world are messaging me asking me how I became an Aerie ambassador,” Macdonald said, “And larger companies are following me just because they see that Aerie follows me and that Aerie engages with my content.”
Overall, Macdonald feels her experience as an ambassador has been positive.
“As a public relations major, this has been a really great opportunity for me,” Macdonald said, “They chose ten of us to fly to Pittsburgh over the summer for a day of training … It really opened my eyes as to what in-house [public relations] looks like, what marketing looks like and it really reinvigorated and energized my sense of career.”
CORRECTION: An earlier version of this article included a photo that was not authorized to be published. The current version doesn’t not include this photo.
