Jake-VanKersen and his team at Morningstar grew their Youtube channel views to over 88,000 a month. At this year’s Digital Innovator Summit on Thursday, June 13th he’ll share tips he’s learned while waking-up, activating and growing Morningstar’s Youtube audience and views.
In advance of his session, we asked him to share answers to a few questions. Check out his answers below and find our more about his session at this year’s summit here.
What is your favorite example of an out-of-the-box campaign either at Morningstar or another company?
The Oatly campaign that I keep hearing on podcasts is my favorite of the moment. They talk about how boring their product is so they aren’t going to dress it up. It’s oat milk, just drink it. Recently I heard them acknowledge other companies are getting into oat milk and they are glad because it means more people are getting into products with minimal environmental impact. This laid back approach made me want to try them over others.
What impresses you the most when you see digital campaigns of other brands?
What always impresses me about any campaign is authenticity and confidence. Whenever a brand stand on their own without trying to be like their competitors, then you have my attention. Authenticity is impossible to fake because people can sniff it out from a hundred miles out. Have the confidence to make your brand have an authentic and human voice.
How do you keep your “finger on the pulse” of this rapidly evolving field?
The trick here is to keep up with what’s going on but not at the expense of what’s good for your brand and/or audience. I keep tabs on everything that’s going by being an viewer and social media users, but not everything is going to be something that we can do.
What advice would you give to your younger self at the start of your career?
I would tell myself to not be afraid to try things and even fail at them. Experience is the best teacher and even rough episodes can help you learn a lot.