UI social media team

dagdaj

Well-Known Member
I don't know where they rank in terms of other universities and such.
A lot of it is fairly rote type stuff every university does. "Move in day" stuff. Solid use of Herky. (Side note: I assume Herky is now managed by the athletic department or the cheerleaders maybe? When I went there it was a fraternity that did it or something. Herky is definitely much better leveraged and managed and is a real understated asset for the university. Also, he's TALL!!!! Way taller than I remember).

Twice in the last 7 days they've hit it out of the park. They did a Corn Kid "Corn Song" video on their Instagram account that hit the feels for me as an alum.
And they had a brilliant TikTok today called "Class of 2026 Learns the Iowa Fight Song". A comedic series of clips of stunned looking class of 2026 kids trying to sing the fight song to a recording of what I assume was the Hawkeye Marching Band. A few of them knew a word or two of it. Most were just embarrassingly stunned. Then halfway through the video, the graphic pops up "Let's try that again". And it's a series of clips of the same kids starting to belt it out reasonably well.

I've seen them do a lot of clever stuff. Sure, some of it's just "there". But what do you expect? They have to churn out a ton of content. And a lot of it (like most of social media) is just copying a trend with your own take. But some of it I've seen is downright clever and unique.
 
I don't know where they rank in terms of other universities and such.
A lot of it is fairly rote type stuff every university does. "Move in day" stuff. Solid use of Herky. (Side note: I assume Herky is now managed by the athletic department or the cheerleaders maybe? When I went there it was a fraternity that did it or something. Herky is definitely much better leveraged and managed and is a real understated asset for the university. Also, he's TALL!!!! Way taller than I remember).

Twice in the last 7 days they've hit it out of the park. They did a Corn Kid "Corn Song" video on their Instagram account that hit the feels for me as an alum.
And they had a brilliant TikTok today called "Class of 2026 Learns the Iowa Fight Song". A comedic series of clips of stunned looking class of 2026 kids trying to sing the fight song to a recording of what I assume was the Hawkeye Marching Band. A few of them knew a word or two of it. Most were just embarrassingly stunned. Then halfway through the video, the graphic pops up "Let's try that again". And it's a series of clips of the same kids starting to belt it out reasonably well.

I've seen them do a lot of clever stuff. Sure, some of it's just "there". But what do you expect? They have to churn out a ton of content. And a lot of it (like most of social media) is just copying a trend with your own take. But some of it I've seen is downright clever and unique.
In the past several years, I believe Iowa's communications/media team has really kicked it up a few notches. They used to be terrible (or turrible, as Hayden would say). I recall a game with Wisconsin in Kinnick when they laid out pom poms (red, white, blue). All of the Wisky fans were rockin the red and white ones throughout the whole game. ugh.

Now, they bring back great players for games, have on field interviews with that VDB girl and current/former athletes, put together great videos, continue to add to the WAVE tradition, etc. I think they're pretty creative and really good these days.

Maybe they should run our offense.
 
So, I just started following The Real Herky social media account.

He's a much more leveraged asset than when I was a student. I first noticed it during a visit for prospective students with my son.

I'm sure it's a common evolution everywhere, but it is being well leveraged.

Who manages Herky? Is it the cheerleaders? When I was in school it seemed kinda disconnected from university management. Maybe I just got the wrong impression. I was kinda led to believe it was one of the fraternities. Maybe the guy in the suit just happened to be a member of that fraternity.
 

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