The McCourtney Institute for Democracy
Creative Strategy | Content Management | Content Creation
Project Overview
Company Context
The McCourtney Institute for Democracy at Penn State examines the condition of democracy in the United States, producing short lessons on democracy, podcast episodes, and full lectures from the world’s leading scholars.
Role + Responsibilities
I was already working with the team as the Network Manger for The Democracy Group initiative when they asked me to take on further responsibilities as a Content Specialist to help them expand the Institute’s presence.
I led content strategy and production for the Intitute’s YouTube channel, leveraging their catalog of recorded lectures, podcast episodes, and existing content to repurpose and create new videos.
I also produced and managed audio and video podcast content for bi-weekly episodes of the Democracy Works podcast, ensuring high-quality production and audience engagement.
Content Strategy
Goal
Increase YouTube subscribers and reach of Institute's brand. The strategy was to give the channel a face lift with new titles and thumbnails, repurpose old content, and drip new content to keep up engagement.
YouTube Channel
Using YouTube’s analytics, I chose the top performing long form content from the institute's back catalogue of lectures and podcast episodes. Then I broke the content down into short videos to be published as new videos. These videos were 5-20 minutes long with an educational lesson that could be easily consumed and understood without having the context of the original video. I also created YouTube shorts from the existing content, which were also repurposed for Instagram.
New content was added to the channel from new episodes of the Democracy Works podcasts and guest lectures being given at Penn State.
Crafting content strategy
Video and audio production using Descript and Adobe Premiere Pro
Optimizing old videos for new engagement
Measure, analyze, and report on content
Results
Drove a 1,600-subscriber increase in just three months.
Garnered 393,406 views on long-form content over one year.
