By Jenna Harris
A graduate student at Florida State University, Jordan Wiener is working toward a master’s in integrated marketing communication in the School of Communication. As a member of Arrowhead’s 2020-2021 team, she worked as a researcher and strategist. She recently sat down with me to talk about her Arrowhead experience, the importance of maintaining balance while wearing many hats, and how to be flexible when it comes to the future.
JH: What was the driving force that led you to find a passion for digital marketing and strategy. With your major being psychology in undergrad, how did you decide to go that route?
JW: So, I was a transfer student, and in my first semester here I went to the involvement fair. And at that point, I was already pretty experienced in graphic design. I found an organization called The Big Event Tallahassee, which was a nonprofit organization that was kind of how DM [Dance Marathon] is—associated with FSU. Because they were looking for graphic designers they put me on the marketing team.
I loved how it was the perfect culmination of art and being creative, but also putting yourself in the consumer’s shoes and seeing it from their perspective. And I didn’t really know much about strategy until I got put on the strategy team for Arrowhead. Being on that team, that was when I realized what I wanted to do in my career.
JH: So, speaking of your position on Arrowhead, you went from digital to social to strategist. What were the major roles you took in each of those positions throughout your time on the team?
JW: What was really cool about the strategy team is that everyone on it was from a different background. I was a psychology major, one of the girls was a studio art major, another girl was purely communications. My biggest role was just being a listener and absorbing all the information and research that we were getting, then bouncing off ideas with the rest of my group. It taught me a lot about collaboration and working with others, and it taught me a lot about having confidence in your own ideas.
JH: That’s a perfect segue into my next question. Throughout your different leadership roles, whether through Arrowhead, being on the executive board of Alpha Kappa Psi or through your work at the Innovation Hub, how did you gain confidence in your contributions and knowing that your work is solid?
JW: So honestly, it’s been through every position that I’ve had, I feel like I’ve gained a lot more confidence. One thing that I’ve learned and have really come to terms with is this affirmation that’s like “I am deserving of taking up space”. With every position, I practiced that more and more. If I’m sitting in a meeting and we’re bouncing off ideas, like how we do in Arrowhead, I remember there would be times where I’m like, “I don’t know if I should say this, I don’t know if it’ll be funny or not”, so I’d put it in the chatbox and I would see someone be like, Jordan, I love that idea. It’s just little things like that that would make me think, even if it’s not the best idea the people around me are supportive. And I think that just having the mentality that every idea can be factored into something else.
JH: I love that, I think a lot of people can relate to that feeling. So, specifically for the Tinder campaign you worked on for Arrowhead, what were your main contributions to the actual design and execution?
JW: On the strategy team, a big role that I played was working with others to come up with catchphrases, colors and tag words. Contributions that were purely my ideas? I came up with this idea for Tinder, where on college campuses you have something called the Wall of Shame instead of the Walk of Shame. It was a chance for everyone to walk up and put up a post-it of the most embarrassing moment they’ve had on a date, whether it be on Tinder or wherever. I was really proud of that idea. I said it and everyone got really excited, which I wasn’t expecting.
Another idea that I built upon was this idea to come up with a Sims expansion pack that would have used Tinder. I had a blast with that one.
JH: How did that work? Did you make the expansion pack or just pitch the idea?
JW: We pitched the idea. Jake, one of the guys on the team at the time who’s super talented, came up with a mockup of how the expansion pack would look. He designed it and everything like that. I had this idea where, you want a date with [another sim], and then you can get the option to woohoo, ghost or date. And I was like, ‘What if every time you ghost someone, if you happen to be in the same area, your sim disappears?’ I had so much fun with it.
We really got blessed because Tinder was very anything goes. They gave us a $10 million budget. They have a very push-the-envelope tongue-in-cheek perspective, so we just got to have fun with it.
JH: That’s amazing. I know you’re in grad school now, what’s next?
JW: I love grad school. I’m in the Integrated Marketing Communications program. It’s super hands on. The final project in one of my classes is a brand review, where we have to assess it and think about ways we can improve it, so it’s literally something I would do in the workforce.
Postgrad, I’m looking for jobs in ad agencies. Eventually I would really love to work in sports, but it’s hard to get straight in there out the gate. I applied for a job at Warner, so hopefully I can get that and build up from there.
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The Arrowhead Advertising team won first place in District 4 along with awards for Best Storytelling and Best Diversity and Inclusion. They placed 9th at the semi-final round of the national competition. Jenna Harris is an advertising major at FSU’s School of Communication. She talked with Jordan Wiener about her experience preparing for the 2020-’21 competition.
Axel Lagergren, advertising major at FSU’s School of Communication, edited the interview for the team’s blog.