Orlando City Social Media Manager Shares Tips With Students on the Business
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Ryan Martinez is pictured in the back row, third from the right.
A Message from Wendy Givoglu, Interim President, East and Winter Park Campuses
Professor of Speech Courtney Lewis and Professor of Mass Communication and Journalism Rebecca Newman welcomed the social media manager for the Orlando City Soccer Club on Tuesday, February 4, 2020. Ryan Martinez spoke to a large group of students and highlighted his education, including how he became a social media manager for a major sports team. Ryan shared how he changed majors four times in college, yet all of the classes he took incorporated skills for social media. He stressed that one needs to have a love of writing to pursue a career in social media. Since Ryan is a sports fanatic, he made the decision to focus on social media in professional sports.
During his senior year in college, Ryan worked as an unpaid intern at Orlando City Soccer Club and learned some key points while working there:
- Network with everyone you know and join LinkedIn; create a relationship before making a request.
- Expect to work 70 hours a week, and hours vary into the evening.
- Educate yourself and hone your skills with social media management tools: Adobe, Photoshop and Premiere.
- Social media jobs in sports are very competitive — there are only one to two positions per team.
- Effort and commitment are keys to success.
After Ryan’s internship and graduation from college, he accepted a social media position with a major league soccer club in Philadelphia. Two years later, he is back with Orlando City Soccer Club. A typical day for Ryan includes coordinating video and photo shoots, talking to the players, video editing, blogging and posting new information. His advice is to have a second set of eyes check over all proposed postings, so careless and embarrassing errors do not occur.
“Don’t post everything that pops in your head and remember it is quality over quantity,” he said.
When asked his insight on emerging technologies, he said he constantly learns about new platforms to improve online engagement. As a marketer, he regularly uses TikTok and Flickr, and it is his daily responsibility to stay on the cutting edge of social media.
In closing, Ryan shared that he was extremely impressed to learn about Valencia’s New Media Communication Associate in Science degree and stressed how this type of education prepares students to go directly into a specialized career in new media communication.
