Veterans United’s Chief Storyteller

In a room nearly 1,000 miles away, Olympic shooter Jamie Gray lifted her gold medal within inches of the laptop screen. Those watching by video cheered, and a couple of other viewers started a busy side chat, after noticing the athlete’s patriotic-colored fingernails.

Moderating the interview was well-known local news anchor Sarah Hill. After a dozen years with NBC’s KOMU-TV, the media maven has joined local upstart Veterans United Home Loans (VU) as their chief storyteller.

Hill’s new role is a natural fit for a field that she says has been “near and dear” to her heart for years: the U.S. Armed Forces. Prior to VU, she and other volunteers helped get the local Honor Flight program off the ground. The campaign transports World War II veterans to Washington, D.C., so they can visit their own memorials. Hill’s appreciation for the military stems from her grandfather Russ, who played drums in the jazz band for the Army Air Corps during World War II. “It wasn’t until he passed that we began learning about all of his exploits, which is what I admire about that generation – they never spoke about themselves,” she says.

So Hill speaks for them.

And the world flooded in

Since joining VU in late August, Hill has been busy collecting and sharing the untold stories of military veterans and active duty personnel across the United States. “We realized we had great stories to tell, and we needed to do a better job of capturing them for our audience,” says Kris Farmer, VU’s chief marketing officer. “The logical choice was Sarah.”

She was also the popular choice.

More than 1.7 million people have her in their Google Plus Circles, which is the equivalent of Facebook friends or Twitter followers. That puts her among the Top 45 in the country. A favorite tool in her repertoire is Hangout, Google’s group video chat feature. It has just celebrated its one-year public anniversary and already boasts more than 150 million active users. For non-users, a Google Plus (or G+) Hangout is similar to Skype, Microsoft’s video conferencing feature. Hill refers to the use of the platform as “human media” because of its departure from text-based posts. “What this technology does is reduce the physical space between businesses and their customers,” she says.

TV stations across the country are beginning to interact with their viewers in similar video formats while broadcasting news. The genesis of this venture can in large part be traced to Hill and a newsroom quirk. Google Plus had just rolled out to the public, and Hill had the idea of trying it out during a newscast. “I opened up a laptop, and the world flooded in,” she says. “People from the Netherlands and Pakistan and all over the world were suddenly watching a local newscast in Columbia, Missouri. They were fascinated, and we allowed them to carry on conversations with us in real-time. This platform blew away the TV glass.”

An arrow to your business

Although video may encourage transparency, practitioners must be ready for what that openness might bring. During one hangout, Hill says she heard a rooster crowing while she was conversing with someone from the Republic of Trinidad and Tobago. “In a later hangout (with the man), I didn’t hear the rooster, so I asked him where it was. He replied, ‘Oh, that was my dinner.’”

Hill doesn’t seem to mind the surprises that come with the venue. The nine-time Emmy-award winner is used to interacting with people in hosting KOMU’s weekly “Sarah’s Stories.” Hangouts that have had the most impact on her at the NBC affiliate include a woman who joined a chat from her hospital bed, as she was going through chemotherapy. Another memorable chat involved residents of Oslo, Norway who spoke of the bombing and terrorist attacks that became their country’s “911.”

On the business front, you don’t need to conduct a hangout with an Olympic gold medalist to notch an acceptable ROI for your business. Hill says just about any Columbia firm – from fast-food to finance – can be successful in social media “It creates an arrow to your business,” she says. “Corporations need to tell their story, and they need to do it on a variety of platforms – not just through advertising, not just on Twitter, but at that ‘human media’ level – face-to-face.”

Veterans United, the nation’s No. 1 dedicated VA lender, has more than 1,000 employees in 21 states, with a growth curve that rivals a NASA rocket launch. Last year they financed more than $1.6 billion in loans for veterans and active duty military families. In such a fast-growing environment, Farmer says they needed to simplify their social media strategy: 1) communicate through multiple channels, and 2) provide engaging content for both internal and external audiences. Besides Google Plus, the company regularly uses Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube.

Creating their own media

Farmer says the multi-channel approach is valuable, because each online medium has its unique strength in capturing the market. “We use Twitter to reach influencers, and Facebook to reach consumers, primarily,” he says.

The most important thing social media does in general and hangouts do in particular, Hill says, is to distinguish a business from its competitors. “It allows businesses to develop their own authentic voice,” she says. “Businesses are no longer waiting for outside third-party media organizations or TV stations to cover their story. They are creating their own media, which gives them their own broadcast stick.”

Hill says she will continue some work for KOMU, as her schedule allows. While she no longer teaches at the University of Missouri’s School of Journalism, she’s not out of the picture, saying she will conduct occasional webinars.

And she’ll never pass up an opportunity to share an interesting anecdote. “If anyone has stories out there about military families, let me know,” she says. “You never know where one might turn up.”

When it does, you can count on the chief storyteller to be part of it – blogging, chatting, tweeting, posting, and sharing the stories that make up our men and women in uniform.