Katie Warchol is a graduate from BGSU, and is now a Senior Social Media Specialist at ProMedica, where she represents the brand on a corporate level.  

Warchol graduated from the university in 2008 with a major in broadcast journalism. During her junior year at the university, she started working at the weekend assignment desk at WTOL and stayed for three and a half years. Warchol was also a freelance writer for Toledo.com, where she covered arts and entertainment.

Soon, Toledo.com offered Warchol a full-time position writing articles, and she was given some social media clients to manage.

“This was a brand-new experience for me, but by applying my news-gathering skills, I learned to seek out what was ‘newsworthy’ at the companies I represented, built a network of reliable sources at each company who could provide me with content and even developed my own way of writing posts in a way that honored traditional writing styles,” Warchol said. +

Warchol explained that her experience in journalism gave her a firm foundation for how to adapt to the latest trends and industry standards at the time. In 2011, she was offered a position as a Social Media Specialist at ProMedica, where she now currently holds the position of Senior Social Media Specialist.

“I’m responsible for translating ProMedica’s marketing and communications initiatives into engaging and informative content for our patients, visitors and community members,” Warchol said. “Sometimes that means helping people learn about heart attack symptoms and sometimes it means informing people about services and events.”

For Warchol, it is something new every day depending on what campaigns are active, the time of year or what is timely in the news. She also monitors public conversations for sentiment toward the brand and any trending topics.

“My favorite part of my job with ProMedica is my ability to make a direct impact on the health and well-being of the patients and communities we serve. The information I provide people every day could very well save a life, or at the very least, provide some valuable food for thought,” she said.

When asked what advice she has to BGSU students who are pursuing a career in public relations, journalism or a related field, Warchol has always believed writing was one of the most essential skills needed to excel in any field, and to not limit yourself in the field you think you want to enter.

“I never imagined a career in healthcare marketing could be so fascinating and rewarding,” she said.

In the future, Warchol said that it is hard to say where she sees herself, because new social networks will always begin, and older ones will go out of style.

“Facebook was just taking off my freshman year, and social media as a career didn’t exist even as I was preparing to graduate,” Warchol said. “Always be on the lookout for how you can use the foundation of your major with new concepts, there just might be a demand for a field you never considered.”