UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. — Family and friends of recent Penn State graduate Talia Whipple know one rule when eating in a restaurant with her — “the phone eats first.” Basically, don’t touch the meal until she takes a photo. The adage not only reflects a love of food, but also Whipple’s passion for social media.
Since the days of hiding Facebook from her mother because she was too young to have an account, social media has been a big part of Whipple’s life.
“I know every major social media platform like the back of my hand,” she said. “Anything that is social media related, I'm into it.”
Since graduating in May from the Donald P. Bellisario College of Communications, Whipple has been the one doing the influencing. She is currently in the middle of a six-month internship working as an influencer communications professional at Disney. Her role is to identify social media influencers that “fit into Disney’s vision.” Her team then starts building collaborations between the company and the influencer.
These social media personalities are typically fans of Disney and/or its other divisions, like Marvel or Pixar. Disney invites the influencer to visit one of its locations where they work with Whipple’s team on creating Disney-related content for their followers.
“If it's at Disneyland, the cruise line, the resorts or anything like that, we want to make the influencer’s followers feel like they are here with them,” Whipple said of the content she makes with the influencers. “Then hopefully the followers want to come, too, and say, ‘I saw this influencer. They came here and I would like to experience what they experienced.’”
For example, Whipple said, if they choose a fitness influencer, her team may invite the person to Disney World and create social media content showing the influencer running a 5K with Donald Duck or doing yoga with Goofy.