Evelina Yanchevskaya: Listening matters more than broadcasting

[YOUNG] Evelina Yanchevskaya pushes the limits of content

Evelina Yanchevskaya is a Social Media Specialist at L2L and studies Creative Business. She believes in content that dares to stand out and values a more human approach to branding and communication.

Can you pitch yourself to a potential employer?

I am a strategic and creative thinker with an international mindset. My experience in social media and my studies in Creative Business have taught me how to make brands relevant in a digital world. I love content that surprises and connects – ideally in a team that values bold ideas.

What are your ambitions?

I want to help brands become meaningful in people’s lives. Not by shouting louder, but by listening better. I believe that creativity, empathy, and strategy go hand in hand – and that communication only truly works when you understand who you’re talking to.

Which trends will transform our industry?

Obviously there are some more niche-specific trends, depending on what area we are focusing on, but what I see emerging across all is a focus on experience. As a consumer myself, when we talk about brands, it’s not necessarily the product or service that catches my attention – it’s what this product/service will make me feel and experience. What reality am I going to enter by using XYZ? What version of me is it going to create? These are the questions that drive consumer behaviour and their brand relationships. Especially if you make the experience immersive and personalised, then you are in for the win.

It sounds quite depressing when you say it out loud, but it’s true: escapism has become a need that redefined the idea of a modern luxury, and is at the heart of modern brand loyalty.

How can companies better respond to the needs and desires of Gen Z and millennials?

If I go into all the details of what Gen Z and millennials are looking for, it will be a long list because every generation has its nuances of what is special and important to them. And to me, it’s rather easy to pick those things up if only you get out of your perception and really try to understand the generation sitting in front of you.

Ask. Listen. Understand. Empathise.
And then take action.

Companies ask themselves such questions and then when they get the chance to dive in, they kind of dismiss it as 'unimportant' or 'silly' or they interpret it in a way that they are used to, not what it actually is. The main problem of ALL generations is that we tend to stick within the box of what is understandable and familiar to us, and then we get frustrated because we can’t get our point across. Of course, because you are speaking in YOUR language – not theirs.

You have to understand that as a business, it’s your responsibility to switch hats and try to get into the shoes of your client/audience. It’s not easy, I know, and will take time, but if you think about how you learn a foreign language – it’s also a lengthy process, huh? But the minute you take the initiative and simply LISTEN and grasp it, you will already understand much-much more (and you won’t have to Google or ask ChatGPT what that damn generation wants).

Which marketing tasks do you think will be fully taken over by AI?

I love this question because I can address the heated topic of 'evil' AI taking over creative jobs, because I think some are still concerned and scared that AI will replace them in some way or another, and to that I can say: yes and no. Let’s be realistic and admit that: yes, AI does a fantastic job at generating copies, creating images – making videos even – and the more time passes, the better it becomes. So yes, it is more efficient than you (sorry).

BUT let’s not go insane over this and separate the tool from the creator.

The example that comes to mind is the evolution of portrait creation. Before, you had to hire an artist to draw a portrait for you, and then cameras came in, and after some years we have a phone that does it all in one click. Did the job of a photographer die? Did artists stop to exist? I bet you know the answer.

I hear a lot of peers of mine talk about how much AI sucks, and the general mood around AI is somewhat skeptical and jealous I would say, but I believe we should stop being scared of it and as creatives, instead of seeing AI as our enemy, embrace it as a tool that can elevate your creative work. In fact, I think you can train it to a degree that will increase your creativity and help you optimise work so you get space for idea generation.

In the end, there’s nothing you can do to stop it because that’s how the industry is right now and it will just go further from here. So why not, instead of fighting it, use it to your advantage? It’ll make your life much easier, trust me.

How big will influencer marketing become?

Oh, it will be huge. I’d say it’s already becoming quite a big thing, and then again, we go to the topic of social selling through human relationships. But here’s an interesting observation I made – it’s not even the big influencers that brands are approaching.

More and more small- to medium-sized influencers are taking center stage, and I think it has to do with the relatability that these influencers create with their content. Since they are not yet so well-known (you know – as many diagnose big influencers with star fever), they are more relatable to the general public, hence why it becomes smarter to use them for promotions (also – much better for the budget).

I’m curious to see what way it’s going to go from here, but if you plan on investing in influencer marketing, I’d say it’s a smart choice and you should definitely do it.

What trends do you see in social media?

My personal favourite is seeing how unserious brands are becoming in their social media strategies. Perhaps it has to do with the younger generation populating more and more of the job market and starting to dictate the trends, but this is something I see more and more brands start to do.

Take Duolingo – they are true innovators when it comes to social media because they are freaking creative with it. The whole campaign with killing Duo and resurrecting it through a cult? I mean this is crazy but also genius! The hype it created was wild, and you see – I talk about it now, so it definitely worked!

It was definitely a risky move and it’s always important to think about your target audience (it’s the number 1 rule!), but I believe that in good content marketing, you need to learn to sometimes push these imaginary limits around your content strategy. It’s like going outside of your comfort zone – you have to stretch the boundaries to find if you enjoy it or not.

Even in my job – I am working for a SaaS manufacturing company – we don’t want to sit in this box of strict corporate and very technical communication. We try to expand the picture and positively trigger our audiences with some unexpected content – like creating memes or using a dog in our videos, for example. Not to say that the usual predictable content doesn’t work – again, think about your audiences – but in my opinion, the less you are trying to make yourself seem like you are 'the big and important guy', the more people get drawn to you because they can resonate with you.

They see a living person and/or thing instead of an emotionless logo, and that already builds much more trust. Going back to Duolingo – they could’ve just kept an owl as a symbol and that’s it. What did they do? They made a whole persona out of him that everyone on the internet knows and connects with. So, watch and learn ;)