Blue & Gold Illustrated: America's Foremost Authority on Notre Dame Football
Issue link: https://comanpub.uberflip.com/i/234294
UNDER THE DOME Five Questions With … IRISH DIGITAL MEDIA COMMUNICATIONS ASSISTANT AARON HORVATH Aaron Horvath is in his first year as a Fighting Irish for Notre Dame's athletic department? digital media communications assistant. In his Horvath: "It's been said in the past that we role, he is the editor of the Notre Dame athletic haven't done the best job of connecting with department's expansive blog network, and he every fan — we have fans on every coast and works on special projects pertaining to social across the world. Social media is an easy way media and communications. for us to have an avenue of engaging with Horvath previously was the assistant sports those fans, and it gives the teams a chance information director and social media coorto give their specific fans a behind-the-scenes dinator at DePauw University in Greencastle, look. It also gives an immediacy of things. HORVATH Ind. He is a 2011 graduate of Indiana University When men's soccer is warming up for a game, and is currently pursuing his master's degree in business they can post a Vine video, something you can't see unadministration. less you are at the game." Blue & Gold Illustrated: What does being a communications assistant entail? Horvath: "I go behind the scenes of all of Notre Dame's sports teams, write about them, get to know them, try to promote them in the best light possible. "In addition to that, I work with different teams on strategic marketing [ideas], like men's basketball and football for football weekends and the bowl game." Blue & Gold Illustrated: What is Notre Dame's blog network and how does it help reach out to fans? Horvath: "The blog network started as Irish Underground in 2011 under the direction of Alan George, who is now the football contact for Stanford. What it entails is a couple of different blogs: the Irish United Men's Soccer blog; Irish Underground, which is the main athletics blog; In the Paint, which is for men's and women's basketball; Strong and True for football. "Those blogs are trying to give you a behind-thescenes or non-AP style release like you see on UND. com by using social media, photos, videos, more casual conversational style of writing." ▼ Blue & Gold Illustrated: Why is social media important Blue & Gold Illustrated: How do you balance your job and pursing a master's degree in business administration? Horvath: "You just have to be good at time management. But also people at Notre Dame are really good about understanding that professional development is key, and that we can't just expect that out of our student-athletes, we have to expect that out of people that work here as well. "A little hard work now will always be good in the end." Blue & Gold Illustrated: What new things or special projects are you doing to enhance the communications side of the athletic department? Horvath: "We've been doing a couple more social media engagement projects. This year we started #HelmetFriday, which on Fridays before home football games we went around campus and took a football helmet and let people wear it and take a picture with it. "Another one is with Upper Deck Sports Cards. We pitched the idea of doing a five-card set of people interactive with Notre Dame football, and the first one was Father Doyle. You'll see four more coming in January." — Staci Gasser Click here to listen to Blue & Gold Illustrated's complete interview with Horvath.