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Going Viral for Your City with Emelie Schultz · Modern Gov Matters

• Sarah Loyd: What does it look like when a city government goes viral on TikTok? We're talking 380,000 views, 45,000 likes, and a TikTok influencer flying from North Carolina to Ohio to attend a football game he'd never heard of, all because one city communicator saw an opportunity and went for it. I'm Sarah Loyd and this is Modern Gov Matters, the show for people doing the real work of government communications and civic engagement. Modern Gov Matters is presented by CivAll, powered by Social News Desk. Today, I'm talking with Emelie Schultz, social media coordinator for the city of Toledo, Ohio. Emelie welcome to Modern Gov Matters. Emelie Schultz: Thank you so much for having me, Sarah. I'm happy to be here. Sarah Loyd: So you're coming to us from Toledo, the Glass City. And for anyone who doesn't know Toledo, give us a quick picture. Emelie Schultz: Toledo, Ohio is centered ⁓ right at like the tip of Lake Erie in Northwest Ohio, where Lake Erie and the Maumee River meet. ⁓ the Maumee River flows beautifully through Toledo, which is kind of a you know, a unique landmark for us. We are, ⁓ I the third largest port in America, which is really big for our city. We are about 280,000 people population wise, and we have been in a city since 1837. So ⁓ a of cool things about Toledo. I like to say that Toledo is ⁓ a big city, 100%. Even though there's a lot of mid-size amenities to ⁓ city, definitely can feel big and bustling. Sarah Loyd: Yeah, very cool. And your role is social media coordinator for the city. So in your own words, what does that actually mean day to day? Cause I have a feeling it's a lot more than just posting to Instagram. Emelie Schultz: ⁓ the social media coordinator for the city of Toledo, it entails a lot of strategic communication in regards to ⁓ a of different things, services, ⁓ large that are happening in the city that a resident might not really ⁓ understand So there's many levels when it comes to communication. And when we say strategic, ⁓ it's not the sense of marketing something to our residents or trying to sell something, but it's being transparent. using plain language so that our residents fully understand what they should expect or the service that is being provided to them, as well accessibility. I think that those are really big things. Being a social coordinator and making sure that we're reaching as many people as possible through all of our channels. Sarah Loyd: Yeah, and how long have you been in this role and how did you actually end up in government communications? Emelie Schultz: That's a great, great question. I started here in April of 2021. At the time roles were very different here. And so we didn't really have a dedicated social media coordinator. That person was kind of the right hand to the mayor, like a liaison of the mayor. And they primarily ran the social media here. And so when they left in 2022, there was an enormous void, especially during the time, you know, we had just kind of recovered from COVID. A lot of people were getting their information online through social media. And so we realized that there was a need to have a dedicated person in this position. And ⁓ had just so happened to be ⁓ in as the graphic designer at the time. And so I was doing a lot of things comparable to the social media position, making a lot of the graphics. Helping with videos, you know how that multimedia stuff, you know how it goes. So I did kind of naturally fill in that position of in 2022 have been since ⁓ I have learned a lot in that time. I definitely didn't get into that position just knowing everything. So time that I've been dedicated to social media, I feel like I've learned ⁓ so more than just using it, you know, personally through my life. Sarah Loyd: Right, right. Yeah. And you've seen a lot of success in that role. So I want to get into, you know, the Italian football league story because this story is just too good. So in June of 2025, a TikTok creator from North Carolina posted a video asking why in the world the Italian football league championship game was being held in Toledo, Ohio. And you saw it and then walk me through what happened next. Emelie Schultz: Yeah. funny enough, ⁓ lot of people had always asked why the Italian Bowl in Ohio or in Toledo. We had actually hosted it two years prior in 2023 as well, and it didn't get ⁓ much traction as it did in 2025. And right. There was a TikToker who in that same year, he had posted a video, why Toledo? And so part of some of the promotion for the Italian bowl, ⁓ a lot of surrounding mayors from local municipalities thought it would be a fun idea to congregate together and do a mayor's football challenge to promote this. And so, ⁓ And so I had told our mayor, Hey, I'll meet you out there and we can do just a fun video, whatever. I hadn't planned too much about it. So honest to God, I was sitting in my car waiting the mayor and I'm like, let me just search Italian bowl on TikTok. Sarah Loyd: I love that. Emelie Schultz: And that was the first video from Mason Powell, I believe his name is his video was the first thing I saw again. Why Toledo? And that immediately I was like, that's my video. Just every single question he had. From the mayor, of course. And so I showed Mayor the video while he was there at the field. So in between the drills, he stopped really quick, watched the video and was like, all right, I'm ready. And I will say the mayor. When the cameras turn on, he knows exactly what to say and how to say it. So he, ⁓ you know, answered Mason's question so eloquently. We do have kind of a personal tie to the IFL, Italian Football League. where a Toledoan actually ⁓ played in the IFL in Italy. So it was always a dream of his to kind of have the IFL championship in his hometown. And he was determined to make it happen and he did. so, know, Mayor kind of went into that as as just the history that Ohio has in football, which is rich and many, many users, you know, ⁓ saw interest in ⁓ They related to football, to enjoying football. They were interested in the Italian football league. There were so many new conversations coming up about Wow, Toledo can do this. I want to come to Toledo things like that. The Browns football team also commented on it again. Yes, that was, I think that really made my day when I saw the Browns account post or comment on it as well. And it did, it just garnered so much attention that I really was not expecting. Honestly, as soon as I posted it, like, like, like. and so I had never. Sarah Loyd: That's amazing. Emelie Schultz: it just garnered so much attention that I really was not Honestly, as soon as I posted it, like, like, like. and Like I said, I hadn't experienced anything like that, but I just knew as soon as I posted it that we had something good. I hadn't experienced anything like that, but I just knew as soon as I posted it that we had something good. Sarah Loyd: Yeah. And then the influencer actually came to Toledo. So how did that come about and what was it like to watch all that unfold? Emelie Schultz: ⁓ yeah, it was so much fun, especially cause I was the one who was in direct communication with Mason. So, ⁓ I almost felt like a travel agent, so to say, yeah, helping him coordinate things, finding him tickets, finding him other things to do, kind of suggesting things for him to go. He mentioned that, ⁓ when I saw him at the glass city bowl with mayor, he mentioned that he was at Tony Paco's the original Tony Paco's hot dog. Sarah Loyd: It's coordinating everything. Emelie Schultz: in Toledo, is an absolute staple restaurant. think it's been open since ⁓ ⁓ very authentic Hungarian ⁓ food. ⁓ So got a taste of that, went to the game. So he was absolutely thrilled when I had originally reached out to him and said, you know, we love the fact that you helped us get this attention. We really want to ⁓ bring you Toledo. And he was stoked that later that evening he had purchased his plane ticket and was immediately. Sarah Loyd: ⁓ wow. Emelie Schultz: interested in coming. So he enjoyed the entire game and was posting about it all throughout. He has multiple TikToks on his page prior to game, as well as being at the game, as well as taking another, making a TikTok with our mayor. ⁓ Yes. And so he really found a love for Toledo, I think. Also another thing that, ⁓ another organic moment that of Sarah Loyd: Fantastic. Emelie Schultz: was inspired by all of this was that our local minor league baseball team, the Toledo Muthens, also reached out to him when he made a video confirming like, I'm coming to Toledo, I can't wait. So the Muthens reached out to him and offered him tickets to their weekend game the same day that was the Italian bowl. So he got to go to the game, the football game at three, got to go to a baseball game at like seven and kind of get a whole ⁓ experience. he. ⁓ Sarah Loyd: All the Toledo sports, all the Toledo restaurants. So he's almost like an honorary Toledoan now. Emelie Schultz: Mm-hmm. Yes, he said the hospitality here was incredible. Again, just the amenities that Toledo had, he thoroughly enjoyed. So we hope to have him back ⁓ another point in time. But ⁓ was a huge moment where it just felt like we really showed someone an amazing time in the city. ⁓ Sarah Loyd: Yeah, and I mean, that's just worth its weight in gold. I mean, I can't imagine, you know, the amount of views you guys got off of that, off of his videos, off of your own videos. And what did that moment teach you about the kind of content that actually travels? Emelie Schultz: it taught me two things really. It taught me that one, if you can try and take a topic or a conversation that's happening online and get into that conversation, that really helps. And then secondly, it kind of taught me to work more on our own promotion and our own wins. know, securing the Italian Bowl championship. having it in Toledo, Ohio, that is a huge deal. And I would like to kind of think that it almost allowed us to start our own like viral moment. Again, where we're like responding to something, a conversation that's already started, but we definitely like owned, owned the fact that it's happening here. And yeah, like we are excited about it. So I guess kind of to that second point, like again, owning your accomplishments, celebrating them and Sarah Loyd: Yeah. Emelie Schultz: like making that a viral moment. Sarah Loyd: Yeah, that's amazing. And that whole moment is definitely a highlight, I'm sure. But I also know that's probably not what most days look like for you. You mentioned to me before the podcast that you're spending a lot of time right now on strategic planning, content creation, and you're kind of shifting the focus back to highlighting everyday city services after a few years of heavy federal project content. So tell me a little bit more about that. Emelie Schultz: Mm-hmm. Yeah, know, it's governments and cities definitely have to find unique ways to serve their residents and to know what the problem is ⁓ to right? Like, how are we to provide a service other than just leaf collection and snow removal if there is a housing problem, for instance? ⁓ That's kind something that is really big in Toledo right now. ⁓ We have amazing housing market, actually, ⁓ compared to ⁓ cities in the United States. However, we have a really almost like a 50-50 ⁓ of homeowners ⁓ renters in Toledo. And so our housing department has been really trying to stress homeownership, you know, that the value in the service that ⁓ our ⁓ department provide. And so with that, I think that it really comes with a lot of communication of what are the benefits of housing? What are the benefits ⁓ of home ownership and things like that. So that's kind of where like strategic, I see my role of strategic communication being extremely important. the Italian Bowl is super fun to talk about and it is really fun to create these like, fun videos that respond directly to our residents. But there are also these very, maybe not so serious, not as fun, not as like show worthy programs that ⁓ are just ⁓ for our that they might overlook just because, ⁓ my God, the city is posting and I don't really care what the city's posting about, but we have a down payment assistance program that could help you get $7,500. ⁓ Sarah Loyd: you That's a big deal. Emelie Schultz: That's the difference in our communication that we're really trying to shift here is our residents know that these services are for them ⁓ that we are trying to be proactive in our neighborhoods and make a difference. ⁓ know, that's just kind of like one simple campaign, but I think that those are like the bread and butter, honestly, of what a city municipality is and should be kind of serving our residents. Sarah Loyd: Yeah. Yeah. So let's talk kind of along the same lines about a specific one. You mentioned your homeownership fair campaign. did that partnership come together and what did you actually do to double that attendance? Emelie Schultz: So at the very beginning ⁓ our Housing and Community Development Department reached out to us saying, hey, we want to do this. We've never done this before. This is a brand new thing. I sat down with our ⁓ neighborhood as well ⁓ as lead safe coordinator at the time who were really immersed within not only our neighborhoods, but also just the home buying process. One of those employees is actually a licensed real estate agent. So they were able to bring so much knowledge to the table. I'm not a homeowner yet, unfortunately. I definitely want to be soon, but I'm not familiar with the steps, which was almost perfect, right? Because if it's a homeownership fair, and the whole point is we want to bring people to the table who might not be educated on this subject. The fact that I had a real estate agent to work with who is also versed within moderate to low income, like historical information and resources. And then there was me who was very new to this and just now reading. I almost felt like we were the perfect storm information. Yes, like she really brought good logistics and information. And I said, how can we simplify this? How can we make it easier for people to not only just understand, but just be enticed by it? ⁓ Sarah Loyd: The dynamic duo. Emelie Schultz: excited to come to it. And so we made a lot of like testimonial content. do we do have a photographer in our department who is absolutely amazing. She's an award winning photographer and she was able to get like nice headshots and nice photos ⁓ of of the other agents and organizations that are part ⁓ of were part of the inaugural fair. ⁓ So then were able to use like quotes and testimonies from those people. ⁓ and they talked about how they directly helped residents, they shared stories that directly about like one-on-one ⁓ conversations that they had with people that just added a lot of not just here's what you should expect, but here are the connections that you can make. And I think that the content that we ⁓ made extremely strong ⁓ between and ⁓ Sarah Loyd: Yeah. And that's, that's so important. mean, I, I am ⁓ a several time homeowner at this point in my life, but, ⁓ I remember buying my first house and it's, it's super scary. ⁓ it's like one of the biggest purchases you'll ever make. there's so many steps and that can be really intimidating for a first time homeowner. So that's really great that you guys able to. ⁓ you know, kind of bring more people to the table, use your, newness to the process to kind of look at it through that lens and say like, how can we make this simpler? How can we, you know, break down this process so it's not so intimidating for folks? Yeah. So let's get into your toolkit a little bit. You mentioned you have a pretty specific stack. Emelie Schultz: Yes, yep. guys. Sarah Loyd: ⁓ what is actually ⁓ making your life easier right now? Emelie Schultz: Yeah, every single day when I walk into work, I do open the same three tabs and it's usually social news desk to see what is being posted that day, just in case, ⁓ you just in case we maybe need to pause something or potentially schedule something else the day. at the end of the day on Monday, we had severe storms and potential thunderstorms. So that kind of like changed our social content a little bit. So that's always really nice to have. on hand. The second tab I open is Base Camp just to see if there's any notifications ⁓ from any other teammates that I have. ⁓ the end of every day, our photographer, ⁓ also our PIO. ⁓ posts a lot of news stories from previous day. And so I'll go in and read those, see if any could go up on our social feeds. ⁓ If we've had a scheduled interview that's great to review and then get in, in our scheduled rotation. And then the third tab that I open is Google Sheets. I a content calendar, a monthly content calendar that will ⁓ kind loosely show me what we've posted in the past. So for month of March, I'll put all our holidays, St. Patrick's Day, ⁓ things of that But then also in the past, if we've made an announcement that's normally that normally comes around every March then I kind of have that on my radar for the month. So those are the three things that kind of tell me ⁓ how my day is going to go so to say. Sarah Loyd: Yeah, absolutely. So ⁓ brought up something really timely. ⁓ ADA accessibility requirements for social media and websites taking effect ⁓ year in April and I know next year for smaller municipalities. So what's that conversation looking like ⁓ in the community right now? Emelie Schultz: We actually, our department just did a private screen reading with someone who is blind. And so she hooked up her computer to our TV and we got to see firsthand what that screen what it like, how it works. And I think that was a really eye-opening experience for a lot of us to just get a better understanding of, when I put in alt text or ⁓ when I to do ⁓ a description the webpage, like ⁓ making it as detailed as possible really does help. Another thing that this ⁓ had to us was that if we could take just a couple of seconds to describe. ⁓ what the video is. Like if we are at a location, what does the location look like, right? Like who is the person that is talking in the video? so I would say the first thing that we have done is ⁓ doing a training someone who, ⁓ you know, utilizes technology to get that better understanding Sarah Loyd: Yeah. And if someone's listening and hopefully they've thought about this since the deadline for larger municipalities is, you know, April of this year. But if they haven't thought about this yet, where do they even start? Emelie Schultz: The first place I would start, because I think the first place that we started would be removing PDFs from their web page and converting them to web pages. those PDFs may be ⁓ applications or forms, those to online applications and online forms, or the very least, making those PDFs accessible so that a screen reader can go through them and read them and potentially help the person, ⁓ the user fill them out. ⁓ think that would be the best place to start is ⁓ removing of those inaccessible PDFs and converting them to web pages. Sarah Loyd: Yeah, that's great advice. So Emelie, we always end with our rapid fire round. So if you're ready, go. What is your favorite local spot in Toledo? Emelie Schultz: I'm ready. My favorite place definitely more so to get takeout is it's called Tandoor. It is an Indian restaurant ⁓ in the south end of Toledo. They've been in business for over 40 years. Truly delicious, delicious. Sarah Loyd: Amazing. Yeah, I love Indian food. So that sounds amazing. What's the most underrated part of your community? Emelie Schultz: Mm-hmm. Again, I think it's just the fact that we're a mid-sized city, but we have a lot of big city feel, a lot of big city vibe. You know, I love the fact that we have a lot of major teams. have a minor league baseball team. We have a minor league hockey team that has actually qualified for the Kelly Cup a couple of years. We have a beautiful art museum that actually just won first place ⁓ Good morning America's ⁓ top. 10 like best places, the Toledo Art Museum is number one. a big city accomplishment in a mid city. So I think that there's just a lot of things that you can experience here without the hustle bustle, but still like feel really immersed in it. Sarah Loyd: Yeah, that's great. And then if Toledo had a theme song, what would it be? Emelie Schultz: I had thought long and hard about this and I think that the song would be, ⁓ I Want to Break Free or Break Free by Queen. I think that Toledo can sometimes be bogged down by ⁓ past and can sometimes be bogged down by industrialization. ⁓ the hard and heavy, ⁓ grit of industrialization. And although that I understand that that is totally, that is what Toledo has been built on, you know, the automotive industry and things like that. We have so much beauty to give too. And so I think that that's kind of like the break free part. Like we have so much more to offer than just that type of cold working type So ⁓ that's kind of why I chose that song. Sarah Loyd: Yeah, that's great. And what's your best piece of advice for someone who's just starting out in gov comms? Emelie Schultz: My best piece of advice is that time and consistency are your best friends and that you will mess up because I have had so many fair shares of messing up on social just because sometimes you feel the urgency know, like, I to get this right? Is this okay? Sometimes you just feel like you have to get it out and it is okay to make mistakes. You know, just try and fix them. you know, try and be honest about them just learn from them. you know. And like time really does all, you know, it helps you look at years past and say, well, I didn't do that very well, but my strategy now is really good. And that's of the place I'm at. I feel like I'm really using tool or I feel like I'm really learning from the past and I'm now really using those tools. So I hope that someone can get to that point. Sarah Loyd: (laughter) That's great. Yeah, that's so important. letting a mistake dampen attitude about your job and just kind of being able to move on from that. But yeah, learning from the past, that's so important. Emelie, this was such a great conversation. Thank you so much about being so open about what you do. The wins, the grind. ⁓ I think a lot of people listening are really going to hear themselves in this. And where can people find you and follow Toledo's accounts? Emelie Schultz: Yeah, we are on TikTok. We're on X, Instagram and Facebook. So if you search city of Toledo, you'll see a really fun block TOL logo. And that is our official pages. So go ahead and make sure to follow us. ⁓ see me and some of my coworkers faces those pages. But yeah, please go ahead and follow. Sarah Loyd: thank you again so much. It was such a pleasure to have you on. And that's it for this episode of ModernGovMatters. If this resonated with you or if you've got a story that we should hear, reach out. Modern Gov Matters is presented by CivAll, powered by Social News Desk. I'm Sarah Loyd. Thanks for listening, and we'll see you in two weeks.