Posting & Paddington Pride with Social Media Manager Karina Saniuk
By: KitKat Brown
As an intern at Paddington Arts, I know there are many different people who work together to make Paddington the best that it can be. One of these people is Karina Saniuk, 23-year old freelance social media manager. She specializes in digital marketing and works at Paddington Arts promoting on social media and creating content. I wanted to interview Karina and showcase why her role at Paddington is so special. Karina describes her job as: “help[ing] businesses with their social media marketing, digital marketing, content creation, ensuring that they stay ahead of the trends, ahead of the times, helping them sell, educate or inspire, whatever their business goals are.” Specifically at Paddington, Karina plays a big part in helping us achieve our missions. My interview with her is a behind-the-scenes look at how Paddington connects with the community.
Karina ensures that all of the good that Paddington does for the community is made known. She explains: “At Paddington Arts specifically, I manage the social media and help with their communications. Majority of the time, the goal is to inspire and educate people in the community, and to showcase what we do in the community and the impact that we have.” According to Karina, it is very important to have marketing for an organization, because it is how the public stays informed about what the organization is doing. In the case of Paddington, usually the goal with various things such as events, performances, or shows, is to reach as many people as possible. This is the approach through which Karina works to promote Paddington and engage with the community. Karina also describes why she believes that social media is such an important platform by which to do so. She mentions the impact of the global pandemic on businesses and highlights the importance of digital communication. “I think what COVID did was it brought awareness as to the importance of social media and why every business needs to be on social media. Businesses had no choice but to go digital.” In general, the world has experienced a dramatic shift into online services due to the pandemic. Marketing, especially social media marketing, was always something that was digital, but because of COVID even businesses that did not have a strong social media presence then needed to curate one. From this, Karina at this time was also “…coaching different businesses on social media, how to set it up, how to manage it themselves.”
Finally, I asked Karina what her favorite part of her work is. She answered: “It’s the fact that I get to see people’s dreams, and I get to see people’s work, and I help them turn it into real life and help them…help other people, and now that’s really rewarding.” Karina truly has so much passion for what she does, and she takes pride in it. Indeed, it is a great feeling to know that what you are doing is helping people. Overall, Karina is someone who I admire due to the fact that she built up her marketing skills and eventually has become able to work for herself. I am very glad that I’ve gotten the opportunity to work alongside her and contribute to the success of Paddington Arts.
