The walk from the central station in Münster is a strange kind of time travel. It was late summer 2025. The air was thick with the familiar warmth of my hometown, a feeling as deeply ingrained as the muscle memory of paddling for a wave. I’ve spent years in Portugal, my days governed by the Atlantic’s rhythm—reading the currents, predicting the sets, feeling the subtle shifts in energy that tell you what’s coming. Walking here, on these old stones, felt like coming home, but I couldn’t turn off that part of my brain. I was reading the city’s currents, the flow of people, the energy of a place both ancient and buzzing with student life.
I was on my way to meet Stefan Muckermann. The official agenda was “content strategy and social media” for his company, studenta. But I’ve learned that projects like this are never just about content. They’re about the entire system, the hidden currents that dictate flow.
Our initial conversations were about just that. Before we could talk about what to post, we had to understand the core of the studenta brand. Their mission was simple and powerful: improve university life. But the expression of that mission had become diffuse. So, the first project wasn’t just a marketing campaign; it was a complete revisioning of their digital presence. We weren’t just building a new surfboard; we were shaping a new one from the foam up.
We started by creating a comprehensive brand book, giving studenta a clear, unified voice. This became our North Star. With that defined, we built a new website on WordPress (studenta.de), a stable platform to serve as their central hub, publishing regular, valuable content.
Then we turned to the social channels. We launched a new Instagram account, and the response was immediate and immense. It was like paddling into the perfect position and catching a clean, powerful wave. The follower count exploded into the thousands. We captured their energy, and they gave it right back. We also secured their brand on all other relevant social media channels, placing calm, confident placeholders for the future.
The project was a success.
The channels were built.
The flow was established.
And that created a new, much better problem.
The wave we’d caught was now roaring. The new website, the thriving Instagram, the clear voice—it all worked. It worked so well that it was overwhelming the human team behind it. Lena and her HR crew were now facing a flood of dozens job applications a day. The system designed to help students was being submerged by the very interest it had generated.
The success of the first project had revealed a deeper need. The conversation naturally shifted. We had figured out how to speak to the students of Münster. Now, we had to figure out how to listen to them, at scale.
This is where the next swell begins.
It’s a story not just about managing flow, but about building a silent, intelligent reef beneath the surface to handle the power of the waves.
It’s the story of Alena.
(To be continued in Part 2)
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