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In this week's Baking it Down Podcast - Episode 195 - The TikTok Ban, continuing with last week's theme - ❌ the TikTok ban went into full effect on Saturday night for... ⏰ like a few hours? 

It was odd as the platform kinda shut down features over an hour then a pop-up blocked access for some, then others, then it came back, but not. That said - it did happen though, which is the topic of conversation in our podcast (which - ahem - you can now watch on YouTube - heads up, you still won't be able to read these lips unfortunately). 

😤 "Never downloaded TikTok and never will..." no - that's not what we're talking about. 👂 And frankly, if you're saying this, you definitely aren't using TikTok as a lead source which means you're even less diversified.

What we're talking about is this: 👋 You don't own any platform from which your business gains leads - and that's evident by this TikTok ban. 

📧 Your emails can be blocked, your Facebook page hacked, your YouTube shut down, your Instagram suspended, your TikTok banned, and your best word-of-mouth lead source can move away. 

🥚 So what do? 🧺 We diversify is what we do.

📊 First, we need to understand our current marketing landscape. Yours won't look like mine. 🤔 Where are most of your leads coming from? If you don't know, start adding that question to your intake form - the data you get from it is worth its weight in marketing gold. 

🔍 Once the data comes in - how diversified are your lead sources? If 90% of people are coming from your Facebook page - 📈 guess what, you're not diversified. I'd like to see at least 5️⃣ 5 channels (3 if you're too busy) bringing you in leads. And note - not all those channels can be owned by the same company (ahem - Meta). 👻 Remember, not only did TikTok play Houdini, but so did CapCut (the editing software folks were using even outside of TikTok but also owned by TikTok's parent company, Bytedance).

💻 We'll also want to focus on a website, an email list, and a Google Business Profile. Yes - again, stuff we don't technically own, but hey - they work a lot different than social media algos, and they're owned by 🗽 American-based companies that aren't just Meta. Remember - it's all about d-i-v-e-r-s-i-f-i-c-a-t-i-o-n. 

🥚 The less "single egg basket" our marketing is in, the more likely we are to weather any cybersecurity storm. 🥚🥚🥚🥚🥚🥚

⏰ Email aka a newsletter is an even better backup tool to have in your marketing chest because it's one of few marketing avenues that still work chronologically (meaning the emails are listed in the order they are received) unlike social media which is dictated by fancy hard-to-understand algorithms where only the best content gets the viral win.

If you only have time for one social platform, 2️⃣ try to borrow from the time spent on that sole source of leads to start working on a second social profile - that way if your primary source goes dark, 😢 you're not left in the red (bottom line, 💔 I mean). 

As marketers, 🥺 we're merely slaves to the whims of social giants and social issues - and roll with the punches we must. 🪦 The graveyard of social media that "once was" grows every year, and leaves creators and businesses who were too invested in a single lead source in the dust. ⚰️

👂 Snag this podcast on any major podcast player (Spotify, Apple Music, Audible, Amazon Music, or watch it on YouTube) by searching for Baking it Down - Episode 195 - The TikTok Ban. 

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In this week's Baking it Down Podcast - Episode 194 - Meta Verified, TikTok is about to have a big, public breakup with its avoidant soon-to-be ex, the United States. And whether or not we like this coupling, it comes down to the Supreme Court's decision - who needs reality tv when you've got this?!

As we see content creators scrambling to dust off their Instagram backups, it may be a good time to consider standing out among the masses with Meta Verified.

Meta Verified is that neato 🔵blue check mark that you see next to some pages and profiles (go check out Sugar Cookie Marketing's Page for a real-life example). And it's more than just an icon, actually - which makes it a possible contender for your marketing budget in 2025.

Quick backstory on 🔵blue checks: Back when Twitter was, well still called Twitter, accounts that were verified as professional or famous profiles received a 🔵blue check next to their handles to signify that this was the legitimate profile of the business or creator. It was a manual application process and it was hard to get accepted into. Elon buys the failing Twitter and converts it to X takin' the 🔵blue checks away and offering them as a subscription to anyone who had about twenty bucks.

While verification is still required, the exclusivity is long gone. Meta followed suit a few months later for personal profiles and mid-2024 began offering 🔵blue check subscriptions to business pages.

Meta Verified pages do get some added perks though - so let's take a look at them (we'll focus on the plan I paid for to test this - the Business Plus plan - although all the plans include the 🔵blue check).

But first - let's see the pricing for these Verified tiers:

• ✅ Business Standard - $14.99/mo
• ✅ Business Plus - $44.99/mo
• ✅ Business Premium - $119.99/mo
• ✅ Business Max - $349.99/mo

Yeah - so, like not chump change at all - and this is per profile meaning that yes, Facebook and Instagram are considered two profiles even if the Facebook and Instagram accounts represent the same business and are connected. But the good news - there's a yearly discounted option, a bundle 

✅ Meta Verified Business Plus - $44.99

1. ✅ Verified Badge
2. ✅ Impersonation Protection
3. ✅ Meta Verified Support (Priority)
4. ✅ Enhanced Facebook Profile - 3 Linked Accounts / 3 Locations
5. ✅ 2 Links in Reels
6. ✅ Featured Account

You're reading that right - you can actually email or chat with a support rep (for that one profile) if you sign up for Meta Verified. If you upgrade to Premium or Max, you can talk to someone over the phone - a rarity with these social media giants.

But there's more - you also get "enhanced" profiles on Facebook (if you pay for Verified on that platform) or on Instagram. Instagram will give Business Plus subscribers the ability to add pictures to their bio links as well as link 3 additional accounts in the area under the profile bio. 

Facebook pages with the 🔵blue check will show up in horizontal scrolls in feeds as "Recommended Meta Verified Businesses." Hey - it's like a free ad included in your not-free subscription. Beggars can't be choosers, right?

Impersonation protection is a neat feature - basically no one can spoof your Business page. Does that mean that past hacked pages have a chance of being reunited with their original owners? Not a clue - but it's worth a shot if you've completely lost access to your Page.

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Onesday Thursday? Sorry - ❄️ we had a big snow storm (big for the Washington DC area is anything over 3 inches, and we ended up with 8 - 10 inches, ☃️ so rest assured, my car won't be clean again for 2 months).

In this week's Baking it Down Podcast - Episode 193 - SMART Baby Goals, 👶 we cover a better baby way to tackle big goals - and that's by not making them big, but making them rather small.

Let me jump right into an example of my own. ✍️ Last year (and for the last 5 years before that), I had the goal to learn Procreate (the iPad app that redefines digital drawing). 🎨 I'd bought the top-of-the-line iPad, the fancy Pencil, and Procreate... and proceeded to say each year, ✏️ "I'm going to learn to draw." 

But my goal wasn't S-M-A-R-T. It was too broad. 🤓 S-M-A-R-T stands for Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant, and Time-bound. 

My "I wanna draw" was not specific. 🤷‍♀️ Draw what? It wasn't measurable because you can't measure "can I draw yet." And because it wasn't broken down into steps, it thus became unachievable, and "sometime this year" was not a viable option for "time-bound." 

My goal was running before it could crawl, and thus it never got any traction. We have to make it small (baby) before we can make it big. 🏃‍♀️💨

🤱 A lot of time, we see bakers say BIG goals - 🤑 "I want to increase sales by 50%," or 🔟 "I want to teach 10 cookie classes this year." Love them - but those are really easy goals to say and really hard goals to beat. 

What if we made these goals smaller? 👶 Baby...ier? What if "I want to increase sales by 50%" was, "I'd like to sell 1 more dozen each week this year than I did last year." Still pushing you, but definitely S-M-A-R-T because it's smaller and a lot more specific, we can measure it, we know we can do it (hey, what's 1 more dozen), it's relevant to our business, and it's time-bound (each week).

🎨 That's what I did with my lofty "learn how to draw" goal. Instead of "take 1 Procreate class a week," I switched it to, "Just ✨open✨ the Procreate app once a day." Whatever happens after that - it counts. Because the goal is so small and easy, it's easy to tackle, but it's not impressive. 

And therein is the key - 🔑 small goals aren't sexy, but they are attainable, and completing 100 small goals this year will get you so much further than not completing 1 giant goal.

🧠 Small is Smart. 🤏

Here are some small crawling goals that you can use to get your goals to toddler stage. 

👶 1. Social Media - Consistent Posting 2x per Week

• 🍼 Focus on 2 times per week - be gradual, you can increase posting once you've learned how to stay consistent with just 2x per week.
• 🍼 Focus on 1 platform - set up up cross-posting if you'd like, but focus on 1 platform for now.
• 🍼 Add in 1 copy formula to work on each *month* - not each post. Learning just 1 copy formula (AIDA) is better than learning them all and using zero.

👶 2. Financial - not "all the money" but rather "1 extra dozen per week"

• 🍼 Ask, "How would I find 1 more sale a week?" - let that question guide your marketing to find just 1 more lead.
• 🍼 Focus on value-adding in community groups - community group admins love valuable content, so become an asset before you make your cash grab.
• 🍼 To help make it achievable - premake dough so you have it ready to go.

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In this week's Baking it Down Podcast - Episode 192 - Workin' Birkin,  we're following a pretty funny story taking over TikTok. 

You see - 👜 Hermes is a line of really high-end luxury items like purses and belts. And if you have a Birkin bag, you're looking at tens of thousands of dollars alone. But the king of the Birkin bags? The Kelly Bag - a bag that you have to be invited to be able to buy... 💰 for almost a hundred thousand dollars. 

But last week, ⏰ a TikTokker discovered that Walmart has launched its own Birkin of sorts... a knockoff the internet how now dubbed the "Workin' Birkin" from "Walmes." 

Hilarious doesn't begin to describe it, but what's even more interesting is the marketing lessons we can pull from 🤑 Walmart's mass-produced copycat Kelly. 

Is Hermes going to shift its marketing strategy to compete with the behemoth of Walmart? Is Walmart testing its entry into the luxury designer bag market? No and no - here's why.

👛 1. Different Market Segments

Hermes sells to really rich people. Walmart has built a brand on the savvy money-saving shopper. Their market segments never overlap. The person who wants an authentic Kelly bag won't even glance at a Walmart's sliding doors. The price-conscious Walmart shopper ain't gonna be clickin' to Hermes website. Their market segments aren't even in the same parking lots.

And you shouldn't worry when a new baker starts posting in your community groups - they're not sharing your market segment. You're years into this - your skills are honed, your prices are set by your defined costs. You know exactly what it costs to stay in business, and you charge a profit accordingly. The new baker? They can charge a lower rate because they do produce a different product that does attract a different buyer. Don't you worry about them - the market takes care of everything.

👛 2. Supply and Demand

Hermes could ramp up production to compete with Wally World's massive production empire. Scrap the hand-made and sub it out for the mass-produced, right? WRONG. The more supply available of authentic Birkins, the less valuable each Birkin becomes. That's the law of supply and demand. The more supply, the less demand for it. The more demand, the less supply around to fulfill it. It's the invisible hand of the market at work.

👛 3. Costs Covered

You can't work for less than it costs to make, right? You'd be losing per order. So let your costs dictate your pricing. Same with the newbie. They can charge less because their labor rate is lower, they have lower indirect costs, and they don't have as much overhead. You - you can't. You have that Eddie to pay for, that Universal Bosch to keep powered on, and that Heavenly 70 Amerigels to use. You gotta cover your costs + profit - no if, ands, or Birkins.

👛 4. Exclusivity means Money

The higher your prices the more exclusive you're able to make your order inquiries. Hermes hand-makes each bag - taking up to 20 hours to produce. They can charge more for their lack of availability. That translates as "exclusivity" to your marketing. If Birkin can slap a $100k price tag on something that a grocery bag can functionally replace - why are you so worried about pricing lower than your competition? Price HIGH. Get EXCLUSIVE high-paying customers. We aren't selling food - we're selling a luxury edible product. 

️👛 5. Perceived Value in Luxury Pricing

Finally - the perception of value creates money. Oreos are cookies. Your custom-decorated dozen is cookies. Why can you charge 20x the price of Oreos? 

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In this week's Baking it Down Podcast - Episode 190 - How the Grinch Saved Christmas, ️and we're BACK and Frank is DIZZY. 😿 Heather came back from a 10-hour trip to a sick Frank who turns out had an inner ear infection that led to him gettin' an early start on the kitty somersault Olympic tryouts. 

But back to baking - December is a rough time for bakers. On the one hand, with all the marketing work we laid all year, we're finally able to cash in during the "Cookie Super Bowl." On the other hand - my goodness, it's a lot of work. 

It's easy to become jaded by our clients during this season. While we're "baking spirits bright," we ourselves are neglected during the holidays. It's the price we pay in the industry we have chosen to be in. But it's important to stay focused on the goal: a really solid business that sustains itself both through slow and busy times.

So how do we stay focused without becoming embittered by the long hours and late nights over the kitchen oven? Here's a few tips from Sugar Cookie Marketing.

🎄 1. Manage Communications

'Tis the season to get behind on emails. When (see: not if) clients send an angry message about something you messed up (or they think you messed up), wait 24 hours to reply. For all other messages, set expectations. "Hey! Thanks for the email - I'm looking at 24-hour response times, but rest assured, I'll get back to you!" goes a long way in quelling the fears of your customers. If you've not replied to January inquiries, make a note to reply before your next "Hey, I'm taking orders" scheduled post goes up to stave off upset would-be clients.

2. "This will be the best experience they will have."

Corrie and I taught a Christmas cookie class last weekend. Factor in the weekend before, we were circa Vendy Blendy, it was easy to have a bad attitude with two overly long working weekends. We took a deep breath and said, "This is our cookie class attendee's Christmas season kick-off. Let's make it the vibe." And the same goes for you - a lot of your clients are excited about their orders. Make it the best gift they've felt that they have ever given by perking up your attitude.

🎄 3. Custumers =/= Therapists.

You're tired. We get it. Customers aren't therapists.  It's easy to turn a pick-up into a vent sesh of all the orders from all the difficult people who don't understand all that goes into cookies. Word of caution: don't do that. Corrie and I frequented a delightful local Thai restaurant, except the owner wasn't so delightful. What was one lunch turned into an hour-long vent session about clients who don't tip. Here's a tip: don't do this.

🎄 4. Happy Cappy - Clean, Brushed, Smile

I hate telling people to shower and makeup when frankly, I don't like doing it. But boy does it help paint the picture that we're the happy, hearty bakers our clients expected to open the door. Think about it - would you want to see your mechanic driving in a hoopty with squeaking brakes? Or about how your real estate agent living in a dump? We want to image the folks we hire are what you believe them to be - same with our bakers. We want to think your kitchen is clean, your house smells good, and you're happy to serve every client with the freshest baked cookies ever to come out of an oven.

️🎄 5. Use AI to keep it friendly.

Nothing says, "I'm too busy for much effort" like "sent from iPhone." In the world of AI everywhere, we hardly have an excuse to not let the robot overlords have their way with our curt emails. 

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In this week's Baking it Down Podcast - Episode 189 - Marketing Lessons You Can Apply from [Redacted], ️🎉 and this week's podcast is the LAST time we'll say [redacted] ever!!! ️🎊 * 

😭 * until next year.

But with every [Redacted], there are marketing lessons to be learned - 🧠 and this year we picked 10 marketing lessons to apply to your bakery-endy (okay now I'm done making up words). 

📣 The biggest takeaway from the [redacted] spamming: NO ONE is seeing your posts. 📣

That's something we just have to make peace with as marketers and design our posting schedules, content types, and social media channels around. Doesn't matter how many times I said, 🗣️ "You pend until midnight," I was still asked even until midnight, what time they would get in. 🙉 And it's not their fault! 

😳 There's just so much content thrown at us on newsfeeds that reading the group rules + entry questions + group description + event description + 1,345,167 posts, 4 podcasts, 15 newsletters, 57 Reels... 👀 we just simply don't have the time or attention span to absorb it all.

❌ And your audience doesn't have the bandwidth either.

Now that that's outta the way - let's talk about the 10 tips we took from [Redacted] 2024 and applied to bakeries in 2025. Corrie made it a point to only talk about topics that could be adapted to your bakeries - 👁️👁️ so attention up front!

️🛒 1. Started Marketing Early

🤫 The [Redacted]: That was the key to this year's Vendy Blendy. With the increase in the required discount percentage, it was necessary to extend the marketing funnel to 5 months (we typically do 2.5 months in the past). ⏰ Add in a funky election year affecting reach, and in hindsight, we were really happy we got this off the ground earlier this 'round. 

🍪 Your Bakery: Same goes for your bakery events - classes, vendor markets, pop-ups, pre-sales. You gotta give yourself some marketing runway, otherwise, you run out of concrete (aka money). If you think 3 weeks is enough time to fill seats in a Galentine's Day cookie class, you'll want to rethink that. 6 weeks or more of marketing can ensure that you can fill seats. And hey, once you're booked, you can move your marketing focus onto the next campaign.

️🛒 2. Increase Value / Decrease Costs

🤫 The [Redacted]: With the event that shan't be named, we required a better value proposition from the sellers - they were required to up their discounts to 25%. 💲 But to offset their increased value, we decreased their costs by lowering the registration dollars. This allowed them to protect their margins a bit more.

🍪 Your Bakery: Same with your bakery's value prop. I see folks complain about a saturated market and "Whatever should I do!?" Increase your value proposition - better packaging, better customer service, better ingredients, better pizza, Papa Johns. But if you increase the value your product has, we need to shed costs elsewhere to protect our profit. You can do that by buying in bulk, printing your own cutters, creating passive income streams, etc.

️🛒 3. Posting Schedule Ramp Up

🤫 The [Redacted]: With our marketing, you could see (if reach and Zuck allowed), an increase in our posting frequency and a diversification in our content type strategy. 📈 From back in June when I made a single post to the day of (when I made about 20 posts), that increase in posts per day - intentionally. Remember - no one is seeing anything you post. More is more when the algo is calling the shots.

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In this week's Baking it Down Podcast - Episode 187 - At Fault Cult, we admit it - you guys say we "run to the refund," 🥛 so if you want to sip the Kool-Aid, grab a glass because this pod is about joining the At-Fault Cult. 

In all seriousness though, we wanted to explain the long-term benefits of the short-term losses "absorbing fault" can have on your bottom line. And here's the kicker - 😵 we'll be talking about absorbing the fault that belongs to the client. 

⚔ You see, "🗣️ he said / 🗣️ she said" arguments are all about assigning blame. How much culpability does either party have? 👈👉  What was each person's role in this business blunder? 

But once blame is assigned, we now have a "baker vs. client" scenario - a fight to the de🩸ath. So really, who loses? 😖 It's always the baker - because even if you're right, you're still wrong because you lose the client long-term. 

🤔 "But I also lose if I refund, right?"

Yeah -  You do - 🤏 you lose a little. 🔮 But what you don't (or can't) see is the long-term "a lot more" loss of the lack of that client returning - 😓 or worse, that client going out of their way to un-recommend you. 

Instead of our typical list format, 🥺 I'm going to retell Corrie's podcast confession - a mistake she kinda made and the client kinda made, but she took 100% of the blame for it. 

A few weeks ago, Corrie let Laurie (lol, 🙊 they rhyme) bypass her form when Laurie reached out through email. "Eh, simple order, what's the harm," she figured. 

🗣️ Narrator: "But there was much harm."

Laurie had specified three simple designs across three dozen cookies: 💊 a pill (because he was a doctor), 🏈 a football (because he liked football), and ⚾ a baseball (because he liked baseball). 

Easy right? 📧 However, Corrie's form requires inspo photos - but reeeemember, the client bypassed the form. 🖼️ There were no inspo photos to be referenced.

Lo, and behold, Corrie sends Laurie the pre-pickup picture to which Laurie replies with... dun dun duuun... 😲 "Where are the sports team's logos??" Corrie scrambled to add a few logos, but there was absolutely no way to get the order up to the client's expectations in enough time. 

But the client was to blame, right? Because...

• 💢 Laurie was the one who circumvented the form when she saw her date was booked. All orders must go through the form!
• 💢 Laurie was the one who gave general descriptions of what she wanted leaving out the specific details about the logo. How was Corrie to know?!
• 💢 Laurie never sent inspo photos to help dictate her order requirements. 

💸 Laurie Laurie Laurie... was refunded 100% of the order and apologized to. Why? Because so what if Laurie was to blame even partially for the cookie miscommunication? What does Corrie win when Laurie loses?

Corrie wins the opportunity to get a bad review and loses all potential future orders from Laurie. By being the "at-fault party," Corrie let Laurie save face. And guess what Laurie did? ⛔ She wouldn't accept the free order. She begged Corrie to at least let her pay half.

🤔 Her reasoning? 🙏 "I want to be able to order from you again in the future, I loved this experience." 

When you take the blame, even the blame that wasn't yours to bear, you make your clients feel like your business is a safe space to make mistakes.