Small businesses that continue to pitch a "Buy Now Buy Now" message are still living in the 1970s era of marketing. OK, may the 1980s too. Today, it's all about creating engagement and that happens when you target the emotions of prospective customers. When people develop a bond or attachment to you, they get to know you and like you, and they are more likely to come a customer. If you target based on price alone, you're end up in a competitive game that develops little long-term customer loyalty. On the other hand, customers with an emotional bond to you, tend to be long-term customers.

In this week's episode, I share one of the simplest three-step formulas that you can use over and over again in our storytelling. It's a great formula for telling short, concise stories in a way that helps keep people hooked to the end. Give it a try!

Have you ever looked at the viewer analytics on your videos? It's not uncommon for many people to stop watching after 20 seconds or less. From a strictly audience retention angle, that's where podcasting has an advantage. Sure, your audience may be lower than, say a video, but the retention is usually much, much higher. According to 2018 statistics compiled by Edison Research, 85 per cent of podcast listeners said they consumed “all” or “most” of each episode they downloaded. That's because podcasting is passively consumed. It plays, like a radio, as we multitask, take public transit, work at our desks, or drive cars. Podcasting is a terrific additional tool to have in your marketing toolkit. And year over year statistics show that podcasting is steadily growing. What intrigues me is that the growth isn't rocket-ship like. It's steady. That indicates to me that podcasting is becoming permanently embedded as a medium that we consume vs some fly-by-the-night, flavour-of-the-month trend.

There are lots of small downtowns that are struggling. There are also many small downtowns that were struggling at one time. I've been hired to speak in a ton of small towns, along with Leslie Fournier, for our Your Town Rising initiative. Often it is not some grand revitalization plan that saved these downtowns. Successful small downtowns got started by working with what they had at the time, introducing creativity and innovative marketing and events to get the excitement and momentum started. Sure, it began with small steps. But that's how it goes. Most successful small downtowns can trace their turning point to an action that one person or small group started. On the flipside, small downtowns that continue to be stagnant all share another trait: No activities, no creativity, no events. It's a recipe for looking like a dying downtown. If you want to change your downtown, it begins with not buying into the myths that waiting and dreaming that all the grand plans being suggested will save your downtown. Here's the thing: Small downtowns that get a pile of municipal money and grand revitalization, will still struggle if they still do no events, no creativity, or no creative marketing. New cements, new signs, and new lamp posts do not make a downtown turn the corner. People do.

Some restaurants get it. When customers tag the restaurant in a social media post and talk up how good it was, many restaurants do Like, Heart, Comment, Share or Retweet those posts. It's a no-brainer not to engage. Afterall, nothing helps a business more than word of mouth. And social media is the amplification powerhouse for that today. But sadly, some restaurants still don't get it. They ignore social media posts that sing their praises and their food. It's shocking that we even need to discuss this pitfall today. But it's still happening.

I've seen it over and over again in my 10 years as a social media and marketing strategist. The problem is this: It's an organization, association, business, or downtown that consistently fails to make any progress doing anything creative. So it stagnates. Nine times out of 10 it stagnates because it has failed to grasp all the steps in the creative process. Instead, people abandon the process at Step 4 which is the self-doubt phase, also known as the "I Can't Do This!" phase. Conversely, successful people and organizations know that there is a Step 5 and 6 in the process. In this episode, I talk about all six steps and why they matter.

Over the past couple of years, I've had several entrepreneurs tell me that they've discovered that the place where they live and work is not their primary market for their business. Some of those entrepreneurs are dejected, and some see it as a revelation that has changed the way they grow and market their business. As an entrepreneur, you have to identify -- or come to realize -- where your land of opportunity is, and go chase it. Your time, energy and resources are valuable and limited. Use them wisely.

Looking for the simplest, obvious identifier hashtag for your community and its various niches on Instagram or Twitter? Area codes are a no-brainer choice. There's a reason why we're seeing these become so popular. They are instantly recognizeable and connected to our everyday lives. We've all grown up with an area hashtag that has become embedded in our brains. 519. 613. 416. 705. 

We're all guilty of this, videographers and organizations included! We tell organizations to tell their story! People need to hear your story! And that's completely the WRONG approach. In this episode, I tell you why

People are always curious about podcasting and what it takes to get started. So, in this episode, I share three tools you'll need to begin. Two are free, and one costs about $65. But overall, podcasting is very economical to get started. And if nothing else, it's a fun extra to have in your overall marketing plan. Below are links to tools that I mention in this episode:

Audacity (Free desktop audio recording and editing tool)

https://www.audacityteam.org/

Blue Snowball microphone

https://www.amazon.ca/Blue-Microphones-Snowball-Condenser-Microphone/dp/B014PYGTUQ/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&qid=1550422861&sr=8-3&keywords=blue+snowball

Podbean (hosting for podcasting - get started with three free forever plan)

Podbean.com

Visit my website > WorkCabinCreative.ca