Baking it Down with Sugar Cookie Marketing 🍪

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Silver Linings with The Old Gays

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Our Chosen Family: "The gay community is much bolder today." 33:19

för 22 dagar sedan33:19

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33:19

What’s the secret to lasting friendships? How does queer community show up through the ebbs and flows of life? And what’s the REAL story behind the “YMCA” song? In the first episode of Silver Linings, The Old Gays dive into an essential part of queer life: chosen family. They discuss the vital love, support, and sense of belonging that community provides, especially during life's toughest moments. They open up about what “queer” means to them, how chosen family has impacted their lives, and how to maintain close bonds over time–including their love for each other! “We’ve come a long way, baby.” Family isn’t just what you’re born with; it’s the people who show up, shape you, and stick around. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.…

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177. Baking it Down - When Marketing Isn't Working

för ungefär ett år sedan 1:21:19

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😥 When Marketing Isn't Working - What to think and what to do.

🎧 This is an excerpt from this week's Baking it Down Podcast - Episode 177 - When Marketing Isn't Working

In this week's Baking it Down Podcast - Episode 177 - When Marketing Isn't Working, we wanted to talk about both mindset and methods to reboot a sluggish marketing season.

🧠 In the Diary of a CEO podcast on YouTube, brain doctor, Dr. Daniel Amen who has scanned 250,000 brains, says he was asked to scan the brain of author Noelle Nelson who was writing a book on The Power of Appreciation. 🤗 She wanted to see how positive thinking affected brain function.

The doctor then asked Noelle to return the next day after 24 hours of negative thinking to understand how the brain's baselines changed. 😥 The results? 📉 Lower functioning in the pre-frontal cortex - the part of the brain responsible for decision-making, reasoning, personality expression, and other complex cognitive behaviors.

The takeaway:

⬇️ Negative thinking culls cognitive performance.
⬇️ Inhibited cognitive performance creates more negative thinking.
⬇️ Thus we're in the death spiral of bad news blues.

🤔 "How does this apply to my marketing not working?"

Great question. You'll hate the answer. Marketing works because it just... works. The more people that know about a product to buy, the more people can buy said product. 💭 The how to get them to know there's a product to buy is marketing.

✅ So the good news - your problem is fixable. ⛔ The bad news? The problem is you. "No one is buying from me" dulls your strategic thinking. "Everything I post doesn't get any likes" is an easy way to never have to strategize why your posts are reaching your intended audience.

Shift your mindset by running through these cognitive questions:

🧠 Is your messaging confusing? Focus focus focus - switching product offerings too often can confuse your audience
🧠 Are your goals dialed in? Too much of everything is nothing
🧠 Do you have enough campaign runway? Think: run a campaign for at least 3 months to see if something works - yeah, that long.
🧠 Are you being consistent over long term or only energetic in short spurts?

But - if you're marketing truly isn't working and you're in no mood for brain games, Corrie and I came up with a list of six tasks you can implement this month - that, with the right attitude, should turn your marketing numbers around a bit.

✔️ Work the campaigns backwards: here is launch date, so where is pre-sale end date / pre-sale launch date / photography date etc. Come up with three campaigns for the rest of the year.
✔️ Invest in better camera / photography gear and take one photography course (ahem - the Cookie College has a photography course) - plan photography days.
✔️ Start adding consistent posting in community groups - make 2 posts per week (non-sales) for 1 month.
✔️ Work on a local likes campaign. Grow your page numbers - you'll never reach 100% of your page likes, so increase the page likes to increase potential eyes on your content.
✔️ Audit your sales funnel - is something somewhere driving people to your competition.
✔️ Audit your competition - if you can handle not comparing yourself, competitor analysis is a great way to see where you're lacking.

Try these 6 suggestions out. Hey - your marketing isn't working, you probably have a lot of spare time. What do ya have to lose? Except the yips that is.

216 episoder

#Food #Entrepreneur #Arts #Business #Marketing #Heather and Corrie Miracle #Corrie Miracle #Bakery Marketing #Cottage Food #Sugar Cookie #Bakery #Cottage Home Bakery #Sugar Cookie Decorating #Selling Sugar Cookies

Baking it Down with Sugar Cookie Marketing 🍪

177. Baking it Down - When Marketing Isn't Working

Baking it Down with Sugar Cookie Marketing 🍪

published för ungefär ett år sedan

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😥 When Marketing Isn't Working - What to think and what to do.

🎧 This is an excerpt from this week's Baking it Down Podcast - Episode 177 - When Marketing Isn't Working

In this week's Baking it Down Podcast - Episode 177 - When Marketing Isn't Working, we wanted to talk about both mindset and methods to reboot a sluggish marketing season.

The takeaway:

⬇️ Negative thinking culls cognitive performance.
⬇️ Inhibited cognitive performance creates more negative thinking.
⬇️ Thus we're in the death spiral of bad news blues.

🤔 "How does this apply to my marketing not working?"

Shift your mindset by running through these cognitive questions:

🧠 Is your messaging confusing? Focus focus focus - switching product offerings too often can confuse your audience
🧠 Are your goals dialed in? Too much of everything is nothing
🧠 Do you have enough campaign runway? Think: run a campaign for at least 3 months to see if something works - yeah, that long.
🧠 Are you being consistent over long term or only energetic in short spurts?

✔️ Work the campaigns backwards: here is launch date, so where is pre-sale end date / pre-sale launch date / photography date etc. Come up with three campaigns for the rest of the year.
✔️ Invest in better camera / photography gear and take one photography course (ahem - the Cookie College has a photography course) - plan photography days.
✔️ Start adding consistent posting in community groups - make 2 posts per week (non-sales) for 1 month.
✔️ Work on a local likes campaign. Grow your page numbers - you'll never reach 100% of your page likes, so increase the page likes to increase potential eyes on your content.
✔️ Audit your sales funnel - is something somewhere driving people to your competition.
✔️ Audit your competition - if you can handle not comparing yourself, competitor analysis is a great way to see where you're lacking.

Try these 6 suggestions out. Hey - your marketing isn't working, you probably have a lot of spare time. What do ya have to lose? Except the yips that is.

216 episoder

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Baking it Down with Sugar Cookie Marketing 🍪

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213. Baking it Down - Hit the Breaks 1:13:43

för 7 dagar sedan1:13:43

1:13:43

Send us a text 🛑 Hit the Breaks - How to take big bakery breaks. In this week's Baking it Down Podcast - Episode 213 - Hit the Breaks , we cover the fact of life that just sometimes, along your business journey, you need to take a big break. If you've listened to past podcasts, you know we're anti-"big break" when it comes to marketing because it's really hard to stop and start marketing when funnels are long and competition is well, competitive. However, the beauty of being your own boss is that when life requires significant breaks, you're able to take them - with the correctly set expectations that it will impact your marketing and lead generation. With the right setup, that negative effect can be mitigated. And that's what today's podcast is on - the strategy behind big breaks. Note - if you're taking a small break, like something under 2 weeks, disregard this strategy. You likely don't even need to alter your current marketing much, if at all, for a small break. We are talking big breaks, as in 2 months. ⛔ 1. Make an announcement When it comes to big breaks, we need to c-o-m-m-u-n-i-c-a-t-e effectively because nothing is more frustrating than to go place an order with your favorite baker for an event that just happens to fall during that baker's big break. So we need our audience to fully comprehend our break and what it entails. ⛔ Add a defined start and stop date for your big break . I'm talking "July 1, 2025 - August 15, 2025" type specificity. This can help your audience plan around your break without being ambiguous. ⛔ Unpin ALL pinned posts and JUST leave this announcement post pinned. We want to make sure all the attention is brought to a singular point - our break announcement. ⛔ Do NOT put the dates you're out of town . Thieves can use this information to figure out that your house is homeowner-free and rob ya. Again, this podcast is for "taking a break from my bakery" breaks, not "at the beach for the week" breaks. ⛔ 2. Schedule out posting and newsletters Contrary to "taking a break," we don't want to fully ghost our socials and newsletters. We live in an algorithmic world, so fully ghosting can make it really hard to reach our audience when we return. So we make maintenance posts just so Zuck doesn't think we've fully abandoned our baking ship. ⛔ Schedule fewer posts during this absence . While we're not working, we don't want to post at the same frequency as when we were working - it's confusing. Bring your scheduled posts down to once a week - if you're taking off 2 months, that's only 8 posts. ⛔ In each of these posts, you're going to reiterate your break start and end dates . This way, your posts are sending a confusing message of "Wait, I thought she was on break? But she just posted about baking a fun set??" ⛔ The copy should not drive sales . We don't want to have any CTAs in our maintenance posts, because we don't want people to take an action at all. We're on break. So don't ask people to click to your website, place an order, or contact you. With your newsletter - constantly drive folks who caught ya "on your big break," to sign up for your newsletter so they can get the inbox exclusive on your 'big break return." It's a decent way to grow your email list while still staying in touch about your break schedule. You may want to send an email giving folks a heads up about the break (1 month out), the official break announcement, 1 newsletter during your break with a reminder about the return, then a return-day announcement. ⛔ 3. Update all auto-responses Your business has a lot of auto-responders designs for big…

Baking it Down with Sugar Cookie Marketing 🍪

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212. Baking it Down - Admin Hours 1:23:58

för 14 dagar sedan1:23:58

1:23:58

Send us a text ⏰ 1-Hr Admin Tasks - Setting up time blocks for tasks. In this week's Baking it Down Podcast - Episode 212 - Admin Hour , we break down four different "admin hour" frameworks you could spend each week pluggin' away at to be a better baking business. "Admin Hours" are groupings of tasks that take up an hour spent on one specific aspect of your business - social media, bake prep, customer management, and inbox management - the four frameworks we cover this week. By spending a dedicated few hours a week on these "admin hour" tasks, you'll save yourself a future headache, streamline your workflow, and become a competitive baker in your space (as well as stress less as you forget fewer orders and run out of fewer cookie tags ya already sold). 🕰️ 1. Social Hour Staying consistent on social media will be a great foundational strategy. But to be consistent, we must make time to create content. Here's a social media "admin hour" framework you can build from: ⏰ 20 Mins - Schedule this week's posts (3x/wk minimum) ⏰ 10 Mins - Reply to comments ⏰ 10 Mins - Comment on posts in a few local groups ⏰ 30 Mins - Make a Reel (film / edit / voiceover / post) You can add multiple "social hours" to your week depending on how aggressive your social media marketing focus is. And these hours can ebb and flow throughout your cookier calendar year as needed (for example, when you're fully booked, drop down to 1 hour, when the upcoming month looks light for orders, add in a few more social hours). 🕰️ 2. Inbox Hour If you've not tasted of the sweet nectar that is inbox zero, you're missing out. Walking up to an inbox only full of actionable emails you got in the last few days is a breath of email-fresh air. Once you reach the coveted "Inbox Zero," your inbox-power-hour will look something like this: ⏰ 20 Mins - Reply to all emails / Ping follow-up emails ⏰ 10 Mins - File emails away to reach Inbox Zero again ⏰ 10 Mins - Transpose orders / tasks to Google Calendar ⏰ 10 Mins - CRM - Follow up with orders placed this time last year Getting an inbox hour on your weekly task list puts you in control of your calendar (rather than the stress of being a slave to a calendar missing your dentist appointments and that one order you forgot to write down). 🕰️ 3. Admin tasks Likely the one you don't wanna do but are forced to do, running a business requires admin tasks. Here's how we'd break up that hour spent "behind the scenes" of your bakery biz: ⏰ 10 Mins - QuickBooks Bookkeeping Update ⏰ 10 Mins - Adding new leads to CRM ⏰ 10 Mins - Inbox Zero ⏰ 10 Mins - Inventory Check ⏰ 10 Mins - Weekly Meeting (Asana) ⏰ 10 Mins - Plan Out Week So again - your admin tasks may take longer than this - and that's absolutely fine. The goal is to consistently show up for at least an hour for these recurring tasks, turning you into a consistent working powerhouse. 🕰️ 4. Baking Prep Baking preparations for the week can streamline your baking workflow because you're not stuck running to the cutter corner for every order. I prefer to do this stuff on Mondays and capitalize on the time saving all week. Whichever days you choose for your admin hours is up to you, but sprinkling in a baking power hour is a must for a ballin' baker. ⏰ 10 Mins - Wash Baking Mat and other supplies ⏰ 10 Mins - Wipe down Surfaces / Disinfect ⏰ 20 Mins - Collect Cutters for the Week ⏰ 10 Mins - Dough Ready / Dough Day Planned ⏰ 10…

Baking it Down with Sugar Cookie Marketing 🍪

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211. Baking it Down - Luxury Refunds 1:26:13

för 21 dagar sedan1:26:13

1:26:13

Send us a text ↩️ Luxury Refunds - Refunds are a business strategy. In this week's Baking it Down Podcast - Episode 211 - Luxury Refunds , Corrie wanted to recap yet another reminder on why luxury bakers should consider luxury refunds. 🤔 What's a luxury refund? It's the baked-into-the-price guarantee that if something goes left, the baker will make it right - and typically that will be through a refund. Per the twin, we can't claim 💰 " luxury brand and thus luxury pricing ," but claim 😭 "I'm just a small business, give me a break" when things go wrong. Luxury price needs to be threaded throughout your entire sales process. Yes, refunds included. 💰 1. Be Refund-Centric When you think about luxury brands, you're likely not picturing a front-desk person telling unhappy clients that that sounds like a them-problem when the client has an issue. Noooo - you picture luxury brands like hotels handling all the gross parts of staying in a hotel = managing luggage, door hops, taxi cab and uber calls, clean rooms and room service - you get the point. Luxury pricing includes making things right for our luxury clients. A refund-centric company will have its happiness guarantee baked into its policies before the client even orders. If there were two bakers equal in every way but only one offered a 100% money-back guarantee, which do you think clients would choose? Be that baker. 💰 2. Take refund culpability Most of the time, it's not a 100/0 split on who is at fault when it comes to client issues. ⚖️ Likely, there's shared culpability. But a luxury brand would still take culpability from the client. 🤨 "But twins! I wasn't wrong, they were!" We know - but you're the business owner, and a luxury business owner at that. Don't be afraid to say, "I'm so sorry - I misunderstood when you wrote XYZ! My apologies - I'd love to make you whole regarding this issue." 🔑 The words " I'm sorry " will unlock more doors than they shut - believe ye we. 💰 3. Offer refunds often Here's the thing - you won't have to refund often if you're willing to refund. Why? You'll find that clients actually aren't trying to get free stuff - they just want their cookies. 🛑 Being gracious to your clients by offering refunds will allow your clients to actually ask you not to. People are more understanding than we give them credit for. We just have to allow them to have the elbow room to exercise that grace - 🥊and they can't when you're threatening them by blaming them for the order issue. 💰 4. Refund swiftly Be quick to refund, as in don't make your clients fight you for it. With every message rejecting the client's issue, you're one step closer to the dreaded, "Well, I also found a hair in the cookie." Pluuuus, when you address the first issue rather than forcing customers to rattle off 10 reasons why they think you should offer them recourse, you get the brownie points of being "that baker" that puts customer service first and foremost. 💰 5. Refund and be generous When it comes to refunding, don't nickel and dime your clients and expect them to appreciate it. 🤕 If you made a booboo, grab the biggest band-aid . 🩹 Rather refund too much than too little and leave the clients hurt (and in your review profiles, finding their written vindication). "But I only messed up a few cookies!" We get it, and we're not necessarily saying a full refund, but a "barely there" refund won't cut it. As an example, maybe a rebake and a partial refund may be the answer to satisfy the client's upsetting experience.…

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210. Baking it Down - How to Sell in Community Groups 1:55:42

för 26 dagar sedan1:55:42

1:55:42

Send us a text 💸 Selling in Community Groups - Turn groups into lead gen powerhouses. In this week's Baking it Down Podcast - Episode 210 - Selling in Community Groups , we are talking about the same topic we presented this past Tuesday at What's Popping Co n (a convention for Cake Poppers). This content is all available on our website by clicking this button - it's a lot of info and free templates, so click here to snag that stuff while it's still posted. If you're already thinking, "There are no community groups in my area," consider starting your own. In this course, we'll cover some of the group mechanics that can help you form the foundation of your own community groups. Community groups that are valuable resources can be massive lead gen opportunities for the group admins. 🧠 A group is only as good as its management team. High-quality groups require a lot of effort, but they pay out in dividends. https://www.sugarcookiemarketing.com/popping 💸 Snag a Free Tracking Template! We live and die by our spreadsheets - and using one to track community groups allows you to stay on top of specific group rules, posting times, post types, group size - you get the point. This free Google sheet is built out for community group management. Use the dropdown to categorize each aspect of your local community groups. Way too often, users get banned from community groups for breaking the sales rules specifically . It's important to keep track of each group's sales policies so we're not permanently banned from selling there. We're going to look for about 10 local community groups if possible, but we'll take what we can get. The more options you have, the more potential audience you can reach. It's important as a seller to understand how groups can be run within Meta's group options and features as these can affect your posting abilities within groups. ⚠️ An important aspect of selling in a community group: following their rules. Take a minute to join the Example Facebook Group we're using for the rest of this lesson - you can join it by clicking here > answering the membership questions > agree to the group rules. Let's run through some common community group Q&As to help you better understand how to approach groups when making your sales posts. 🔗 Rules can be found for any group by adding /rules to the end of the community group's URL ( example : https://www.facebook.com/groups/sugarcookiemarketing/rules ). 💸 Group Profiles - How to Optimize When you join a community group, you automatically create a group profile separate from your Facebook profile (although still connected). Think of your group profile as a version of you specifically made for that group. Optimizing these group profiles can help increase lead generation in your community groups. Each community group you join creates a unique group profile for that specific group. You can customize: ✍️ Your profile intro (150 character limit) ✍️ The profile cover photo (1640x600 pixel sizing) When other users click on your profile within that group, they are taken to your group profile. Admins can also use your group profile to see admin actions taken against you, your group activity, as well as your profile information. From there, they can also click to your personal Facebook profile. Your group profile is only a part of your overall Facebook persona. Optimize your personal profile as well. You can tag a business page or insert a URL in your personal profile. You can update your cover photo to feature your latest bakes, and you can share content from your baking page to…

Baking it Down with Sugar Cookie Marketing 🍪

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209. Baking it Down - Half It then Half It 54:18

för 5 weeks sedan54:18

54:18

Send us a text 🤏 Half It then Half It - Make goals small and then smaller. In this week's Baking it Down Podcast - Episode 209 - Half It Then Half It , we cover a topic Heather saw on the Diary of a CEO podcast with Dr. Alok Kanojia on goal setting. The concept is pretty basic - set a goal. Then take that goal and half it. Then take that half and half it again. You're now left with only 25% of that goal. And guess what? That 25% is much more doable than the big, massive, overly sized goal you couldn't eat whole. Breaking (baking?) goals into edible chunks makes for small bites that we can accomplish to get us to our bigger goal. 25% Goals aren't as fun to tell people about - they get the vibe of, "Okay... and?" And that's what makes them so valuable - because they're not big, they allow us to take small movements forward. Sure - we won't get the accolades for announcing some giant goal like, "THIS YEAR, I PLAN TO OPEN STORE FRONT," but the path to opening a store front is long and lonely - I'd rather claim this year to do the thankless foundation work required to get into a brick and mortar rather than make a big announcement with no execution (remember the " No One Likes a Party Planner " podcast episode). 🤏 1. Example - Facebook Lead Gen Turning Facebook into a lead gen powerhouse is a BIG goal - and one we really like. Facebook can really make some sales for bakers. But let's half that goal: 📏 I want to turn community groups into a referral source. Even better! We narrowed it from "ALL of Facebook," which is a massive task to tackle down to an aspect of Facebook. But per the doc, we can go smaller! Let's half that half. 📏 I want to make this one specific group a resource for my bakery business. There we go - in fact, this will be next week's Podcast topic (turning Local Community Groups into Referral Powerhouses after we teach it at What's Popping Con 2025 on Tuesday). 🤏 2. Example - Brick and Mortar Most bakers dream of seeing their business logo in bright lights on a building they leased . And who wouldn't?! Talk about a HUGE goal that feels all warm and fuzzy! But brick and mortar dreams aren't built overnight, but rather on consistent "half of a half" goals over time. Let's half that B&M goal: 📏 I want to contact a commercial leasing agent to learn more about taking on a B&M lease. Love it - so much more actionable than "I will open a brick and mortar bakery," but can we half it again? 📏 I'm going to reach out to the Sugar Cookie Marketing group and see if any B&M bakers would take a 15-minute call from me to talk about the "first 6 months" of prep needed to get started on potentially opening a bakery in the future. Loooove that so much more. That's a "half of a half" goal that will actually teach you something - whether a brick and mortar bakery business is meant for you. 🤏 3. Example - I want to be a social media expert. As a marketer myself, love this goal - but it's a chunky one. Taking on all of social media is admirable, but that's not going to move a needle because it's too broad. Let's see if we can half it. 📏 I want to focus on making my Facebook page a valuable resource for my business. Just like the community group goal, LOVE this - it'll be a huge boon to your business goals. But can we go smaller on this halved goal? I bet we can. 📏 I will post to my business Facebook page 2x a week to establish a baseline for a posting schedule. There we go!…

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208. Baking it Down - Multi-Holiday Showdown 1:12:33

för 6 weeks sedan1:12:33

1:12:33

Send us a text 🥊 Multi-Holiday Showdown - How to tackle multiple holidays. In this week's Baking it Down Podcast - Episode 208 - Multi-Holiday Showdown , we wanted to talk about the scourge of Q2 holiday line-ups. With these non-heavy-hitting baker holidays falling mid-month and/or on top of each other, it makes for a confusing marketing strategy. Do you tackle all of them to maximize sales? Or will that dilute your offerings too much and you'll sell out of nothing but be stuck with materials for a whole 'nother year? Here's our take on a multi-holiday marketing showdown in mid-spring. 🤧 Heads up - I'm slightly under the weather, so forgive any typos (and forgive typos when I'm not sick too lol). 🥊 1. Don't choose every holiday Find a few holidays and focus on them - heck, even focusing on one is probably a better approach than trying to sell out for every holiday in Q2. Mother's Day is a hit or miss with some bakers, Teacher Appreciation seems like a good bet, and Cinco De Mayo seems more like a location-based seller rather than a guaranteed sell-out. Consider that Teacher Appreciation cutters and packaging can also double for graduation sets and the "last day of the school year" teacher gifts. 🥊 2. Past performance = future performance We'd recommend choosing holidays that have been consistent for you in the past. If they sold well then, they'll likely sell well now. Trying out a "new" holiday in the slower part of the cookier's calendar year may cost you more than it brings in, so we'd stick with the consistent seller. 🥊 3. Treat them as separate content buckets Content buckets are a strategy you can use to plan out your social media content (see Episode 182). As such, these competing holidays shouldn't share a bucket, but rather get their own separate content pillars that you'll pull from for the duration of the promotion of each holiday. Tap these buckets frequently until you feel like you've sold enough. Content buckets don't have to be systematically drawn from - you can use more content from a specific bucket as it supports your sales goals. 🥊 4. Increase marketing runtime If you have two holidays fighting for the marketing limelight, you'll want to increase your marketing runtime. Corrie and I always prefer around 6 weeks to include planning + cutter securing + photography + marketing. It's enough time to account for any wild cards like weird weather or slow sales. 🥊 5. Sold out? shut up Once one holiday sells out or you're happy with the sales numbers, drop that content bucket out of your marketing strategy completely and refocus your efforts on the underperforming holiday target. Once "Mother's Day" is sold out, there's no real marketing purpose to keep posting about it when there's another product we need to move more of. 👂 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 Podcast - Episode 208 - Multi-Holiday Showdown…

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207. Baking it Down - Nobody Likes a Party Planner 1:01:25

för 7 weeks sedan1:01:25

1:01:25

Send us a text 💡 No One Likes a - Party planner (ideas without execution). 💩 A forced a play on words from "no one likes a party pooper " - but in this case, we're focusing on 🧠 "ideas guy" who love to plan and fail to launch. These folks talk up "the next great thing," and yet the idea never exits the ol' cranium to make it to market. 🗺️ Having a plan is good - but too much of a good thing, and you've got either a perfectionist or a serial starter , but you definitely 🚫 don't have a viable product. ⚔️ And that's why planning is a double-edged sword. You have to have a plan, but some bakers turn "making a plan" into a never ending excuse as to why they've not launched [that cookie class] or [that new bakery item] or [the vendor event that's now since come and gone] or [that cookie cart]. You get the point. 🚧 They turn planning into roadblocks . 💭 They spend their whole baking lives in the dream stage so that they never have to take the risk to launch and possibly fail. But our challenge is to accept failure and fail forward . Here's some ways to ensure you're not a party pooper... I mean, planner. 💡 1. Determine your mvp MVP = minimum viable product . 🤏 That's the "least amount I need to do to be able to take this concept to market for a v1 release." In simpler terms, what's the simplest thing you can produce from your idea and use to test if your marketing would bite? This "MVP" concept forces the forever-planner's hand by making them launch as soon as something is good enough . They can't wait until it's perfect because it's no longer the minimum viable product. Take Stupid Car Tray (podcast sponsor - use code SUGAR to save 15%). They're on their v3 tray. What if they'd only launched when they felt their product was super refined? 🤑 They would have missed years of sales. Same with you, ya party planner. Stop planning, start pushing out product. See if they bite. If they do, then improve. 🚀 Launch and learn. 💡 2. Two types of "party planners" Okay, maybe "party planner" wasn't my best play on words, but there are two types of "ideas guys" - which camp do you tend to find yourself in? 🏢 The Perfectionist - The perfectionist builds the perfect skyscraper. It's got the best finishes, the best appliances, the most amenities, but they never list the condos for sale. They're in a perpetual state of trying to make everything good, better, best. They never fail because they never open. 🏚️🏚️🏚️🏚️ The Serial Starter - The type of person who lays the foundation for many ideas, but never builds a single house. This planner loves an idea, runs out to source materials, then panics at the thought that they weren't naturally talented at the thing and jumps on the next bandwagon, leaving a trail of partial starts (and budget buster) in their wake (and basement storage closet). 🏡 We need to be the single home builder who lays the foundation, constructs a modest home (aka MVP), sells it, then gets hired to add on to the home later. At all stages, this planner is generating income while improving their craft. 💡 3. Plan = yes | Overplan = hard pass Planning is a business necessity. 🗺️ Venture out without a map and you're bound to get lost. 🧭 But business (and life) exist in the gray areas. Same with planning. ❌ Spending no time planning is just as bad as spending all your time planning. 👎 Plan enough, then take that first step out there. Remember - you can always tweak. ⏳ But you can't time travel , meaning we can't go back and launch when we "coulda - shoulda - woulda." Take the leap of faith, push out the MVP, see what happens, cap'n.…

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206. Baking it Down - Expound then Expand 1:34:39

för 8 weeks sedan1:34:39

1:34:39

Send us a text 💳 Expound then Expand - Plan before your purchase. In this week's Baking it Down Podcast - Episode 206 - Expound then Expand , Corrie wanted to come to the altar with her confession of packaging purchases. Yeah - we're talkin' to the "overconsumption cookier" this week, 👣💥 and it'll step on some toesies (starting with Twin2's... er... TwinToes?). It's easy to get ✨shiny object✨ syndrome when you check out the Best Bakes threads in the Sugar Cookie Marketing Group thinking, "Well, if that sold well for them, it might sell well for me! Let me buy these supplies." Here's the thing - that's not a guarantee, and it can actually be a distraction , not a sound business decision. And guaranteed it's going to impact your financials. Even worse is if you do get the supplies and never get around to selling that adorable Easter Egg PYO carton - 🥚🥚🥚🥚 you're now stuck with colorful cartons for an entire year - and that's bad for business and your bottom line. 💰 1. Start with 1 versatile backdrop White matte finish (use code SUGARCOOKIE on thebackersco.com to save 25% - they're one of the podcast sponsors that keeps this content f-r-e-e for y'all) is the most used backdrop Corrie has, citing that it's the one she reaches for 85% of the time. 📸 Know what that means? That's likely the only backer you'll need to get started . Yes, in time, snag a few more options, but when you're just getting started, "one and done" it until you've maxed out your photography skills on that backdrop. Then expand. 💰 2. Learn from the Target trays If you were in the SCM groups around 2021 - 2022, you lived through the fun (funky) Target trays - 🪵 a wooden tray Target sold in its dollar spot that took the craft world by storm. Specifically, cookiers gravitated to this tray since it made for a high-quality package for about 20 cookies for Christmas - 🎄 talk about a best seller! But such is panic buying, some stocked up on these trays and were left with an unfoldable storage nightmare when they didn't sell out. The lesson? Find out if your audience wants the product first - then purchase. ️🎯 Overbuying for your clients who never wanted the product in the first place is a bad investment. What's the value of 50 wooden trays if no one will buy them? Hint: it's a negative number. 💰 3. Purchase plain packaging to start 🎀 Cute packaging is a great way to up your customer benefits packaging and set you apart from the competition, but not if it sets you apart from your profitability. There's a sweet spot between really high-end custom packaging unique for every holiday and packaging that's on the plain side but works for any occasion. 🏳️ I'm not saying "cheap white Amazon boxes or bust," but I am saying if you're getting started or you're in "packaging purchasing purgatory" rehab, go back to the basics. Add in fancy when necessary (and buy an appropriate amount - so like, not 50 units when you likely only have time to bake 10), but have the cheaper fallback as your go-to. 💰 4. Cut out overbuying cutters Have your steel-toe boots ready, but here it comes. Overbuying cutters can cut your profit margins down to nothing. 🔲⚫ Plaques to get started and basic shapes are likely fine in a lot of cases. Client wants something super custom? Offer to bill them that cost or source a cutter you already have in your stash that's super close to their design and can save them a few bucks. Likely, your clients won't care, and you'll be able to stay away from cutter overconsumption. (🖨 And you 3D printer folks can learn a lesson here too - cutter takes up storage, and just because it was cheaper to print doesn't mean it doesn't have…

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205. Baking it Down - Top User Submitted Marketing Tips 1:32:25

för 9 weeks sedan1:32:25

1:32:25

Send us a text 🪄 Top Marketing Tips - Submitted by group members in March. In this week's Baking it Down Podcast - Episode 205 - Top User Submitted Marketing Tips , we challenged the Sugar Cookie Marketing Group in March to make more posts - and 4 winners would be chosen to join The Cookie College on our tab (I'll announce those soon). But the marketing tips were so good, we thought we'd feature a few on this week's podcast! The layout of this newsletter will look a little different since I'll include the 📸 screenshots from the authors (gotta give credit where credit's due). I read them in no particular order, but they're all great tips. If you want to see the screenshots, snag our blog at www.sugarcookiemarketing.com/blog this week once I've updated it. 🎧 The rest of this post will be those marketing tips - but snag this week's podcast episode to hear our take on 'em. ✨ 1. Reach back out to corporate clients "My marketing tip is don't be afraid to reach out to past corporate clients about ordering again. I just received two orders (one for 300 and one for 1000 cookies) just by reaching out and basically saying, "Hey, you ordered this time last year, would you like to order again?" Sometimes they just need a reminder that they want your cookies." - Tammy ✨ 2. Use “for sale” homes for headshots "Want to do a branding photoshoot, but thinking your kitchen ain't fancy enough? Why not use a nearby model home? I haven't met the homebuilder yet or the sales person for them, who didn't appreciate the shout-out when you post your pics. Guess what? It's free. I called to ask when their slowest times were & I made plans for an hour. I left them all the baked cookies I had for the shoot." - Sharon ✨ 3. Incentives through discounts "Every cookie class I've hosted, each attendee gets a little take home gift. I'd love to see what ever one else does! Here’s a sample of mine: I make a mini 3D printed cookie cutter and provide a coupon for either custom orders, or it may sometimes be $5-$10 dollars off the next upcoming cookie class. I find it’s been working very well to get those to return to classes or place orders for customs." - Jennifer ✨ 4. Seek out strategic local businesses "Local. Businesses. My husband and I have made a list of local businesses in our area, from mom and pop shops to large warehouses, and we've been strategically picking some to take boxes of samples and business cards to. Would this business employ my target clientele? Would bringing samples to this business get my business name in places it isn't currently known? Does this business openly support other small businesses? ...are a few of the questions we've been considering. We've gone to car dealerships, furniture stores, medical offices, boutiques, salons, coffee shops, YMCAs, and we have more on the list. Doing this has greatly increased my following; and shortly after beginning this, the owner of the local Harley Davidson reached out!" - Alayna ✨ 5. Be your #1 fan and believe it "Start actually thinking of yourself as a business owner! I'm a stay-at-home mom, so when people ask me what I do, that’s what I reply with. I've been listening to the podcast and it's empowered me - and at the dentist the other day the hygienist asked what I did and I said 'I own a custom sugar cookie business' By the time I'd left the office I handed out 5 business cards and have already gotten an order from them." - Tara ✨ 6. Save for samples "Marketing tip - Have extra cookies left over? Great, cut them in quarters and freeze them. Save them as samples to give out at the next market or event. Always only offer one flavor of a sample otherwise, people will want to try…

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204. Baking it Down - In the Market for Farmers Markets 1:18:57

för 10 weeks sedan1:18:57

1:18:57

Send us a text 🥦 In the Market for Markets - How to scope out the ideal vendor setup. In this week's Baking it Down Podcast - Episode 204 - In the Market for Markets , Corrie wanted to talk about the 5 tips to help you source a strategic farmer's market (or recurring vendor event) relationship that bolsters that bottom line. 🥕 1. Is the market marketing itself? Markets are businesses too - and as a marketing podcast, what would we be if we didn't say the ideal market is well... marketing. Markets live and die by the efforts of their organizers, so if the organization isn't promoting the event - guess what? Foot traffic won't follow. 🕵️ Finding a market that's doing its job of marketing is a recipe for market success. While it'd be nice if all the vendors did their share of the marketing heavy lifting too (more on that later), finding a market that has social media profiles posted to and updated frequently, a website with all the info necessary for attendees to find their way, and event listings on Facebook and event listing websites are signals that market means business. And business = selling more bakes. 🥕 2. Do your "market" research Research your potential market match before you sign any contracts. Not all markets are created equally, so understanding the implications of this seasonal relationship can make a sales difference if you get stuck with a low performer. 🤔 How long has the market been around? 🤔 How often do you see it recommended when people in community groups ask for local market recs? 🤔 Is the market growing or shrinking? 🤔 Is there diversity in vendor types - think pickle booth, honey booth, etc.? Using community groups to get these questions answered is a great way to get authentic feedback (and maybe market your 🥕 3. Question the organizers Once we get outside feedback, it's time to go all in - by that we mean contact the organizers. Now - yes, the organizers are biased in their favor, so we need to keep the questions more "information gather-y" and less "how great are you-y" (we get it, they're great). Here are some ideas: 🤔 Can I get a list of vendors? 🤔 How much does it cost per week? Month? Season? 🤔 What are your weather policies? 🤔 What insurances do you require? 🤔 Do I need to supply the table / tent / chairs? 🤔 Do you have a drop-in rate ? 🤔 What are your cancellation policies? 🥕 4. Contact past vendors Contacting past vendors is another great way to get insider info. You might be able to source this by scrolling back through the farmer's market's social media posts from years ago, but another great way is by asking in community groups, "Has anyone been a vendor at the [Farmers Market]? I'd love to ask you a few questions!" Keep in mind, squeaky wheels tend to complain the loudest, so get a few different vendors to give you feedback - one that used to vendor there, one that still vendors there, and maybe one that is considering it. We'd ask them these more open-ended questions to get more authentic responses: 🤔 How do you feel about how the organizers manage the event? 🤔 How many years have you vended here? Do you plan on returning long-term? 🤔 What 2 factors bring you back here year after year? 🤔 If you could change one thing about this market, what would it be? 🥕 5. Prep for the market Once you've found your perfect market match, it's time to really dig in. Treat this market like you would a cookie class - market the market.…

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203. Baking it Down - Reasons to Start a Blog 1:22:27

för 11 weeks sedan1:22:27

1:22:27

Send us a text ✍️ Reasons 2 Start a Blog - The SEO, content, and reach benefits. In this week's Baking it Down Podcast - Episode 203 - Reasons to Start a Blog , continuing on with our "lessons in websites," I wanted to talk about blogs. I know - we're all about websites when it comes to online sales - but does your website have a blog ? 😅 "Uh, twins - what could I possibly blog about? Reasons people should give me their money in exchange for cookies??" Well - kinda, yeah. You see - websites are pretty stagnant . I mean, you got the 4 main pages - home, about, service or products, contact, and then maybe one extraneous page - for cookiers, it could be a page on your cookie classes or your booking process for example. But blogs allow websites to be dynamic since blogs are always being updated. ✍️ This fresh content allows more potential for your website to be found in search engines (Google is a search engine). That means it could be a whole new lead source that never sleeps - and a blog can help your website accomplish that. 🤔 "Okay girls... maaaybe you're onto something, but what could I possibly blog about??" Great question - and that's what we talked about in today's podcast. Blog posts don't have to be overly complicated, but they do have to stay on topic. And what's your topic? Local and baker - this should help you narrow down your content topics. Now - who are we trying to reach with our blog posts? Local non-baker clients . See where this is headed? Don't worry - we'll give you some topic ideas below. Hint: you're overthinking it. ✍️ 1. Website SEO benefits Because we can add keywords related to our product and associate those product keywords with our location , blog posts have a direct benefit to getting our websites to rank in search engines for "baker near me" type queries (aka searches). Consider this, when a local potential client googles something like, "sugar cookie classes in [Your City]," how can Google associate you with that ? Through a blog post you wrote on "everything you need to know before taking a cookie class." You see the connection there? It creates... buzzword incoming... topical relevancy for Google's lil' robot crawlers. ✍️ 2. More diverse social media content If you find yourself always sharing photos, photos, and more photos to social media, blog post content can benefit two-fold here. You can add a link to an article on "Best Date Ideas in [CITY]" (make one of those ideas attending a cookie class), and share that to your page. It's heck of a lot more interesting than just a photo of a set you baked PLUS it drives traffic to your website (traffic = people). And guess what's also on your website? Your CTAs directing that traffic to place an order. Again - you see how this is all working together? ✍️ 3. Reference topics You can't bog down your homepage with a ton of text - that would make for a bad UX (user experience aka how real people navigate through your website). So where do we put content that's kinda important, but not important enough to be on our home page menu? Blog posts. You can add "how to defrost cookies" as a blog post and link it to any clients who need to... well, know how to dethaw a set. You can keep that concept going with, "How to store a DIY kit," or "How to use a scribe" and "What to bring to a Cookie Class" - the ideas are endless when the topics can be used as a knowledge base for customers. ✍️ 4. Local topics ripe for reshares Okay - what did we say earlier? Both content about baking and location - this is where things can get fun. Feature a local business - sta…

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202. Baking it Down - Calling All Actions 1:17:12

för 12 weeks sedan1:17:12

1:17:12

Send us a text 🔊 Calling All Actions - What are CTA’s and how to use them. In this week's Baking it Down Podcast - Episode 202 - Calling All Actions, we wanted to talk about a digital marketing buzzword that'll increase your bottom line - and it's stupid simple. 📞 CTAs - otherwise known as C all T o A ctions - typically seen as buttons on a website's home page. These lil' buttons tell your users what you want them to do. And they're direct too - no beatin' about the bush when you've got next to no room for additional characters. And you know them because you have been clickin' on these little commands for years. They're the buttons that say: 📣 Order Here 📣 Add to Cart 📣 Buy Now 📣 Get 15% Off 📣 Play Now 📣 Subscribe ☎ Yep - those are CTA's - 🤏 small, concise phrases typically displayed on website buttons telling you the next action to take in the buying process. And you should have them on your website, social media, bios, and print materials = because they work. Creating a solid CTA is both simple and complex - because while we don't have a ton of space to work with, we still need to find the optimal command to get our web traffic to take an action. While it may be tempting to make all your CTAs "BUY FROM ME," there's a bit of strategy (and testing) that goes into them. 📣 1. Be concise and direct CTA's are concise and tell the user what to do. "Stream here," "Join here," "Sign up here" - it's very clear what the next actions to take are. We want to keep that concept in all of our CTA's. Wish-washy, too long, and mumbled messaging is a CTA-killer. "Maybe if you want to join the newsletter I send out sometimes, you can click here... if you want." 🥺👉👈 Yeah - that's not going to cut it for a solid CTA. Short. Clear. To the Point. The next step. That's the goal with the CTA. 📣 2. Use action-oriented verbs Do this. Stop that. Click here. Subscribe there. Buy this. Add that to cart. Each CTA should include a verb - because we're calling people to do an action. That's how they work. They command people to take an action. And we, the sheeple, love to be told what to do next. We're conditioned to look for CTA's to guide us through a website's user experience. 📣 3. Highlight benefits If you look at our revamped sugarcookiemarketing.com website, you can see I marry each of our CTAs with a reason why it's worth clicking the button. "Join the community... to get free bakery marketing help." "Stream the podcast... to learn one marketing tip each Tuesday." The CTA tells them what to do - the supporting text tells them why they'd be stupid not to do it. 📣 4. Make them visually appealing CTAs are typically associated with buttons - so make them buttons POP, baby girl! If you look at the SCM (sugar cookie marketing) website, you'll see I opted for bright pink buttons in our brand colors + white bolded text. I even added emojis where possible to further draw attention to my money-maker buttons. 📣 5. Keep it simple CTA's should be single-step commands. "Sign up here" takes them to your newsletter registration form. "Book now" should take them to your booking page. "Add to cart" should immediately add the baked item to carts. Now is not the time to increase your funnel. CTA's are intended to decrease funnel length, and that means a shorter buying process (and less time to second guess whether they should splurge on custom cookies or not).…

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201. Baking it Down - Value over Price 1:09:27

för 13 weeks sedan1:09:27

1:09:27

Send us a text 💰 Value over Price - How to stand out in saturation. In this week's Baking it Down Podcast - Episode 201 - Value Over Price, Corrie happened upon a "bomb pop Facebook Live" - and from a marketing standpoint, it's a fascinating business model. It's a multi-level business model - but that's not what the podcast is focused on. The concept is this: the seller pre-sells 5 bath bombs for $20 a piece - bundle price of $100. Once purchased, she reveals what the bath bomb hides - a piece of jewelry. After the reveal of each piece of jewelry, the seller exclaims, "Wow - a ring valued at $350! What a steal - you got it for just $20!" And therein lies the key - value . Because we all know that the costume jewelry wasn't worth $350, but value is relative to the perception of the buyer and seller. In the words of the ever-successful Warren Buffett, "Price is what you pay; value is what you get." The same applies to cookies. Instead of competing on price (an unwinnable negotiation when Oreos are in play), compete instead on value. By increasing perceived value, we can maintain and even increase price. Increasing value can be done in many ways - just being readily available or responding quicker than the next baker can increase the perceived value of your clients. It sharpens the industry as competition strives to increase their perceived value over the next baker. The consumer wins, the sellers don't get complacent, and the invisible hand of the economy keeps the wheels turning. It's increasing value across your brand that makes the big difference between you and your competitor - so always be looking for ways to "up the ante." But if you'd like a list (because you know the twins like them a list), we've got one for you. Here's the big takeaway though: move every chess piece in "value added" before you move the "price adjustment" piece. Your price is your profitability - messing with that is a recipe for a bad bakery. 💰 1. Increased value through photography. We buy with our eyes - and our eyes see good photography. By changing nothing but increasing the quality of your product photos, you can increase value without having to decrease price. With high quality standing, images, and backdrops - you can nearly have your cookies jump off the newsfeed and into the hearts ( and wallets) of your customers. 💰 2. Increase value through customer service. My favorite way to increase value is by increasing the value of your customer service. Answering emails faster, having better ordering guidelines, handing refunds quickly and without opposition, heck - replying to Facebook comments in groups and keeping your branding updated on your page all signal to the client that you're putting a value on customer services (and thus you can charge accordingly). 💰 3. Increase value through decorating skills. If communication ain't your thang, you can always work on increasing value by increasing your skill set. A better product is a part of perceived value. Couple a stunning product with stunning photography and you've got a match made in value heaven. Being able to accommodate more requests because you possess those skills is a way to carve out your place in a crowded market. 💰 4. Increase value through ease-of-ordering. A better website, a better organization of products, better website copy, better check-out options, better order confirmation - all of these are methods you can use to increase your value perception within your market. 💰 5. Increase value through customer reviews. Easy one - have enough other people proclaim your value that other potential clients can't help but increase their perception of you.…

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200. Baking it Down - Bu-cee's 1:09:06

för 14 weeks sedan1:09:06

1:09:06

Send us a text 🦫 Buc-ee's - A beaver’s marketing lessons. In this week's Baking it Down Podcast - Episode 200 - Buc-ee's, Corrie and I took in all that the beaver gas station had to offer in our quick trip down to Nashville, TN this weekend. If you've not been to the roadside bathroom stalls of your dreams yet (aka Buc-ee's Fuel Stops), you're missing out - it's... I don't know that words adequately describe what a Buc-ee's truly is - but I'll say it's fantastic and overwhelmingly so. Which is why twin2 and I stood in awe for a solid 10 minutes soaking in all that is Buc-ee's - which makes it so talked about and thus an adequate topic for today's podcast. So yes - instead of "marketing nuggets," this week we're gettin' "beaver nuggets." Now if you've been to a Buc-ee's, you likely know what I'm going to point out - but we're extrapolating the beaver's marketing to bakeries so pay attention (no - stop looking at the man dressed as a beaver - f-o-c-u-s). 🦫 1. Efficiency - endless fuel pumps (and potties) If there's one takeaway from the land of to-go, it's the efficiency. If you've not witnessed a Buc-ee's endless line of fuel pumps - their goal is 0 wait times, and boy do they have it mastered. You pull in, get gas, find a spot to park in front of what feels like 3 main entrances, and then you walk into the land of "over-optimized" with endless bathroom stalls, endless soda dispensers, endless selection, and endless check-out lanes. Much like "the buc," the baker can sharpen up efficiency with a more streamlined ordering process, a well-thought-out website, a great CRM, and a nice pick-up reminder campaign - the more you optimize, the better your client's experiences, the more competitive you are in your space. 🦫 2. Optimized - NO TRUCKS Buc-ee's knows that by cutting out catering to semi-trucks, it can keep the flow goin' thus all Buc-ee's entrances have large NO TRUCK signage. Just like Buc-ee's, we can limit our offerings to the products we know generate cashflow. Yes - you'll be turning down orders, but in the long run, like the beaver, you'll be optimized for the products that bring a profit without bringing analysis paralysis to your client base. 🦫 3. Clean and Organized Ever year, we do a "spring cleaning" curb appeal episode of the podcast (coming soon), but man does the beaver understand what clean floors and cleaner displays do for the buyer's mind. When I see clean restrooms I automatically assume the kitchen is clean. We can borrow from the Buc-ee's here too - keep your front stoop clean, do your hair and makeup on pick-up days (I struggle with this one), and light that vanilla-scented candle for when that customer pops their head inside. You can organize your digital stoop as well - refreshed social media pages and a clean website have the same "I feel safe here" effect as a bathroom stall with plenty of TP. 🦫 4. Merchandising - refreshed product displays This is geared more towards the vendor and farmer's market baker, but walking down the Buc-ee's chip aisle, all the products had been moved to the front of the stand. When I snagged a bag (who doesn't like a Ranch Dorito from time to time, amiright?) a Buc-ee's employee was right behind me to refresh again. 🦫 5. Welcoming - WELCOME TO BUCEES And can we say that Buc-ee's employees are SUPER friendly!? I know it's likely a part of their job description, but every time I walked through the front doors (of which there felt like more than one), a very busy check-out clerk welcomed us each and every time. And bakers can do that too - be super welcoming in your emails, your social posts, your messenger responses, your reminder texts, and your in-person pick-ups. It makes a HUGE difference in how your customer…

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199. Baking it Down - Are Your Sales Slow Right Now? 1:15:04

för 15 weeks sedan1:15:04

1:15:04

Send us a text 🧐 Are Your Sales Slow? - Here’s how to shift that mindset. For this week's Baking it Down Podcast - Episode 199 - Are Your Sales Slow Right Now?, we wanted to cover the question that pops up every post-Valentine's Day rush... the nagging feeling that your business feels slow and leads are down. What gives? 😢 Why does that one baker post that this was their best Vday yet and yet you're nowhere near their "units sold" number? 😓 Is your business dying? 😖 Are you losing your edge? 😩 Is it market saturation? 😭 Is it... time to throw in the proverbial tea towel prop? 🧣 Here's the thing - feelings don't matter. 📉 Metrics do. Are you actually slow? And if yes, what did you water with your marketing efforts? 💦 Corrie pointed out that marketing is like a garden - and we tend to water certain goals. 🌱 If you wanted to teach your first Valentine's Day cookie class, guess what - 📉 your customs are probably down - 📈 because your classes are up . I posted this in the Sugar Cookie Marketing group this week: 😭 If you read that a baker sold 60 units for Valentine's Day THIS year, and you only sold 50 units - you'll feel like you're business is shrinking by 16% 😀 But if you sold 30 units for Valentine's Day LAST year, and this year, you sold 50 units - your business is actually growing, and you're 66% ahead of last year. 🔍 Perspective is everything. Focus on the right metrics. That's what today's podcast is focused on - focusing on numbers that actually have meaning instead of your feelings which can switch depending on the weather, what's for lunch, and if your spouse was nice to you this morning. 📈 1. Compare your "this year" to your "last year." Comparing your "this year" to a random baker's "this year" is a recipe for disappointment. You all have nothing in common other than selling cookies. Comparing your market in rural Iowa to my Washington DC market makes 0 business sense. What does make sense? Comparing how your sales were this time last year to the same time this year. You'll be able to truly see if you grew that bottom line. 👉 Remember - your biggest competition is yourself yesterday - beat that baker! 📈 2. Compare $$ to $$. Instead of comparing "how many customs did I sell," consider comparing, "how much money did I make." The secret is this: if you raised your prices, you may have actually sold less but made more . That means an increase in your bottom line and a decrease in labor costs = a business win. Money matters! 📈 3. Consider where you focused your marketing efforts. I had someone reply to the thread I posted saying, "My sales are down from last year to this year, what gives!" Fortunately, I'd seen their posts that prior month. They had started teaching cookie classes! So yeah - their customs were down (another reason to compare bottom lines) but their class tickets were up. In fact, they'd sold out three Valentine's Day classes - THREE! So where they watered = where it grew. And of course, the counterpoint to that is if you focus on something new, something old may not be in the limelight as much. 📈 4. Look at metrics, not feelings. A lot of times I see bakers "feel" that sales are slow. Feelings are unreliable - heck, they say if you need to appear before a judge, do so right after lunch because judges with full bellies tend to be more lenient than judges who have grumbling tummies. Focus on metrics. Meta gives us a ton of free, easy-to-use metrics. Google Analytics also allows us to gauge without the grump meaning we know exactly what happened and why instead of goin' on an unreliable hunch.…

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198. Baking it Down - Weather with Heather (and Corrie) 1:23:18

för 16 weeks sedan1:23:18

1:23:18

Send us a text ❄️ Weather with Heather (and Corrie) - Weather policies 101. This week's Baking it Down Podcast - Episode 198 - Weather with Heather (and Corrie), we talk about the very reason why the Baking it Down Podcast was a day late this week - ❄️ bad weather. 🌪️ They say the only job you can guess wrong every time and still be employed is being a weatherman - 😭 and that's what makes weather events and cookie pick-ups a match made in refund hell. So - how to predict the unpredictable ? 🌧️ Here are our hot takes on cold weather in this week's podcast (🌡️ also yes, I (Heather) wanted to be a weather person because I thought it would be a neat radio tag like to say, "Weather with Heather on the 8's." ❄️ 1. You need a weather policy right now. Your best friend when it comes to handling bad weather is a weather policy - 📝 a simple page on your website (ideal), a post on your Facebook Page (okay), or even a Google Doc (easy) that states what your plans are in the event of inclement weather can help you set expectations before the flurries fall. If you wait to enact a weather disclaimer after the bad weather hits, 😠 you've got a recipe for a bunch of angry reviews falling from the fingers of unhappy clients. While you're at it - have a separate policy for both 🍪 pick-ups and 🎟️ classes since both can be different enough that one policy won't necessarily apply to both a pick-up order and a class attendee. ❄️ 2. No one reads - so repeat, repeat, repeat. Making a single post to your Facebook page about a class cancelation for weather isn't going to cut it. 👓 No one reads (and even if they did, the algos don't let posts reach them anyways), so make sure the weather communication is across the board. I'm talkin' r-e-p-e-t-i-t-i-v-e as in: ❄️ Facebook Page Post - 7 days out, 4 days out, day of ❄️ Website banner / pop-up ❄️ Newsletter Email - 7 days out ❄️ Individual Emails - 7 days out, 4 days out, day before, day of ❄️ Individual Texts - 7 days out, 4 days out, day before, day of In the world of communication, less is never more - more is more. ❄️ 3. Get in front of weather events. 🥶 When weather is in the forecast, start messaging clients before it starts precipitating. 🧊 You'll know you've not beat the storm communication when it's your clients asking you what the plan is. Don't be that baker - get to them before they start to panic. It'll show that you've got this handled and aren't panicked yourself. ❄️ 4. Offer Refunds / Credits for Classes | Freezing for Pick-Ups When it comes to cookie class cancelations, I like to offer a full refund or an incentivized option to roll into the next class (and save on their Eventbrite fees). Here's our take - if you signed up for a class that got canceled and you couldn't get your money back, how would you feel? "Do unto others as you'd have them do unto you" - the Bible (🙏 and these bakers). Now more tricky - 🧊 communicating to the custom cookie order client that freezing a cookie is actually an effective way to keep it fresh. And you'll be able to accomplish this by stating that in your "weather cookie pick-up policy." 🥶🔥 The thought of " frozen thawed " for the average user signals a lack of freshness, so the words you use here to sell them on a delayed pick-up are important. ❄️ 5. Take their orders to them & have insurance. 🚫 Your homeowner's insurance policy will deny that claim made by the lady who slipped on your front porch picking up her cookie order so fast, it'll make yo…

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197. Baking it Down - Lessons from Susan Reed 1:22:18

för 17 weeks sedan1:22:18

1:22:18

Send us a text 🕵️‍♂️ Susan Reed - A scammer's lessons in marketing. Baking it Down Podcast - Episode 197 - Lessons from Susan Reed (now watchable on YouTube , don't forget), we wanted to talk about common scams - but not in the way you'd expect. We want to find out what marketing tactics make scams so effective . And we've come up with 5 takeaways for lessons we can steal (on brand) from Susan Reed and company. If you're unacquainted with ol' Suzy, she's the name for a common scam where an event planner reaches out asking for a very specific set for her upcoming corporate event. She names a place, time, and location - ironically exactly in the same city as the unassuming baker. Once you take her order, she pays you. Which would all be well and good but she makes a mistake and accidentally over pays you - by just a hundred bucks (give or take) on top of the nearly $1k she intended for the baker. The baker is notified of the mistake and returns the overpayment. A few days later, the baker's bank reports the entire transaction as fraudulent, the e-check bounced, and the baker is out the refunded amount. But the marketing question lies in what made the baker believe the lie? And that's today's podcast. ⚠️ 1. Be Consistent. If there's one thing Susan Reed is, it's consistent . And in marketing, you have GOT to be consistent. Corrie and I say folks shouldn't worry about an oversaturated market - they should worry about their lack of consistency because it's inconsistency that will lead to someone gobbling up your market share. The unfortunate part of inconsistency is that its results are not immediate. 📆 That break you took all of January ? 😭 You'll see those slower sales in July - when we are truly fighting for each and every baked buck. ⚠️ 2. No is not the Final Answer. In marketing, "no" just means you've not found a way around an objection. 🛑 "No, we're not looking to switch bakers" should sound like, 👂 "The deal you pitched isn't good enough yet , what else do you have to offer?" A salesperson sees no as the interlude to a yes. Same with Susan Reed. She emails thousands of bakers and keeps emailing - ❌ even if 1000 told her no - 1️⃣ because all she needs is 1 yes. ⚠️ 3. Cold Outreach (on repeat). Cold outreach ain't for the faint of heart, but it works! 🥶 Cold outreach means reaching out to someone you have no prior relationship with (be careful when cold emailing, there are some laws around this). But reaching out to a 🧊 cold contact is how they become a 🔥 warm contact willing to talk business. Look at Suzy - every baker she reaches out to is a cold contact - it's because her pitch is so desirable that she gets bakers on the hook for hundos. ⚠️ 4. Concise and Clear Communication. The reason why so many bakers fall for Susan Reed's antics is because her initial email is so clear and concise. ✍️ She tells you what she wants, when she wants it, how she wants it, what she'll pay for it, and how to deliver it. It's such a great approach to emailing: clear and concise. ⚠️ 5. Steal. LoL Jk. Efficient Follow-Up. Finally - steal. 🦹‍♂️ Just kidding. Don't do that no matter how tempting. 📧 But the final point is efficient follow-up. While the "Susan Reed" emails are likely a script running to thousands of bakers at all times, it seems like the follow-ups are actual scammers, and they get replies because they reply so quickly. ⏰ They do this on purpose - the less time you have to see if they're scammers, the more likely you are to fall prey to their schemes.…

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196. Baking it Down - Words Matter 1:30:05

för 18 weeks sedan1:30:05

1:30:05

Send us a text 🤐 Words Matter - How copy can compel cash. Baking it Down Podcast - Episode 196 - Words Matter (now watchable on YouTube , don't forget), we were a lil' late - and that's because Heather thought she had a bad night's sleep but was actually 🤢 sick-sick and never left her quarantined room for 3 days and nights. But better late than never, the show must go on... Friday. The message still stands though - your words matter (even if they're three days late). ✍️ Copy is best summarized as any writing that's meant to help you sell or advertise something. That could be the caption on your Facebook post, the text in your email (hey, like this one!) or the ad you took out in the local kids PTA newsletter. If it's written to sell = it's copy. 💸 And if it's copy, it has to be intentional. Gone are the days of, "Thanks for your order, Cheryl," and here to stay is compelling copy intended to get a person to part with their cold hard cash . 💊 There's no "magic copy pill" that, if swallowed, moves mounds of money (trust me, if there was, I woulda swallowed 1,000 pills by now 💊💊💊). But there are strategies you can mix and match to serve as a guide 🗺️ to finding copy that compels - meaning copy that when read makes people want what ya got. 🪝 Start with the Hook Consider the hook - you know, that first part they read before social media companies "truncate" (aka anything behind the ...See more text) the post. The first few words in a post that capture the reader's attention to stay beyond just glancing at that stunning photo. Examples of hooks could look like: 🪝 " My inability to count is your gain ! ...I overbaked and have some extra cookies!" 🪝 " I'll NEVER do this again ! ...This is the LAST time I'll reopen pre-sales for latecomers!" 🪝 " I've got bad news ... I've only got 1 cookie class ticket left." Hooks, 🐺 much like the boy who cried wolf, have to be used sparingly, or eventually you'll exhaust your audience. Additionally, hooks don't have to be dramatic. A simple hook like, "Okay guys - let me give it to ya straight" can even capture someone's attention. 🛑 Don't be afraid of using emojis on social to stop that scroll! 📝 Follow a Formula Copy formulas can help guide your vibes. I use them so often that I don't even realize they've become a natural style of writing for me. AIDA is a great one to start with. Attention, Interest, Desire, Action. Let's try it out: "🆓 Get a FREE transfer sheet! How about a free sheet every week? All you have to do is sign up! ✅ Here's the link: [link]" Let's break that down by the AIDA formula: ➡️ Attention : 🆓 Get a FREE transfer sheet! ➡️ Interest : How about a free sheet every week? ➡️ Desire : All you have to do is sign up! ➡️ Action : ✅ Here's the link: [link] The AIDA formula is a fan-fav because it walks the user through a really short copy funnel with a clear call-to-action. It's a great foundational formula to start with - highly recommended. 📞 End with a Call End with a Call-to-Action that is (don't worry, I hate calling on phones too). Call-to-actions (also called CTAs in marketing jargon) tell your customer where to go and what to do (like give you their money). Some CTA examples for bakers would look like: ☎️ "Subscribe to our YouTube channel" ☎️ "Sign up for class!" ☎️ "Click here to learn more." Copy missing a clear call-to-action doesn't accomplish a goal. So tell your audience what you want them to do next.…

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195. Baking it Down - The TikTok Ban 1:01:19

för 19 weeks sedan1:01:19

1:01:19

Send us a text 🚫 The TikTok Ban - And the diversification of your marketing. 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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194. Baking it Down - Meta Verified 1:22:01

för 20 weeks sedan1:22:01

1:22:01

Send us a text ✔️ Meta Verified - The pros / cons of the blue check. 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 ✅ Verified Badge ✅ Impersonation Protection ✅ Meta Verified Support (Priority) ✅ Enhanced Facebook Profile - 3 Linked Accounts / 3 Locations ✅ 2 Links in Reels ✅ 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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193. Baking it Down - Smart Baby Goals 1:40:15

för 21 weeks sedan1:40:15

1:40:15

Send us a text 👶 SMART Baby Goals - Taking small bites out of a big goal pie. 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 S pecific, M easurable, A chievable, R elevant, and T ime-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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192. Baking it Down - Workin' Birkin 1:17:36

för 22 weeks sedan1:17:36

1:17:36

Send us a text 👜 Workin' Burkin - How kelly hands kompetition. 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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191. Baking it Down - Break Me Off a Piece of that January 57:06

för 23 weeks sedan57:06

57:06

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Baking it Down with Sugar Cookie Marketing 🍪

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190. Baking it Down - How the Grinch Saved Christmas 59:05

för 24 weeks sedan59:05

59:05

Send us a text 💗 How the Grinch Saved Christmas. 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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189. Baking it Down - 10 Marketing Lessons from [Redacted] 1:23:52

för 26 weeks sedan1:23:52

1:23:52

Send us a text 🔟 10 Marketing Lessons - You can apply from [Redacted]. 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.…

Baking it Down with Sugar Cookie Marketing 🍪

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188. Baking it Down - Vendy Blendy Strategy 1:04:48

för 27 weeks sedan1:04:48

1:04:48

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Baking it Down with Sugar Cookie Marketing 🍪

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187. Baking it Down - The At-Fault Cult 1:23:33

för 28 weeks sedan1:23:33

1:23:33

Send us a text 🫗 The AtFault Cult - Taking 100% of the blame shame. 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.…

Baking it Down with Sugar Cookie Marketing 🍪

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186. Baking it Down - The 5 Ds of Disarming 1:13:22

för 29 weeks sedan1:13:22

1:13:22

Send us a text 💪 5 D’s of Disarming - Making Clients feel seen, heard, and understood. In this week's Baking it Down Podcast - Episode 186 - The 5 D's of Disarming , we're back to business talking about the 5 D's of disarming upset clients . As we cruise through the "Sugar Cookie Super Bowl" that is October - December, we're more inclined to make mistakes - or to miss the client's cryptic order details amid the flurry of incoming requests and changes. Hey - we're human. They're human. It happens. But d isarming clients can make the d ifferent between d isaster (in your review profiles) or d omination (in your bottom line). So d efining the steps to make sure you get your d esired outcome is what we d esigned today's podcast on (can you see I'm forcing the whole "starts with the letter D " thing?). The key to each of these approaches is to make the client feel that you've heard them and plan to make it right. Now how you go about making it right is subjective - but making it right? That's a business requirement. 🖐 1. Dispel their Worry. When people get the guts to reach out and tell you they have a problem, see that as being gracious. Because their other options were to either never order from you again (bad), or to leave you a bad review (worse). So when a client says, 🫣 "Heeeey, I'm not 100% happy," they're choosing to be kind by giving you the chance to make it right. 😥 I'm a HUGE fan of, "I'm sorry that the experience didn't meet your expectations." You can say sorry while also not agreeing with the client - but the client's feelings are 100% valid even if they're not right. 🖐 2. Deter Anger (before it starts). Having a solid refund policy set up before you even touch the client's money can deter anger. 💯 Corrie has a 100% satisfaction guarantee or you'll get a full refund. It signals to her clients that even in the worst-case scenario, they'll still be made whole. You can also accomplish this by getting good reviews - it tells future buyers that you're a green flag when it comes to solving issues. 🖐 3. Do NOT be Defensive! 😠 This is where I see most bakers make the left turn when they should have gone right. Defensiveness will only limit your options. Do NOT reply when you're angry!! I'm going to repeat it because so many folks make this mistake: ⛔ DO NOT REPLY TO AN UPSET CLIENT WHEN YOU ARE ANGRY. Wait 24 hours then ask ChatGTP if your response to the client sounds amicable or defensive. Hey, the robots can even help you rewrite it. 🖐 4. Discharge Them Correctly. It's understandable to be upset when the client "gets one over on ya" by getting a refund. Wrong business move. 🥲 Remember - the client that reached out was doing you a favor by letting you make it right. 🥹 So respect them when you roll them off your books. Just because someone got a refund does not mean they're an automatic ⚫blacklisted⚫ client. Do your best to thank them for bringing up the issue to you and allowing your bakery to be better for it. 🖐 5. Do it like Chick-fil-A. Does Chick-fil-A ever make mistakes? You bet. But you know why you don't hear about them as often? 🐮 Their HEARD policy to client issues. 👂 Hear, 👂 Empathize, 👂 Apologize, 👂 Resolve, and 👂 D elight is the approach that one of the largest, most successful fast-food restaurants takes when it comes to unhappy clients. And it works. A few months ago, Chick was backlogged and took about 10 minutes to fulfill my order. I didn't mind at all, but when they finally handed me my chicky-strips, they threw in a $5 gift card as an apology... for an issue I didn't even raise. Talk about Delighted .…

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185. Baking it Down - The Vendy Blendy Episode 1:53:05

för 30 weeks sedan1:53:05

1:53:05

Send us a text 🛒 The Vendy Blendy Episode - Who's selling what and for how much off. In this week's Baking it Down Podcast - Episode 185 - The Vendy Blendy Episode , it's the moooost wonderful tiiiiime of the yyeeeaarrr. It's the annual Vendy Blendy Episode! This is the one podcast where we cover all 77 Vendys , where they ship, what they sell and how much they'll sell it (not) for. As the hype builds for Black Friday, pre-shopping the Vendys on the podcast is always a fan favorite (or maybe it's a Heather and Corrie favorite and y'all just have to listen along). There's too much data this year for me to copy and paste into this email, so I'll include the important links you'll need to pre-shop the VB: 🟠 The Group (pend here) : https://www.facebook.com/groups/vendyblendy 🟠 The List of Vendys + Websites + Discounts : http://thevendys.com 🟠 Corrie's Vendy Product Reviews : https://www.instagram.com/sugarcookiemarketing_ Here are some facts that should get ya hyped for Novemby 29th: 🟠 We have more Vendys than we have ever had (77 this year compared to 72 last year). 🟠 We have higher discount minimums than we've ever had (25% off this year compared to 20$ off last year). 🟠 We have more door prizes this year than we did last year (10 Big Door Prizes + 71 Vendys are also offering Door Prizes). 🟠 We have MORE days 'til Black Friday than we've had last year (last year it was Nov 23, this year it's Nov 29th). Bigger, better, faster, stronger - this is shaping up to be a BLAST of a Vendy Blendy, and I am HERE for it! If you missed Heather's Facebook Lives on the Vendy, you can rewatch the replays here: 🟠 Live 1 - Intro to the Vendy Blendy! 🛒 🟠 Live 2 - Let’s Pre-Shop The Vendys! 🛒 🟠 Live 3 - Secrets to Shopping the Vendy Blendy 🛒 🟠 Live 4 - The Cookie College and the Vendy Blendy 🛒 In today's podcast, Corrie covered some of her shop favs . We also cover shipping + door prizes + and discount codes.…

Baking it Down with Sugar Cookie Marketing 🍪

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184. Baking it Down - Boo-urn Out 1:14:01

för 31 weeks sedan1:14:01

1:14:01

Send us a text 👻 Boo-urn Out - Staying in front of falling behind. In this week's Baking it Down Podcast - Episode 184 - Boo-urn Out , Corrie wanted to do our annual 😩 "Ways to avoid getting burnt out during the baker's busy season" strategy sesh. Hey - business ownership ain't for the weak. Additionally, baking businesses reach their ordering maximums during the Q4 months (📅 October, November, and December). 🤑 It's easy to fall prey to that green we've been laying the foundation for all year, 🔥 but it's always the fast pass to closing a business when we burn the Christmas candles at both ends. 🔥 Summary: you can make the MOST money in the world, but if you close your business Jan 2025, was it even worth it? 🏈 Sustainability is the 🔑 k-e-y to success in the baking "Super Bowl." 1. Turn off your order form when you're booked. 📃 Disabling your order form is a really definite way to say, "Don't come knockin' on my door, I'm too busy settin' up my Christmas tree. 🎄" It's perfect for those of us who hate to see the look of disappointment on a client's face and struggle with saying no. 🚫 I wrote a poem for ya - "If they can't hit submit, you won't witness the fit." 2. Set your order max now. DO NOT DEVIATE You know what your limits are. 💯 If you know 10 dozen will be the most you can handle without hating life, set your weekly max now - and when you hit that max, shut down that order form. You'll be tempted to get greedy when the order submissions are hittin' the Inbox and the DMs. 🔐 Don't fall for the green goblin - if the limit you set was 10, 10 it shall be. 3. Schedule 2 posts per week. Corrie's rule-of-posting-thumb is 2 posts per week. ✌️ We have, what, 8 weeks left in the year? That's 16 posts - something you can likely knock out in an hour tops. And the posts don't have to be earth-shatteringly good. 💆 A simple post can keep your page audience engaged while also removing that dreaded feeling of, "Oh darn, I forgot to post to socials. I'm falling behind" when we need more bandwidth to bake. 4. Schedule days off now. NO COMPROMISING 📆 Go right now, open your calendar app, and set the days you DO NOT want to work to " busy ." And then absolutely do ❌NOT❌ schedule anything on those days. That includes prep work, supply and ingredients shopping, baking, pick-ups, etc. THOSE ARE YOUR OFF DAYS - I'm yelling so you hear me loud and clear. 👂 When we get rushed and take on too many orders, we're tempted to give those days up. 💸 What's all the money in the world if we didn't get to stop and smell the roses... or in this case, the pine needles? 5. Shorten your FB Business Page Hours. Facebook business pages work off of set hours (it affects how your page shows availability and how your auto-responders work). ⏰ In busier months, shortening your "available hours" can signal to your clients that you're not sitting by your Messenger inbox twiddling your thumbs and waiting for their next reply. Setting your page hours to 3 hours a day makes sense when you're trying to limit order inquiries. 6. Elongate the funnel. In the world of sales, 🤏 we want to shorten the funnel. In the world of "too many sales so we're feeling burnt out," ✋ elongating that funnel ✋ can subtly curtail orders. Just as a short funnel has the fewest amount of clicks to order (think: Amazon's one-click-to-buy option), ⛹‍♂ a long funnel that has clients jumping through hoops to place orders can be a nice bumper to slow down incoming inquiries. Don't add the order links to post, don't had the form link to your auto-response message, have your auto-responder say it'll take you 3 days to get back to someone, etc.…

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