Cara joined host Howard Wolpoff on Marketing Champions to talk about all things small business marketing, authenticity, and why we believe marketing should always be fun.
So tell me, why marketing? Why is this something that has value and is important to you on a day-to-day basis?
I think the most important thing about marketing and why I enjoy it is that it’s fun. You’re able to insert a lot of your personality into these campaigns, and we help small businesses showcase who they are in a fun, engaging way. Marketing, depending on how you approach it, can be a little boring, so it’s important to remember that you can have a good time with it.
What kind of conversations are you having with business owners as you’re starting to make sure that you understand their needs and can get them on the right track?
Many of our clients are female-owned health and wellness providers, so a lot of times it’s doctors’ offices, like an OB/GYN, where they are highly focused on their field and their patients, but marketing is a blind spot for them. They don’t really understand how to present themselves to their prospective and current clients.
When we start a new client relationship, we sit down with them for two to three hours, ideally in person, and ask them an abundance of questions about who their brand is, who they’re trying to reach, why they do what they do, and how they do it differently than their competitors. Their answers help us learn a lot about them, their ideal audience, and how we can pull different campaigns together and present the client in a way that resonates with prospective and current patients.
How much are you using video and social media, and how much is print of value these days?
At Bubbly Creative, we heavily focus on digital marketing and do a lot with social media, video content, and photo content.
We always encourage our clients to have a professional photoshoot so they have branded content for their website and social pages. I’m sure you’ve visited websites where you only see stock photos, and it just takes away some of the personality. If you’re choosing a physician, a doctor, or anyone who is providing you a service, you want to see what they look like, what the team looks like, and what their interactions look like. Having that professional photoshoot or video shoot can really help. We’re also able to do things on a shoestring budget when needed. We’ll take whatever the client can give us!
We’ve moved mostly away from print, but we will do things like postcards here and there. Digital marketing just reaches so many more people and can be tracked a lot more easily. Traditional advertising makes it more difficult to see exactly who you’re hitting and who the message is resonating with.
How challenging is it for small business owners to run the right marketing mix with the budgets they have?
Budget constraints are obviously a concern, so we focus our efforts on being hyperlocal. We encourage clients to get involved in their community, build relationships with other local businesses, and get to know the people who are going to be their patients.
Community involvement is huge, and showcasing this on social media is important, but above all, be authentic to who you are. For example, we try not to make people who hate being on camera film content because it doesn’t really work. Authenticity, being community-minded, and reaching the people in your immediate area are key.