196. Baking it Down - Words Matter

Summary

Podcast Summary: Baking it Down with Sugar Cookie Marketing 🍪
Episode: 196. Baking it Down - Words Matter
Release Date: January 30, 2025
Hosts: Heather and Corrie Miracle

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Introduction: Setting the Stage (00:00 - 00:59)

Heather and Corrie kick off the episode with their signature playful banter, establishing their friendly dynamic. They briefly discuss the essence of the "Baking it Down" podcast, emphasizing its role in helping bakers enhance their online marketing strategies to boost sales and manage their businesses effectively.

Main Topic: The Importance of Words in Marketing (01:00 - 16:32)

Understanding Copy in Marketing (01:00 - 05:54)

Heather and Corrie delve into the concept of "copy" in marketing, clarifying that it encompasses any written or spoken words associated with a product for sale. They explore the etymology of "copy," tracing its origins from Medieval Latin copia (meaning abundance or plenty) to its modern usage in advertising.

Corrie (02:31): "So if you're wondering if we dumb it down in 20, 25 terms, it's the caption that goes along with your post."

Balancing Visuals and Words (05:55 - 12:17)

The hosts discuss the critical balance between compelling visuals and effective copy. They highlight that while stunning photos can stop a scroll, it's the accompanying words that drive engagement and guide potential customers toward making a purchase.

Heather (04:54): "Words are so important in marketing because they dictate next steps."

Types of Copywriting Styles (12:18 - 16:32)

Heather and Corrie categorize copywriting into different styles to cater to varied audiences. They emphasize the need for diversity in content to resonate with different segments, avoiding monotony that can lead to audience disengagement.

• Emotional Storytelling: Engages audiences on a personal level but can be overwhelming if overused.

• Concise and Direct: Provides clear information but may come across as abrupt.

• Interactive Hooks: Utilizes questions or humor to encourage interaction.

Heather (15:01): "There is such a thing as too emotional. This is what I see a lot of artists, people who like creative love, large. Everything is emotional."

Practical Strategies for Effective Copywriting (16:33 - 32:22)

Creating Engaging Hooks (16:33 - 19:18)

The duo offers actionable advice on crafting hooks that capture attention. They stress the importance of placing critical questions or intriguing statements at the beginning of social media posts to encourage users to read further.

Corrie (17:51): "One that I do yearly around my son's birthday is I have to tell you about the worst client experience I've ever had."

Implementing Calls to Action (19:19 - 25:02)

Heather and Corrie discuss the significance of clear calls to action (CTA) in guiding customers toward making a purchase. They provide examples of effective CTAs and caution against overly lengthy or complex instructions that can deter potential buyers.

Heather (20:39): "You have to add that call to action because it takes people to the final step, which is the most important one in sales—the buying action."

Optimizing Copy for Engagement (25:03 - 32:22)

The conversation moves to optimizing copy to increase engagement metrics like comments, shares, and click-through rates. They advise against using walls of text and encourage the use of emojis, line breaks, and concise paragraphs to enhance readability on mobile devices.

Corrie (29:58): "Sometimes when you put emojis with your copy, it's easier for people to engage without feeling overwhelmed by text."

Listener Questions and Real-World Applications (32:23 - 51:52)

Handling Pricing and Competition (32:23 - 42:18)

A listener shares challenges with pricing strategies amidst a saturated market. Heather and Corrie provide insights into positioning oneself within different pricing tiers to attract the right customer base without competing solely on price.

Corrie (63:34): "So what you are doing is you are the top of the lowest of the budgets. So if I'm budget conscious, I'm going to have to bypass you because I'm looking for even cheaper than that."

Engagement Tactics for Ghosted Customers (42:19 - 51:52)

The hosts address strategies for re-engaging customers who initially showed interest but did not complete a purchase. They recommend follow-up messages that assume the sale and gently prompt the customer to take the next step.

Heather (69:09): "If you had 10 leads and 10 people ghosted and you reached out to 10 people, you may get two."

Interactive Segments: "Stupid Text" and "Stupid Questions" (51:53 - 74:50)

Stupid Text (51:53 - 74:50)

Heather and Corrie introduce the "Stupid Text" segment, where they entertain humorous and light-hearted questions from listeners. This segment adds a fun element to the podcast, showcasing the hosts' chemistry and playful personalities.

Corrie (72:43): "If you could be a cast member at Disney, what job would you want?"

Sponsored Content and Promotions (74:51 - 82:00)

The hosts acknowledge their sponsors, highlighting products and services that complement their audience's baking and marketing needs. They offer exclusive discount codes, encouraging listeners to support their business while benefiting from special offers.

Heather: "If you want Better photos, you're like, my copy's great. I really want to work on my photos. The Backers Co is a home photography setup."

Closing Remarks and Final Thoughts (82:01 - End)

Heather and Corrie wrap up the episode by reiterating the importance of effective copy in marketing for bakers. They encourage listeners to implement the discussed strategies and engage with their community for ongoing support and growth. The episode concludes with light-hearted conversation, maintaining the amiable tone that characterizes their podcast.

Corrie (85:08): "Yeah, I think so."

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Key Takeaways

1. Effective Copy is Crucial: Words guide customer actions and are as important as visual elements in marketing.
2. Diversify Content: Utilize different copywriting styles to engage varied audience segments.
3. Clear Calls to Action: Direct customers towards the next steps with concise and compelling CTAs.
4. Optimize for Readability: Use emojis, line breaks, and short paragraphs to enhance engagement on mobile platforms.
5. Strategic Pricing: Position your pricing within the right tier to attract the desired customer base without solely competing on price.
6. Re-engage Ghosted Customers: Implement follow-up strategies that gently prompt inactive leads to complete their purchases.
7. Leverage Community Groups: Actively participate in Facebook groups and community forums to build relationships and promote your business organically.

Notable Quotes

• Heather (04:54): "Words are so important in marketing because they dictate next steps."
• Corrie (02:31): "So if you're wondering if we dumb it down in 20, 25 terms, it's the caption that goes along with your post."
• Heather (20:39): "You have to add that call to action because it takes people to the final step, which is the most important one in sales—the buying action."
• Corrie (63:34): "So what you are doing is you are the top of the lowest of the budgets. So if I'm budget conscious, I'm going to have to bypass you because I'm looking for even cheaper than that."

Conclusion

Episode 196 of the "Baking it Down" podcast offers valuable insights into the significance of words in marketing for bakers. Heather and Corrie provide practical strategies for crafting effective copy, engaging diverse audiences, and optimizing social media content to drive sales. Through their engaging dialogue and real-world examples, listeners gain a deeper understanding of how to enhance their marketing efforts and grow their baking businesses.

Transcript

[A]

What is your. Okay, let's start here. Sorry. I said to Corey, let's have an intro and if she froze.

[B]

Yeah, I froze. I don't know what YouTube intros are not.

[A]

It's not a thing. Stop making it sound like it's a thing. It's just talking to YouTube.

[B]

Okay, talking to YouTube.

[A]

Your big takeaways are. Did you watch yourself?

[B]

I did.

[A]

What is your. What is your takeaway? There's no right or wrong.

[B]

Oh, my big takeaway. Like things that I didn't like about myself.

[A]

I don't care. However you want to take that question.

[B]

I think my mouth is open a lot. I think when I sit in a pondering position like this, my mouth is always open in my mouth.

[A]

Does that make sense? So it's always slightly ajar. My big takeaway is the reason my lips don't touch is because there aren't any to touch.

[B]

What I noticed about your teeth is you use them as an upper lip.

[A]

Because I don't have one. So something's got something. Gotta close that sound. And it's not my mouth. Okay, this is the Baking down podcast. You wanna tell us what we are.

[B]

The Baking it down podcast with sugar cookie marketing. And you might be saying, what is sugar cookie marketing? I have some news for you. It's actually a group on Facebook. We have, we have stopped the request. We've slowed down the request to join because we really want to have a good tight knit group. It's not that we slowed down. It's instead of letting anyone in who's answered the questions, we're just letting people who really look like they really want to learn something in people who just say decorating cookies as their entry question answer, probably not going to let them in. If you're like, I'm really looking to sell. I'm just starting out. Hey, there's a seat for you right next to me. So in this group, just make sure.

[A]

You close your mouth in your mouth.

[B]

My mouth in your mouth? In this group, what we see weekly is, you know, we see a lot of trends. So right now people are in the, the waves of Valentine's Day. I see a lot of people already posting up their sales and things are looking good. People say they're. That this year a lot of people are buying for Valentine's Day, which I think is great.

[A]

We think the switch is, I don't.

[B]

Know, I'm not quite sure if we've had some weird years. So it's really hard to find that status quo of what it is. What We've seen a lot this week is people are having issues with copy. And the word copy sounds weird.

[A]

Weird, but it should sound wordy. Copy is the. I think it's a marketing buzzword. It's any words, text words, spoken word that's associated with a product that's for sale. Yeah.

[B]

So if you're wondering if we dumb it down in 20, 25 terms, it's the caption that goes along with your post. So the caption is the codename word copy. When you're in marketing, copy has to be a spin off from something from a newspaper copy. Copy that. Roger that.

[A]

Let's see, where did the word copy come. I woke up feeling so nauseous this morning. Feels am how Cory's going to carry. Where does the word copy originate from? Medieval Latin copia. From Middle English copy. Copy. From the old English French copy, Abundance, Plenty. Transcript. And copy. Okay.

[B]

Copy.

[A]

It means abundance of plenty. The word has evolved over time to mean written account, reproduction, or any specimen of writing. Okay.

[B]

Oh, what a specimen of writing.

[A]

Okay. So this is the copy the. Now it says in the early 20th century, it's advertising writing.

[B]

Yes. Okay.

[A]

Before it was your diary, and now it's your sales pitch when it comes.

[B]

To online marketing and online marketing of products. And these pre sales, these Valentine's Day pre sales, a lot of people are like, I got the photos down. My photos look shamazing. And your photos will stop the scroll. But what gets them to read, Right?

[A]

No read it anymore.

[B]

No, no, I said read.

[A]

That's a great point. So I think that's. I think that words are so important in marketing because they dictate next steps.

[B]

Yes.

[A]

So your photo worth a thousand.

[B]

Yes. It's already doing the talk.

[A]

It tells us to stop, but it doesn't tell us where to go.

[B]

It doesn't tell us where to go. And instead of delving into copy formulas, which we have done on this podcast before, what we're going to do is maybe like the cognitive ways, like Heather. Heather is. I am, I want to say, maybe the star athlete of email writing.

[A]

No, mine is.

[B]

Yours is lengthy.

[A]

You're gonna know where to go. You're gonna be barely hugged along the way, but you're gonna get there. Like, there's writing that has a lot of superfluous words where it's high emotion, very low content.

[B]

Very low content.

[A]

And those are. Those are great storytellers. And then you have people that are list. Here's what you need to know. Here's where you need to go. And Very few emotional words, and they come across as very curt or like, abrupt, very cur. Erupt.

[B]

Or there's people who are like, I don't even know what to say. Here's three emojis.

[A]

An emoji never hurt my feelings.

[B]

So what we want to do is more of what can stop the scroll? What can get people to expand the truncated content. And truncated means Facebook will show, like, a sentence.

[A]

A great example of truncation is my target. Selling the cutters for a penny. See more. The see more is truncation, meaning it cut. What we could see the joke being that there's no Seymour and you guys are all.

[B]

So our goal photo to stop the scroll. A good. Good hook is what they're called. And I've been studying hooks this week. A good hook to expand that truncation to the Seymour and then how to tell your customer where to go to get whatever that you're selling.

[A]

That is the call to action, which you see abbreviated a lot as CTA call to action. Yeah. A lot of times I see a baker's like, hey, just can't get people to buy. But when I go to their website, it's like, here's what I did. And they're like, tell us where to go. Like, you have to direct it or what.

[B]

I've been seeing a lot in the cooking college is a lot of people are like, I have no engagement. And unfortunately, when you have no engagement, sometimes you're. If you're always talking at people instead of talking with. And it's kind of like you want to promote a conversation there. But if you're always talking at them and every post is like, here's a set I made. Thank you, Julia, for ordering. Here's another set I made. Thank you, Pilly, for ordering. What you're going to end up with is they're going to stop reading the caption because it's not to them. It's to Billy and Sarah.

[A]

And then when you tuck in that call to action that's been truncated, then nobody's going to know.

[B]

I know, I know.

[A]

I think there's a cohesiveness, and I think there's a type of content buckets for copy, like, you can touch. And that's why I like formulas so much, the copy formulas. Because it's like, touch this one, do this one, this one, this one. Reset. Yes. But I wanted to start. I'm going to do a quiz for you.

[B]

Okay.

[A]

Not like a hard one. Look at you like, Like a speed.

[B]

I was just talking about high School we weren't getting.

[A]

We were in those, like, first grade, second grades, they had these things called speed drills.

[B]

Speed drills.

[A]

You had the teacher be like, 1, 2, 3, and go. And then you turn the paper over and violently start doing math. Rowan, I know. Corey has ptsd.

[B]

And then when you're done, you slam.

[A]

The paper over as fast as possible.

[B]

You know what mine never got? I felt embarrassed to not have mine slam in 30 seconds.

[A]

You want to get a participation trophy? I do. I call it your paycheck. So I'm going to give you a noun.

[B]

Okay.

[A]

I want you to add an adjective that makes it more appealing to you. Okay. This is going to be. It's going to be hard off the cuff for sure.

[B]

Oh, it's so hard.

[A]

I mean, if you can think quickly. Couch.

[B]

Comfy.

[A]

Comfy Couch. Okay. Bed.

[B]

Cozy.

[A]

Cozy. Bed.

[B]

Door. Squeaky.

[A]

Makes me not want to buy it. But that is an adjective. Oh, I didn't know.

[B]

I thought you just.

[A]

Oh.

[B]

To make it more.

[A]

Feeling slidey. I would say solid. If I was a door seller, I'd say these are solid doors.

[B]

They're solid.

[A]

Yeah. Curtain.

[B]

Blackout.

[A]

I was gonna say that would make me want to buy a curtain.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Or flowy, if you wanted that aesthetic.

[B]

Flowy. Airy.

[A]

Airy. Okay, That's a nice one. Pillow.

[B]

Comfy. Can I choose that again? No.

[A]

Try it in another one.

[B]

Head. Thinking.

[A]

It's got three words. Buy another one.

[B]

Plush.

[A]

Hardwood.

[B]

Solid.

[A]

Oh, it's durable.

[B]

Durable.

[A]

Durable. LVP shoes.

[B]

Long lasting.

[A]

That's a good one.

[B]

My toe pops through the tops.

[A]

That's a good one. This one. Vacuum cleaner.

[B]

Suctiony. A real word. Dyson.

[A]

I'll take three. Yes. Okay. So this is a great example of how like. Okay, let's try. Let's try baking cookies.

[B]

Oh, I. I don't like the word yummy, but that is what came.

[A]

Get off of yummy's case. You even thought yummy. You could say warm, fresh, delicious to me.

[B]

Soft. Because I like eating a soft cookie. So your grandma doesn't. Soft.

[A]

Sweet. Okay. Then we have. Let's go even more niche. Down to custom sugar cookies. So even the word custom.

[B]

Made to order. I love that.

[A]

Personalized customize these words that signal more than just the cookie itself, but help move the client forward to that purchasing process.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

So adjectives are great. Then there's the other side of adjectives. You know, words that describe a noun. No, we're not. That are just. They call them word salad, where there's too many of them and that's where you kind of see AI take Chat.

[B]

Chat. GTP will love the word delicious.

[A]

Let me make Gemini have booted up right here. So let's say Gemini, describe a cookie that a baker is trying to sell in. I'm going to make it do three sentences and you're going to see it's going to be like Ben. As the nice spot sets. Let's see. He said. Just a sec. Here's who he said. Indulge in our signature triple chocolate chunk cookies bursting with decadent dark milk and white chocolate chips. The word spite is a symphony of rich, chewy goodness, perfect for satisfying any sweet tooth craving. Okay. It lies.

[B]

It loves the word indulge. Symphony was a new one. I kind of like it.

[A]

Should we get it? So that. That's why Cory and I said the big tell with AI is that there's too much of that. So we want to have a balance of not too sterile. Buy my cookies.

[B]

Yes.

[A]

And not chocolate chunk cookies. You're a sting with decadent.

[B]

You're not in high school trying to make your words right.

[A]

So especially in the land of truncation is where AI is kind of taken. Like, I don't know, like. But it said I gotta give her three cents and I gotta make it sound delicious. Yeah. So we have the. What I like to do is find this one find by my cookies and end up in the middle.

[B]

I love that. What you want to start off with when someone says the hook. If you see videos a lot, especially like on TikTok or Instagram specifically TikTok, people love them. A hook. And what a hook is. It's something that gets into you that makes you want to watch the rest of the video or stay for the rest of the post.

[A]

I always kind of call it like Laffy Taffy. Like something that pulls you in and you just.

[B]

Yeah, you have to see something.

[A]

So you guys will see it a lot when somebody gives somebody a membership to the college. And I'll be like, hey, you know, the hook is like, you'll say, corey.

[B]

Please to the front office.

[A]

Corey, this is my favorite one. Like, hey, Corey, I asked you not to message me on messenger and you keep trying. So you're not going to listen to me there. You're going to listen to me here and we're going to have an audience.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

And you guys are like, expand.

[B]

Yeah. One that I do yearly around my son's birthday is I have to tell you about the worst client experience I've ever had. And it turns out to be My son. But people have drama.

[A]

So everyone's like, well, I can write exclusively in hooks. No, that's a content bucket. We can't only write in these juicy hooks, but there's other types of more normal hooks that we can do. A big one. My loss is your. Your rich goodness gain. Like so when you over bake or when you're running a sale, like, hey guys, I'm about to lose money right now. I would read anything that starts with a company saying they're about to lose.

[B]

Oh, absolutely, Absolutely. And you know, a lot of times people start off with an emoji. If there's emojis that can be used as hooks, like the worried face or people do the angry emoji.

[A]

The angry emoji is.

[B]

That is a trinkle. That one up there. Right.

[A]

So there's. Okay, so we already have. We want an adjective that helps move us along the written buying process. We have the hook that helps us stop the buying process. The image is a big part of this.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

So have the image get us to read the hook that gets us to read the interesting banner. A really wordy copy. And then we end in the call to action. So you can see how this is kind of multiple steps pulling people along when people. When big makers don't get it. I could see it because it looks fragmented. A stunning photo. Great.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

That got my scroll. That stopped my scroll. The copy is either a big paragraph. I'm I my biggest Heather calling walls of text Walls of text one time. And I should repost. And I might even do that today. I wrote this huge wall of text. It was all lorem Ipsum text. And I put at the top. I put a line break at the top and a line break at the bottom. And I said if you read went from here and then you skip down to here, you're the average person. Yeah, that is me. So when. When you write your copy and it's just this wall of text. No line breaks, no emojis. No. Even if you can do formatting in.

[B]

Groups because you have to think our phones are just as big as our hands. It's so hard to one follow along when there is no line breaks or paragraphing. So you have to think the amount of tension that someone wants to give a post that is this big slim to none. I find myself dozing off when I'm trying to read him.

[A]

I used to get in arguments with romp and he spoke like a wall of text. And I was like, hey, I'm sure this is annoying. To him. But I would just. I would just, yeah, whatever. Like. So I was like, hey, can you talk in an outline? Can you tell me what the thesis is? He loved it. Can you tell me what the thesis is? And then every point below that supports this thesis. So I know where we're going. He said, not on your watch. But that was how. That's because it's easier to follow. Like, hey, I'm about to run a sale. Here's why, here's how, and here's where. Yeah, but when we have this, like, hey, guys, just wanna let you know, I had this really busy weekend. I made too many cookies and then this person didn't show up. So I have an extra cookie. And that's all one thing. People are not gonna just stop to read that. Yeah.

[B]

Especially when you feel like you're being talked at versus talked to on Reddit.

[A]

It's an anonymous form. Right. Because it's anonymous. It's more honest.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Right. So somebody will be like, I love to read relationship problems mostly. Cause of my own. Right. People will have this book of like, it just. It's so long. That's what I love. I'm here for the hook. So it'll just be this wall of text. And even I'm like trying to skim it. So I'm like, let me go to the first comment to see what this paragraph was. And the first comment is, I'm not reading all that. Right. So if the anonymous honest form is like, we're not reading all that and we subscribe to it, what is that telling you about the copy used with your business?

[B]

This.

[A]

So there is such a thing as too long.

[B]

There is such a thing as too emotional. This is what I see a lot of artists, people who like creative love, large. Everything is emotional. And sometimes if you're trying to make a sale, you can't be so emotional when you're trying to make the sale. So instead of being like, and then I went out to the farm and I got the fresh flour to mill at home. And then I put.

[A]

It's a symphony of flowers.

[B]

It was a symphony.

[A]

Perfect for satisfying. Yes.

[B]

With homemade vanilla made by my bare fees. It's just a lot. And so there's a time and place for emotional post. But if you're trying to make the sale because there's a cutoff time, we gotta.

[A]

Even emotional posters should be a content bucket. Yeah. I would tap in as much to that one as I would the hooks, the very dramatic hooks that are made to. And when you have These different content buckets of copy types and you ping them occasionally. You're gonna see that it resonates with a different type of audience. Right.

[B]

And you might wake up some people that maybe have snoozed on your post in the past might be like, oh, I love an emotional, heartfelt post. I'm gonna read the whole thing now.

[A]

Corey and I aren't very emotional people.

[B]

Not we. We are emotional in the fact that we like happy and laughy joke, laughy angst.

[A]

Those are my two emotions. But you'll see us commonly pulling from those two types. I don't think we're very angry, but more of a jokey type thing or informative. Yeah, okay.

[B]

But there's not a lot of emotion.

[A]

And Cory and I were like, that's a huge problem of our own marketing is that we're hard to connect to. We are. Because, like, I know him, but I have no clue about them. I see them, I hear them, and not a school.

[B]

And it's because me and Heather are like, well, we're only here for the last in the joke.

[A]

Only here for a good time.

[B]

But I can tell you when I. Last year when I said, my son's in high school. And guys, every, every cookie order that you've made has helped this. It was a long caption that I don't typically do.

[A]

People were like, really receptive. They were like, wow, this sterile, cold hearted boredom plank of a human finally let us in a little bit. So you have. On the flip side, you have people that are only emotional. Every day is the best day. Every day's the worst day. Every problem's the trial and tribulation. You know, I, you can kind of see it. Dry bagging is what I learned the term was called pretty interesting. Dry bagging is somebody who's like, I had the worst day. And you're like, oh, how's it going? I can't afford anything. Yeah, they're. You'll see it.

[B]

They're constantly on the verge of closing down. Unless they make one more.

[A]

Yeah. And then, and then it works. Because they make the sale and they're like, guys, you'll never guess. I'm having the worst week. Give me more money. It's like, wow, that'll exhaust your audience. Too emotional and also too sterile. Also not. So you can kind of see that we're always ending up kind of in the middle. Compromise of this one, this one, that one, the copy for me. Copy, formula, copy, formula, and then content type. So Corey, we can see if you want to go to Mixing Bowl Cookie. Anyone want to go there?

[B]

You can go.

[A]

You can go to mixing Bowl Cookie Code and kind of look and see if you can determine Corey's content buckets.

[B]

I want to tell you that it's been something in the last six months. If you tuning into podcast, I've been trying to incorporate different content buckets because I was falling into the here's what I made. Here's what I made, here's what I made. So now I'm saying, like, maybe a meme every once in a while. Fun. The last week it didn't like, do any numbers, but I was like, you know, guess what? I can't wait for Christmas. Tis my favorite holiday.

[A]

You said that in January. I did, I did.

[B]

Just because it's different content and I'm not always talking at you or selling.

[A]

At you a great place. So let's just kind of like reconcile where we're at. We're like, hey, you need to write copy. Right. It's your advertising writing. It moves people along. It needs to stop them, get them in, get them to expand, get them to go. That's what we need. And then within that, you can have different content buckets. So funny. Here's something I learned for your cookies that kind of tell. It lets people into where you're at. Then you can say, here's my family. That's why the about the baker post do so well.

[B]

Yes.

[A]

There's about the baker post. A lot of times they have longer copy because you are again, connecting on an emotional level.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

We can't have too much emotion. We can't have too much humor. We can have too much anger. And we want to hit those content bucket types. Yeah. And then we want to end on a call to action. So call to action is the Center. YouTube. If you've watched any YouTube video in the last 15 years or however since it's come out, it says smash that like button. Smash that like comment.

[B]

Subscribe.

[A]

Why do you think every YouTube channel does it? Because its effects on growing subscribers is so high. Even though you knew you should subscribe to the channel.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

And that's a call to action.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

And humans respond so well to calls to action. Yeah.

[B]

So if I'm thinking about buying something, here's different types of call to actions. I'm on a website, I find a cute little sweater. I love it. A call to action to be like. If you buy it Today, you get 15% off by entering your email. That is a call to action. Unfortunately, I always do it I always give my email just so I can have the code just in case I want to use it. That is a call to action. Anything that's running out, an expiration is a call to action. So my pre sale is open from now until February 1st. Your call to action is now you have an expiration date call to action. You got to order before February 1st.

[A]

So you're telling them what to. You're calling them to take an action. It's so weird because you're gonna be like, every single one of these ends in this kind of same thing. Place an order in a very different worded way. A symphony of order placement. But without it, you're like, you brought people and they're about to jump off the cliff. And then you're like, there's nothing to go there. Right. So we have to add that call to action because it takes people to the final step, which is the most important one in sales. And it's taking the action which is buying.

[B]

A lot of times if you know a good way to know that you're missing the steps to the call to action is if your comment section ends up with are these for sale? So somewhere in your copy you've not alluded to. If you're selling, you might be like.

[A]

You see this giant paragraph. It's right there. I know it's too long.

[B]

I know your comment section is quite telling because either people don't have enough time so they're going to re ask the question in the comments.

[A]

A lot of bakers get. Nobody reads anything that's telling. That your copy is confusing. It's hard to read. They're not reading something because it's boring.

[B]

Yeah. Or it's long in the tooth. So if you break it up with line breaks. If you use emojis, Heather loves a. What is this little finger pointy emoji.

[A]

Right point is the search.

[B]

Heather loves right point. They have arrows that are emojis I love for if people are online shopping, there's a shopping cart emoji that.

[A]

What do we know that means?

[B]

That means we're putting that in there.

[A]

What if there's a little person's head? A little person's head along the top, right? It's your account details, you idiot.

[B]

Have you ever used the Internet before?

[A]

I'm a grump. Never read the way before. Let me pop up this diagram.

[B]

I was feeling the sweat of Heather.

[A]

Starting man, I could do, I could do A lot of sicknesses and internal nausea would be my undoing. Oh, I know you should have told me before I came here.

[B]

I could have brought you an anti nausea.

[A]

It's okay. The water drinking thing, that water is.

[B]

Not doing it to me.

[A]

I drank it super late and I woke up all night with fragmented sleep. I woke up.

[B]

Did you hit your water goal? No. Even the worst part, I didn't get.

[A]

The bottle cat dance.

[B]

I didn't do good.

[A]

I suffered yesterday. But back to copy. So we, you know, it's gotta end with that call to action. Now not every post needs to end with a call to action. That could be a different content bucket. Corey talking about her son being one of her most difficult clients is a humorous post. It doesn't need end. If you also would like to be as difficult to my son, please place an order here. Not sure that it has to. And it's also great to test algorithms in relation to links at the end of your call to action. So something I've realized is sometimes if you put a link in the copy of a post, it won't generate the preview. Oh if. Yeah, it won't be a clickable link.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

So you can drop it in the comments. Another strategy is to say link is in the comments. Well now they have to expand the comments. That's an extended file. It is but at least it's now clickable. And it's not going to go HTTPs. Yeah, you're never gonna do that. Right. So it's these theories and then there's the whole Facebook depreciates the reach of copy. That includes external links because it doesn't want you to.

[B]

But copy is everywhere. Copy's on your website, on your order form. It's important everywhere you go, you're gonna.

[A]

Run into every menu you've ever looked at. Somebody wrote the copy underneath the cheesecake that you're about to order. That said, each bite is a symphony of rich and chewy goodness. I honestly think the Cheesecake Factory uses. Just think when you started your day, every roadside sign, every ad on Spotify, every commercial on tv. Oh yeah. A lot of. If you just watch the news, it's. It's still a lot of advertisement.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

You know why you should even listen to this news station. We're honest. We breaking news.

[B]

The breaking news on every hour on that.

[A]

Right. So there's a lot of copy written, spoken otherwise that when you get into your car these days, there's kind of like you've chosen Acura.

[B]

Honestly, I want to say I. I'm not a reader. Like I don't read books, but I've never Read so much in my life as I do in today's society where everything is a post on social media, an email that's coming in. There's. I'm reading all the time.

[A]

Of course you're being sold to constantly. They said if you counted how much marketing material you're actually in, by, in each day, you're, you're, you're going to be floored because it's everywhere.

[B]

It's insane.

[A]

Yeah. Everyone's vying for your dollar.

[B]

Yeah. So that's why your copy has to stand out. And you can't be married to one type of copy because too much of the same thing. It's easier to drown out. So if you're like thank you Chelsea for your order this week. I mean you're talking to one person and it's nice that you're thanking that one customer. But Chelsea's already ordered. What you now need to be focusing on is additional orders from Chels. Chelsea's order. You'll never see me thank a customer.

[A]

For their order on a dead me. I got your money.

[B]

I'll thank them in an email for sure and in person. But here's the thing. If I'm using the content that I made to market my business, I've got to use it for marketing. So thanks, Chels. Appreciate you. We'll take your order anytime you do it.

[A]

Consider thanks to Chelsea. Right. Let's pretend this imaginary Chelsea ordered a dinosaur one. Is there a pun there? You guys using puns for dinosaurs?

[B]

Roller, Rory. Rawr.

[A]

Okay, so let's say she places an order for a dinosaur for a one year old. Corey can say thank you Chelsea for the dinosaur but then also another type of content copy that I think is more compelling. What a delicious word for when you talk about copy compelling, it compels us to do something. Is I was contacted by a customer, her first, her firstborn is turning one. And she said I want something unique but I just know he loves him a dinosaur. So I got my tiny little arms out and I went to rocket something where you can. Here's what we were able to create. If you also want me to design a set that's unique to your 1 year old and their birthday party with your friends and family and something that is a fun take home thing, please contact me. Right. So you can see it's the same post but the copy changes the intent completely. Yeah.

[B]

You still linked Chelsea.

[A]

You're still gonna get the compliments. That's cute. But now you actually did a business centric, a business forward Post rather than these ones like content's king. Content's king in regards to a place where no content is posted. Yeah, but the content majesty is someone who is using content that posts a copy to their social media to really move their sales forward.

[B]

So do you think all hooks are bad? Like you shouldn't use a hook on every post.

[A]

I think there's different types of hooks and you should use different types for different posts. Yeah. I think if everything was the boy who cried wolf, eventually no one will read your post for sure.

[B]

But for the Chelsea's order, the dino, you could start with a joke like does anyone know why dinos disappeared? Something like that.

[A]

You can ease it. Let me see if Jet.

[B]

I'm Chad.

[A]

Definitely a dinosaur joke with a joke about dino source for people who have to watch me. Okay. I really think AI and this is what we're saying, that it doesn't get humor. This is the joke it run. Okay, okay. I asked it come up with a joke about dinosaurs. It has the whole Internet to pull from. It says why don't scientists trust atoms because they make up everything. Which is hilarious. And then it said and dinosaurs. And in third line with a dot, dot, dot.

[B]

That's so not good.

[A]

It was like, here's a funny joke and we're going to add dinosaurs.

[B]

And that's why at the end of the day do I think AI will replace.

[A]

AI will take everyone's job. But comedians we know it's a wild thing. I would find a different type of joke. But that a joke would be a.

[B]

Joke is a hook.

[A]

Right.

[B]

Because it gets people to expand the comments to look for the answer. Or you can ask them their call to action. If you're not selling Chelsea's order, here's.

[A]

Another type of hook that I think would be an interesting content bucket. Hey guys, help me decide. We love to. We love to have an opinion.

[B]

I did that when I was redoing my log. Heather had made what she thought was an ugly logo. I loved it. It was a tire.

[A]

Oh, is that right?

[B]

And I had people get that away from Kyle.

[A]

Okay. Yeah, but what's like can you not ask them that when I my at.

[B]

The end of the day, I love my look. It's bringing them involved and it's. It's an ability to include them in your social media content. Not always selling to them, not always talking out them, but including them talking out them out and at out the buttholes.

[A]

Right. So when you come down to coffee, you know, I always find it somebody, a baker comes to the page and they're like, I just can't make sales. You know, I've done all the stuff. I write the post, I post to social media, I take the stage photos and I always find it like, oh, there's something here with the copy. And I think it's a kind of a hard nut to crack when you don't know how to approach it. So that's where those formulas really kind of are a nice approach because you just kind of. What is those things where you get the book and it has the blanks and you just write the word and then you read it back and it's like, corey, where is that stupid outfit today? There's a name for this. They used to happen at Outback a lot. We were kids. But that was like a word fill. Yeah, yeah, yeah, a word fill. That's what those formulas are. It's like, hey, call to action. Start with here, put this here, put that there. And it kind of guides you that way. Eventually you'll be able to write it just off the top of your head.

[B]

I know someone's listening to this right now and they're like, I ask a question on every post and no one answers. I want to say, when you do that, it's like the dissertation of why you made this order. And then you'll be like, what's your favorite dinosaur? Unfortunately, because you did your dissertation before that. To think that someone will read all the way to the bottom to find your question is asking a lot of them. That's why it's okay to maybe put the question at the top and test how those are. If you're not getting engagement or reach, you're not going to get answers to your questions of what dyno do you think you would be if you were in the dino age? So what you're going to have to do is manufacture things until we can get this off the ground. It's not. Just include a question and you're going to make a million dollars. I wish it was that easy.

[A]

It truly isn't. Why don't scientists just. I find it real interesting sometimes when a baker kind of reaches the end of the rope and they're like, I have run out of ideas. They come to the group and they're like, I have tried everything and nothing's working. I'm like, that is really well written copy right there. In your desperation, you got a hook, you added a lot of hope.

[B]

I've tried everything and nothing is working.

[A]

And a really great example of content that hook lines and sinker is customer drama. And the baker doesn't realize they've written that in a way. Sometimes I even lock it. I said, you wrote this in a way I have to lock it. Yeah. Because it's just like, it's too. It's too. And that's a great point is that really dramatic. Posts are written in such a way that gets a lot of engagement. And I think we, we're good at it when we don't mean to. And then when we go back to our pages, it's just like. Because they make up everything and dynatize, you know? But when you come to the group and you're like, okay, okay, throw away all this stuff I haven't learned and I've made up. And then you write the. I'm like, well, that's a really well written.

[B]

Well, I'm gonna say you're writing it conversationally versus this sterile board of buy my stuff.

[A]

Yeah. And it's very interesting. So copy is the other half of this engagement formula. In the world of algorithms, where people even stopping on your post is a tell to the algorithm that there's something here them clicking. See more if someone engages with your. If they touch anything on your post, it is registered as a click.

[B]

It is. It's registered as an engagement, which is great. So, you know, if we love looking at our insights, I can tell you from insights if something came from it. So like I posted about the $2 transfer club the other day. I said, we got some signups from it. Never did I reference it like, buy this $2 transfer club right now. I just said I'm making hearts using this $2 transfer club transfer in the content made you want to be a part of it because you liked what the content. When you marry.

[A]

Good copy and good content.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Matchmade and money making making heaven.

[B]

Money making heaven.

[A]

Then on the flip side, to not marry those two. Match made and money making.

[B]

I know. And that's, that's what's so unfortunate because people can have amazing photos. You did the hard work of learning photography and it looks amazing and you may get a lot of likes, but when you look at your insights, it stops at the likes. And no one's expanding your comments or no one's commenting or no one's clicking away to your website. That's. Those insights are not to make you feel bad about yourself.

[A]

They're to help guide you to have strategy. Yes.

[B]

So from that you can be like, okay, my photos look good. I'm getting a lot of likes here. And then nothing after that. Okay, I've got to work on my copy. And maybe the expanding and then moving your question to the top, maybe making.

[A]

Less words websites, you can run plugins called heat maps. Do you know what that is? Yes.

[B]

Heat maps. Don't even test me what a heat map is. If you go to a website and people want to see where are my customers hanging out on this website, it can track where your arrow is. Cause usually if you're rolling up or down the website, if you stay in a section for a long time, either that's a good section or maybe it's a confusing section.

[A]

I was thinking about Corey's writing copy for her website and. Okay. On social media, if you hold shift and enter, it creates. Does not create a line break. It's called something else. But it, you know, in the world where enter can either be a submission.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Like when you click enter, it posts something or it sends the email.

[B]

That's what has trained me.

[A]

Right. And then in the world of copy where enter is a line break, it creates a line break. In the word document, Corey will hold shift, enter and write an entire word document. Then she'll send it to me, like, add us to the website. So when I go to add formatting like H1 tags and H2 tags, it treats the whole thing because it's technically one sentence with a space in it rather than multiple paragraphs. It'll change the whole thing. I'm sorry.

[B]

I am who I am.

[A]

Don't say Corey. Listen, next time you send me this riff raff. Corey, Heather was chastising me in the comment section.

[B]

You can add a note on.

[A]

I'll be 36 and I'm still asking you not to hold shift enter, which. This is not the first or the fifth time we've had this conversation. Did you get it right? I have it pulled up right here.

[B]

I've done it right.

[A]

Is that you?

[B]

Yeah, I did it right. I even went back and just.

[A]

Would it be wild? Oh, did you send it to me? Would it be wild if we read some of your copy here?

[B]

You can, you can. I tabbed it. Tabbed it out.

[A]

Oh, yeah. And I'm really just kind of trying to see if we can see what did I do good type of cop. I didn't read the second one. Okay, I. I've already formatted this one for Corey and we had the intervention over the weekend, so let's read this one. Welcome to Ms. Mixing Bowl Cookie Company's allergy info where you can find my ingredients list Right there is what we know what's on this page.

[B]

Yeah. I needed to be straight to the point. Not so word fluffy right there.

[A]

This one. I thought you were word fluffy. I don't know. Corey was trying to.

[B]

Heather said if you don't make 500, 2,000 words and you need.

[A]

Yeah, 500 to a thousand valuable words. This is an advertisement. This is. So she's like, I'm so glad you were able to crumb by and check it out. So we have a pun there. Levity. I added an emoji here, an orange one because that's her colors. You'll find my ingredients list for my sugar cookie dough and royal icing mix listed below. Now the reason why she's put those there is that's keywords.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

We want to rank for sugar cookie and royal icing and licorice. Any additional questions as to what's in the mix, just send me an email. Right. And then she lists your email there. I often get asked if I'm allergy free or allergy friendly. Again, keyword, we want this allergy friendly Baker Lake Ridge. Not that she ranks for it, but that it helps her rank the whole entire website because she's about to say, short answer. I'm not allergy friendly or allergy free and I can't accommodate allergy needs. You may have. Right. Because we need that part. That, that's the health part has to be really big there. And they put that, I think, as an H2. I think.

[B]

Yeah, it was bold.

[A]

And then we add some levity here. Wow, that's a bit of heart. You might be thinking. And it's not because I don't want to help you out with your dietary needs. It's because a lot goes into allergy conscious baking to be allergy free in Virginia. So you can see keywords there. Your entire kitchen would need to be allergy free at all times. Right. So again, you can kind of see that the words here. And that's the problem with SEO. SEO Centric is too many keywords. It also is hard to read. Uh, then you have the chat GTP Word salad, which too many adjectives, it gets hard to read. Yeah. Uh, but then we still need to re reach a word count. But we also need to be readable.

[B]

I have my next blog post that I've entered for submission forever is the who, what, when, where and why of sugar cookie classes. So often to say a thousand or fourteen hundred words about sugar cookie classes is hard. But if we break it down into topics, the who, the what, the when, the where, the why. It makes it a lot easier to write a lot of content, and it makes it easier for your audience. So who should take these classes? When are these classes? Where are these classes located? It allows my customers to see what pertains to them and skip over what doesn't. Right.

[A]

And that's where heading really breaks up. Heading tags. So H1 tags. It'll be the largest text. H2 will be nested.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

And will help you understand where this page is. And not only does it help you understand, it helps your. The SEO, the crawlers. Yeah. Yeah.

[B]

So website. Website copy, and social media copy.

[A]

They related.

[B]

They are related. They're just different strategies behind them both. A lot of times when people are like, I just don't love my website. People are going to my website. Nobody's ordering. Sometimes we'll go there and we'll see this whole about section. Like, about where you grew up, where you lived, your favorite dessert.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

And unfortunately, if I'm the consumer, I'm worried about what did it for me.

[A]

Yeah. Corey said, how can I write my about page? Well, write it as if somebody was buying from you. What would they want to know? They could care less. Where you were born.

[B]

They could care less.

[A]

They do like to know how long you've been baking. They want to know if you've won any probably awards. Yeah.

[B]

Any credentials that helps them give them more buying power when it comes to you. But a lot of times we think about section.

[A]

It's all about me. It's not about me.

[B]

I wish it was. But how can this part of my website convert someone? How can the copy take someone from entering the website for the first time and have them leaving, saying, I want to order from this baker? And oftentimes it's not about how I went through a divorce and my son is now 15, and we're gonna order.

[A]

For all these reasons.

[B]

Order for me.

[A]

I'm a divorce 15, too. Doesn't it? You guys gotta get the point that copy really makes the world, the marketing world, go round. And I think sometimes we fall prey to this beautiful image and nothing around. It's really pushing our sales forward. Yeah.

[B]

When people really, truly do give up on copy, they'll hit at you with four emojis and that's it. And at the end of the day, sometimes, if you're like, my copy isn't working. A lot of times we're like, I don't know, take these four emojis. That's all I got right now. But if you can delve in and test. It's not going to be an overnight test. I can promise you that.

[A]

It takes some time. And then even if you have, sometimes I write the best copy in my whole life. And it's like when I got to. I'm going to pull up, I'm going to randomly look on for like a plumbing company.

[B]

Okay.

[A]

Plumbing services near me. I'm just searching this on Facebook. And we're just going to analyze their copy. Poor person. Who's going to show up first when I click on pages. Let's see what we got. Red Rooter, Springfield Roto Rooter.

[B]

That's a chain, though.

[A]

Should I do McDaniels? Yeah. Heard of them. Oh, I think I have seen their jokes. Okay. This is their first post. It was posted a week ago. Thank you, Barbara. We're so glad we're able to help you and really thank you for your trust in this. Have you received service from us? Leave us a review. So we got the call to action. Have you received service from us? Leave us Review. The image is a review from Barbara. Thank you, Barbara. Barbara.

[B]

And you know what? And you're like, oh, but look, he's. He's thanking a customer. If he's pulling from his review content bucket. It's okay to thank Barb. It's not okay to thank Barbara on every post.

[A]

We have a nice one here. They. I feel like they have. They have a good strategy here. So it's the post. It was made three days before the Barbara one customer faq. How long does it take to replace? My H Vac system said generally the average time for replacing a system can range from one to five days. Sometimes it can take up to four to eight hours. Time frame includes planning and removing. And they're like, here's the emoji lady. List of things that have an effect on how long it takes. And then it says book now. Oh, that's right. Which they're using a Bitly link, which means they're tracking their growth through rates. And on January 10th, we got a meme. One does not simply have a perfect furnace. It's an old, old meme. It's for the Lord Darlings guy. Happy Fun Friday. We got an emoji there. So we got some nice diversity in here. I think this is probably run by a marketing agency.

[B]

Probably so.

[A]

Okay. The Plumbing Doctor Inc. The profile picture is a man. This looks very homegrown. I like it. Him. His Last post was 23 hours ago. We have hashtags on Facebook. Not my favorite.

[B]

Okay. Usually if you see hashtags on Facebook, again coming with copy, it's indicative that he's posting from Instagram to Facebook. And the people who are reading the copy on Facebook think they're more of an afterthought.

[A]

Here's one I think could use. No offense to Mr. Plumbing Doctor. You are a doctor and an expert.

[B]

In who is Heather to say anything about your doctor?

[A]

Posted on the 25th, he said green grease can clog your drains and cause major issues. Follow the doctor's orders and dispose of it properly. Hashtag the plumbing doctor, hashtag drinker. Now, there's no way that tells us how to. How to dispose of it properly. Yeah, we do have a picture of a drain. So I. That is clogged.

[B]

What? Honestly, if I could rework that one, I would be like, do you throw your bacon grease down the drain?

[A]

Raise your hand and confess.

[B]

Yes. So what that does is a lot of people do do that.

[A]

Right?

[B]

So what you're getting do people. What it would do is get people to stay a little longer. And then if he was like, don't, don't do that or you'll be giving the doctor a call. Doctor's orders say dispose of it.

[A]

In these three, he has a name where you can really lean into the doctor thing. Slow drains are often a sign of a bigger problem. Don't ignore them. Contact a check. Check your pipes. There's not enough here.

[B]

Yeah, unfortunately we do know that drains moving slow. There is an issue.

[A]

No, there's a problem there. So it's interesting to see Liberty Plumbing looks small. Let me just do one more. If you own Liberty Plumbing, please contact us. Liberty. Liberty Plumbing. Shield your home from winter's chill. Ensure a leak free season with routine pipe maintenance. Don't let water damage freezer plants cost a day. So we got a call to action. Tons of hashtags. Here's okay, I'm sorry, Liberty. If you're listening, people who call Northern Virginia North Va, and I know it is called that, it feels like you're out of town.

[B]

No, you're not a town or you came here. What I would say if I was him, did you know that we have gotten 24 bursted pipe calls this week?

[A]

If you had said 24 burst pipe calls in Springfield, I'd be like, oh, like this is a local guy. Like hashtag flood damage. You're not going to get any leads from that. Hashtag plumbing tips. I'm not subscribed to hashtag plumbing tips. Maybe I need to too. Oh, right here. 60 recommended. I would be working much harder on that. But otherwise you can kind of see that we've got these very, very narrow content buckets for these poor plumbing companies. We have.

[B]

Sometimes at the end of the day, people are like, if I just post, put something up, it's.

[A]

Huh? Oh.

[B]

Oh, Lordy. I've been really trying to work on my engagement and my conversationalism.

[A]

Okay, last post a while ago.

[B]

What?

[A]

22Nd.

[B]

The 22nd. It's literally the 24th.

[A]

It's the 28th.

[B]

The 22nd.

[A]

That's what it says.

[B]

Are you sure?

[A]

I don't know. Is there a caching issue? Because all these people were timestamped. The bank.

[B]

Five days ago.

[A]

One, two, three. Yeah, the 22nd.

[B]

The 22nd. I haven't gotten. We're only on Tuesday of this week. My goal is to post twice a week.

[A]

Oh, okay. Yeah. About to give you.

[B]

So the only reason I did post this allergy one is to get more.

[A]

Clicks through the website. But I think it's a great idea.

[B]

Okay, nice.

[A]

Okay, so we got a thinking emoji and it says, is a website ever done? According to my web dev, it's. The answer is no. I thought that was a nice little hook.

[B]

Thank you.

[A]

It wasn't a dramatic one. Like, if you eat this and you have egg allergies, you'll die. Here's my allergy list. Like, it's like, hey, is website done? No, but here is my ingredients list. I've just added it. Like, things like that. So call to action. I like the image. She used the link preview as the image, so she didn't add an additional image. There. Scrolling on. Okay, this is a text only post. Very unique for you, which I'm trying. So Cor and I are testing on this sugar cookie marketing page. Text only.

[B]

It's doing well. What do you think about having the color behind?

[A]

I don't know. I've never tested that. Okay.

[B]

Yeah, because you typically don't do it with the color behind there. This almost looks like it could be a photo. Sometimes these are shared a lot.

[A]

That's so. Okay, we knew it was coming. But here's my yearly statement. Brace yourself. Here it comes. You've been warned. I can't wait till Christmas. Okay, that's 100% humor. No call to action.

[B]

No call to action.

[A]

Connection. She can't do this all the time because this would be weird.

[B]

Yes.

[A]

But my.

[B]

My thing is I want to connect with you. If you like Christmas, I like Christmas. We like Christmas together. My next one is a cookie post.

[A]

Okay, now this was very heavy images if you want to hold it up to them. This is the Taylor Swift set she did for my older sister growing up in a Swift. A grown up Swifty in her 30s era, shaking it off and feeling 22. So we got a lot of puns, but we have no call to action.

[B]

Because I'm not taking orders right now. I'm booked.

[A]

Okay, so there we go. So she's increased the funnel. It's harder to figure out how to order from her. Yes, yes, we are. And then according to that. So yeah, it's diverse and what is what works for Corey is not going to be exactly what works for you. But if you have no strategy, might as well try it out.

[B]

Go to my next bulldog one because.

[A]

That one performed well. So here's. Here's one. I thought it was a cutter flip and I thought this was a decent way to flex knowledge. Like the versatility of I can be a baker and I can make things work where they shouldn't. Yeah. She said, I'm so proud of myself. It's all in caps, right? So we got the hook and then the laughing, crying emoji because you don't. Now I'm like, are you proud of yourself because you made a mistake? And she said, okay, let me explain. And she's writing in very conversational. So it's not. Let. Allow me to explain. It's. Let me just. She. She's using abbreviations. Typically I can't see a cutter for anything other than what it really is. A ball is a ball and a shark is a shark. A pizza slice, cookie cutter. No way. It could be a pie slice too, but it totally can be. But my brain will not let me imagine it as anything else. We got humor. Corey is saying, hey, here's my self deprecation. I'm not that creative, but I had a dog theme order and found this pig cookie cutter and I saw the bulldog possibilities, which makes sense because I have a bulldog and he's a pig, so same lineage, basically. So then we let him in a little bit, A little bit more.

[B]

Dad, I am a dog lover, you guys.

[A]

Look at him. I did it. The cookie cutter flip. Like the cool kids. So this is a deprecation but kind of letting in and a lot of humor. I do like it. It's got 51 comments. It's got. This is probably one of your more viral posts in regards to your audience, which is 227 likes.

[B]

Yeah, right.

[A]

She did that without creating drama or posting politics.

[B]

So kind of That's.

[A]

That's hard to do. And this was posted, you know, we live in Northern Virginia, so when you guys see like the inaugurations on Monday, it's. The inauguration is shutting down the interstate where we live. So it's very big here. A lot of government contracts and stuff. So that did perform well. And then before that, she said, here's what I started. Here's the first cookie I made, and here's a cookie I just made now. And here's the difference of there a lot of this is from what I can see if I audited this. There are no call to actions. You do not want orders.

[B]

Yes.

[A]

But you want to stay in people's feeds. So you're flexing your abilities. These are very like, here's what I can do. Here's what my capabilities are. Here's how I can help. Here's how we can fill in this gap.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Yes. So when she wants to take orders, these audience is very calibrated. However, I can see there's a strategy here not to take orders. Yes. Now if I go to your page, person watching or listening, and you're like, I really want orders and I'm getting it. And I'm seeing no links like I'm seeing in Corey's, I'm going to say, well, you must not want orders. There's no call to action.

[B]

And if you go and the comments are under responded to, like the people who are commenting to me, they're my angel babies.

[A]

Thank you.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Every single one has one.

[B]

Every single one I have.

[A]

Every single one has her blonde. Which is a great point, because when I see people, I don't have any engagement. But you're not replying to the people who are watering your lawn already.

[B]

What if it's your mom? I don't know it's your mom. But they could be asking a great questions. Will these be available on Saturday at the market? Yes, we'll be at so and so market from 8 to 12. We're a booth number that and you.

[A]

Can go find your mom and any. Yeah.

[B]

And you're too. Tennis, sport setting.

[A]

Something I didn't do and sat on the bench. So that is how we could kind of make copy. And copy in the world of social media is very important copy. Really. I mean, you guys only engage with us through copy because you're not on this video. You guys can hear us, but we can only read you. So very interesting strategies that takes us through this thing. I would challenge you this week to just see how much copy you're actually imbibing copy, meaning advertising, writing, and then read it. So when you go to Olive Garden and you're going to get the thing you always do, read what its description is, you're going to see a lot.

[B]

Of chewy, delightful goodness made in the Italiano. I'm thinking of Olive Garden.

[A]

Right.

[B]

Italiano.

[A]

Mountains with ebbs and spices. So. And then you're going to kind of see, like, wow, this is really intended to guide you towards a certain act. Yes. That's why when the wait step. It's so odd. Olive Garden now has the zoisk, the kiosk. It's this little computer that sits at each table. And we go to Olive Garden enough that they've let us into what's happening. The reason why they have to type in your drink order is because it starts a timer for them, the wait staff, which is weird because can I get a Diet Coke? And they're like, can I get your zois, please? Diet Coke? And I'm like, I could have done that. But they're like, yeah, we have to do it to start your table. I know, but when you check out and it's like, hey, do you mind completing a survey? They always ask us to do it because it helps them get, like, a bonus or something. It'll be like, hey, were you offered a refill? Like, it's like, I'm seeing how the sausage is made, but I'm like, yeah, it was offered refill. How was the salad? Was the manager in the room? Like, I feel like I'm like big brother to my waiter.

[B]

I know, but we always love our waiters.

[A]

They're always good. So that takes us through that. Now let's go to the stupid questions. The stupid questions. You'll be happy to know the person who won 8 5, 0, who won last week, reached out and got it.

[B]

Nice. You're welcome.

[A]

You're welcome.

[B]

For me choosing your number.

[A]

Um, if you want a discount code for the stupid car tray, this is why it's called stupid text. You can use code sugar for 15% off. 15% off sugar. Yeah. We still record.

[B]

Still recording.

[A]

Still recording. Still recording. Is there a red dot lot lot going on here? A lot can go left and go right. But if you want to text and it's 571-556-5644. And if you go to stupidtech.com, you can buy yourself a stupid car trade or win one. If you text in, one person wins each week, and if not, if you didn't win to pay full price. Don't pay full price. Use code sugar for 15% off. Stackable. If they're running any other promotions, I.

[B]

Was using mine today. I brought Heather some sourdough chocolate chip muffins.

[A]

You know, I actually. Stupid Phil. Phil, he said, can you offer them this? I'm. I said, I'll just read it on this one. So he was like, hey, a thought I had. Phil, Phil writes like we do.

[B]

I like that.

[A]

I thought I had. Since we're trying to really grow our video testimonial base face is if one of your listener buys a tray using code sugar for 15% off and sends us a video testimonial, we'll send them a custom cut silicone grip mat and the drink holder set for free. Can I do it? Just a thought. Am I in? You can noodle on it.

[B]

Can I do that?

[A]

Yeah, do it. I can do it. He said, if this. He said, we want. They run. They run a lot of video ads. So all you have to do is create a video ad with your stupid car tray. And he will send you a custom cut silicone grip mat and a drink holder. They'll hold your beer, but you need the newer tray.

[B]

Maybe I could use your tray.

[A]

Use code 15. That one's in India. Oh, gosh. Code 15.

[B]

Okay, I'll give me a tray boxing.

[A]

Yeah, yeah. And also I need to make a post about in the group because I said I would. So if you could like, do it. So if you do that and send a video to Phil, he'll give you.

[B]

Whatever this silicone mat is.

[A]

Do you know what it is? No. Remember, you don't have it. So, like your whole thing is plastic. Yeah. There's an add on where you can put silicone on the flat part and it stops any.

[B]

Oh, that'd be so nice.

[A]

It really, truly stops anything from moving on it.

[B]

You got that on when you bought it?

[A]

I said out of one of each. I got both there. There was two drink holder. I know.

[B]

I need a good bowl in there.

[A]

Yeah, both of them.

[B]

I said, yeah, my guy is just bare naked.

[A]

I bought this before. There's a discount I just paid out of pocket. So anyways, back to the stupid card trait. Okay, Cory, pick. This will be the winner. Winner.

[B]

Okay.

[A]

How many? 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 2 2K area code 907. If you email heather triggercookiemarketing.com the rest of your phone number, your name and your address. Because it turns out I wasn't asking for that. I will get you your stupid cartridge. You have seven days to claim this. What is the number one piece of advice you would give to someone who is moving this year?

[B]

That is a great question because I have moved in the past. My, my a hundred percent. Since you know you're moving in the next year. You have.

[A]

It's it.

[B]

You have. Time is on your side versus when it's not on your side.

[A]

Here's the thing.

[B]

It my suggestion. If you're moving local versus distance, let's just assume you're doing distance. Go and join those local groups to the place that you know that you're going to. You want to get in there. You want to start sitting around answering questions, asking questions because you're you.

[A]

You're right for that. I'm moving here guys, and I need to get a new pediatrician. Yes.

[B]

And when you see an an ask for like does anyone know a custom sugar cookie baker? You want to be like, I'm not sure when you need these by but I will be moving to the area on blah blah blah and I'm going to tag my business name so we can already start growing our audience before we even get there. In the meantime, in your bio section of your page, I want you to put your location that you are now moving to. Blah.

[A]

Start warming them up for that and you're gonna start slowly trickling off. Here's another recommendation. If you know you're moving and you're moving with some distance.

[B]

Yes.

[A]

So that old client base will not be your new client base. Turn off your email subscriber. We don't want to grow our subscriber list, although that's such a nice vanity metric to be growing when we will not be able to sell them. So just let's discontinue that until we put roots down and we can start marketing ourselves.

[B]

Yes, yes. Also I have joined next door. I updated my address to my now address. Next door is poppin here in northern Virginia.

[A]

It is. It is the boomers.

[B]

Yeah. Oh my goodness.

[A]

My aunt comes in. My aunt who lives right next door.

[B]

Listen, I'm doing what I can for my community. She said.

[A]

I found a post on my next door and it was from Corey. But next door has this ability to post in your cross street, post in your neighborhood, post in your county and then post in nearby county. So my aunt is a county over, but she had gotten Corey's post in there.

[B]

Yeah. So there's a lot that you can pre do before you even get there by joining local moms group groups. Local community groups is a great way to get your foot in the door. And you want to start act like actively talking to people. And a lot of people have questions like how do you get your child to stop sucking on a pacifier that does. You don't need to be in that location to. You might need a kid. But that's a way to start building rapport and relationships with people before you even get there.

[A]

You know it's funny like I build mental relationships with the people who add a lot of value into the cookie group and I know them by their name and their little picture. Like I have, I'm like oh that person. I have to read what it is because I know it's going to be okay. You can build that rapport in a group for a community group. Like Corey makes me run her community group with her and I'm like oh I like this user. This user tries to make the rules all the time. Like you can build a relationship even never having communicated these admins by adding value. I feel like right now that's one of the most undertapped resources that bakers can't seem to wrap their head around. Around the value added non sales consistent pitch in community groups on Facebook.

[B]

Yeah, if you are a value adder the that you get spanked on your hand when you disobey a rule is less in that you can snuckle by a sales rule is more.

[A]

This is funny. In Corey's community group the the rampant abuse of sales was overtaking the quality of the group and in every every sales day just diminished.

[B]

Oh yeah, it was a wasted day.

[A]

It was the beginning of the end of a group. Right. You can see when the group reaches its event.

[B]

We were far from the end. We'd had one crappy day.

[A]

So Cora and I were like let's you know, really limit sales. So we did that by requiring that sales pitchers make a non sales post throughout the week. It requires so much more hands on than it should. Such is though and now the quality of the group. The number one posted today is no longer sales Saturday because they have to make a second post. But I was trying to, you know, I declined to post and then we cite the rule like you have to make one non sales post. And a lady was like but every time somebody buys from me they benefit for having a need met. I was like wow, you've spun that in a way that makes you look like a saint without getting the point of this. Yes. Is that from an admin? You making money benefits me none. You making A post or answering questions benefits.

[B]

Benefits me a lot. So if you're joining a group and you are like, hey, you know, I'm looking for good wi fi, spot those questions. You'll get so many comments.

[A]

That's a great one. Hey, I'm moving into area. Our wifi probably won't be set up in the first week. I'm looking for a good cafe with plugs.

[B]

Yeah. Do you use Verizon? Timo, what do you do for Internet? I'm moving here to the area. I want you to say, I'm moving to the area.

[A]

And then when you get into the area, instead of saying like, hey guys, I'm selling cookies, be like, hey, guys, thank you so much. Who is that name we've been using? Sheila. Sheila for recommending the cafe. Here's a picture of it. Chelsea, you people and say, you know at Chelsea, if you can remember name and say, here I went. And it's great. So now you're building, you're building up this coffee shop, you're building up Chelsea and you're creating community without selling yet.

[B]

Yeah. What I also want you to do, unless you're posting like crazy political stuff, is post I work at and then your business page. So mine says head baker at Mixing Bowl Cookie Co. So as I'm making posts, people can. People are nosy. We're all nosy. They're clicking, they're seeing. And then they can also tie me to that without me having to say a word.

[A]

I want to tell you guys, if you are in a Facebook group, if you're in the sugar cookie marketing group, great place to test it.

[B]

Yes.

[A]

Go to the group. You can do it on your phone or desktop computer. And then click on in the top ribbon, towards the top there's something called you. And I'll have your profile picture next to it. Click on that. That is your group profile. It has its own cover photo. You can have a unique cover photo per group you're in. So I know people are like, I don't want to put cookies as my cover photo. My grandma sees or whatever. You can make one uniquely for that group. Group. You know how interesting it would be? Corey and I were testing a theory about there's a foodies group. Let's say your cover photo is Northern Virginia foodies on a cookie. Oh, that'd be hilarious. Very interesting. Right? So she'd be able to sell without selling. You can also create a custom bio for that group specifically.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

So, you know, you may not want to say on your personal bio Like, I live in this new place I don't live in yet, but you can in that community group. Yeah. Yeah. Very interesting. So that is that-1907, congrats on the move. But text in or email in the rest of your your phone number and your name and your address and I'll set you up with Phil. If you get your tray and you make a video, you can let Phil know and you'll get the add ons for free.

[B]

Voice.

[A]

Tammy from Texas.

[B]

Tammy from Texas.

[A]

We got a hand. We got three hand palms.

[B]

Oh, Tammy.

[A]

I was in such a hurry to solve Corey's baseboard problem that I didn't hear Heather's issue with Graham's shower. Tell Graham's to use a squeegee on her shower glass. Leave the door open and the exhaust fan going until the door is dry. This will help with mold and mildew. It won't completely stop the growth, but it will slow it down.

[B]

Oh, slowing it down is great.

[A]

Did we talk about that mold removal stuff?

[B]

Gel?

[A]

Did we talk about it on here? I can't remember when we talked.

[B]

We definitely had a conversation about it.

[A]

Okay, Tammy, that's great. And I will let Ruthanne know about the door. I'm just gonna expose myself here. Do you guys have grout you gave feeders? I do showers.

[B]

I have grout on my floor. I have grout on the walls.

[A]

Like people. This house has grouted where grout he couldn't even dream of being. Grout is here. And it's. It makes for a beautiful design, right?

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

But grout, I think you have to keep sealing it. And I don't think this grout has been resealed.

[B]

Grout is weird to me.

[A]

Grout is weird. Grout is odd. Like, let's put something that's holding on crazy. So anyways, the grout up here, like, I could not scrub this thing any harder. Like, at one point I'm like, I'm just destroying the grout. Like, the grout's coming out because I'm scrubbing so hard. So I had looked on Reddit. There's a cleaning suburb it, and someone was like, hey, this product, which I'm about to show us, this product cleans grout. If the grout is stained, which is mold and mildew, they're like. And you can't scrub it out and bleach is not working or anything. Use this Appulito mold and mildew cleaner. So I buy this stuff, right?

[B]

I.

[A]

It's gel.

[B]

Little did I know I had already had it. Heather didn't know.

[A]

Cor. I was like to Corey, I was like, I have this great product, mold and mildew cleaner for Grant. Like, no, no, no. I have a better one. I said, no, no, no. Even her understand. This is the best one. Now lesson I can't touch mine. On the count of three, we revealed our mold and mildew cleaners, revealing the same one Appulito I got on Amazon. It was, oh, it's on sale. 7% off, 13.98.

[B]

Worth every dime.

[A]

Subscribe and save. I'd rather die than just subscribe and save, but I tried it. So the concept being people, the concept being if you put all this cleaner, it just doesn't sit long enough to kill the molded mildew. So this is highly jelly. And you actually can't just wash it away. You have to wipe it off and, like, throw the towel. Yeah, but it cleans. I mean, you know, whatever it's doing, I can't. For all mold and mildew stain, tile, grout, sealant, bath sinks and showers. Whatever it's activist doing, it's doing it. Why are we talking about this? Okay, cuz, Tammy texted in great tip. If you guys want an additional shower tip and you're fighting this, like, stained grout and you're like, it's clean, but it's not. It's not looking clean.

[B]

Tammy, a question for mine. I always tell my son, he, like, when he gets out, we have shower curtains over here in my poor house. He pushes the curtains to the side and I always tell him, you need to bring them out so it can air out.

[A]

Agree.

[B]

That's right. But then there's less airflow to the actual tubular.

[A]

I bet you Tammy's gonna say, tammy not speaking for you, but I bet you Tammy's gonna say, then push it at night, squish it over, like half day.

[B]

Half.

[A]

Yeah, half. Half. Like you like getting your son to do that.

[B]

He does pull it back now.

[A]

Oh, great. Yeah, they can be taught. Not can.

[B]

Barely.

[A]

Hi, twins. Sorry, no. Favorite twin. The chemistry between the two of you is like no other. Wouldn't have it any other way. We have chemistry. I have more chemistry than you, than.

[B]

My two husband's companions.

[A]

I said, I'm your work husband. The guy I'm dating said, how's your husband? She's good. She's chugging along. My question is in regards to reaching out to customers that ask about ordering and then ghost you when you reply. The previous two years, I was making a decent amount of money as a side hustle. This year I get tons of recommendations off our community Facebook page, which is where the majority of my orders came from. Besides friends and family and word of mouth. Then people reach out. I tell them what I'm about, they send their inspo for cookies, I quote them, and then it's crickets. I have priced myself against others in the community and compared the quality of work. I'm anywhere between 2 and $22 per dozen less than those that are comparable. I'm getting concerned that my marketing area is just too saturated. Do you have any advice that would help me seal the deal? Can I reach back out to those who ghosted me or sometimes say they went with another baker? Is it rude to ask why? I've tried to search the group for an answer? So. So I'm sorry if you've already answered it, but I am desperate. Thank you for all you do in both helping me and the baking community. Best regards, a relatively new single mom just trying to be able to afford my precious little children. Love you.

[B]

Single mom here too, for a while. I want to tell you, sometimes when you're priced 22 to 25 lower, you're getting people who are price shopping. They are looking for the lowest price baker.

[A]

And you're not the lowest.

[B]

You're not the lowest. You're coming in at mid tier.

[A]

You're saying, look at how good I am and here's how cheap I am. And they're like, yeah, I don't care how good you are. That's not cheap enough. Yes.

[B]

So what you are doing is you are the top of the lowest of the budgets. So if I'm budget conscious, I'm going to have to bypass you because I'm looking for even cheaper than that. If you and I know if you raise your prices, you're now going to be the bottom of the highest tier people. You're going to make more sales for the simple fact that people are charging so much more than you you, but you're charging just a little bit less than them, but you're not charging so much less than them that people are just price shopping with you and they're looking for the cheapest price.

[A]

Here's a great example. Corey and I price our cookie classes at $78. The lowest price competitor, I think is under $50.

[B]

40.

[A]

$40. So we're almost double. We're $2 away from double. The highest price competitor is at now 120, which we're pretty shocked because I was like, whoa, we are leaving so much money on the table. I have not lazily posted our classes this year. Would you not assume everyone would go to now the $40 class? No, the $120 class is always booked. Yes. And they do them very consistently. Yeah. Corey and I have about 10 emails of people saying, why aren't you posting your classes?

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

So they still want the $80 and the 41. The $40 person is probably doing it just fine. I think they actually have a lease and overhead, stuff like that. So we have three different tiers of pricing and yet we're all still selling out. The problem is if I'm like, well, I want to make sure I sell out, so I'm going to pricing it at $45. I'm still higher than $40, but I'm competing with people who wanted the cheapest class.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Which is a strategy. Right. Being the cheapest one is a strategy. Work off economies of scale. As long as you know what you're doing, you're still working at a profit. You can do it. However, like you said, you're providing money to afford your children. Wouldn't we rather compete with that higher price tier?

[B]

Unlike classes where it's a numbers game how many bodies can get in there. There sugar cookies take a long time to make. And if you're not willing to cut corners and make a sloppy outline and you're taking the the time for each and every single order, you can't be priced the cheapest. So what you want to do, instead of being lumped in with the lowest price people in your community where you're.

[A]

Now the highest, highest price of the.

[B]

Lowest price of the lowest price people, people are bypassing you. You want to jump into this next category of the high, highest price people and you'll be the lowest of the highest price people.

[A]

And that is definitely a strategy because you, because she said so. We're not just making this up. She said she's comparable to the higher price tier of people. Now the wild part is you're, you're literally getting ghosted on your prices and we're telling you to raise your prices. Yeah.

[B]

Right.

[A]

And that, that's going to be a mind boggling challenge right there because you're like, I'm not even. I only asked you if I should reach out and ask why. The reason why is because you're not cheap enough. Right. So but we like stop being cheap at all and raise your prices. You'll be a great deal for who's shopping with that person has $22 over you because you're only now $2 under.

[B]

Them if you say, I'm not ready. So, Quince, back to my question. Should I reach out to people? Here's my thing. In car sales, it's always. Never end a conversation with a yes or no answer. It's always going to be like, and what can I do? I'm going to go ahead and book you on the calendar. Here's the place.

[A]

Where.

[B]

Can you just let me know where I need to send the invoice to?

[A]

I was pulling them along. Alex Hermosi take them. Yeah. Before I accidentally uninstall TikTok. Never download it again because I can't. They won't put it back in the app stores until it sells parts of itself.

[B]

Are we supposed to be looking at these cameras?

[A]

Sometimes when I'm talking to them. Staying in there because I teach these classes a lot and I have to.

[B]

Give my people a time of day.

[A]

Right? My people, my people. Look at me. Come here. Listen, I. I recognize that you're here. You're watching it. Us. Corey's like, I will not look at anything.

[B]

Heather said, keep it to me.

[A]

I'm talking to you guys.

[B]

I'm talking to you guys.

[A]

I'm talking to you. I'm talking to you. I want them to know and I want.

[B]

Just because I can stare at your eyesight every sentence.

[A]

You will hit the three. Because I want. I want to be like, hey, you're here.

[B]

Okay, well, now I'm talking about here.

[A]

Alex hero. Oh, yeah. He said when you can feel that. And he's talking about in person sales. Right. But when you can feel that the person. Person has got this objection.

[B]

Yes.

[A]

Instead of being like, okay, well, reach out to us if you want to continue forward. He said like, what about this? What about what I said is. Is tripping you up? Like, what can we talk about here? Because I can see you're hesitant and I want to make sure that you understand fully. And let's see if we can work through whatever that. That last issue is in person.

[B]

Sales is so much different because you can see the.

[A]

Yeah. I mean, yeah.

[B]

That's why it's so easy to ghost somebody. Because you're like, I got the information in the life.

[A]

It's not like, hey, listen, I feel like I'm hesitation in your replies. What's the last thing you can. You can see without saying that, like. And I get what you're saying. Should I ask? No. If somebody truly goes to me and weeks have passed, I probably wouldn't ask again, but I would make a hey, just want to let you know I'm teaching this cookie class and I would love to invite you to do that.

[B]

In my initial email, I would always say, assume the sale. They've reached out to you because they want your cookie.

[A]

It's the hardest part. You did the hardest part.

[B]

It is instead of being like. And then let me know what you think about that and be like, okay, and I have your date ready. Just go ahead and let me know the invoice. You're assuming that they're going to book with you versus putting the ball in their court and they're ghosting you.

[A]

I like this. Okay, so let's say the person ghosts a little bit. We're three days out. You can kind of tell that they're disappear. Here's what I do. Yeah, I would say, hey, what's the. Chelsea Chels. Hey, Chelsea, I. I'm super excited about this design. I'd love to get you in the books, but I got somebody vying for your day. I typically book out, but I want to give you first ride of refusal. What can we do to make this happen?

[B]

If people have ghosted you weeks ago, it's probably too far. And then they'll be like, we can.

[A]

Just bake it into future sales, right?

[B]

Yeah, for sure.

[A]

Here's my okay. If you had 10 leads and 10 people ghosted and you reached out to 10 people, you may get two. So it may be a really effective strategy at getting that sale back again, but you have to start baking it into your sales process. Yeah.

[B]

So it'd be like, I send it. And even if you say, and this is big in online sales, I'm going to follow up with you in three days and see how it's out with you.

[A]

You're sitting there. You're not like, yeah, sometimes, like when I need to kind of like, I really hope for something and I'm not getting it, I was like, hey, I'm. I'm. I'm. My worst features. I can't read a room. So if you want me to go away, just say it. But until then, I'm gonna keep writing you a message because I would love to work with you.

[B]

Yeah. It is taking the guesswork outta there when you're like. And let me know what you think you've said to them. It doesn't matter how you treat me now. From this point on, I'm out in the balls in your court. And until you send me something back, I will leave you alone.

[A]

And maybe they'll go see you. Maybe they'll get angry, but whatever. There was already a law sale we have potential to get. So yeah, I would consider raising prices. Remember, you can always run discount discounts. Once your prices are higher, you can start messing with your margins and doing promotions, stuff like that. But yeah, if you're feeling like you're getting considerably ghost over amount of time, I think it's because you're the highest price of lowest price tier. Last one. Okay, here's a random thing. Someone commented on a post you made and they said, hey, I like the tool you use. Did you know how to spell that tool? T, U, L, L, E. Oh, that's how you spelled it.

[B]

The bow.

[A]

Oh, they spelled it very differently. Oh yeah. I was like, wow. I've never considered spelling it like the. I was thinking D. What did you think that's a tool? D, U, L. I have no idea.

[B]

You never rock.

[A]

Corey's ribbon that she ties into her boxes is cool. What fabric is that and where does she get it? I almost think they talk about Karen. Talk about that? No. Is it. Hold on. And by the way, your cookie college has some great classes. I jumped in during the Vendy Blendy and I'll have to jump back off for now, but I'll make more money and I'll be back. Yeah.

[B]

Did they sign an off as them?

[A]

No, signing off as one.

[B]

Like Deb. Is it Deb?

[A]

No, Albany. Okay. It's tool.

[B]

You can buy it from Michael's. Michael sells it by the spool and it's very inexpensive. And that is since I'm talking.

[A]

That is why I actually really, really.

[B]

Like it is because you can buy it in different colors and different and I like to combine them. So if a under the sea theme I can do aqua and white to look like the ocean. It's very, very inexpensive and that's why I like it. You can also buy it on Amazon. The one that people really liked was this one that had sparkles inlaid into it. That was also from Michael's. I want to say if you use that, prepare for those sparkles to get off of the tool and onto your body. That's a rough one for the rest of your life.

[A]

That's a rough one.

[B]

But it was very cute. But I use tulle. If I'm just like, I need to judge this up, I don't have a lot of time. Tool is the best plan of action.

[A]

Too well.

[B]

Too well.

[A]

Okay, you want to do one last. Last one.

[B]

One last one stupid text.

[A]

A stupid question for your stupid tech segment. If you could be a cast member at Disney. What job would you want? I want a job where the audience treats me like a hero. Like, oh, I can't believe I want to be one of the princesses that pops up randomly throughout the day and.

[B]

Crowds form, you know, who got famous.

[A]

I want to drive the money monorail.

[B]

It's not a cast member.

[A]

All hands and feet. You don't think they call them cast members? Disney people are the monorail. Is there monorail operators?

[B]

Is it people who just are acting the cast members?

[A]

I thought everyone's considered a cast member.

[B]

I think, and I can imagine the name is. It's. His name was either Tilly or Telly or Tully, but he went famous tool. He went famous in Christmas because he was part of the Christmas parade and he would tell you if you were on Santa's naughty list.

[A]

He's this funny, entertaining if it's hilarious. I specifically don't want to be in the parades. Why? I don't know. I feel like there's so many dancing around.

[B]

What if you were on the float?

[A]

Listen, I want. I want. Oh, if I was at the top of float. We talking. You don't want to be the walking cast member of the.

[B]

Where he got to talk to people and say.

[A]

Yeah, I don't know. There's a lot.

[B]

There is a lot. Would I want to be a Disney princess?

[A]

I don't think I'm cut out to be a princess. The monorail dream.

[B]

Honestly, could I tell you what you'd be? You'd be one of the mice from. What is she the princess?

[A]

Who's Cinderella?

[B]

Not Cinderella. She was Snow White.

[A]

That's not a mouse. Didn't she have a mouse? The small people, the little sleepy and Snoopy.

[B]

Did she have mice, though? Maybe Cinderella had the mouse. Okay, you are Cinderella.

[A]

I'm a mouse.

[B]

You are. You're the tubby one that's cute with the little hat.

[A]

I think you're Chip the cup.

[B]

Chip the cup. I like it.

[A]

I like it. Great question. So that takes us through our stupid text. If you want to text in your stupid question, you do it. 5715-565-644. And your chance to win a stupid card tray. If you don't win, we pick one winner a week. You can still purchase [e-mail] for 15 off using the code sugar. If you're listening on Spotify, there's just a button you can click and it will text that in for you.

[B]

Noise. Next up, what is a cookie college?

[A]

That was what the Prior question mentioned that Cookie College is a collection of courses that help you bake more and make more.

[B]

It is done with you marketing. If you hired a marketing agency that's done for you.

[A]

Meaning we do it for you. That's expensive cost, an arm and a leg. Done with you means we tell you where to click and do it yourself. Means you are on YouTube figuring this out. You'll never guess.

[B]

One of the courses in the cookie college is a copy course.

[A]

Ah yes, copy formulas. Yes.

[B]

And how to make copy work for you.

[A]

And instead of audio visual it is a screen share where we type it out together and design the words.

[B]

Will buying the cookie College make you a million dollars? Yes.

[A]

Yeah buy right now www the catch is it's on sale for only right now the cda.

[B]

Here's the thing. If you sign up for Cookie College and don't take the courses, that's a strategy. But you can't say my copy isn't working and you didn't take the course to help your copy. So there is. You can get in there, you can sign up and never take something but then you lose the privilege to say my photos suck.

[A]

Right. Like did you take the photography course?

[B]

So these are more helpful. Done with you marketing the video. Those are because I'm a video visual learner. I need to watch things so I assume everyone is like me. But you can also listen to it too while you're decorating and then you can go back and watch with if you want to. There's over how many courses now because.

[A]

The cookie college is actually includes five total memberships. There's a ton, it's over 100. So the cookie college gets everything. It's a top tier but below that is a cookie class kits of which Corey is working on the March class kit. It'll drop on February 7th. It is dog themed. Last year we did a cat theme which is cute. So we have to do dogs, we have to do cats. And then there's also the baker's business basics which is 13 foundational courses for the baker just getting started. Who wants to start off on the right foot. And the digital downloads which had a revamp in 2024, they're actually a lot more versatile now. Last month's digital download was these cookie cutters, these mini cookie cutters with these cookie tags that were January's digital downloads and you can use those for your Valentine's Day offerings. Now people say when I sign up, what do I get? Depending on the the course, the membership, you get everything. That's been added to this point. The only caveat with that one is the cookie classes. You get everything added this year until this point. So the cookie college we started in August 2021. The next day we drove down to Cookie Con to speak. Crazy. That was crazy. And then so you get all the content since 2021. That's the biggest complaint is it's overwhelming. But don't worry. Every month I have a get to know your membership Facebook Live. It's a one hour long live where I walk you through how it all works, where to find it, how to focus, things like that. You can sign up for TheCookieCollege.com the last membership I forgot to mention is the $2 Transfer Club. I actually give that to all of our memberships. So if you sign up for the digital islands, you get the transfer club. If you sign up for the cookie college, you get the transfer club of which we're now at almost 190.

[B]

And if you sign up for the transfer club, you get the transfer club.

[A]

You'll ever guess what you get when you sign over. The the transfer club. You don't get the transfer club. You do get the transfer club. So here's my call to action. If you want to make more money and understand marketing as it applies to bakers more in 2025, you can sign up for just a month. $76. We can sign up for the year and get two months free. If you sign up for the month, you can cancel anytime after that or it'll renew on you and you'll get the new content that drops each month.

[B]

For those bakers who like to take my copy from my page page instead of doing that because that is bewildering to me, let's learn how to make copy that is good for you, that incorporates your personality, your.

[A]

Speaking of content buckets, it's disjointing to read suddenly like Corey's humor. If you're not a very humorous person or that's not very. You're not very humor centric brand to just post something like whoa, it's kind of crazy. So it's, it's nice to build up your brand personality and write the way that you write so that when people meet you they expect to see what they see. Yes, yes. Corey writes the way she talks.

[B]

Yeah, I do.

[A]

Yes.

[B]

Yeah, I think so. Let me. Yep, let me.

[A]

So you can learn more about [e-mail] now let's go. Sponsors.

[B]

Sponsors. Okay. If you wanted to know if you want Better photos. You're like, my copy's great. I really want to work on my photos. The backers co is a home photography setup. And I talk about setup because it's everything you need. If you want wanted lighting, if you wanted backdrops, if you wanted the little L brackets to make the whole thing. That's what they have. They even have these cute little ruffly towels.

[A]

I love sourdough cellars. Yeah, you staged. I did a.

[B]

A very easy stage.

[A]

But it was, it was interesting to see how the sausage is made. Really? Yeah. Because you're like, oh, the L brackets. She's recreated her whole house in this little shape square. Yeah, yeah. So if you guys want to see that. You posted in sourdoughs. I did post it requested.

[B]

But if you went to the backers co gives you 20 off. And if you watch the video, you can see how you set these up to look like a whole house in 23 inches by 23 inches. It's fantastic. They're food safe, they're matte, they're waterproof, scratch resistant. Love them. I use them all the time. And you can use code sugar cookie that's singular. And get 20 off.

[A]

Very nice, Very nice. Moving on. Bakedy bake Royal bat match meringue powder. Best ever. 10 off. Twins.

[B]

Twins. It the thing that I love about it. It bake. It bake. So it whips up bright white. Already has white food coloring in it. Or it has corn syrup in there and vanilla extract. You can add whatever else you want to. It is light, it's fluffy, it's silky, it doesn't sink in.

[A]

Is there any separate attractive?

[B]

I don't know, but you can get that using code twins at checkout. Last but not least, Eduardo Eddie, the edible food printer. He always saves me, man. He always saves me.

[A]

Someone said we were snooping on my grandmother's best friend from childhood's daughter in law's daughter's baby shower and someone had printed Eddie cookies.

[B]

Yeah, there was any.

[A]

Listen. How we had a snoop to get that far into the baby jar.

[B]

Why she didn't order from me, we'll never know. There was a lot of snoop and a lot of questions going on. I had this order and it was the most complex logo I've ever seen in my life. There's no way I could have hand piped, wiped it. Otherwise the cookie would have been ginormous because the details were so small. So she said, I really would like if you could have this logo for this little air force whatever it was. She was in her department.

[A]

This little military base. Yeah.

[B]

There was so many things that were in it, like the words of whatever they were in it. Plus this little logo in a world. I don't know.

[A]

It was a lot.

[B]

But Eddie came to my saving grace. He was able to print it on the cookie. And she was ecstatic. She said, I can't believe you put the logo on a cookie.

[A]

And I said, yeah, I know. Control P. Crazy Eddie in their group. Eddie Printers users group TM on Facebook. They had announced this software and they had to relaunch it. Apparently they had to go take it back to the kitchen. And they. Now they dropped it again. And I think it's so funny. I'm going to try to sound like it's a. You know how we went to the wedding venue and tried to print off this? That was a lot of manual technology labor because we had to take things that could have gone wrong. Pipe it in course. Computer piping in the Eddie software. Pipe at Eddie. So they were like. They create a software that cuts it all out. Like it just says, from the camera to the Eddie.

[B]

Is it something you divine? That's extra.

[A]

No, I. It's not added on. It's just a software.

[B]

Oh, so it's a. It's an additional software from Bartender and Primera.

[A]

Bartender is not by primary. This is primarily.

[B]

Oh, really?

[A]

Right. So. But I think it only might work for Windows. I don't know. But I'm going to do my best representation of accounting. Why? One, two, three. Jeez. That's hilarious. Printing now.

[B]

Well, that's so funny. So if it takes the photo, does it hook to a camera or could you do it from your phone?

[A]

I did not watch that part. It seems like any. It seems like all you had to do is tell the software which camera you wanted it to use.

[B]

I wonder if you could just like, was it.

[A]

I assume it just works like I can tell this computer when I open Zoom. I want to use this one or I want to use that one. Oh, interesting. And then it would just trigger it. But I'm not positive. No, I didn't. I didn't download stuff for myself.

[B]

You want me to sign up for another wedding event so we can figure it out?

[A]

So those are our three sponsors and we have the stupid car tray sponsor. Yeah.

[B]

Nice. Without them, we wouldn't have this. So thank you guys for so shut down your head. Wood. It's wood. Do you have a twin? Tr. Do you have a twin? I think I'll say my twin.

[A]

Trust.

[B]

I was wearing these like, very dingy. They were clingy. They were dingy jackets.

[A]

You may have noticed them in last week's podcast the week before.

[B]

The reason why is some things when you watch, like, because I wash them all the time.

[A]

Tammy, we need you.

[B]

I wash them all the time. So it just looked okay. You know those pills. Yeah, the pills were everywhere.

[A]

Yeah, those pill trimmers do. But someone's like, hey, just so you know, those pill trimmers.

[B]

Yeah, they're like, aren't they taking off?

[A]

They're literally cutting off part of your clothes. It does freshen up, but eventually you burn.

[B]

You'll run out of clothes to pill and to cut.

[A]

No clothes will be pilled. So me and Heather were at the.

[B]

Mall on a Sunday, as one does. I said, you know what? I just feel like a blob. A blob in the wind. A wrinkly blob with pills everywhere. So she said, let's go to Athleta and find and see if we can find a jacket. This jacket is my replacement for these wayward jackets I've been wearing for years.

[A]

I think that every article of clothing has a use span. Like how many uses before it starts?

[B]

And how long have I had these Jackies?

[A]

Years. Years and many washes, I'm sure. Let's hope. And then they start kind of like reaching their end of use cycle. And then you, you either donate them or your person, whatever.

[B]

But I find that I wear a jacket every day. You do?

[A]

I just like, instead of getting rid of jackets and this. Somebody asked about this in the cookie college. You're like, I am so distracted. Like, I don't know what to do. I think I'm gonna go cold turkey off all social media apps. Like, you know TikTok.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

And I was like, hey, that limiting. My brain hates that feeling of like, hard. No, like, throw away all your jackets. We're not wearing jackets anymore. But doing like a halves is like, wear a jacket, find a jacket that fits better. Find a higher quality jacket, invest some money in it rather than a bunch of dingy jackets. Instead of saying, we're getting rid of jackets. Yes. So I told her, like, I uninstall TikTok, unfortunately, permanently, I guess. But I install it every week and then I reward myself, myself with guilt free watching on the weekends. So.

[B]

So while I know I will always wear a Jackie, because I love a Jackie, it could be a nicer Jackie instead of going, no Jackie.

[A]

So you got those from athleta, which was 30 off.

[B]

It was 30 off.

[A]

Not bad. A Little bad if they weren't.

[B]

And I had to go and purge. I had so many jackies that were very old.

[A]

You inspired me. I went and did some.

[B]

Oh, you did?

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

I said, I have got to donate these eggs asap, otherwise I'll keep one. And that is dangerous.

[A]

Yeah. So I did.

[B]

I did it got me a lot of room in the closet.

[A]

That's great because some of the jackets weren't even wearing just happen.

[B]

And I had the same four in rotation. One get washed, wear the other one.

[A]

It's dangerous. How do you wash your clothes on hot. I was told not to do no cold. Cold.

[B]

That's what my husband said.

[A]

Oh, really? The bastion of clean clothes and not holes in his pants. Knight is an interesting feller. It's the best way to describe him. He wears. He does not like spending money at all. Ever allergic to spending money. In fact, Corey happened to go through his credit card statement and caught someone stole his credit card. Caught it because it was only charged. We knew something was wrong.

[B]

Buy something 10 times a month, it's groceries. He does not go out to eat in gas once. And then I found this charge. And that's the only reason I found. Because it stuck out.

[A]

Because it was like the most expensive.

[B]

Thing he had bought all month.

[A]

So as such, he's not buying clothes. Which means he's wearing the same clothes he's always worn his pants years are. I thought they were inside out. No, it was just the hem giving up the ghost. And he's at the gym the other day, and this man walks up to him and hands him a pair of pants and says, hey, man, I hear. I hear you're a police officer. I just wanted to help. Yeah, my husband.

[B]

I know, I know. But you'll pry those hemless pants out of his.

[A]

They look inverted. They.

[B]

You know what's absolutely crazy? Me and Nate have been together for a decade now. Mom and dad had bought him something every Christmas that is a clothing item. He collects them. They're all in the closet in a big bag. And he'll like, I'll. I'll get him in a big suitcase.

[A]

Oh, no.

[B]

He said, I'll take them out. When these fall apart, they're falling more than they are.

[A]

You'd be pants less any further fall. Yeah, he's.

[B]

He's waiting. Like yesterday we went for a walk. He said, I feel the brisk air on my toes. There's a hole in his shoe.

[A]

But okay. You'd say, well, then get him some. No, it's not that he doesn't have them. My dad can't clothe the man. Yeah. He doesn't want to wear him. He like, it's the.

[B]

It's the weirdest thing. He's never been able to break it. You can't break him of it. He has these nice clothes.

[A]

How to be satiating. Yeah. I now to be satiated. And then he married you.

[B]

I'm a little less satiated, but I.

[A]

Don'T know if I have a twin dress. I'm nauseous. We try to eat protein struggling.

[B]

Maybe that's your issue.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Too much pros. Too much pros for goats.

[A]

Yeah, I was, I was struggling last night. When you don't want to eat and you have to eat a hard boiled egg.

[B]

That's why I have a dog.

[A]

Eating my protein. Goes, would he eat an egg?

[B]

You know, he used to be really good with eggs, but now he does puke them up.

[A]

Me too. Right? Me too. About an egg, when you start thinking about it, you're like, if you think.

[B]

About an egg too much, you can't. Honestly, it's making me get rid of it.

[A]

I had this one grandpa, you know, like the white part of an egg. The white part of an egg. I kind of love it.

[B]

It's bland.

[A]

It's bland. Put it in a salad, it adds some like texture.

[B]

The yellow part is whatever the moisture, it sucks up.

[A]

If I ate a piece of chalk, I think it would taste better than the yellow part of an egg. Me and Heather when we were little.

[B]

Had a teeter totter. But it broke. So it could go spinning. It could spin crazy. Like once we were like, yeah, we had nilla wafers. We said every time we spent, we would spin so fast. Maybe it was me remembering.

[A]

It was light speed. Light speed.

[B]

We said, every time you pass the Nilla wafer box, take a bite. Take one bite. And then there was a bunch of moons of Nilla wafers after it. And we went, we're like, yeah, we.

[A]

Don'T want these anymore.

[B]

My grandfather said, you will not be wasting those. He said, do you eat every half moon that you.

[A]

I haven't had a nilly wafer. Oh, yeah. Speaking of the other, Grandpa was like, you will eat the yellow stuff. I had set it aside like, like to not to not eat. And it wasn't even coated in the white part. Just the.

[B]

You said you better and doom. That stuff multiplies in your mouth. Whatever it does, it sucks up any moisture right here. Sucks up the moisture.

[A]

And I think it grows in your mouth.

[B]

It like, almost like a foam. And you eat it. It coats everything.

[A]

If I wasn't ash before, I'm not. Okay, guys, we'll see you next week. Corvin be taking a macaron class. Oh, yeah.

[B]

That is my. That was a good twin.

[A]

You tell them next week. See you next week.