214. Baking it Down - Pivot Pivot Pivot

Summary

Episode 214: Pivot Pivot Pivot Release Date: June 3, 2025 Podcast: Baking it Down with Sugar Cookie Marketing 🍪 Hosts: Heather and Corrie Miracle

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Introduction: Embracing Change with Double Episodes

In this vibrant episode, Heather and Corrie Miracle dive deep into the essential marketing strategy of pivoting. Filmed as two back-to-back episodes before their beach getaway, they maintain their signature upbeat tone despite the busy schedule. Corrie quips, "We are your host, Heather and Corey Miracle. Corey is your favorite. Heather is your B team." (00:25)

When Your Current Strategies Aren't Working

The primary focus of this episode revolves around recognizing when existing marketing efforts fail to yield results and the importance of pivoting strategies. Corrie highlights the frustration many face: "Nothing is more frustrating than... I've done this stuff, and I'm still not seeing traction." (02:09)

1. Changing Your Posting Time

Heather and Corrie emphasize the significance of timing in social media engagement. Heather advises, "Knowing your audience... you need to know my audience and not just posting." (06:05) They suggest experimenting with different posting times based on when your audience is most active, such as evening hours for busy parents.

2. Utilizing Different Copy Formulas

Diversifying the style and structure of your post captions can reignite engagement. Corrie explains various copy formulas like AIDA (Attention, Interest, Desire, Action) and PAS (Problem, Agitate, Solution), encouraging bakers to mix these into their content to keep it fresh and engaging. She notes, "Maybe it'll make our copy more interesting." (10:23)

3. Transitioning from Static Photos to Reels

While static photos, especially ASMR decorating videos, can garner high reach, they may not translate into actual sales. The hosts recommend creating more locally-focused reels to attract an audience that is more likely to convert into customers. Heather mentions, "You're inflating your page growth number, but they're not interested in your products." (13:07)

4. Mixing Up Content Buckets

To maintain audience interest, Heather and Corrie advocate for a diverse range of content types. They suggest establishing multiple content buckets such as behind-the-scenes looks, throwback posts, featured sets, and calls-to-action for events or classes. Corrie shares their group’s strategy: "On Monday, I do the calendar countdown. Tuesday I do a baker poll... on Friday, I do a water cooler question." (19:27)

5. Diversifying Your Reach

Relying solely on one platform can limit your audience. The hosts encourage leveraging multiple channels such as newsletters, YouTube, and podcasts to broaden your reach. Heather advises, "Grab your cell phone, go to your Facebook page... like the most recent post." (25:04) This multi-channel approach ensures that you stay visible even as platform algorithms change.

Listener Spotlight: Addressing Real Challenges

A listener from Bel Air, Maryland shares her struggles with dwindling sales despite increased online activity. Heather and Corrie dissect her situation, emphasizing the need to align content with sales goals and possibly shifting focus from high-engagement content like sourdough to promoting less popular products. Corrie suggests, "If you're focusing on something that's selling so well, you are going to focus on that." (51:00)

Practical Takeaways: Implementing the Pivot

Heather and Corrie summarize actionable steps for listeners feeling stuck:

1. Change Your Posting Time: Experiment with different days and times to find what resonates best with your audience.
2. Use Different Copy Formulas: Incorporate various storytelling techniques to keep your captions engaging.
3. Transition to Reels: Utilize video content to create a more engaged and relevant audience.
4. Mix Up Content Buckets: Diversify your content topics to cater to different interests within your audience.
5. Diversify Your Reach: Expand your presence across multiple platforms to ensure consistent visibility.

Corrie emphasizes, "Focus on one, get one dialed in versus getting six not dialed in." (47:43)

Closing: Upcoming Initiatives and Community Engagement

The episode concludes with exciting announcements about their sponsors and upcoming Facebook Lives, providing listeners with opportunities to engage further and access additional resources like the Cookie College membership.

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Notable Quotes:

• Corrie Miracle (02:09):

  "Nothing is more frustrating than... I've done this stuff, and I'm still not seeing traction."

• Heather (06:05):

  "Knowing your audience... you need to know my audience and not just posting."

• Corrie Miracle (10:23):

  "Maybe it'll make our copy more interesting."

• Corrie Miracle (19:27):

  "On Monday, I do the calendar countdown. Tuesday I do a baker poll... on Friday, I do a water cooler question."

• Heather (25:04):

  "Grab your cell phone, go to your Facebook page... like the most recent post."

• Heather (51:00):

  "If you're focusing on something that's selling so well, you are going to focus on that."

• Corrie Miracle (47:43):

  "Focus on one, get one dialed in versus getting six not dialed in."

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Conclusion:

Episode 214 of Baking it Down with Sugar Cookie Marketing offers a comprehensive guide to recognizing when it's time to pivot your marketing strategies. Through practical advice, real-life examples, and listener interactions, Heather and Corrie provide valuable insights to help bakers navigate the ever-changing landscape of online marketing. Whether it's tweaking post times, diversifying content, or expanding your reach across platforms, this episode equips listeners with the tools needed to adapt and thrive in their baking businesses.

Transcript

[A]

Welcome to the Baking it down with Sugar Cookie Marketing podcast. We are going to be as chipper as we can because we are filming two episodes today because we will be at the beach next week.

[B]

But we know you guys can't live without caring these.

[A]

Who are we to hold you back from your joy? You guys get us.

[B]

You get where? You get one today and then you get one scheduled.

[A]

Yes. Versus missing a whole week.

[B]

What the bid for 150.

[A]

So we are your host, Heather and Corey Miracle. Corey is your favorite. Heather is your B team.

[B]

Today. I said to someone or yesterday, escape someone, credit card. And he said last name. I was like, oh, Miracle. He's like, really? And I said, you've been blessed.

[A]

I said that it didn't go over well last time. Sometimes it hits, sometimes it doesn't. We are actually the ad.

[B]

Do you hear your voice changing?

[A]

We are actually the admins of a Facebook group called the Sugar Cookie Marketing Group. If you haven't joined, please do. What we decided way, way years ago when this podcast first started was I sometimes have so much work to do with my hands from making cookies, cake pops, macarons, that I can't often just sit down and read the group. So I miss out on a lot of things. So what if we started a podcast.

[B]

And this will be our 214th episode. 215th if you count the next one we're about to record. So. And if you guys are listening to this and you wonder what we look like, these are now uploaded to YouTube. You can go to YouTube and just search Sugar Cookie Marketing. And the playlist is called Watch the baking Adapt. Watch.

[A]

Nice. Nice. Hello to my husband who's watching this one for sure. Let me play with my hair.

[B]

Okay. Today we wanted to talk about this will be a buildable thing. We'll come back to this. But I want to talk about pivot, pivot, Pivot. And this is going to touch on some stuff we've already talked about, because that's what marketing is. It's repetitive. But therein lies today's topic. When what you're doing ain't working, but you're doing all the things.

[A]

Yeah, you're doing all the things. And I can see how mentally you're like, I am doing all the things and it's not working. Sending the newsletter I'm posting every day.

[B]

Nothing is more frustrating than listen, I. I've listened to these podcasts. I've done this stuff, and I'm still not seeing traction. But my competition is, yes, a lot.

[A]

Of times you need to narrow down what your ultimate goal is. I see a lot of people like, I'm posting every day, and I'm like, does that. Do you want more sales? Are you looking for more engagement?

[B]

I find that sometimes when the checklist isn't married to a metric, it can feel lost.

[A]

Yes.

[B]

Right. Meaning I'm doing all the things, I'm going through this list, but I don't have a clear goal for the things that I'm doing. And thus the things, Things while they are there, are not working together for a single focused goal.

[A]

Yeah. Yeah.

[B]

So that is what we want to talk about. And that's why today's podcast, this day, not next day. It's called pivot. Pivot. Pivot. When it's not working, you got to get to work.

[A]

Here's the thing. Back in the day, Facebook lives were the best thing since sliced bread.

[B]

So funny. And if you guys are on our YouTube channel, I've been uploading all of the past lives. So I got. I hit the thumbnail limit, but I got all the way back to 2021 ye Facebook lives. So what I'm doing is to keywords. To take the keywords from the event listing and put it on YouTube in the. In the event description or the YouTube channel description. I can see how many people would RSVP to this Facebook lives.

[A]

Tons.

[B]

At the beginning, 1500 people.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Now we're lucky if a Facebook guy pulls in three. Now tell us why.

[A]

The reason why is as social media changes, as people start using and abusing features on a platform, the platforms will degrade certain things that are on there. So Facebook lives were huge during COVID And that's why. Because a lot of people, that was their only source to get information, news, to connect with people.

[B]

Now think of this in terms of Zuckerberg. Zuckerberg said, if I make lives reach more people, more people will move to Facebook.

[A]

Yes.

[B]

Genius.

[A]

Okay. But now the lives have been degraded. It's almost like if we create a live, instead of it pushing out to everybody so they can rsvp, it almost reaches no one. So no one's like, I didn't even know that was a live that was going on.

[B]

Here is. And tell me if I'm wrong here. When you go to create a Facebook Facebook group, it pre populates a list of rules. Or it used to. It may not anymore, but for a while it did. And one of those rules was do not go live. You'll used to see it. Don't just go live in this group because it's crazy when somebody does.

[A]

It does. Yeah.

[B]

It used to ping everybody.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Somebody started going live. So then group admin start saying, don't go live. You can actually disable the ability to go live. And now the same content that used to pull in a thousand seven hundred people, when I put that content on, will pull maybe 15.

[A]

Yeah, yeah. So you see that if we were.

[B]

Like, well, they work.

[A]

Back in the day, we used to get 1500 people to watch Facebook Lives. Keep pushing Facebook Lives, we'd be spinning.

[B]

All the wheels and making attraction.

[A]

But you're like, I'm doing the things. Here's the thing. Sometimes the things that you're doing are no longer the things that work. So that's where the word pivot comes in.

[B]

I almost think the only thing worse than doing nothing at all is doing the most and it not working. So that'll be a reason for you. Number one, this is an easy one. Change the time that you're posting. Now, if you use Facebook planner like I do, it defaults to 10am and that's an Eastern standard time. Right. So it's defaulting my entire audience, who may be. What if they're heavily west coast people? It's their 7am that's rough for them. Corey and I look at our own group, her local community group, Metrics, and It's telling us 8pm on Fridays is the most active time. If you are using a planner, which I love, and you're posting consistently at the exact same time and you're not seeing great traction, try after hours. If you're doing after hours, try working hours. We had a client and they hosted a seminar at 5pm in the area we live in. 5pm is the time we all sit in traffic together. It was not a wise time to put a seminar. And guess what? One person showed up. What if they next month put on another seminar and they did it at five? Is that wise?

[A]

It's not wise.

[B]

Where should they try?

[A]

I would try it.

[B]

They did a week down at 5. I would try weekend at 10.

[A]

Yeah, sure. Here's the thing. Knowing your audience and who's buying from you, most of the people who buy for me are mothers of young kids.

[B]

Great point.

[A]

So I need to know in the morning, probably they're busy. They got a million things going on. Maybe a good time for me to post is around car pickup line around 3 8pm when they're sitting in the car. They have nothing to do. They're on their phones or after dinner time when the kids are going to bed. Around 7pm, 8pm and that's really pivoting to know my audience and not just posting. I post every single day at 9am and I'm getting zero engagement, zero reach.

[B]

So I want to speak to the person who is that consistent because I love you. Yeah, you are me and we are the. You may say, okay, well the twin said don't post at 10. So I will post every day at 6:30pm as that is the time that I also have eaten dinner and my kids are doing their own thing like it is. Be flexible. Yeah, you, you may need to test. Remember it's 6:30 on a weekday. Maybe it'd be 7:30 on a Saturday. We need to be flexible and then also mar that consistency. So you're going to do this for a period of time. We're going to test these different times in these different days and unfortunately different content types to see which one resonates, to see which one kind of hits better. And you're going to need a long period of time to kind of create enough data points to make that shift decision. Yeah.

[A]

Because if you post one time at 6:30, get two extra likes. Sometimes that's going to tell like signal to your brain. Okay.

[B]

Every day at 6:30 and then you're going to be back here saying I did every time I did the things you said. And I'm in the same bucket where it's not working anymore. So what I like to do is kind of constantly mix it up. You'll see a lot of it goes up at 10. You'll know why Facebook Planner defaults at. But then I like to randomly throughout the week add in some new content at random time. Sometimes I'll say to Corey, I do long form content in the Facebook group on Sundays. I said, it's falling flat on his face. Yeah. She's like, cause I think it's long form content on a Sunday.

[A]

Yes.

[B]

She said maybe long form content on a Friday where we're done baking or.

[A]

We'Re sitting on the customers who didn't show up on time.

[B]

So again you see that it was. Should the long form content change? Should the image change? Should there be no images? Should it change the day? Right. So we're constantly asking like, hey, this isn't working. I've tried it for a while now. It doesn't seem to be a hit or miss. It's just consistently. Can we switch it? Number two, Corey brought this one up. Mix in different copy formulas. I know people hate the word formula.

[A]

Yeah. And what copy is copy is Just the caption that goes along with the post that you're, you're making. So you have a beautiful photo, the words that you are typing. That is what is called the copy.

[B]

So Cori had mentioned that she saw a post in the group and someone's like, I am posting all the time. I am writing the copy. So Corey goes looking at. And Corey's like, every piece of copy she wrote, the pitch was truncated, which means it's after the. See more.

[A]

So here's, here's what it was. Every post she was asking an engaging question. Unfortunately, it started off with a fact about her and then under the seymour was a question for them. But you have to realize if they're not even stopping to engage with the post, you've lost them because you've made it about you first and foremost. Sometimes working that engagement part into higher into the caption or lower or into the comment section and really working to see where your audience's eyes are actually can almost help you break through that. I'm posting the questions and I'm getting no reactions.

[B]

And the reason why I defer to a copy formula is because there's so many. And what, what's a copy formula? It's, it's whatever that thing is. I just googled it. The last couple podcasts where you put the word in, replace the word with the thing. An eagle lammer. I don't know what it's called when you say, okay, Aida, that's one I kind of like because it kind of covers all our bases. It's grab their attention, gain their interest, create a desire, and then give them an action to take. So you say, okay, well I'm going to just do the Aida formula forever. No, again, you, me, we, the. We're not going to just repeat. We're going to mix in new stuff. So the pass formula. And then there's the before and after bridge. The before and after bridge is how infomercials are. Are you having a rough time getting your pants clean? And then you have the gray image and then you say with this product, your pants will always be clean. We took a problem and we came to a solution. Right? You can't do that. Don't know. Here's a before and after bridge. For a cookie. Don't know what to get. The hard to buy for a mother in law. How about something that won't sit on her shelf and she'll love it. And it's custom made to the thing she uniquely likes. A set of custom cookies, right? Yeah. If we can mix those in, maybe it'll make our. Not. Maybe it will. It'll make our copy more interesting. Yes.

[A]

And that is switching it up. We love copy formulas because they really give you an outline to follow versus when you get there and you're like, oh, I don't know. Thanks, Billy, for turning four. You know, and that's what a lot of bakers end up going to. Thanks so much, Tricia, for your 73rd anniversary.

[B]

And that's the biggest offender I see with really consistent people. And it's hard for me to even punish the consistent.

[A]

Because you're doing the thing.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Because you're like, I'm running out of words.

[B]

You're doing the most and you're getting the least. Think that's unfair. But there's a small tweaks. These pivot. Pivot. Pivot tweaks that we could do.

[A]

There's a local shop that we. Me and Heather talk about. They go out of business every month there. But what she's done is. It's almost like she got hit with a ton of engagement when she first announced that she was going out of business. So she said, ooh, this content bucket, this caption. This thing works.

[B]

What I like to call the strategy is a boy who called closed.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

When you have a going at a business sale, you'll see there's furniture company. Is what you're talking about. The. What's it called? Is it Ashley Furniture?

[A]

There's though.

[B]

There's so, so many. But the strategy is they hire these three cars.

[A]

Like, three traffic cars.

[B]

Like cars you and I would buy off of the lot of CarMax. And they'll put these affix. These permanent signs, and I'll say, going out of business sale. And these cars will just drive in traffic all day on Saturday and Sunday. It is a wild marketing tactic. But what happens is we're like, going out of business.

[A]

They got to figure out the great sales.

[B]

Great sales. Uh, it's such a trope now, you know that there was no going out of business. Yeah. It's a going out of business sales strategy that. That works on newcomers who aren't familiar with the. I'm going to call it a scam.

[A]

It is, right? Definitely scam. But you'll see, like, what it's. They're like, oh, I got so much engagement the first time I posted. Let me keep doing that. But you'll see, each and every single time you reuse something over and over again, you're getting less and less. So while the aida formula is fantastic. Overusing it every single time. You're going to see those numbers of me and you're like, I don't know. I'm doing what the twin said. It's time to switch it up.

[B]

Yeah. P A S pass problem, agitate solution. And that's where you say, hey, do you have a problem? What if it was worse? I can solve both of those.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

And you can see that creates more interesting copy and that makes more interested audience members. Yeah.

[A]

So while we do love someone who's dedicated and consistent, you are the person.

[B]

That can be molded into the final form. You are a Pokemon card that hasn't evolved all the way. You are halfway there. You're doing the most. Now. A small tweak and you'll see better results from that, which I think you're already there.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Moving on. You're gonna hate this. Everyone hates this. If your photos aren't working reels, it is.

[A]

I want to say, I have seen people's content. Here's the thing. Sometimes bakers overdo reels and you'll just get that. It'll be a lot of decorating asmr. And you do get a lot of reach with that, which can grow your page, but it's growing your page with not the ideal audience.

[B]

Again, you're doing the most.

[A]

You're doing the most. You're doing the thing. Yeah. If we're trying to grow a local audience, a good reel would be going when you're at the farmer's market to take a quick video of what the parking situation looks like, or if the watermelon guy is there, you know, because he's the most popular. Everyone wants to know. Creating reels that are more locally focused in addition to the ASMR videos is going to help you. What I see most bakers do is, is they do the ASMR videos, get tons of reach, get page followers, and then it trickles off and they're like, I don't know where my engagement is. I'm not getting any sales. I'm getting no reach. And it's because you've inflated your page growth number that when they. When you finally post something for sale, they're like, well, I'm not interested in that. I was interested in the decorating video.

[B]

How unfair as a small business owner and marketer to do the thing we were told to reels to profit, to create profit for the business and to create growth on our page for it to turn around and not pat our pockets.

[A]

You're right.

[B]

And.

[A]

And here's the one thing I will say. A lot of bakers do get offered the creator rewards program. So you gotta say, what is their end goal? Here is their end goal of their Facebook page. Because we said goals are going to dictate what you do. Is there goals to get more local sales? Because if it is more local sales, you're not going to do so many ASMR decorating videos. If they're getting paid through the creator rewards program, maybe that is their end goal.

[B]

And tell people who aren't familiar with TikTok what ASMR is. It's that it's now kind of, you can extrapolate it to a bunch of different things where there's watching something that feels good to watch and you have no idea why. I like, I'll watch an auto detailing video.

[A]

Yes.

[B]

I will watch a carpet cleaning video. I'll watch a hazmat cleanup. I'll never buy any of these things. Yeah, I will watch the video with you. I'll follow you. I'll watch everyone, you said. And I become a view, an impression that goes to pay these people, right? But that's their job. They'll do these free cleans, this mower. SB Moe. SB Moe on TikTok, he'll come in and he'll go to strangers houses and their houses are overgrown and he'll say, I have a YouTube channel. The views are what pays me. Can I mow your lawn?

[A]

So he says it case in point, I would like to do your lawn for free because I'm getting paid elsewhere. So you have to think like, oh, your favorite creator, your favorite cookie baker out there, which there's some big names. Where are they? Where do their goals lie?

[B]

Because right here, I know you guys just had an idea. You're like, maybe that is where I'm going to take my business. It is ruthless. It is a content generating slave master that makes you turn the camera on every day. Someone in the cooking college was like, hey, I got invited to the creator fund, so should I accept it? And I said, you might want to, but don't make it your focus. If it's your focus, which they want it to be your focus, they do, because they will stop selling locally.

[A]

So here's the thing, Heather, saying they want it to be your focus. Meta's job is to keep people on the platform. If they could turn you into a content creator and you no longer make any local sales, that helps them. So they're making tons from advertisers and they're giving you A little token of that money through the creator rewards program. You got to think, do you want to focus your business on local sales or do you want to become a content creator? Because I will say taking. Making a video takes forever.

[B]

Yes, it does. Making a video people want to watch.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Then having to make 50 of those videos sat aside. I was in some car group or something, and there was this guy who had a performance shop. He's almost our age, if not younger than us, and he'd gotten diagnosed with melanoma cancer and had gone in. And he said. He said this. He said, I'm not gonna. YouTube pays my bills. He said, but it is. It requires so much from us that I knew I should have gone to the doctor earlier, but I have to put out a piece of well edited formatted content every Wednesday. Or YouTube punishes me that I just didn't have the time. And now it's spread and now he's gotta shut down the YouTube channel anyways. So just understand, like, if that guy's like, I couldn't even go to the doctors when I knew I should have. That is what these systems want out of you.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

So let's go back to reels. We're like, girls, you just saw me do reels, and then you just beat me. Beat me to a pulp about it.

[A]

But it's to have a goal with the reels.

[B]

Right? So, okay, now we want to say, okay, the reels. Well, you just said not to do asmr. Kind of. You said to do reels. Where's the gap in between there? Like we said, hyperlocal things. I'm going to the farmer's market here in Lake Ridge, Virginia. Here's all the vendors you'll need to check out. Corey will do it. She'll go to Yoder's Dutch Delight, a new donut shop that open, and then she'll be able to tell people on her page, guys, you got to check out Yoder's Dutch Delights. If you just need a quick fix, and I'm your cookie girl, and trust me, I know a good dessert, the.

[A]

People who are watching that video, who resonate with that video, who'll stick around to the end of that video, are local people. Because Yoder's Dutch Delights is only located near my house.

[B]

Right.

[A]

So that's the goal behind that is still creating local content. Another one. If you're like, I really don't like to leave my house. You setting up for Pop up outside of your house. You packing the DIY kits for the orders tomorrow.

[B]

This is all good content that feeds this. The goal of more local cookie sales. Becoming the local cookie baker. Being identifiable by my local audience. TikTok popular, Right. This guy shows up on my feed. He's in Annandale, Eden center ordering. Yeah. Or whatever. So I save the video, follow the guy. I'm like a guy exploring Eden Center. I'd love this look on his profile. No, he joins across America.

[A]

I know. Exactly.

[B]

So I saved the video. I unfollowed the guy. Not because he was in good content, because I'll never be where his next video is. He went to a couple restaurants in there. I will try them out. So again, that content. Who do I want to follow me. Who do I want to reach? It would be cool to say you have a million followers.

[A]

Sure.

[B]

But you, the people who have a million followers have blood, sweat and tears. Earned this never ending taskmaster.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

4. Mix up your content buckets.

[A]

So we've talked endlessly about content buckets. What content buckets are, if you are unfamiliar with it, is different things you pull from to create content for your page. Instead of being like, here's a set. Here's a set I made. Here's another set I made. Here's another set of that is very boring content. We love that you're a cookie decorator, but you got to keep your audience engaged and always being like, order from me, order from me.

[B]

Let's come up with five content buckets right now. I'm going to say about the baker. Easy. Love that behind the scenes.

[A]

Love it behind the scenes.

[B]

Throwback Thursday. Not my favorite, but I like it.

[A]

Okay. Yeah.

[B]

My. Here's my talent growing featured set.

[A]

Okay.

[B]

Call to action event.

[A]

Yeah. Like class or something.

[B]

Right. Class vendor pop up thing. So those are five content buckets. And I'm saying a lot of you. When you're like, I'm doing everything and nothing's happening, you're pulling from a single content bucket. I was telling Corey that was talking to therapist and I was like, sometimes when I tell people I don't understand what they just said, they say it louder using the exact same words. And I'm like, that didn't make me understand it anymore. Kind of when you always pull from the same content bucket and you're like it's not working. So I'll post twice as much. You're yelling the same thing your audience said we don't really understand.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

So you would grab from a different content bucket. And I if you're posting three times a week, that'll take you through a week and a half where you just circle right back to the front and you're going to see that your audience resonates with some content more than the other. So here's a good example for the Facebook group. On Wednesdays, we do Wednesday wins on Wednesdays. Also do the Wednesday Wednesday newsletter post.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

On Monday, I do the calendar countdown. Tuesday I do a baker poll. Thursday I do a meme. Friday, I do a water cooler question. And Amy does what's your Friday?

[A]

Yeah. Best set of the week.

[B]

On Saturday, there's something in the Sundays at long form content testing so that each time you come to the group, not everyone posts on Wednesday once. Not everyone laughs at the memes. Not everyone reads a long form content. But there's something for everyone. And the same thing works with your audience. Some of these content buckets, I'm like, yeah, that wasn't working. We're gonna get rid of him.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

When he doesn't work for months I have tested and I'm like, I just can't get him. No matter how I tweak him. Can't get this one. Throw the bucket out.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

So you're going to mix up your content buckets. That's probably the biggest offender I see.

[A]

I think because it's hard to. Like, I've been doing this for years and my content bucket of my favorite farmer's market has been poured out.

[B]

But your audience is ever growing. The algorithm is ever changing.

[A]

Yes.

[B]

Corey could. Corey could just have a local content bucket called Farmer's Markets where she just every Saturday she gets a chance. Could go to different farmers markets and create a reel from them.

[A]

And here's the thing. And you're like, well, there's only five farmers markets. Okay then. Okay. We created five good reels. The next time I go to the farmer's market, I'm gonna highlight some vendor in there that I really, truly.

[B]

Now she's taken. Well, I'm limited to only five videos. Two, she's limited to five times. However many vendors are at the event.

[A]

Yeah. So my honey guy, like, if you guys wondered where the honey comes from in my oat honey bread, here is the shop I get it from.

[B]

You can do baking tips as a one. Now that one's gonna be a little broader. Cause everyone could use a tip. But you're also still resonating with people in your audience who are like, oh, that's good. I didn't know that. Corey will give away like a drop cookie recipe that she has something sometimes it's even something she found online. She's like, hey, bake these. And here's what they turned out to be. Yeah.

[A]

Because sometimes you see recipes online. You're like, well, I don't know that they're a food photographer. It might not look how, but I'll be like, I made. It actually tasted pretty good. And here's what it looked like.

[B]

So even again, before your next excuse pops in in front. As a roadblock to what we're saying, she's literally getting a recipe online and making. Absolutely.

[A]

It's my favorite thing. I just scroll on TikTok that whatever they made look good, let me remake it.

[B]

Sometimes she'll take. Make our family all decorate a cake pop. And then we'll take a photo together. Again. Just another great content bucket that incorporates people's faces. Okay, number five. And we're almost done with this podcast. Diversify your reach.

[A]

Okay.

[B]

The algorithm. I was talking to somebody about this, and he was like, I'm just. It was really boring. Industry finance. He's like, I just really worried I'm gonna annoy my audience with how much I post. I was like, nobody's seeing it. If you had the secret to annoy your audience, please let a girl know, because I'm trying to reach and you can see. Okay. The sugar cookie marketing Facebook page has 11610 followers. Corey posted a real. Went viral. And at my best, at my best, I get 50 comments. And I love each one of those because me, a 50 comment post, that one popped. I was like, wait, look, this one popped. Screenshot. But nobody's seeing anything. Yeah. So what we want to do, instead of saying, hey, nobody on Facebook seeing anything, let's pummel them with more. Essentially, we also want to broaden our horizons, because if it's, you know, it's. Lives were a big thing. Now they're not. Yeah.

[A]

A lot of people love to say, I've been shadow banned. My content doesn't get pushed out to anybody. Is shadow banning real? We don't know. But a lot of people are like, this account is useless now because no one ever sees my content. Do you have to think, what is the goal of your content?

[B]

I used to not believe in shadow banning. Now I do. Specifically because Facebook says, we don't like how you posted. So we're gonna make your post reach fewer people. Oh, and in a weird way, that's a version of shadow banning for sure. An algorithmic if. Now I have a creator profile, my personal profile. I don't use. You guys are Missing out on a thing. But it will be like, hey, the one post you made this year performed really well. We're gonna show whatever you post next, more people come to papa.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

So you can see that we're. That again, is another taskmaster. But if we have a newsletter, if we. This podcast is a great example of diversification. That Facebook group, man, Facebook groups are favored. Facebook groups are not favored. Sometimes our content is shown. Sometimes I'll click on a profile of somebody and I'll be like, they've never, ever checked back into this group, ever. One time in five years. So just me being like, okay, well, the group's hard to make reach. Let me just triple down on the group. Yeah, I think we should say, I'm going to implement these strategies, but I'm also going to diversify my ability to reach my audience. And this is what this podcast does.

[A]

You have to think the way the algorithms work. You've been around. You've been baking for five years. People have followed your account over the years. But maybe something new has popped up in their feed. Maybe they got into the hobby. That Mandela mandala dotting was something that I got into. So when I joined those groups, that was the only thing showing up in my feed while I still liked the pages from before that Facebook was like.

[B]

No, who cares about the pages before?

[A]

This is what she's into. This is what's going to keep her on the platform.

[B]

Here's what I want to tell you guys. Grab your cell phone, go to your Facebook page. You go to your profile, click on the hamburger menu. I'm on Android. And scroll down to groups, and you'll see just how many groups you're in that you are not shown content from anymore that you've forgotten about. Now, before you leave the group, click on it. Click on the group and like, the most recent post, regardless of what it is, unless it's about, like, murder, don't do that. But, like, if it's a hobby, it's a mandala. Rock dot, go heart the most recent rock post and say, this is great. You'll suddenly see that post, that content from that group reaches your feed again.

[A]

Because you're indicating to meta, hey, this is what I want to show.

[B]

And it'll keep me here to see your ads if you show me that.

[A]

Do you have to thank Think your audience is the same thing as you. They've joined groups, they've liked pages, and your page has now fallen out of their feed. It's because maybe you were so consistent with the Wrong content that it's never bringing them back in.

[B]

So with these small tweaks will help get more of those people engaged. But some of them are just too far out of our reach. Right. Here's a great example of how we use this podcast and all the avenues. So we record the podcast and I upload it to a host called Buzzsprout and pushes it to all the podcast players. You know. Hmm, don't stop there. I'll actually before I post, I'll tonight on the page, the Facebook page, I'll post a screenshot of the of the free transfer sheet you'll get if you sign up for the Wednesday Wednesday newsletter that goes out the next day. What's the Wednesday Wednesday newsletter about? It's about the podcast. That content in the Wednesday Wednesday newsletter I'll post to our Instagram a Facebook page, a Facebook group and that repeats itself every week.

[A]

And from those I'll share it to the stories because some people only envelop.

[B]

Their content via stories and it goes to YouTube. So you see that we unfortunately most of us use Gmail. So we're using Gmail and we're using YouTube owned by Alphabet or Google. And then we use meta, we use the Facebook page, Facebook groups. Okay. Instagram. We also use newsletters, Gmail, stuff like that. So you can see that it's all encompassing and every week is a battle.

[A]

But you are going to think, wow, twins. You must have a zillions of listens every single week.

[B]

We fight for every single one of them.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Week after week because you're consistent, but you have to be consistent. And then within those contents, within that content, we're testing out new ways to see if we can get somebody to be interested.

[A]

So Heather we, Heather used to post like a different graphic and then recently she changed to kind of what's trending.

[B]

Those little Apple Notes.

[A]

Yeah, Apple Notes, which is just please.

[B]

Know I don't own an eye product. So how to make the Apple notes in Photoshop.

[A]

But what she's doing is we're testing creatives which that means the photo. If it's video that we need to do, if it's a sound bite us screen grab from YouTube to get people to click because people do grow disinterested in the same content over and over and over again. And it's nothing about you. It's not that they don't like you, it's that you've fallen out of their feed because things just a little bit more interesting has found its way into there.

[B]

Missing 1 I post all of the Wednesday, Wednesday newsletters to the website.

[A]

Yeah, yeah.

[B]

So it is. You can just see how when nothing's working, it all kind of needs to work together. And then within each of those avenues, you gotta make it, you gotta tweak it. Pivot, pivot, pivot. And what works today won't work tomorrow. And what worked 10 years may work tomorrow. Oddly, it's what. It's how these platforms are ever changing.

[A]

I've seen cookie content accounts who've grown hundreds of thousands of followers, but their posts will have 11 likes on it. And it's because they're doing the same thing. The thing they did five years ago. They're doing the same thing.

[B]

Let me tell you, we. I've been in marketing since I was 21. You've been in marketing and sales for as long. But back when you and I first started 2017, we started working together, you could still buy followers and it would make a ton of sense. Oh yeah.

[A]

Oh, absolutely.

[B]

Because there was not this heavy algorithm that was weighing this engagement rate. Instead, it was this social proof.

[A]

And everything was chronological. So at the end of the day, I still could get some.

[B]

Like, if you guys don't remember the beautiful heyday, that was chronological ordering. It meant that every time you posted. If I posted at 2:30, everyone who checked their feed and scrolled back to what happened at 2:30 would see my post regardless of the content.

[A]

Yeah. Now that exists no longer. There's not one question.

[B]

Better or worse?

[A]

Better for the end user.

[B]

Better, because imagine today when everyone, all these small businesses are Facebook and they're like, if I got in the feed, guaranteed I'm just going to pummel you.

[A]

Oh, absolutely. And I see them all the time. And I. The thing is, someone posted in. There's these business groups around Northern Virginia and they're called the social collectives. And someone, one of the admins posted today, I will learn more about you from you engaging with a morning post than I ever would from you dropping a sales post. And it's true, because you're like, I. I just want to. The people who are constantly sharing their sales posts to all these groups, they're probably shared it in 20 different groups but have seen zero uptick in anything.

[B]

And here's what I want to say. The reason why that was okay at the beginning is because Facebook was about personal profiles and your profile and our relationship. And if you said something like I want to say before, you said at 2:30, when it switched to an external connection, meaning I can connect with A business or these groups or just this random graphic showing up in my feed. It needed the algorithm to limit because then I'm not seeing what happened. You said it.

[A]

Absolutely. So instead of just making it so you're like, wow, I'm just over inundated by content I don't want to see. You're telling meta and these platforms, here's the content I want to see. And they're saying, great. That is the only content we're going to show you. So if you are a baker and your page has fallen out of those feeds, we got to get a little creative so we can get back in there.

[B]

And that's why people attract trends. Sometimes the trends can like resuscitate you. They're kind of hard to follow because you got to extrapolate what the trend is and apply it to your business. And that takes some Brian brains. Send them brain tails.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

So that is the recap. So just to go through the list again and. And this is great to implement if you're frustrated or you're like, I'm fine now, but when I get back to really baking, I do get frustrated. This is something to keep in your back pocket. One, change your time and posting. Very easy thing to structure there. Change time, change the day. See? See? Mix it up.

[A]

We're being cognizant and testing it though. We're not just going to choose a random time and hope for the best.

[B]

Post it. Two, use different copy formulas. If you don't use copy formulas at all and you're frustrated, try a couple copy formulas. Aida before and after Bridge the problem. Agitate solution. Those are gonna. There's so many. You find one that resonates with you. Photos not hitting. We're living in a reels world.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Try a few reels. That doesn't mean abandoned photos altogether. That means mix in new content up Content buckets. Now we talked about content type content buckets. The reel and the photo can both move into the same bucket. And that bucket could be the farmer's market challenge. It's a great one. We're moving into farmer's market season. Saw the fireworks booth being put out. Tell me where all the fireworks booths are.

[A]

Heather made me do a content bucket. Our favorite waitress at California Pizza Kitchen is moving away to Disney World.

[B]

Can't even hate her. Can't even hate her.

[A]

So what Heather made me do was she said, bake her some cookies. I'll take a picture of you with her before she leaves. And that's a whole content bucket. That I can use one.

[B]

We really like California Pizza Kitchen too. This has been our waitress for two years. Yes. We have long term relationships with our waitresses and our wait staff. My favorite thing, they fight over us when we get there.

[A]

Yeah, yeah.

[B]

And then three, it mirrored one. Corey turned the California Pizza Kitchen cookie into a cookie logo. And then she took Disney's head, the Mickey Mouse head, and turned into a pizza Pizza Kitchen. And now she can say, hey, guys, I was just telling our aunt about it. I was like, yeah, California Pizza Kitchen. When Corey ordered, I ordered the salmon. And she said, said, oh, I thought it was a pizza place. I said, it is, but it's so much more right now. Corey can incorporate that content when she makes a post.

[A]

So here's the thing. Instead of being like, thank you, Shauna, for being my waitress, here's the cookies I made for you. That's very intro.

[B]

Me, me, me.

[A]

What I want to be like, guys, I've gone to California. What is your go to? What is something that isn't on the menu that you have to have? Because I want to order it too. So we're creating a conversation.

[B]

Cory can recommend the chicken lettuce wraps.

[A]

Chicken lettuce wraps are dynamite.

[B]

Shrimp dwen and white shrimp. And then pizzas are good. Yeah. Chicken picata.

[A]

My one just long con tip that I want to say. A lot of people are like, I'm posting every day. I'm seeing nothing. Sometimes the issue is you posting every single day. You have to think, and this is just a strategy session here. When you're posting every single day, the person who liked the post on Monday, the person who liked the post on Tuesday, and the post who liked the post on Wednesday. Those are three people that are now pulled out over five days of content because you post every day. If we narrowed it down and posted twice a week, that means three people who like the post, each one here, they're on the first post.

[B]

Hot take. You hate my hot takes. Warm take, warm take, lukewarm, moderately heated take. If you're posting so frequently, how is the quality of your post across those posts?

[A]

Right.

[B]

If you are able to just knock content out of the park and every post you make is a great reel followed by a farmer's market bio, and then in which case, please tell me how many hours you have in your day. Cause that's fascinating. If you're a. If you're like, oh, well, I mean, I'm posting content, I'd wonder if it's, thank you, Jason, for turning one. Thank you, Billy.

[A]

For turning three Instagram post every day.

[B]

It's the.

[A]

It's the platform for it. That content is not evergreen. It's very minute Facebook. If that's where you get your sales, I would suggest bulk, bulking your content. So the person who likes it all throughout the week, now we forced them to like one single post. When a post gets more reach, it gets pushed out to more people because you signal to meta. This is a good post. People want to see it. When you're posting every single day and each post gets one, like, that's going to be your average. It's not. It's not knock out the part content.

[B]

I would, I would take it back to the basics and rebuild it from there and save yourself some time. If you're posting like every hour, on the hour, say, let me peel this back.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Let me start incorporating some strategy with the common goal. What's my common goal? Maybe your common goal could be as simple as if Once I reach 10 likes per post, once my posts consistently get 10 reactions, I'll have met my goal and then I can reassess.

[A]

Yeah, that'd be great.

[B]

If you could get consistently 10 reactions per post and it's not always your mom. Love our moms. That would be a neat little.

[A]

That would be say your trajectory is going upwards.

[B]

Because then you can say, okay, my next goal is 20. That strategy is really easy to kind of map out. I think sometimes we were like, I want to go viral. What does that mean?

[A]

Yeah, what does that mean?

[B]

What's the end goal? Viral could be if you get a hundred likes, 150 could be considered.

[A]

When I told someone about that, don't post every day, they're like, but you said, literally, if we're not putting content out there, we're gonna fall out of the feeds.

[B]

They're not wrong.

[A]

They're not wrong. Here's the thing. You have your core group of people, let's say my core group of people who are always gonna engage their. Heather and my mom. So Heather and my mom are going to engage with any content regardless. It's trying to break free of that and getting more likes per post by giving them less post to like. So that grammar, please.

[B]

Are you kidding me? I think you're gonna hear me when I said that.

[A]

Are you kidding me?

[B]

I think you're gonna hear me. I think it's great. So. And then did I get to the last one?

[A]

I think so.

[B]

Diversify your reach. So we love to talk about Facebook because most of us would do that and that Includes Instagram. Corey touches on TikTok, which is more of a wider open net, but newsletters and you know, we have this podcast. I'm not saying start a podcast, but a local community group. Corey and I are big proponents of that. It allows us to have. Have a lot more access to local people.

[A]

I actually took Heather's tips. She did on everybody.

[B]

Hold on, listen up, listen up.

[A]

Heather was like, just so you know, the whole podcast topic on how to sell in community groups, you're not utilizing that with these local groups. And technically you might not think it. I am a lurker in most groups. I don't like to post. I'll it like Digest the content 24 7. I'm just not one who likes to go post in the local group groups. So what I did was when admin posted, I'd go comment on it and they're just asking like engaging questions like, what's your plans for the week? What's your business goal for the week? What did you do for this weekend? What's your favorite restaurant?

[B]

Corey told me a couple weeks ago. She's like, I'm gonna test it. I'm gonna test the theories, the things that we talked about. I'm gonna test it in this group. On Monday, she sends me a screenshot of the admin of the group screen posting a graphic that her had her logo in the middle and said, guys, if you want cookies, go talk to this girl.

[A]

Here's the thing. In those groups, ne' er did I once do a sales post about my cookies. But what it did was me engaging with their content.

[B]

Specifically the admins brought them to click.

[A]

To my profile and discover that I was this baker that they were.

[B]

Did you pay them?

[A]

Did not paid them in my comments.

[B]

And my attention and as an admin of a group, every time you guys comment on something, I post sugar cookie marketing group people, thank you. It is a wild ride to try to get even. I posted yesterday, like, what's everyone. Have you joined a networking event and have you seen it change your business? No comments. Even I was like, I wrote him.

[A]

Yeah, it's hard. It's just like honestly posting to your Facebook page and getting no reactions.

[B]

It's.

[A]

It's investing in those people that do give you the reactions in the comments.

[B]

It is because sometimes we're like, yeah, good, I already know I got you. But when we are like, hey, imagine Corey Facebook page, right? Mixing bowl, whatever. And she has a business that's constantly engaging. Like somebody switches to their business page and goes to her post and likes and comments. I wouldn't be surprised if one day you turn around, be like, hey, I love. Thank you.

[A]

Absolutely. I appreciate it. Yeah, yeah, yeah, absolutely. Because it's such a doggy dog algo world out there.

[B]

Yeah. On the Facebook page. And I. I'd recommend you guys following it because it's got different content than what we post in the group. I kind of make it a more free for all I don't like, you know, force a rule and drag your clients there. But like, I'll get these dry by shooting sales comments sense.

[A]

Yeah, I know.

[B]

And I'm like, wow, I don't even know. You don't even like when I go to delete the post and ban the person for, you know. Because that's just. Yes. For sure. They're like, they don't even like the page. Can't even.

[A]

It just ended up in their feed. And they're like, I just thought, let.

[B]

Me take a little dookie on the thread. And I'm like, you invested nothing. You came here to take. You are bottom of my shoe gum.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

In regards to my reach.

[A]

Right.

[B]

So having to comment, having that same.

[A]

Reaction when you're in like getting in the community groups that we're not going to just drive by, post a sales post and scooch along by without engaging in the content. It really did work. And that lady didn't know I was a baker before I started this.

[B]

Okay.

[A]

Scooches on.

[B]

Fun and exciting news. Cookie Design Lab. Heard the podcast last week, heard my cries for saying I would love somebody to sponsor the texting questions. And they said, you know what? Count us in. We'll start today.

[A]

So wait, tell me. So Cookie Design Lab is an UCL software? Yes, it's a software.

[B]

I really do like it. Okay. If you want to sign up, you can use Code twins to save 15%. But she said, hey, what if we give away one month of cookie Design Lab for the people who text in the questions so one person each week.

[A]

Will win a same rules apply.

[B]

You got to pick seven. You got to pick it up. You got to message me within the seven days or you're out. And she will give you a month of Cookie Design Lab.

[A]

Oh, that's so nice.

[B]

So it can't be called the stupid questions. What do we call it? The. The STL Text. The ST Text. The STL texts. We gotta think of it.

[A]

Jazzy little cool name.

[B]

So Cookie Design Lab is the new text in sponsor. She said, we launched today. So the text questions today. Okay, thank you people who risked it because there was nothing.

[A]

I know. Appreciate you.

[B]

Maybe they just generally. 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 6, 7, 4. 1, 2, 3, four. Hello. This winner. 4 3, 4 area code for that.

[A]

Is going to be a Florida right there.

[B]

It's Virginia. Oh, four, three, four. Lynchburg. Lynchburg, Charlottesville. Danville. Hello, neighbor. Hello, my southern neighbor. Hello. Adding to the what to do in June and July to prep for the holidays. Can you please add a segment of year end review tasks that if we had a physical year ending in June 30th. Okay, that was confusing. So her fiscal year or fiscal year is your financial year. So she's like it starts in June and it ends in June. That's my. Her 12 month. A lot of times fiscal years start in January. End of January. I know January is supposed to be for the. For that mess. Oh, she got me. She beat me to it. I know January is supposed to be for that mess, but in reality is I'm hungover from the holidays and spring is my like breathing down my throat. So I, I do it in my slower months. Not a bad strategy. It is a slower June. July and August is slower for bakers. So she's like. And they're longer lazier days and I feel nice and a relaxed summer vibe. I think you could actually set myself up for year end task in Q3 than in Q1. So her. She's saying what her year end task. I think we actually talked about this in January, maybe even December last year. But what I like to do and Corey had actually talked about this. Clean out your Google Drive. Clean out your in the cookie college. I'll talk about this in a second. In the cookie college. We're doing a photo cleanup. Yeah. That's your task. My. My man right there. You're going to hate it. We take so many photos and we're doing a photo challenge and I'll tell you a little bit about it. On June 1, you had to check in with how many photos were on your device. Right.

[A]

The winner was 84,000.

[B]

84,000 images on a device and then likely that device is backed up. So technically you have 84,000 times two.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Which is insanity. It's actually pretty poor business practice because if you're paying for photo storage for photos you'll never use, that's a waste of your money. A year end task for her June, July and August would be to get down and you're going to hate this. All your images are in one location. That location is backed up within there you only have photos that you would actually post. And within those photo sets, you would only have one to three photos.

[A]

At the end of the day, what you made five years ago isn't the same caliber of what you made now.

[B]

Cory and I talked about it. I said, would you send a client a picture from five years ago just because it matched the set that they want, but your skill sets change. And Corey said, no, because then I'd have to explain to them that handwriting, it looks better now. Just imagine a better handwriting. It wouldn't be a good sales tactic.

[A]

So those photos that are taking up your storage, your computer storage, your backup, your phone speed, and everything like that are just costing you money. At this point, I'm not going to what five years ago Corey made will never repost that to my socials because I am better than what I was five years ago. So I need to cut my losses. If I want to have the same first photo, like, so I could reference, like, how much I've grown, that's fine. But if I. If I have a set, that'd be.

[B]

A single photo folder with maybe 30 photos.

[A]

Yes.

[B]

Yeah. Of like, where I started.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

And that's what I'd call it.

[A]

I just know when I was first baking, everything got a photo. I was so excited about everything that I made that I was taking photos right and left mid set. I added wings to the bee. He got a photo. No face. Now a face.

[B]

Go out another photo. Yeah.

[A]

That stuff to delete to.

[B]

To just purely let it go. And it's one of the hardest breakups you'll ever go through. I would clean that out. I would have it so that my photos are folder nested, correctly named. All of its content, I'd actually use. And I would have it stored in a single location. And it would not be on my mobile device.

[A]

Yeah. So what Heather was talking about in the college is this is the challenge that we're going through.

[B]

And each.

[A]

Every other month, we choose a challenge. One was walking, one was water. This is the photo challenge. And it's not taking better photos. It's really cleaning up your photos. Yeah. So when you're in a community group, someone asked for a Pooh Bear set. Hey, I'm looking for a baker to make a Pooh Bear set. My baby shower's coming up.

[B]

The fastest person. Corey says that Corey it's. And it creates an anxiety. She says when somebody grabs their phone, she's like. It all becomes slow motion. If you're. If you're watching on YouTube, she's like, and when they start scrolling back to find the image they're referring to. Corey said, time stands still for the rest of us. They are not cognizant of the fact that we're all just staring at the back of the brick phone. I say, my H VAC technician yesterday.

[A]

Wanted to show me this dog in the snow.

[B]

Okay.

[A]

Last time it snowed so much.

[B]

I mean, that's when you start adding, like, maybe it's in February. Yeah, maybe you checked. I just had to stand there. I was like, wow, is it getting cold? Once you start seeing that, the time passes in another dimension.

[A]

Here's the thing, we need time to go faster in a community group when someone's asking for a specific set. If you've done that set, having that set ready to go in the post, when you're like, I can make that for you. Here's a similar set I've done in the past. You're going to resonate so much more. They want to buy with their eyes. They want to see she's made of who we are. Set said, if you're sitting on a phone and you're going through 20, 000 photos, you're not going to find it.

[B]

Yeah. So what we did, what we're doing in the cookie college and what I've done with my own personal photos is I've created a naming structure.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

That allows me to search poo about the correct one. Yeah. And it pulls in all the Pooh Bear stuff. Right. So I can be the fastest draw.

[A]

Yeah. So I have made mine. I have my macarons. It's a folder of macarons. So in there, if someone's asking for macarons, I can go right to there, find the one that I like the most to post in their own.

[B]

Yeah. That I honestly think it's going to take a whole month for you. Another thing, clean out the Google Drive. What was once does not be needed anymore. Things that we share to clients, we don't need anymore. Clean out your invoicing software, move it to a CRM. Those leads, CRM. That's going to take a whole month. You're going to hate it. You're going to love the results. You're going to hate the process.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

I'm going to say create your content strategy for the next 12 months. You're going to hate it. You're going to love it. These are massive amounts of things. The things that I like, taking all my data turning into a spreadsheet that pulls into a graph. I do that. I Built it out one time. Took me a week. Now I just update it and the graphs update and then I can quickly reference. You're like, what do I mean? Go to your square, export your invoices, see what each month your income is, your sales numbers are what your average ticket per sale. We're gonna. We're gonna boost that up next year. But we need those numbers in a concrete place. I would keep that in my Google Drive. It updated every week. Get into a project management software. I use Asana. It did take me a while to configure it the way I wanted. Listen, you got three months long summer days. Roll it. I would do that. And then I would start actually implementing that strategy about community groups.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Corey and I say what you do in the summer will pad your pockets in the winter.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

So we have a delay of like six months. Right. That's why I typically see marketing cycles as what I did six months ago is a result of what I'm seeing today. When you think of that, you'll say, okay, four, three, four. You'll say, okay, What I did in June, July and August has set the. The stage for my November and December. Yeah, January. So that's what I would do. There's no end in ways to continue optimize. Inbox 0 here's my tip though.

[A]

If you're anything like me, Heather just gave you a ginormous list that could take you a couple months. Focus on one get one dialed in versus getting six not dialed in.

[B]

I agree.

[A]

And that's going to be so much.

[B]

More if all you did with the photos. Yeah, I'd be happy.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

The other stuff we can do next time. We'll get to it. Let me read another text. Hi, I'm a cottage baker in Bel Air, Maryland. So you're not the winner, but you could win a month of cookie design lab if you text in next week. But we'll read your text right now. You can text back to back. I don't care. Technically, we won't be reading any new text. Well. Oh, one of these people will win it next week. I'll only read one more right now. The rest of you guys got a second shot and you didn't even know it. I'm a cottage baker in Bel Air, Maryland. Hey, our cap.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Maryland is Virginia's hat. It looks like a graduation camp. And we have moved over to the Chincoteague island. And I specialize in breads. My business has been growing successfully since I started selling in 2022. I was taking Orders via Facebook comments and eventually I had to automate the process. After a couple weeks of taking orders online via website that everyone says is super easy and user friendly, my sales have dwindled. I still sell lots of sourdough but everything else seems to have been reduced by over 50%. I've started using edits and making excellent posts and reels and I have a lot of new followers but the sales aren't picking up. I hope it's just that time of year income fall, everything will go back to normal. But perhaps you twin goddesses of marketing could shed light that's gonna go straight to my shed light and share some suggestions to me. I've been following you guys pretty much from the beginning and your advice has always been on point. Thank you for all you do for the bigging and small business community.

[A]

You're so sweet. Here's the thing. When you start from nothing and go to something, you are going to feel an uptick in everything because you went from zero to something.

[B]

Here's the issue with this text. There's multiple layers.

[A]

There are layers.

[B]

So I'm going to say the first layer is moving people to a website extends your funnel.

[A]

It extends your funnel. It lowers your social media reach, but.

[B]

It also lowers your risk.

[A]

It does.

[B]

So we have coming going there. I think still a great move. I would not move that back to Facebook. I've just seen so many people this week who cannot access their Facebook pages. Okay, we got that. We got the extended funnel. Okay. That's not the only thing. We are in our slow time. We are, we are in a slow time. So if you're seeing that atrophy, that's very on par with the industry. We can't just say, okay, well that's what it is. I don't have to think about it. We have to look at the whole picture. She did say I did make a change and I noticed a result. Sometimes those are feelings. What are your numbers telling you?

[A]

A big thing is I was sending all this sourdough to the police department because my husband works for the police department. And then one day I just stopped. I was like, you know what? I'm not getting any Glori lan or back. No feedback from them this week. They said, where are those cookies? Having limited drops can create that fervor back in the business. Instead of having the sourdough chocolate chip cookies on the menu all the time, what if we limit. Hey, we're only. You're getting a limited drop. We only offer this three times per year. Now you're creating FOMO around these things that have cut the 50% of the.

[B]

So she's using promotions to kind of resuscitate some weaknesses here. Now, here's my question. Here's what I would say that the website's not the culprit. Sourdough sales haven't dropped. They're still taken on the website. So my thought is maybe the content could shift a little bit. You're making reels. It's great. Are you only featuring sourdough on those reels? Let's diminish. Sourdough's strong, so let's diminish that and let's increase the weaker products if we want to sell them.

[A]

What you're going to feel, though, is sourdough bread in general gets more engagement because people love to think sourdough bread.

[B]

Also lower price point in regards to what custom does.

[A]

Absolutely. So when you make your content shift from the breads to maybe the cookies, you're going to see a drop in that engagement and that's going to feel.

[B]

Like maybe now two things are down. Yeah.

[A]

But what we're doing is we're something that is high.

[B]

High.

[A]

We're bringing down something low to bring it back to high.

[B]

Thoughts of this. She's clearly selling sourdough. It's increased.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Give the sourdough people a sample of something that's not selling. Absolutely right. So you can see that we can't really diagnose. Exactly. We can create. And these are. Why do you use graphs? We can create graphs to kind of see what those numbers actually are. We can create notes within our graphs. Say, here's where I pivoted. Here's where they were. But it's a cohesive approach because she is right. Everything gets slower. Are you yawning in your closed mouth? Yeah.

[A]

You have to out. That was appropriate.

[B]

Your mouth is wide open. Closed. Yeah. Everything kind of shifts at one time. The chess pieces are moving in a game. It's like we're, you know, like a. When cookie turntable. We put the chessboard on a cookie turntable and we're trying to play. And it's also dark and it's raining and it's hard to see which pieces we should move when we're also blindfolded, you know, and we're trying to say, okay, did the website have. Well, because of the sourdough orders. Didn't take. Something shifted there. I think we're looking at industry. I think we're looking at content focused. Like industry and time of year. Content Focus may have.

[A]

I'm going to say, when you have something that's selling so good, you are, you're going to focus on that.

[B]

And then your audience, your bread audience. People who buy sourdough and people who buy sugar cookies are different people. To me they are. I love both and you'll see both in my gullet at any given time. But the sourdough people, I'm like, you like how your stomach feels. You like your stomach lining to be healthy. You like bread delicious. The people who are like sugar cookies. I'm like, you're also my people. You like sugar at all times.

[A]

To me, I feel like people who buy bread internal. I want to eat something that is good for me. Cookies external. I'm bringing this to an event so.

[B]

Maybe you could create some content buckets. Do not stop posting about Saturday. But let's strengthen up the weaker buckets and say by giving them more air.

[A]

Time, you are going to see a little bit drop in engagement because it's not something that you're creating an audience.

[B]

That actually isn't there. I wonder if your audience has dwindled or they have thought you shifted and don't sell it anymore.

[A]

And I'm also curious, are you doing markets weekly drops or is this custom order?

[B]

Yeah, there's some questions, unfortunately, like they always say in marketing. The answer is it depends. And it depends what I would do if this is a slower time. You're in Virginia, so it was also be muggy for you. Oh, sorry. This is muggy. We're all on the east coaster. We're all sweat. I would say the next couple months, try to focus on that other side.

[A]

Just build it up before we get into it. Yeah. What do you.

[B]

What do you want your December to look like? Whatever that is, focus on it. Now. I would not blame your website. Websites have only been known to increase trust to increase order process. It increases your funnel. Hate that. But I love the fact that it keeps everything more organized and professional. Yeah, tell us. Okay. Thank you so much for texting in.

[A]

Thank you so much.

[B]

Thank you so much for cookie design lab.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Code twins for 15% off. You can buy it by the month.

[A]

I really like it.

[B]

It's a really, really, really easy way to make a cookie cutter for people wondering.

[A]

I did not call Heather to help me set up my bamboo, but I did incentivize her to come to my.

[B]

House when Corey finally uses the printer. I set up, configured and loaded with filaments.

[A]

Got a nice little spot.

[B]

When she does, I will be Setting her up on cookie.com, which I am. I have an account with very quick, easy way to make a cookie cutter.

[A]

Nice.

[B]

I was in fusion yesterday because I needed to make a cookie cutter.

[A]

Take that off the table.

[B]

I need to drink.

[A]

It's so close.

[B]

You just. You spilled that in your shirt.

[A]

You don't even know.

[B]

I'm telling you, most of this water is absorbed by my shirt. This is that thing. If you guys want to get the twinterest last on this water thing has kicked my butt.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

But I am drinking more water than I've ever drunk my water. Okay, Cookie Design Lab 15 off Code Twins, but text in 571-556-5644. And I want to say thank you. Cookie Design Lab. Yeah, you'll have to think if you guys can think of and text in a jazzy name for the segment. Yes, we like you.

[A]

And things that rhyme.

[B]

Yeah. If it uses the same first letters. If it rhymes.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

If it rolls off the tongue.

[A]

We love that.

[B]

Love all those lines. Tell us about the Cookie College. What's coming.

[A]

The Cookie College. So what the Cookie College is, is a membership. If you are looking to do everything we just mentioned in the podcast, you want ideas of content to post. That's a great place to get it. If you want to know how to get to Inbox zero, that's a great place to get it. There's courses in there designed to make you more efficient in your business. It is not a baking membership. There is no baking. You do get my recipes and things like that is more business baker focused. And it's a monthly membership currently. How much is it?

[B]

76. Because you forgot 76. But it will be. It will be C8 the last week of July, which takes us for the first two days in August. That is the only sale that will run until the event that shall not be named. The vendor blending. So this is your one shot to get this to make your summer worth that. All the things we talked about in in that question. How to clean out your Google Drive. How do you get to Inbox zero? How to. I think I make graphs. Well, the Excel one is coming because I love a spreadsheet. How to do all that stuff. How to take better photos, how to clean. You can join the photo challenge in which case there's tips and tricks on.

[A]

How to set up a newsletter is in there.

[B]

That will be the only week now if you're like girls, I was going to sign up now you can sign up now you can get all this content now you'll get the 4th of July class when it drops this week. Week now. And come that sales week, you can switch your plan to grandfather yourself into that sales price which you can maintain until the event that shall not be named. Right, Right.

[A]

So that is what's going down now.

[B]

Corey has a very cute setup for the Independence Day fourth of July class.

[A]

Very, very cute.

[B]

I had to print out the cutters last night. It's adorable.

[A]

Adorable. Very, very cute. Very cute.

[B]

I'm working on a digital download. Cory seem to think it was very. I thought it was adorable. The digital downloads is a membership. It's also included in the cookie college but it's also at standalone if you're interested. It's $10 a month. Cancel anytime. But you get all the content that's been posted.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

The digital downloads is a cookie cutter STL that creates a thank you cookie of which I provided the print file for various designs.

[A]

If you're wondering, I had made a post in the sugar cookie marketing group. Just look up thank you cookie and it says the strategy behind it. But everyone posted what their thank you cookies look like. And a lot of people like I didn't even know this was a good idea. So this, this is where you could maybe come up with your.

[B]

So I created it in a circle and it says thank you for your cookie order with a blank spot in the middle for you to put your logo. Or you could add any text you want. Again, it kind of works with the. The Eddy printer. If you have like a. The big blue one or the small blue. There's so many. There's so many.

[A]

You could even do it on wafer.

[B]

Paper if you want to do it on wafer paper. This is to sew. And then there's a Halloween one, a Christmas one, a cutesy one, school one. And you can just print that same thing on each of these cookies so that, that this thank you cutter is themed but could last all year. Yeah. Very, very. All right here in the Schnagen.

[A]

Moving on to our sponsors. Without them, this wouldn't be a thing.

[B]

I'm sorry. We have two Facebook lives.

[A]

Oh, you're right.

[B]

This week we have a Facebook Live today, Tuesday. So tomorrow's Wednesday. You guys asked flip insurance. Took forever to answer, but they got through. So flip Insurance, if you don't know, it's the insurance that most cottage bakers add on to their their house policy. Like it's a separate policy, but it covers the liability of cottage baking in your house.

[A]

So if someone gets get sick off of Your cookies. If someone trips on your stoop, these are the things that you would contact your food liability insurance program and that's something that they would cover. So what these. There's so many questions around it and there's always so many questions around insurance. How much do I need? When do I need it? Can I take a break from it? That's what he's going to answer in this. Tell all. It's Grant and his friend and the friend has been working there for a long time. So I'm excited because I think there's so many Q and A that people want to go down.

[B]

That'll be tomorrow, the 4th at 3pm Eastern. I told Grant, please send me the video uploaded to our YouTube channel on the Facebook Live. So all those. Because Facebook's depreciated Facebook Live so much that they get deleted in 30 days. So they live forever on YouTube if they send them to me then on Saturday, this Saturday. So that is Saturday 7th at 12pm Eastern. Getting Google reviews with Eddie. This girl has turned Eddie into a powerhouse of Google reviews, which has great, great rankability.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

So you can catch those too, which is fantastic. Can't wait. Can't wait.

[A]

Next up, without the sponsors, this wouldn't be a podcast. First and foremost, we have Royal Batch by Baby Bake. What is Royal Batch? It is a meringue powder. If you're making royal icing, the key ingredient is meringue powder. Genie's dreams. Apparently people cannot find it. I've seen so many.

[B]

I saw a post, I think they canceled a big order.

[A]

Like a giant thing.

[B]

It was a giant or I don't want to say the word 30 was a £30 million.

[A]

Yeah, 30 million. I think it was like £30,000.

[B]

It was something.

[A]

It could be £3,000. It was a lot of threes in there.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

So if you're not able to find Jeannie's dreams and you were freaking out, here's the thing. This is your time to try Royal Batch. I have posted my recipe in the Baking with Sugar Cookie Marketing group through the brain powder already has vanilla extract in it. You can add more or a different one if you want to. It has white food coloring in it. So it whips up right white. You're not going to have any off cream color thing. You don't even need to add it if you don't want to. And it has corn syrup in it to give it a softer bite. So you don't have to add that if you wanted to. You can always add it into that that is still available. Can you get in the five pound bag and the one pound bag currently?

[B]

You don't think we can?

[A]

No, I think you can. And I wondered if she still had the sample pack.

[B]

You can get it in 1 pound 5 pound sample, 50 gram sample 10 pack.

[A]

Oh nice.

[B]

Use code Twins 10% off.

[A]

Yeah, Twins will save you 10% off of that order.

[B]

I mentioned cookie design lab but I got to get my shout out again. I love it when a sponsor steps up and says let me go the extra mile. Cookie design lab STL software, web based. Very easy to use. Code twins save 15% off or text in 571-556-5644 be entered to win a month of that membership. Ah, we got a new sponsor on boarding. Who making me crazy.

[A]

Baking me crazy.

[B]

They're a vending. She was like I'm from the vending blend. I was like I know exactly who you are and don't mention that word. She's like can we just. I said I think I actually got to start planning it next month. But she's like let's just. Let's just pretend we don't have to. I don't have any details yet but she's onboarding. She was like, yeah. I love the audience. I love the sugar cookies.

[A]

Everyone like bacon craze.

[B]

Bacon crazy. The backers co use code sugar crazy cookie to save 25% off on these backdrops. If someone is like I'm just getting started, what should I buy outside of the basics that you need? An accounting software, a Facebook page, maybe a newsletter that you gotta pay for, I would say and get a backdrop. The photos are how we sell these cookies.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

These backdrops allow for very either clean design or a very custom backdrop. That really makes these, these, these photos.

[A]

Yeah. Really. I mean the white matte finish is my go to. If anyone asked me which one you should start off with. That is the most versatile one. You can dress it up, dress it down. You can use it as is. It's not distracting. So it's not going to take away from your cookies.

[B]

The issue with the granite countertop. Granite. Love it. Granite. Busy. Why high spills? Yeah, busy takes away from picture.

[A]

It does, it does.

[B]

So if you're using your granite countertop, you haven't tasted the sweet nectar of a discounted backers co backdrop drop use code sugar cookie 25 off Eddie, the edible food printer. Those digital downloads I was just talking about will use Eddie. Yeah, Corey's gonna create one for me. She said.

[A]

I said I would make you one cookie.

[B]

One cookie. You can print on a cookie. So when I say I created a thank you cookie with five print templates you can use and then add your logo to the center.

[A]

You're like printing ink. Someone's gonna get sick. No. The same food coloring that colors your icing into colors that is edible food coloring. It's the same thing that comes out of this printer head. But it prints like a printer prints on paper.

[B]

Somebody in the cookie college had asked and I, and I love people who think like this. They're like, I don't want to take on debt. I don't put this on credit. I don't have the funds available right now for an Eddie. What are your thoughts? And I said typically I'd always say pay cash because I don't like paying interest money. But I said if you can stomach. If we can. If we can. If you have a plan in place, the Eddie would pay for himself swiftly.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

And in this case and because I knew how she worked and she's very strategic, I said for you it would be a yes. For me.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

You can finance him. They have it on their website how to do that. And then you could buy a used one. I love, I love a refurbed. Yes. But you can also. There's another Facebook group where you can buy used Eddies.

[A]

Yeah. If you really want to get on their Facebook page in their Instagram and it will show you how people incorporate Eddie into every single single custom order.

[B]

I don't see. Why would I be.

[A]

It's the.

[B]

It's a stencil replacement. Really.

[A]

Yeah. And I want to say not to buy a custom stencil that's maybe a three parter to achieve half of what Eddie can do.

[B]

Corey has. I had airbrush, PTSD airbrush open. And so when Eddie's right there.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

When Eddie's right there. Why.

[A]

And then now. So many cookie cutter shops are now creating PNGs for Eddie.

[B]

No brainer it unfortunately because it has two really great avenues. Corporate wedding, large scale orders but also streamlining customs. It is a two for a win. Not cheap. 3,000 bucks. No, not cheap.

[A]

And if you leave them in the box, guess what? You're not going to like them. But if you get them out of the box and you utilize them.

[B]

I didn't think you were going to step on my toes without a warning.

[A]

It's been fantastic. And I'm not even utilizing Eddie like other people are. Other people are. Are printing on royal icing transfers. Putting it on.

[B]

There's Some. There's some people.

[A]

Real good. Real good at it. Real good.

[B]

Real good. That takes us. Do you have a twin twist?

[A]

Do I have a twin?

[B]

How are you wearing your back straightener?

[A]

I am wearing my back straightener. Here's the thing. Someone texted Heather about my yearbook.

[B]

Oh, so sorry. Not more than one person reached out and gave Corey these phenomenal workarounds for the. If you missed episode 213, the yearbook debacle, you save the day.

[A]

Save the day. So the principal was like, I love the idea of giving him a piece of cardstock paper that's the same size as the yearbook. 8 by 11. Letting everyone sign it like as if it was a yearbook. And they'll insert it in there. So I finally got the yearbook shipped to my house yesterday.

[B]

I got resolutionist Corey, Cory and I don't have to drive them.

[A]

They.

[B]

They said we'll ship them. It's fine. And then they did the papers.

[A]

I mean, more work for me. And I deserve every ounce of it.

[B]

But it could have been worse. Could have been worse. Could have been. So what was your twin dress? I thought you were say thank you for whoever said that, Kim. And I think somebody else gave you another great idea. Thank. Isn't that so funny? You started podcast lesson five years ago. You make a mistake on a yearbook. Last week, somebody from the podcast from five years ago says, here's a tip to save the day.

[A]

Gr. Thank you, loves.

[B]

Love have tortoise. That was my tortoise. Oh, that was your toast. What are you holding up? Hold it and show it to the people.

[A]

What do you think this shape is?

[B]

My grandmother said none of her grain cells are firing when she called it a lollipop.

[A]

This is a part of the Independence Day cookie class kits, which will drop on the 7th of this month. And this is the cutest shape.

[B]

What a nicely printed cutter. Who did that for you?

[A]

I don't know. A snow cone.

[B]

Snow cone. Yeah. So what are the shapes for the Independence Day?

[A]

We have a snow cone.

[B]

We have a popsicle.

[A]

Bomb Pop. Yeah, Bomb pop.

[B]

You know, the fireworks Pop. The Uncle Sam's hat.

[A]

Uncle Sam.

[B]

A firework pre exploded. A rocket.

[A]

A rocket.

[B]

A firework post exploded explosion in a flag. And a flag. Great.

[A]

It'll be cute.

[B]

And the colors are red, white, blue.

[A]

Red, white and blue. And gray. Gray. And then the stars. Don't worry, no one's going to have to pipe them because those are actually very hard to do. It's the. These little sprinkles.

[B]

That'Ll be a Cute little set.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

If you guys are wondering, you can sign up for the cooking class kits membership, but that'll be on sale as well. And you get that in the cookie college. My Twinrest. I'm gonna still say it is this posture thing. It is so frustrating.

[A]

It's beyond.

[B]

You've been very straight. You're actually lean back in your chair. Yeah.

[A]

Is it like.

[B]

Yeah, it's working. You're like past the point of upright. You're backwards.

[A]

I'm gonna say I did try. I said I was going to test it. Wearing it while I was baking.

[B]

That's hard.

[A]

That wasn't.

[B]

It's also impossible to wear at a restaurant. You will be frustrated.

[A]

My daily goal is complete.

[B]

189. You guys can see I have it on my back. YouTube people. Look at dangles. It was celebrating with confetti. You and confetti windows. I love. Yeah, that's what the yearbooks end. Did you see the confection? I said, no, I didn't.

[A]

And they're like, well, you never made the book.

[B]

You didn't order. I, I, I'm still into this posture thing.

[A]

I love the posture thing. I don't think it is easy to use while baking.

[B]

I think it is your admin desktop work. I think you could wear it on a walk.

[A]

Oh, definitely wear it on a walk. Walk through the mall, edit dinner.

[B]

But not while you're eating. So what you can do is turn it on. Oh, shoot. I got too hot. Okay, we're gonna wrap this up because the camera said, good girl.

[A]

Wrap it up.

[B]

Bye.