263. Baking it Down - Summer Slowdown

Summary

Podcast Summary

Baking it Down with Sugar Cookie Marketing 🍪

Hosts: Heather & Corrie Miracle
Episode 263: Summer Slowdown
Date: June 2, 2026

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Episode Overview

Heather and Corrie Miracle break down the seasonal "summer slowdown" that affects sugar cookie bakeries and discuss actionable, upbeat strategies for keeping your business and marketing “piping hot” when orders are thin. Drawing from their vast experience as bakers and community leaders, the twins cover organization, skill-building, content creation, relationship networking, and more—all with their signature friendly, relatable style and a splash of humor. The episode is rich in practical tips, personal stories, and audience Q&A.

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Key Segments & Insights

1. Summer Slowdown: Reality & Opportunity

[05:20] Heather: “Summer slowdown is a natural, slower time for bakers. You can always see this when you go to Google Trends and search the keyword 'sugar cookies.'”

• Seasonal Dips: Orders typically decline in June and July. Holidays are sparse, with a "massive gap" between May’s graduations, Father's Day, 4th of July/250th U.S. Anniversary, and back-to-school (August).
• Perspective: Many bakers take breaks, while others push through—both options are valid, but Heather and Corrie argue that slow times are “golden” for working on your business.

2. Actionable Summer Strategies

The twins present three broad categories (with 10+ concrete ideas) to make the most of the seasonal lull:

A. Production & Systems

• Build a Freezer Stockpile
  • [07:36] Heather: “Build a freezer stockpile.”
  • Dough freezes well for 5–6 months. By prepping dough in August, you can leap-frog into busy fall order season without time-sucking prep days.
    • Corrie’s tip: Invest in an upright chest freezer; “It is a game changer.” [08:27]
    • Batch dough and precisely portion: weigh a single batch, see how many cookies it yields, label accordingly.
• Audit Standard Operating Procedures (SOPs)
  • [10:40] Heather: “Audit your SOPs, your standard operating procedure. Write down the workflows... use Asana or just a Google Doc.”
  • Update project templates, autoresponders, and presale emails. Consistency and documentation now prevent chaos later.
  • Corrie’s hack: Prewrite and save Facebook group comments to quickly respond to order inquiries.
• Streamline Workflows & Batch Steps
  • Identify bottlenecks—time yourself on cookie tasks; implement tools like dehydrators where needed.
• Physical & Digital Organization
  • Reorganize your baking space—put high-use items within arm’s reach.
  • Sell unused tools on buy/sell groups.
  • Organize cookie cutters by theme, usage, or whatever makes sense for your brain. Use tags & labels; join “Cookie Cutter Identification” groups to ID mystery shapes.
  • Heather’s organization mantra: “Always work in broad categories first.” [22:40]

B. Skill-Building & Proficiency

• Learn One New Technique
  • [24:14] Heather: “Learn one new technique … florals, lettering, photography, airbrush—even just one thing to upgrade your offerings.”
  • Use boot camps or revisit pre-purchased courses (“just crack open one, that’s a win!”) [25:02]
• Design for Q4 Now
  • Pre-download STL cutter files, organize by source and holiday, and cancel subscriptions you don't need—saves money.
  • Corrie’s system: Use nested folders (shop > category > event).
  • Heather’s file-naming tip: “Year_Month_Day_Category_Shop_Event” for easy search. [27:26]

C. Marketing & Visibility

• Build a Content Library (Sample, Photograph, Schedule)
  • [29:38] Heather: “Build a content library … create, photograph, store, plan, schedule out content.”
  • Use downtime to stage and photo Christmas-in-July, 4th of July, and fall/holiday samples.
  • Tools like FeedHive allow yearlong pre-scheduling; less stress when busy season hits.
  • Corrie’s reminder: Consistency keeps your page growing—don’t “ghost” your socials even if not taking orders. [33:00]
• Audit & Refresh Storefronts (Website, Socials)
  • Update outdated info (e.g., booking banners, bios, pinned posts, broken links, expired discounts, forms, QR code links).
  • Corrie's formula: Make a recurring list—“On June 1, check my TikTok bio, website, and links.” [34:29]
  • Start working on SEO for “custom cookies near me” and related search queries; use AI/Gemini to understand and optimize local search results. [39:20]
• Grow & Nurture Email/Text List
  • Run a giveaway to build your list; batch-write emails to drip out August–December.
  • “Quality over quantity”—segment your list, prune non-openers, and prep automated reminders for seasonal sales.
  • Corrie’s tip for transient/military areas: “Whoever’s bought from me in the last year—that’s my hottest lead list.” [41:05]
• Plant Relationship Seeds (Networking)
  • Join forces with local businesses, florists, event vendors, or influencers for mutual promos.
  • Corrie’s story: Making highlight videos at farmer’s markets resulted in shares from the county, market, and individual vendors. [47:47]
  • Lean in on collaborations to create “a ton of photos” and gain new referral streams.

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• “The best-selling bakes for the 4th of July is a hard seller. Rare are the days someone orders a custom dozen for July 4th... this year, though, they're coming in hot.”
  — Cory [03:39]

• "Summer slowdown is a natural, slower time for bakers ... it is a golden chance to work on what you never have time for come busy season."
  — Heather [05:20]

• “What you don’t want to do is ignore the twins on this one... and then in October, November, December, you realize you’re taking orders via DM and losing the details.”
  — Cory [06:47]

• “If you’re flying totally blind, you could ill or kill your clients…”
  — Cory [15:32] (joking about the importance of food safety and portion accuracy)

• “Find a system that works with how your brain works... don’t force yourself into someone else’s system.”
  — Heather [20:57]

• “Now is the time to make sure you’re not leaving cash on the table.”
  — Cory [31:22]

• “If you take big breaks from social, your page will never get to where it was. The algorithm does not like breaks.”
  — Heather [32:30]

• “The number one way she’s grown to millions of followers: consistency. Posting once a day, a Reel specifically.”
  — Heather quoting an Instagram educator [33:00]

• “Nurturing that lead… six months past people can become your six months future people!”
  — Heather [40:54]

• “If you have slow sales, blame yourself for not calling in—can never complain if you haven’t done everything you could possibly think of.”
  — Heather [49:09]

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Q&A & Community Segments

Text-in Questions Highlight

• Removing Narration from Video Class Kits:
  Corrie explains step-by-step (with InShot app instructions) how to mute her voice and add music for class promo videos. [67:49]
• Managing Chaotic Private Classes:
  Set clear time boundaries upfront for private events, charge for overages, and use humorous signals (bell/pig toy) to call attention and keep things moving.
  — “Set the expectations beforehand… you’re there to teach a cookie class, not for their family reunion.” — Cory [73:54]
  — “If you set the pre-expectations, it’s easier to be firm at the end.” — Heather [76:35]

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Pro Tips & Micro-Insights

• Always check that your QR codes and Bitly links are still active! Bitly sometimes routes to ads now. [35:05]
• Use group-based marketing and collabs to force engagement and generate content ideas—even if you’re “kicking and screaming” at first. [62:44]
• For Social Growth: “If you’re not consistent, you’re the reason it’s not working.” [91:36]
• Cookie Video Creation: Success is as much about strategy (hooks/jump cuts/pacing) as production quality. Boot camp covers both. [51:52]
• Personal Organization: Label everything in broad categories; resist the urge to over-specify unless it fits your natural workflow. [22:40]
• Networking: Even a brief, polite “no” reply to impossible customer requests can yield future business (and good karma). [58:46]
• Embrace Imperfection in Content: Just hit record and get better as you go—don’t wait for “the perfect setup.” [90:09–91:12]

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Notable Timestamps

• [03:11] — Upcoming: 250th U.S. Anniversary (“America’s birthday”)
• [05:20] — Defining the Summer Slowdown & natural “break” times
• [07:36] — Build a Freezer Stockpile (production tip)
• [10:40] — SOPs, Organization, Google Docs, Asana
• [13:47] — Website banners & recurring update lists
• [19:42] — Organizing Cutters by Theme/Use
• [24:14] — Summer skill-building: learn ONE new thing
• [29:38] — Build a content library, schedule in advance
• [31:22] — Why summer samples benefit Christmas sales
• [32:30] — Social media breaks & algorithm issues
• [33:33] — How to audit your website/social for outdated info
• [39:20] — Local SEO: “custom cookies near me” and AI search
• [40:53] — Email list growth and nurturing strategies
• [47:47] — Networking examples: vendor collaborations & local highlights

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Fun, Quotable Moments

• “America’s birthday—Velveeta is doing the pre-marketing for us!” — Heather & Cory [04:11]
• “The millennial pause is problematic.” — Heather [53:03]
• “Dandelion clients had a marketing team: ‘Make a wish and blow on it so I can spread my weed seeds.’ Genius.” — Heather [46:15]
• “When I’m on the go, I like to show any baker that falls in my feed now I’m like everyone’s top fan.” — Cory [37:05]
• “I cried nearly my first time making cake pops.” — Cory [79:37]

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Community Events & Announcements

• Upcoming Boot Camps: Cookie video creation (June), mastering community groups, and Procreate for cookie designers (August).
• New Collab Format: Limiting Instagram collab participants to ensure engagement and manageable comment numbers.
• Cookie Con Frappy Hour: Hosted in Orlando for networking at the signature event.
• Black Friday Vendy Blendy Online Sale: Fifth year upcoming; “absolute chaos, overwhelm, yelling, celebration."
• Sponsor shout-outs: Cookie Design Lab (custom STL files, code “twins”), Daisy Makes (cake pop molds), Eddie food printer, Bosch Nutrimill mixers.

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Overall Tone & Takeaways

Heather & Corrie’s chemistry and wit make business and marketing advice accessible, light-hearted, and motivating, infused with real-world anecdotes and community spirit. The summer months, while slow commercially, are an incubator for all the behind-the-scenes DOING that leads to major Q4 wins.

“If you did even half of these, you’ll be in a better place this fall. Just keep your marketing piping hot, even through the cold months.” — Cory [49:18]

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Transcript

[Heather]

This is random. And I was a tick tock yesterday or on Sunday night and that guy that mom likes with the local videos, the restaurant is live. Yes.

[Corey]

I was watching his lives too. Oh, yeah.

[Heather]

So I wrote to him, I said, hey, I went to a restaurant you recommended. Do you want us to tell them? And he's like, oh, yeah, it'd be great. Like, I'm not paid to be there, but it like makes them like happy. Then I said, hey, my twin sister makes custom sugar cookies. So she cookie fi dmv. He never replied. He skipped my comment. I tried. Oh, that's so funny.

[Corey]

Because I was like, should I cook it his thing? He is now 100 exclusively doing restaurant reviews. So I think he's pivoting his actual business to become an influencer. Granted, it's super hyperlocal, but he's got so much engagement both on Facebook and TikTok.

[Heather]

He said somebody asked him, are you doing this to push? And he's like, no. He's like, I'm not seeing more bookings because of these things. He's almost must be making side cash. And that's why he's doing it. That's why I think it wasn't supporting his business.

[Corey]

Yeah, that's why I think he's pivoting and he's trying to go the influencer route. He went to El Taco and had a bad experience, so didn't want to lambast him. So he's coming to that weird thing.

[Heather]

Was that the one where he didn't? He wouldn't. Because people were saying, just say what the restaurant is.

[Corey]

It was because he had done a preview of it. He's like, I'm finally here at El Taco. And then the next video was like, yeah, I should have looked. The Yelp reviews all came on one day. Like all the five star came on one day and all the one stars came after that because they did a big push for it. But he's like, I'm not going to name the business. But he had already posted that.

[Heather]

Oh, funny. Interesting. I posted this in the Viper Group.

[Corey]

Yeah, I thought your car looked good.

[Heather]

Yeah, it cost $8. That's a money making thing. They just sit on the corners and take photos.

[Corey]

Oh, I would pay $8 in a heartbeat.

[Heather]

Yeah, I got 209 likes and chip

[Corey]

Connell one of them.

[Heather]

Better believe it. Better believe it. And I replied to most people and they're like, you're so funny. Never guess what his camera phone is. Himself in the rain. Yes, exact. Turn wild. Okay,

[Corey]

welcome.

[Heather]

Wait I have to tell them I'm sitting in a tin can.

[Corey]

A diet Coke can. Really? Hello.

[Heather]

My speaker. My fancy speaker isn't working. So that's why last week sounded so funny. I thought Corey just did me dirty and didn't tell me you wild.

[Corey]

So it wasn't even my fault at all. Oh, it wasn't my fault. Guys. Welcome to the Baking it Down with Sugar Cookie Marketing podcast. We are your host and you are not seeing nibble. We are actually 37 year old and

[Heather]

we did not plan this.

[Corey]

We did not.

[Heather]

But we have.

[Corey]

We have. We are actually a spin off from a group that's on Facebook. It's called the Sugar Cookie Marketing Group. If you aren't in, come and join it. What you can find there are, you know, trends. Heather likes to post the what's a hot selling bake for X holiday. So she just posted up the Father's Day one and I think. Did you do I. No one's done the 250th anniversary one yet.

[Heather]

I finally got people posting 4th of July. So this year, if you're not American, is America's 250th birthday that falls on the Fourth of July. So this Fourth of July is bigger than the other ones.

[Corey]

Well, I want to tell you, when I go to the grocery store and VelvetA cheese has 250 written on there, it's a big deal.

[Heather]

So yeah, that best selling bakes 1 4th of July is a hard seller anyways. And then you get this one off. Big one.

[Corey]

I've been selling cookies for six, almost seven years. Rare are the days that someone orders a custom dozen for July 4th. I've only had a handful of them this year though. They're coming in hot.

[Heather]

Really?

[Corey]

Yeah. And I think it's a 250th. A lot of people are planning to do a lot of events and go to a lot of parties.

[Heather]

I always say that the grocery stores do our pre marketing for us. They do stay testing.

[Corey]

Yeah.

[Heather]

Whenever they get real heavy in a grocery store, it kind of paves away. It gets in people's heads.

[Corey]

Like that's what I'm saying.

[Heather]

The Velveeta cheese. Thank you. Velveeta is doing the work for us.

[Corey]

It is.

[Heather]

So this is the sugar cookie marketing group. If you and most of the things we reference on today's podcast you can find on our website sugarcookiemarketing.com and then a few things coming up is the meet the Baker collab on June 19th. I can't believe it's June. That was it. Cannot the cookie videos boot camp, which is in two days. We'll talk about that in a second. And the cookie con happy hour. We'll talk about that in a minute. But these are all things heading your way. Heading your way. So what we wanted to talk about, since it's the second.

[Corey]

I'm so sorry, do you have a quote? No, I don't

[Heather]

because I usually skip

[Corey]

over it and get my hands left.

[Heather]

Okay, you can talk. I'll find a quote.

[Corey]

Today we were going to talk about the summer slowdown, but ways to keep your marketing piping hot. More with.

[Heather]

I was really happy with that. Okay. There are no secrets to success. It's a result. Preparation, hard work, and learning from failure. That's a good one.

[Corey]

Good. Taking it. Taking it.

[Heather]

What we want to talk about is summer slowdown. It is a natural, slower time for bakers. You can always see this when you go to Google Trends and search the cook the keyword sugar cookies.

[Corey]

It's and searched and can confirm that.

[Heather]

Yes.

[Corey]

And I asked both in the sugar cookie marketing group and on the Facebook page, do you take breaks during the summer if you would like to see a lot of fun answers, interesting answers, where bakers are coming from. It's so interesting how many people do take breaks, how many people don't take breaks.

[Heather]

But if there's a break, it likely falls in either January or June and July. The j. Typically kids go back to school in August. So you guys get dialed back in. Our clients get dialed back in with back to school. So every Monday, Cor and I meet and talk about the upcoming holidays. And I said there's a massive gap that comes. I don't think National Cookie Day is a holiday, but it's the last one in the list before back to school, which is so many weeks away. So there's a massive high hiatus where the holidays aren't generating the orders. You'd almost hope somebody just had a birthday.

[Corey]

You know, there's for people for us who don't take the summer off, the summer birthday people do appreciate the team on their shoulders.

[Heather]

So we want to talk about summer slowdown, things to do to keep your marketing piping hot all summer. So these are things you can spend these slower months doing because you will not have the time come September, October, November 7th, you're thinking, yeah, what you

[Corey]

don't want to do, and especially if you're newer to business or you're just growing your business now, you don't want to ignore the twins on this one. And they'll be like, no, I have tons of time. I don't have a lot of orders coming in right now in June. And then you get to the October, November, December time frame and you realize that you're taking orders via DM and losing the details because you didn't pre plan.

[Heather]

And then you always have that thought, I'll fix it next year. And then you're so exhausted and happy everything's done at the end of this year that you forget to ever look back to it.

[Corey]

Amen. Amen.

[Heather]

So I broke this up into three categories. It's not landscaping. Don't worry about it. We do use the word seed one time. I thought Corey would be happy, but I broke it up into three categories that kind of categorize these things. And it breaks down to 10 total. We can work on.

[Corey]

Love it.

[Heather]

This is your recommendation. Build a freezer stockpile.

[Corey]

So cookie dough does have a good freezing shelf life. It's not going to last for a year. The Internet will tell you it lasts between five and six months. So when we hit July, August time frame, you can actually load your upright standing chest freezer with your dough to really save you a lot of prep time so you have a quicker turnaround and you're not stressing on the dough prep days, which I just had yesterday myself. I told my husband there's nothing worse than dough prep days. You don't get a cool photo out of it, you don't look good after it. You can't post a social media about it.

[Heather]

You just bought yourself a ton of future.

[Corey]

Yes, yes, A big old ugly ball of dough, but a lot of bit of time.

[Heather]

And now you, Corey, and this could be something somebody could consider have a dedicated upright freezer. Don't you?

[Corey]

Yes. I invested in this from Walmart. I think it was 179 at the time. It's got no light in it, so make sure you have your flashlight in the basement. It's just a standing freezer chest, but it is been a game changer for me. Let me tell you. It is my go to if I did not have it, I can't imagine life without it. That's how useful it is for me. I hate that it takes up space in the basement, but I also love that I have it. So it's like the, the evil and the good thing. So I love to stock it. And my husband will be like, oh, is it dough stocking day? Yeah, because there's about a billion eggs in the fridge. I'm getting Ready to really stock that chest freezer up. Because when I stock it, I can set it and forget it. And then when these big orders come in, the corporate orders, the December orders, I ain't thinking about the dough prep days. That's not even on my timeline of work. Not even thinking about that.

[Heather]

So when. How often do you do a dough prep? I guess it would really technically depend on someone's freezer space, but how often do you do it?

[Corey]

I find myself doing it every two to three months, depending on the order volume. So I have two Bosch mixers. One is the Universal plus. It's got a bigger motor in it, can handle a lot. And then I have the artiste, a smaller Moto Moto. A smaller motor. The thing is, they both hold the same amount of dough. So I will run those at the same time. And it makes six batches each time.

[Heather]

So you're eating 12 batches per run? No, six total. Sorry. So three and three? Yeah, four and two.

[Corey]

Three and three.

[Heather]

You're making that four TC.

[Corey]

Oh, he runs twice as long to make.

[Heather]

To mix the dough.

[Corey]

But he going, he, he.

[Heather]

If you guys are interested, the coach, sugar cookies, gets 20 bucks off those mixers. Okay, that's a good one.

[Corey]

I would then.

[Heather]

Okay. Considering that we are doing a summer slowdown, you'd probably save this till the first week of August.

[Corey]

Yes. I think because you have dough technically lasts for five to six months, and July puts us halfway through the year. If you have it in August, you can. You can really just stock it up and you can use it and you'll

[Heather]

get you through at least November.

[Corey]

Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely.

[Heather]

Another one. I added this one. Audit your SOPs, your standard operating procedure. So write down the workflows. So your workflow, when you get that Eddy order. And if you guys have listened to me, Asana, the application project management software application that I use to manage my life, it allows you to create SOPs and trigger them when you need them. So I'll create a. Create an SOP for cookie classes. So it'll start with, you know, send the venue a reminder that we're here. Follow up with Corey and send her the list. You know, export the eventbrite list attendees and put them into mailchimp or whatever.

[Corey]

The great thing about that is Heather can copy and paste every new class we have because imagine her having to rethink of that and each new class, she's going to forget something. The girl forgets something every time we have a meeting, I'm going to forget something.

[Heather]

So when I create the sop and with a good thing, you can do an SOP on a piece of paper Google Drive. But I just use Asana because it's kind of built for that and you can have a supporting sop. So it's send these emails and you can say, okay, send these three emails before I can check off the primary goal. Yeah, but because Asana or these processes are so easy to tweak as we keep going along, Corey and I'll be like, you know, we should have done this differently. I can go tweak my SOP piece so I don't have to reinvent the wheel every time.

[Corey]

Oh yeah. And what I have Heather knows Kicking, screaming, hate. A standard, A standard operating procedure never sees me coming. So it doesn't hate to see me coming.

[Heather]

But it's forcing your hands. You're creating them by necessity. So now who has. When we create the class kits, it's, it's typically, it's been like I can see every year, every month it gets a little more dialed in with organization

[Corey]

standing operating procedures that I'm dialing in myself is my email templates that I send to pre sale buyers versus custom cookie orders. Now I can just, I can copy and paste and it saves me a lot of that back and forth. I'm not forgetting anything like you know, my pickup address or you know, how they need to pay or the confirmation or anything like that. Another one that I've been able to really do is a lot of times groups on Facebook have designated either posting days or posting threads. So I've pre done my copy that hits all the majors. So I have a mixing bowl cookie company comment thread. So if someone asks for a baker who makes cookies, I copy and paste this comment. So one, I'm really quick to the thread, two, it has all the information they need. And three, I don't have to think about it. It's just right there in my notes app. Copy, paste, wham, bam, thank you, bam.

[Heather]

Other ideas that you can check out your SOPs is like funnels. I know we've been talking a lot about funnels. Like what's, what happens when somebody starts the buying process? Where do they go? What do they read? What do they see? A lot of times, and I'm guilty of this, I'll have an autoresponder. It's like, thanks for your order in 2025. It's like happy. So go through that audit. See how you act as your own customer. I'd love to get a grandmother to try to place an order find things.

[Corey]

1 I need you to look at is my banner on my website. Heather. God forbid, she didn't want it to be an active banner.

[Heather]

A banner that you have to go

[Corey]

in and edit throughout the months as you get booked.

[Heather]

I could make it a evergreen type. I love it. It would have to be because we're

[Corey]

forgetting to to do that.

[Heather]

I just checked the other day. It says now accepting orders for June. We're July, baby girl. Then you just changed your form last week. Maybe we'll go figure it out another one. Streamline your workflow and batch your steps. So this one was more of Corey's idea. Time yourself through. Order like creation, like badge dough, whatever. And see where you get bottlenecked. See what's eating up the time and slowing you down. Sometimes I could be. Maybe I need to implement a dehydrator. Yeah.

[Corey]

When you're doing the dough prep, I. Since I'm making six batches at a time, what would behoove me to do is go back to my early days and make one batch and weigh that out. So if I can weigh that out and then I can cut 35, 40 cookies from that one batch, I know exactly what that dough brick in my freezer can do. So do I need to bring two out to thaw? Is it just a one out to thaw? That is going to really save me a lot of guesswork. A lot of thaw time, a lot of oh well, I thought it. Now I have to freeze it again. Now it has even shorter of a shelf life. That is something that's going to help you, especially if you can nail down like exactly how many 3.5 inch circles you can get from one batch of dough. So if I know that I can pull a full 35 cookies from that, that information, granted the size of cookies is different. That's going to give me a great guesstimation on how much dough I need to pull from my freezer for this

[Heather]

next order or that next order. At least you're not flying totally blind. I know that there's some wiggle room, but it would. How many times can you refreeze?

[Corey]

No, they don't want you to do it.

[Heather]

If you do the food safe certification. Yeah. If you unthawed too much now you're left with.

[Corey]

Yeah, it has. There's a timer on how long dough can sit in the fridge. So it's that delicate time because you are working with, you know, a lot of food that can go bad. We don't want to ill our clients because we measured wrong.

[Heather]

You say ill or kill.

[Corey]

Ill or kill. Both.

[Heather]

You shouldn't be doing either of those things. Yeah, yeah.

[Corey]

Try to stay away from both if you can.

[Heather]

Sometimes the other one is tempting. This one. Same part of this is the same tab is this would be a decent time to reorganize a cooking room, which I know gets a little bogged down. So in the kit in the kitchen, it's always called the kitchen triangle, and it's the three most used parts of the kitchen. So it's always the stove, the sink, and the fridge. In your cookie room, you have things you access more and things you access less. Yes. Move the things access more into a more accessible place. And the things you access less are not at all. Put them away, sell them, flip them, whatever. Put them in the basement and retool the cookie room so that it. The cookie room matches your baking workflow. So you can say, like, Corey has a dehydrator right there. She has a 3D printer right there. So she's gonna say, I'm gonna get the cutter. I'm gonna bake the cookies. I'm gonna put them in the dehydrator. And then now she's doing the podcast at her cookie table.

[Corey]

I am. This is my cookie. This is where the magic happens.

[Heather]

So Corey just swiveling around all that so she would optimize that. I think below the dehydrator is your packaging or something.

[Corey]

Yeah, this is my. This is my bag, drawer, shred drawer. And this is my. If I need staples, everything like that, pencils, paper, things like that.

[Heather]

Where do you keep your very. Not often you. Where is your grex airbrush right now?

[Corey]

Unfortunately, up here in this closet. This is where my boxes are. These are where my stickers that I need for packaging, because we have to put a sticker on each thing. Down here is my toolbows, my tool. And down here is. Needs to be organized.

[Heather]

So now Corey would say, let me organize the bottom and then put the stuff that isn't being used at all, which is your airbrushes now, in the basement. Yes, yes.

[Corey]

Or sell them, get them gone, make some cash back.

[Heather]

If you guys want to sell stuff, there's these cutter buy, sell, trade groups, and they allow you to sell your Eddie. They allow you to sell your airbrush and everything like that.

[Corey]

Honestly, I had never used Facebook Marketplace for the longest time because I've heard horror stories in total. Right now, granted, I'm selling just anything that isn't tied down. I've almost made $950, selling things at 5 to $10 increments back and forth.

[Heather]

Oh, yeah, whatever you want it.

[Corey]

Come on, get it. The other day I sold, like Ashley had given this marble place where you make bread, and they didn't want anymore. It had literally never been open. So she gave it to me. I ended up selling it. One lady says, can I get this in the morning? I said, absolutely, Kelly. Let me know what time works for you, okay? Kelly threw her, I guess, across the

[Heather]

home, as one does after you send them an important message with a timeline.

[Corey]

I want to be like, Kelly. It was two seconds after you said, Kelly doesn't respond to me for 10 hours. But someone in that time picks up this. Whatever this is, this piece of marble. Kelly says, all right, can you let me know when to pick it up? And I said, so, Kelly, I'm so sorry. Someone came and got it about two hours ago. And she said, how come you would do this to me? I said I wanted it. I said, kelly, I'm ghosted probably 5,000 times per day on this stuff. It's nothing against you, and I hope I did not ruin your day. She's like, no, I've been ghosted before too. You didn't ruin my day.

[Heather]

Take care. Hilarious. Yeah, I'm sorry. I'm. I'm ethical. And if somebody has first dibs, I wait until they take it.

[Corey]

What I do is I say first dibs. But in my listing, I said, I will always choose someone who can come and get it first. So, like, you already know. Yeah, yeah, you already know, Kelly.

[Heather]

Last one in productions and systems is organize your cutters. This is Corey's one because she says she spent a lot of time and it says, spend the summer organizing your cutters by shop theme or usage. Now, the approach of cutter organization is unique to the baker. It is unique.

[Corey]

It's so funny because my brain works a weird way. What ends up in Father's Day in sports does the cheerleading. Is it sports? Technically. But is it birthday?

[Heather]

No.

[Corey]

Is it graduation? It's. It's how your mind works. The thing is, when you can organize your cutters and get hyper organized with them, whether you do a software out there or you do a physical thing that your brain works with. I had a construction theme, and I have a few different sets of construction cookie cutters. One was from the Sprinkle Factory. One was from Liz Biz in my construction theme bin. I've then put those in two separate bags. So when I have the idea of the next construction theme, I can say, okay, I'm just going to go with the Liz Fizz on here. I'm going to go with the sprinkle factory and just grab those bags to really keep me organized. So I'm not searching. Like, I knew I had a hat for Liz viz, but I can't find the construction hat cutter.

[Heather]

It's confusing because some cutters belong in more than one place, but you don't find twice. Of course, if you have the stl, you can print them twice. But now you're, now you're eating space. You are, you are. So yeah, find a system that, that works well with your brain. You could take somebody else's system, but if your brain works differently, it's going to be very unintuitive.

[Corey]

I do want to say, if you have not joined this group, join it. The Cookie Identification cutter group. Cookie Cutter Identification group is what it's

[Heather]

called,

[Corey]

like sweetly printed. Just closed down her shop and she took down her entire listing. So you can't even see what the cutters that you bought look like. If you want to get organized. Those cutters, you don't know what they are. Probably their word cutters because I'm speaking from some experience right here. You're never going to use them. So I have them and I see that they are in the back to school bin, but I don't know what they are. Get those identified. Right now the Cookie Countess sells these little tags and they have a little rubber band on them in a little paper tag and you can actually write what they are as they are identified. So you have one less thing to remember and you just tag it in there, put it in the box. And when you go to find your cookie cutters, it already has the tag. So you can be like, oh, that says back to school.

[Heather]

Tag it and tag it. Interestingly. Okay, so this house does not have any drawers in the bathrooms.

[Corey]

Oh yeah, you just have cupboards.

[Heather]

That's what I mean. But I came from a bathroom with a lot of drawers and not as many cupboards. My system there does not translate here. Yeah, turns out like cupboards are not great at space management because they're taller than they are wide. But things need a bottle, right?

[Corey]

You need a shelving system.

[Heather]

Then I said, okay, let me group. I have. Okay. You know, you go to the Ulta and you buy something that is going to. Supposed to change your life and it doesn't.

[Corey]

Yeah, yeah.

[Heather]

It's not. Not throwing. You don't want to throw it away. Don't want to give it away. You want to use it, but you're not using it frequently enough. Yeah. So it doesn't deserve prime real estate, but it needs to still exist because you got a hoarding tendency. You know what I mean?

[Corey]

Yes, yes.

[Heather]

So I decided the way my brain was working, I would categorize things by broad categories. Always work better than really tight categories. Yeah.

[Corey]

Because you're gonna have one or two

[Heather]

high and he's gonna be alone. So I said, okay. Hair, skin, makeup, those are my broad four. And then one is spf. Because for some reason I have so much sunscreen. I guess I was on a sleep.

[Corey]

Bring some for me. I would like to try when we go out.

[Heather]

I have a lot. I was trying to find that nice consistency. You know, sometimes it's tacky. I have.

[Corey]

You want UVB and uva.

[Heather]

Sometimes you want UVB and uva.

[Corey]

You want them in the same. If you have one. I'm asking.

[Heather]

I'm putting in my request. I'll just read the whole bin.

[Corey]

I'll read it.

[Heather]

But okay, so what I did is broad categories and then I put them in bins. Well, now we've got weird shapes and sizes. Anyways, the concept. I said, well, my brain would like if it's been open before, it needs to can't touch things that have never been opened. So I wrote the expiration date on them. Yeah, I know. Because it's just so much random stuff that I've tried or that I loved and used or that I loved and don't like anymore. Because once I got a pimple and I figured it was probably that couldn't

[Corey]

be the mound amount of sugar.

[Heather]

It's not me touching my face and eating sugar. It has got to be this single product whose sole purpose was to stop a pimple. Something to keep in mind is figure out how your brain naturally thinks and then build around that. Don't do what Corey just did because if you don't think like that, then you're not going to find it intuitive. Point two, Proficiency and skill building in the summer months.

[Corey]

Oh, this one's great. Especially if you don't have a lot of orders coming in during the summer's months.

[Heather]

Learn one new technique. And that could be a photography as a technique or it could be florals as a technique, or it could be lettering as a technique or airbrush. Something that you can learn in the slow time that you can use as a thing to garner more orders. Your differentiator.

[Corey]

Yeah, we have a boot camp coming up about creating videos. If you haven't created videos and you're like, I want to start now so I can be good by Christmas and showcase my pop ups and my pre sales, that'd be a great one. And it's only 13. But if you went to the Vendee Blendy last year and bought a ton of courses like floral courses from the Miller's wife and you've not cracked those open tis the season.

[Heather]

Here's my little hack for the mental block that I have a bunch of courses and I've never taken one. Forget that you have a bunch of courses, just take one. You're. That is your A plus is just taking one. The boot camps are really designed for this. Learn one new specific skill one.

[Corey]

Yeah, they're really hyper specific. If you bought from the Miller's wife, she has like 50 techniques in one course. That's great. Say I want to do better florals. I want my florals to look like her. Go to that part of the course that you bought.

[Heather]

You don't need to list the whole thing. Yeah, yeah. I used to buy books on Audible and felt like obligated to listen to the whole thing. But I'm like, I'm only wasting my time. So I was like, there can be a point at which that was a nice nugget right there. I'm gonna stop reading the book. I did not enjoy this book and I don't want to do it anymore. So another one is design. We used to always say this one, this was our July collab last year. I remember Christmas in July was a class.

[Corey]

Yes, it was.

[Heather]

So it's designer Q4 set now. Like Corey said, she has these STL libraries that these cutter shops are coming out with are pretty good. But Corey said with a digital subscription we're treating it like a storage, like, wow, just download it when I need it. Whereas that's going to renew and be a high cost. So she's saying, and this is what she's been working on is going to these STL libraries and downloading and categorizing all the STLs doesn't even mean she needs to print them. But when she can download them and then cancel subscription, you can save money there too.

[Corey]

Yeah. So in the evenings when I don't cook, my husband cooks dinner. While he's talking about his day, I'm just clicking right click save as. Right click save as.

[Heather]

You're seeing an image here. Not up a creek without a picture pedal.

[Corey]

Yeah, yeah. Especially because when shops close down, I don't want to be like, what did this look like?

[Heather]

And Then you're back asking people, does anyone have a picture of this?

[Corey]

The biggest thing though, I want to say, and Heather has taught me over the years, you want to stay organized. So when you're downloading the STL files, we don't just want it to be a big one. Like say if you are with the Sprinkle Factory. We don't just want to throw all the STLs in one folder called the Sprinkle Factory because that doesn't help us. We want to narrow it down. So what I've been doing is going to patriotic and creating a folder that says patriotic and putting the patriotic ones in there and then putting it under the Sprinkle Factory so I'm not wasting time when I need a patriotic cookie cutter.

[Heather]

My biggest hack in digital organization is folder and file names.

[Corey]

Yes.

[Heather]

And the way I always do it is year. So you'd be 2026 month underscore month. So 06 underscore day. So 02 underscore broad category holiday. Or yeah, I would just say broad category STL, broad category sprinkle factory. So where the STL came from? Narrow category holiday, more narrow category July 4th. And I would also add the word Independence Day so I could search for both.

[Corey]

If you have seen, which I did this weekend, the movie Back Rooms. What Heather just said is the full version of that movie.

[Heather]

I feel like you keep dragging it.

[Corey]

No, you have to know the lore in the backstory. Otherwise you're sitting there confusal bobbed and you're waiting for the movie to end. So I did it backwards.

[Heather]

Oh, absolutely.

[Corey]

The whole time I was confused with Bob that I went and got more popcorn.

[Heather]

When you. When you take time to put salt on the popcorn movie, it's not everyone loved.

[Corey]

I mean everyone in there knew the backstory in the lore but me. So when the movie ended, the entire place erupted in him clapping and applause.

[Heather]

That's always a good movie when there's a cheering at the end.

[Corey]

Yeah, but there's so many rooms in this back room. But Heather's folder structure is similar to

[Heather]

that where you get.

[Corey]

You tell me you want me to search for something.

[Heather]

I also will take the folder name and I'm Windows Computer. I don't know what you Apple people do. I'll take go open the folder and then do control A which selects every file and then F2 the button at the top find. No, it's just a called F2.

[Corey]

Okay.

[Heather]

Yeah, it's for function I guess but F2 and it allows you to rename every file within that folder. So then I'll name it the same name of the folder itself. So now even the images will show

[Corey]

up in search Pinteresting.

[Heather]

That's if you guys ever have the class kits and wonder how I got all those things in order. That's how you do that.

[Corey]

Oh, that's so nice.

[Heather]

Thank you. You can also. Oh, yeah. So you could get all your Christmas and July stuff done. Now. I know you might say, well, something might be trending. You could always add that later.

[Corey]

But adding one thing versus adding ten things way different in the time frame you're looking at there.

[Heather]

Find out the color palette you want your Christmas designs to look like, whatever that is, and then kind of go from there. Point three, Marketing. Can't be a podcast about marketing unless we talk about it. Build a content library. So a lot of times we're the best. Like plans of mice and men, we say, I want this content, but I haven't taken any photos in these slow months. You have time to organize, create, photograph, store, plan, schedule out content. I know that Facebook Business planners scheduler only goes out for like a month and a half on pages. Yeah. But third party apps like one I use called feedhive allow me to schedule for you. I can schedule out for a year, which is.

[Corey]

It's a. It's be aggressive.

[Heather]

Be aggressive.

[Corey]

No scheduling out. Here's the thing I want to say. You are like, okay, twins, you told me to plan for Christmas. It's only June and July is right around the corner. I don't have orders coming in for Christmas. I'll be wasting my time and money. No, you're not. Because Christmas in July is nationally celebrated now. You're going to make your samples now.

[Heather]

Okay?

[Corey]

Because you got your cookie cutters organized. You're going to make those samples. You're going to do a giveaway in July, but your photos are going to be taken. You know your color palette, you know your packaging. You're going to do a giveaway to then build your. And we're going to talk about newsletter so that when we come to December, November, time frame, when you send the newsletter out about your pre sale, it's being opened.

[Heather]

You can start building. I'll talk about that in a second. You start building out those products. You don't have to publish them on your website. Yeah, yeah. So we're just ready to go. You're just ready to fire it off when you're really busy. You're not that. I meant to, but I never got around to it.

[Corey]

That's the biggest thing I see bakers do around the holidays. Guys, I'm so late. I'm so sorry. I know I promised you a pre sale drop today and I can't. Or they just take pictures of the packaging or. Or they take the cutter shops graphic and be like, this is what I'm thinking. What do you guys know? If you want it is costing you sales. But you're like, but I ran out of time. It's something's better than nothing. But now is the time to make sure you're not leaving the cash on the table.

[Heather]

So we have the time now. These little months especially if you take a break, you have plenty of time. And I know the mental thing is I'm taking a break from the whole concept. But you could take a break from orders but not leave the whole concept of your bakery.

[Corey]

I think taking a break from from customers is different than taking a break from cookies. Like we all have downtime. Like kids are outside playing and they don't want to play with you. That'd be like, oh, I'll squeeze out a few ideas. And you're not dealing with customers. I think when people take a break, it's like taking a break from the business side of it.

[Heather]

That's a rough one because that's. That requires the defibrillator paddles.

[Corey]

I'm back. I'm back.

[Heather]

And you get that whole like there is these rumors out. I don't think I've ever like actually like a write up the statistics that if you take big breaks and come back, your page will never get to where it was with that original engagement. I see something that the algorithm does not like about breaks.

[Corey]

Oh, breaks on social media are different just than I'm not taking orders. If you're like I'm not taking orders and I'm ghosting my marketing wild work. But you do you boo boo at

[Heather]

the end of the day. I saw this creator that like she sells courses on creating content but she said the number one way she's grown her is millions of followers. The number one way. And she's like, it's just consistency. And that consistency is posting once a day a real specifically. Yeah, but that's. So if they're saying to grow your page it has to be consistent. It's hard for you to continue to grow a page while you're being extremely inconsistent with these massive breaks.

[Corey]

Yeah, I, yeah can confirm. I, I feel like I'm a slave to the algos. I enjoy the marketing side of it so I enjoy posting something and being like, let me see how this does. But it can be bedraggling because I'm like, oh, yet another day to come up with something to post.

[Heather]

But that's just. We're just a slave to it for sure. Audit and refresh your storefront, which for 99 of us is a website. So update the website or the order form like Corey said. Go through the kinks. I always find residual references to things that no longer apply.

[Corey]

Oh yeah, I see broken links to Valentine's Day pre sale of bygones of years gone by. People mentioning that they're taking off January of 2025.

[Heather]

Always, always an Instagram bio to humble you. Yeah, a big one. Corn. I forget specifically I do is the hyperlink to the link tree always has stuff past class. Yeah. It's fun. Pin post always sneak up and get you especially in Facebook groups since it's a collapsed. Collapsed feature. Yeah, yeah. Just.

[Corey]

Yeah.

[Heather]

Lists and make that things that need to be updated.

[Corey]

And if you put it. If you make a list like Heather's talking about it and you don't just happen upon it like oh shoot, how long has that been up? If you have a list that you know on June, on June 1, I go through my tick. My Tick Tock bio. I go through my Shorby link. I go through my link tree. I go through my website and just do a once over to make sure every. Everything looks up to date.

[Heather]

Click on them links and see. It's hard.

[Corey]

And you're like twins.

[Heather]

Are you clicking?

[Corey]

No, we're not always clicking. Let me tell you.

[Heather]

Also scan that QR code, make sure it's not dead.

[Corey]

Yeah, yeah.

[Heather]

The resurgence. And I think some of them got a little sneaky sneak. Although if you're big in the link shortening. Bitly. I've used Bitly for years and then it came up with. Now it sends you to an ad before it sends you to the link. So wherever they.

[Corey]

Because they were going to have to make money somehow some way. Here's the thing with the QR codes that Heather's talking about. A lot of people just googled how to make a QR code. The first website that popped up let you make one for free. Listen, you made it for free for like a month and then you needed to rent it. So they owned your QR code and then you were that held it hostage for a monthly fee that no good. No good. Because then you got your business card printed and now it goes nowhere except

[Heather]

for sign up for QR code for free. Yeah. So Something to keep in mind. Fix the pricing page if you did update your prices sometime. One time Corey updated her prices, but she didn't tell me. So the website and order form or two different prices.

[Corey]

Yeah.

[Heather]

If you were running a discount or sale, take that stuff down, things like that, make sure your booking process is smooth again. We always want that funnel to be as short and as consistent as possible. Setting up autoresponders. A lot of times the autoresponders get people into trouble because you forget to check them.

[Corey]

They're not being oh yeah, like I. My autoresponder says this is unmanned. This you are on an unmanned mission.

[Heather]

If you would like to place an

[Corey]

order, go to here. So I see the movie Understone.

[Heather]

That's where you're at right now.

[Corey]

I don't want to. That's DM is not where I take my order. So if you're asking then I need you to just go to the form because it's going to answer everything that you need. But I see a lot of people's. Especially now that Facebook. Every time you post to your Facebook business page it says do you want to add a send now a message now button? So we're inviting messages when you do that. And then I'll accidentally try to like the. You can like a picture on Facebook by double clicking. But when I double click. When I double click and there's a message option, it automatically sends a message. So I'll be like, sorry, random baker. I was trying to support you in the feed and I ended up in your messages but they're that double tapping

[Heather]

because I was like, how am I liking this stuff? I'm just trying to scroll.

[Corey]

Yeah, it gives you just a. Like you don't get a love or anything like that. But when I'm on the go, I like to show any baker that falls in my feed now I'm like everyone's top fan. It was like, you're this top fan, you're this top fan. I'm like, great. Those autoresponders though are a dead giveaway that you aren't monitoring it because they'll be like, hey guys, taking off for January 2025. But stay tuned for my Valentine's Day pre sale.

[Heather]

Uhhuh. Websites. Big offender. These is you were selling class tickets on your website, but the class is passed and it's always like, come to my March 2025 class. It'll be great. Yeah, hopefully it was great.

[Corey]

No, there's so many different instances. The thing is we like to look up to date in, in by going and adding like I'm now currently booking for June and Aug. June through August. Great. But it's so hard to come back and remember. Oh shoot, I did put that out there and now I forgot to change it.

[Heather]

Another one. If you are interested in SEO or AEO or something. A, E, I, O, U. I don't know how to farm. If you want to get your website ranking, now is where you have to plant the seed. It does take a while. It's not an instantaneous thing. There's a lot of strategy behind it. However, you need content for content to rank. Yeah. Now that content's being pulled into these LL MLP models. There's a lot going on with acronyms and we have. So if you want to create that content. So you say like optimize for custom cookies near me. Because when come Christmas time, that's how people are finding these bakers really quickly.

[Corey]

If you have a Google business profile, they'll send you a monthly update on, you know, what was searched and how you ended up in the searches. It is always custom cookies near me.

[Heather]

I find myself doing near me searches a lot. It was when Corey and I were in Tesio and that was a new thing. The nearby search.

[Corey]

Yes.

[Heather]

Then it became everyone optimized for near Me near me because it was a weird thing that nobody typically did. And now I find myself restaurants near me.

[Corey]

What's so funny? I passed a truck, a plumber truck and his name was literally Plumbers Near Me.

[Heather]

That's an old school style, a residual artifact. That's what they said back when the

[Corey]

phone book was big. You named it AA Aardvark Plumbing Incorporated.

[Heather]

So now that we have AI incorporated into Google search, it's a little bit. The strategy has changed a bit to kind of answering questions. So Corey would write an article, say how to find a baker near me. So you can kind of see that's trying to. That's a lot more strategy needed than what I just said. So don't go around scrambling that down. But I'm saying we. You can even ask the AI Cory and I were talk to talking to an I think Gemini and I said pull up the baker that you'd recommend in Lake Ridge. And it wasn't Corey. And I said can I ask you why you selected this? And it was like, yeah, here's the reasons why I didn't select this and here's why I did. And based off of what I think you want, I gave you this answer. So I was like, okay, now tell me How I can get her website to show up for this. Yeah. Here's what I would do.

[Corey]

I know. Granted, it's not a end all, be all. And what AI is doing is pulling off of knowledge on the Internet. So you have to be on there for it to even find you.

[Heather]

It can't find nothing, that's for sure.

[Corey]

It cannot find nothing.

[Heather]

Instead of trying to find directories and interlinking the directory so it seemed more official. It was, it was an interesting concept. It was, it was. We even need to push back on this. Let's explore it a little bit more.

[Corey]

Just stop being mean to my sister. AI, we're not trying to be mean to your sister. But I can see where you got that from.

[Heather]

Moving on to the next point, grow and nurture an email list. Or maybe you could start a text list if you wanted. Like we talked about getting those emails for the last six months. Yes. We're in the. We're in the sixth month of the year. We're halfway through 2026. These six months past people can become your six months future people.

[Corey]

Oh, yeah.

[Heather]

Nurturing that lead.

[Corey]

I want to say I live in a very transient area. I get new orders from new people all the time. But then they move away because cost of living is high here. The job market always moving.

[Heather]

A lot of transient areas.

[Corey]

Yeah. A lot of military here. So whoever has bought for me in the last year, that's my hottest commodity the last six months. I want to keep those people and I want to be top of mind because I know they're still local.

[Heather]

That's a good one. You can grow your email list if you have a week email list. You could run a giveaway in the summer for some freebie or something. A cookie class ticket if you wanted. Something like that. Something to get that email list going and then to start scheduling out those emails. Now in email scheduling software, you can schedule out till whenever. Like I would say, write those emails now.

[Corey]

Yeah, I would. That would be great to do in the summer. I would say instead of being like, I'm going to email them every single day. Not great. I want to say do it as like a graph. So right now we don't need a ton of emails going out, especially if you're not working during the J months. But as we approach the busier times, that would be when you want to stay top of their email. So that would be a great way to say, okay, I'm going to send One out in August.

[Heather]

2. September. 3.

[Corey]

No, 3. October 4th. November. In December. That I'm going to just burn up their inbox.

[Heather]

The mechanic shop I used to go to, it's down too far away. But this is their email Strategy. On the first of day, I get a 10 coupon for an oil change. Now, Now. Because the oil change is always $10 off. I just think it was priced $10 higher. So. Absolutely. The hobby lobby.

[Corey]

Yeah, I got.

[Heather]

It does trigger in my head, oh, I gotta get the car inspected.

[Corey]

They want you to go there for the inspection. So they can be like, legitimately.

[Heather]

I'd probably never think about them. Yes. You send that email. I'm like, oh, yeah, I gotta go check to see if my car's up today.

[Corey]

But I want to say now you. There's some text messaging things that I won't unsubscribe from because I do appreciate the reminders. There's some that are just way too much. Paula's choice, looking at you, you that I will unsubscribe and block. So you. You've lost me all together. You'll never be able to reach me.

[Heather]

I know. So there's a. There's a level of consistency. You could be the first Monday of each month. Cory and I send out the newsletter every Wednesday, weekly. So that's. They expect to get 40amonth. Or you can do an email quarter, but the consistency is there. Building that list, nurturing that list, organizing those past orders and getting them to a list and then getting them segmented, which we talked about a past podcast.

[Corey]

You know what would be a cool one to do is pre sale. If you do those Advent calendars, pre sell them in July for Christmas. In July and then ask those people that order, do you want to be added to a text messaging list where I send you a reminder that today is your first day to give it to your kids. That'd be a great way to make it more natural and not so invasive.

[Heather]

The double opt in is always the win or the forcing people to opt in. I know we get. We are like, oh, I need a big email list. No, you need a quality email list. I'd rather send an email to five people. So we have our newsletter. It has 9,000 subscribers, but a lot of those come from the Vendee blendy. They want to win a door prize. Sure. As soon as a Vendee blends, they're immediately unsubscribing. Yeah.

[Corey]

Because they either didn't win or they're like, I'm annoyed of hearing, or they're

[Heather]

just doing, I didn't want this anyways. Yeah, yeah. So. But. But it cost me money to pay for them to sign up. So there's unrealized cost there just to build a big email list. So some people say. And they always ask, like Heather, I'm about to cross a billing threshold here. Should I go back through and delete people? Yeah, I know. Like mailchimp will tell you when people have never opened an email from you, it's, oh, you're not going to get to them. So anything.

[Corey]

Let them go.

[Heather]

Cut them loose.

[Corey]

You're free.

[Heather]

You're free. And then the final one for this podcast topic is plant relationship seeds. There you go. Landscaper Seeds, Seeds. You shouldn't see me. I went out with that Fisker. I should have seen you or seen me over seeding. Was it a pre emergent. I went out with that Fisker weed puller. Dandelions have a. It's called a tap root. It goes real deep in the center. Yeah.

[Corey]

They have one center. One.

[Heather]

Did you know if you find a dandelion, of course it's got those little weed like it does and you just pick the leaves off. You've created a super dandelion. You pruned it.

[Corey]

You've pruned it for success.

[Heather]

It comes back something ever so. But you have to get down under the dirt and grab him from his bun forwards.

[Corey]

What's so funny? This has nothing to do with anything, but I've been going on a tremendous amount of walks to beat my walking count. I don't know why. There is my neighbor's bush. You know, bushes are like a holly bush is pretty sturdy. Oh, a dandy dandelion has grown up through the bush. But because the bush has reinforced its neck, the dandelion's neck. It is higher than the size of myself. I will if it's not.

[Heather]

If it's the. If the.

[Corey]

I stood eye to eye with the top of a dandelion.

[Heather]

Does he have a yellow top or a seat? He was yellow.

[Corey]

Now he's seated. He's so tall. It is so tall.

[Heather]

Dandelion clients had a marketing team that, hey, make a wish and blow on it so I can spread my weed seeds is genius.

[Corey]

Oh, yeah. And it says, like, hold your marketing internal. You're never going to reach anyone. It out. And it reaches all the dandelion pr.

[Heather]

Unmatched.

[Corey]

We'll have to do a dandelion metaphor.

[Heather]

Yeah. The little girl next to me, she's like, can I blow on this? I was like, no, you specifically cannot do that.

[Corey]

Or yanks it from her Hand.

[Heather]

We have to gently carry it as to not relationship seats. So reach out to local businesses, vendor, events planners, complimentary or collaborative things. I know Corey likes to do that if the conversation today will result in the collaboration or the event or the vendor show in Sigma.

[Corey]

So this past weekend I went to a farmer's market and I said, I said, corey, you're going to have an out of body experience because you're going to ask people to be on your video. So this one man yells at me, do you want a free sample of jam? I said, only if you want to

[Heather]

be in a video, sir. And he's like, what?

[Corey]

And I was like, yeah, just tell me what makes you different, where we can find you and how often you're at this farmer's market. So he did. He did a great job. And then I went to a cookie lady, you know, gotta help my bakers out. And I said, is your name Belinda? She's like, that's my mom's name in the baker's name. I said, well, you're Belinda in my heart now. She did that video. It ended up getting shared by the county, which is great. My face was everywhere. It got shared by the farmer's market and it got cheered by the vendors that I highlighted.

[Heather]

So that is a way to get your bakery name shared out there. It's. It's awkward. You know, if you want to sign up for the bootcamp, you'd say awkward is I doubt your cyan bistro one. I listen to the whole thing. I was like, so, like you could. I know Corey partnered with a lady who did Adult Picnic Phoenix.

[Corey]

I did.

[Heather]

Who brought in a lady who did florals, who also brought a lady who did photography. So that collaboration, they created a ton of photos. So it was a photo shoot and they created promotional materials that goes back to that content batching tip. Yeah.

[Corey]

What's. You'll actually, I edited the video. You'll be seeing it on my stuff lately, if you follow me. What my goal is is yes, I got a ton of content out of that two. I created relationships with both the florist who does weddings and the little picnic lady who does picnics. And my goal is for them to reshare it so I can reach their audience because they're also hyper local. So my, I'm. I'm doing a three for. I'm making my marketing work for me with the goal of like a threefold and not instead of just a one fold.

[Heather]

So that takes us to our summer tip. Obviously you could come up with A billion of these. But we had to have a podcast. We did. We had to end it somewhere, do all the things and don't miss out one thing that you should have done. And if.

[Corey]

And then if you have slow sales, blame yourself for not calling.

[Heather]

You can never complain about them because you didn't do everything you could possibly think of. Also. But these are some ideas. If you knocked out even half of these, you're going to be in a better place.

[Corey]

Absolutely. And we're not saying to do them all. We have to bring a podcast topic a week to you guys. But if you did some of these and check them off your summer bucket list, your marketing is going to stay piping hot even through the cold months.

[Heather]

Corey really liked that tagline. I'm hyping it in the newsletter. Okay, so speaking of creating content, we have our cookie videos bootcamp. I'm just about done with the modules. Corey created a 59 page slide deck and talked for two hours.

[Corey]

I had a lot to say. I had a lot to say.

[Heather]

It kind of starts with like the. I thought initially what she was going to do is like, here's how to record your cookie. No, she's doing this whole strategy thing of this lifestyle content. How to jump on trends, how to record your cookie videos, things to voice over to make the content more interesting. So it is how to film videos, how to edit videos. But here's the different types of videos she's trying out. And then obviously she got shared by the county of millions of people.

[Corey]

Very local, but hundreds, hundreds of thousands of people.

[Heather]

Here's the goal.

[Corey]

If you take the video bootcamp, you will learn how to make a video. If you make that video and your intro is too long, the video's seven minutes long, you find that you don't get an engagement, you're going to be discouraged. And that's because it's not just video creation that's going to get you views. It's strategy behind the video creation. So we do talk about how to make a video. We go over stands that you can use in the different types of stands. But then we also want to translate that into how can you use video in your marketing strategy to end up with more sales, more views, more shares in your local community? That's my goal.

[Heather]

There's a local guy and he's creating restaurant reviews. And Cory and I were just talking about him, but his day job is videography and he was on TikTok Live last night. So I was listening to it and he said, it's not Translating so great to video because his content is focused on restaurant. It's actually translating really great to restaurants. Getting more sales. Yeah, but he is not a restaurateur. But he's making a side cash from his creator fund. You know, these impression type things. Yeah, but it just says, like to just record the cookie videos won't necessarily pad your pockets. No. So that's where the strategy comes in. And that's kind of what you covered. So this video boot camp is in two days. It'll drop on Thursday, and there'll be a second drop of the materials on Friday. So Corey has stuff Thursday. She's going through this PowerPoint together, kind of talking about the strategy, how approach and some demonstrations. And then on Friday, it's how to edit. Yeah.

[Corey]

Friday it'll be Thursday, we say we actually make our own video. It'll be three short clips and we edit those really easy. And I take you step by step, and then I showcase how to do it on my phone with a screen recording. That night. On Thursday night, my goal and my task for you is to play around with the app. I want you to get in there, I want you to try to do a voiceover. I want you to stumble over your words and say Becky Moy, something like that. So, you know, like, oh, that wasn't as easy as I thought. As the next day, Friday it is shotgun. How to edit. So you're going to see me editing kind of quickly. The videos were ginormous if they were long and drawn out. So what we do is a quick and dirty edit in that if we are bakers and we have to be in the kitchen, we have to do admin tasks, we're taking photos, we're talking to clients. We don't have a ton of time to do a full production. Lights, camera, action. So on day number two, I want you to stop, rewind me, play it back until you understand what we just did there. So I'm telling you, the jump cuts is what keeps people midway through your video to the end of your video. We talk about hooks, how to get someone to watch the first three seconds. These are the things you're going to implement in your strategies.

[Heather]

The millennial pause is problematic. Yeah, the millennium pause, if you don't know what it means. It's that breath and pause before you start talking, which is a very normal way for millennials myself to start talking. It's how we started recording. Those first three seconds, unfortunately, are the most important in terms of whether that video will perform or not. So having that pause is actually detrimental to. In a negative. Yeah.

[Corey]

You would say, if I saw Heather, it would be normal for me to be like, hey, Heather, how are you?

[Heather]

You.

[Corey]

There's some creator, and that's the one that I stalk all the time. She always does her intros. Hi, guys. Okay, you are being polite and saying, hi, guys. You've lost people in the first three seconds that maybe do not know you because you didn't tell them what they're in for. What she needs to do is say, get ready with me because I have to deal with 500 kids today at school. What 500k I'm obsessed with.

[Heather]

I've gotten into the algae for terrible dating first dates to. Yeah. So they're like, guys, put a finger down if you have. So there's a hook. Guys, am I the only one who gets stood up? Like, okay, I want to know what happened?

[Corey]

Yeah.

[Heather]

Like, hold on. It's always that, you know, the Facebook Live tendency to say, let me just wait and see who else is going to that killer there. So the. That's what the boot camp you can expect. The way the boot camps work is you can purchase it today. You'll get an email when the modules drop. We'll get you in the Facebook group today as well. That Facebook group is attached to the date. So it's always say, June 4th and 5th. However, after the bootcamp, you could still purchase this and maybe make that the thing you learned this summer, how to record cookie videos. There's no Facebook group for it once the event has passed, but the evergreen content still applies.

[Corey]

Yeah, you're still gonna learn how to make a video and the strategies. What you're just gonna miss out is the discussions like, hey, guys, I bought the canvas lamp and my head keeps bumping it. What do. What stand do you use? But I do show you all the stands that I've used. The ones that work, the ones I prefer, the ones I don't prefer, and what they're used for either. Lifestyle style, cookie decorating, things like that.

[Heather]

And the boot camps are just 13 bucks. When you sign up, you get a week to upgrade to the cookie college for 13 off. So you get your money back immediately. If you want to do that, you can go to the cookie college.com forward/bootcamp. Or if you want to just buy it directly, it's TheCookieCollege.com Bootcamp5forward/buy.

[Corey]

I do want to say if you. Now that we have some of these boot camps, this is our fifth one, and you're like well there's two of them that I really like. It would save you cash to just sign up for the cookie college because you get access to access to every single boot camp that has happened which is pre sales cookie photography, 3D printing, in person classes and now videography. The next one we will be doing is how to master community groups because it's good to know.

[Heather]

This is a great, this is a great thing to do in the summer to plant the seeds in community groups in the summer so that you're recommended in Q3 and Q4. Yeah.

[Corey]

What's crazy is I'm considering a move next year, a whole one year away. But right now I am joining all the groups of the potential places that I want to move to because I need to get in there, see what the situation is like, learn who the admins are, see how I can help that group grow, be involved in it. Even if I don't sell for another six months, I'm not even over there. So I can't even sell to them. How can I become a commodity to the admin team so that when I do pull the trigger and move, I'm

[Heather]

ready to roll like it. So upcoming boot camps is videos like Cory said, Cracking community groups and procreate. That takes us through August and then we'll start thinking about our. Our September, October, November class.

[Corey]

Yes.

[Heather]

Yes. Very cool. I actually got somebody to text into the gossip column. This is fully anonymous. You. I put the links on the website now so you can go to the podcast and you can just go to the homepage and tech click the button and send this with gossip.

[Corey]

Is it there's a podcast.com that they can go to that what? There's a podcast.com.

[Heather]

no, that takes you to the podcast but if you go to sugarcookingmarketing.com you can I just have that one as a pass through.

[Corey]

It's not a Teresa podcast. There's a podcast.

[Heather]

Podcast.com takes you to Buzzsprout where we host the podcast.

[Corey]

I'm just saying it says It's. There's a podcast.com but a lot of people read it as Teresa podcast.

[Heather]

Teresa loves the podcast. Yeah, she's got it. She's the only. If there's only one lesson, it's Teresa. This one says sneaky workaround. My not so favorite type of client is the one that sees that their date is unavailable on my submission form and decides to choose either the next available date and adds the correct date in the note section or chooses the same date but for next year, but hopes I won't notice. That's creative.

[Corey]

That is. I have had the people change. Like do the next available date and then change it in notes. I've never had someone do a year out.

[Heather]

I know. I guess that's one way to kind of force somebody to tickle it at it. Sure. I'll take your order for your baby shower cookies 12 months from now. Congrats on your impending pregnancy. But I'm still booked on your date this year. I'm 15 years into this and I still get excited when I get order inquiries. So it's super disappointing when someone wastes my time by ignoring my black updates. Is it petty to wait until the end of my 24 hour response time and then respond that I'm fully booked?

[Corey]

No.

[Heather]

Girl, that is hilarious. No, Corey has this problem too, where people are like. Like, hey, I saw that was blacked out. So I wanted to contact you in a different way.

[Corey]

Yeah. To see if maybe I could bully you into opening it back up.

[Heather]

Let me tell you, Cory will open that bad boy back up.

[Corey]

I will.

[Heather]

Yeah.

[Corey]

But believe me, I'm.

[Heather]

I'm your guys. Because clients from hell.

[Corey]

What I wish I could do is say on my form, I may be booked. But if you send me an idea, and I think it's easy enough, I may be unbooked.

[Heather]

Listen, I'm gonna tell you now. And until I see that they don't take your money.

[Corey]

Yeah.

[Heather]

If somebody can figure out a way to word that, that'd be great.

[Corey]

I don't know.

[Heather]

Too difficult. Sorry. Yeah.

[Corey]

Would you.

[Heather]

I wouldn't. I would say waiting to the end of your 24 hour response time is absolutely fine. I mean, would you ever not reply? Because that's somebody taking advantage of a loophole they've attempted to create.

[Corey]

Well, let me tell you a situation that just happened to me in April. Some corporate client found my Google website and needed a turnaround time in less than 24 hours. I there. It was no physical possible way to make the amount of cookies they needed in the turnaround time possible. So I said, I'm not even going to reply to that. They know one they got hit with. If you would like to schedule an order, please fill out this form. And that date obviously was grayed out because there's no way. But I said, you know, it takes four seconds for me to just build a relationship, even if I am giving them a no. So I said, hey, I actually can't do cookies with that quick of a turnaround. I would love to earn your business in the future. Can I just get an idea of what kind of designs you're looking for? So if we ever did it in the future, I would just know. Already ghosted. She did not even respond. I know that they were trying to get someone to bake cookies last minute. So I said no, love lost. Four seconds out of my day and whatever. On Thursday, same lady reaches out, but she needs last, last. It was more last minute. She had read my email that I can't do a day turnaround. So she said, what if you did it for Monday?

[Heather]

Two days? Yeah, girl.

[Corey]

And I said. She was like, but we just need

[Heather]

you to deliver to dc.

[Corey]

And I said, no chance in hell.

[Heather]

But I appreciate it.

[Corey]

If you ever should find yourself in

[Heather]

the Libra, Dario, I'd love to do it.

[Corey]

And she said so I just assumed that it was not going to work out. Then she messaged and she's like, you know what? We appreciated your email back in April. April. And we know you want to work with us. We're going to send a courier service. So I ended up okay, there you go.

[Heather]

Respect goes a long way, even when you're ghosted.

[Corey]

I. I know it was against my will to send that email, but it

[Heather]

did work out, I guess. Thank you. Sneaky work around texture. I like that. This is a good one. Good for thought for sure. Food, upcoming events. The collabs we have. The Meet the Baker collab is in two weeks. Starting after this collab, we're going to limit the number of participants and there's a couple reasons for that. So that if you sign up, you actually have to do, but also so that I can create a tight list and force engagement through going this spreadsheet versus hoping that the hashtag pulls in your content.

[Corey]

The hashtags on Instagram did something weird a couple years ago, so they've limit the amount of hashtags. AI is really reading your your post now, and that's where it's categorizing them. But when you search hashtags, not everyone's post is showing up. That's nothing that we can control. That's an algorithmic thing. So what we see is it is depressing to do the work for a collab and not have, you know, some of the juice of the comments for the collab. So if we limit the amount of people so it's doable and we have like 20 links for people to click in that way everyone gets love and affection in the feeds. That to me is better than getting a tremendous Amount of people to sign up up only to have half of the people not even show and do it.

[Heather]

Right. I'll say that. Typically a boot camp. I'm sorry Boot camp. Typically a collab for you get about 20 to 30 comments. So probably just limit to. To 20 or 30 Baker. Yeah.

[Corey]

Which is way more than I ever see.

[Heather]

It's gonna get so. And then it's much easier to manage and then I'm not sending out emails to 500 of you and getting 400 of you saying that something crazy happened this week and you can't do it.

[Corey]

Yeah. The great. The thing about the collaboration is they are putting you out there and giving you content ideas that maybe you typically wouldn't do. Like I wasn't planning to sit in front of a camera in a kitchen for a June collab, but here I am doing it and I'm going to appreciate that one. That's a lot of content for me to use. I can update my profile picture. I can update my business page. I can update my Instagram, my LinkedIn, things like that. I can update my Google my business. It's. It's giving me endless content to work with with and it's an excuse to grow my business and a little pat on the back by the comments I get on Instagram then.

[Heather]

So the July collab. I know maybe it. I'm not sure. We can't do the fourth of July because the collabs was on the third Friday. Work with Cor on it. Events. Upcoming events is a Cookie Con happy hour. I call it the Frappy Hour. Hosted by Heather Campbell Brookshire. She's a Disney trip planner. Cookie Con is in Orlando. If you want a. A just a bubbly personality to break the ice. You can't go. You found it with Heather and Kim. They call themselves other Heather. Heather Corey. Find them. Go to this frappy hour and grab a coffee, grab some snacks and mingle. You will be well taken care of. You will now be well taken. Careful.

[Corey]

You can say hi to in the

[Heather]

hallway without feeling a freak of nature. Yeah.

[Corey]

If you want someone bubbly planning your Disney vacation. Someone excited that like you're experiencing the monorail for the first time time. Heather Campbell Brookshire. That's your girl.

[Heather]

She has them on. Look for the girl in the monorail dress. I hope she wears it now. I would probably. I hope she does.

[Corey]

I know you really pressured Andrea Vendy Blending.

[Heather]

We're starting to talk about it. It's The Black Friday 1 day online sales event that we've hosted this will be maybe the fifth year. The fifth, I think. I think so. Or yeah. I don't think we did the first year.

[Corey]

I don't think we did.

[Heather]

This will be the fifth. Yeah. So that's in 25 weeks. It's on Black Friday. It lasts for 24 hours. It's absolute chaos. It's overwhelm. Tears, gnashing of teeth, celebration, yelling, crying, screaming during things. Yeah, I'll talk about that when I have to. Not against my. It'll be against my mom. Major holidays. A lot of schools have already graduated. A lot of last day of schools have come and gone. Some of you guys are going late into the summer. But those roughly one to two weeks and then schools out for the summer. School out for the summer. Father's Day is in three weeks. Is that a decent seller?

[Corey]

It's way better than Mother's Day. Miss. Mother's Day is big. It's not big.

[Heather]

Mother's Day not big. Stop trying to make Mother's Day work. La Cor legends that mothers think of the fathers, but fathers don't think of the mothers.

[Corey]

I do. I do.

[Heather]

At least when they finally do think of them, it's only because there's three bouquets left at the Walmart and you can't place a cookie order anyways. Yes, Summerween. We're. We're forcing Summerween to be a thing.

[Corey]

It's a thing that's in four weeks.

[Heather]

It's summer.

[Corey]

It's Halloween in the summer.

[Heather]

For people who love Halloween, apparently it's catching on. But we thought it'd be cool if bakers could make more sales from a holiday that does sell well. But bring it into the summer where there's nothing.

[Corey]

Yeah.

[Heather]

Fourth of July. And America's 250th birthday is in five weeks. Happy birthday, America. National Sugar Cookie Day is a pointless day. I just wrote it down because we all like to post about it.

[Corey]

We do.

[Heather]

It is July 9th. Point I probably just added because there's nothing going on for the rest of July and August.

[Corey]

I think you're like national.

[Heather]

Like Donut hole Day. Anything national.

[Corey]

Brush your teeth there.

[Heather]

It's like it's time to celebrate. That toy. Corey had to take her son to the dentist and he got in trouble for being on his phone. And Corey walked out with the little biv on to have a hard time because I'm getting my teeth clean.

[Corey]

And then the lady from his little booth comes over and be like, your son's on his phone and he's not Brushing his teeth. So I said, put my chair up there. I'll be right back.

[Heather]

See you coming with that little springy bin?

[Corey]

Yeah, My little purple bib blowing in the wind.

[Heather]

Moving on to the STL me about it segment. This is your guys's ability to text into the podcast to get your questions answered. It's sponsored by Cookie Design Lab. You can use code twins to get 15 off. I could see Cory was frantically printing all weekend.

[Corey]

Oh, listen, Cooking Design Lab and me are, are a team that makes last minute custom orders just happen. Like I'm in there all the time. I. If she can know, if she knows. Like Corey just logged in. I'm, I'm logged in all the time. I just like it open. Staring at me at this point.

[Heather]

Who is that? You were so difficult and now they can pry from your cold head.

[Corey]

Oh yeah. Because I'm like, oh, do you want, want your look? You want the shark to wear a cap? Can do that. I can do that.

[Heather]

I saw. Did you. You ended up posting your shark with a hat. I did.

[Corey]

And you'll never guess from that order. I got an order from the competing school, a Viking, and she wants the

[Heather]

Viking to wear a hat or he's going to put a hat on something. So we have four texting questions. The number to text in is 571-556-5644. Yeah, 5644.

[Corey]

I choose number two.

[Heather]

Number two is a four two, five area code. This one is actually funny. So you are the winner of the Cookie Design Lab month. If you email me at heather sugarcookiemarketing.com I'll get you set up. Hi, twins. I have to start by saying I love your podcast. There's so much. They're full of so much information, heart and humor. My question is how do I remove Corey's narrative on the videos from the cookie class kits? I thought I had removed them and I replaced it with music and posted it to my Instagram trying to market my cookie class. But then I go to look at it. It's none of that.

[Corey]

It's just.

[Heather]

Hello.

[Corey]

Yes. Okay, I want to say I use the. In this. We cover it in the video boot camp as well. But I use the app Inshot. It's one of the many apps out there. It's big. It's going to be around for a while. It's very heavily supported. A lot of people use it in. In shot. You're going to bring that clip into there. At the very front of that video will be a megaphone you're going to click the megaphone phone. Corey's voice will disappear, a thing of the past, and then you're going to export it. And I will no longer have audio on there. If you're uploading to just Instagram, because I see Heather's on our phone.

[Heather]

Sorry, class kids.

[Corey]

Okay, if you're uploading to just Instagram or what you're going to do is you're going to bring it in there, you're going to see a little music at the top, and it's going to be asking you do you want to add music to your video? You're going to say yeah. You're going to click it and then it's going to say original audio. And it's going to be. The bar is all going to be up to the top. You're going to toggle that down to nothing and you're going to leave the music 1. Whatever song you choose, you'll leave that one toggled up to the top. My voice will also no longer be with us.

[Heather]

End of an era. Okay, another text in question. You didn't win, but you're a winner for texting in. You could win next week. So please do spam us.

[Corey]

Deb.

[Heather]

Deb's game of consistency in the podcast. It works. Yeah. This is from Hamilton. Hamilton, Ontario. Hi, Heather and Corey. This is Ashley from Ontario. Kennedy Kennedy.

[Corey]

Kennedy.

[Heather]

What in the world? You always think it sounded like Candy. Formerly in the cookie college. My name Ashley Lynn. Oh, yeah, absolutely. I know exactly who that is. I'm a few podcast episodes behind, but in April when you're asking for people to reach out for interviews, a podcast listener from episode. As a podcast listener from episode one, I'd love to be on the show. Happy to give you my story and see if it'd be great fit. Awesome.

[Corey]

Ashley, you're a great fit. Interview done. You got the job.

[Heather]

You have an interesting story. Yeah, so we are. And I've started scheduling these out, having you guys on the podcast so you're not inundated with these voices that are seemingly everywhere, including your Instagram videos.

[Corey]

No more dandelion and overseeding talk.

[Heather]

You liked it?

[Corey]

No, I think I like it, but they need some variety.

[Heather]

I got it.

[Corey]

Yeah.

[Heather]

So, Ashley, I'll reach out to you. Thank you guys so much. Hopefully we can a bunch of these by the end of the year. Then we'll do scheduling them now. Definitely the slow time. Another Text in from 281 Area Code. Howdy from Texas. I just want to say thanks for the monthly collapse. I can. I can't always participate because insert excuse here, but I'm sure there's a ton of work for you all on the back end and I want to let you know it's appreciated. Thanks. Oh, thank you.

[Corey]

No, I appreciate every. I know it's best laid plans of mice and men.

[Heather]

What do you guys are complaining about? Cory's complaining about to me directly.

[Corey]

I'm complaining about it 24 7. I don't like to do. I. I only do the collabs because Heather makes me.

[Heather]

This is this. I wouldn't have done this one. But you need your content, so I get it. I have to. And I'm like marketing, get your butt out there.

[Corey]

But I'm also always grateful that I've done it. After I'm like, oh, that was a really good experience. I got a lot of content out of that. So I understand that to sign up it's you have the. When there's no orders on the books, you're like, yeah, I can totally do that. But then as the month progresses, you're like, I'm getting orders on the books. I can no longer. But I appreciate that you're seeing Heather's hard work and noticing that I'm really putting my myself out there.

[Heather]

So the last Main Street May collab is always the hardest one because you got to go to a business, you got to cookify it, then you got to go back and take a photo of it and then you got to write the copy and hope they attack. But Corey had taken the main street collab which is a photo, but she turned it into a video by doing an interview. Or she went in and said, here's everything about this restaurant that I love. Yeah. That video she uploaded to the cookie boot camp. The cookie videos boot camp that's coming. And when you had it, you said it been saved 30 times. It's been saved 41 times. So she took one piece of content and now that content contents being saved, she posted it to her tick tock as her bakery. So it says. All she says is, I'm Corey with mixing bowl cooking company and I've got to tell you about this place. Yeah.

[Corey]

And so I. I have the pictures from that now I have the videos. The video's been shared, the videos have been saved. I've tied myself to my location. That's the marketing thing. Other and then I liked that so much kicking and screaming that I did it again for a smoothie juice bar. And I'm going to do it again for a Rumor cake business in Manassas.

[Heather]

Romulations.

[Corey]

Yes.

[Heather]

Have you been?

[Corey]

No, but he showed up on my feed and there's strategy by how you choose who to highlight. You want someone who is active on social media who actually gets like. It was so funny. The smoothie guy, when I was there on the farmer's market, he was like, let me get you an action shot in the sun. It looks better on video. So I'm like, you understand the assignment?

[Heather]

Yeah.

[Corey]

So Rumulations, I think is how you pronounce his name. He has a brick and mortar and Manassas, but he's. He does videos all the time and I. He's just got like an addicting personality. So I, I have. I use cookie design lab to turn his rum cake logo into a cookie and I have to ice it. And I was planning on going Thursday, Friday and stopping by making a video.

[Heather]

So funny. Yeah, I wanted to swing by because I like his videos because he features every Thursday. It's like Cupcake Thursday or something. Yeah, yeah. I thought it looked delish. And that tells you videos really add that personality to a business.

[Corey]

But look, Heather and me, unbeknownst to each other, got fed the same video.

[Heather]

Yeah, I have his video saved. Look pretty good. Last text in question, 203 area. Go. Hi twins. Love the podcast. This is a good question from Jordan. I had a question about private classes. I feel like during my normal monthly classes I have a really easy time moving the class along, getting everyone to pay attention. My usual participants really, really want to learn and are so. However, my private classes are a free for all. Everyone's constantly talking between steps, ordering food in the middle of class. And generally they're to have a good time instead of being so concerned about their cookies. Which is great. But I'm trying to get the class wrapped up in two hours I can go home and go to bed and so they can get back to their families. Lol. Should I be giving them more downtime to visit or provide an itinerary when booking class? Do I charge them more for this excessive time they're causing me? Any feedback on private classes would be greatly appreciated. Thank you. Extra.

[Corey]

Yes, you are correct. Private classes aren't there to learn. They're there to have a great time. It's usually friends coming together and the cookies are the afterthought. Them chit chatting about their life updates is the forethought. What you do want to do is set the expectations beforehand. Hey, I'm going to be going. I have booked you for one hour and 30 minutes. If you would like to book an additional 30 minutes, it's this. If we run over, I'll be charging you X amount. You'll see an invoice after the part party. What we want to do is set the expectations beforehand so we don't have an awkward moment after. You're there for one goal and that's to teach a cookie class, not for their family reunion. So it's up to you to set that expectation moving forward, letting them know like, hey, typically these are scheduled for an hour and a half. If we do run over, which typically do, especially when chit chatting starts happening, you'll see an additional bill come to you after for X amount of dollars. If we stick in the hour and 30 minute. Mark, Mark. Forget this part of the email. It does not pertain to you.

[Heather]

Some other things to consider. In a public class, I can always pretend that the venue needs to switch back over to what it was designed for. You can't do that in a private class, especially if it's at somebody's house. I thought this would be a decent idea. Not sure if it's the most annoying idea but when we went to that private class the host knew this would happen. She was also a part of the reason it was so chaotic. But she had a bell she would ring to get people's attention. Attention. I thought it would be neat and interesting. I do know those little bell things.

[Corey]

I think the bell's great. There's this funny dog toy and he is the shape of a pig and he makes the biggest grunting sound that's so like abrasively. See you could do this is my, my pig friend. He keeps us on target. I'm gonna honk him. Something like that to keep you moving.

[Heather]

Make it like comical but have it. Have something that forces them to look up. When people get lost in conversation, they kind of lose track of time. When I'm public class, I can tell who paid for the tickets. Even in a group because that was like I want my money's worth. This wasn't cheap. In these private classes, a lot of times it's friends and not everyone had paid and so they do not care. I also not for the performance. Yeah.

[Corey]

Humanize you and your brand and say hey guys. I have you guys for an hour and 30 minutes. Then I got kids to put in bed. So I'm going to be out of here around 8:30. I'll let you know when class comes to about 20 minutes. Then we're gonna have to wrap things up but after I leave and pack things up, if you want to go and continue on with your cookies, you can, but I will be heading out the door because, you know, these kids don't wash themselves something funny to set the expectation. A lot of times they're humans too. They have kids. They know what the nighttime routine is. And you just saying that out loud isn't unprofessional. It's just setting like, hey, guys.

[Heather]

Yeah. I'm here to say at the beginning, if you say it and they're. They're calamity embodied at the end, it feels like you put like you're frustrated with them. Right. If you say it at the beginning, you're like, yes. Say like, oh, yeah. They know the expectations are set. When you're like, guys, my kids are crying at home. Then people are like, oh, chill, dude.

[Corey]

Yeah, but like, at 20 minutes, if

[Heather]

you set the pre expectations, I love

[Corey]

that I can look at my watch and pretend I got a text message. I be like, oh yeah.

[Heather]

Oh yeah. Looks like there's a.

[Corey]

There's something happening in the kitchen and it's. It's about to be on fire. Guys, we're gonna. We're gonna wrap this bad boy up. Something like that.

[Heather]

You could shorten the class, but then that shortens your. That lessens your value proposition by. By taking out a cookie. They buy more time to come dance or talk, whatever. But then now you have less offering and people don't like that feeling. Yeah, it is a. Something you could do is cut off the beginning. Cory and I do about a 30 to 40 minutes of intro work, which is py. Practice introductions. Take that out if you feel like they're going to go over and just get right into the cook. Cookies.

[Corey]

Yeah.

[Heather]

Cared about. Anyways. They're not trying to bake them.

[Corey]

They're not trying to. Yeah, and we see that. People zone out for that part. For the private classes anyways.

[Heather]

Yeah, some options there. Setting expectations is going to be the best one. And then really leaning in. In the public class, I turn off the lights. No, we.

[Corey]

Heather literally will turn the lights off. And Heather loves the bar closing line.

[Heather]

You don't gotta go home, but you can't stay here. Yeah, listen, you're gonna hear that phrase. There's always somebody who's got the gift of gab and they just want to. Yep.

[Corey]

And Heather with her gift of gab can recognize the gift of gabber.

[Heather]

I see you because I see me. Sometimes somebody will get Corey's ear and you know, you can kind of I'll be like, Corey, hey, we have a little bit of an issue back here. But there's no issue. The issue is a person yapping.

[Corey]

But whatever the twin telepathy is, me and Heather have it. And it's an advantage. There's many disadvantages to being a twin.

[Heather]

An advantage is Heather can get me

[Corey]

out of a hard situation.

[Heather]

Yeah. Corey picks me up on the side of the road. I do.

[Corey]

I do.

[Heather]

Going to our sponsors cookie design lab use code twins to get 15% off. That's the software used to. Used to create STL files. It's really simple to use. Yes. There's other options out there, but sometimes simple is better. It does have more features than we even use. But you just. Can I just. Just load up something and download it in two seconds?

[Corey]

I'm gonna tell you guys. Mind boggling. Mind boggling. How. How often I've accessed that.

[Heather]

Yeah, I seen you print. I. I'm still in control. Of course.

[Corey]

Heather, last night it was or other night it was like 10:05 and then I just get a message from Heather. Get it girl. And I said get what? And she said the cutter dispenses.

[Heather]

Bacon you bake is the meringue powder of your dream again. Code twins get to 10 off. Daisy makes wonder if code twins 10 get you 10 off of her ice cream. Just.

[Corey]

Oh, her ice cream shop.

[Heather]

I doubt it. Daisy makes is the cake pop mold

[Corey]

mold K pop mold lady. And she's always coming out with new designs. If you're doing a wedding set, if you're doing cake pucks like that. That's what she's got like the little circle ones. It's no longer cake balls on a stick. It opens up so many different designs and it's just a lot easier to work with coming from someone who cried almost on their first time with cake pops.

[Heather]

I thought it was your cake pops that were weeping.

[Corey]

Yeah, I, I was using my tears as the. As the binder is what they call it Primera.

[Heather]

Eddie's the direct of food printer. It's pretty. I mean it's pretty fantastic. It's kind of hard to describe. It don't have a discount code for you. It is full price but it pays for itself. And then. So if you wanted to get into corporate orders Christmas is that license to print money. Time for that corporate order stuff. And Eddie will pay for itself come Christmas.

[Corey]

Yeah, I love it now with grad orders. I do not want to pipe someone's logo. So what I did was Heather was in the back of my Mind she likes when I can put an Eddie image with a little pipe. So there was a shark in the water. Is one person's logo. And I made the shark. The shark fin was printed by Eddie. And then I added the water at the bottom and hand piped it, so. So it added the best of both worlds.

[Heather]

I love it. And then Bosch Nutri meal, the discount, the affiliate code there is sugar cookies at checkout. Gets 20 bucks.

[Corey]

Do I have a twin? What's so funny is I'm so nosy. But I was outside. My neighbors moved out in there. The house has been.

[Heather]

This is how we know you're nosy, because you got involved. I know.

[Corey]

I hate that he involved me. I wasn't, but I did.

[Heather]

When I went in there, I picked up before Tom started to get picked

[Corey]

up that someone showed up and they passed on all three things. So they just literally caused the man extra work.

[Heather]

Corey's neighbors are moving out. They were renters and the homeowner, it was a rental property, but now they're almost 80 over 80 years old. So they're selling the house, but they want to replace the appliances because the renters have been there for years. Yeah. Corey walks out and we're end our Monday morning call because she. I can hear her talking to an absolute stranger. And then I get the. Hey, can I call you back? Okay. I was like, whatever. This is is weird, but it's the contractor they're using to flip the home wants to get rid of the appliances and not pay a dump truck. So he asked Cory to post in a local community group if somebody wanted an oven, a fridge, and a fridge and a dishwasher. So Cory posted that wanted it.

[Corey]

I said, though. I was like, yeah, I don't want it, but can I take a look around his house? Like, I've never been into my neighbor's house. And I was so nosy.

[Heather]

He's like, yeah.

[Corey]

And I was like, okay, I'm gonna go upstairs, and then I'm gonna go downstairs.

[Heather]

What Was it the same thing?

[Corey]

It is almost the same exact layout, except for there's a full shower and toilet in the basement. So there's a. There's three full bathrooms. Yeah, but that way. I said, you know what? That would be two now three bathrooms for me to clean. I know, I know, I know. But yeah, no, there was three in there.

[Heather]

So I thought nobody took those appliances.

[Corey]

Nobody did.

[Heather]

Yeah. Pay the junk man.

[Corey]

Pay the junk man. And I said that I don't want to get involved. So I actually went on A walk. And the lady was outside, she's like

[Heather]

hey, I'm here to pick that up.

[Corey]

And I said dad, see between you and them, don't know him. I am just looking. I'm actually going on a walk. So I can't even help you.

[Heather]

I'm just really nosy. So funny. That isn't so your twin. Is that your nosy?

[Corey]

It is that I'm nosy.

[Heather]

I'm very nosy. What's your 2 interest? I went to Tale of the Dragon in that antique car. So I had for as long as I had a car that was sports car even when I was an idiot 19 year old. They've all gone to this road. It's over 300 turns and 11 miles.

[Corey]

But the turn, what state was it?

[Heather]

It's at the crevice of North Carolina and like Tennessee. We were switching state lines. We were also switching them the meridian time. Like we're switching back to an hour. So the clocks were all off because you would cross over. But then it's just. It's all it is. And I said did they build this road just for the tourism? Because it's built. This whole area is kind of propped up by this road. I'm sure it has no shops on it. Like it has no restaurant. It's beautiful. It's scenic. But the twist. I don't think you understand how tight these turns are. They're 90 like 90 degree radius up a hill immediately to a left bank and turn to a right bank.

[Corey]

See I. That would. Would. I would scare me one.

[Heather]

So many people got sick. Motion sickness. Oh. Drivers did a lot of the almost exclusive. All the passengers got ill and then even some of the drivers were taken aback by just that tossing and turning in these.

[Corey]

Yeah, right. Right.

[Heather]

Yeah. So I. I did my bucket list and then we did a parade. It was an official event. So they shut down Gatlinburg. We got police escorts and all these cars, these vipers.

[Corey]

Heather got her 1 $8 photo that we. That she'll treasure till the day she dies.

[Heather]

Nice. I did. I'm gonna print it out.

[Corey]

Yeah, I knew you were gonna print it out. You.

[Heather]

But it was ne.

[Corey]

Yeah.

[Heather]

We went to Gatberg. We did the Tale of the Dragon and they took some roads called the foothills some road or something. It was pretty. Yeah. Yeah. Fun. Fun. It was fun. It was hard. I took the car out on. There was a fast day. I did not drive. There was a slow day. I did drive. Yeah, the slow day day. Slower day. It was actually.

[Corey]

Heather loves that she can drive a manual car anywhere she guys.

[Heather]

And then I got my shirt signed by the guys who invented it. 35.

[Corey]

I want to say, driving a manual car. Attention seeking behavior.

[Heather]

Absolutely.

[Corey]

I said.

[Heather]

I said my help is full of attention.

[Corey]

Rolled right.

[Heather]

Didn't even need to fill the gas.

[Corey]

My husband drives manual. Heather drives a manual. And I'm like, why do extra work? Just let the automatic do what it automatically.

[Heather]

Because I'm driving down, down. We're gonna sprint. And people are screaming, that one has a girl in it. Oh, it's a tendency behavior.

[Corey]

That's why Heather was like. I was like, why don't you get this tinted?

[Heather]

And Heather's like, people won't be able

[Corey]

to see me in it. Yeah.

[Heather]

I didn't spend this much money and sweat through my clothes for nothing's really hard.

[Corey]

I saw that. I've been in Heather's little antique car in the rain. Let me tell you. Not waterproof in there. So it had to have been been

[Heather]

raining up on your lab. So the car cast five generations. It was last produced in 2017, which looks like a normal, cool car with. Yeah. But still now 10 years old. Yeah, it's crazy. Mine is from 1995. So the. They interviewed the guys who designed it or the guys came up with it, and they said, okay, how long do you think for them? We did it with our eyes closed. You guys have put any water on it to test? It was actually they said. The guy said, Bob Lutz, who was the head of Chrysler Stelantis at the time or whatever, driver said, I need this car, and I need it in 33 months. From an idea he had to something that could be sold. It was only 33 months.

[Corey]

That's insane.

[Heather]

That's insane. So the. They find the mirrors. The guy's like, well, we have mirrors. They're powered. He said, take the power out of the mirrors. I need it to be on this car immediately. We don't have time to test the mirrors. So they. That's why it has nothing in it. They were like, as much as we could, but they said this is the first time they kind of created a secret team. Nobody at Dodge knew this was happening except for a small group of people. But they were allowed to go take. Steal from the parts bins of other cars that were in production. So the mod. Like the dials in the car from Dodge, a lot of stuff is from a Dodge Caravan minivan. Oh, that's so funny. Yeah. So, yeah, they were just throwing parts. The headlight is actually a defunct BMW project that was supposed to go for a Z but they. So they bought them from them. Yeah, everything keep. He's the two older guys because they're not there. He said the budget for the project this skunk works type car was 4999949 million 999 he said because if it passed 50 million they the auditors, the finance department would start breathing down their necks. Oh that's. So they said anywhere you can cut corners cut it. And then we got to make sure the car. So they needed to get it tested but to get it professionally tested it was months and months of waiting. So they rented a falling apart racetrack and somewhere in like Ohio or Michigan or something and tested it there for. For hours to see good blow up.

[Corey]

I will say it's like a transformer but the bad kind.

[Heather]

Decepticon expensive for how it should be. Heather said what's crazy because the cars

[Corey]

have been around obviously what it was yours the first one.

[Heather]

95. No, 92.

[Corey]

92 to 2017. The cars were breaking down right and

[Heather]

left on the strip.

[Corey]

Yeah.

[Heather]

They'd be like. Like we were sitting at a an overlook and everyone's like that was really cool. Then all of a sudden you look at the set. The second generation mine's first generation just starts smoke just billowing from the woods. Greg right there. Another guy's engine needs to be replaced.

[Corey]

It's like whack a mole. Like which one was going to go next?

[Heather]

I think everyone was like. So the guy apparently something happen was cooling. So we all, all the people were drinking waters. We got all the water together that we could put it back into the team work. It makes the dream work.

[Corey]

Heather, brake light. Stop working.

[Heather]

Braking.

[Corey]

Not great on a.

[Heather]

People probably thought I'm just really into engine breaking. I'm excited. They're like, wow.

[Corey]

I can't. I can't judge. But you're slowing down so fast you never touch it. Right. Nothing is more discombobulating than being behind someone whose brake lights don't work because you do not know when they're slowing down. So I'm like why am I getting so close to this car? Turns out they're stopping. They have the photo like the bad

[Heather]

driver because you're slamming on your brakes. Yeah.

[Corey]

I'm like I am up there, bun. What am I doing?

[Heather]

Poor people. Miami poor people. There's a lot of bear apparently a lot of bears there. I didn't see. I was too busy trying not to die. But it missed the bear.

[Corey]

Do you have a twin Tolection

[Heather]

like

[Corey]

a fact a twin elect. This is not your first rodeo.

[Heather]

Well, I, I, I'm trying to get into videography with Corey. When I did talk about it, reels is a necessity. Reels, tiktoks, whatever is a necessity in marketing. So I put on my big girl panel panties and I bought some external audio and I did order the pocket yesterday. I said, heather, go big or go home. But you have to make a video less than as possible.

[Corey]

It has to be as often. Don't just have the stuff now see

[Heather]

how Corey talks to me?

[Corey]

Yeah, because I, I know Heather will get everything she needs and then stop. Because it's never about the stuff. It's about the person in the pilot.

[Heather]

It's about the pilot in the box. Have gone reference corn. I want to see it last year.

[Corey]

But I want to say if you're thinking about doing videos and you think you have to have all of the stuff to make the videos, it's never that. If that is what is holding you back, it's something internally holding you back.

[Heather]

It's not that I'm perspective, it's, it's,

[Corey]

it's mentally you're, you're putting up roadblocks that don't need to be there. My first videos, bad lighting, horrible sound, horrible edits, Millennial pause everywhere, all the time. Not saying my videos are blockbusters now, but whoa, worlds of difference from when I started. But I would not have known how to get better had not I started at the bottom and now we're here.

[Heather]

But yeah, I guess maybe Ed editing Corey's endless had to sit through it three times and I've listened to it for two hours straight. I guess maybe it said like that. It really isn't it. It would behoove me if I'm going to preach from the pulpit of marketing to get my butt out of from behind the pulpit of marketing and do the thing. Yeah, man.

[Corey]

Yeah.

[Heather]

And that's good.

[Corey]

In a world where AI is now making all the flyers, all the graphics, people are using it to make their cookie photos and do their pre sales. The thing that's going to bring human back into your brand is literally you getting in front of the camera.

[Heather]

I know.

[Corey]

I hate it. Hate it too. I hate it. Me and Heather said we hate that. We love that. We hate it. We love that.

[Heather]

We know it works, but we know it works and don't do it. Then you're the reason it's not working.

[Corey]

Yeah. So I just. Heather's type of personality is a perfectionist.

[Heather]

I'M so far from a perfectionist. I might have. I'm a little ocd, but I'm not a perfectionist.

[Corey]

Prove me wrong, man. Because you like to have things ready to go. You like to have things flying up in the corner of your videos that never need to be there.

[Heather]

Yeah, but no, I got. I'm doing, like, the organic.

[Corey]

Yes.

[Heather]

I have it in my plan. I have a plan in my head.

[Corey]

Appreciate. And if you say. If you befuddle a word, you know, do it like the podcast. We're doing it live. All right, guys, that's all we had for you. Got to get down in the kitchen to finish up some grad orders. We'll see you in the group. See on the pod.

[Heather]

See in a video. We will. We will.