Hello, and welcome to the Theory of Marketing Relativity podcast. I'm Jess Burton a Marketing Specialist here at Epic Marketing Consultants Corporation. Let's talk all things marketing and merchandising with our Epic team. Today we are here with Epic's very own Senior Copywriter Sheryl Silberberg. Thank you for joining us today, Sheryl.
Sheryl :So glad to be here.
Jess :Yay. And you're all the way over in New Jersey. How is it over in New Jersey?
Sheryl :It is awesome. The epicenter of everything exciting.
Jess :The epicenter of the beach versus shore debate. Absolutely.
Sheryl :Oh, totally true. And are you Philly or New York, New York.
Jess :Right? Well then, I know atleast here in Delaware, we get the big like so like we have New-ARK Delaware and you guys have Newark, New Jersey and I just fighting with all of my New Jersey friends over the correct correct pronunciation of N-E-W-A-R-K.
Sheryl :Totally. Totally true.
Jess :So we are here to kind of talk today, Ann in our brainstorming last night, and we came up with the phrase, "What to Expect When You're Expecting" to meet with Epic. Little play on words for anyone who has ever read the what to expect when you're expecting a baby book.
Sheryl :So when a client is about to give birth to their best vendor experience ever?
Jess :Absolutely, absolutely. I think I like to think that we do like a very thorough job of when we when someone comes to us and says, I want a new website and social media and PR and and and and and and. We do a good job of taking all of those, like crazy ideas that they have and like, ironing them out into a nice little plan for them.
Sheryl :I totally agree. And it's not even just about, you know how much money somebody is going to firm is going to spend on marketing, but where does it make the most sense to put the dollars? You know, if a client is thinking, oh, we should spend money on, you know, on a print ad and, you know, we have to look at where strategically it makes the most sense.
Jess :Absolutely, yes. Because I guess so I work more in the social media realm. You get to do all of the newsletters and email blasts, proofing and print ads, which I always find fascinating, because I always think of like a print ad as like a billboard. I never actually think of it as like a newspaper ad or a magazine ad and I know a couple of our clients do magazine ads.
Sheryl :Yeah. You know, sometimes, I mean, it makes sense for a client to, you know, depending on what industry you're in to put an ad in an industry publication, because it's hitting the right audience. And I know there's so much, obviously, there's a huge focus on digital marketing, but, you know, print marketing is alive and well. And it's not always retro; it's getting to the right audience. And I love doing them, and I think that they do well for the clients when they're done properly.
Jess :I agree with you 100%. So let's, let's rewind a little bit and go back to when, when someone comes to us and they want all of these fun things. Part of our onboarding process usually consists of video calls with atleast two or three of us. Either if you want social media, it's either with me or if you want, you know, print ads and PR it's with you or Amy. If you want a website, it's with Amy. So a lot of times we have a lot of meetings. And I think that sometimes we find like meetings super tedious. I think you can actually, like unearth a lot of things that you wouldn't necessarily know about a client unless you like said let's have a Zoom call at one o'clock today and talk about you.
Sheryl :Totally true and aside from, you know, where are you going to set up in your house these days where you're not going to hear the kids or the spouse on a loud Zoom call or you know, the neighbors construction outside, aside from all the logistics of getting situated in these weird times, it's an awesome idea and it's really necessary. And I think Epic does a really good job about having all the players on the line from the get go. I don't think that all firms do that. And I think, because all of us are on the calls up front, all the players hear the part that affects them, and we all can take a turn and asking the right questions to the client. And I think when you hear it firsthand, instead of just getting it from like one point person who's on the phone, and then relaying everything that the client needs, I think it works so much better that we're all part of that first call.
Jess :Absolutely. I know, there are plenty of times where someone's had a question about, you know, social media ads, and Amy's been like, I'm gonna throw that over to Jess. Or they have a question about, you know, we want to do an email blast, or we want to do we have a newsletter, and you'll tag it over to someone else. I know, like it makes it I always worry that like, we're overwhelming people like oh my gosh, they're coming to this kickoff meeting, and there's eight of us on this phone call. But it's designed so that you can have all of your questions answered right there in the moment.
Sheryl :You just reminded me. I don't know if you ever saw the movie Erin Brockovich?
Jess :Yes, it's been a while, but I've seen it.
Sheryl :There's a scene and it's not the same thing, but there's a scene where the lawyers come in from utility company and the little underdog firm wants to show you know, you know, make a show that they were mighty also. So they got all these people who weren't really lawyers, they said, come in the conference room, put jackets on. And, you know, their goal was to overwhelm the nasty lawyers, which is totally not what we're doing. We're bringing everybody together so that we ultimately don't overwhelm the client, you know, just so they can meet all of us then and they know who they're going to be interacting with going forward.
Jess :Absolutely. That is really funny. Yeah, because we totally don't want to overwhelm people. I think part of it is just so that we can get all of the information we need right up front, like you said. And then going forward, you really just have like one or two point people who are checking in about, you know, website design about email blasts about content for your social plan. Which is like another thing like I think all of us atleast on the social side, we can we either email converse or phone call converse, depending on the client at least once a month, if not more, with everybody. Just because we want to make sure that we're, it's almost like we're just we're in your office with you. We were just a phone call away.
Sheryl :It's really true. You know, we're just touching base and making sure as things change that we're changing with them.
Jess :Absolutely. So with, like all of the clients we have, I'm trying to think of like good ones. I know I with some of our bigger clients, I get emails from them, oh, atleast 2, 3, 4 a day and I almost like panic when I don't get an email from them. I'm like, it's been a very quiet Thursday. Should I email and check on them over there? But I think that like that communicate that open communication is what makes our jobs easier and what helps us to learn about a client's voice. It helps us learn about the client. I feel like we've I've unearthed things about different clients just from like, asking a question about this person tagged you on Facebook. What's the story here? And you get like an email that's like a giant paragraph like, oh, we went to a play at the theater and we thought it was a great idea. We decided to sponsor this art event and I'm like, wow, like I never would have gotten that had I not asked that question. So I think it's like super important to ask questions.
Sheryl :Yeah, I totally agree. And when I am working with clients on the social side, if you haven't heard anything in a while, and it's kind of like crickets, it's so important just from our end to reach out to them and say, you know, hey, what's up? What's up this week? What's up in the in the weeks that are coming up? And then right to your point, sometimes they'll say, oh, yeah, I forgot to you know, this is coming up, and this is coming up, and this is coming up. So it's important to go after them.
Jess :Yeah.
Sheryl :And I, you know, having open communication with the clients always and I think we, I think the fact that we do it internally so much all the time also, it's the only way to give good service and you can't be afraid to ask questions. Inside Epic, or to the clients, it's important just to always, you know, if you don't know something, the only way to get the info is to ask.
Jess :Absolutely. Yeah, I know. Like, we always I think every single phone call we're on someone is taking notes somewhere. But it is super beneficial because for some of our clients, they are an island. I refer to everything as an octopus for some reason. It's just that's my go to analogy; it's an octopus. And like your marketing is an octopus. If you, you might come to me for your social media, they might come to you to write their newsletter or their blog, they might go to Amy to help do their website or some PR stuff. And I think it's very important internally to communicate about oh, I just got off this call with client A and they mentioned that they're moving and you know October. Oh, I didn't know that. And then, you know, if you're writing a blog about whatever, or if you're writing social posts, you can email them and say, hey, I talked to Amy she said, you guys are moving. Tell me more about it. So I think it is like super important, internally for you to communicate because then you find all the these extra little nuggets of information that you're kind of like, oh, I love when this happens. I'm learning more.
Sheryl :Love that.
Jess :Yeah. I know we, oh God.
Sheryl :I was just gonna say we have clients that are in so many different fields. You know, we have let's think about this. We have financial services; we have building development. Now I'm gonna be really hard to be vague. I'll get it because I don't want to give it away.
Jess :Energy solutions, environment and energy environmental solutions, energy efficient environmental solutions. I hope she listens to this.
Sheryl :How can we phrase it without giving up the client names?
Jess :Retail. We have plenty of people who are in retail. We have acouple in retail.
Sheryl :Yeah. And you know, the list goes on and it doesn't even matter what industry they are in or what fields. But like the part that's consistent across all the clients is just getting to who they are. And the one of the biggest things that I have found in marketing, it doesn't even matter what kind of marketing you're doing, is that clients have a tendency, if it's a business or nonprofit or whatever, they have a tendency to talk about what their services are, or like the features that their products have without like focusing on the benefits as much. So, you know, even if we could take Listerine and you know, the company could say, oh, we make you know, a mouthwash and it's blue, and it comes in berry or mint. Like those are, that's how a business might think to just state the obvious like, this is what we offer. But what good marketing would do with something like that would be to say, hey, you know, are you having trouble with your breath? We have the solution, you know. And it's, it's spinning everything so that it it resonates with whoever they want their audience to be. And we have to, you know, ask those questions to make sure that we take clients from just talking about what they offer and making sure that we're really conveying for them what the benefits are. And that's what all the digging with the questions is for. You know, so if, hey clients, if you ever feel like we're coming at you with so many questions, it's like a, like a press conference. That's why, you know, we're gonna pepper you with questions until we get to the info that we need to make you sound as good as you can in a very authentic true way so that we can help you reach audience.
Jess :Absolutely. I know, I used to work for a small business, before I moved into the social media realm and I remember, I would always ask my boss because we had like a physical location where people could come and shop, I would always ask, Who do you want to walk in the door next? Like who? Who's the person like describe them to me? Like in the marketing world, we call like a persona. But for someone who doesn't know what a persona is, and it sounds like super technical, I literally would ask him like, who do you want to walk in the door? And like, he would always jokingly like, tell me like, oh, like, Kim Kardashian, or like, whatever, like, you give me some celebrity or whatever. Yeah, Beyonce, whatever, some celebrity. And I'm like, okay, but like more realistically, who do you want to walk in that door? Because then from that, you can create a person and then you can create an entire marketing plan around that those one or two people that you want to come in to your store, that you want to, you know, pick up the phone and call you. That's one of those like questions like, I was like, I need to, like keep this in my brain because like, I'll even ask some of our clients like, you know, who do you want to walk in the door next? Who's do you want to book next? Who, you know, do you want to make an appointment with you next? And sometimes they'll tell you like, oh, this month, I really need I would really, I'm really having a good time working in, you know, I can't even think of a client, like working with like, parents. So like, okay, we're going to target parents this month and then the next month, they might be like, oh, you know, restaurants like dependent on their products. So like it is, it's a, it's a simple question that gets you oh, I feel like it's one of those things. It's a simple question that gets you exactly what you need to know.
Sheryl :Totally. And I ask something very similar, which is probably really the same thing, you know, who is your current audience? As question number one and question number two is who is your desired audience? Because maybe they know some of the businesses that I've dealt with they they're split between, say dealing with like residential customers and commercial. And maybe now they're, you know, what they're actually getting is 25% residential and 75 commercial, but they'd rather that shift. Maybe they want it 50-50 or whatever. So knowing who they have and who how they want that to change it, you know, that it's totally king.
Jess :It is. I think part of that is, like us being flexible and then realizing that like, so we are not like, Epic is not a cookie-cutter. I feel like that phrase gets overused so much I need to come up with a new one. Epic is not like we're not cookie-cutter like it's not like, okay, you're coming to us because you want you want Sheryl to write your blog and do your social media. So this is it. This is what you're getting. There's no wiggle room. I think that we have this like awesome flexibility to not be in of the box.
Sheryl :And again, that I completely agree with you, you know, cookie cutter is still an awesome way to phrase it. And another thing that that we do, I think, with all of these incessant questions to new clients or existing clients, is that we don't say, well, this is how we do posts. End of story. This is how we do blogs. End of story. It's not one size fits all. If a client one client needs a blog this way then we do it that way within you know, following all of good protocols and all of that sticking to good marketing guidelines. But it's not one size fits all and and what customized to what a client needs.
Jess :Yeah. I think I met with someone the other day to do a one-on-one like training session and we were talking about, you know, the social media stuff I offer and she asked me about pricing. And I said, you know, like, we we have our recommendations and we give you our recommendations, but ultimately, like, it's up to you what you want to do what you think. And she was, like, interesting. And I was like, yeah, like, why would we tell why? I don't know. I don't know what you're thinking. And if, you know, you want to have a blog that posts once a week, or if you want to have a blog that post once a month, you know, if you want us to write that for you and do the research, and whenever I'm like, you know, if you want to post if you want all the social media channels fully flooded, or if you say, you know what, I just want Facebook, and I just want Instagram, and we're actually going to delete our Twitter. You know, stuff like that like it's nice. It's, the one thing I love is being able to tell clients like we come, and as Nancy has coined, we come from a place of yes. We like to say yes. If it's something you can think of, we can do it for you. 99.9% of the time. I still have yet to find something that we can't do. But I don't want to give like 100% guarantee just in case someone's like, well, what about this? And then that's like the point .01%. I feel like I that's like, just general science. But yeah, I like being able to tell people that like, oh, we're full service. We do it all. If you can think it, we can do it. We'll tell you yes, and your yes may mean that, yes, we can do that, but it's going to take a little bit. Or yes, we can do that. I'll have that to you in three days. So I think that is like a big bonus point too have like working with an agency versus, you know, hiring a single person to do everything. You kind of we have different price tiers, we have different people we have like an entire have an entire team of people doing all of these things that maybe you would only be able to hire one person for.
Sheryl :Yes, and that that's completely the advantage of an agency, and the advantage of an agency our size is that we're not so big that you're going to get, you know, we're not isolated from each other. That we're still a reasonable size where it is daily communication all day long, and that goes to the, you know, communication thing that we're talking about. We communicate across specialties, literally all day long at Epic. We're not in silos where one doesn't know what the other is doing, and that, you know, where a client can get lost at a really large-scale agency. No one gets lost here because we're communicating internally all day long. You know, and on the point of communication, when we you were talking before about when we bring clients in and how we get to know them, you know, for me the questions continuing, you know, we always ask about the audience and, you know, who do they have now versus who do they who's their goal audience, but something that I like to ask also is, what misconceptions do people have about your business or your nonprofit or your products now? Like, what, what is out there in the market or the community that, you know, maybe isn't the case? Maybe it was the case in the past, maybe it's changed, maybe it never was the case because good marketing, you know, we can easily you know, craft messaging that is a counterpoint to whatever misconceptions there are. And so that's a really good thing to know from clients up front. You know, what, what thinking should be changed and then we just adjust the messaging. And another thing that we like to ask up front to is what distinguishes you from the competition like going back to that mouthwash example. It's not just what do you offer? You know, you can say we offer ABCDE and so on with, like a bunch of features. But what makes you different products now? You know, what's your differentiator? Why should someone choose your business or your product over another one? And these are the kind of, you know, questions that when we ask clients up front, we really get a handle on who they are. So, you know, that's the upfront communication with whoever we're forming a relationship with.
Jess :Absolutely. I think it's funny like I come, I feel like I learned I'm like a sponge like I feel like I learned things really quickly. I was always the kid like growing up who got the like, most coachable award and like, listens to directions on my report card. But yeah, but so I feel like I like learning like I enjoy learning. And I remember so I teach a fitness format called Pound Fit. And I remember I take took, so this is hilarious, I took one class. I took one class in college. Someone that we've called Pound Pros. A Pound Pro came and, taught this giant class at my college, and after that, I was like, I need to get certified. Like, so I went and got certified. It took me an entire day I actually drove to New Jersey, Cherry Hill, New Jersey. I drove to New Jersey. I got certified I loved it. And one of the things they told us is that you know, you have to look out for and I'm sure all of the girls training have said this so much nicer, they were like you have to look out for imposters, because there are like essentially Pound Fit is in its very, very simplest terms, it's cardio drumming. But there are other things that are considered cardio drumming. Now the founders of Pound, were drummers themselves and they're both pilates instructors. So they kind of combined drumming and pilates to make this exercise. The only other things you need are these really cool like neon green weighted drumsticks. Then that's that was their branding. They were like everything else is black and white, except for your bright green drumsticks. And I remember in our training, you know, them telling us, you need to come up with an elevator pitch that will set you apart from all those other people. Because you're going to tell people, oh, I teach Pound Fit, you should come to my class, but what you need to make sure that you're hitting on those points that make you different from the cardio drumming class that you know is there's a cardio during class where you take like where you're drumming on like an exercise ball. There's a cardio drumming class where it's, I guess there's like, I've never actually been to one I guess there's like a I don't want to say like a trashcan or something but then you put the exercise ball in it and you draw on it that way. There's a couple different ones. They were like this, you need to differentiate that, like, you went through 16 hours of training and have to get continuing education credits to keep your whatever and you have to learn all the choreography and this is in this in this and this and this. So it is funny because as I've taught people and I have like a regular group of ladies that come to my class, they're all like, wow, this is way more in depth than I thought it was. And I was like, yeah, because this is a really well thought out program and it's based on like your own personal body strength. But one of the things that I did come up against was giving people my people my elevator pitch, which I haven't done in a while because we're all stuck at home. Um, you know, and telling them that like, you know, this is a full body cardio workout where it combines pilates and drumming, you get really cool way to drum sticks, it ties in with, you know, audio theory. So, when you're drumming, everybody likes to hit on the beat which if you ever want to see something funny you should come to one of my classes and stand in the back because there is always always one person who has no rhythm and or no sense of like left right rhythm at all so it is kind of funny because like if people get angry when they don't strike the floor or like their sticks together on the right beat.
Sheryl :Oh my god I need video. I need the video.
Jess :I'll have to send you some? But yeah, it is it that's part of it. It's kind of in one in one glance, being able to tell people this is what we are. This is why we're unique. This is what we're not.
Sheryl :Yeah. And now as someone who's always asking questions, my I have a why, sorry for another incessant question, but what made I'm just curious what made that appeal to you so much that you knew right out of the gate? This is for me? What was it?
Jess :So I was like, this is gonna be so bad because I have friends that are Zumba, but instructors was so anti Zumba and Zumba was huge, like so I graduated college in 2013. Zumba was huge. It was like starting to blow up in like the early 2010s. And I hated it. And I think it's just because as a general principle, if everybody loves it, I hate it. Like, I think that's just me. And I liked that it tied in music, because I'm very music oriented. I learned how to play the piano and the flute and I was in marching band and they did all this. I like I love music, and it tied in, not just music I'd never heard of, but like, there are songs that like I learned the choreography for that my classes like listen, this just got played on the radio 12 times today. Can we move this song out of the rotation? So they do use like popular songs that are big right now? I think it was just that one, I was burning like 500 calories in like, an hour. And that they would they were like, oh, you can do up to 200 squats, and I'm like, wait, let's do some squats. I don't know. I think it was just it was different. And not everybody was doing it, which like, immediately I was like, es, I want to do that.
Sheryl :Yeah, you felt like you were like at the start of a movement or something.
Jess :Yeah, it is crazy because I've been certified for seven years. Some seriousness, longest relationship I've ever had.
Sheryl :Oh, my God. And you see, like, it's just, I think that's why we always ask the questions like of each other, or clients or prospects, whatever, because I think that we're really truly curious. You know.
Jess :Oh, I love I love when we get clients that like, I've never heard of what they're doing before and I just like I want to learn more about it. I know there are a couple that like pop right into my head right now that I'm like, yes, tell me more. Can I just like sit on the phone with you for two hours and you can just explain to me like what your product does? Like, I'll come with you. Can I just watch? Like, it's fascinating because I think that when people are invested in what they're doing, like we are like, I like learning a lot of things about a lot of things, when we're invested in it, it's just better for everybody around. I know, I love learning about a couple of the products that some of our clients have, or even some of the things that they're doing because they're just interesting.
Sheryl :And we could tell people because I know that you won't that we had learned about a client this a year wasn't even a year ago, we have a client in a very specialized field. The product is really kind of one of a kind. In a in a really good product that we really believe in and the owners are really good people. And the owner was already going to an event out of state so you and Ann, you know, all of us had learned enough and you and were asked to stand in for the owner at a conference. Was it a two day conference? I think so.
Jess :It was. It was a two day nature-related conference.
Sheryl :And you and Ann really kicked it and have you know, we're able to represent on that product. And just another service that we provide. But had had we not gotten to know the client truly inside and out and really, you know, understood the product and believed in the products and the people, it wouldn't have been possible.
Jess :Absolutely. That was that was an experience for Ann and I. That was definitely we learned a lot. We learn a lot we didn't know. Especially about Delaware.
Sheryl :And you got names, right? You've got you met people. And we did.
Jess :We met people we networked for our client. We came home with like a list of like 10 to 15 people that were interested that she could then reach out to. So all in all, everybody was learning. Although I think she got the better end of the deal going to Florida. Well, Sheryl, thank you so much for joining me today. We'll have to have you back on sometime soon to talk about writing.
Sheryl :I would love to. Thank you for having me and ask you some questions later. Get ready.
Jess :Oh, I'm sure I'm sure you will. Thank you. Thank you all for tuning in this week. We hope this theory is relative to your marketing. Make sure you subscribe to get notified of our latest episodes.