Marketing Happy Hour - Driving Brand Recognition + Sales with Hyper-Local Influencers | Emily Steele + Callie Hippler of Hummingbirds

Starting point is 00:00:00 Hi, Emily and Callie. How are you doing today? So good. So excited to be here. Yes. Thanks for having us. Oh my gosh. This has been such a long time coming. I know Callie has been listening to the Marketing Happy Hour podcast for quite some time. She was like one of our original community members that reached out and was like, I love your episodes. And we were like, oh my gosh, we didn't even know like other people other than our parents were listening to this podcast. So it's been so fun to like keep up with what she's doing and through her be connected with you, Emily, and just learn more about hummingbirds and all that's coming with that. But before we get started, I do have an important question for you that we ask all of our guests and that is what is in your glass this afternoon? It is marketing happy hour after all. And we were talking briefly

Starting point is 00:00:50 just before this, that you might both have the same thing in your glass. So tell us about that. And I was absolutely influenced by Callie. Let's be clear. Like she is, she is my source of like, what's cool and trendy now. I feel like an elder millennial sometimes. We're both drinking the same thing and we're both kind of wearing the same outfit, which we did not plan. But I got the lemon lime lollipop. Callie, what do you have?

Starting point is 00:01:15 I also have a lemon lime lollipop, but I also have a beverage cooler full of different fun things to try. I feel like every time I go to the grocery store, I find a new one. And honestly, listening to Marketing Happy Hour, I feel like I always find a new one to try. Oh my gosh. That is so awesome. I have a flower head tea, I guess it's a new to me brand. And I picked it up. I was just in New York and I went to this shop called big night and it's a, um,

Starting point is 00:01:42 kind of like a local housewares and just like fun little grocery shop in the West Village. And I picked it up there. It's so good. It's a double mint and rose tea. It's delicious. Yes. Okay, well, we can't wait to chat through what the two of you are building at Hummingbirds. But we know our listeners will be curious to hear a little bit of the backstory first. So could you both share a peek into your professional journeys thus far? I guess Emily, we'll start with you. Okay. I feel like every year it gets longer and longer, right? Because we get older. But I would say like right out of college, I studied marketing PR, did a lot of like non-profit community development work. So my background was in kind of building

Starting point is 00:02:25 brands and campaigns around revitalizing our city. I'm in Des Moines, Iowa. And so had a lot of fun building a brand that was all about like helping a local community, my own city and kind of had so much fun with that. I'm like, let me side hustle, start a couple of side hustles, pop up yoga and a women's networking group and grew and scaled those really quickly. Got a lot of buy-in from the community and felt like I was doing a lot of like community building strategies that people were like, how do you do that? I'm like, I don't know. I just do it. Like this is who I am. And it turned into one of those things where like, can you teach me this strategy? Can you do this for my business? Like, well, here we go. We're going to start a local

Starting point is 00:03:02 marketing agency and kind of see if this is like something I can replicate or if it's really only for my own brands and my own things. And just had a lot of success, like kind of building that up and serving a lot of different types of clients for music festivals to night spa to physical therapy clinic. And really just like locked in on local marketing and how to drive local behavior. And, you know, I get really excited around the people powered piece of it. And so that kind of led to hummingbirds where I really wanted to see like a strategic streamlined way for local people to try things in their own backyard and be able to share it with their friends and followers. Word of mouth marketing just works so well in a local environment. So Hummingbirds was born from that.

Starting point is 00:03:45 And my fun little story with Hummingbirds, I feel like people are like, wow, that's such a fun little piece of the story. And the brand is my father-in-law is like a big bird guy. And so at dinner one night, he like goes around in a circle and tells like a sign that's a bird type that we're like, and he gets to me, he's like, you're a hummingbird, Emily. Like you put around the community. You're such like a pollinator. You do all these things. You're such a contributor, like community builder, right? And I was like, oh my gosh, that is absolutely what we're calling this community. Like it makes so much sense.

Starting point is 00:04:13 And, you know, it just has really, really grown from there. We've raised capital. We've done the whole like build a startup, scale up business model in 15 cities. So it has been an incredible and honestly, very meaningful journey to do marketing that like actually impact local communities. So Callie, I'll send it over to you because you've been a big part of like half of that journey with me. Yes, definitely. So going back to like college graduating, I graduated from St. Ambrose University with a degree really focused in communications and started out working for a few small marketing agencies in town, one of which was Emily's.

Starting point is 00:04:50 And it was really focused on serving that local small business owner, specifically in the Des Moines area. And as anybody who has worked in a small agency knows, you get to wear a lot of hats. So you get to try and do a lot of things, whether it's building websites or doing social media or, you know, launching a podcast, launching courses. So I got experience in a lot of different areas and kind of learned what I liked, what I didn't like, what I wanted to do more of. And working with Emily in that hummingbirds piece kind of has continued throughout my career, whether it was like in a contract freelancer type of role or leading up to January, 2023, when I got to come on full time with hummingbirds. And the reason I've stayed and stuck around is

Starting point is 00:05:30 just because I believe in the mission and the belief that, you know, people are your best vehicle to help build your brand and build up the community with your like having things going on and figuring out what's happening in the community. It's where you go when you're looking for things to do, you're going to your friends and your family. And so I just felt like hummingbirds really does that so well. And that's why I've continued to stay here and stuck around. Oh my gosh, that is incredible. That is so great. And I, you mentioned it a little bit. Could you just share a little behind the scenes of like the mission, the vision of hummingbirds and why localized influencers or content creators are such an incredible resource for businesses and brands? Yeah, I mean, I get so excited about this, because I think about myself a little bit on

Starting point is 00:06:16 both sides. Like when I was running the local marketing agency, I was looking at like working with brands of all different types from like services to events and experiences and just felt like you know a lot of the the local marketing services available right now are like fully digital right so you can do like the meta google ads etc and that's more of like a push a message at people and hope you catch them with search intent or like at the right time where you have your big like billboard tv print radio and, radio. And like all around us though, like we're going to our neighbors to be like, Hey, my parents are in town. Where should we have dinner? Like, you know, like what should we do, et cetera. So I was seeing that from just like

Starting point is 00:06:55 the brand side in terms of what things are available. And I'm like, it's people who are the most impactful, but there's never been a way to mobilize people effectively. And ambassador programs, even to this day, are really designed for bigger enterprise types of customers in terms of pricing and structure. And then as someone who identifies as a bit of a local creator and someone who loves talking about my city, I was watching my peers, followers, friends, acquaintances, et cetera, actually doing the things that I was sharing on social media and then following up with me. Like I always share that example. You can't see this in the video, but I have a permanent bracelet that I got at a jewelry company. And like, I bumped into someone at like a local chamber event and she was like, it's totally influenced

Starting point is 00:07:37 by you. Like, check out my bracelet. I got one too. And I'm like, oh my gosh, I would like bumping into people who are like, I grabbed an Ollipop because I like heard this episode or whatever it is. Like people hear from people they know, like and trust and they take action. And so, you know, I just like, just think like today's world, it's very clear that influencer marketing is a huge, huge channel and opportunity, but no one's played in the local space and big brands have to drive local retail behavior but also small businesses absolutely deserve the opportunity to work with creators in their own backyard who can build awareness for them on social so that's really where we play it's like the local local local even if we work with big brands you think I captured it Callie but I think you did I think

Starting point is 00:08:18 you nailed it yes you really get to borrow that like deep trust that people have with their community and with the people they know like and trust and so as a brand you get to borrow that like deep trust that people have with their community and with the people they know like and trust and so as a brand you get to borrow that through working with influencers and that's why we love that local local level because a lot of times their followers are made up of their friends and family very very cool and we uh took a browse on your website and we saw that you focus a lot on the midwest region why are you so passionate about tapping into those hummingbirds in that region? I think personally, we really love this area because a lot of influencer marketing platforms out there or just marketing channels in general are focused on the coast and nobody really comes

Starting point is 00:09:01 and plays in the Midwest. And there's a lot here. There's a lot of things going on, a lot of exciting things. And I think when a brand is also trying to get national reach, they have a hard time sometimes getting like traction and brand adoption in the Midwest. So this is just such an easy way to like start here. And Des Moines is where we're founded and like where we started. So investing back into our communities here is such a big part of Hummingbirds too. Yeah, I would say like our initial thesis was like mid-sized cities, like we understand them. We started in Des Moines, mid-sized city. What if we go to a few other mid-sized cities? Like we can actually bump into people at the grocery store and be like, hey, so I got this hot sauce,

Starting point is 00:09:40 like should I try it? Like you posted about it. Is it really that good? You know, you're actually seeing peers, friends out in the community that you can double click on their content. Like, should I try it? Like you posted about it. Is it really that good? You know, you're actually seeing peers, friends out in the community that you can double click on their content. Like, that's just what we do, right? We see someone's posts and we're like, Hey, I saw you just went to that new amusement park. Like, did you love it? How was parking? Like these conversations are always happening. It's like such a good reference point. So when you can actually bump into someone in real life that you can see all their content, it's really cool to see the impact of that compound. And so Midwest is definitely where we are, but this year we'll actually bump into someone in real life that you can see all their content. It's really cool to see the impact of that compound. And so Midwest is definitely where we are. But this year, we'll

Starting point is 00:10:09 expand to 15 more cities TBD on the region. But that's kind of cooking right now internally. Exciting. Well, we'll have to stay tuned for that. I love that. And it's kind of fun to bring like that neighborhood vibe to like social media where you're, you know, bumping into people, but virtually and talking about the things that they're loving in their area. So I love that so much. Let's talk about, um, like a typical hummingbirds campaign from the brand side. What can someone expect when they run a campaign with you and how are you focused on helping

Starting point is 00:10:44 like local brands and businesses utilize your platform to drive sales? So honestly, how someone typically comes to the platform is they come to our team and they want to work with so many hummingbirds. And typically right now, how it works is you create a campaign. And so you create a campaign on the platform. That's kind of an overview of what you want to do as a brand. So whether you have a new product you're launching, or maybe it's an event you have that's in a specific community, like a local playhouse that has a new production coming that they want hummingbirds to come and experience and share about. So you would put that campaign out as an opportunity to hummingbirds. And then depending on what communities you select that you'd like to work with, those hummingbirds then opt in and say, yes, I'm really interested in this specific campaign. I'd

Starting point is 00:11:29 love to work with this brand. It's that mutual opt-in process. So it's not necessarily like going out cold DMing people. You already know these people are interested in working with you. And then from there, it's working with our team to kind of get whatever that perk or that item that the brand is giving to a hummingbird in exchange for them posting about their experience or that brand product. And so it kind of walks through that process and campaigns can last, you know, as short as a few weeks to as long as a month. It kind of depends on the brand and what they're looking to drive. But that's kind of the basics of how a campaign works. Anything I miss, Emily? I think just the thing that we really double click on just based on, like we play in the local

Starting point is 00:12:11 influencer space. But if you talk to our, we call them, we actually call them hummingbirds. I know it's our company name, so it's slightly confusing, but we call our creators hummingbirds because it's not truly like a community of influencers. They wouldn't say I'm a local influencer. There's something about just the community we've built. They're like more local champions, social media enthusiasts, love small businesses. They want to be out in their community. They're early adopters. So when we call them local influencers, it doesn't always resonate. But in the marketing side of the house, it makes no sense to tell brands that they're influencers at the local level because it's something people understand. Like if I was to go to a brand

Starting point is 00:12:47 and be like, Hey, do you want to work with a bunch of local pollinators? I'd be like, what are you, what? But that's really how we, how we think about them. So that said is really why we chose to go the perk route to begin as a company. So we're not trying to attract people or trying to make a living, right? The hummingbirds who come to our platform are like, what cool things can I try? I get a $50 gift card to go to Costco and pick up like a six pack of Ollie, Ollie pop. That's cool. Like I was going to go to Costco anyway. Now I'm going to look for a new product I've never tried. We're like, I get free tickets to go to a performing arts show. Like I love going out and like, it's a great chance for me to reconnect with my best friend and get her a free ticket. What a fun night out. And so it's really not about the incentivizing with cash

Starting point is 00:13:29 at this point in the business model, because we're really not trying to attract that type of user who's probably on, you know, a dozen plus other influencer platforms. So just a slight differentiator that I think has been really compelling to the community of hummingbird. Oh, yeah, that's really, really cool. And I think to just having the, you know, community forward aspect is really impactful, because we were we had the Yelp small business expert, her name is Emily, we had her on the podcast. And one her questions to us when we were on her show actually is surrounding like local influencers and how can small businesses work with influencers and, you know, our advice to somebody in the small business world that wants to dip their toe into like influencer creator marketing is to really do some of those campaigns where you are, you know, trading your meal or like

Starting point is 00:14:28 a service or something like that in exchange for someone telling their authentic experience with you. Just because we know a lot of small businesses or local businesses are strapped for cash, they don't have like a ton of a marketing budget. And so that's a really creative way to like dip their toe into that and see what works. And they'll be really, you know, pleasantly surprised when those programs really work for them. So yeah, I love that. Okay, so what are some of the key KPIs or results that you're measuring to gauge the success of a campaign on the hummingbirds platform? Do you have any like recent testimonials or any like case studies that you would want to point to of just like, this is how it worked for somebody else?

Starting point is 00:15:15 Yeah, I get really excited about this. Because I think we launched our products, like for brands to like log into and use in January 2023. Before that, I was like basically running it as an agency, like we handled everything for the customer. And we still do that for a handful of the brands that are like, can you want it for us, like, etc. But that being said, from a KPI standpoint, what we've really, really unlocked in 2023 is understanding what each like vertical really values. So as we've really grown in the CPG space, we're showing a lot of sell through data, like how are products actually moving off the shelves at the retail locations that hummingbirds are going to. So we see anywhere

Starting point is 00:15:55 from like 4x, we've seen 14x lift in sales. And like, that's an unbelievable ROI from those CPG companies that then are also kind of creating behavior, right? Like you now know, when you go to your favorite grocery store, this is where the yogurt is, this is where the hot sauce that you really liked is located. So you're building that pattern. And I think about an example of like my husband, like I'm not a huge hot sauce person, but I brought home a couple from a campaign and now it's all he gets. Right. So like that data now is held and your hope is to like bump the data higher and those like campaign months, but then also to sustain it.

Starting point is 00:16:32 So we've seen that as well from brands in the CPG space. When you think about services, so a brand that's like, we have an oil change company. So that's interesting, right? Like everyone needs an oil change. So come and get a free oil change and share about it on social. Those brands are kind of looking at, it almost has an acquisition, a customer acquisition play.

Starting point is 00:16:49 So I always say it's like my little thing. I'm like a billboard can't become a customer, but a creator can. And so when you're working with our hummingbirds and local creators, they can absolutely, they've already said like, I want to do this campaign.

Starting point is 00:17:00 I'm interested in your brand. And now they're like, oh my gosh, I love this med spa. I love this oil change company. I'm going to come back. I'm going to be a lifetime customer. And because of the nature of who these hummingbirds are, they're amplifiers. They're probably going to post content when they're back at that place again. And so it's kind of this, what I would call almost like referral engine, right? Where you get the customer and then they're still excited about you. And then more of the like, hey, we're really talking about like advertising, reach, engagement, impressions. Like

Starting point is 00:17:29 we do pull that data from Instagram's API just to be able to show, you know, some of the brands are like rolling up an entire campaign, all those metrics into one kind of like end result, like, hey, this channel did this, this channel did that. And impressions and reach tend to be the like roll up metrics. So it just depends really on the sophistication of the brand and what play. So, and I would say the final thing is UGC, right? I think that is just continuing to explode. And people are like, I have to be relevant and social media, and I cannot keep up with the content.

Starting point is 00:18:00 So like, how do I get 30 people talking about my brand this month? And I can, you know, trickle through that content the next like two, three months. So I have this kind of steady base of content created by other people experiencing my brand. So it's kind of loaded, but it always just depends on the vertical and what they what they're trying to prioritize. Yeah, that's so smart, especially the UGC piece. That was another thing that we referred to in our episode with Emily from Yelp. We were like, we were like, that is so impactful, especially when you can get somebody actually talking about their real

Starting point is 00:18:31 experience versus like someone who's incentivized by a cash payout. Yeah, it's just so impactful. And we were her their platform is primarily like reviews, right? So we were talking about how to like utilize those reviews on social. And this is kind of the same thing where you can post about their experience on your website. You can send it out in an email newsletter. Like there's all sorts of things that you can do from this like UGC content and feedback that you're getting from these real-time influencers

Starting point is 00:19:04 and creators who are interacting with your brand. So that's super smart. Love it. Well, we're approaching the end of the interview here and Callie probably knows that this question is coming because we ask all of our guests. But I want to hear from you guys, what is something that you know now that you wish you knew a little earlier on in your career? And Callie, how about you go first? I would love to go first. Okay. I feel like I've heard so many answers of this now. And of course, there's lots of things I feel like I would tell my younger self in my career. But I think one of the things, especially I've thought about even more so lately is like everything is a season and that's so true in life. But I think that's also so true in your

Starting point is 00:19:44 career, you know, and you're not going to be in the same role or doing the same tasks or even, you know, at the same company for your whole career. So I think it's so easy to like get ahead of yourself and thinking of your next career move. And there's nothing wrong with that or thinking of what you did in the past. But I think there's also so much to be gained by just staying really present in your career and leaning in on what you're enjoying and what you're finding excitement in right now.

Starting point is 00:20:08 And so I think something I would just tell myself in the past is just like really enjoy where you are now and embrace the people you're working with and the things you're doing, because you never know when things will change or go forward in the future. So that's definitely something I feel like I would tell my younger self. That's so good. And Emily, how about you? I'm like, my response around this is data. And it's mostly because I come at the world, like I'm an Enneagram seven, I'm very visionary. I'm very brand marketer, et cetera, like message, you know, like feel good opportunities to connect with brands. And I feel like at a younger age, I wish I would have adopted the muscle of like, understanding the performance side of marketing a little bit better to really

Starting point is 00:20:49 identify how key initiatives ladder up to goals. And I, you know, that muscle is so important, as I think about even hiring marketing people, for our team, like I'm looking at like, hey, I don't really care if you have a list of things you've done, like how has it impacted the bottom line of the company and like the, the, yeah, the goals that a company had in place and just really being able to articulate because I do this, here's the output. And I think like, that's something I wish I would have developed sooner. So I could have brought it into, I mean, bird's bed but just like a faster velocity, but that would be like probably mine among so many other things, but that's my answer for this, this episode, at least. Yes. Oh, that's amazing. And I'm glad you brought that up because we talk a lot about hiring and a

Starting point is 00:21:36 lot about what to include on your resume and what to kind of have outlined on your LinkedIn profile. And we talk a lot about, you know, there's, mean, everyone has the same. Oh, yeah, I posted on social media for this brand or I, you know, I did. I ran email marketing or I ran PR or whatever it may be. But having those tangible results that people can really refer to and even ask you about and having answers prepared for how you you specifically impacted the business is always very helpful. Just when you're interviewing for new roles and things like that. So I really I'm so glad that you brought that up because it just reaffirms what we've been chatting about with our community. Yeah, yeah. Yes, absolutely. Okay, well, we have to know where everybody can find you follow along with what you're up to. And you actually recently started a podcast as well. So I'd love to hear about that and where everyone can listen into that as well. So we started a podcast, local marketing school, as you can tell, we're really like, we love playing in the local

Starting point is 00:22:37 marketing space are like, we find our genius is the local creators, but there's so much around local marketing that really hasn't been unlocked. Small business marketing isn't local marketing all the time. And so we really want to have conversations with brands that are driving impact at a geo-specific level. So you can expect guests from like Olipop to a local retailer in one city and location, like what are the strategies working for them? So we're super excited to bring that value to the world. And that launched a few weeks ago. And yeah, from the hummingbird side, yeah, you tell us. I would love to. We have lots of things. So you can find us on all of the social media platforms. We are at hummingbirdshq on Instagram, and that will lead you also to all of our city specific Instagram. So if you want to find out

Starting point is 00:23:22 if hummingbirds in your community, that's probably the easiest, easiest way to go. We also have our website, hummingbirds.com. That'll lead you to all the places. So the podcast, all of that kind of thing, you can find the podcast, local marketing school on all your favorite podcast apps, Spotify, Apple podcasts, all those places. And then of course you can find both Emily and I on LinkedIn. We're both there. If you want to connect with us and chat, we'd love to do that as well. Amazing. We will link out everything in the show notes and how cool that you got hummingbirds.com. I wonder if there's anybody that like types that in thinking they're going to see like

Starting point is 00:23:55 pictures of hummingbirds or something like that. I know. Right. Like how much of our traffic is people looking for actual hummingbirds. My fun fact, that domain was available since 1998 and we snagged it like, I don't know, maybe three months ago. And like, I can't believe it was just available that long. I mean, it was, you know, quite a, quite an investment, but we're like, we want to be a dot-com brand. Let's do it. Yeah. Oh my gosh. Well, congratulations. That's awesome. That's

Starting point is 00:24:18 really, really cool. And we'll link everything out in the show notes, like I said, but thank you so much for joining us. This has been such a good conversation and raising just awareness of what your platform is doing. And I know a lot of brands listen into this show and they can really utilize some of that local marketing help. So hopefully that they'll reach out and want to work with y'all. Yeah, that was good. Thanks, Erica. Thank you so much for listening to this episode of the

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Marketing Happy Hour - Driving Brand Recognition + Sales with Hyper-Local Influencers | Emily Steele + Callie Hippler of Hummingbirds

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