Marketing Happy Hour - Practical Email + Podcast Strategy Tips | Content Strategist Conor Brown

Starting point is 00:00:00 you're listening to the marketing happy hour podcast where we discuss career and industry insights with our peers in marketing we're here to talk about it all like the ups and downs of working in social media how to build authentic relationships in the influencer and pr space managing a nine-to-five and a side hustle at the same time, how to be productive in your life and career without losing your sanity, and more. Ultimately, we're here to build a community with you because we're all trying to navigate the world of marketing together. Are you ready? Grab your favorite drink and join your hosts, Cassie and Erica, for this week's episode. Hey, Marketing Happy Hour listeners,

Starting point is 00:00:53 welcome back. This week, Cassie interviews podcaster, blogger, travel agent, and digital marketing professional, Connor Brown. In this episode, Connor shares practical email and podcast tips that will propel your business forward, explains why storytelling is an integral part of any content strategy, and provides a unique perspective on working full-time while pursuing a side hustle simultaneously. This is a great conversation and I'm excited for you to hear it. So without further ado, go grab your favorite drink and listen in. Connor, I am so stoked to have you on the show. Welcome to Marketing Happy Hour. Thank you so much. Thank you for having me. I'm excited to be here. Big fan.

Starting point is 00:01:40 Of you as well. So that's exactly why we had to bring you on the show. You know, I met you, gosh, I think back in February of this year, and we've been at a couple events together so far. And every time I hear you speak, I'm like, man, all right, we got to get them on the show and we're finally doing it. So looking forward to it. Me too. Thank you very much. Well, Connor, before we start, if you've listened to the show one or two times before, you know, that we always ask this question to our guests, but what is in your glass either right now or what do you enjoy sipping on? It doesn't have to be alcoholic, but what do you like to drink? Well, you know, we're recording this at 9 a.m. So I'm starting out easy with bourbon. Neat. It's the day going, gets the blood flowing. No, of course I'm kidding. You know, Cassie, what I've really

Starting point is 00:02:25 been, I'd say obsessed with for the last couple of months is liquid IV. Like I love, I love it. I love that little salty twang to it, but I was strolling the local Publix and I saw a new product, body armor, flash IV. So their IV product, not too shabby. I think it's still like the, the liquid IV better, but if this was a traditional happy hour setting, uh, I'm an old fashioned kind of guy. I love them. Can't get enough of them. Oh, so good. We too, Eric and I both enjoy an old fashioned, we love Negronis too, which I think is kind of like a cousin to the old fashioned. So, uh, but I have not tried liquid IV yet. I've been dying to, so I will is kind of like a cousin to the old fashioned. So, uh, but I have not tried liquid IV yet. I've been dying to, so I will definitely have to do that now. This is my push

Starting point is 00:03:10 to do that. It's good. Yeah. Don't be fearful. Cause it is like, there's a little saltiness to it, which freaks people out, but the scientists say it's important for us. So I guess we'll trust them. I trust you. I'm glad you gave me a warning because I'd probably be a little startled if I drank it without that warning. Well, thank you for that, Connor. Well, I'm excited to dive into your experience and just learn from you. I've gotten to learn from you, like I said, in the past, and I am very excited for our friends to learn from you as well.

Starting point is 00:03:39 But can you share first about your journey and what led you to where you are today? Yeah, absolutely. So I say my journey is kind of twofold. It's a marketing journey and it's a Disney journey, which I know you know a lot about, of course. I went to college to study communications. I'll be honest, when I went to school, I didn't know what I wanted to do, but I knew I liked three things.

Starting point is 00:04:04 I liked to be creative. I liked to write and I like to think strategically and problem solve. When it comes to creativity and writing and stuff, I knew I still wanted to do it in a business setting. So I didn't know what that was going to be. And then I realized, oh, at the school I go to, marketing is in the school of business and I would have to take business calculus. And Connor was not doing that. So I did strategic communications, which is like a cousin of marketing as well. And I loved it a lot.

Starting point is 00:04:35 I loved the storytelling aspect of it, of connected to business, of telling a brand story and convincing consumers that this is the product or the service that they need. My grand plan was always to work for Disney my entire life. And I know we share a similarity, and we both participated on the Disney college program. So I got to do that right after college. The main goal was I'll do the college program. I'll parlay that into a professional internship in the world of marketing at Disney. And then I'll swing that into a full-time gig in marketing with Disney. And I'll work there for the rest of my life. And I'm happy to say I got a third of the way there.

Starting point is 00:05:18 I did the college program. The other two things didn't pan out for me, but I knew I wanted to put my degree to use. So I went back home to Bethesda, Maryland, just outside Washington, D.C., and I worked in the association world for a while as a marketer. What was really cool about that is there were so many avenues I was able to explore. That's where I first found my love of email marketing. But I was working on membership marketing, renewal marketing, event marketing for our huge annual conferences that we would put on every year. It was a lot of fun.

Starting point is 00:05:59 It was awesome. I knew at a point in time that I needed something new, something different. So I left that. I worked for myself for a while doing Disney vacation planning. I wanted to explore, take what I knew in marketing and kind of apply it to what I love to help people with, which was planning vacations and things like that. I still do that for a travel agency now, but I also have a full-time job at a marketing agency focusing again on email marketing. So there you go. That's my, I guess I was going to say TLDR, but that was still pretty long. Yeah. I love it. Well, it's super cool to hear about your story because, you know, you and I have very similar paths that we took. Like you said, we both did the college program. I too was like, all right, professional internship. Then I've met some amazing people over the years, some of

Starting point is 00:07:05 our mutual friends, and it's just incredible to see this group of people that don't necessarily work for the company, but they're still doing amazing things tied to Disney. And so if you love Disney and you love business and you're interested in this community that we're talking about, reach out to either one of us because we could connect you with some incredible people. So thank you for sharing that Connor. Absolutely. Yes. Well, speaking of, you mentioned that you work full time as well as dabbling in a couple of different areas. Do you have any advice for professionals who work full time as well, but they're looking to kind of get their feet wet, build a side hustle, pursue their hobbies to create something of their own. Yeah. So full-time job that I have, and then I would say I have two side hustles. So there's

Starting point is 00:07:56 WDW Opinion, which is blog podcast. And that's kind of my marketing engine for my vacation planning services as a travel agent. And then specifically the travel agency I work for, Keys to the Castle Travel, I'm also the director of agent development. So I train new travel agents. It's a lot of fun. I help them with marketing, those sorts of things. It's a lot. It's definitely a lot. When you're coming at this and you wanna take on a side hustle or an endeavor,

Starting point is 00:08:26 I'm glad, Cassie, that you mentioned the word hobby because I think a hobby, you spend money on. A business, you make money from. And of course, to start a business, you're gonna be spending money. There's gonna be investment costs. It can be as little or as big as you want or need. My one tip is, if you want it to make it a business, treat it like a business. Take yourself seriously,

Starting point is 00:08:54 even if nobody else is taking you seriously. You get out what you put in, all these cliches that I'm saying, but it is true, right? If you treat it like a hobby and you do it every once in a while, like I treat golf as a hobby, I'll play a couple of times a month, whatever. I'm not going pro. I'm not making any money off of, I'm losing a lot of money if we're being honest, but I know that that's a hobby and I'm okay with that. If it's a side hustle and it wants to be a business and you want it to be a business, then you have to understand how are you going to make money. When you take yourself seriously and you treat it seriously like a business, that gives you the wherewithal to actually focus on it.

Starting point is 00:09:37 The other aspect of that is if it's a hobby, it's much easier to stop doing, to not be focused on, to if something comes up and you say, you know what, I should be working on this if I want to grow it. But somebody's going to the theme parks or the very merry Christmas party is that day. Forget it. I'll just go to that and do that. Then you're treating it as a hobby. So I would just say as a word of warning and caution, when you do treat something serious, you're going to have to make sacrifices, make time for the things that you want to grow and they will grow.

Starting point is 00:10:13 It's very easy to walk away from something if you just treat it as a hobby. Yeah. And it's funny you mentioned time too, because I think one of the biggest things that stops someone, especially with a full-time job of launching something else is time. They say, oh, I don't have enough time. And I understand a lot of times working a full-time job, it's nine to five, but that still opens up a lot of extra time that you could supply to that. Obviously don't overwork yourself. Don't burn yourself out, but think about all the time you spend maybe watching TV or doing some other things where you could put that time into that hobby, potentially a business in the future. And you'd be surprised

Starting point is 00:10:50 at how much you can get done. Are you telling me I have to stop my love is blind addiction? Never. I would never say that because I also enjoy that show. So we're not saying that, but all the other television shows, maybe you can come aside for a little bit. Well, Connor, you've talked about the importance of storytelling in your work. And so, you know, we talk about story a lot on this show, but I love your perspective on it. Just what I've heard in the past. So how do you think personally that businesses can effectively incorporate storytelling into

Starting point is 00:11:23 their content strategy? And what are some of the key elements to a compelling brand story, you'd say? So I think, especially in the audience that we might be talking to, if there are a lot of creators, if there are a lot of solopreneurs or entrepreneurs, or even if you are working for a corporation, story should be at the core of your marketing and advertising endeavors. Think back to your origin story with what you're doing, whether it's starting your business, whether it's going out on your own.

Starting point is 00:11:56 There was a reason that you decided to do that, a time, a place, and a motivation. That's your story right there, which I think people often struggle to find their voice, their story. It's simple. Your story is the story of you. When you take that and you break it down and you realize this is why I wanted to do this thing, then you have a compelling narrative that you can craft marketing messaging around. And I often say, you know, it doesn't have to feel marketing, right? Like if we talk about the brands that we know are really good at marketing and advertising, the things like Disney, like Nike, like Coca-Cola, every commercial that you see, take Disney, they never say, we have 47 attractions, four theme parks, 30 hotels, 100 restaurants. They're not

Starting point is 00:12:46 talking about the facts that make up their Disney World destination. It's much more emotional, right? The story that's tied to it is emotional in nature. The classic one is the kids are too excited to sleep. They can't sleep because they know they're going to Walt Disney World. Or when you see the family at the very end having a great time, Coca-Cola is the same way. They never talk about, we have a caramel flavoring and this is how tasty it is. It's celebrations, it's people coming together, bringing a Coke, sharing a Coke around a meaningful time and place. That's how you do it effectively, right? You talk less about all the things that you're going to get out of it and more about how are you going to feel when you experience this product or the service or whatever you have. So I love that notion of

Starting point is 00:13:40 when someone uses what you're selling, how do you want them to feel at the end of it? If it's happy, if it's relieved, if it's satisfied, you can take that and work back and tell the story of how they're going to feel when they do take you on as a client or what have you. That's so good. I love asking this question because I know there's a lot of great resources out there, but where have you honed in your knowledge of storytelling for business or is there anything specifically you study or you learn from or where are you getting some of this, these ideas or strategies from? You have to be a great natural observer. And I often say this about someone who wants to start creating content. In order to be a good content creator, I think you have to be a good content consumer as well.

Starting point is 00:14:31 And I don't just mean aimlessly scrolling, you know, for hours on end, which I probably fortunately, I think we all do. It's about seeing what works and kind of replicating it as best as you can, right? There's no need to reinvent the wheel. I mean, there's a great saying that's like, great artists steal, right? Every single artist that has ever come has been influenced by a being before that. They didn't just magically wake up one day, never seen an art piece installation or whatever and be like, you know what? I got a great idea for a sculpture. No, they saw thousands and hundreds of things before it. And then they took that and influenced it into how their taste comes through in their art.

Starting point is 00:15:17 So I think that that's it. You have to be a great natural observer and always looking for storytelling, whether it's through videos or social content or on Netflix or in a book, or just one thing I love to do is people watch, right? Watch the world go by. Observe as best as you can. And eventually, I think you'll kind of see what works well when it comes to storytelling. Yeah, such good advice. I think the other thing I tell people a lot of times is think about the things that you naturally gravitate towards or the brands or the, you know, people, the artists, the singers, whatever it is, and think about and ask yourself those questions. Like, what are they doing that makes me gravitate

Starting point is 00:15:59 towards them? What are some of their strategies or things? I think having that perspective and changing the way that to your point, you look at things when you strategies or things? I think having that perspective and changing the way that to your point, you look at things when you're experiencing it, I think we can learn a lot from that. So, yeah. And I often think about that too, of when someone says, oh, well you should do this because that's what all these people like a perfect example is, um, on big newsletters, they always ask a question, right? And for years and years and years, everyone was like, reply to this by answering this random question. And I think that's still effective in a lot of instances, but we were doing it at one place I was working at. And I was like,

Starting point is 00:16:40 who has ever gotten an email like this and actually replied and no one raised their hand? I'm like, well, how are we asking someone, our consumers to do something that we in and of itself would never do? So that's what it is. Understand your emotions and what you react to and then try to replicate that. Yeah, absolutely. 100%. Well, with the storytelling, there's a lot of different platforms and places to infuse that into, right? And I think one of the biggest questions, especially as a brand is either getting started or if they're a seasoned brand and there's new platforms coming out or new platforms to consider that are new to them. How do you recommend businesses choose the right places

Starting point is 00:17:20 to show up on and what's kind of the thought process behind that specifically? So I'll kind of break this down in twofold. So one thing that I do that I mentioned is I'm the director of agent development at my travel agency. So all the new travel agents that come on, I lead them through onboarding and training. And throughout the year, I do some other training opportunities for existing agents. I love it. It's great because I not only get to tell people about the systems and processes that we have set up, but I talk to them about marketing, about finding their clients, about going out into their communities and attracting people to sign up for their services of vacation planning. With that, a huge question I always get asked from the new travel agents is,

Starting point is 00:18:07 what platform do you think I should start with? And my response is always, well, what do you want right now? What do you want right now? Because there's a million new things you have to learn as a travel agent. There's a million things you have to consider when you're a brand or a business or a solopreneur. Adding one more thing that you're going to have to learn means inherently you're going to have to take something away from anything else in your normal day. If you're already somewhere, that's a great place to start. Build your brand, understand your audience, build your voice. And then once you get muscle memory and you're so good at posting to that platform or posting that style of content, then you can go on and try something different. From a business perspective, it's about knowing where your audience is, right?

Starting point is 00:19:00 You want to show up to your audience rather than having your audience search through endless pages or what have you to find you. Make it as easy as possible for your specific audience to find you, which is why, you know, working at a financial association where I used to work at, we're probably not going to be on TikTok, right? That's not our client base. Like finance professionals, industry professionals in that endeavor, they're not going to be on TikTok, right? They're probably going to be on LinkedIn. So we're going to go to them and see what works effectively. And then we can branch out from there and try to dabble in that. The shiny object syndrome is real. I think when people want to explore a new platform, they always think it's going to be the gold rush. They always think, well, once I get on this platform, that's when the money is going to come in. But we both know

Starting point is 00:19:58 it's about the hard work. No matter where you are, it's about putting in the time. There's no shortcuts. So don't make it hard on yourself. Know where your audience already is and go hard on that. And then you can kind of pivot from there if need be. Yeah, absolutely. Great advice. Well, speaking of hard work too, and one of those content verticals that you can jump into podcasting is one, right?

Starting point is 00:20:20 And you have experience in that space, which I'm very excited to talk about, because I personally love talking podcasting as well. But, you know, podcasting is a lot of work. Like I said, there's a lot of things to consider, a lot of steps to get your show up. But also in the launch phase, there's some things to keep in mind in terms of building the direction of your show or what you want the audience to get out of. So when jumping into podcasting or even just assessing your current podcast strategy, what are some considerations you think a brand should keep in mind when it comes to choosing a niche or even just the format or topic in order for it to resonate with their audience? When someone is starting out with a podcast, firstly, understand why you want to do it,

Starting point is 00:21:07 right? I think a couple of years ago, it's probably still the case. It still had that shiny object syndrome, right? Like, well, I have to do a podcast. Why? Well, everyone's doing it. Okay, well, it might not be right for your strategy in this time and place. There's a great quote by F. Scott Fitzgerald that's like, you don't write because you need to say something. You write because you have to say something. And I kind of feel like that's the way it should be with a podcast. If you have something you have to say, then you should go into that. Not is, well, I could talk about something. No. If you have to talk about something, a topic, whatever it is, then you can dabble into a podcast. And I always tell people when you're first starting out, come up with 25 ideas of what you think a podcast episode could be.

Starting point is 00:21:57 So each idea would become its own episode. When you think you have 25 incredible, awesome topics, do it again, do 25 more. And if you can get to that point, then you're probably ready to start on your podcast journey because that's a year's worth of content. You know, you have enough to talk about and then you can go from there. Because the biggest thing in podcasting is getting past that two month mark, right? Like a vast, vast, vast majority of podcasts do not get past episode 10. Why? Because after two months, the novelty, the excitement has worn off and it is hard work. When it comes to niching down, I would say start broader, Start broader and see what your audience is resonating with and then niche down from there. Especially if you're doing something once a week, once every

Starting point is 00:22:56 other week, you'll have a lot of content coming up, piling up relatively quickly. So that'll be good data to interpret and see where you can start focusing on. Additionally, my podcast talked a lot about Walt Disney World. I would do a couple episodes about Universal Orlando. People would reach out. You know what? I never thought about Universal, but I listened to this episode because I like you and I like your thoughts and opinions and you might've convinced me to go. So in that regard, be yourself, they'll show up and you can kind of dictate what you want to talk about. Yeah, really good. It's such an intimate platform too. And you really do get to know someone on a deeper level. So you're so right. Although the content you're providing is very helpful and it probably adds a lot of value to the audience. They're getting to know you through that experience. I like to tell people podcasting is

Starting point is 00:23:48 like sitting at a dinner table with someone. And so there's different strategies, like make sure you're talking directly at one person and all this stuff, but that's because it works. And when they listen to that, they feel like they're directly having a conversation with you. So it's a great medium. Absolutely. I love it. Yes. Well, speaking of that too, you know, one of the biggest things that people come to us with, they'll say, I want to start a show. I'm not sure where to start. And the biggest thing in terms of starting that I've found hangs people up is the tech and kind of the process, right? So do you have any practical quick tips for

Starting point is 00:24:25 streamlining the production process, but also some different tech elements that someone should keep in mind when getting started? Yeah. So you always hear this thing of, well, you just start, just start and use your computer audio. You know, you'll be fine. I hate that advice, right? For a couple of reasons. One, yes, it's the cheapest way to go. You probably already have a computer. You have Zoom, right? You can just talk into it. The problem with that audio quality aside is it's going to be very easy to walk away from, right? When you haven't invested anything other than time, it's going to be super easy to walk away from. At the top of the show, that's what we kind of talked about. Take yourself

Starting point is 00:25:09 seriously. Invest in it like a business. Take it seriously. We're not talking about breaking the bank. We're not talking about spending hundreds and hundreds of dollars. You can get a very affordable mic that will 10x your sound quality on Amazon. It'll be able to plug right into your computer and you'll be good to go. That part is the easy part. Sometimes the starting, of course, is the toughest component of everything. And I think for so many people, they just don't understand where to start. There are a couple of places.

Starting point is 00:25:47 Pat Flynn has a great How to Start a Podcast series on YouTube. It's many years old. It's still as relevant today as ever. The setup aspects of it, getting your show in feeds, getting your RSS feed, you only have to do that once. So you only have to figure out that stuff once. And then the only thing you have to worry about from there is showing up, recording a podcast and posting it onto your feed, which is as easy as posting something on social media,

Starting point is 00:26:17 if we're being honest. I would say the other thing people get hung up on is the editing of it. That's something where you probably don't have to invest a whole lot in. You can use GarageBand. If you have a Mac, you can use Audacity, right? Is that a Windows? I'm not a Windows guy. Come on. But I think that that's the one. And those things are easy to learn and you don't have to make it super complicated.

Starting point is 00:26:46 What I love about my favorite shows is they're not overly edited, right? If we're sitting at a dinner table, to use your example, that's not an edited conversation. So you don't have to make yours as edited or as polished as that. So invest a little bit in it and don't worry about, don't get hung up on the tech behind it because a lot of the stuff, once you set it up, you don't really have to worry about down the road. Yeah, absolutely. Well, thank you for those. And I'll have to look up that course. That sounds great because I'm always looking for podcast resources out there. But Connor, I want to shift gears a little bit once again and talk about email.

Starting point is 00:27:29 In the age of overflowing inboxes, as we all resonate with that, I'm sure, how can brands craft email campaigns that actually stand out and captivate the reader's attention? And do you have any creative strategies or even just techniques for coming up with new ideas for email? So an important thing about email is why should they sign up for your list in the first place? I think one thing that I always hate to see is a pop-up that just says sign up for our newsletter. I'm like, why?

Starting point is 00:28:03 What am I going to get out of it? You have to show the worth that it is going to provide to that person subscribing. That worth can be you're giving them something. You're giving them a digital download. You're giving them access to a short course on whatever the topic is that you're talking about, a coupon if you're in the e-commerce space. Then from there, the value that you have to give the person needs to be based on what you've already talked about. So I always, one thing that annoys me

Starting point is 00:28:38 is if I've already signed up for something and now they're emailing me stuff about, hey, this is why you should buy our product or service. I know, dude, I already did it. I did the research, right? Like that drives me bonkers. So it's about being upfront and honest about the content that you're going to deliver to people. Another thing is to make it personalized, make it one-to-one, just like we're talking about with podcasting, talk to that one person. There's a number of ways that you can do this. Instead of having it be from this brand, right? Instead of having be from nike.com and it drops into your

Starting point is 00:29:20 inbox, you could have it from connor at n Nike.com, right? Add in a little headshot at the bottom. You can even change up the sender icon like that, that sends through emails to actually have it come quote unquote from a person and have that person write those emails. Everyone has their own unique style and language and cadence of words that makes it more familiar, that humanizes it. And then from the reader's perspective, you can use things like personalized fields. That's one thing that I always love, love, love to use and tell people when you have a newsletter sign up, yes, it's very easy to just say, all you have to do is give us your email address. Sure, that might mean that you're getting the most amount of people to sign up because they just have to put their email address in and put,

Starting point is 00:30:19 click submit. I say include that first name field at the very, very least. You want to do more information? You can. The more that you ask for, the less likely someone is going to sign up. But at the bare minimum, email and first name. That way, you can take that first name and you can start personalizing things. Personalize the subject line, include their name in it, say, hey, Steve, how's it going? Right in the email field. And that really, really resonates with people becomes less about you're on this huge, massive email list, and more about I'm having a one to one conversation with you. What about segmenting? That's a big buzzword in the world of email marketing. How should we be

Starting point is 00:31:04 segmenting? And what type of content should we be tweaking for those different segmented audiences? So it comes down to a lot of things. I'll give a couple examples. Let's talk e-commerce. If you have a wide variety of things that you're selling, maybe you're a jewelry store and you have necklaces, bracelets, you have rings. By segmenting, you can see one, interests, and two, what they've already purchased,

Starting point is 00:31:35 which then influences what you think they're going to like. Segmenting is basically like knowing what these people are already interested in and giving it to them right up front so that they don't have to search for it. So if we use that jewelry example, let's say they purchased three bracelets in the last few months. Let's start sending them emails just about our other bracelets that we have. Throw in a coupon code for their fourth bracelet or whatever it is. Segmenting like that means you're personalizing it more and more and more. If you're more of a service-based business, then you can kind of segment it by where they are in the process, right? If they've just signed up,

Starting point is 00:32:30 you can give them a welcome series. If they're past that point, you can give them a, hey, what's going on and kind of push them towards purchasing. If you haven't heard from them in a while, they haven't opened anything. I love a goodbye series, right? Hey, we noticed that you haven't, you know, been opening our emails. We don't want to be annoying. If you want to stay on our list, click this button and you can do that. A huge thing that I love about segmenting is start up front. You can tag your pages, of course, with pop-ups like this pop-up is on this page, put them in this segment. You don't have to do that. You can just have one signup form across your website. And when they come in, create a welcome campaign. And the first email in the welcome campaign is, hey, thanks so much for joining our list.

Starting point is 00:33:16 Let me know, what are you interested in the most? Are you interested in bracelets? Are you interested in rings? Are you interested in necklaces? And when they click on something, you can then segment them into that group. They're telling you exactly what they're interested in. And from that, you can take that info and give them exactly what they're looking for. Segmenting is so, so, so, so powerful. And that's another incredible way to combat the overflow of inboxes, especially when people know whenever I open this email from this brand, it's exactly what I'm looking for.

Starting point is 00:33:52 They're 10 times as likely to continue to open your emails. Yeah. It's kind of the way to think about it too, is when you're scrolling on social and you see an ad literally about the product you just looked up or you were talking about it and you see an ad for it. product you just looked up or you were talking about it and you see an ad for it. And a lot of times, at least for me personally, it makes me want to buy the product even more. Cause I'm like, well, shoot, there it is again. Like maybe this is a sign. And so it's kind of a similar thing I would say, right. Of, of email as well, giving people exactly what they've been looking for exactly what they need or exactly what they've purchased in the past to purchase again. Exactly. Yeah. Yeah. Well, let's talk about two to round out this discussion, list growth. I know that's a big goal of everyone when they're launching or even just far along in

Starting point is 00:34:36 their email journey. They want to know how to grow the subscribers, right? So any strategies there for list growth, but also, you know, just capturing audience attention through email in general to hopefully lead to sales or whatever it may be? So there has to be some sort of incentive, right? You have to lead with something upfront to get people on your list for that growth opportunity. You could give a download away, right? It depends on what your industry is, of course, but maybe it's a checklist. On my site, I have a packing checklist for your Disney vacation, right? People like that. They can print it out. They can check. It's got everything that I think you should pack for a Disney trip. One thing when people are just

Starting point is 00:35:26 starting out with email, but they might have an established business, a great, great, great resource is a frequently asked questions, right? Get our guide to the 10 most asked questions we get every day about your buying process, whatever it is. You have that info already, right? You know what your customers are already asking you for or questions about your product. If it's a service and you always start your prospecting calls with, well, what are the questions that you have? I bet you with each prospect that you do, you're going to have some similar questions that people continue to ask. Take those, index them, and then turn it into a valuable resource that you can give away. That goes back to that segmenting idea, right? People are searching your site. They're wondering what you're about. They have questions. Oh my gosh, here's a pop-up. Here's a call-out box.

Starting point is 00:36:29 Get our guide to our most asked questions. They download it. It's already answering the questions that they're probably going to ask. That is a super, super powerful thing that's easy to spin up that you already have the data around. I would start with something like that. And then you can grow from there to be more segmented. That's really what it is, right? If you're not getting a whole lot of web traffic, then you can do things like Facebook ads that are geared exactly for newsletter signups. But again, you want wanna be really intentional and specific

Starting point is 00:37:06 about the audience you're going for and the thing that you're gonna provide for them. Because the most important thing next to list growth is healthy list growth. So get rid of the old emails, get rid of the emails that aren't opening anything. Don't worry about it. Don't feel sad.

Starting point is 00:37:23 When people unsubscribe for emails, I love that because it means they're not interested anymore. They're past the point of no return. Fine. Get them off the list. I only want to talk to people that are serious about what we're doing. Yeah. It just means your engagement rate is going to get better and better.

Starting point is 00:37:41 So that's really good. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And it's, it's funny you mentioned or not funny, but it's, it's good. You mentioned ads, but, um, you know, if you have the capital to run ads, I think our friend Paul Gowder said, uh, lead generation ads are really powerful to build your list. Uh, Jenna Kutcher from the gold digger podcast said the same exact thing. So seems to be a trend. And so maybe test that that's a way to kind of build your audience as well. But most of the time on there, they're

Starting point is 00:38:09 offering something to your point. It's some sort of lead magnet or resource or, uh, you know, some sort of incentive. So that's something to think about as well and test. Absolutely. Yes. Well, Connor, one of my favorite questions to ask on the show, it wouldn't be Marketing Happy Hour without, really weird thing. And your relationship with time is going to be very different at different, no pun intended, times in your life. I remember coming out of college and I'd done the college program and my buddy and I were getting an apartment. We're about to sign a lease. And that real estate agent was like, oh, you could sign up for a 12 month lease, or you could sign up for an 18 month lease for a little bit cheaper. And I was like, 18 months, we're going to be like 72. Like I couldn't comprehend 18 months. It seemed like forever and a year away from that because we had lived our lives in four month increments

Starting point is 00:39:27 with semesters and, and, uh, summer vacations for forever, right? Every four months, our lives completely changed our schedules, what we were doing, who we were hanging out with. So for me early on in my career, I was always nervous about that. I was like, I got to go. I got to go. I got to go. I got to get this promotion.

Starting point is 00:39:48 I got to get to the next level as quickly as possible because I got to do it. I got to do it. So when someone was like, you just need time, wait a couple of years, a couple of years, you're crazy. That's college is a couple of years. There's no way I can wait that long. And I wish I understood how time worked better. That was going to be all right.

Starting point is 00:40:12 You can take a breather, play the long game and focus on what you're doing right now. On the flip side of that, some projects that you're going to do are going to fly by and it's not going to make any sense. Why certain projects fly by yet while your career seems to be going very slowly. It's okay. You're playing the long game. It's a marathon, not a sprint. Understanding time, I think is really, really crucial in your early stages of because it grounds you and it helps you focus on just doing the work that you have to do in front of you and knowing if you put maximum effort into that, good things will come with time. Such good advice. Could not hear that more in the show. So thank you for sharing that, Connor. And thank you for all of the strategies that you've shared just throughout

Starting point is 00:41:04 this whole episode. I think it's going to be super powerful for just rounding out your content strategy that you're building, especially going into the new year, you know, making sure that those are tweaked and refined and ready to go for 2024. But Connor, on that, I know you have a lot coming up in your personal business, which I'm excited to hear about and I'm sure everyone else is, but where can we stay in touch with you online and just, you know, get in touch with you if needed, ask questions, any of that stuff, what's the best place to do so? Yeah. So you can head to wdwopinion.com. You can follow me at WDW opinion across all the social medias. And you can reach out to me at Connor C O N O R

Starting point is 00:41:48 that's one N at WDW opinion.com. I talk about Disney, a whole lot of stuff. Um, I believe I've shared, I shared this with Cassie, uh, going through a little bit of a rebrand. So hopefully we'll be launched prior to the new year. I'm looking forward to that. But if you follow all those socials and things like that, they'll just convert over to what we're going to rebrand it to. And I'm very excited for all of that. But please feel free to reach out about anything, not just Disney marketing.

Starting point is 00:42:17 I'm here to help. Yes, I love it. Well, you've been talking about this rebrand, at least that I've heard for almost a year now. So I'm excited to see that come. Thank you very much for telling me that I haven't been working very hard. Thank you. Listen, I was going to make a point. So you mentioned time, things take time, right? And so that this is a pure example. Things take time, rebrands take time, building a business takes time. So give yourself grace in that time and it's going to be great. It's going to pay off. So give yourself grace in that time and it's going to be great.

Starting point is 00:42:45 It's going to pay off. So excited for you in that. Yes. Well, Connor, thanks again for coming on Marketing Happy Hour. We'll definitely have you back because I think there's a lot more that we could dive into.

Starting point is 00:42:57 But thanks for just sharing your insights with us today. Love it. Thanks so much for having me. That's it for this week's episode. Thanks so much again for tuning in. If you enjoyed this episode, please remember to subscribe, rate, and leave a review on your favorite podcast platform. For more from Marketing Happy Hour, head on over to our website, marketinghappyhr.com, or follow us on Instagram at marketinghappyhr.

Starting point is 00:43:27 We'll see you next week. We are so excited to share that our first ever free Marketing Happy Hour digital resource is now available. Download the Dream Career Game Plan today at marketinghappyhr.com forward slash freebie. That's marketinghappyhr.com forward slash freebie. This five-step workbook will guide you through defining your goals, building your network, diversifying your skills, influencing where you're at, and investing in your growth. Cassie and I created this resource with marketing careers in mind, but the framework can be applied to any industry.

Starting point is 00:44:11 Our hope is that this workbook will help you truly elevate your career, whether you're in the market for a new position or just looking to make your mark in your current organization. No matter where this resource finds you, we are cheering you on every step of the way. So go check it out at marketinghappyhr.com forward slash freebie to download and make your career dreams come true.

Marketing Happy Hour - Practical Email + Podcast Strategy Tips | Content Strategist Conor Brown

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