Today in Digital Marketing - Weekend Edition: Get Your Digital Certifications Through Jelly Academy

Episode Date: November 27, 2021

Jelly Academy is an educational program that presents a solid understanding of the most successful elements to a digital marketing strategy, including, the ‘What’, ‘Where’, ‘Who’, ‘When���, ‘Why’ and ‘How’ of a winning campaign and the departments within them.MORE INFO AND SIGN UP: https://b.link/jellyacademyThis course is ideal for those with limited experience in digital marketing, or for smaller companies without a dedicated marketing team. During this course, trainees will become more confident and equipped in understanding the value of digital marketing and will be able to immediately implement learned concepts in social media, digital ads, public relations, and content marketing.In this course, trainees will learn:Why every company should have a digital marketing strategyHow to identify the pain points in their own company’s strategyWhy it matters to have a target audience (Ideal Buyer), and how to identify themHow to identify the most effective ways to reach this target audienceHow to set SMART Marketing goals, and quantify results to measure successMORE INFO AND SIGN UP: https://b.link/jellyacademyCOURSE STRUCTURE:Our complete Digital Marketing Training program consists of six sessions:Session 1: Social MediaSession 2: SEOSession 3: Google AdsSession 4: Facebook + Instagram AdsSession 5: Google AnalyticsSession 6: Public RelationsThis was not a paid placement, but we may earn affiliate commissions for registrations.Our Sponsors:* Check out Kinsta: https://kinsta.comPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

There are not a lot of people that I trust when it comes to digital marketing information and getting the latest. And really, if you are going to be trained by someone, you've got to be trained by someone who is in the trenches. Welcome to a special weekend edition of Today in Digital Marketing. I'm Todd Maffin. I'm here with my friend Darian Kovacs from Jelly Academy. Hi, Darian. Hi, Todd. Good to see you. Good to see you. We are looking at each other through a Zoom-like interface.

So we have kind of, we both run agencies. We kind of compete against each other on the business side sometimes. We run up against each other in RFPs. But I wanted to talk a bit about Jelly Academy, which is really one of those few places where people get an opportunity to be trained by folks who are doing the actual work. So let's talk first about kind of what Jelly is overall, like what your agency is, and then I want to go into Jelly Academy. So what's the what's the origin story of Jelly Marketing? I can give you even our business

card is actually an actual jar of jelly, strawberry jelly. So Todd, have I given you one of these? Yes, I have several. Yes. Okay. You probably ate them because they're edible business cards, where we even put a little website on them where you can actually order peanut butter and bread. So some people know, yeah, PB and bread. I won't give the full URL, but it's on the side of the jar. And then we but sometimes I'm like, especially, you know, when our office wasn't as full and I would like had a lot going on. I was like having to go to the grocery store and put peanut butter and bread in a box and mail it off. So there's no like, there's no like automated fulfillment station in Indonesia doing this. No.

No. And I'm being sensitive, especially when Canada Post was like a little slower. I was like, oh, I don't know if I can send the bread now because it could go bad. But so. Can you even send bread across the border no so it's been we've only really handed the jars out in canada so that's been uh you know a saving grace there but and then i got to make sure if it's like can they even have peanut butter so then we have to have peanut butter you know peanut free options oh God, the waivers. Seriously. All right. But the work we do, actual day-to-day work, we took the idea of being a traditional PR agency mixed with an ad shop. So Facebook and

Google ads mixed with kind of a content management shop. And so we kind of took those three disciplines and then realized that SEO was happening because of the work we were doing with kind of backlinks with PR and blogging and Google My Business on the social side. And we added SEO to our team as well. So those are the four things we focus on. But more so the mix of the four is kind of our specialty. So more like the salad instead of just selling tomatoes. Okay, enough with the food metaphors. I'm done with the food metaphors now.

So where did the idea for Jelly Academy come from? We had a client of ours who said, you know what, I have some extra capacity and I'm really curious about the ads you're doing for my brand. I'm wondering if you could teach me how to do it instead of me paying you to do it. And we said that would be amazing. And so we did it as a trial about five years ago and we taught her how to do her own SEO, her own AdWords. And it was awesome. And then, but wait a minute, and then didn't you, did you lose her as a client because now she doesn't need you? You know what she did? She actually tried it on her own for a bit. And then she came back and said, Hey, you know what? I still want to hire you for SEO. I don't

like it, but I now get it and I respect it and I understand it better. So she became one of our best clients because she fully understood all the acronyms and understanding what was going on behind the scenes in SEO. And then we realized this is a really cool offering. And so we started offering it to others. And mainly it's been, you know, when we opened it to our class to say, hey, if a group of students want to come, we're going to offer this as kind of an open classroom. It was a lot of moms who had, you know, when we opened it to our class to say, hey, if a group of students want to come, we're going to offer this as kind of an open classroom. It was a lot of moms who had, you know, looked after their kids. They had a comms degree from back in the day and said, you know, I'm gonna get back in the marketing sector. My kids are going back to school.

I want to kind of get rapidly re-skilled is the term they use, or I want to get the certifications to show the person hiring me that I know what I'm doing. And so our kind of big push is always, it's not about the Jelly Academy brand as much as it's a cool logo and, you know, kind of, you know, it's very Harry Potter inspired. It's kind of the four schools that you can learn like digital ads, PR, social media, and SEO. But it's all about focusing on the 11 certificates that you can get through Google and Facebook and Hootsuite. Oh, I see. So and let's give out the link right now so people don't if they are busy and they don't want to listen to the rest of this podcast.

It's our affiliate link is b.link slash Jelly Academy. So is it kind of like a like a wrapper around these other certificate programs? That's exactly and at the end of the day you could really not do jelly academy and go directly to google directly to facebook directly to hootsuite and do it all yourself and i encourage everyone to do that and that's the whole thing with our industry for our industry to be taken seriously people should be getting their certifications should be getting their credentials in the same way we take lawyers seriously who pass the bar or accountants who get their cpa electricians who even get their ticket and so

you can go and do it but our idea is hey we're going to be with you for six weeks three hours a week you're going to get professionals who are in the trenches who are going to show you the best practices and essentially hold you accountable and hold your hand to get all those certificates. So what's the value add? You mentioned like holding your hand. So like what is for the course fee to get into Jelly Academy? What are you offering people other than, you know, the certificates, which they can get on their own? Probably three things is what we add as value is number one being because you're taught by and you're working with actual practitioners, you're going to get actual resources, actual real life case studies, real life examples of why what you're learning is so important. You're going to get templates and

resources, you know, Google sheet forms that have been used and tried and tested in the trenches of agency life of brand life that you can apply to your own company that you work for, or the company that you're going to work for one day, or the agency that you work for. Second thing we do is a big thing is really, I think, accountability. So I think so many people say, you know, in the new year 2022, I'm going to get all my certs, but it's just so easy to put off. And so our job is to hold people accountable, support them, and to really make sure that they're able to get them. And then we provide them kind of the study tools and the resources and the training to get them. And then the third thing is they get access to a tool, essentially, you know, kind of a year long access of learning called masterclass. So inspired by the masterclass

that you can see out there with Malcolm Gladwell and others. We provide you, right now there's about 20 classes. There's two to three new classes added a month. And so, and that whole philosophy is you should always be learning about digital marketing. You should always be, you know, listening to your podcast today in digital marketing because it changes literally every day. And so we recommend some good podcasts, but we also give them learning on demand and also some really deep masterclasses like Google My Business specifically. There's a whole class just on that and mastering and understanding Google My Business. So it's the concept, the idea of being, hey, welcome, you've got your certificates, but here's a year long access to always be learning and always kind of recertifying and training yourself. And is there an opportunity to kind of cohort with people?

Are there group sessions on Zoom where everyone can kind of learn from the wisdom of the group? We haven't done that yet. We probably could and should like even making a Facebook group per class. Um, what we have done and said is people can book office hours. So people want to book an office hour, say with one of the instructors that's offered. But we haven't fully taken advantage. I think because our classes are only three hours a week and it really is, you know, it's 18 hours total. It's over six weeks. Most people are working full time or are in school full time or really just trying to focus on the credential piece. And so there is maybe it's a little more.

Again, the flip side would be it's a little more, again, the flip side would be, it's a little more intense and really hyper-focused on the achieving the goals versus it being a more maybe relaxed, maybe kind of educate, traditional education environment. Gotcha. Gotcha. And when is the, the next kind of entry point in terms of the date for people? February. So February is our next cohort group. We run them four times a year, every season. So next one is called winter and then it'll be spring, summer, and then fall. And yeah, winter it is. But again, my biggest encouragement is a lot of this you can do yourself. And my biggest kind of hope and encouragement is that people do get these

certificates. And if you want to use us to leverage it, great. And if you are in Canada and happen to be in the great white North, all the provinces recognize it as a skills training course, and they cover up to 60 to 100% of it through your skills training grants. And also we've got a load of scholarships. So whether you are a woman going into marketing, whether you're a youth, good old RBC, Royal Bank of Canada is providing scholarships for that. Or if you are indigenous, black or a person of color, we've got scholarships for you as well. And including if you're indigenous, Best Buy is offering every indigenous student in need who does not have a sufficient enough laptop or cell phone, you get a brand new laptop and a brand new cell phone so that you can get right into the work of doing digital marketing. That's amazing.

So this February, it's important to register early, of course, because this does fill up. And the link again is b.link slash Jelly Academy. And with that link, not only, of course, will we get a little bit of the action, but also you, more importantly, will get $500 off with that link, not only, of course, will we get a little bit of the action, but also you, more importantly, will get $500 off with that particular link. So b.link slash Jelly Academy. Anything else? Anything we missed, Darian? I think it's an incredible industry we get to be a part of. And I think, you know, this podcast, the fact that Google and groups like Facebook have created these certificates.

It's so great seeing that there is maturity in our industry. The work we're doing is taken more seriously, and we're able to see some great things come from the work we're doing. So I just encourage everyone, continue to listen to the show and get your certificates however you can. Whether you use Jelly Academy or not, check those out and become a certified professional digital marketer. Darian Kovacs, he runs Jelly Marketing in Langley, British Columbia, and also Jelly Academy.

Again, the link is b.link slash Jelly Academy. Thank you, Darian. Thank you, Todd. And at one point, random fact, we decided to make a random radio jingle, and it went something like this. It went, Jelly, Jelly, Jelly, Jelly Academy. Jelly, Jelly, Jelly, Jelly, Jelly Academy. decided to make a random radio jingle and it went something like this it went jelly jelly jelly jelly academy jelly jelly jelly jelly jelly academy I tried singing

it but then they never used my singing voice so I should actually find that audio file and I can provide you no no no no no because I was like if we're gonna do a radio ad it's gotta be a jingle like Uncle Jesse from Full House you know no goodbye goodbye Like Uncle Jesse from Full House, you know. No, goodbye. Goodbye, Mary Ann. It's the season for new styles, and you love to shop for jackets and boots.

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