Happy New Year! If you’re reading this, that means you survived the wild and chaotic year that was 2020. Congratulations! Maybe 2020 was a successful year for you, perhaps amidst all the unknowns you were able to sit, reflect, and cultivate a new business plan. However, maybe 2020 felt like you were struggling to keep your head above water and you just barely survived it. Either way, it’s a fresh year with a fresh start and we believe in you! We are here to help you plan and organize a year of growth and success. 

We ended the year with a FREE marketing workshop for our community. During those five days, we introduced strategies and ideas to help even the least marketing savvy conquer their 2021 marketing plan. Maybe you’re new to our community or you weren’t able to attend, no worries! We’ve got you covered with a complete wrap up. 

This workshop consisted of 5 days covering the following topics: 

• Mastermind & Research 
• Organize & Plan
• Mindset / Q&A
• Tools 
• Execute 

Throughout all of these topics, the underlying theme is the importance of adaption. As 2020 proved, sometimes things will not go anywhere near how we planned. However, having a clear plan, goals, and targets helps make the pivots easier when they are necessary. 

Day One: Mastermind & Research. 

“Before you can tackle a business plan or a budget, you’ve got to know your ideal clients.” 

Here are the highlights: 

Having a thought process for our marketing plan helps us not mindlessly throw money down the drain. One way to begin your thought process is to use a Character Avatar Worksheet (Get yours here: link). 

Your Character Avatar Sheet humanizes your marketing plan. It makes you literally put a name and details to your plan so that your marketing strategy is centered around your ideal clients or audience. 

The goal of day one was to introduce this process and talk a little about how it works. Attendees spend the following hours after the workshops filling out their own sheets. 

Day two: Mindmap. 

“if you want to secure your ideal clients… you need to have 32 touches a year”

During this workshop, we actually completed an avatar sheet using our attendee’s ideal clients. 

Here are some details on the steps:

• Give your avatar a name 
  • “Needs More Space Moores.”
• Demographic / Interests of your ideal client… what are their interests? 
  • “They are a young, large family, public school-aged children, outdoor lovers, they enjoy being a part of an active community, and they like to entertain.”
• What is their income? 
  • Combined income of 120,000+
• Key Purchase Drivers: Why do they need your business? What is driving them to move? Need xyz?
  • Their family has grown, and they need more interior room. They like to entertain and with their family, it’s hard to fit more people in their current home, they also want to be a part of a bigger community, perhaps with a park. They would like to relocate closer to their school district. 
• Frustrations and Fears: What are they frustrated about that leads them to need you?
  • Looking on their own Is not going so well. They are a busy family, they both work and the kids have a lot of extracurriculars. They don’t have the time to do this on their own and need a realtor committed to finding all of their needs. 
• Wants and Desperations: outside of their current move or purchase… what are their long-term goals?
  • The Moore’s are looking for a long-term home. They want to find a house they can raise their large family in, create memories and entertain others in. They want this house to be a big investment for them. They want to build a connection within their community and want a relator to be a part of their process. 
• Before / After:
  • Have:
  • Before: Too small of a house, lack of community, too far of a commute for the kids’ schools, and lack of outdoor spaces. 
  • After: New house, more space, less commute time, and a better neighborhood. 
  • Fee: 
  • Average Day:
    • Before: Kids fighting in the bathroom to get ready, skipping out on inviting others over, lack of sleep due to long commutes, kids playing inside instead of outside. 
    • After: Easier mornings, more dinner parties, and more time enjoying their neighborhood outside. 
  • Status: 
    • Before: homeowners, but unhappy. Not living their best life. 
    • After: Happy homeowners! 
  • Good v. Evil:
    • Before: Good- Ready to move (good credit score, etc) Evil- unhappy in their home. 
    • After: Good- Happy in home, ready to stay for a while, and built a connection with a great realtor. Evil- none! 

After this, break your year into the 4 quarters and decide when this family is going to move. Let’s say they’ll move in May, because school is out, and they won’t have to worry about the stress of their children’s school schedule. That means you’re going to have to get in front of them in Quarter 1. Are you going to run Faceook Ads? Join Facebook groups? From there, focus your energy on how to use your Q3 and Q4 strategies to keep the momentum going! 

This may seem tedious, but when you add in all these details it becomes easier for you to know where to put your marketing funds and energy. For instance, if your ideal client is the Moore family as described above, there is no sense spending money running Facebook Ads with your name on a graphic with townhomes in the background. Instead, you’ll know to use big homes with large yards or parks, and include verbiage like “Running out of room? Let’s get you in the home of your dreams!” 

Day 3: Mindset 

“You have to make a plan to get where you want to go… you cannot look at your plan and not break it down into actionable items.”

During day three we tackled what sets a lot of business owners back: mindset. We can probably all agree that everyone’s best work comes from mentally preparation. One way to do this is to simply sit down and examine your goals. 

1. Think about where you want your business to be in a year. 

2. What is stopping you from achieving this?

2. Examine your “why?” 

These are just a couple of examples, but we highly recommend laying out goals for your year and exploring why these goals are important to you and what is holding you back. 

Maybe marketing is not your cup of tea, but you cannot afford to spend money on a marketing service yet. That’s okay! If you cannot spend money on marketing: take actionable steps to be your own marketer… expand your network on fb, build relationships, join fb groups, join the Nextdoor app, drive through neigborhoods and see who looks miserable cutting their grass, (seriously, one of our attendees recommended this and it’s genius!)  The bottom line is: GET YOUR NAME OUT THERE

In that vein, we can also agree that a huge factor holding most people back is confidence. The best thing about confidence is that the more you practice, the more confidence you get! If posting on Facebook scares you, make a plan to do it 3x a week. In a couple of weeks, you’ll probably find yourself doing it closer to 4 or 5 times! 

An awesome book to kickstart your mindset is Cameron Herolds “Vivid Vision”. We just so happen to be doing a book club on this book for the month of January on Thursdays at 9am. Register here: 

Day 4: Toolbox

“No one can market alone, there are so many tools able to help you create your ideal marketing strategy.”

On day 4, we introduced our attendees to the tools and apps we use the most frequently. They are as follow: 

• Canva:
  • Canva is a digital design service that lets you create flyers, social media graphics, business cards, and so much more! There is a free version that allows a good bit, but the paid version adds a TON of features. 
  • Two notes on Canva: 
    • We offer Canva Templates! Visit our Etsy shop to browse our premade and customizable templates: https://www.etsy.com/shop/BlackhoundCreative
    • We are also offering a FREE Canva Workshop February 8-11 at 3pm. This will be your complete guide to navigating Canva for your business. Register here: 

• Social Media Platforms:
  • Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, Twitter, etc… you’ve got to be on something! As the world turns more and more virtual, this is the BEST way to get your name out there. There are a million ways to do this. Let’s break down a few:
    • Let’s say your ideal client is a military family relocating. You can utilize Facebook Private Groups to get your name into military family circles. 
    • Already have a personal Facebook or Instagram account? Definitely sprinkle your business materials across those platforms. However, creating a business account adds some benefits. You can track analytics, invite friends to “like”, and much more. 
    • If this seems a bit much for your time or skillset, we offer social media management. We can create and run your business accounts, so you don’t have to!
• Scheduler:
  • We all get busy, so having pre-scheduled content ensures your social media presence stays active. There are tons of systems out there, but if you’re starting out, we recommend using the free scheduling system that comes with a Facebook business account. You can even link an Instagram! 

• Re-post App:
  • This app allows you to repost Instagram posts that someone else made. Let’s say your client posts a picture with their family in front of their new house with a raving review for you in the caption. You can use this app to repost this to your Instagram page. 

• Facebook Messenger: 
  • Let’s revisit the Military Private Group example. Maybe you spark up a conversation with a family looking to relocate in the group, using messenger is a great way to extend that conversation a build a relationship.

• Grammarly:
  • Grammarly saves LIVES! This tool creates grammatical errors, spelling errors, but also gauges your tone in emails or social media posts! 

• CRM:
  • A CRM is a great way to organize and categorize your leads and potential leads. There are tons of different options with different features, but this is a highly recommended tool. 
• Facebook Ads Manager:
  • Facebook Ads Manager allows you to create ads and target them to your ideal clients. This is a huge skill to have, as it can generate a ton of leads. However, it’s a lot to learn. We offer a Facebook Ad self-paced course for those looking to learn this skill entirely. (link)
  • However, we will also be offering a workshop that will cover some of the basis of FB Ads Manager in May. Register here: (link)

Day 5: Execution 

“Who will be your biggest audience and how are you going to create a routine to consistently get in front of them?”

On the final day we wrapped up by discussing how we can take the knowledge learned and turn it into tangible actions. Here are some highlights: 

Time Management: 

Knowing the difference between marketing & prospecting. Maybe on Sunday you schedule out Facebook posts for the week, Monday you send friend requests, Tuesday you join a new Facebook group, and on Fridays you go through and see who engaged with that post and shoot them a message. 

Routine:

Put your intentions on the calendar… stick to do your dates and it will become routine. For instance, following that schedule above for a couple of weeks will turn it into concrete. 

Vendors:

Can you get with your vendors and market things together to split cost? Ex. Spotlight them on your page and vice versa. 

Measurable Goals:

If you take anything away from this workshop, it’s that you HAVE to have measurable goals. It’s okay to start small or make pipe dreams… but write them down and create a plan! 

Our attendees found that this workshop helped them develop a solid marketing strategy for 2021. Several of them were able to use that Character Avatar Sheet to target their ideal clients. What about you? What are your next steps? Email us at Marianne@blackhoundcreative.com to share your thoughts, feedback, or for any service requests. 

Happy 2021! 

-Your friends at Blackhound Creative Werks.