Business Reflections Podcast Episode #31 - Turning Customers and Influencers into Advocates with Aja Bradley Kemp

Episode Transcript

Meredith Matics: Welcome to Business Reflections with your host Meredith Matics, and we are here to reflect on the business topics that are affecting you today and how you can better run your business.  

Today’s episode is brought to you by Virtual PBX. Are you starting a new business and concerned about using your personal number? For less than $13 per user, you can get a business line with Flex Plans, the all-new business phone plan by VirtualPBX. Flex Plans provides unlimited calling, business texting, and video conferencing for entrepreneurs, like you, that need a way to connect to their customers. It includes a free Softphone App, allowing you to make calls from your business number on any computer or smartphone! Plus, it includes 2 Free Local or Toll-Free Numbers, a Virtual Receptionist, Professional Greetings, Call Forwarding, Voicemail to Text, and so much more! Our listeners can save 15% by visiting virtualpbx.com/podcast. That's less than $13 per user for your business line! Separate your private line from your professional line today by visiting virtualpbx.com/podcast today! 

I have Aja Bradley Kemp, Founder and Chief Experience Officer at the Conversate Collective. Aja, I'm so excited to have you on today. How are you?  

Aja Bradley Kemp: Good. Thank you. I'm excited to talk with you today.  

Meredith Matics: Well, thank you for coming on. Let's start with what inspired you to start your own company?  

Aja Bradley Kemp: Conversate Collective was born after I moved back to the U.S. from living overseas and had two young children. Most important for me with starting to work again was having flexibility. 

Throughout my career, I had done stints of freelancing and contract positions. I always enjoyed working for myself, but the biggest driver, I think for me starting my own agency was just that I wasn't interested in being tied to a corporate job and all the politics and inflexibility that can come with that life. 

I wanted to create a business that gave myself and my team a little bit more freedom in terms of how we, our time was structured and the locations that we worked in.  

Meredith Matics: I think that's the motivation between a lot of entrepreneurs and their businesses is wanting to not be tied to that in general corporate grind and wanting to have their own space and entity to operate in. 

Aja Bradley Kemp: Exactly. Entrepreneurs always have ideas. It gives us the freedom to chase down all those ideas or pursue them if we choose to. 

Meredith Matics: Exactly and to make them what we want or to fail at them on our own, but on our own terms. So what are some of the services that Conversate Collective offers or does?  

Aja Bradley Kemp: Yeah, we call ourselves a brand experience agency. We primarily work with consumer brands. We also do some work with corporations and nonprofits. But specifically in the area of events - event production, event marketing. We also do public relations, communications strategy and influencer marketing. 

Meredith Matics: Got it. I was taking a look at your website and it's really one of those things that makes you go, like, I want to hang out with these people. They look fun.  

Aja Bradley Kemp: Having fun and laughing is a very important part of our job.  

Meredith Matics: You have so much experience with marketing and helping businesses increase their revenue and drive sales. What would you say are your top tips for helping a small business that's looking to increase their sales?  

Aja Bradley Kemp: Well, I would say, especially for small businesses, I'm a small business. I know what that struggle is like. What I think the easiest thing to do first is to look at where your current sales are coming from and also just really having a good understanding of who your consumer is or who your customer is. What do they do for fun? How does your product or service fit into their life? And if you don't know, you can just ask them. I think it's surprising how much we as business owners have a perception of who our customer is, but then when we actually speak to them and we take a look at the data as well, sometimes the story, the results could be very different than what we imagine. 

So I would say, start with your current customer lean into to that and go after more of that. And then, if you have a good handle on who your customer is, you can ask yourself, what ways can you create an emotional connection to this customer? What are the ways you can build brand love? 

Customers, they don't go from knowing about who you are and immediately purchasing from you. It's a journey. How can you meet them along that journey? Take them from awareness to engagement. Give them a great experience, so they can fall in love with your brand and identify with your values and mission, and then move them to taking action, making repeat purchases, telling others about you. I would say those are two places to start. 

Meredith Matics: Those are two really great places. So can we go back to you saying that you need to know your customer. What questions should a small business be asking of their customers? Like how did they even know where to start with talking to them about getting to know them? 

Aja Bradley Kemp: It depends on the type of business that you have. A service based business versus a product based business, you might approach things a little bit differently. If you're a service-based business, have a conversation with your client. If you have a good relationship with your clients, as you should, ask them are there other people like you that can use my services? Like, do you know of anyone else that could use my services? And if you've done a great job for that client, they are definitely inclined to share the great results that they've had with you and share that with their network. 

Sometimes we assume that our clients will do that anyway, but they're busy. They have a lot going on between their job or running their own business and their own personal lives. So they're not thinking about us and how they can help us. It's not top of mind. So sometimes we just need to ask.  

And then if you're a product based business, it's like looking at the data and who your customers are. Have a conversation with them, pick up the phone and give them a call. If you have a customer that's purchased from you over and over, give them a call. Thank them for being a great customer and have a conversation with them. I think that's how you get to know who your customer is and what their needs are.  

Meredith Matics: Yeah. What would you say are some of the common mistakes you see businesses making when it comes to increasing their sales?  

Aja Bradley Kemp: I look at sales through the marketing lens, I'm a marketer. In my opinion, sometimes when we're very focused on sales, we just kind of go to that very quickly. I think it's about taking a step back and what I said previously about getting to know your customer, have a relationship with them. Have a conversation with them that's not about pushing a sale. Take some time to build a community and put some effort into building a community, whatever your brand or your business values are. Galvanize your community around those same values. Highlighting some of your favorite customers and figuring out ways you can add value to that community. 

 The other thing I think people don't think about is making sure that if their customer base is diverse in terms of age or gender or race is to tap into that diversity. Make sure that the diversity of your customers is reflected in the team that you have working in your business. It's reflected in the content that you're producing. So you can build those genuine relationships with your customers. 

Meredith Matics: I think that's a great point that people might miss. People often think of what is their ideal customer in the sense of like who do I want to sell to not who necessarily buys my product and then reflecting that in what you show them and what you give them, I think is very different than just trying to always target towards what you kind of want. I know that sounds funny because you know, you want to sell to who you want, right? You made a product or a service that's supposed to help somebody. You had an idea in your mind, but thinking about, if marketing towards somebody who you want, like if you sell tennis shoes and you really want to be in the high fashion industry, and you're constantly marketing your tennis shoes to something really high fashion, but your core collective is really great sports people who really love the quality of them. You're just wasting your effort. 

Aja Bradley Kemp: Exactly. You've hit the nail on the head.  

Meredith Matics: Let's say that a small business has really limited resources, and that could be time, money, staffing. Where do you recommend they begin when it comes to increasing their sales and their marketing?  

Aja Bradley Kemp: Surveys are a great way. Again, going back and figuring out who is my customer, what do they want? If you can't get on the phone with them individually, that might not be realistic for some people, send out a survey and ask questions in that survey that will help you get a better understanding of who these people are that are buying your service or your product.  

I would also say you can partner with like-minded businesses who have similar customers but are not competitors of yours and create an experience for that customer avatar. 

So, if your customers are, I'm just being very generic, are moms with newborn babies, and you sell baby clothes. Maybe partner with someone that sells baby bottles and accessories and things like that .And create, have mom's night in or a mommy break event on Instagram. Do something on zoom. Just little things like that. That way you can benefit from cross-promotion. That like-minded brand can promote you to their audience. You can promote that brand to your audience and you can create a bigger audience together, create more customers together.  

Also I would say creating valuable and useful content in places where your customer can be found. Like this podcast is a really great resource for other small businesses. There's a new app called Clubhouse, which is almost like live streaming podcasts, but it's a great place to bring people together and have conversations about the things that matter to you. 

Being very intentional about how you spend your time on social media, because social media is a great, low cost way. It can be, and it can also be very expensive. But you know, it could still be a very low cost way to increase your customer base.  

Meredith Matics: You're passionate about turning customers and influencers into advocates. Tell me a little bit more about that idea and how that works.  

Aja Bradley Kemp: For me, it goes back to creating experiences, that's the core of what we do as a business and customer service and how you interact with your customers is a big part of that. I'm sure a lot of your listeners have heard about influencer marketing. Giving someone that can help amplify your messages about your brand or your values are, working with someone like that. You can even start by looking internally at your existing community. Partner with people from your existing community who really embody your brand's philosophy and values. Work with them to help amplify your messages on social media or maybe some kind of experience.  

And then, when it comes to working with quote, unquote influencers, you don't have to look at as a small business right away. You don't have to look at spending tens of thousands of dollars on working with somebody that has a million followers to do one post about your product. Look at what's called micro influencers. Those are social media influencers who have one to 10,000 followers who get really great engagement. Focus on a specific niche work with people like that, that really aligned to your business values and philosophy. Give them an experience that they're going to want to talk about and share. 

Meredith Matics: Would you say that micro influencers are a better value? Not necessarily in cost, but in the number of people that they have following them to the amount of return on investment.  

Aja Bradley Kemp: It also depends on the platform if we're talking about specifically social media, because that word influence, it refers a lot to social media, but can refer to other areas as well. There are people in business that you want to align with, that are influential in their industry because they speak at a lot of events or are on a lot of panel discussions or are hired by corporations. But yes, the micro influencers, especially for smaller brands deliver a better value because studies have shown that those influencers that are focused on a really specific niche and have a really tight group of followers that really look to them in that niche. 

Their content tends to convert better to sales than say, paying someone that has over a million followers to do a post on your brand. People nowadays, they tend to rely more on a trusted friend or associate, word of mouth recommendation than necessarily a big celebrity recommendation. 

Somebody that's big and crafting, people will trust someone in that niche that might not have millions or hundreds of thousands of followers, maybe they only have 10,000 or 15,000 followers. But they deliver consistently in terms of showing up on their social media and talking about this new craft I made this week and I went to this store and I found this for 99 cents. People trust those recommendations because they're more authentic.  

Meredith Matics: What do you think are some specific steps that you would recommend a small business do to turn their customers into advocates? 

Aja Bradley Kemp: Be a good listener. Go and find the people that are already talking about your brand and show your appreciation for that. Show your love to them. Give them some surprise and delight in some way. The other thing is understand the journey that your customers on in their own life. When we talk about customer journey, how they're finding you, but it's like what's the role that your product or service plays in their life? 

Are they just had a baby? Are they switching careers? Are they moving? All of those things and then figure out how you can deliver value to help them in their life journey and delivering value without expecting a direct sale in return. A lot of these tactics that I'm talking about in terms of experiences isn't always dollar in dollar out sort of thing. 

And the great thing about small businesses is that, while you need to be mindful of how much money you're spending on certain activities. You're not beholden to the kind of rules that you would have at a big corporation, where there has to be an immediate return on investment for every single little thing you do. This is about the long game and how you can invest in your customers and take them on a journey so that you will keep your customers coming back. They'll naturally want to talk about you without you having to pay them to talk about you. 

Meredith Matics: When you bring that up, I was thinking of one of our past guests Willa's Oat Milk, and they really engage with their customers. Over Valentine's day, on their Instagram they have this little like mocktail. They think about the journey. For like a food product, why is somebody choosing my food product over another food product, understanding maybe they have new choices or maybe they're trying to be healthier or whatever their thing is, understanding that and embracing it. 

That does seem to be the way to really, truly connect in that. We often think that our product is just kind of lost in a decision almost like a candy bar at the end of the store aisle. I'll just grab it without thinking, but really we don't shell out our money or our investment of time or anything without having a reason or want. I once heard a piece of advice that was, for the job I was working at the time was, they'll come in because they need it. They'll come back because they liked you.  

As we close up, what is one piece of advice that you've received that you'd like to share with our small business owners? 

Aja Bradley Kemp: Oh, the one that it always comes to mind that I always keep in front of me, especially when I'm having difficult days, is to run your own race. As small businesses, we're often looking at our competitors and bigger businesses that we want to be like, and we try to do what everybody else is doing. Sometimes we flow like the wind. If everybody in the industry's doing X, then we need to be doing that too. The advice that I received and what I try to always remember is knowing what I'm good at and run my own race. And if I run my own race and focus on what my company and my skill set is and what I know what we're good at, then we'll always win. We'll always serve our customers in the best possible way. 

Meredith Matics: I really like that. I've never heard it phrase like that, that running your own race is really cool. I think that's huge because at least for my experience, there's been a lot of business owners that'll be like "but my friends on my Facebook groups said that I should do this" and it might not be the right thing for your business, but they're just wanting to do what everybody else is doing that's making the money and making them profitable, but it may not be what's going to work for your personal business because it's its own.  

Aja Bradley Kemp: Yep.  

Meredith Matics: Where can our listeners find you on social media?  

Aja Bradley Kemp: I am most active on LinkedIn. If you've listened to me here and you've enjoyed it, feel free to connect with me on LinkedIn and let me know that you heard me here because I am very discerning about who I do connect with on LinkedIn. I don't like the random people that send connection requests and there's no context to it. I do like a point of reference. Even if we've never met in person, but you heard me speak on something, tell me that and I'm happy to connect. Follow me on Clubhouse and I love to talk to people and meet people on Clubhouse. And then on Instagram, I'm at Aja Bradley Kemp or my company Conversate Co. 

Meredith Matics: Wonderful. Well, thank you so much, Aja for coming on. It was great to have you on and talk to you.  

Aja Bradley Kemp: Thank you so much.  

Business Reflections Closing: Please note that these are thoughts and opinions alone. For tax advice, please see your CPA or tax advisor, tax professional for business advice and legal entities. Please see your local business, lawyer, or attorney for advice. And if you'd like to reach out to us for any topics or questions about. Any subject, any episode you can reach us podcast@maticsbilling.com. That's podcast@maticsbilling.com.    

For show notes, visit Maticsbilling.com/podcast. If you liked this episode, we want to hear from you. Please hit subscribe. Leave a review and share this episode with your friends, family, and on your social media pages. See you next time!