Are you ready to explore the world of online marketing and revolutionise your e-commerce game? Join us on this journey as we dive into 'How to Plan 12 Months of Online Marketing in 45 Minutes' with Fiona Allman-Treen from "FAT Promotions". Get ready to discover new strategies, surprising revelations, and expert insights that will take your online business to new heights.

🎯 Key Insights:

• It's the holiday season! Adapt and capitalise on relevant holidays.
• Be ahead of the game. Launch Valentine's promos in January, not February!
• Mother’s Day, Father’s Day, back-to-school, and more: these occasions boost your business.
• US sellers: Don’t miss Halloween, Thanksgiving, and Christmas from September to December.
• By syncing with the holiday spirit, we've slashed costs and attracted more shoppers.
• Remember to constantly measure conversion rates.
• Don't shy away from revisiting content.
• Avoiding old blog topics? Think again!
• Topics evolve; revisit and refresh them for today’s audience.

ABOUT FIONA:

Fiona Allman-Treen, the web wizard and growth guru, is the creative force behind the globally recognised Hastings-based agency, FAT Promotions Ltd. Famous for fusing strategic website design and software systems to fuel businesses and charities worldwide, she's a champion for young entrepreneurship. And when she's not crafting the internet, she's strumming the ukulele just for fun!

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For complete show notes, transcript and links to our guest, check out our website: www.ecommerce-podcast.com.

Well, hello and welcome to the e-commerce podcast with me, your host, Matt Edmondson.

Now, this is a podcast all about helping you deliver e-commerce.

Wow.

And to help us do just that today, I'm chatting with Fiona Alman rein with a hyphen.

Oh, yes.

From fat promotions about how to plan 12 months of online marketing in 45 minutes.

That's a bit of a bold promise, isn't it?

But we are gonna get into all of that.

Yes, we are.

So let's do a few housekeeping things before we jump into it.

Number one, if you have not done so already head to the website at e-commerce podcast dot net.

Sign up to the newsletter because all of the good stuff comes direct to your inbox totally for free.

So just go sign up for it.

You may as well.

It's a good thing to do.

And whilst I'm doing this, I am just gonna uh find on my screen the music and just turn it down ever so slightly.

There we go.

Look at that.

It's a wonderful thing.

Ok.

So let's jump into today's show sponsor, which of course is the legendary, the awesome, the fantastic e-commerce cohort.

Oh, yes.

Come join us in e-commerce cohort.

It is a monthly mastermind group where we go through all kinds of workshops from expert people who have got a whole bunch of amazing things to teach us about e-commerce.

It is a membership group.

Prices start at just 14 99 a month and you can come join in.

And one of the benefits is Fiona, we were talking about this before we hit the record button is if you're in cohort, you can watch the live recordings of the podcast.

Something that we have just started doing.

This is our second week of doing it.

Yes, it is.

Uh You can come and join us on the live stream.

Uh As we do the recording, you can post your comments, you can post your questions to our legendary guests um and just have a bit of fun.

Uh Why not?

So as part of the benefits of signing up to cohorts do check out e-commerce cohort dot com.

Now, let's talk about Fiona.

Fiona is the web wizard and growth guru, the creative force behind the globally recognized Hastings based agency Fat Promotions Limited uh which is such a cool, cool brand name.

I'm not gonna lie.

Uh famous for fusing strategic website design and software systems to fuel businesses and charities worldwide.

She is a champion for young entrepreneurship and when she's not crafting the internet, she's strumming the ukulele just for fun.

Now, that's fascinating.

In its own right.

And it's also worth saying, Fiona, A as we read the bio that you are also a fairly, a fairly new author for a few months of a book called uh website Mastery for business owners who don't speak tech.

Oh, there you go.

You put it on screen.

The shameless plug.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Which is now you are saying this is a best selling book in nine categories including um Ecommerce Design, which is I thought might be relevant to some of your listeners today.

So I'm gonna hopefully share something useful for them.

Fantastic.

Now, before we jump into it, I guess my question is why on earth would you want to write a book?

I mean, I do the podcast, which is, you know, it's great in its own, right?

And it's a lot of work.

Um, and I don't get me wrong.

I enjoyed it.

It was good fun.

Um, but everyone I've spoken to who's written a book is just, they just sort of shake their heads and quiver, you know, like PTSD has set it through as a result of it.

Is that what you found or was it actually quite an enjoyable process for you?

I, I've got to say I really enjoyed it.

I resisted it for many, many years.

Every business coach I've ever worked with.

The first thing they seem to say is write a book and I just think you've got no new ideas, but I've actually found where it became interesting for me was, it's all about our unique process that we go through because, you know, a website to website, to website, except it's not because we're all different and how we do, what we do is what sets us apart and writing that out.

Getting the chance to actually think about it rather than just doing things on autopilot.

You know, like a control C control V, I couldn't tell you where to find copy and paste on a menu.

It's just something you automatically do and it's the same with building great websites.

I just found that we just following our own process when you have to stop and write it out.

You actually think.

Do you know what?

Actually, it's kind of self validating.

It's a, it's a little bit reassuring to think.

Yeah.

No, we know what we're talking about.

So it's pretty cool.

Fantastic.

Well, it's, it's, it's one of those things, I'm not gonna lie, Fiona, it comes up a fair bit with me.

Um, and people, like, they've suggested to, you go write a book.

Matthew, you know, just write the book and I've been putting it off and putting it off.

Um, and maybe this year, uh, is the year that I actually start the thing.

I know exactly what it needs to say.

But it's one of those things, isn't it?

You're just like, oh, I, I was talking to, um, Daniella Werner who uh she runs the spa marketing made easy podcast.

Daniella's awesome.

And I was talking to her on a different podcast that we run, uh called Pod Junction, which if you're into podcasts, go check out Pod Junction.

Ladies and gentlemen, quick shameless plug.

And I said to Daniella, why did you start the podcast?

And she said to me simply because I hate writing, yeah, I can relate and I was like, that's me right there.

Uh, I can do the podcast thing.

I'm not sure I want to do the right thing.

But, you know, all I can say is congratulations on doing it.

It's a labor of love.

And, um, I appreciate, there's an awful lot involved in that so well done.

And I was talking to another lady earlier on, she's written a book.

Um, and she's, she's going to come on to the, uh, different podcasts to talk about it.

And she said to me, she said, you know what writing the book was, was a lot easier than marketing the book.

And that's a bit they don't tell you is all the whole marketing side of things.

But, you know, we're going to give you a way to do that in 45 minutes today.

Oh, yes, we are.

So, we're gonna, we're gonna get into that.

But before we do, right, I have to ask the Ukulele, what's that all about?

Yeah, that, that was one of those things, you know, when your kid says to you, if you just buy me this one gift, I'll never ask for anything else.

Well, I'd already fallen for that with the French bulldog.

And the, and then she suddenly falls in love with this tiny pink guitar that she's seen in the shop.

Home comes the ukulele and I'm thinking like I can see it after a couple of days, the enthusiasm is waning.

So I thought I will join her.

I've read the parenting books.

They all say that this is what you do, join your kids in their hobbies and they'll keep going and she dropped it after a week and I just found it was the easiest possible instrument to play.

I'm not even kidding.

It's easier to play than a recorder.

And we all had to go through that pain in school.

So, yeah, it, it just sticks once you start playing it and there's like a whole underground thing going on with Ukulele groups.

I mean, I'm in Hastings on the South coast and we've got something like 12 different ukulele community music groups that you can play at.

It's crazy.

That's, that's, that's awesome.

You want anybody they'll say to you.

Oh, I've got a ukulele.

I think it's in the loft, but I've got one.

Yeah, my son has a ukulele.

He plays well.

He plays the guitar and, uh, he's a very good guitarist actually.

And, um, he, he, he also plays a cello and u, you know, sort of one springs into another and he got the ukulele and he played a little bit, I've had a go, I can play the guitar.

Um, I've had a bit of a go in the UK lately, but in my head, who's the guy that sang that song when I'm cleaning windows, windows?

Was it George George Formby?

So, whenever I hear the word ukulele I've just got, when I'm cleaning windows in my head, anybody under a certain age threshold is just going.

You are.

Yeah.

Exactly.

Exactly.

Well, I can tell you at, at, at the Ukulele group that I run in my spare time is a community music group and the last time we did, um, a CDC on the Ukulele, that is the thing to be heard.

Seriously.

Right.

I'm gonna, I'm gonna call my lad and I'm gonna say Josh, I want to hear a CDC on the ukulele.

That's what I want.

She shook me all night long.

It's a really good one on you.

Well, that's awesome.

Yeah.

Yeah.

I just, I, you know, I'm in awe of people that play musical instruments and they can play a CDC on a musical instrument as well.

And again, anyone under a certain age has just gone AC U. That's ok.

That's ok.

I've, I've kind of got my head around it.

So let's talk about content production then.

So the claim of the podcast is, and this is something, this is a title that you and sad after the show's producer sort of came up with, um let's talk about that.

Let's talk about the premise for that.

So, um you've, obviously you've written your book, you've got some kind of strategies up your sleeve, uh some insights which I dare say you have learned over the years.

Um So how do we, let's start at the beginning?

What do we need to think about when creating a 12 month content?

Calendar in just 45 minutes?

If I had a stopwatch, we'd click go but we haven't.

So let's just go.

The key thing is everybody thinks of marketing is something you have to do.

And, and a lot of people have got a boot in their back, as you said, with the book that the lady wrote, it's the marketing, that's the pain.

And everyone says, like, do big tasks in little chunks.

And I say no, do what's a little task, do it in one big chunk and it's done.

And I've been helping clients do this for over two decades when they say to me and it, it was originally their blog post and now they're saying to me, oh, social posts.

And I've got to do linkedin articles and I've got to do da da, da, da, da, da, da da da.

And I'm like, you know what use that Wet January Day.

Yeah, you've got zero.

What is it?

Blue Monday or something.

It's like the third Monday in January.

You've got no motivation.

You're still from Christmas, it didn't fall off.

You thought it was?

Nobody's come back in the new Year going.

Yes, we're ready to spend money with you.

You know, it just hasn't happened.

There's that big slump in January.

Fantastic.

Use that as your marketing time one afternoon out and that's when you go all of my content for the year ahead coming up bang and you can do it and it's all about planning, ok?

So it's all about planning and the easy way to do that if you want me to do, you want me to go straight into it right now.

I I'm diligently writing notes.

Grab your calendar.

That's all you gotta do.

Grab your calendar and think what are those really annoying public holidays I get reminded about throughout the year.

All right.

So you're starting with Valentine's Day, right?

We're in January.

It's wet grotty.

January.

Valentine's Day is February.

Then you've got March is Mother's Day, then Easter is somewhere that moves around every year and I can never remember why.

And it's really annoying because it just, but then you've got ESA and this is all you're going to do is go through it and write all of these out and you can put as many as you like, especially with e-commerce.

It's all about like everything we say is strategy first.

Who's your target client?

Who are they?

Because you get these key public holidays that are gonna get advertised and promoted and marketed by everybody else.

Anyway.

So all you're gonna do is piggyback.

The part of those that appeals to your clients.

So, you know, as I say, Mother's Day, Father's Day, you move, then you've got off to school, then you've got school holidays, then you got back to school.

So anybody who's dealing with parents and that kind of thing, these times are the times when you want to be marketing your stuff in front of them.

Obviously, you've got summer holidays, you've got September, October Halloween, Thanksgiving.

If you're selling stateside coming up, uh, guy Fawkes Christmas explaining to anybody outside the UK.

So they got something to talk about between late September and December.

It's a much better concept than, uh, bonfire night as we like to call it.

But, yeah.

Yeah, it's sorry, I interrupted you.

No, it's cool.

And then of course, then you're coming back around to January because the only people who don't have time to do this in January is accountants.

So they need to move their calendar back a month.

They need to be pushing this stuff in October ready for January.

So, get those dates in that they're your key starting point and then get that super clear mental picture of who it is that you're selling to.

And that's, and think when do these matter to them?

And they, some of them might not.

Some of them might not matter to them at all.

Yeah, it's interesting because, um, if I think about, say one of our ecom companies, uh, Vegetal right now we sell, uh, on the website, you won't know this.

Some of the listeners will know this.

Um, we sell, uh, vitamins and minerals.

I can't on the, on the site now.

Veg is an interesting company because it's, it's predominantly, our marketing is predominantly aimed at vegans and vegetarians.

The supplements are vegan and vegetarian certified.

And so there's all kinds of reasons why this is a good thing.

Um, uh, but it doesn't preclude meat eaters at all.

Um, but it, it obviously gives us a bigger pool of people to marketing and some more interesting niches.

Now, one of the things that's always intrigued me, uh, when it comes to choosing holidays, for example, I'm a, I'm a big fan of holidays.

Right.

I love things like Mother's Day and Father's Day and Valentine's Day.

I, I just, I don't know why I just do Christmas.

I go nuts and I just, I love, I'm, I'm, I'm a sucker for it.

Right.

I'm, I'm all in, but there are certain holidays, for example.

And maybe you can talk to this.

Um, Fiona, I'd love your opinion.

Take something like Mother's Day.

No, no, no, let's take Father's Day because Father's Day is even more contentious.

Um, because not everybody has had a good relationship with their dad or dad has passed away.

Right.

And so I found in the past when we've done something, say on Father's Day we get a number of emails from clients going, didn't really like that because my dad passed away or, or, uh, I didn't really know my dad or whatever.

Um, and I, I, it's a small percent of very, very, very small percentage of people.

Um, but it kind of puts the marketing department on edge a little bit when they get these emails.

Um, I, I don't know if it's a complaint.

I don't know if I'd call it a complaint, but it's just an email, just kind of observing how some of our clients feel around those holidays.

Um, how do you deal with that?

Do you think?

I, I don't know if you've got any experience with that?

I just thought I'd throw it out there.

Yeah.

No, it's, it's a really good point and I think what's interesting is culturally as a society in the UK.

We, we've all a bit peeved about what's gone on the last three years, you know, in the years since BC, before COVID.

And so there's a lot of people who are like, they kind of, they're ready for a fight.

I mean, I'm not kidding.

A lot of my client is, people are so grumpy right now.

So you will get those people who complain the thing I always say to my clients when they get something like that is, you've got two different things to look at.

You've got two sides of this coin.

Number one is you probably had, you might have half a dozen, you might have 6 to 10 people who say actually that really helps at me because I, you know, I haven't got a dad.

You know, I'm an orphan myself.

Annie, I can relate.

It's not a problem at the end of the day.

I don't expect other people to know that.

But right now people are super sensitive and they're ready to put finger to keyboard and let you know exactly what they think.

The thing to remember is on the one side of the coin.

Remember how many people have seen that ad or that post and not complained.

Now, we can all get access to this data.

We can all see these stats.

You can see like we, you've got 44,000 people looked at an advert and you've got six people complained it's not the end of the world.

So that's the first thing is get it in proportion.

The other side of that coin is to have some sensitivity to it.

But you can't be all things to all people because if you try and be all things to all people, you're a scatter gun.

And in marketing, scatter gun does not pay off online.

Scatter Gun does not pay off Facebook ads wouldn't make the money they make, you need laser focus.

So you're focusing for that moment on people who've got and it can be as loosely based as family values.

Ok.

I don't want to get an email saying, you know, don't forget I get one from Moon Pig every, every 10 minutes, but particularly around, you know, don't let dad feel unloved and I'm like, ok, I doubt he's feeling much of anything right now.

So it doesn't really bother me.

But some people might, if they just lost their dad that might be sensitive, make it less direct go general, you know, thinking of family this weekend.

Who do you know who's a great dad doesn't have to be yours, doesn't even have to be yours.

Yeah, that's very good.

Yeah, very good point.

I like that.

I like this.

Um Again, this whole idea of, uh and we'll come back to the calendar in a second but just to emphasize the point that you mentioned, um about being over sensitive, oversensitive.

Um You, you said that you end up becoming a scatter gun, which is not great for marketing, which I love that phrase.

And also I think you become, you just become quiet.

You don't, you become beige.

It's not like you stand out, you don't stand for something.

And a lot of um what I'm seeing at the moment, Fiona around marketing is marketing, around standing for something.

You know, this is, this is who we are, this is what we stand for.

These are our values.

Um If you're like us great if you're not, that here's a company over here we think can help you.

Right.

Yeah.

Yeah, exactly.

So, stand for something rather than stand for nothing kind of a thing.

Um, and the, the, I think when you get these emails and these complaints, the, the fear is that you just switch it off.

Sorry, my phone just went off.

That's very unprofessional, isn't it?

I'm so, that wasn't mine.

I can't even tell you how glad I am.

That was not my phone.

I was like looking down like thinking, oh no, please don't be my, no, it was mine.

I, sorry, I always put my phone on, do not disturb and this time I forgot, um I totally lost my train of thought as well now.

But this ladies and gentlemen, this is what it's like to be a professional podcaster, don't, you know, uh standing for something helps you stand out and you're absolutely right.

It is.

And I think the culture in which we have at the moment where like you say, everyone's a bit grumpy.

I love that word.

Very British.

Everyone's just a bit grumpy and feel the need to share their grumpiness with the world and they send emails.

Um and some of those emails are maybe deserved and quite a few of them probably aren't.

Um And so we have, but we get these and we, we do overreact and we do feel like actually I, I, I therefore am gonna shrink in to myself.

Whereas I like what you have said.

I actually find a way to make this work.

So maybe it's not your dad.

Can you think of a great dad that, you know, if you're a moon pig or something, like, send them a card?

Which ironically, I always send out several Father's Day cards on Father's Day.

Um, but it, it's, it's a great thing to do.

Ladies and gentlemen.

uh top tip.

Um So yeah, I think it's, it's one of those things, isn't it?

Where when we've done marketing or you, you start doing marketing, don't shy away when people say to me, oh, but we're really busy at the minute.

A guy said to me at an exhibition on I was at on Friday during the day.

He said to me, I'm not, actually, I shouldn't even be here.

I'm not looking for more business and I'm like, you know, why are you here?

Why are you here?

But it's like you always be marketing, a mentor, a really good mentor of mine said that to me years ago and I always be marketing because you might think, yeah, we're busy at the minute.

So great.

So build a waiting list.

Put your prices up, be more selective about who you choose to work with, but never stop marketing because you just, you're going backwards, you really are going backwards.

But what you said about values is, is true.

It's, it's something that particularly.

Um we're seeing people recruiting on values now.

They're not afraid to put on the website.

This is who we are and what we stand for.

And if you look at and think, oh, that's not for me.

Great.

Just keep walking.

That's fine.

Yeah.

Yeah.

No, totally.

We did that a while ago.

We started, um probably about 10, 11 years ago, we started recruiting around values first.

So um changed our whole recruitment process.

It really did uh a quick story just because I like the story.

Um in our, in our sort of job application process, we have this thing where you fill out a, a sort of a form.

And we, we're like, if you were going to be a superhero who would you be?

Um And there's no right or wrong answer, I just want to see what kind of, if you can't answer this question, then you're probably not going to fit in with our crazy people, right?

It's just um and so we have people, you know, fill it out, how would some, how would your arch nemesis defeat?

You draw your costume here?

And we've had everything from simple stick men to full on like Picasso quality art going on.

Uh And I remember I was in Jersey and Rachel who was working for me at the time called me and said, Matt, the job application for a new marketing role uh closes today and I just want you to know, Batman has just turned up with a job application and cupcakes.

So somebody applied for the role, sent their friend down, got them to dress up as Batman brought in a tray of cupcakes and deliver their job application.

The most memorable job delivery, uh, job application delivery I've ever, ever had.

So, yeah, uh, recruit around values.

It's awesome.

You get free cupcakes and Batman brings them to you anyway, let's talk about marketing.

So we're gonna do, let's, we, we've got our diary, right.

We're going through, we're going through the holidays.

We've jotted down the ones that are gonna make sense for us, which you could probably make most of them make sense for you.

Actually, if you, if you, if you put some creative thought around it.

So I've jotted down the holidays, I'm gonna start planning.

What sort of things do I need to think about at this point?

The first thing to do.

And it's a really weird one is where you've got, like, here are the months of the year and you've got here when I'm, when I can market to those people move it back a month because it's no good advertising putting out your social post about Valentine's on the 12th of February, move it back a month, right?

Everybody makes this mistake and they suddenly put, oh, special offer this week, we get it all the time.

Wonderful scatty clients who go, oh, my gosh.

We've just realized it's Black Friday tomorrow.

Can you bang this on my website?

And I'm like, we can do that all you like, but it's too late.

You need to keep drip, feeding it to people.

So firstly stagger it, move it back a month to make sense of it or if you need it and if you can offer an incentive, terrific, you know, we work with a plumbing and heating company and they were doing specials on boiler servicing in August.

Good idea because no one wants a boiler service in August.

They got nothing to do in August, they got nothing to do and suddenly they're going, oh, but you get 50% off it, you're going to pay it in November anyway, you may as well have it done now.

Yeah.

No, I totally sign up for that.

If they, if they're around Liverpool, give me the details because I do that.

Um So move the dates back a month.

This is, and this gives you space and capacity to start the marketing effort, which is, I mean, you know, Black Friday is probably the most obvious one, the amount of people that do their Black Friday promotion thinking uh in mid October, early November is scary.

Um People like me and Chloe and all the, you know, James and all the guys who do Ecommerce podcasts.

Uh We start harping on about it around around summer.

It's like you got to think, you start thinking about it now.

Guys.

Um And so I think, like you say, push it back at least a month, makes a lot of sense to me.

Um At least a month uh and start promoting around that.

That's very, very clever.

That's how do you deal with?

I'm just trying to think actually, Fiona, if there is, if there is such a thing.

Um I don't, I don't think there is a crossover.

So if I start my marketing for Valentine's Day in January, am I confusing it by bringing it back early because of another holiday that's going on at the time in January.

I don't think I can't think of anything where that would, I was going to say the only place you might get that is with religious holidays because there's, there's a lot of religious holiday, I believe Yom Kippur overlaps with a couple of other American holidays.

So there's a difference again, it's knowing that target market, who am I aiming at?

That's the key thing because yes, it would be great to reach all those people.

But as I said, years ago, we were dealing with this really fantastic company who were doing these midrange designer handbags and they were getting like 4000 visitors every single week coming to the website and 4% were buying and we fed out this massive traffic and we worked out that it was actually they were paying to advertise on a blog that was all about like what we jokingly refer to as n your own yoga mat.

And they were like, you know, grow your own baby food and do all your own stuff.

And they were very much, you know, down to earth kind of thing.

They don't, they're not the people who are going to spend 500 quid on a handbag that Harrison's going to yak that super grown baby food straight into.

So it's getting the right traffic.

And as I pointed out to them, I said to them at the time, you know, if I could bring you 1000 people who look or 100 people who buy, what would you rather have?

And he did pause to think which disturbed me on a lot of not that that was, that was not the response I was expecting, but it's easy to get caught up in, in those sort of we want the big numbers.

You don't, you want the right people.

It's not about, it's about people so, so important, so, so important.

Um Just circling back if I can f it's something that you sort of non nonchalantly mentioned.

Uh international holidays.

So back to vegetability, we distribute all over the world.

So I'm obviously very aware of the British holidays being a brit myself.

I am semi aware of the US holidays just because, you know, they're marketed over here quite a lot.

Um uh irrespective of whether we celebrate them or whether we don't.

Um Thanksgiving would be an, you know, an obvious one.

So am I, if I have an international client base, am I doing this for all of the, the key nations that I'm shipping to?

Yeah, what I tend to do is say for your targets, who are, who are your main targets?

Because you might say, ok, we've got, I mean, we've got clients in the States, we've got clients all over Europe.

We've got clients in the UK.

We've got clients in the Falkland Islands, which I love because they're so cute and teeny on a map and they're so important to us.

But it just, you know, historically takes me back, but I don't say, ok, I will do a whole marketing plan for, for the, just for those handful of clients in the South Pacific because they're not my main audience.

80% of your marketing needs to hit that 20%.

Who really give you the results, who really give you the payoff to be crass about it.

But that's what it comes down to.

If your till's not bringing e-commerce, you're just another website.

Yeah, it's interesting.

So, I mean, again, I, I'm just going to pull it up here on my screen if I can confirm my ma but there it is, uh, I just had an email from, um, uh, the company who deals with the paid media on one of our ecommerce companies.

And, um, this is what they said overall week on week we saw a 1.9% increase in impressions and a 7% increase in traffic.

Thanks to an improved click click through rate and they were talking about all the great things they've done.

Um When I looked at uh all the other stats like the conversion.

Yeah, that had fallen as well.

Uh So we've got more people coming to the website but less people are buying.

So my click through rate has fallen.

Therefore, my cost per click has fallen if that makes sense.

But we're seeing more people.

Uh And there's been a, there's been a 7% increase in and it's just understanding the right numbers, isn't it?

You're looking at that and going well well done for bringing the cost, click the click through rates up and the cost down.

But my conversion rate has fallen.

So we're, we're not getting the quality traffic that we need.

Are we really and understanding that's critical?

It really is.

I mean, everything on a website, you know, it, I did a talk last week.

I, I gave a talk to him a whole room full of techies, which was great fun for me.

I don't think it's great fun for anybody.

But um I gave a talk to them about how your website success is not about the technology, it's about the people because a website that's just a shop window isn't doing the three things it needs to do.

It needs to always be attracting, connecting and engaging.

So, attracting means getting the right people there in the first place, which means having that super clear target audience, making sure every message you have speaks to that person.

Not a company.

If you're B to B, that's, that's something I do see people fall, fall down and go.

Oh yeah.

Well, I deal with manufacturers.

No, you don't.

Who, who's, who's Peter in the operations department?

Who runs it?

Who is your person? What does he want to feel when he lands on your site?

That's what's really important.

Getting the right people there is attracting them.

Connecting is where your conversion rate comes in.

the connection they make, they come to the site and it's all about them.

It's not about you.

When I say to people, I see people going like we do this, we do this, we sell that.

We sell the other, we do the other.

You're weeing all over people.

Nobody wants that.

That's a whole other website.

So we want to make it all about them.

You got this problem.

We have the solution.

This is what it looks like.

You've got this challenge.

This is how so and so dealt with it.

Using our product.

You, you need to be constantly, it's about them.

It's about them and they go, oh, that's me.

And that's what then leads to that third critical piece is engagement.

That's when they hit, add to order.

That's when they add to cart add to basket, whatever you're calling it.

That's where you get that, that real, the till starts ringing is when you get to that and that's when you can lose them as well because people then go.

Ok.

Well, it's obvious what to do.

You need to make it.

Especially with ecommerce so easy.

We've all got spoiled to death by Amazon.

We've all got spoiled by how easy it is.

I want that click, send it one click.

Check out, bang, done.

That's what we want.

And we don't care if you're a one man band or whether you're an orchestra.

That's the experience.

I want to feel that easy on that website.

Very good.

Attract connect and engage.

I've got it noted down here.

So we've, I'm gonna keep going back to the day.

Uh, we've got our holiday dates.

We've moved them back a month.

We've thought about, we ST, yeah, straddled, straddled.

Uh, I'm all kinds of good words.

Uh, uh, we've thought about the internationals.

We've thought about religious holidays.

What's, what's next on our little list of things to think about here in this 45 minutes.

Well, there's the content is obviously going to be the big meat in the sandwich.

This is the really important part is your content and this is where it can be overwhelming and particularly if you're a business owner creating your own content.

It's really hard.

It really is because you think, as I said earlier with, you know, copy paste, copy paste.

It's automatic to me.

I don't think about it.

I might, might not know the right marketing speak as a business owner.

It doesn't matter, think about what is really working for your business.

What are the products that really sell?

What is the problem that you solve?

And I don't like pain points when I say, what's the problem you solve?

And people say, you say what's the pain?

But do you suffer with this?

Does it keep you up all night?

How can you not do XYZ anymore?

That's depressing.

Nobody wants that right now less than ever.

Is that something people want to hear?

They want to feel that emotion.

We choose when it comes down to what we, we decide what we're going to buy, we decide what we're gonna buy.

OK?

I'm feeling lethargic.

I'm, I'm gonna use your supplements now.

So I'm feeling lethargic.

I, I've got brain fog II, I know I need something.

I do my research and with logic, I decide, I think I need supplements.

I think I've heard that this one's good, blah, blah, blah.

It's all head stuff.

So we decide with logic, but we choose with emotion.

It's the oldest story in the world.

It's head over heart with emotion.

So when I come to your site, I want to really feel heard, understood and served.

So it's OK to talk about the problems that I'm facing.

But then make it a pain point that you can push.

I don't know which marketer came up with that about five years ago.

But I would love to get rid of that whole thing about pain points because it's horrible.

Don't pain my pain points.

Get your fingers to yourself.

I want to hear how you solve my problem.

So make me feel hurt.

And so that's what you need to write a list is the next thing you've got is write it and it doesn't need to be, oh, on this date, I could say that on this date and say that, put your calendar to one side, blank piece of paper.

Let's go old school pen and write down and listen to a CDC, right?

Listen to a CDC on the UK.

Um And, and I like, I like fives.

So I choose multiples of five.

So 15 key things that you solve or your product solves for somebody.

And it's not.

We sell books, we sell records, we sell this, we sell that.

It's what's the problem that you solve?

Ok.

So, you know, if you're feeling, what can we help with brain fog, lack of energy, I'm, I'm going to your supplements.

Um My, my kid needs to study so that one wants to be around exam time.

Um You know, granddad's getting a bit old that wants to be around Father's Day, mother's day, whatever, whoever they are.

So get those, those, those problems that you solve.

And have those written out.

Now, those are just your topics.

Great expression.

I was told years ago, cook once and eat often.

So this is where your content comes in.

This is where your phone is, your friend, get your phone out and start recording and it doesn't have to be perfect.

And there's a lot of people go, I hate these talking head videos that I keep seeing all the time.

Just get your phone out and pick one of those topics and talk about it for two minutes, literally two minutes.

No more, no less.

Just talk about it.

Then you can either do it yourself or if you've got a va or somebody like that, that you can hand it off to then say right?

Get that transcribed and from that, write it nicely or you can play with good old A I get chat GP T dusted off.

Please learn how to use it properly and make it talk in your voice first, which is a whole, oh my gosh, do not show me another social post that looks like it was written by somebody who's never met you.

And there are 5000 emojis in it.

OK.

Don't do that but have that transcription rewritten nicely.

Tidied up.

Take out your um s and your R's and yours and all those sort of bits, there's your social post.

And then you've also got, if you want to, if you're brave enough to use the video, you've got the video to go out on youtube, you've got the written post to come out on your social.

You can, then if you want, you can expand on that point.

Add a story of somebody you've helped in that way or a customer testimonial.

And there you've got a blog post or you've got an article for linkedin and then put a snippet of that into your newsletter and you've got content.

you did a two minute video, you've got five pieces of content.

Very good.

Yeah, I, I love that.

It's um it's the reason I talk about this a lot actually.

Um The reason I love doing the podcast, Fiona and I, I get, I can, I'm quite happy to, actually to sit there with my phone and talk.

Um You know, I like the sound of my own voice.

I'm a podcast crying out.

Um But I, I get that and I can do that and I, we have done that and I love this strategy because it's so what you're doing is you're making it easy, right?

Um And for me podcasting, uh we've just done this whole teaching series, teaching series.

It's the wrong phrase.

We've just done an expert workshop on um cohort quick, shameless plug um on how to do podcasts for, uh you know, if you an Ecommerce business, one of the key reasons you want to do it.

One of the things I love about this, we're talking we started recording.

Uh, I'll tell you when we started recording because it will tell me, uh, 39 minutes and 26 seconds ago.

Right?

Uh, we're gonna go for another 20 minutes, I guess.

Uh, finish, uh, top of the hour, uh, maybe in the next 10 minutes.

Really?

It's the first time we've met, we've had a great conversation about content creation.

Um, I like you.

We've just turned up, I've got an expert chatted.

The amount of content I can create from that one podcast episode is obscene.

Um You can create 30 to 40 shorts, quite, you know, the short form videos, fairly straightforward loads of captions, quotes for um social media.

You've got your blog posts, the audios, your podcast, the videos youtube, you can create like a little 23 minute segment and put it on linkedin.

I mean, what I like about what you're saying is you, you're starting with video, which I think is where everybody should start because that gives you so many options as you, as you, as you tumble down the con, which is why I think Daniella when she was talking about, she hates writing.

She discovered actually that if I write, I've just got the blog post, if I talk, not only is it much more of an interesting experience for her?

Um But she's got the video, the audio and she's got the blog post, you know, and um and that's the, the key thing I think to what you're saying, isn't it?

Yeah.

Absolutely.

And then it just makes it easier for you.

And, you know, I do get that.

It can be tricky.

Um, I never listen to myself back when I record it.

I never listen to that.

No, it would never see the light of day.

The light of day.

My wife is exactly the same.

I'm not going to lie.

I just do, it just could not do it.

But one of the things that I do is I run a masterminding group for local business women in my area.

And they all say the same thing you keep saying about doing video.

I can't do video.

So no, you can't watch a video of yourself.

That's a different thing.

You can record a video, you can't watch it back.

So don't watch it back.

Who cares?

Just don't watch it back.

But I know that um one chap I had a chat with Daniel Priestley who wrote oversubscribed all about how to build a massive waiting list.

And he said you need to go out and, and look online and see how much of you and what you stand for and what you sell.

Can I absorb?

Can I sit and binge a day of content about your company?

And there were very few people in the room who could say yes, very few.

And he said, because that's what they do because it used to be very linear people would decide what they wanted, they want to buy a widget, they would search online for it, they would find your website and a few others and look at them, they might look at reviews and things like that and then they would come, they would just go to buy and it was very linear.

It was very much in one, in one straight line.

Now, it's all over the place.

Now, it's the first thing they do is ask their mates.

So they might do that in social.

They might do that in real life.

They might go out and then look at the reviews and then they look at something else and they look at someone else and they bounce, bounce, bounce, bounce, bounce, bounce, and then they come to your website.

So by the time they come to your website, they should already be pre qualified as much as you can saturate that bounce, bounce, pre before they get to your website stuff.

The more you can saturate that with the good stuff that you can control the narrative of.

The more likely they are to buy as soon as they get to you.

Very, very powerful point.

Love that.

So we've got our calendar, we've got the holidays, we've set them aside, we know what we're doing.

Uh And we've jotted down our ideas and we've started to record the talking heads videos.

What else should we be thinking about to be fair once you've done that and you've got all of those topics.

Calendar is your best friend.

Put that regular day in your diary and it's not once a month.

It is every week, put in two hour slot.

It can be 21 hour slots.

Don't do half an hour slots.

You won't get anything done.

Two, I have 21 hour slots.

I used to have just a big two hour slot and it, it just always got pushed back.

And that's the day.

Like that's my article day.

That's my blog day.

And all I do is I go to that list of topics and go Oh, yeah, there was that.

I already recorded the video right now, transcribe it.

And this week let's make it a blog.

And then on Thursday when the next slot pops up, OK.

I've already done it as a blog.

I've already done it as social and do track these because you will forget what you've already done with it and you don't want to put out the same stuff twice.

I have made that mistake and that was embarrassing.

Um And then just keep adding to it.

Ok.

Now it's an article now, it's a blog.

Now it's something else.

And one day it might end up as a chapter in your book.

You don't know how to write your book.

You right size.

Love that.

Love the cheeky plug.

That was very clever, very well as an expert, professional looking at that.

Um Yeah, that was great.

One of the things you said is don't put out the same stuff twice.

And I'm going to take a slight exception to this exception is the wrong phrase.

Um Maybe bring us a different way of looking at it because I'm aware that when I used to blog, I mean, I still technically blog, but the blogs come out of the podcast and stuff.

I would sit and look at my computer like a lunatic just waiting for that inspiration to strike.

And I'd have a list of things that I'd already blogged about thinking.

I, I can't go anywhere near those because I've already blogged it.

And the reality of it was, I could totally go near those again because the topic will have evolved.

There'll be some more updates, not everyone's going to read that last one.

You know, it's why on the Ecommerce podcast at first we're like, well, we've already had some talk about email marketing.

We don't need another email marketing person.

You're like, well, no, that's not entirely true.

Is it because everything moves forward and you can talk about this um from a slightly different angle or in a slightly different way.

But the, the, the same topic over and over again.

Right.

Yeah.

No, it's, it's a really good point and the thing is because especially in technology in my world, things move so quickly.

So it's really important that you do come up with the latest this, that and the other.

And that's why this was 12 months of marketing.

Not your whole life of marketing.

This is your 12 next month.

You were gonna come back next year.

Sorry, you're gonna come back in the same month.

You're gonna come back in that wet January afternoon and you're gonna say, but they're still the same topics.

Yeah.

But how has it changed?

How has it changed?

What immune system?

Suddenly we did a website for a company who they sell a particular supplement, which is for immunity.

You can only imagine what happened to their sales over the last three years because they stopped talking about general health.

It's a general health supplement and they talked about immunity.

Immune because that's all people were talking about whoosh up when the site straight up.

So, always make it relevant.

You can still use that same list next year.

But how is it relevant now?

And that's looking at what's happening current and culturally, it's not just what's happening in the news.

It's as a culture.

Do people still want to take tablets for my supplement?

Would they now prefer liquid or whatever?

Very, very important, very good.

Love that.

So, uh I've, I'm, I've got a lot of notes here.

Fiona.

Is there anything else that um uh in the sort of closing minutes of the show here?

Any last piece of advice you wanna throw in?

Oh, there is a great fun one.

And that is hidden holidays.

I've talked about these key holiday dates all through the year.

If you've got a time of year when you know your clients all disappear.

Like August traditionally was a good one.

Not so much.

The last few years, August is dead as a doornail for us because everybody goes on holiday, nobody wants to do anything.

So we know we ramp up our marketing in June to existing clients.

So it's not just the social and the blogs and the articles we then start really targeting our existing clients and saying to them, we know you're probably already planning your holiday in August.

We hope you are.

It's going to be a great one, blah, blah, blah, whatever, get your orders in now and we can save you a slot in the schedule, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah and it fills up those quiet times.

So look for your quiet times.

When are the flat spots in your year and start planning to market to your existing clients on top of that.

Great love, that, love that Fiona.

Listen, I I'm aware of time and I feel like, you know, we could carry on talking about this for quite a while.

It's quite nice talking to you.

You're a very easy person to talk to.

Um If people want to reach out to you, if they want to connect, if they want to find out more about fat promotions, they want to get a hold of your book.

What's the best way to do that?

Uh Best way to do it.

You can go to my website.

If you go to f promotions dot co dot UK, you can find me there.

Uh But you should be able to Google me look and you should find at least seven hours of content or I'm not living by my own rules.

Um But you can download a free chapter of my book, which is all about, uh that particular chapter is all about getting your target client crystal clear.

So if you go to website mastery book dot com, that will get you a free copy of uh the first chapter of the book all about crystallizing your marketing message for the right target audience, no website website mastery book dot com.

Uh We will of course put that in the show notes as well.

Uh And if you're subscribed to the newsletter, ladies and gentlemen, that will also be winging its way to your inbox, it'll be in, it'll be in the show notes.

So we put all the links and stuff in there on the website as well.

E-commerce podcast on there.

It's all there just go check it out.

Download the free chat to get in touch with Fiona.

I'm sure she'd love to hear it.

And it's actually only just now and this shows you how fast my brain is, Fiona.

It's only just now.

I finally understood why you called it fat promotions.

Yeah, the kind I have name in my kids.

Peter Robert will never forgive me.

It's, um, yeah, at first I was, like, fat and it was capitalized and now I've realized now looking at your name.

Ok.

I get it.

I used to get people say, but you shouldn't do that because you're not fat.

And I thought, well, a, that's a good diet incentive.

And b, you know, my phone's not actually orange and I don't think Richard Branson's a virgin, so it doesn't be good.

Yeah, and I'm not sure he drinks coke uh anymore.

Uh So, no, that's, that's very, very true.

Very, very true.

Indeed.

Love that.

Love that.

Well, Fiona, thank you so much for joining me on today's podcast.

Loved the conversation and we appreciate it.

Thank you.

No, it's been great.

Absolute legend.

Also big shout out to today's show sponsor the e-commerce cohort.

Remember to check out the e-commerce cohort, ecommerce cohort dot com.

Come join us, come join the membership.

It would be great to see you in there now, be sure to follow the e-commerce podcast wherever you get your podcast from because we've got yet more great conversations lined up and I don't want you to miss any of them and in case no one has told you yet today, let me be the first person to tell you you.

Oh, awesome.

Yes, you are credit.

Awesome.

It's just a burden you have to bear.

I've got to bear it.

Fiona has to bear it.

You've got to bear it as well.

Now, the e-commerce podcast is produced by a media.

You can find our entire archive of episodes on your favorite podcast app.

The team that makes this show possible.

It's Sadaf Bayon, Tanya Hut Slack and a whole bunch of other amazing people.

The theme music was written by Josh Edmondson and as I mentioned, if you'd like to read the transcript or show notes, head over to the website ecommerce podcast dot net, it's all there, it's all there.

So that's it from me.

That's it from Fiona.

Thank you so much for joining us.

Have a fantastic week wherever you are in the world.

I'll see you next time.

Bye for now.