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As a small business owner, you need to be a lot of things to make your business go—but you don't have to be a marketer alone. Join host Dave Charest, Director of Small Business Success at Constant Contact, and Kelsi Carter, Brand Production Coordinator, as they explore what it really takes to market your business. Even if marketing's not your thing! You'll hear from small business leaders just like you along with industry experts as they share their stories, challenges, and best advice to get real results. This is the 2x Webby Award Honoree Be A Marketer podcast!
Dave Charest: Today on episode ten of the Be a Marketer podcast, you'll hear from a small business marketer that knows you sometimes have to take a step back in order to move forward. And I'm sharing the truth about best practices and why you shouldn't follow them blindly. This is the Be a Marketer podcast my name is Dave Charest, director of small business success at Constant Contact, and I've been helping small business owners like you make sense of online marketing for over 16 years. You can be a marketer, and I'm here to help. Hello. Hello, friend, and welcome to another episode of the Be a Marketer podcast. As always, grateful to have you here. Grateful for your attention. And today I wanted to start by sharing a little bit of a story with you. You know, a while back, I was talking to a constant contact customer that sells tea, and I asked her the question, well, how often do you send emails? Now, this is a question that many people often ask me. Really, they're looking for a definitive answer. And unfortunately, you know, that's not an answer I can definitively give anyone because, well, the reality is, it depends, you see, it really depends on the nature of the business itself and the audience that that business is speaking to. And so when I asked our tea seller how often she sends emails, her answer was one that came from testing with her specific audience. And really, her answer may surprise you. So what works for her? Well, she sends a daily email. Now, I know you may be saying, well, I would never send a daily email. And the reality is that that may not be right for you. And what I'm getting at here is that this is really the truth about best practices, is that what works for you, someone else may not be what works for you. And so when it comes to things like what's the best time to send? How often should you send, or should you send plain text or images and emails? Know that all of these things, ultimately what you're trying to do is find the best practices that are best for you. Now, look, if you don't know where to start, that's where you can begin with some widely known best practices, right? So you'll be in a good place, but you'll also have something that you can test against. And so it really behooves you to develop this testing mindset where you're trying things, you're looking at the results and seeing what actually works best for you and your audience. Now, a simple example here would be something like maybe you're wondering if you should use emojis in your subject lines to increase open rates. Now, the best thing to do here would be to set up an A B test where a portion of your contacts get one subject line with an emoji and the others get one without an emoji. Then you can see which works better for you. Then you can send the winner, of course, to the remaining contacts so you get the most opens. Now I'm going to include a link in the show notes so you can see how you can do this with your constant contact account. And I'm also going to include a link to a webinar on testing that was recently done so you can learn more. But ultimately, what I want you to remember here is that general best practices should really serve as guidelines, but ultimately there are things you should prove for yourself so you have a marketing playbook that works best for you. Well, friend, today's guest is no stranger to testing and finding out what works. Gablian Eddie is a self made marketer currently working in the commercial real estate industry. She pulls from her diverse background to collaborate with sales teams and develop marketing strategies and resources to help her employer, wolf commercial real estate, reach their expansion and revenue goals. You know, I asked Gab how she got started in marketing. Let's pick up the conversation there.
Gab Leonetti: I have a very diverse background. When I was younger, I wanted to be in the medical field. I wanted to do ultrasound. I went to school for it. I realized I worked in the medical field for quite a bit, realized that it wasn't something that I wanted to do for the rest of my life. Where I left, I left cancer, dealing with cancer patients. So as you can tell, it's probably why I was a little bit willing to leave, because it was very sad. I went into mortgages and because of my brother being in the real estate industry, it was great opportunity for me to learn on the financial side of things and really get down into like growing business together as like a family, which it did work out. It was great. That's kind of how I started in marketing. I developed my facebook page. I started really posting on LinkedIn and really trying to drive home. Not just, hey, I'm a mortgage representative and you should contact me, but other aspects like getting to know me, getting to know, being motivational. So that kind of like, I really liked that side. And then I realized that I actually hated mortgages, but I liked marketing. So I left the mortgage industry and I went to the asphalt company where I was the admin. And then within like three months, I became their marketing representative and just ran from there. And I just learned as much as I could with constant contact. Like, I already knew about, you know, CRMs. Like, I worked with Salesforce from the mortgage industry, which is great because they could do drip campaigns and they have a lot of different platforms that work with them. So it was great. It was something that I really just, I've always been creative. It's always been since I was a little kid, but didn't know that I could actually utilize it to make money.
Dave Charest: So I was gonna say it wasn't really something you always knew you wanted to do, right, in terms of the marketing.
Gab Leonetti: No, I really thought I was gonna be in the medical field. I really thought that that's where I wanted to be because I have, like, you know, I'm very well versed in the medical field, but also well versed in business. My dad's in construction. I do all of his bookkeeping for him and accounting. So I had, like, I have such a crazy background, but it's helped me learn, like, every facet of what goes into a business.
Dave Charest: So, oddly enough, I think it's funny because it sounds like you've learned a wide variety of skills that a business owner would have to learn, right. But you're not actually, like, you're just doing the marketing part of the business. Right. So it's interesting because you actually have that other skill set as, as well. So did you start as a director when you went over to wcre?
Gab Leonetti: No, so initially I started as the sales team coordinator. So all of their like, oh, so.
Dave Charest: You weren't even really in a marketing position?
Gab Leonetti: No, it was marketing.
Dave Charest: It wasn't?
Gab Leonetti: No, it was marketing. So it was initially helping with social media and essentially getting the sales team to be more on the same wavelength with social, helping them thrive with social, how to utilize it better, you know, because Jason's great at it. Right? Like, Jason's good at it, and we've got a few guys that are really, really good at it, but it was more so, like, let's get these blog sites up, let's utilize SEO, let's. So it was like getting the sales team on the same wavelength, but also helping them aid in their social media, aid in the back end.
Dave Charest: Having moved into that role, I mean, is there anything that scared you about kind of taking that leap into marketing, whether it was where you are now or in your previous marketing role?
Gab Leonetti: You know, I think for me, and it's more so, like, what we tell ourselves, right. For me, it was my own self doubt. I think that it was, you know, well, I don't have a degree in that. How am I going to be successful if I don't have a degree in that? How am I, how are people going to want to listen to me or respect me in this field if I don't have a piece of paper backing it? And it got to the point that I was just like, I don't need that. The way that the world is with all these influencers and all these different people, it's not the same anymore. And I also have, I have a very good understanding. And I think the hands on training really shaped and helped develop, you know, getting over that fear and getting over that little voice in your head telling you that you're not worth it.
Dave Charest: Was there anything specifically that what I'm getting at is, you know, I know for me, right. Similar kind of thing, right. Didn't really go to school for marketing. Started teaching myself how to do this online marketing stuff. And then, you know, I was doing some things, had some success, and then it was when I was able to then, you know, come over to constant contact, which I've been at for over eleven years now, where I was really able to implement things at a larger scale that I wasn't able to do on my own. And it was a huge confidence boost in that sense. It's like, yeah, this stuff works all right, I'm doing it. I can do this. Was there anything for you? Was there a particular moment where you were like, yes, that is a win? Was there anything like that?
Gab Leonetti: Say yes. So when I was in the asphalt industry, they didn't have a social media. You know, it's construction. That's, it's like, do we need, do we need marketing? Do we really need it? A lot of their business came from referral base, which is fantastic, right? They had a great rapport, but in order to win new business, you kind of have to put yourself out there. So it was, you know, getting them on social media and, like, getting the ability to kind of like, help and aid them. The successes, one of the things that we did to win business, if they, if a sales team member was trying to go after another commercial company, let's say if they weren't effective in doing that, we would then send them something geared towards their business. So one of them was a trucking company, a huge, huge trucking company. It was a huge industrial company. And I, you know, with industrial, we could pave their parking lot. We know what to use, we make the asphalt, all these things. And I was like, how do we get in the door with them? Let's send them a huge truck to the CEO that has their logo on it, and let's open that door for conversation. Well, it did. It was successful and it did. And the guy was like, this is so cool. Can't believe you sent this to me. Let's have a meeting. They got that meeting. We didn't end up winning the deal, but we got our foot in the door for them to be more responsive to us, to be able to move forward with building that relationship. So I think that little, that win, being able to, I think a lot of times, unfortunately, people or businesses think like, hey, you know what? Let's put our logo on this and send it to XYZ. Let's put our live on this. And I, you know, we're going to do gifts for Christmas. Let's, you know, send them cookies with our logo on it. Nobody wants your logo. They don't want your logo. Sorry. They don't want your logo. No. You're going to send them a gift. You're going to make it personalized towards them and what they want with their name and their logo. So that kind of, like, that win really just, like, opened and flourished. And I was like, I didn't learn that. It was just something that I was like, why would somebody want our stuff on it? It was just like, I know what I'm doing. I know what I'm doing.
Dave Charest: So it was cool, actually. I guess the first question, for clarity's sake, it was a toy truck, correct?
Gab Leonetti: Yeah. Oh, my goodness. No, no, no. It's like, you know, one that, like, sits on your desk that you can be, like, real proud of, you know?
Dave Charest: But to your point, I think that's one of the biggest mistakes I think, you know, people fall into because it's a really interesting dynamic, and I'm sure you can attest to this, where you're. You get very self centered because you're like, we need to market our business. And to your point, nobody really cares about you. They care more about themselves. And so the real way to market yourself is to actually be selfless a bit. Right. And not talking about yourself and talking about the customer or the person that you're trying to reach. Right. And that's a real interesting dynamic because you actually have to do. It's almost like you have to do the opposite of what you instinctively want to do because that's the thing that's actually going to make the thing work. Right. So what would you say is your biggest marketing accomplishment so far.
Gab Leonetti: I'm in leadership right now. It's something that my company is paying for, and basically it helps, you know, you to stay aligned and, you know, accountable. And I from that, I was nominated for women to watch in a local real estate magazine in south Jersey, business magazine. So that was a huge, huge deal for me because it's not only putting myself out on the map and saying, hey, look, I'm here. But it's a huge deal for WCRA to be able to get that branding and that out there. So that, that was cool. That literally, I think, is going to be going out next month. I believe so, yeah. So that was really neat. I think that's probably one of the biggest on the other side of it.
Dave Charest: How does that accomplishment make you feel?
Gab Leonetti: Validated. I think validated is pretty the strong word there.
Dave Charest: Well, congratulations to you in your role now today. What do you love most about it?
Gab Leonetti: Connecting with everyone. Like, I, you know, there are people that can work from home in marketing and they can do it on the back end, and that works for them. I've done it, but I truly enjoy being in the office, connecting with the brokers, connecting with, you know, the sales team and with Jason and being able to come up with fun ideas, collaboration. Hey, what works? What doesn't? I think that's, that's the best.
Dave Charest: How big is the team? How many employees do you all have?
Gab Leonetti: So we have about 20. So we're like a smaller, we're, I would say maybe like 22. We're a smaller firm. Like, we're more of like a boutique firm firm. Like, we're pretty strong. Yeah, we're pretty dominant for being a boutique firm.
Dave Charest: Yep. No, I love that. I love that. Sometimes it's easier when you have a smaller team to work with, too. So, yeah, you can move a lot faster and do things that you really want to do. So do you have a team? Like, you're a director now? Like, do you have a team of marketers or is it just you?
Gab Leonetti: It's just me.
Dave Charest: What does a typical day look like for you, then?
Gab Leonetti: Well, my cheese is always moving on my plate, so it's a matter of handling what is getting thrown at me. A lot of times, I think for my industry, being in commercial real estate, you're always moving, you're always out there. Things are always changing. The market is forever changing. Right. So as the marketing director in that position, my day, you know, I'll have one day where I'm like, oh, my God, I'm so caught up this is great. I feel fantastic. And then the next day it's like everybody needs me and I'm in meetings back to back to back to back to back. And it really varies. Every day is different and I kind of like that. But I'm always busy. I am extremely organized, which I think aids in the success as to why I am a single person in this role. But yeah, every day is different. It depends on what, what's getting thrown at us, what's what we're dealing with.
Dave Charest: Anything else you would highlight as a strength? Right. Obviously, being highly organized is important in terms of, particularly in the marketing, when you're always kind of feeding the beast, so to speak, on many levels. Right. When, particularly when it comes to social and online. Anything else that you would highlight as a strength for yourself there, being strategic?
Gab Leonetti: I think that as a marketer or within that industry, it's always great to try new stuff and to research what else is out there. What could you be doing better? But it's also important to be strategic about you're doing. It's important to know your RoI, return on investment. You don't want to put all your money in one area and it not work and now you're out of luck. Right. So you want to make sure that everything that you're doing there is a plan, essentially. So I think that before me coming here and kind of taking over, there was no real budget or return on investment. Where I came from, from the asphalt industry, they actually were very big on budgets, right? So it was very strange to come here and be like, oh, no, we just do whatever we want. And I'm like, no, no, let's not do that. Like, let's set a budget. Let's figure out, because, you know what? If, let's say this one platform doesn't work, let's take that money and put it into something that is going to be fantastic. Let's put it into more SEO, let's put it into more ad campaigns, or let's figure out a new way of getting our name out there, new tech, getting more stuff up on the website, so different things like that. I think it's important. I think that's very important as a marketer to not only be highly organized, but also to be well versed in budgeting and knowing where you need to be with ROI and being strategic in your plan. For sure.
Dave Charest: Were you the first marketing role or was there somebody else in that role previously?
Gab Leonetti: No, there was someone else previously in that role.
Dave Charest: I feel like usually when you come in, you start to identify potential opportunities right away, like, oh, here are some things that we could. As you're kind of uncovering and figuring out what to do, I guess. What was your approach to that when you come in? What were you like, okay, to lay the foundation to think about this, we need to do one, two, three. What were the things that you kind of came in with?
Gab Leonetti: Well, I came in with scaling back on social media. Usually you'd be like, what? What do you mean, scale back? You're supposed to. You're supposed to be putting yourself out there. Unfortunately, sometimes I think a lot of people that are new in this whole wheelhouse, you think that like blasting out and blasting out, you know, it ends up destroying your engagement. It's researching the time to know, you know what, let's see what they're saying. What is HubSpot? And all these sprout social, what are they saying? That's good times. So that's a start. Let's see what time we're posting and then let's go back a month from now and see our own analytics and see if it marries up and if it works. I think that one of the things really when I took over was scaling back a little bit because we ended up, we were hurting ourselves more than we were helping ourselves. The other part to it was, like I had mentioned was the budgeting, knowing where we were with our expenses, what we were putting out, and coming up with a strategic plan as to, okay, you know what? We're going to put this amount in ads. We're going to put this amount in SEO content, making sure that all of our blog sites are on SSL servers that is better for Google and putting us really on the map. So I think, like, kind of like taking things over in that respect really has helped aid in more success as we've grown. And now we're even discussing rebranding and just taking things more modern and to the next level.
Dave Charest: My background is in the content piece of things. And to your point of scaling back, often people think, all right, it's about doing more and more and more. And I'm always like, no, how do we do? Can we do less so that we can get more?
Gab Leonetti: It's like quality over quantity.
Dave Charest: Yeah. I love to hear you say that. What would you say so far in your path as a marketer? What has been the most challenging or maybe even scariest time for you?
Gab Leonetti: I would say, like, the scariest time would be especially for commercial real estate. It's the market. It's the actual market. It's the economy. There's always business to be made. But how do we develop more? How do we get in with more? How do we educate ourselves more? Where do we need to be as a firm, especially compared to the bigger guys? Right. Like, so I think that has really been scary, seeing and hearing what's been going on in our economy in the market and the rates and inflation. And for me, that's really just been like, okay, we got to gear it up. We got to switch it up a little bit. Where do we need to be? What do we need to do?
Dave Charest: Do you have an approach, I guess, to, like when you're thinking about your marketing and the types of things that you're doing, which I want to get into a little bit more specifically at a certain point, but, like, do you address those issues with the market that you were not the market as a whole, but the people that you're trying to reach? Right. Are you with the audience that you're trying to reach? Do you address those things?
Gab Leonetti: Yeah, I think that we do a good job on educating as best as we can and kind of to, like, so, like, one thing that we do is we do a newsletter. So we have, like, all these different news avenues. And I'm not talking, like, you know, actual, like, CNN or whatever. I'm talking, like, you know, local news that's around our area, that's within the Philadelphia South Jersey region. And basically, we take that, we then reinvent that, put that on our newsletter. We put that out there to educate our people. Hey, this is what's going on in the market. Hey, you know what? We saw that industrial is really hot right now, but there's not enough out there. And the other part of that, too, is we do a quarterly report. So Jason, I help assist him in that aspect, but Jason is really out there as the face of the company talking about the hard stuff, and then I make it look pretty. But, yes. So that is something that is, we don't not ask questions, if that makes sense. We ask the question. We ask the hard stuff, because in order for us to be able to assist and be able to help our clients, you have to know what they're up against or what they're facing or what are their challenges in order to be able to assist them, what do.
Dave Charest: You have to do to make sure that you're reporting back to the rest of the team internally to showcase what you are doing, what's working? Like, what does that scenario look like and how do you go about that?
Gab Leonetti: Typically, what we do is we have, I would say like a monthly meeting, bi weekly. We have one with the sales team. I sit on it, I hear about it. We started doing a networking calendar to get our guys more out on the field, saturating the area, the market, face to face. Now that Covid is hopefully on its way out. But yeah, I come back like we. The other part to it, too is that I'm not closed off to idea. Right. So a part of that is collaborating with them and them saying, hey, you know what? I saw this really good ad, or I saw this really great brochure. What do you think of this? What do you think of this style? And me saying, sure, yay or nay or, you know, and I think I being open and having that open mind has really helped. That's kind of where I take it on. As I come in, we have like a monthly meeting. We kind of go over what's going on. I let them know because a lot of times these guys don't really know. I can say SSL to you, but they're going to be like, what are you talking about? What is that? What does that even mean? I don't understand. And why does that help me? So it's more so kind of like dummying it down and letting them know, like, hey, we got, you know, 85 blog posts. We scaled back on about eight of them. Here's why. And helping them win and helping them with presentation and pitches and things like that. So kind of seeing it's more so me figuring out where they are and where their head is at in order for me to then develop what they need.
Dave Charest: Are you a goal setter? Are you this type of person who. Okay, this is what we need to do this year. How specific do you get? What's your, where do you sit in that world?
Gab Leonetti: So I think our goal, like the goal setting is a part of it, is okay, obviously we want to win more, more deals, right? Like, we want these guys to be more successful. Our goal setting, or at least for me, my goal setting right now is to be more in a leadership type role, to really voice that for me where I am within the company, how I can assist. So I think that that's really my personal goal as well as a professional goal. But for the team, our goal is, you know, there's a monetary, and then there's also the different areas that we're trying to hit right now. We're really trying to drive home into Philadelphia, and we're also really trying to drive home into the AC market to Atlantic City. Where we are is we're trying to saturate more within those areas. That's kind of our goal right now. So it's really kind of a, more of a broad, and then we kind of scale it and funnel it down as to, okay, well, what broker is going to be heading this market? Who's going to be heading Philadelphia, who's going to be heading Atlantic City? And then from there, you know, doing more research about the area, finding events in that area, finding out who's out there, like our competition, getting to know them. And then we kind of derive the plan from there.
Dave Charest: So when you start to think about that and you start driving that plan, like, what, what specifically are you doing when it comes to the marketing pieces?
Gab Leonetti: So specifically, if it has to do with, like, listing or something like that, sometimes if it's an investment deal, there's an offering memorandum that I have to piece together. So it's getting the demographics of that area. It's putting the maps together to showcase the benefit of that area. It's doing, you know, assisting in putting together swot analysis, also making sure that we are advertising within those areas and, like, retargeting within those areas. So I work with our web developer, and we then say, okay, hey, we're going to hit on Philadelphia. We need to push more out on Philly life sciences. So we have, like, different blogs, right? Like, we have about 80 blog sites that hit very well because we do a heavy SEO background. And if I say, hey, you know what, my focus right now is on Philly, and we're really trying to drive home Philly life sciences. We really infiltrate on the Philadelphia area in SEO, the keyword in helping that blog blossom, so that we're kind of like, number one after an ad rather than, you know, being on page three. So, and that's like, a lot of times that's a, eats up a lot of money for marketing dollars. So we try and do more of that. Then, like, you know, send a postcard or, you know, less print, more digital.
Dave Charest: What would you say has been the most effective thing when it comes to marketing that, that you've seen in your situation?
Gab Leonetti: Top of mind, it's really just being out there. I think that we've what Jason has always been very good at, and I know that you're not from this area, but if you say Jason Wolf to someone, they know who he is. They don't know him just because of WCRA. They know him because he's a player within the industry and he makes that very known and in that it's our philanthropy, it's our saturation within the area, and making sure that we're not just doing constant contact, we're not just sending an email. We're doing a drip campaign, we're advertising, we're networking, which is a huge deal. We're doing social media. And it's not just, hey, here's our new property. How are you? Like, call us if you need anything. It's providing knowledge and also providing fun, and you want to kind of have it all. It kind of all is all encompassing for top coma or top of mind awareness.
Dave Charest: So it sounds like you're really one just focused on those communities. Right. Like, how big a role are those communities playing in all of this?
Gab Leonetti: A big deal? I mean, our. So we in, I want to say, 2015, we developed our own foundation. It's called the WCRE foundation, and we benefit six local charities within our community that we hold dear to our heart. And one of them is Ronald McDonald House of southern New Jersey. And one of our very large clients are also a huge factor in the success of Ronald McDonald. So because we have that same core value and those same interests, it's helped grow our relationship even further with that client. So our community and our philanthropy has really been a huge player, and it's, I would say, one of the top reasons why we do what we do. Yes, we're here to help you, but our community is what's helping us grow. So let's get back to it.
Dave Charest: I want to shift us a little bit to just talk specifically about kind of how you're using constant contact. I guess the first question I have for you is, what brought you to constant contact? Like, was wolf already using it, or was it something that you brought to the business?
Gab Leonetti: So they were already using it, and I've used it in the past. I used it when I was in the asphalt industry, and I loved it. I love the plug and play of it, and I like to be able to have, like, now that it's tied with canva, which is also my favorite, it's, like, even better. Makes my life ten times easier. So that's a good integration.
Dave Charest: I love that.
Gab Leonetti: Yeah, it's an awesome integration. Honestly, I love it. So they already had it. I just don't think it was utilized in the best way in previous.
Dave Charest: Well, could you tell me a little bit about how you're using it today, then?
Gab Leonetti: So, in previous, it was here. Let's take a templated picture. Let's upload it to constant contact. Let's send it out today. It's more of the creative side, using those little features on the sidebar of, you know, article and like being able to be more creative. Previously it was, you know, let's, if we have a broker blast and let's say two people have broker blasts, well, a broker blast is where they send an email out to brokers in the field. They would want them to go out in the same day. That is not what we're doing. I am not going to sit here and tell you to send an email ten times a day because we all know that people unsubscribe and they don't want to be bothered and they don't want to deal with that because it's borderline harassment. So taking it back again with the scaling back, it was more of a, all right, let's see how we scale this back. So now we post, I don't want to say post, but we send an email out once a day. We're very targeted in what we're doing. So if there's a medical, let's say a medical building that's for sale or lease, I take all the information, I make it pretty, I put it on custom contact. We use our links to make sure that it goes back to our website. And then I also love the feature of being able to see who actually is clicking on that specified link. So let's say I have five medical properties that I want to send out in an email. I can see exactly what list is hitting on that. I think having that being more targeted has really helped. Whereas before we weren't as targeted as who we were sending things to, now I'm starting to go through and utilize and kind of show the lists. Having healthcare, having industrial prospects, having office prospects, and having that based off of Philadelphia, New Jersey, the region. So having all of that, I think we've been definitely getting better at cleaning up and utilizing constant contact the appropriate way and then also doing the drip campaign in which, you know, this person opens that email. Okay, now they're going to get a second set of emails over x amount of time and then we can kind of like use that as a warm lead, essentially.
Dave Charest: Yeah. So I love that. I love that you're getting into the segmentation of things with the lists and things like that. I mean, that's often whenever we talk to people, it's like the number one thing you can do to start improving your results is really start thinking about that and thinking about how you can be more specific with who you're targeting. Right. And segmentation is the biggest way to just think through that. I love that you're using some automation and doing all of that. What would you say is your favorite constant contact feature?
Gab Leonetti: Ooh. Honestly, I would say my favorite constant contact feature is actually being able to see the reports, seeing the analytics, seeing who's opening. And I also like that you guys as well say, hey, you know what? This is the average industry. Here's what the average industry is doing and here's where you stand compared to that. I think that's fantastic. I love, that's like, probably one of my favorite features is just really being able to download that excel report, see who opened the email, see who clicked, and then use that as a warm need for these brokers to say, you know what, I saw that you were open this or I saw that you clicked on this. Are you interested? How can I help you? It just opens doors, it opens conversation. And the fact that they, the fact that you provide that report is fantastic. So long as it's done the right way.
Dave Charest: Exactly right. That's. There's a fine line between being creepy.
Gab Leonetti: Right? Exactly. Like, hey, I saw that you opened this email.
Dave Charest: I was watching you and I was watching you.
Gab Leonetti: What were you doing on there? But no, I think the other part of segments is like, which is kind of going back to what you had asked earlier. The other part I want to kind of hit on is I think that, yeah, it's great to have the emails, but it's also equally important to know the person's name, the title, the company, their phone number a lot of times. And what I've seen in the past, because when I came to the asphalt industry, their predecessor didn't upload that contact. Additional contact information just had the emails in there as well. I went through and I cleaned it up and that's also what I'm kind of doing right now, too, here. Unfortunately. I think that's, it's important to know because if you're going to make that call, you don't want to have to go and plug that. You don't want to have to put that name into Google. You don't want to have to sit there and waste time on LinkedIn. People are too busy, the sales team is too busy to be looking for that. So if you're going to be doing these emails, you have to make sure that you have the right information in there.
Dave Charest: What would be then your number one tip for maybe a similar business using constant contact?
Gab Leonetti: I think the number one thing I would say with constant contact is, again, being strategic and making sure that you're actually utilizing it for what it is, number one. And secondly, making sure that you're doing those reports and seeing what is working what isn't and moving from there. Because if you're not doing that and you're not getting analytical, and I think a lot of times people forget that marketing is analytics in a way, you're going to continue to almost be in the same, what is that called? Like the same rat race. Like you're doing the same thing over and over and over again.
Dave Charest: Hamster wheel, right?
Gab Leonetti: Yeah, the hamster wheel. You're expecting to have like a different result if you keep doing the same stuff over again. So I think the number one thing is really like figuring out what works and what doesn't and then moving on from there, implementing new strategy. And, like those tools are on there for you for a reason, for constant contact. Watch them, view them. That's helped me when I first started out because I had no idea what I was doing or what I was looking at. I was like, what is this? I don't understand. So those tools, I think if you're brand new, watch them. If you're seasoned and you know, then make sure that all of your stuff is correct and make sure that you're strategic about your emails.
Dave Charest: If you were to think in general, right, what would be your best piece of marketing advice?
Gab Leonetti: I would say to make sure that you're not only aligned with people of the same values that you have, like core values, same culture, but also that when you are going after larger clients or people you're trying to get business from, don't be self serving. It's not going to help you. Being more geared towards a client and researching your client, researching the person that you want to know, like to get to know that business, to be on to your, your business, for you to have that successful relationship is also really getting to know them. I think that a lot of times people network and they go in there and they say, hey, you know, I'm so and so from so and so and this is what I do. But really it's not about that. You want to build that relationship. So the best piece of advice for marketing, I would say, is build the relationship. Ask about people's lives. Ask about what they're doing, what their successes are, where they need help. See how you can help them. How do you fit in their puzzle piece? That's the best piece of marketing that I can give you.
Dave Charest: Well, friend, let's recap some items from that discussion. Number one, focus on the customer first. Although you ultimately want to drive more awareness for your business, remember, it's not really about you, at least at first, right? It may seem counterintuitive, but when you focus on the customer and their needs, that's when they become more interested in you and what you have to offer. Number two, make sure youre looking at your reporting to see what works. Set aside some time to review whats working and whats not. Then you can invest more in the right areas and develop new ideas to test. And three, get more targeted. Develop campaigns and messaging that speak directly to smaller subsets of your overall contact list. Youll get better results, plain and simple. Now for todays action item id like you to think about trying some a b testing on some subject lines. I'm going to include a link in the show notes as I mentioned so you can see how to do that. And I also want to mention that you can even use our AI powered subject line generator to give you some options, so be sure to check that out. Well, until next time, friend, I hope you enjoyed this episode of the Be a Marketer podcast. If you have questions or feedback, I'd love to hear from you. You can email me directly at at dave.charest@constantcontact.com. If you did enjoy today's episode, please take a moment to leave us a review. Your honest feedback will help other small business marketers like yourself find the show. Well friend, I hope you enjoy the rest of your day and continued success to you and your business.