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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 Be a Marketer podcast! New episodes every Thursday!
Today on episode 63, you'll hear from a pioneer in preschool gymnastics that's been helping young people see their value for over 40 years. This is the Be A Marketer podcast. My name is Dave Charest, director of small business success at Constant Contact. And I help small business owners like you make sense of online marketing. And on this podcast, we'll explore what it really takes to market your business even if marketing's not your thing.
Dave Charest:No jargon. No hype. Just real stories to inspire you and practical advice you can act on. So remember, friend, you can be a marketer. And at Constant Contact, we're here to help.
Dave Charest:Well, hello, friend, and thanks for joining us for another edition of the Be a Marketer podcast. I'm here with Kelsey Carter. Hello, Kelsey.
Kelsi Carter:Hi, Dave. How are you?
Dave Charest:I'm doing fantastic. Excited to cut to our conversation here today with our guest. But before we do, there's actually quite a lot of interesting things going on with our guest in the nonprofit foundation that she's a part of and helped cofound. Kelsey, why don't you tell us a little bit about who our guest is today?
Kelsi Carter:Yeah. So today's guest is Stephanie Eileen Campbell. She's the cofounder, CEO, and executive director of Kid's Gym USA, which is located in College Park, Georgia. Kid's Gym USA is a nonprofit organization that puts fitness principles into practice through gymnastics and education programs that build healthy mental and physical lifestyles for children and youth.
Dave Charest:Yeah. I love this. I mean, the the couple, they cofounded the organization in 1986, like, officially. And, you know, they're actually preschool gymnastics pioneers. They're experts in the field of early movement education and leaders in innovative programming for preschool and school aged youth.
Dave Charest:And even though the concept really started as this, gymnastics and motor development program targeting preschool age children, really Tracy and Stephanie's desire to provide the services to all children, especially those in at risk metropolitan areas in inner cities, that was really the driving force behind their ambitions to evolve and expand their focus from strictly that preschool gymnastics that we talked about to an early intervention and, prevention program. And, I mean, what was it, Kelsey? The tons of people that they've really
Stephanie Campbell:Yeah.
Dave Charest:Reached through this program.
Kelsi Carter:Yeah. Since the start of the organization, there's more than a 100000 children aged from 12 months to 21 years in the Atlanta area that have enjoyed the gymnastics and tumbling and the healthy lifestyle classes that they offer.
Dave Charest:Amazing. Amazing. Yeah.
Kelsi Carter:Something also that's really incredible, both the Campbells and the organization have received several national recognitions for their commitment to early childhood and youth development, including awards acknowledgments from several United States presidents. She even posted on about her interaction and meetings with Arnold Schwarzenegger, which I thought was really funny.
Dave Charest:Yeah. Amazing. And I think, you know, just even, you know, the people that, you know, the the people, obviously, she's getting accolades from, people that she's kinda running in circles with and and learning from and doing all of these things. You can really see how you might be like, but why have all these accolades for a gymnastics program? But, really it's, as you'll hear in this conversation, and as we're kind of building up here, it's really more about just gymnastics.
Dave Charest:Right? You know, really the driving force behind the work that the Campbells were doing is really about helping young people see their value. And, I mean, I absolutely love that. And I think that they're doing some really great work there. You're gonna hear the passion in this conversation coming from Stephanie, not only about the organization, but also just in terms of what they're doing from a marketing perspective and a fundraising perspective.
Dave Charest:And you're really gonna understand why the couple has really been able to influence the younger population in such a positive way. So let's go to the conversation.
Stephanie Campbell:Teaching our youngest of children how to build the school readiness skills that are necessary to be successful in school. And that's what Kids Gym USA does primarily. We work with that youngest population and it makes such a difference. We also get a chance to talk to parents and we invite other entities. We collaborate on with so many different organizations, but that came out of my work with inner city games because I wanted to give children in the inner cities an opportunity to have experience with non traditional sports.
Stephanie Campbell:So during that time, Kid's Gym USA as the gymnastics, nontraditional. Then we offered rugby, and at that time, soccer was nontraditional. We did flag football. We did lacrosse. We did fencing.
Stephanie Campbell:I mean, you talk about nontraditional experiences. So, consequently, that is what really Kid's Gym USA has done over these last 40 years and we are very grateful to have served so many children, and we're still serving quite a few. We do about 600 to 700 kids a week. And, yeah, that's a lot. And we've seen them at a location in College Park, but we also go not all of those kids are in College Park.
Stephanie Campbell:Some of them we go to. Like, we partner with the city of Atlanta, and we serve the kids in all of their recreation centers. Now we have an intern program, so we train PE teachers, we train pre k teachers on how to use the sport of gymnastics. Every kid wants to learn to flip. That is something we have discovered.
Stephanie Campbell:We even have adults that want to learn to flip. Okay. But everyone wants to learn to flip. So consequently, that really excites us and it excites everyone. And so it's like, well, let's give it to these various schools through teaching these PE teachers.
Stephanie Campbell:Let's give it to these pre k communities by teaching the pre k teachers, and that's where we are.
Dave Charest:So there's a lot here, and congratulations to you on the success that you've had with the program in doing all of that. And I'm I'm wondering, so as you are getting to this point, I mean, did you ever think you'd end up running a nonprofit?
Stephanie Campbell:You know, that's interesting. I really did not. I mean, that was not in our vision in the very beginning, but my heart was touched. And I know we can make this work, And it's an opportunity to expose children who look like me, who would not have the opportunity. I mean, I talk to families even to this day.
Stephanie Campbell:We scholarship kids all the time, even at College Park and their pricing is nominal compared to your gymnastics centers that are focused on the sport of gymnastics for the purpose of ultimately competition. And of course, here we are in an Olympic year. So it's like, wow. And many parents think, oh, my kid wants to do gymnastics. He's gonna be or she's gonna be really phenomenal.
Stephanie Campbell:And that may be very true. However, I can probably suggest to you that it's less than 5% of the kids that we serve that will ever become gymnasts. I mean, true elite level gymnasts. But we have discovered that this sport is so phenomenal. It teaches the fundamentals for any sport.
Stephanie Campbell:I mean, any sport. I've got a a track Olympian who started out with Kid's Gym USA. I've got a basketball you know, Christian Coleman is a track Olympian. Dwight Howard is the basketball player that people know of. Kiaron Fox was a football player.
Stephanie Campbell:I mean, we probably have a few others, but it's like, this is a great way to develop the fundamentals. So we encourage our parents to see it from a bigger lens. Think in terms of if your child we're gonna teach them technically correct. So if they want to go further in that sport, they'll have the skill sets. And we've actually found that because we are a feeder for College Park, yes, there are a number of our kids, that small percentage, that actually would go further than have gone further.
Stephanie Campbell:In fact, because the College Park rec center has done some things, they've gone up to an an AAU level, but it's a little bit different than the elite level. And we have some kids that have gone even further. They've gone through college part. They've done well, and then they've gone to the elite level. I have a daughter who is a, gosh, she works for Comcast now.
Stephanie Campbell:She started out with kids gym. She was a performer. She was also a stutterer and performing in front of tens of thousands of people changed that confidence level for her. She decided to go ahead and compete. She won state at the level 6 in vaulting and then decided, I wanna play basketball.
Stephanie Campbell:Well, she played basketball, got a scholarship to Clemson, was captain of the team, went to work at High Point in the women's basketball and was the director of women's basketball, and then got a great opportunity to work for Fox Sports, and the list goes on. But it started there.
Dave Charest:What do you think it is about gymnastics then?
Stephanie Campbell:Oh, builds confidence, self esteem. I mean, to develop those fundamental skills where a child can do maybe they decide and we have had. We ask parents. Okay. So what is Johnny gonna do this summer or this fall?
Stephanie Campbell:Well, he's ready now to try football, or he's ready now for this summer. He's gonna do swimming. Yes. Those are the things. Because the coordination, the agility, the flexibility, I mean, those are some of the most important aspects of a sport, no matter what sport.
Stephanie Campbell:And then as I said, the confidence when you can do basic skills that seem basic to us, but they're not so basic to kids. When you can do a right and left side cartwheel. When you can do back handsprings. Oh, my gosh. And those are just intermediate level, but they are so valuable where a kid feels like, I can do anything.
Stephanie Campbell:And let me tell you real quickly, Dave. We actually had a little girl. She was a middle school student. She struggled. We brought a program to this middle school.
Stephanie Campbell:We were working with the school in the after school programming, and we were getting ready to do a performance at the end of the school year. And she's I happened to catch her. I don't go to the sites often, but I went to the site this particular day, and I caught her outside of the gym. And I said, oh, what's going on? How come you're not in the class?
Stephanie Campbell:She says, oh, I can't do it. Woah. I said, so let me say something to you. Let's take the can't out of your vocabulary. Let's look at the possibility that anything you try and put your mind and heart to, you can do.
Stephanie Campbell:I said, so take that attitude back into this program and see how it makes you feel. Well, I'll tell you this day, she performed at that December event in front of all of her classmates or with those that were in the class, but in front of all of her other classmates that were watching and family and friends. So we said, mhmm. That's what this does.
Dave Charest:So it sounds like I mean, clearly, you're passionate about it, and you're doing some amazing things with these kids and giving them or making them aware of the opportunities that they have in front of them in many ways. Why is that so important to you?
Stephanie Campbell:Oh, because, first, when you look at the fact that if you're limited in what you even know exist, then how far can you go? How far can you explore life? And there's so much available, But you've gotta be willing to put in the time. You've gotta be willing to learn and be educated. And today, it's a real challenge because even though I work with inner city, I work with kids that are not inner city, Everyone is facing some of the same challenges.
Stephanie Campbell:They have everything in front of their faces. Their devices are far more important than being physically active, engaging with others. Oh my. So we can't live on this planet alone. It takes working together.
Stephanie Campbell:It takes being considerate of others. It takes putting yourself in someone else's position or pers looking at it from their perspective. All of that comes out of the work that we do. I find some of the most incredible young people because some people will come to us and say, yeah, I need a job. Well, okay.
Stephanie Campbell:I'm athletic, so I need a job and I'd like to do this. I love gymnastics. Okay. Well, let's take a look at that. So we give them an opportunity to have this training period where they actually get a chance and we get a chance to see.
Stephanie Campbell:But you can teach many things, but I can't teach you to love the work that you do. But I do say that you have to be exposed to different experiences in order to find out what's good for you.
Dave Charest:I love all of that. That's amazing. You know, I'm wondering, it sounds like you've a lot of times, obviously, aside from the the hard work and and the work that you put in and the things that you do and the actions you take, there's also an element of timing that comes in. Right? There's that element of, like, oh, you hit things at the right moment, which kinda catapults you into the places that you need to be.
Dave Charest:Right? It's where that the preparation meets, whatever that say it is. Right? But, like, as you're growing and and you're kinda taking off with this thing, what were some of the challenges that you hit along the way?
Stephanie Campbell:Well, as a nonprofit, early on, we were truly challenged by the fact that foundations and corporations were struggling to support nonprofits that were working with sports. I mean, they didn't understand the value that sports would add to a child's life. They figured, and most people did. They thought, well, kids can get exposed to that in school, or they'll be able to compete in school. And so their thinking was they go to school, they get to be on their teams, if that's what they wanna do.
Stephanie Campbell:So that by itself was a real challenge because they were thinking if it's it's gotta be an education, it's gotta be health related. So we found ourselves really looking at how this connects to health and bettering the health of our young people, as well as how it could connect to their being more aware of their of the dynamics of getting their education, understanding and learning the academic side of things. So challenges were funding, and I have to tell you, mister Arthur Blank, yeah, he set the standard. He was the first foundation, and that's what the Falcons and that's the Arthur Blank, owner of the Falcons. He was the 1st foundation that supported us.
Stephanie Campbell:And I'm almost convinced that he was the 1st that supported us being a sports related organization, what they call now an SBYD, Sports Based Youth Development. He was the first, and that's before they even had SBYD. So when that happened, it opened up many doors. People were open to the possibility, well, tell me more about this sport piece. And then when we saw and were able to articulate how it adds value to the lives of children starting as early as 12 months all the way through high school, yeah, we got a lot more attention and a lot more impressions upon that people were willing to support the effort.
Dave Charest:What do you love most about running the business?
Stephanie Campbell:You know, the best part for me is actually going to the gym and seeing the faces of the kids. That part for me is unbelievable. I can remember, and that's something I tell my coaches. Leave everything that's a burden or a bother to you outside. Yeah.
Stephanie Campbell:When you come in, give them your best. And they always seem to do that, and they recognize that it's about the children. It's not about our personal issues or concerns. And that's the beauty of working in this kind of field so that you can leave the rest of that because life continues to go on, and it has a lot of requirements. But when you've worked with children, and then you go back to other things that you have to get done, it doesn't seem so bad.
Stephanie Campbell:It just doesn't seem so bad. You can put a whole new focus on it, you know, a whole new smile to your face. I tell folks, flexibility when you work with children is a must. It's a mandate. And so when you learn to be that way, you actually find that it transfers into your own personal life as well.
Dave Charest:Well, I wanna go to you specifically for a moment. So both you and the organization have, you know, received lots of recognition, awards, acknowledgment from presidents, all of this stuff. Like, how does that accomplishment or accomplishments, I should say, how does that make you feel?
Stephanie Campbell:I feel good about what I do, and I've not looked at any of that. I think that that's great because it gives the organization a lift. People can actually go and see awards or see acknowledgments, and that's wonderful. But me, personally, I love what I do. So I'm not really I never work.
Stephanie Campbell:And I'm always busy, but I've never worked. I love what I do. I love seeing the accomplishments. I love seeing when I hear grandmothers coming back to the program and saying, my daughter was here, or my granddaughter was here. I'm just like, wow.
Stephanie Campbell:You've thought enough of us to come back?
Dave Charest:What level of experience do you have from a marketing standpoint that you bring into the business?
Stephanie Campbell:Good question. From marketing standpoints, I had to do a lot of research on how do we get that message out there. And, gosh, of course, over the last 5 years and maybe a little bit more, that hasn't been difficult because you've got social media. Mhmm. But I will say the vast majority of our families come from word-of-mouth.
Stephanie Campbell:So that was a big deal. It cut back on a lot of need for high level marketing.
Dave Charest:Right.
Stephanie Campbell:So that was important. Now I did get some folks that were willing to donate their time and help us by putting articles in newspapers, and so we did get attention that way. When we get an article about some of the things that we were doing, it would automatically get us attention, and we get new participants. The interesting thing today about social media, however, and email marketing, because, see, that wasn't so available either 40 years ago. And we had to continue growing.
Stephanie Campbell:I mean, coach Tracy and I had 4 children of our own and all of them benefited from Kids Gym USA. And we're so grateful for that. We also had kids that were a part of the exhibition team that would come into our home. We even had, a couple of them live with us from time to time. So, yeah, the idea was in those arenas, when we were going and doing performances, that would get a lot of attention.
Stephanie Campbell:That was a marketing tool, but we didn't really we saw it as a twofold. 1 was to give the kids exposure, to give them a chance to do some of the things that they enjoy doing and to feel better about themselves. Because when I say feel better, I mean really. When you are being bullied in school because you're a small person, and now all of a sudden you're flipping down the hallway, Oh my goodness. Everybody who thought you were someone to, harass now wants your attention.
Stephanie Campbell:And when we were able to share that messaging and get those kids to see themselves, they were like now they go in and they become ambassadors at their schools. So the marketing piece was more about the actual word-of-mouth for so long. We did do some direct marketing things and send out letters, and we would always do some things that would, as I said, the the news articles. But most of where we received our families is because they would tell their friends and family members. Now if that leads me to something else, I'll be glad to share that.
Stephanie Campbell:So go ahead and ask me your next question.
Dave Charest:Well, alright. Well, I was gonna say, you know, as you kinda mentioned, you've been kinda doing this for I mean, obviously, not kind of. You have been doing this for a while, doing this since the eighties. And so over that time, obviously, the technology has changed and things are happening. You're mentioning email and social.
Dave Charest:So how have you I think it's easy to get stuck in what you're doing and not embrace kind of where things are going. So, like, how did you make sure that you were updating and and managing your marketing efforts as to keep them relevant and engaging, really.
Stephanie Campbell:Yeah. It's for me, that was pretty easy because I know that I have my expertise, but I also know I trust others and their expertise. And the younger generation today is able to share so much more with me, and I'm open for it. I want to hear. And quite frankly, Dave, Kelsey, I don't wanna learn it.
Stephanie Campbell:No. I want them to do it. But I need them to be able to help me understand whether or not it's going to be impactful. Mhmm. So telling me, for example, that you wanna do social media and that you can do social media, that's great.
Stephanie Campbell:We actually tried someone with social media and they were the experts, but they didn't know the industry.
Dave Charest:Right.
Stephanie Campbell:So a lot of the information that I had because I wrote grants and everything else, they I had that information available. But if you, the expert, and you don't realize that to become an even greater expert in a field that you're unfamiliar with Right. You have to review things Yeah. Yeah, then I don't have a need for you to be involved in this. And so what we've done is we've gotten others who actually have some background and the ability to create content, etcetera.
Stephanie Campbell:So I look for younger people in this field. I look for I read all kinds of information. And fortunately, there's a lot of information available today that you can get access to online webinars and etcetera. So I do that as well because I know that when I see someone who is has a background in capital campaigns, I'm interested because that's where we are right now. When I see someone that tells us about how to keep your donors interested in supporting you, I'm reading.
Stephanie Campbell:I'm reviewing that. I'm sharing it with my young people so that they can create these wonderful emails that go out to everyone to tell them about what we do and why they should support us.
Dave Charest:So when you think about the marketing then, is the focus more on I would assume it has to be in many levels, but I guess where do does the marketing fall more on the donor side of things and raising funds for the organization? And or is there still a marketing to the kids, like, in the community and that type of thing? Can you tell me a little bit about that?
Stephanie Campbell:There's a little bit when it comes to kids, but it's more about the donors. Yeah. There's no question about that.
Dave Charest:Yeah.
Stephanie Campbell:We're constantly getting information out there and keeping friends, building friends and relationships. Because they are the ones that are gonna pay for these kids to participate. We are finding that we do like to keep in touch with our young folks. And I say young folks, that would be our middle school and high schoolers.
Dave Charest:Okay.
Stephanie Campbell:More so than anyone in elementary school because they're getting out there and communicating more, and they're sharing what they're learning. And they tell their parents about, hey, I wanna go to Kids Gym USA to get because they're gonna teach me tumbling, or we finished our program with them, and they can give me more experience, etcetera. So when I get parents that call us, usually, if they're looking for something in specific for that age range, they're looking at it because someone told them about it, and that someone could be their kid.
Dave Charest:Right. Right.
Stephanie Campbell:But yeah. That's where most of our marketing is used. I I'm curious about the things that we'll do, and I know we'll put it out there. We've been keeping a database for years. We have hard copies, which we for those that we were able to turn into the digital.
Stephanie Campbell:Yep. We have that. But we are constantly it's so important. If I had to share with business owners, I'd say, stay abreast of what is important to your customers. Keep it's relevant to them.
Stephanie Campbell:And you wanna be the best that you can offer. And so you wanna make sure that you understand what best looks like to them. I do surveys. That's important too, to know what they're thinking. But when I even do that, I'm actually looking for them to share with me if they work with corporate America Yeah.
Stephanie Campbell:Who's in the philanthropic side.
Dave Charest:Yeah.
Stephanie Campbell:So, again, it goes back to marketing to those particular areas versus clientele base.
Dave Charest:Well, tell me. How do you think about it then? So do you, like, are you meeting? Are you setting goals every year? And, like like, how do you kind of work through that process, and how do you come up with a plan for how you're gonna execute against it, I guess?
Stephanie Campbell:Well, if you're talking about reaching out to the donors and to those folks that we market to, yeah, we try to identify how many new donors we want to acquire for a certain period of time. We also wanna know how many donors have we been able to keep, how many times are we sending information to them, and what kinds of information we're sending. I really wanna get into the the weeds of this when it comes to Constant Contact.
Dave Charest:Are you
Stephanie Campbell:ready for me to share some
Dave Charest:of that? Please. Yeah.
Stephanie Campbell:I'd love to hear it. Because that's been big. We have used Constant Contact for quite a while, and we've been using them predominantly. Yes. We reach out to our parents, and we keep them abreast of registration dates.
Stephanie Campbell:We have people that call us that are interested, and so we email them. So we group everything so that we can actually identify who's been with us, who's former, who's actually interested. And then, of course, we know donors, so we wanna know exactly how long like, for example, with a donor, how many times have they committed to us? And let's see if we can continue that flow by making sure that we send information to them that gets their attention. Because that's also a challenge on every side, especially today, where we have found that there are so gazillion many emails.
Stephanie Campbell:Even to the point where I've learned there was something and I wanna say I got this from Constant Contact, but there was a session some time ago about creating great subject lines.
Dave Charest:Sure.
Stephanie Campbell:Because you can have the best email going, but if nobody's gonna read it, then what does it do? Yeah. So that's something that I'd say Constant Contact has done by helping us. They have great options that allow us to create different styles of emails. And that's specific because we have some that we're sending out to donors.
Stephanie Campbell:We have some that we're sending out to interested parents. We have others that we're sending out to potential friends or people that we know have influence, and we wanna get them involved in this. So there are different layouts and templates that that Constant Contact has provided has been very helpful on that level. Being able to have all of our contacts in 1 space is huge. I mean, we can go in, and that's another thing that I love about the email is that we can go in, we can create this wonderful email, and then we can decide which groups we're gonna send it to on this day or at this time.
Stephanie Campbell:And we also know that if a person if we're sending it out to 5, 6, 10, 12 groups, that that person who may be in several groups, because we may have them in the donor group, they may be in the parent group, they may be in whichever, but they're only gonna get it 1 time. And that's big unless we ask for it to be sent if they don't open it. But that's very big to us because people get a gazillion emails. Yeah. I mean, I'm not even gonna tell you how much my email yeah.
Stephanie Campbell:Sure. It's really crazy. We also know that 1 thing that we think is critical is that it's been opened up to text messaging. Yes. Oh my gosh.
Stephanie Campbell:Oh my gosh. I was waiting on that. And when it happened and my assistant said, oh, we can text message. Stop the music. Let's text message these everybody.
Stephanie Campbell:And everybody who has an address, a phone number, we text message them.
Dave Charest:So tell me about that because it's interesting talking to business owners, other nonprofit leaders. Sometimes text is a hard sell because they're like, oh, I don't wanna like, you seem excited, ready to go with that. Why is that so important to you?
Stephanie Campbell:I just know that I'm gonna see my text messages. Yeah. And I get a katrillion of them, not even a gazillion, but a katrillion. I get yeah. I get them all the time.
Stephanie Campbell:The thing that I like about this is it's not and it's this is where it separates. It's not just a bunch of numbers. It's actually a phone number. Yeah. And so people are a lot more sensitive, even if they don't recognize the number, to opening that text message.
Stephanie Campbell:And we also have the opportunity to say Kid's Gym USA
Dave Charest:Right.
Stephanie Campbell:Blah blah blah. And that too makes a big difference. So I feel like it is really a better instrument, but I can't say because I don't know the analytics on that. But I can say that it has been a powerful instrument. Our parents, our families, our friends, we've had less unsubscribe unsubscribers through that method than we have through the g through the email.
Stephanie Campbell:But now our emails are such where I'm not even finding that we get much in the way of unsubscribers. I mean, maybe 2 or 3. We try to be very sensitive to the timing in which we do emails, but I love the fact that we can do it and we can also identify the analytics. Oh, and something else that I was just made aware of, and I didn't even know this, that AI will actually fix stuff, reword something. Yeah.
Stephanie Campbell:Oh my Yeah. My assistant said, this has been amazing. Oh my. It has it allows us to have a greater impact. So it's a feature that we like, and we like to see if it's something that could be used for text messaging.
Stephanie Campbell:So keep that in mind.
Dave Charest:It definitely can. You can already do that. So keep that in mind. Okay. Yeah.
Dave Charest:Next time you're in there, definitely give that a shot. Well, so I'm curious because you mentioned something a little bit earlier that I wanna explore a little bit. Mhmm. You've been doing this for a while, and I guess I'm curious. What have you seen in terms of changes over the years?
Dave Charest:Particularly, I I you've been with Constant Contact, if I'm correct, since, like, 2009. And so, obviously, there's been some changes in the just in the world just in terms of, you know, how many people, how many emails people get, blah, blah, blah, all that kind of stuff. Have you noticed any differences in the things that you were doing that maybe worked early on that maybe don't work as well now? And have you made any changes to account for that? Like, tell me a little bit about what you've seen or what you've changed over the years.
Stephanie Campbell:I'd be more inclined to say that things have gotten better.
Dave Charest:Okay. Tell me why.
Stephanie Campbell:Over the years.
Dave Charest:Yeah. Why?
Stephanie Campbell:I would say that, a, being able to learn how to create the subject lines that get the attention.
Dave Charest:Okay.
Stephanie Campbell:I know that the different styles because some people who have children are gonna look at the style of the email that has the all of the cute little images as opposed to a donor who is more interested in hearing what you think about what they've done to help you achieve your goals and impact. So being able to change the styles is important. I've seen that. That was not always the case. I know that we have increased the numbers of contacts, and being able to make certain that we group them correctly has been very important.
Stephanie Campbell:But other than that, I can't really tell you how much has truly changed. I just know that we have found it very important that we use it consistently.
Dave Charest:Yeah.
Stephanie Campbell:Where before because emails were kind of, yeah, people are gonna look at them, but you do better to make a phone call. You do better to be able to receive calls. Now it's like people don't necessarily want to talk to you, which I think is just really ridiculous. Like, nonetheless. They would rather text you
Dave Charest:Yeah.
Stephanie Campbell:For real. And emailing, yeah, that's secondary. But now that they can get their emails on their phones, makes it a little bit easier.
Dave Charest:Yeah. So you did mention how, you know, you have very little unsub in the terms of unsubscribes. And it it sounds like from what I'm hearing from you that you're doing a really good job of really segmenting out your list. Right? Making sure that the people receiving information are the right people to get that information.
Dave Charest:And so can you talk to me a little bit about that and and what that's done for you?
Stephanie Campbell:That's been extremely important, and it's been the great benefit. As I said, we may have a person who actually fits into several groups. But at the same time, if we're only sending to this group or if we're sending to all the groups, that person only gets it once. That helps a lot. I will say that, yes, we have learned how to do more segmenting.
Stephanie Campbell:I have learned, and I'm waiting on my assistant because as I said to you, I let them do now more because they have an understanding that I'm totally in the dark with, but I can always learn and be open to learning. But I'm looking for more in the sense that learning how to use the tags.
Dave Charest:Okay.
Stephanie Campbell:So that they can be more of more value. We've got some things. We wanna make sure that we are scrutinizing our groups very closely, and that takes time to really look at. And so how should this be tagged? Because, for example, my husband being U of I and an Illini football player has a ton of friends that we have in that group as the Mendel, because he was a high school football player, and then Illinois, and they're in 1 group.
Stephanie Campbell:Well, for the most part, when we send something out to those 2 groups or that group, we send them out together. But being able to identify if, say, for example, 1 group of football players was in his actual class of friends and teammates. That's going to be the way in which we can use those tags and we haven't done that yet.
Dave Charest:Got it.
Stephanie Campbell:And that, I think, will be very powerful with being able to relate to them because their commitment to him. And even though I noticed that all of them and that's the beautiful thing about the sport, is that they're all connected. I mean, they find that, yes, they wanna help their former brother, not in arms,
Dave Charest:but Sure.
Stephanie Campbell:In uniform. Yeah. But at this point, there are those who he actually was on the field with that went to and through the tough times that are gonna be far more supportive of his projects than those who may have just come along several years later and know that he participated in it and heard of him, but now, well, you know, not as committed. So we want to be able to differentiate.
Dave Charest:Yeah.
Stephanie Campbell:So I think that that'll be very helpful in when we get that.
Dave Charest:Yeah. That definitely will. There's definitely ways for you to use tags to be able to narrow down. So, like, you can have those lists and say, alright. Now the tag to this so that you can make that split of, you know, those people that are more engaged with that.
Dave Charest:There's also some ways you could also think about we have some, like, we call it segments, right, where it's basically dynamic segments. And so you can pick specific criteria within a contact record, for example. It's like either something that's custom or something that's like a business name or or whatever the case may be. You can pick those things, and then as you add more people that have that information, it creates lists for you automatically for those people. So you could say, like, hey.
Dave Charest:We have group a over here, and group a has been very receptive to whatever. So whenever you get more of group a people, right, I'm just making up a term here.
Stephanie Campbell:But Sure. Sure.
Dave Charest:Automatically, that will start to generate that list, and you can go to that. So without having to manually go through that process, like, you're kinda getting those people kinda situated for you already. So that could be an interesting thing that that could be interesting for you as well.
Stephanie Campbell:That sounds interesting. I will share that with my assistant and Yeah.
Dave Charest:We'll send you some information on that too as when we follow-up with you. Alright. So the $1, 000, 000 question here then, what would it be like trying to run the organization without constant contact?
Stephanie Campbell:Yeah. That email and texting is powerful. I could see it being a real issue because people, they want a quick way to see something, and this allows them to do that. We have to market even if we're marketing, as I say, to the donors and others who are have potential for supporting us. We have to get communicate be in communication with our families so that they know and have the information in a timely manner.
Stephanie Campbell:So I wouldn't wanna go back to that day where we had to do not to I'm looking at I've got, as I said, about 650, 600 kids. 606. It goes from 600 to about 800 kids a week, depending on we've stopped the cheer now, so we're that eliminates about a 100 kids. So we're probably right calling all those families. Oh my god.
Stephanie Campbell:That sounds almost impossible. Now did we do it back in the day? Yes. But it wasn't as me. And even during the time when we were doing Arnold's programming, and that was in the nineties to the early 2000, yeah, we didn't have the access to the emails.
Stephanie Campbell:And so we had to reach the people who were in charge. And people were different then. I mean, you had coaches and directors who were running centers and running programs and groups, and they would make sure that their kids and the families knew about what we were offering them. Today, that's something you can't quite depend on. So you've gotta be able to get that message out there to them, and this makes it possible.
Dave Charest:When you think of all you've learned over the years of doing this and all the amazing people that you've met along the way, What would be your best piece of advice to someone in a situation similar to your own running an organization like you have? What would your best piece of advice be to them?
Stephanie Campbell:My first thing would be making your customers your priority. I mean, customer service is key. And the way to do that is being able to stay in touch, being able to make sure that you're giving them your best. I would say that always looking for others who can help you lead the charge. Because, again, with me having an assistant today, I can get an awful lot more done than I could back in the day.
Stephanie Campbell:So I would definitely encourage that. Yeah. I would have to say taking a constant look at how your funds line up with the responsibilities that you have and the work that needs to be done, being willing to do certain things even if you have to pay a cost because you know that the return is going to be greater.
Dave Charest:Well, friend, let's recap some items from that discussion. Number 1, focus on basic skills. Stephanie shared stories of the confidence kids gain when they learn how to accomplish basic gymnastics moves. It makes the kids feel like they can do anything. And I'd argue that the same is true of marketing.
Dave Charest:If you can accomplish the basics, things start to change in your business. You start to see and feel the impact of your efforts. So as Stephanie would tell you, let's take can't out of your vocabulary. Once you get those basic things in place, then you can expand on the possibilities that that work can bring to your business. Number 2, trust others and their expertise.
Dave Charest:Now as you look to build on those basic skills, many times you have to turn to others that can help you. Whether that means reading an article, attending a webinar, or listening to this podcast to implement something for yourself. Also recognize that, like Stephanie, you may not want to do that work yourself. So you need to understand whether the strategy or tactic is going to be impactful for you. But then you can outsource that work to people who are experts in their field and also understand your industry.
Dave Charest:Number 3, stay abreast of what's important to your customers. Now Stephanie highlights the importance of understanding your customers so that you know what's relevant to them. This allows you to engage with them in ways that are meaningful to them and, in turn, to you. So keep a close eye on your database as you continue to grow and manage it through segmentation and tags to better understand and communicate with the people in it. So here's your action item for today.
Dave Charest:Take a moment to consider if tags would benefit how you organize your contacts. Tags really allow you to add simple labels to your contacts and can act as a filter when you send an email or even create a segment. So for example, let's say you have a list of donors, you could use tags to identify contacts that you may have more personal relationships with. I'm gonna include some details on tags in the show notes for you, so be sure to check that out. I hope you enjoyed this episode of the be a marketer podcast.
Dave Charest:Please take a moment to leave us a review. Just go to rate this podcast.com/bam. Your honest feedback will help other small business marketers like yourself find the show. That's rate this podcast.com/bam. Well, friend, I hope you enjoy the rest of your day and continued success to you and your business.