The Social Feed

According to the National Federation of Independent Business (NFIB) Research Center: Currently, 76% of small businesses are negatively impacted by the outbreak of the coronavirus, About 5% are positively impacted experiencing stronger sales due to a sharp rise in demand for certain products, goods, and services. Of those businesses negatively impacted, 23% are experiencing supply chain disruptions, 54% slower sales, and 9% sick employees. However, in our digital world, there are plenty of ways to stay connected to your customers through this pandemic and keep your business going through it: Let customers know what you're doing to prevent the spread of COVID-19 Update your online channels Offer online deals & community building content Be responsive with proactive community management In this episode we talk through some strategies and examples for your business to keep in mind as you navigate the COVID-19 world right now.

TikTok is a social video-sharing app where users can share short videos cell-phone videos. Users can utilize filters, music, animation, special effects, and more. Like other social media apps, users can also follow, like, and comment on everything they watch, so what makes TikTok so special and why is it so hot right now? In this episode We talk about the basics of TikTok and get some first-hand tips from Izzy Lundquist - who has gone viral with her ACT prep videos on TikTok.

To celebrate our 100th episode, we hosted a show at our Hubbard Digital Academy and looked back at how social media and digital marketing has changed in the 3 years we've had our podcast.

Getting Google to see you and rank you high in search results is a tall order, so are there tools and tricks to make it easier? That's what we discus in this episode. Ruth Tambornino and Sam O'Byrne are digital strategists at Hubbard Interactive and offer some tips on getting ranked higher on Google for businesses who are just looking to discover and expand their online presence.

How To Make Everything is a YouTube channel that explores things we use everyday (and some we don't). Host Andy George takes his curiosity and learns how to make everything from scratch. A sandwich, glasses, an obsidian sward, clothing are some of the things he's made from scratch for YouTube. In this episode we talk with him about how he grew to over 1 million subscribers on YouTube and amassed millions and millions of views on his videos. Andy shares some tips on dealing with comments, the rigorous schedule of producing a weekly YouTube video and how to deal with the ever-changing YouTube algorithm.

When it comes to marketing around a holiday, there are some good campaigns and there are some questionable campaigns. For Halloween, we took a look at some really cool marketing ideas and ads for spooky season and talked about a couple campaigns that we thought could have been better.

Two members of the Hubbard Interactive team went to the Rock What You Got Conference, and came back to tell us their takeaways.

Kemps is a big name in dairy in the midwest, and they are always coming out with new products and finding the best ways to communicate with their customers. In this episode we talk to Addie Dunker, who runs all social media channels for Kemps, about what it's like to market in the food industry.

On this episode our guest host Adriana sat down with makers from the Great Lakes to the Great Plains at the recent MNBloggerBash event hosted at Rose & Loon. We wanted to know how these makers got their start and how they transitioned from side hustle to full on career, how do they advertise with small budgets, and what advice they'd give to someone wanting to make the leap to pursuing their passion projects.

Pet photos and videos are arguably the cutest content on social media. But what happens when there's an emergency situation with a pet family member? Animal Emergency & Referral Center of Minnesota has been around for over 40 years for those situations. They care for a wide variety of animals and offer many specialists and therapies. In this episode we chat with Heidi, the Chief Marketing Officer from Animal Emergency & Referral Center of Minnesota about their online presence. She talks about how they balance education, awareness, cute animals, and everything that comes with emergency pet care both in person and online.

At our latest Hubbard Digital Academy we sat down with several business owners and marketers to chat about what they do to market their businesses on social media and other digital platforms. From brand new products to home inspectors to government to clothing and fabrics, we really enjoyed hearing what people are marketing and how different platforms are performing.

Return-on-investment. You want to show it. Your clients want to see it. Your boss is asking you for it. How do you show what's working and what's not? In this panel, we meet with the marketing teams from the Minnesota Vikings, Mall of America, Anytime Fitness & Land O'Lakes to tell how they track results and how to best display/share them with your team.

It seems like a new article or story comes out every week about how the shopping mall is dying. While that may be true for some malls, Mall of America is a thriving shopping mall. They succeed by making the mall a destination and an experience with over 500 retailers, an amusement park, and 50 restaurants. The marketing team at Mall of America is 40 people taking advantage of social media and digital marketing as well as radio and TV advertising. In this episode we talk to Sara Johnson from Mall of America about what they do to build such a unique and special experience, what it takes to manage so many partners, and what happens when there is a PR crisis.

Life is not all about work. We all have hobbies and passions outside of our 9-5. What happens when you want to take that side hustle to the next level and start marketing and promoting it? In this episode we sit down with several members of the Hubbard Interactive team about their projects outside of work and what they do to grow them.

Social Media Week on NYC was huge with lots of big name speakers and sessions dedicated to all facets of social media. Jayna Wilcox from the Hubbard Interactive team attended and had a blast. She got to hear from Seth Godin, Hope Cowan - Director of Creative at Facebook, Nina Mishkin - Content Strategy Lead at Twitter, Raashi Rosenberger - Branding Marketer at Google, and so much more. We chatted with her about the experience and what she learned to find out what we should be focusing on with social media marketing in 2019.

When teen sisters Isabel and Caroline Bercaw (ages 18 and 17) started making bath bombs in their basement a few years ago, little did they know their hobby would turn into a booming business. We sat down with them to talk about how they got started and what they've done to grow and succeed as entrepreneurs.

A brand focused on empowering women to create, collaborate and cultivate a career, members of the team attended the Create & Cultivate conference in New York City in early May. The event featured panels with social media influencers, business founders, venture capitalists, plus a killer keynote from Martha Stewart. Rebecca, Missy and Tory packed up and headed to Brooklyn to network, gain insights and more importantly, inspiration from female entrepreneurs. In this episode they talk about their takeaways and some of the most fascinating parts of the trip.

Part 2 of our conversation with Kenneth "Shark" Kinney. Part 1 was episode 83, so go back and listen to the first half and come back to this one. Keeping up with trends in digital marketing can be a full-time job because everything changes so quickly. Then implementing strategies and tactics for your business based on what's new is a whole different beast. Luckily there are people like Shark out there to help us stay on top of trends and look toward the future with our marketing. Kenneth "Shark" Kinney is creative marketer, podcaster, speaker, consultant and growth executive. In this episode we chat with Shark about where things like blockchain, AR, VR, email marketing and more are at right now and where they are going this year. Our conversation with Shark was full of great insight and things to chew on.

Keeping up with trends in digital marketing can be a full-time job because everything changes so quickly. Then implementing strategies and tactics for your business based on what's new is a whole different beast. Luckily there are people like Shark out there to help us stay on top of trends and look toward the future with our marketing. Kenneth "Shark" Kinney is creative marketer, podcaster, speaker, consultant and growth executive. In this episode we chat with Shark about where things like Facebook, influencer marketing, video, and chat bots are at right now and where they are going this year. Our conversation with Shark was full of great insight and things to chew on, so this is part 1.

Facebook had a certification course called Facebook Blueprint. It's for advertisers who need to know how to place ads in the best way for business pages on Facebook. Our team is in the process of studying and taking the test for all the ads we place on Facebook and Instagram. The test and the material is very useful for any advertiser, but the testing process is unique. In this episode we talk about the Facebook test protocol as well as the studying, practicing and ad placement we are doing to prepare for the certification to hopefully give you some more insight on Facebook ads for your business.

Digital marketing is always changing as technology advances. A company that is on the front edge of those changes is Adcellerant. They manage hundreds of thousands of local campaigns for businesses across many platforms - from social media to mobile devices to display ads. In this episode we sit down with Brock and Chris from Adcellerant and find out what Adcellerant offers, how they got started, and what they think is the latest and greatest advertising opportunity for local businesses.

MNBloggerBash started several years ago as a part of Hubbard Interactive with the idea to connect businesses to bloggers and influencers. We have hosted many events and the team behind those events decided it was time for a rebranding effort. Over the last 6 months they have built a new website, designed new logos and changed the whole color scheme, and even reframed the events themselves. In this episode we talk with a couple ladies from the MNBloggerBash team about the rebrand and what it will mean going forward.

Flip Phone Drag Brunches have become a big hit in Minneapolis. Tickets sell out as soon as they go on sale, attendees have a blast, performers make good money, and it all raises money for local non-profits. It's a win-win-win for everyone! And it's all coordinated by the owner of Flip Phone Events, Chad Kampe. He is the mastermind behind the drag brunches and the numerous other shows and parties throughout the year. In this episode we sit down with Chad and talk about what it's like to manage the marketing, social media, event production, and even host some of the events. He really does it all - from Facebook event promotion to video marketing to influencer marketing, and he talks to us about what he's done to succeed with all these events.

Facebook makes changes to their platform almost everyday it seems. Between the newsfeed algorithm, advertising rules, new features and user interaction, keeping up with what's new on Facebook alone can seem like a chore. And that's only one social media platform. That's why we brought in Jayna Wilcox for this episode. Jayna travels around the country and keeps all of the Hubbard Radio markets in the loop and up to speed with the latest social media news. In this episode she dishes out the latest for Facebook advertising, Instagram stories & features, and chatbots.

Our team went to SXSW in Austin, TX to learn the latest in digital marketing, podcasting, social media and more. It was a week of informative sessions and crazy experiential events that got our minds spinning with ideas. In this episode, we recap our seven day excursion and dish the highlights from SXSW.

Netflix and Hulu both recently released documentaries on the same subject: Fyre Festival and its creator, Billy McFarland. They each tell the story differently and are fascinating to watch. Fyre Festival was marketed so well with video and flashy photos along with big-name social media influencers and models like Kendall Jenner, Bella Hadid, Emily Ratajkowski, and more. People bought tickets to this one-of-a-kind music festival and expected to have the time of their lives. But in the end the whole thing fell apart and was a big, public flop. In this episode we talk about the marketing of Fyre Festival and how they were able to make the marketing a success and build such a buzz around the event. We also discuss what went wrong and try to take a few lessons away on community management and influencer marketing.

How does a marketing agency market themselves? On this podcast we talk to a variety of business owners and marketers, and offer advice and hear what works and doesn't work for them. But in this episode we reveal what we at Hubbard Interactive do for marketing our own products. We are gearing up for our next Hubbard Digital Academy and are putting a lot of thought and effort into that promotion, so this episode as all about the tactics we are utilizing to get the word out about our conference in June.

When you start a business from scratch, everything seems daunting and social media and digital marketing is no exception. In this episode we talk to Kelsey from CBD Health about some of the things she has worked on with her bosses in the few short months since they opened CBD Health. Kelsey talks about how they use social media and email marketing and even text messaging to communicate and educate customers and potential customers.

Generation Z is the newest generation to be named and were born between 1995 and 2015. They are currently between 3-23 years old, and there are nearly 74 million of them in the U.S. In this episode we went to the University of Minnesota to the Student Advertising Summit to talk with several members of Gen Z about their social media habits as well as how they view and interact with brands on social media.

Southwest of the Twin Cities in the small town of Red Wing, Minnesota lives Billy the Bun Man - a larger-than-life personality who thrives on Facebook promoting the local bakery, Hanisch Bakery. Bill Hanisch is the owner of the bakery and has built an audience of over 18,000 fans on Facebook with his social media alter ego, Billy the Bun Man. In this episode we talk to Bill about that persona. He talks about the work that it takes to run a successful bakery and keep up his Billy the Bun Man identity (for which he has a costume and everything), and how he has used social media to build business for his bakery as well as other businesses in Red Wing.

Recently SKOR North in the Twin Cities went through a major rebrand - new name, new logo, new website, new social media channels, new platforms, new everything. It was a process that took months to plan and implement because they changed their whole business model. Before they were an AM sports talk radio station with it's toes in the digital marketing world, but now as SKOR North, they are a investing heavily in digital content distribution while still maintaining their AM radio presence, which has been around for almost 100 years. In this episode, we talk with Derek Wetmore and Seth Auger from SKOR North about the whole process of rebranding and what they are excited about going forward with a completely different brand mentality and focus.

With Martin Luther King Jr. Day on Monday, there were a lot of social media posts from brands to celebrate the holiday. With any holiday, there are different brands that jump on the bandwagon for some exposure online. But is it necessary for brands to post on holidays? What about days like National Polka Dot Day or National Pie Day? In this episode we talk about the strategy behind posting (or not posting) on holidays. Our conversation eventually leads to how to handle negative reactions and PR headaches that stem from social media posts.

Businesses come in all shapes and sizes. Some brands market themselves to a broad audience and have wide appeal while others have to find a select, small audience. Social media is a great tool for a business to reach a wide audience, but it has immense power to find niche audiences and target them with social post and ads. Even before Facebook and Instagram became paid ad platforms, they were powerful brand building and marketing tools. As with businesses, clothing comes in all shapes and sizes. The King brothers, Kenny & Danny of King Bros. Clothiers, have built their brand customizing clothing and fitting suits for each one of their clients. They used Instagram to build their brand, find an audience, and even find clients to fit with custom suits. In the niche of custom, bespoke suits, they have found success with hard work and the right partnerships. They have worked with a lot of clients - from athletes & celebrities to business people and people who simply wear suits to work everyday. In this episode we talk with Kenny & Danny King about taking the leap of faith to start a business, and how they have had to evaluate and change their business as digital marketing changes. We were able to find out what it's like working with Thor Björnsson - "The Mountain" from Game of Thrones, and the Timberwolves' Karl Anthony Towns. They talk about the role of passion and hard work in making their business a success as well as how they were able to educate people and elevate their brand in a relatively unknown industry.

Standing out in a crowded market is hard. While there's no silver bullet that will fix your marketing and get you a win every time, using some unconventional tools and tactics can get you noticed. The Isaacson brothers are doing just that. They are realtors in a saturated market, but they are also carving out their own space by being open to new marketing methods. They are willing to sponsor events and be themselves - however weird that is - on social media in order to build a long-lasting relationship with buyers and sellers through an exciting and unconventional process. In this episode we talk with Tony and Sam Isaacson about starting their own real estate business in such a tight industry. They are honest about successes, struggles, and what it's really like working with your brother. There was a fair amount of teasing and joking, but they share some valuable insight into the entrepreneurial process and real estate world.

As we start 2019, our producer, Pat, takes over hosting duties for an episode to talk about how Hubbard Interactive works and what we've learned in 9 years of business. Bernie Laur and Missy are the leaders for Hubbard Interactive, so Pat goes right to the top to find out what coming next for business marketing online in 2019 from an agency perspective. Missy and Bernie get a little nostalgic as they remember the early days with MySpace and before Facebook was a paid advertising platform. Bernie talks about leveraging his radio experience to push digital marketing forward and Missy gets excited about influencers and event activations. As we uncover a bit about what makes us tick, we hope you can learn from some of our experience and grab some useful tactics and ideas to try with your business marketing in 2019.

In December, we podcasted from our biggest event of the year, Hubbard Digital Academy at Mall of America - a one day marketing event that includes sessions on Facebook advertising, videography, design, SEO, PPC and much more. We mixed things up a bit this time, and in this episode we spent a few minutes with a variety of marketers and business owners to talk about their biggest business hurdles for 2019 and what they can do to plan their marketing efforts to clear those hurdles.

The cannabis industry faces unique challenges right now. Different strains are legal in some state but not others, and it's still not federally legal. Yet at the same time, there are cannabis products that you can buy at certain grocery stores in all states. Boveda humidity control packs have uses in the cannabis world, and also are used for cigars and wind instruments. In this episode, we talk with Devin Johnson from Boveda Inc. about the struggles and triumphs of marketing a product that can be used as an accessory in the strictly regulated cannabis industry.

Getting your website found online can be a tough task. Between competitors and search engine algorithms, what's the best strategy for website content? In this episode we talk with Alex and Jason from Brandography about how to optimize your SEO efforts and keep your website relevant and up-to-date.

In an industry that includes giant hotel chains and hyper-individual vacation rentals, how do you navigate the changing climate of the travel and hospitality arena? GrandStay Hospitality is a growing national chain of hotels that has a unique focus on local community features. In this episode we talk with the marketing team from GrandStay about their marketing strategies and tactics as they continue to learn and improve their hotel offerings while pushing forward in the digital space.

Polar Plunges have become a big event in Minnesota, and Special Olympics of Minnesota has spearheaded the movement and raised a lot of money for their cause through individual and corporate involvement. In this episode we sit down with part of the marketing team from Special Olympics to talk about the work that goes into the Polar Plunge and how they continue to make it a success every year.

Short animated posts are everywhere on social media right now. From stories to posts to ads, the animated video content includes short, animated text posts to longer, fully animated videos. So is animated content better than still images? How do you make the transition to animated content? In this week's episode, we talk about the pros and cons of animated content on your brand's social media channels.

Agencies and the clients they work with have a unique relationship that requires unique tools to stay connected, efficient & creative. Coming from the agency world, Joe Teo has a really good idea of what one of those tools should be to help agencies work with clients to create and distribute quality content. In this episode we talk to Joe, the CEO of HeyOrca, about the tool they've created and what it's like to build software from scratch.

Missy recently learned about something called ASMR. Since then she has submerged herself into this strange world of sounds and the people who make them. If you aren't familiar with ASMR it stands for Autonomous Sensory Meridian Response. It has become very popular on YouTube. In this episode, we try our hand at making our own ASMR sounds and read some marketing tweets. WARNING: this podcast might not be for you - if you do listen, find a relaxing spot and take it all in.

As the business and media landscape changes, the way companies - large and small - manage campaigns is shifting. Social media has given smaller brands a voice and a channel to compete with larger companies. In this episode, Missy talks with Deanna Baisden about her award winning, viral LaCroix hair social media campaign and how PR and social media are changing the game for marketers.

Like the business world, the media world is changing rapidly. The transition to a digital world is causing some disruption that is forcing some legacy media brands to change their business models. One of those brands is 1500ESPN. 1500ESPN has been around as an AM radio station for a long time, but Phil Mackey is leading the charge to transform their brand and image into something that thrives in our digital world today. In this episode, Phil talks about some of their strategies and mindsets as they move forward and create something brand new that is rooted in the long AM1500 tradition.

The podcast industry is booming right now, and there are often many podcast on one subject. So how do you promote your podcast in a way that helps you stand out from other similar shows? In this episode we talk with Marley McMillan about her podcast, "You Get A Rose", and pick her brain on podcast promotion and marketing tips that made her show a success.

Creating a website is a daunting task. Sure there are tools that will help you build a website, but what do you need in order to create a website from scratch. What goes into building and hosting a site, and what process does a web build/design agency go through to make a website? In this episode we talk about the steps to creating a website - from wireframes to production and everything in between.

We all love great leaders. We're attracted to them in life and in business. But we don't often have great leaders in our organizations. Development and training are often thrown around as the same thing, but Think GREAT leadership coach and speaker, Erik Therwanger, is passionate about differentiating the two terms. In today's episode, we talk with Erik as he offers some insight on developing leaders at all levels of an organization instead of simply managing and training employees.

Big brands do a lot of creative, fun things on social media. Even though small businesses don't often have the big budget for photo and video shoots, there are pieces that we can all take from the big brands' social media and bring to our businesses. In today's episode, we talk about some specific campaigns we love and the common thread amongst a lot of the big name brands when it comes to the type of social content they post.

Event marketing presents some unique and exciting challenges for businesses and marketers. Especially if the event is not your own - like the great Minnesota get-together. Our team manages a couple business's social media efforts during the Minnesota State Fair, and with the state fair starting this week, we take some time in this episode to talk about marketing individual businesses within a large-scale event.

Facebook, Instagram and Snapchat recently announced new features - some are already rolling out and some will be coming to users soon. Some of the changes look to be really good for brands and business pages and others are more focused toward consumers. In today's episode, we run through several changes coming to the social networks and talk about what each one means for consumers and businesses.