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Welcome to the Never Been Promoted podcast. I'm your host Thomas Helfrich. We are on a mission to help you cut the tie to everything holding you back so you can unleash your entrepreneur. We release five shows weekly, all types of guests, and they are really powerful, impactful things to help you move forward. So hit that follow button. That's my only ask. The follow button on your favorite podcast player, Apple, Spotify, crush that follow button. Thank you so much for listening and enjoy Never Been Promoted.
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Welcome to Never Been Promoted. Hi. I'm your host, Thomas Helfrich. You know, our mission is to help entrepreneurs get better at entrepreneurship by, you know, cutting the ties, the things holding them back. I'm not sure when this will air exactly. This is live. But in this is the first episode of 2025. Yes. So one full year completed. It's been a good full first year is great. Became a top 5% podcast globally. Got a million subscribers on YouTube somehow, and, and then the guests over 300 guests came on the show. So it's it's, I look forward to 2025 and what we're gonna do with it. But for any good podcast, as you know, you must have your hair feathered perfectly so that we can get that done real quick. That's right. Right now, my guest is in the backstage, probably going, what did I sign up for? Well, Lou, you're about to find out. That's gonna be great. No. Lou Bowers is our, guest. She's a a marketing, vision, like, you know, getting seen brand expert. We're gonna really get into the the ideas of of mindset of how you get to think about your business and how you get seen and and and these little nuances that make such a difference in how people perceive you. And so her journey is, is a is an amazing one, and and I love what she's building, and we're gonna we're gonna have a good conversation as well. If this is your first time here, I I do appreciate you checking it out. And if you if you're listening, you know, just just stay stay with it. We have fun. We have good insight. You're gonna learn a little bit about her business and what you can do in your, life as well. If you've been here before, I do thank you. The only call to action I have right now is, you know, check out cutthetie.com. It's a mastermind group that we have, from the guests that'll you know, that's how you get into it is becoming a guest, and it's, a bunch of entrepreneurs that are all there to help each other cut ties and stuff. So the everybody there gives an hour of their time every month, and they get an hour of somebody's time to help them cut a tie to something holding them back. So check it out. Cutthetie.com. Enough shameless plugs. Let's bling in our guest, Lou Bowers. Lou Bowers. Lou Bowers. How are you?
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Doing well? I, yeah, I actually appreciate the hair thing. I don't know if you can tell, but hair is very important to me. So
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Those listening, her hair is an aquaman green velvet. Like, imagine a cool nightclub couch. Yes. Oh my goodness. Love that. I thought it was in your head. That would be weird. No. Thank you. No. I had this keyboard cleaner, and at the end of every show, there's always, like, this three second lag. So at the end of it, I started just, like, just feathering my hair at the end just till the the stream ended because no one sees that part because they've already you know, they all checked out. But now I'm creating the loop effect where I'm doing it at the beginning. So you just don't know when the show is starting or ending. Keeping people on their toes. Right. Actually feels good. Kinda cools the forehead. If you're listening, you're like, what the hell is he talking about? Just check out the video. I'm gonna see it. Lou, thanks for for joining. Were you, were you I I it's not dialing in. Were you video editing in from today?
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I am in British Columbia, Canada.
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British come in. Is that, like, Vancouver ish?
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About three, four hours from Vancouver. I live in Kamloops, and people, are often like, what's a Kamloops? And I'm like, where is that? Just South of Froot Loops? You know what? There's a lot of,
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there's a lot of, like, Facebook groups called, like, Froot Loops and stuff like that that are for our local communities and stuff. So So three, four hours in Canadian because Canada is massive. That's, like, twenty minutes. So for most people. So that's, like, really not a big deal. Three, four hours. Yeah. Yeah. I've never been to British Columbia. So the North I've been to most of The US, but the Northwest Of The US and and then British Columbia, I've I've not ventured into. It looks incredibly beautiful. It's it's on the, it's on the to do list. But then I'm like, do I go freeze, or do I go somewhere warm? And
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warm always wins. Oh, but I live in a desert climate. So in the summer ish time well, from probably about May until September at least, you it's it's like Arizona here. Right? Like, it's very hot and very dry. And so yeah.
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We, my wife and I went to, we dropped our kids off at some camp near Montreal for two weeks just in the middle of the forest. We're like, good luck. And, literally, it was I wish it was it was pretty much that. And then we went to Banff for Okay. And so people know it's in, like, like, Calgary. What is it? Oh my god. What's the province? I can't think about it. Alberta. Thank you. Alberta. Holy cow. That's gorgeous. And, you know, people don't understand. Canada is, I mean, absolutely beautiful. It's, I really like that. It was nice. And we saw a grizzly right in our path. It was great. It was fun. Nice. Fun. Frightening. You're oh, let's talk about you a little bit. Okay. So lubehours.com. So you you got your company on your name, so you can't screw it up. You can't do anything illegal. Your whole your whole it's all shot. Right. Exactly. Tell me about, a little about what your your your expertise is. Like, so start with kinda what your company does a little bit and and, you know, what it's focused, and we'll back into into your story. Sure. Absolutely. I do a few things. I do consulting for those people who
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you know, their social media is still very much their baby, and they're not ready to hand it over. But sometimes having, an extra brain there to, come up with ideas, that sort of thing is really helpful. Or even, like, body doubling so that you are actually getting your marketing done, but you have me just as a, a consultant, as somebody to bounce ideas off of. So that's part of it. I also do done for you where I will take over your entire social media marketing, as well as I can do email marketing and all of that sort of stuff. And it's really all about having my clients show up consistently as the face of their brand and be really visible because, as I say in networking meetings and in all of my Instagram videos, I help you get eyeballs on your business because nobody can buy from the best kept secret.
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Yeah. Well and that that's a good point. Now in your business, do do you wanna talk about talk about how you even got into this? Because Sure. Marketing is often where people fall into as a second career. They're like, oh, marketing. I can do that. You're right. Engineer to distance runner. I mean, you name it. Like, I'm a marketer now. So so how did how did you fall into marketing? Sure. So,
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I was married for a very, very long time. And, and at that time, I was a parenting coach, and so I knew a lot about how to, soothe brains, dopamine, how to make people feel good, kinda, like, you know, tantruming parents and kids feel good, keep it calm, and all of that good stuff, and just feel good about, you know, decisions and regulate and all that good stuff. And I did a lot of marketing in that. And then fast forward, I did get divorced and had to take a look at my life and go pivot. And what can I do and what do I know how to do? And so I kind of just said to a friend who had zero social media at all for their business. I said, let me take it over, see what I can do, see if it works. It worked, and I started marketing myself. I started marketing other people. And now it's a it's a whole ordeal. It's it's snowballed.
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Nice. That's that's amazing. Congratulations for the bounce back and pivot. When you're a parenting coach, do you do you know when a a joke becomes a dad joke?
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I don't.
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It's when it becomes a parent.
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Oh, there you go.
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That that that, in fact, is a bad joke. Yes. Only a few of us are laughing and it's just me. Hey. 50% of us are laughing at that joke right now. That's pretty good. That's pretty good. So you you're in a business, now one thing I find it, you know, as a as a marketing person as well, if you will, is, it could become quickly unscalable in your business. And that's a great by the way, everyone should start that way just doing the work. And, are you finding that's where you are now, or are you scheduled you know, are you are you bigger than that? Or how because that that's a problem in the market. You can only do so much yourself, and then you're in this kind of, oh, I lost a client cycle of revenue. And tell me about how you're where you are in your cycle of your business. Sure. So,
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just this year in September, I decided to make some big moves, with pricing and, systems and that sort of thing. And I did lose some clients. So October got a little scary, but it did like, it bounced back so much faster than I anticipated it would. And that's because, you know, I I did put a lot of work into it. Right? I, I figured out how to gain more visibility for myself through articles, podcasts. I met a lot of local businesses for coffee. I started a networking event so that, you know, I could offer people, hey. Come to my networking event. Get more eyeballs on you. And and at the same time, then they have to listen to my spiel about marketing and how how that all works. And I have you know, people have come up to me and said, I think you're going to solve my problem, and we need to talk. And I've I've, you know, scored clients that way, and it's just been a really, it's kind of been like a a throw everything at the wall, figure out what sticks, and then, like, really, really run with that. Right.
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Just for entrepreneurs, that's generally not the best strategy is throw everything on the wall. It's No. It's not handful of times you. If there's a handful of things that feel like that they're all interrelated and connected, okay. I'm more at that. But if it's just like anything, no. You know what I like to do in networking events that I own? I like to say, lock the doors. We're gonna learn the power of Jesus, and now we can sell. And I go into this kind of Jesus preacher character. You see people some people go, oh, shit. What did I I'm I'm just kidding. I just messed up you. That would be hilarious since Now there's go the bar. So a QR code. Go and scan that and send me some money. Guys, don't do that. It's just that's I told you this year, we're not going professional at all. We're we are starting off with the December mindset in January. So I I love that. So so you but what you did is when you said you made a huge investment in it's in I assume, like, automation systems, things like that, Did did that truly
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mentoring, automation systems, and really, like, I put on, a workshop, like, an in person workshop that was very exclusive. But, you know, there was a lot of moving parts to that. I yeah. There was yeah. And in fact, even, you know, even bigger in the visibility realm, I am actually headed to New York because my face is going to be on a billboard in Times Square at the January. So
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yeah. Now is that that the trading of the paperclip thing where you pay for that, you do the picture, and then you That would be great. Right? That would be great. No. So so why so why will you be on a billboard in Times Square?
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Part of it is because I was a coauthor for a book this year. It's called resilient AF, stories of resilience.
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And What AF stand for?
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As fuck.
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That's see, she has the one cuss word we can do on this YouTube chat. That's it. I can't cuss now. She just took it away. There you go. Thank you for gifting that to me. You gotta get one cuss word in every time or it's not adult. There you go. There you go. Alright. So congratulations. You you were coauthor on a book, and then you're are you going there for that launch? Or is that Yes. Yeah. So yeah. Well, that's a big that's a big milestone. Is is somebody who has a book coming out, I I don't I have any New York plans. I was just gonna spend a thousand bucks for the for the fifteen seconds you get on the Times Square thing. It's like a thousand bucks when you go up. It does, like, three times. You gotta be there. Hopefully, it's not raining. I know. I'm I'm hoping it's not snowing or blizzard y or something like that. Oh, when when do you now when does this, when does the time work? January. So Oh, that's gonna be cold. Yeah. It's gonna be cold. I know. Likely gonna be snowing or raining. Yes. Yes. You're gonna be so happy. You're like
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just kidding. It's alright.
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Well, alright. So are do you focus your business this is always a a question on marketing. So, for those who are looking you know, there's a lot of marketing people who listen to this, and and, those that's like a very normal place to kinda go from a business standpoint because you can solve things by yourself. Are you focusing lots of local as your strategy?
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It's not certainly my strategy. It's what has happened. So, yeah, I'm definitely I do have, distance clients as well. I local feels really nice simply because you can, you know, you can be there with that videographer that they've hired and be like, hey. I think these are great ideas, and there's a lot more collaboration that can happen. Yep. But at the same time, you know, like, we live in such a a connected world. You and I live on opposite sides of the continent, I believe. And,
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and maybe. On American, we don't understand geography.
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And and so and we can just sit here on video and chat. So, so, yeah, I have had clients in other provinces, in other countries, that sort of thing, and it does work really well as well.
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And and I was I look for these reflective moments that kinda give people, like, a nugget of so if it helps. But I I think if you're just starting, a local presence for a digital experience is a really smart thing. One, because you you can be more collaborative. People do like to be able to meet the people that they work with and touch. And and and what that what that translates to is not only you're if you're decent with people interactively, you're probably gonna have a client longer, and they're gonna be more lenient if you're especially if you're just learning to work with them because they know you're there. You're showing up. You're you're helping. If you're digital, it becomes more disconnected, and then they start looking for other people digitally to go solve their problem, and they're less tolerant. So the local strategy is a very good one to keep clients longer term. And if you can solve for that, specifically say, like, hey. I know how to crush coffee shop marketing, whatever it is. Then you can go to almost any coffee shop, like, hey. I'm helping them. I can help you, and you go to another city, like, I'm helping them. And it gives you reasons to go visit people. And and from a strategy standpoint, it may be not it may be what you fell into, but it's actually a really good one specifically. And and how long have you been doing that? I forgot to ask that. I'm sorry. For this Four years now. Four years. So you're you're in that zone where you got it. You know what you're gonna go do. And Yeah. And that that that that mark to move to more technology. You you said you had lost clients. Did you lose clients because you moved to technology or just kind of the same timing?
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In that same timing, I also created a different pricing structure, and I knew that, you know, that wouldn't sit well with some people, but it needed to happen. So it just yep.
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We have a I I I I struggle with the same thing. We have clients I've had for almost three years now. We've never raised prices. But it's also, like, I meet with them once every six months, maybe. And, like, you know, our teams just execute and I'm kinda like I know they have a budget for that specific number. I'm like, why even mess with this? Like, I'm just gonna let them know. Like, I don't want a second set of eyes looking at that. Like, I'm good. And in the beginning, I was like, well, let's just throw out an hourly rate because, you know, you would you'd have people
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this is the x y z service that I'm providing for you, and they go, oh, but can you do this as well? And I didn't know how to add that in or, you know, that sort of thing. And now I'm a flat fee structure that Yep. This is what I'm providing for you. This is it. So When when you've been growing your business for four years, you you went through a divorce.
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Mhmm. And and, like, there's a lot of entrepreneurs who go through that, and and they come out on the other side of it with some resilience and focus because they kinda have to. Was that the hardest part of starting your business was just getting through the emotional side of that? Was there was there something tied to cut, so to speak, that you had to do to get there?
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Yeah. So, I mean, if we go back even further a little bit in my story, I grew up as, it's called a glass child, and my sister had a chronic illness. She had cystic fibrosis, and so she had a lot of big needs. And Glass children are, the siblings of high maintenance, high needs.
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It's almost like you're not seniors.
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Right. Right. We're not running you. We're not called Glass because, you know, we're breakable. We just are a little bit more invisible. Right? And so I throughout my life and then into my marriage, I kinda took, like, that supporting character role. And then probably the last, I don't know, five years of my marriage, I was like, there's gotta be something more. There's got to be something bigger. Right? And so I think really working on that worthiness of stepping into that main character role and and living my life for me as opposed to living my life for everyone else around me was was a huge tie to cut. Right? It was just yeah. The the whole expectation that I was devoting my life to my kids and family, as opposed to actually living it, was a huge mindset shift. And it's not that I'm not showing up for my kids or, you know, or my partner now. It's that, I get to show up for me in way bigger ways and and just have it fit together like a puzzle instead of a a big person over here and then little me. So
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Did you you're using an interesting word word there, I get. That's a mindset word. Right? That's instead of I have to, I get to. You, and we talked a little before off camera about that, but you I mean, that's that is a direct and intentional word, and those listening, when you say I get to, you're maybe I'm saying or I'll say it wrong, but you're allowing yourself the pleasure of as opposed to the task of the Yeah. You you wanna take how you came to that a little bit? Yeah. Get to is full of gratitude. It expands you. Right? Like, when you just say that, like, when you say, I have to, you shrink. And when you say I get to,
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you expand and you're like, yeah. I get to do that. And then it does make things more enjoyable enjoyable. It makes it that so that you, like, you kinda want to do that thing. Whereas when you had to do it, it was like a dread as opposed to, a looking forward to.
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So, like, I get to take the trash out.
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Sure. Because when you take the trash out, it's no longer in your house. Like, I guess. I don't know.
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You can you can, like, do that however you want. Extra 50 steps more than anybody else in this family today. There you go. But but but, like, I know that sounds stupid, but, like, you know, but, like, okay. So apply that to some stuff, like, you know, like, you like, you know, I have a community starting called Cut the Tie. Right? I don't know much about masterminds. I know what I want out of the mastermind for myself, and I know what a lot of which is like, I need someone's time for an hour without being charged. And I wanna give an hour of my time so I don't have to pay endlessly. I wanna, like, have us kinda come together from the idea of not pay it forward, pay it now. Well, let's pay it now to each other to help each other. And the the thing I get to that I have I've been thinking, like, I have I have to go learn more about communities. I think the idea that I get to go learn about more communities this week is a much better way to think about it. Because I'm like, you're right. Like, I've been saying I have to go I mean, I have to do it. I have to do that. I get to it makes me more excited. Absolutely. Yeah. A little just like, whatever you said, like, I actually get to go do that. I gotta go learn that this week. So, anyway, I just take that for you where you are. In your current business Mhmm. How how are you gonna take it to the next level? How are you gonna double it?
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Number one, I, for the first time ever, have planned out my year for 2025. So, No entrepreneur does that. Right? I know. I know. I sat down. Have have a support system, though. Like, that that is a huge game changer because when you have somebody that you have you know, they've made a commitment to you and you've made a commitment to them that you're gonna sit down and plan together. And you I mean, if you're paying that person, yay. Like, they they have that commitment to help you out. Right? And so, yeah, sitting down and being like, what do I want this year to look like? How am I gonna get that going? What does that look like working backwards? So yeah. And, so January is, you know, there's a lot of interviews and stuff like that around the book and going to New York and all of that good stuff. And then moving into q two, there's how do I make, so last year, I did a workshop called shine online. It's a local content creation workshop where you come in for three hours, and we create content together. So we create videos and photos that you have a bank then of of all that stuff so you can DIY your social media. And so I'm putting on two of those this year to make things just bigger. And, and then I'm going to do a September summit on holiday marketing and when to start that and how to start that and to really position yourself in the market to get all those holiday sales.
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So you're gonna start your Christmas marketing now. You're you just became Walmart.
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Right? But you do wanna start those things, like, ninety days out. Do you want that Warm up. Yep. Probably more. That warm up. You want all of that good, you know, like, top of mind when people are actually making those purchases. Right. Well and I think understanding when your market actually purchases, like so a lot of them, you know
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I always tell people in the summer, you might as well just, just just do a bunch of strategy work. Yeah. Just don't even sell anything. Don't even try. Just just do strategy work. Get get ready for October, November when people spend their last budgets, and then use December to get ready for it's it's funny because, like, if it it like, you're out there busting your ass in July and everyone else is out, like, at the beach or the mountains or the desert if you're in Canada, and then, join Nimes now. So it's for you to double. No. When I say double for you, I I probably should have clarified. Are you thinking in terms of revenue? Are you thinking in terms of clients? What's your what's the metric you're following for the year?
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Yeah. So definitely revenue. That would be amazing. And I have managed to, to grow every year. Right? So that's that's always a good thing, and sometimes that has been doubled. So that is Yeah. Lovely when that happens. But, yeah, I definitely want to bring in and not you know, in that, it's extending my services. Right? It's not necessarily, hey. You need to come and work with me for x y z amount of time. It's simply come join this workshop. And if it, you know, if you take stuff away and it connects for you and you can roll with that, great. If not, let's talk about me taking it over. Let's talk about me helping you out in some way further so that we can really create that buzz for you.
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Yeah. And it and I I will tell anybody, you know, somebody who we we manage LinkedIn profiles for, you know, billion dollar companies down to just solopreneurs and, you know, the business pages. And I will tell you that that don't underestimate the time savings of someone else just staying up with your social media. And and I what I mean is even someone in there in your account for a couple hours a day to make a post, respond to some text messages or DMs, draw your attention to somebody you might wanna jump in on or send the link to say, hey. Listen. Let's find more time. That that is like that that stacking effect of that service you may pay a thousand bucks a month for, whatever it is. Right? Some some costs are like, I'd rather have that thousand, but then, you know, there's the other side of time and someone else doing it for you. It's it's so crucial, it's me, at least, for for people who are doing business where they're they're trying to get rid of the peaks and values of revenue, and you do that through things like that, through that consistency that you're investing in. And so you're as long as you have the right brand and all the other things that are going with that, I mean, I I assume you've you've the pitch is somewhat the same, but do you do you feel that same kind of power when someone is consistently showing up when you're consistently showing up for your coaching. Yeah.
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Yeah. And that's like, you know, there's there's a couple of things that are the secret sauce for your branding. Right? And one of them is show up. Just show up consistently. But, yeah, show up is is 50% of of the strategy.
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And that could be saw that's you know, so if you know the investment, you gotta do it yourself. But when you have it, you you do need to invest into someone else doing it. Otherwise, you never scale out of it, and you'll and and it becomes a drag. And then it becomes I have to oh, shit. I don't want to. I'm sick of making content. Like, I'm sick of doing that. Like, I'm personally, like, only in social media about an hour a week total across you know? And there's 40,000 people on TikTok. There's YouTube. Like, I just show up to meetings. My team does all of it. And some days, I'm like, I should probably do this, but then I'm like, I get to just show up to meetings. So I get You get to show up to meetings. When you're, one of the things I find, you know, when you're trying to we're talking about visibility growing your influence with, you know, brand and other pieces that you work on. One thing I find that a lot of customers of ours don't focus on is a desperate problem. And and what I mean by that is, let's say you're solving hybrid workplace. Just an example. Right? A CEO probably doesn't actually care about hybrid workplace. What they care about is stabilizing revenue, and to do that, they need better people because they don't wanna get a divorce because they can't have a bad year again. They can't have the stress at home. They care about that. And if hybrid workforce helps, then awesome. But to solve the problem desperate, it's like, oh, I help you figure that out. No. I help you stabilize revenue so you're the so I guess my point is, would do you do you find this in your customers even on a local level that, like, if they're a coffee shop or they're this or whatever, or do they do they really get in the weeds of what they do from a like, something somebody has to solve? They, like, they feel the need to. Do do you help them with that in their brand?
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Yeah. Yeah. A lot of times, I one of my clients is a high end photographer, and, you know, one of the sometimes it's like she's she's marketing her photos. And what you really wanna market is what what happens when you have a really great photo session and the confidence that it builds and all of that good stuff. Right? As opposed to you're gonna have this photo on your wall forever. You you get that feeling and that closeness and, like, how how it affects your kids to have photos of them up on the walls and that sort of thing or branding photos where, you know, like, instead of instead of it being, like, branding photos are essential for your business, turn it into your clients. You have x y z more revenue when your clients see your face and that sort of thing. So yeah.
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It's the experience of it. Right? And it's it's it's, and you're right. So, like, you know, it's it's one thing of a nice picture. It's another when your kids get to see the how they look five years ago and it's on the hall and they walk by it every day, and they never notice until one day they do. They're like, oh, how little I was. And it ties to an emotional thing, and then I think I think that's where a lot of people work. They're so far in the weeds of what they do. They forget sometimes the intrinsic value of how to market it. And that's how you build influence. Right? And so did you have a do you wanna give, like, a listicle of, like, hey. Listen. Anybody out there, these three things or whatever it'll be, you should always be looking at or you should always be doing do you do you have that listicle go to or, you know, as part of your workshop or something? Do you have a you know, remember an AI is listening. So let's let's get a good listicle. Yes. Yes. So,
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yeah, a couple of things. Number one is all purchases are emotional. Even if you have the most logical list of benefits and features for your product or service, it's how people feel when they're working with you. So really think about that. Really think about how you want your audience to feel, when you're putting out your content, when you're interacting with potential clients, that sort of thing. I had number two in my brain, and I'm totally blanking. Oh, you you are your own secret sauce. So
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that's Well, how do you mean that? You you, like, the these are probably on the solopreneur side of it, but, like, how do how do you mean that?
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Well, I mean, there are umpteen different marketers out there in the world, and people work with me because they want to work with me, not because they necessarily want to work with any marketer. Right? So stay out of the stay out of the mopiness of, oh, it's a saturated market. Oh, you know, like, even even back to photography, there are
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bajillions of photographers out there. And They didn't have an iPhone today as a
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Right? Yeah. Yeah. And it's, you know, it's genuinely how you are making those people feel and and bringing them in and and showing up as you. So when people can see who you are and what you do and and how you act and your mannerisms and they make sure you're not irritating the heck out of them, they they're more apt to work with you. And then, you know, show up consistently. Like, be top of mind. It takes it used to take seven times for someone to see you. I think it's more now because our attention spans are just so you know? But, yeah, if you are not in people like, in front of people's eyeballs frequently,
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you're you're gonna get lost. And here here's something I think people should keep in mind. If you show up consistently, but you're consistently changing your message or what you're doing Right. This is horrible for you, just to be clear. And and and so for and then what I'll say is this, like, so and you'll struggle with this if you have multiple brands. So I'll give you a personalized story. So I have a company called Instantly Relevant. It's a marketing agency focused on LinkedIn. We have Cut the Tie, which is a community in a book coming out, and I have never been promoted, which is related to that. I had to I had to make the decision on LinkedIn to just show up as cut has never been promoted at the cut tie. I'm here to help you cut ties and stuff because it becomes confusing of what it is you're doing and who you are, and that has to do a lot with what direction you're going. Now the flip side of that is, let's say it's just a little easier. I have one business. You're a marketer, but you show up on social media as yourself making you know, talking about your cats and your dogs, and it's on your your business. That's gonna confuse the shit out of people and no one people may watch it to like it, but they're not gonna buy anything from you. This comes back to the desperate problem. You make sure that you know what it is you solve as a customer. Yeah. Show up every day adding some type of value toward it or asking questions or trying to drive a conversation around that topic. If you don't, people really won't have a clue what they they may like at you. They may understand what you do, but you won't be relevant, and they won't buy from you. So you'd have to show up every day on point. I think it's probably the
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Right. And that doesn't mean that you can't take something like a story about your dog or your kids or whatever and, you know, have that wrap up at the end of as just why x y z is important, right, or something like that. But, yeah, definitely, you know, your knitting is not part of your brand unless you're selling that.
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I and we do so I think it's actually important to do some of the, topical things. I think, like, my post today was on the squid something from Squid Game. I had I just saw the first episode. My team's like, oh, we gotta do this. Everyone's watching this. I'm like, alright. The point is take something topical, a fishing trip you're on, a shopping thing you did, a trip to New York, tie
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it into what it is you do. If you can make that connection, that does make it interesting. But if you're just saying, listen. I ate a cool thing of sushi today, and you should try it. That doesn't help you if you're selling marketing services to someone. Yeah. I actually have a post coming out that is like I was at a comedy show this weekend, and, you know, I picked up on some just really great marketing things that they were doing in their in their bits and stuff like that. Right? And I'm like, here's your carousel of great marketing things I discovered at a comedy show. So I love that. That's,
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it's funny. I don't I don't watch the news or TV for that matter, but the only news I do get is when the headline comes on my phone of a Samsung, because Samsung news will pop a headline, and I only click on it if the headline's compelling. And I'm like, okay. That was good. Let me see what they did with that. And I only take it from the marketing standpoint. I usually find some information out about what's going on in the world when that happens, but if you take it from the eye of I'm just trying to learn from the marketing, I get to learn from the marketing of others. So it's kind of fun. Yes. Yes. And actually, crazy enough, I don't watch TV either. Like, I don't own a TV. I haven't owned a TV intentionally or on purpose
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for a decade or more. I mean, obviously, there are screens in my house, but, yeah. So it's it's the same thing. It's kind of a it's a little bit of a protection blinder. Right? So I I don't know if it's positive or negative, but,
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I find it's it's a happier place, I think, than not like, we'll watch Netflix or something like that at night. And, I don't know. I I think reading a book is probably better. Even though I don't Yeah. I don't do it enough, but I I I think reading reading is probably better than Yeah. I also don't listen to the radio a lot. I usually have an audiobook or a podcast or something like that going because, honestly, radio ads. Boy. I I feel like just jerking the car right into a tree. Because because it come on at the Just stop. Like, kids, like, you turn the radio. I'm like, no. It's 06:15. You know, fifteen to, like, twenty seven is all ads, and then it's at from forty to fifty three is all ads. I go, I will just connect. We can listen to Spotify or something like that. Yes. Exactly. Exactly. Can't do I can't do the radio. I don't it's annoying. Like, in the Whoever I don't get I don't get like, here. Just DJ this. Here's my phone. DJ whatever you want. Radio dies, and I'll tell you why. Because because it's an ad model. I know we're kind of on a tangent here, but from a marketing sample, I think it dies because every car coming out in the next ten years is all Bluetooth. Mhmm. So all the older people who this who may listen to the radio who like, even my car, it's a 02/2013 minivan. Right? It still connects Bluetooth to it. Yep. And so, like, as cars exit, anybody who's spending time listening to ads and who has a phone is and everyone has some free music on YouTube. And you just I don't know why anyone listens to the radio. I just there's no need at all. You could listen to all the songs on a playlist on Spotify for free. Like, it it And if they're all the ones you want to listen to. I I just I just I think radio dies. I I don't know who listens to radio after because everyone has a phone, and and I just don't I don't know. It's like t like, it's like, you know, when you you you have a book coming out, and they're like, oh, I'm sure they were like, you would've gone to morning TV show stuff. And I'm thinking, unless it's for social equity or social brand building, for those listening, that's when you like, oh, I was on USA Today, or I was on some kind of, like, TV Good Morning America. Yeah. You should go do those even though the only people watching it are probably people not buying your book. It's grandmas and grandpas that have time and they have Unless it's your grandma and grandpa, and then they're totally buying your book. Right. Well They're buying multiple copies and handing them out. Right. But but, like, I would unless it's for social proof Yes. Yeah. I think morning TV is also somewhat
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dead Yes. Dying. Yeah. There's definitely, a couple people there's a local TV program here that I don't know. I I catch glimpses of every once in a while when someone posts their spot on that TV on that local program. But other than that, it's like, alright.
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Yeah. I agree. As for I mean, I was I this would be fun. I always ask this question. If there was a question I should've asked you today and didn't, not not how to get ahold of you. We're gonna we're gonna do a shameless plug here in a minute. Okay. But besides that one, what's the question I should've asked you that I didn't today?
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Oh, the question you should've asked me, I'm I don't know. Oh, gosh.
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You said no left field questions. This is Yeah. I know. I can tell you one left field question I've been asked that I don't want it to be asked again. But Okay. Then don't ask. Actually, now I wanna know. Damn it. She's flipped it on me.
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I'll have to go off here. I'll tell you. I'll tell you the question. It was, if you could describe business visibility to a five year old only using items found in a candy store, what would you say?
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You buy what you can see first. Yes. That is what I said. That is That's what I was like. You buy what you see first with that eye level. Yes. Yeah. You buy what you know. So you see an M and M's over Bob's chocolate, you're buying the M and M. Yes. Yes. Exactly.
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Yep. That's a that's a mean question. It was. And it was followed up by if the mountains of British Columbia could offer you advice about business, what advice would they offer you?
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Oh, I don't wanna think about that. Mohammed came to the mountain. The mountain did not go to Mohammed. There you go. There you go. That's nothing to do with British Columbia. Only mountains are in that story. Alright. Shameless plug down. Who should get ahold of you? Why they should get ahold of you? And how do they do that? Awesome. So I mostly work with solopreneurs
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and small to medium sized businesses. And if you are looking for marketing help, you want ideas, you want theory, I can give you theory, you want to take that piece of your business off your plate and have somebody else do it for you, get in contact with me. You can get in contact with me through my website, lubowers.com. My email, lu@lubowers.com. And I am all over Instagram LinkedIn and Facebook as Lew Bauer's visibility expert.
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And you you could do any of the socials. You're you're, I always tell people you should always start with the tip of spear. So if you're getting into social media or you're kinda struggling, one or two things are happening when you're not you're too thin. You're too you're across because LinkedIn is different than Meta Meta or Instagram is different, Facebook, etcetera, TikTok. Go focus on one. If I I will say as someone who is an expert LinkedIn, I will tell you meta is super powerful for finding a very targeted audience. It's they are people complain about ads cost, whatever else. It is not even more close to where LinkedIn is on their pricing. And I would I would tell you and you're a you're a meta expert, like Instagram, Facebook. Yeah. If you're really if you I would say people who are looking for that need to kinda give you the first run of it. At least give you a half conversation. I assume people can jump on fifteen minutes with you. Just Absolutely. Yeah. I offer a thirty minute strategy session. It's you know, there's a calendar link on my website. So, yeah, book in. Yeah. That's good. Thirty's nice. I I do 15 with a fifteen minute buffer. So if I like the conversation, I can continue. If it's like, well, that was fun, and then you're out in fifteen.
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Nice.
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It it helps because I'm over 40, which means I go to the bathroom every hour. So, anyway, TMI. Anybody that's in the conversation, I'm just bathroom thing. I might I might adopt that, the the fifteen minute buffer. That's that's amazing. Cool. Yeah. Alright. You'll be funny if I shot this out there and then your hair started blowing. How funny would that be? Like, who wants to try it? I, first of all, wanna thank you for trying to get your hair color to match our brand. I'll send you the the, the the color codes next time so you can get that right. K. But, Lou, this has been great. I I I would love to hear what you're doing on Meta as well. If somebody's newer using Meta, I have an agency working, but I'd I'd still love to maybe I'll follow-up with you conversationally wise to kinda hear what your kind of take on is on stuff and what you would do and stuff. So, do you do anything I actually asked you, I do do anything around community. Do you around community building on Facebook or, administrating communities as part of the social media offerings you do? Yeah. So, like, Facebook groups and that
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sort of thing? Absolutely. I Yep. I don't have I don't have, like, client work around that now, but in the past, I've definitely built groups and lead magnets to promote those groups, and that's something.
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I I'd say that because I think a lot of people, that I've met are looking to belong somewhere. And I and I say that because I think it's a spillover from COVID. I think there's people who's and I'm one of these people too who kinda still feel disconnected a little bit. And you're always looking where do I belong and how do I do that. And I think a lot of times people feel like, how do I monetize my podcast or how do I do this? Right? A lot of it is around value of community and bringing people together is what people buy into. Even on our podcast, right, people you're not buying here to get views. Like, you get them in this, that, but we we we do the sponsorship because we want people to buy into our idea, to come together. And I think the community piece, if you're out there trying to figure out what's next for your business, I think that might be something for you from a new service, not to script your 2025 plan. No. No. No. People powerful, like, bring to be able to manage that and do that because it's a lot of work. And and that's where I think some company like, that's where you could scale your business because you could find people to help you could bring the clients in to do that. So I think it's a Yeah. Yeah. And even,
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I mentioned that I started that networking event this year, and it's a monthly networking event. But I you know, people are like, we we love coming to this event because we feel like we belong. It's not snooty. It's not, you know, it's it's not a chamber event.
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I don't know if any of those. I should probably check those out so I can make a funnel. They're they're good. They're fun.
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The first one, you kinda stand there and go, who do I actually talk to? But
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but yeah. Cut tie and let them come to you. There you go. There you go. Is your tie cut? It's cut. She looks surprised.
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Nice. Woah.
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Woah. Did you do it? Did you do it? I must have. Maybe. I don't know. I mean, honestly, if you want someone to come talk to you at a conference just to walk around in a white shirt and a cut tie and shorts Yeah. Yeah. I wonder I wonder if there's a more feminine
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equal to that. Or or as a woman, if we just are like, did you see what she was wearing?
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Well, the women in our group get a tie. They still have to cut it, and then they can do it anymore than at that point. Thank you so much, for coming on today, Lou. I appreciate it. You've been, you've been fantastic. And you will get the invite in to cut the tie because you did the stuff. You you Perfect. Ah, I love it. Yeah. Cool. I think I don't know if anybody tells this. I tell all of the guests or the other people who do the screen. I'm like, if you don't suck, you get
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If you don't suck.
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If you get up here and you can't have a conversation, I'm not putting you in the group. That's not gonna happen. Anyway, thank you. You've been doing fantastic. I appreciate your time. I'm gonna put you in the the periwinkle room, the room color behind me. Perfect. But thank you. Thank you, Lou. Check out lubowers.com. You know, if you just you know, you you don't have to be Canadian. This is open to the world. But if you are Canadian in the British Columbia area, you may you may wanna you know, it's an added bonus of why you might wanna reach out to lu Lou Bowers Com. If this was your first time listening, I hope it was enjoyable. I hope you had a good time. And I hope you learned something about, you know, just brand awareness and marketing and just growing a business and and kind of refocusing yourself. Like Lou, she actually she actually sat down and said, I wanna make goals for 2025. That sounds like, she gets to do that and supposed to has to do that, but good for her. Thank you, by the way. Until we meet again, get out there and go unleash your entrepreneur.
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Hey. Before you go, hit that follow button on your favorite podcast player, Apple, Spotify. Crush that little follow button so you get the latest episodes as they come out. Thank you so much for listening to the Never Been Promoted podcast.