Brooke Summer 0:00 Hey gorgeous business owners, welcome back to Bold with Brooke, another episode of the podcast in place to be to learn the marketing and business skills you need to reach your biggest goals. I am super excited for today's episode we are harnessing Done is better than perfect today, because I wanted to get this out to you as soon as possible. Because we are officially the day before or at the day before Thanksgiving. Right now, today is Wednesday, November 22. Tomorrow is Turkey Day. If you are in the US, I know that Canada has a different date. I know that other parts of the world don't even celebrate Thanksgiving. But either way, I really wanted to get this out to you as quickly as possible, so that you have some tools to use if you want to run any type of promotion, or flash sale or Black Friday sale. This is a checklist that I created more for myself and I was like, You know what, if I need it, someone else does too. So we're gonna dive into the things that you need to do before launching a big promotion.

Brooke Summer 1:06 And I have a quick ask iTunes recently removed about 20 of my podcast reviews. I don't know why I don't know what happened. But I would love to get some of those back. So if you love this podcast, I would be so appreciative if you would head on over to iTunes and leave a review. And a good one. Of course, like I guess if you don't like the podcast, it's okay. You don't have to leave a review. But head on over to boldwithbrooke.com/itunes. I would love to hear more. And those reviews help us get amazing guests and grow so that we can help more people.

Brooke Summer 1:36 Let's listen in to the checklist for Black Friday promotion, sales, launches, all the things 10 Things you need to make sure to remember before those types of sales.

Brooke Summer 1:49 Hello, there gorgeous business owners. Welcome to bold with Brooke, the podcast for creative business owners to learn the marketing and business skills they need to get more clients and design their lives on their terms. So we can actually make a living doing what we love. Am I right? I am your host Brooke summer, and I'm an entrepreneur, educator and champion of women reminding them to embrace and step into their power. I'm bringing almost 20 years of business and marketing experience straight to you to help you get more clients and run a sustainable and successful business without burnouts are overwhelmed. Let's jump into today's topic.

Brooke Summer 2:32 Oh my goodness, I want y'all to know this is take four of recording this podcast episode because I had my microphone on mute when I recorded for 20 minutes. So that's fun. And then apparently something went wrong with my camera. And because I wasn't paying attention and it was trying to look at the camera. It was just a mess. So here we go. Take for Welcome back amazing business owners to another episode of bold with Brooke the podcast and place to be to learn the marketing and business skills you need to reach your biggest goals. This episode came about because I was creating my own checklist for my Black Friday promotion and things I wanted to remember to do before I launched everything. And I was like, you know what if I need this checklist, maybe you do too.

Brooke Summer 3:21 So here I am today, pre turkey day. Today is the day before Thanksgiving when I'm recording this. And I am telling you this because a I am here with a hat and messy hair or thrown some earrings. So if you're watching on YouTube, welcome to Reality, right. And if you're just listening to me in your earbuds, maybe you're prepping your turkey to carefully your earbuds don't fall in the Brian that would be a disaster. Or maybe if you don't celebrate Thanksgiving, you're just relaxing in which case high five to you. But either way, thank you so much for being here. today. We are going to walk through this and I am going to ask for a little bit of grace from you. Which is ironic because my editors name is Grace. My beautiful podcast editor just got married, she is busy. So I will not be sending her this episode for editing. Plus, I wanted to get it out to you as soon as possible. So I'm recording on the day of Thanksgiving. I'm hoping to get it live on the day before Thanksgiving. So we're going with that I don't have my normal big outline all of my notes. So what I've been working on is speaking without everything written out ahead of time. So here we go. It may not have the beautiful editing, I may not be as clear as I usually am. But I am working on this. As I imagine you are working on other skills as well. So we're all going to just give each other grace and understand that we're all just doing the best we can right 10 Things that you need to remember to do before you launch any big promotion, including Black Friday.

Brooke Summer 4:51 Now I do want to preface this by saying that everyone's business is different. So if I talk about a specific social platform or a specific tool that I needed to prepare for and you don't have that, that's okay. I don't want you to overwhelm yourself. I know from speaking with my students, and I know this for myself as well that if there's a ton of things to do, and I don't really know what I'm doing, then I just kind of freak out and I don't do anything. And I go into what I call overwhelm paralysis. And that is not what we're doing today. Okay, some of these may not apply to you. And that's okay. And some of them may have more steps for you. And that's okay to the point is we're going to take small baby steps to get ourselves ready for Black Friday, or any other type of promotion that you may be doing. Now for my photography studio, I actually don't do Black Friday. My birthday is in December. And so I do Brookes birthday bash every year, it's at the beginning of December, and that is when I do all of my specials for my birthday. For bold with Brooke, I do all of my Black Friday specials, the When do they come out Thursday until Tuesday. So people have a few days. And if you've been waiting and you're like, Oh, I really want to get into that. Now's the time it's coming. Okay, so make sure you're on the VIP list, which will also give you access to a printable version of the checklists that I'm gonna go through in just a moment. So if you're like, I really need to see this in front of me Brooke, where can I get ahold of that go to boldwithbrooke.com/vip. I used to create a million landing pages for all the things and I stopped. Again, we're making our lives as easy as possible, we are not going to keep adding to our to do list we are going to get shit done. Because Done is better than perfect. So all of my freebies are in one spots. Now. If you go to boldwithbrooke.com/vip, you can get this checklist.

Brooke Summer 6:49 So let's move forward into the checklist of 10 items, 10 things 10 checklist items or tasks that you need to complete before a Black Friday sale, a big promotion, a flash sale, anything like that. Number one, you need to make sure that your website and FAQs are up to date. Now, this is a huge point of contention for a lot of my students who hear that they need to update their website and they're like, oh my gosh, my website hasn't been updated since like 2017. And I feel you Okay, take a breath. If you need to just do an FAQ page the answers all the questions from this particular sale, so that you don't have to update everything. But if you can update things like contact information, like if you have pricing information on your website, the very basic down to bare bones information that someone needs to know needs to be up to date on your website, it does not mean that it has to be perfect. It does not mean that if you're a photographer that all of your galleries have to be 100% up to date with the most up to date photos, I want you to make sure that things are up to date without overwhelming yourself. And if it helps set a timer. Give yourself 30 minutes to do this go in update the things do not get distracted. I am the queen of this, I will go into update one thing on my website and realize, oh look, all my plugins need to be updated. And so then I go do that. And then I'm like, Oh, look, WordPress is out of date. And then I go do that. No, no, no, no, we are going to stay focused. Set a timer. And make sure that the basic details that someone would need to know to book with you to purchase from you or to schedule with you are up to date on your website, especially those FAQs. For my photography studio, I actually create one page that goes through all of the FAQs for any sale, because I want to make sure that everyone knows all of the details, they're very clear, completely up to date on one specific page. So you can do it that way. Or you can make sure all the little pieces of your website are up to date, but either way, do not let this overwhelm you. So number one is make sure that your website and FAQs are up to date.

Brooke Summer 9:12 Number two, if you have popups on your website, for email marketing for anything else, if you have banners on your website, the little banner at the top that says hey click me to do this or Hey, click here to add your email or whatever you have a banner for we are going to update all of those to reflect your sale. Now again, if you don't use these things, that's totally fine. You don't have to add them for the sale. Now if you have time to add them, by all means they are very helpful. But if you don't have time, do not freak out. Don't add more to your plate than necessary. Let's get them updated or added or skip this part. But either way, you want to make sure that that sale is front and center when someone visits to your website, so that if someone comes to your website from, let's say, a social post about your Black Friday sale, they can see it pop up immediately. And they know exactly where to go to get more details on that particular promotion.

Brooke Summer 10:14 Number three, I want you to verify all pricing, all deadlines and details, as well as any type of bonus or referral client or referral bonuses or loyalty bonuses, anything like that. I want you to go through this with a fine tooth comb. If you have a special deal, let's say 50% off for Black Friday. What does that mean? Does that mean 50%? And they can book something forever? Can they do it in two years at 50% off? Is that something that they can bring 27 friends to? Is that something that they can repeat over and over again, can they use the coupon, the coupon code over and over again, there are so many things to think about. And I want you to be very, very, very, very, very, very, very specific when it comes to all the details. So you'll notice on my Black Friday stuff comes out one to one coaching is part of the Black Friday deal. But those coaching calls have to be completed by June 2024. Because I don't want to have undone to dues or open things that are taking up space in my brain in my mental bandwidth that I need to keep following up with someone past that time. So I am very, very specific on the details and the deadlines and the pricing, make sure that everything is very, very, very clear, not just for you. But for anyone who visits that Black Friday page or sale or wants to book it or schedule with you work with you purchase from you.

Brooke Summer 11:51 All right, number four. This one always ruffled some feathers, I'm not sure why I want you to schedule your emails in advance. Holy moly, you should not be sitting around with your family on Thanksgiving, sending out a mass email about Black Friday, get those scheduled now. Write them all ahead of time now and schedule them all. So that they are working behind the scenes on autopilot. And you don't necessarily have to be doing that.

Brooke Summer 12:20 Number five is actually social media, same thing, get it scheduled ahead of time. Now, if you have a plan to go live, I don't know, maybe you're a food blogger. And you want to show how you prepare your turkey. That makes sense, because that's part of your content that you would normally do. And so you wouldn't be doing content on Thanksgiving. But if you're a boudoir photographer, chances are you're not shooting sexy photos of a turkey, although now that's an idea. But the bottom line is that I want you to have these things scheduled in advance. Number four, schedule those emails out in advance. So they are automated. Number five, schedule the social media posts out in advance. So they are automated.

Brooke Summer 13:03 Number six ties right into this automate, automate, automate. Now we talked about emails and social media, which are the notifications of the sale, right? I want you to schedule all of those out in advance. But when it comes to number six, and I'm talking about automation, I'm not just talking about notification of the sale, I'm talking about what happens after someone purchases that sale item. What happens after someone books with you? Do they get a series of emails? Do they get a confirmation email? Did they get a receipt? What is the process that happens when someone clicks by all of this should be automated, you should not have to be on to get all of this done. Okay, I want you to automate everything behind the scenes. If someone schedules with you, can they expect some sort of email ahead of time and this is also part of setting expectations for your clients or customers? When they schedule a calendar appointment? Are they going to get some sort of guide to prep or an interview questionnaire so that they know what you're going to be talking about ahead of time, all of these little details will make so much sense when someone is walking through the process when it comes to booking with you and working with you. All right.

Brooke Summer 14:18 Number seven, real estate. That sounds very odd and you're like, but I'm not a real estate agent or broker, or whatever they're called. Or they called. Anyway, I am talking about the real estate that you have on various platforms. So we're going to change all of your social banners on Facebook groups, Facebook pages, Instagram, the banner up at the top or the the place where you can put in a link. We're going to update all of that if you have a link tree. We're going to update to include the Black Friday sale. We're going to update the Tiktok links. We're going to update all the things and you know I've talked about this before when it comes to web that stuff, make sure that you're able to track that traffic as well, if possible, okay? Social media, you can also do events. So when it comes to especially Facebook groups and Facebook pages, you can set up an event so that someone doesn't miss the sale so that it actually goes in Facebook will remind people of events, if they've clicked on interested or going, then they'll get a reminder an hour before it starts. So we want to make sure to update all of the tools that we have to show that the sale is going on. And this should all again be done ahead of time. This is not something to be doing on Thanksgiving, when your brain is foggy, because you've had too much tryptophan from your turkey. Okay, we're going to do all of this ahead of time. Basically, I want to do in this now, okay, we're gonna be working on this tonight, the day before turkey day, so you can relax tomorrow. And Black Friday goes live. And you have these things working behind the scenes for you while you're doing something else. Okay, automate, automate, automate.

Brooke Summer 16:03 Number eight, I want you to test your checkout process. Even if it's just a $1 sale to your own credit card, or you can have a friend or family member, try it, I highly, highly recommend asking maybe an older family member who's not as tech savvy to walk through the process, because if they can get through the process, you're probably going to be good for other people, right? Or have a kid do it, I can ask my eight year old to go through the process, give her my card and give her a coupon code so that it only charges $1. Right. So if it's like a $200 thing, I'll give her a code to use. So it charges $1 to my credit card that $1 is well spent. Yes, I know you're gonna pay merchant fees on that I know you're gonna pay your 3% you're gonna pay 30 cents, because you're getting the the rest back right as a sale. But that 30 cents is well spent to make sure that your checkout process is working correctly. Are the emails firing? Is everything happening? That's supposed to happen after the fact? Is there a typo? Is the wrong logo on there, have you rebranded has something changed? Is there oh my gosh, there's so many funny typos that like, aren't actual incorrect words, and therefore autocorrect doesn't find them things like Virginia versus virgin. Like there's so many things like that, that looking at that, after the fact can really, really spotlight so that we can fix it ahead of time. Have someone test your checkout process or do it yourself, charge the dollar to your credit card, set yourself up a coupon code or whatever you have to do so that it's only $1 Charge and pay the 30 cents that it will take to test the process and make sure that everything is working properly. Make sure the coupons are working properly, is everything going in the way it should Is someone getting signed up the way they should is their email being input into your email service provider the way it should, everything should be working flawlessly. And you won't know that it's working until you test it yourself.

Brooke Summer 18:11 Number nine, I want you to set aside time to respond and set expectations for that response time in those scheduled emails and social posts, or chosen inbox. So if you have people DMing you on Instagram, set expectations for that ahead of time, I cannot even tell you how many times people get frustrated that they haven't heard back. But I'm like it's Christmas yell I'm not going to respond on Christmas. So I'm very clear with my clients ahead of time. I will not be responding to your emails on Thanksgiving, you might get an email and if you open it, that's cool. Send me an email back but you're not going to get a response on Thanksgiving. Set expectations. If you have some specific time set aside, if you have scheduled, let's say Friday from 10am to noon, you will be responding to all questions for anyone that was unable to complete the process on the automated and successfully. If you have set aside that time, then they know they can expect a response during that time. Set those expectations ahead of time. People understand, of course, there are going to be the odd ones out that don't understand and they're like why didn't you text me back within five minutes. We've all had some of those. But most people they understand they get it they're with their families to someone might be bored after dinner and looking through your your emails, and they're like Hell yeah, I want to sign up for that. But they know that you're not necessarily going to respond right away if you set the expectation ahead of time.

Brooke Summer 19:44 Number 10. Have a backup plan. And another and another. I just did a Tiktok and Instagram video about this. How many business owners are running their businesses without even considering back got plans for things like their social media accounts, having backup plans for their sales? What happens if you are booking things through Calendly? And all of a sudden Calendly isn't working? What is the backup plan? If something isn't working, you need to think about this ahead of time. I'm not saying you need to set up for different processes. But let's say I have all of my clients booked their sessions online, my calendar is accessible online. If they can't book online, what would I do? I have a process in place for that. And again, I have set expectations ahead of time that I will not be manually booking them on Thanksgiving. But if for whatever reason that doesn't work, I will call them back on Friday between these hours so that I can book them manually. We need to have backups in place. Because if someone can't book if the website isn't working properly, if something happens, people are just going to give up. We have less of an attention span than a goldfish now, we are so used to getting things immediately. Amazon spoils me. And it spoils everyone else too. I can literally ordered something from Amazon right now. It's 1:11pm here in Colorado, and have it by 8pm. That is ridiculous. We are so spoiled, and I love it. I absolutely love it. But as a business owner, not so much. We need to make sure that we have these backups in place that people understand when we will be responding, how we will be responding, if something doesn't work properly, because otherwise they'll just give up. And we'll never hear from them again. And that person that could have been your best client is now somewhere else. So we want to make sure to have those backups. I'm gonna give you a quick recap.

Brooke Summer 21:51 Again, if you want to download this checklist, so you can actually look at it. Go to boldwithbrooke.com/vip. And you can download the checklist online for 10 things that you need to do before a Black Friday sale or a big promotion or a big launch. And this is not a guide on how to set up one of those sales because there are so many things in place. These are just the last minute the things that you don't want to forget. Right. And this came because I was setting it up for myself. I was like I was supposed to do i Oh gosh, I forgot to change that link and I forgot to do this. These are the things that I want to remember too. So I thought you might want to. But if you want to download the printable checklist, it is at boldwithbrooke.com/vip.

Brooke Summer 22:37 Number one was make sure website and FAQs are up to date. Number two, change your popups your banners, all the things that are on your website if you have them or add them if you don't if you have time though, don't overwhelm yourself. Number three, verify all pricing deadlines detailed loyalty bonuses for returning clients. Can they stack discounts? How does this all work? Had someone get a gift card and use that for a discount, we want to make sure to have all the details complete. Number four, schedule your emails ahead of time number five, schedule your social ahead of time. Number six, automate, automate, automate not only up front, but behind the scenes when someone purchases what happens what is the process that you don't have to touch because it's automatically done. Number seven, use all of your available real estate to promote your sale things like social banners, on groups and pages the top image for groups and pages, set up a social media event. Update links on social media pages to be correct to number eight, test the checkout processes or have someone do it for you. Number nine, set aside time to respond and set expectations for your response time during this sale. And number 10 have a backup plan and another and another all the backups that you need. I am super excited for Black Friday.

Brooke Summer 24:01 As I said my photography studio doesn't have their big sale until December the first week of December. So that's coming up soon. But when it comes to all of my courses, even bold Marketing Academy, which is a membership that has all the courses inside of it, and one to one coaching, everything is going to be on sale for Black Friday, you will get an email tomorrow. If you're on the email list. And if you're not, why the heck not go get your checklist, go get all the freebies go get all the free resources that I have created throughout the years at boldwithbrooke.com/vip.

Brooke Summer 24:37 If you loved this content, and you're like Brooke, thank you so much. I never would have thought of that. How can I thank you. I would be absolutely honored if you would head on over to iTunes and leave a review or if you're watching me on YouTube. Leave a comment a thumbs up subscribe to the channel for a quick and easy way to find iTunes. You can go to boldwithbrooke.com/itunes go ahead and pause. I'll wait. Because those reviews is what allows us to bring in amazing guests and keep producing the content to help more people. I'm so happy to have been featured on Amazon as a future podcast. And I am I haven't announced this yet. My podcast is listed as one of the top 3% of podcasts on marketing in the world.

Brooke Summer 25:23 I am so passionate about helping you move your business forward, there's a much bigger why to that, that I will share later, but this podcast is free for you. And those reviews are like a little nudge, like a little podcast currency. Uh, thank you, and we so appreciate all of them. I would love to know, some of your biggest aha moments or takeaways, what was something you heard in this episode that you're like, holy shit, I never would have thought of that. You can share them in the community at bold with brooke.com/community, which is our little cozy corner of Facebook, or take a screenshot, tag me on social episode with Brooke that is on tick tock or Instagram. And I really, really want you to embrace this idea. So I'm going to say it slowly. Your business is just one way that you can move through the world and impact people around you in the way that you choose. So it's really time to step into that power and own it fully, including marketing your business, putting yourself out there to get the clients that you need and want to reach your biggest goals. I cannot wait to see what you do with your business and how you change the world. Because what you do matters. Have an amazing, amazing holiday. And if you don't celebrate the holiday, have a great Thursday. Either way, have an amazing rest of your week and we'll talk soon.

Brooke Summer 26:45 Thank you so much for joining me today and listening in. You can find all of the show notes for this and every episode over at boldwithbrooke.com/podcast where you can also find all of the links or resources mentioned. I can't wait to work with you have an amazing rest of your day.