August 11, 2025 • 21 mins
When the Market Feels Like It’s on Summer Vacation
It’s August. The sun’s hot, the kids are back in school, and your customers… well, they’re acting like they’ve all disappeared to the lake.
Every year, we get the same call from a business owner: “The phones are quiet. Sales feel slow. Is something wrong with my marketing?”
In this episode, we pull back the curtain on why August (and other weirdly slow months) happen—and why a quiet calendar isn’t always a bad thing.
Here’s what we dig into:
- The hard data behind seasonal slowdowns—and why August is the repeat offender
- How vacations, cashflow cycles, and even the weather affect buying behavior
- The “mature marketer” mindset that keeps you from making panic moves
- Smart ways to use slow months to plant seeds, refine your message, and set up your next big push
If your August feels like tumbleweeds rolling through your sales pipeline, this conversation will give you perspective, a plan, and maybe even a reason to enjoy the lull.
Maven Marketing Mastermind → https://www.mavenmethodtraining.com
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Host: Brandon Welch
Co-Host: Caleb Agee
Executive Producer: Carter Breaux
Audio/Video Producer: Nate the Camera Guy
Do you have a marketing problem you'd like us to help solve? Send it to MavenMonday@FrankandMaven.com!
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Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Brandon Welch (00:06):
welcome to the maven marketing podcast.
Today is maven monday.
I'm your host, brandon welch,and I'm joined by Caleb, give us
a win, Agee.
ooh, win, um.
Caleb Agee (00:17):
You know I school is coming back and actually count
that as a win in my house.
But we've got activitieschanging and there's a shift
happening and I love it.
I think actually kids, my kidsthrive better in some structure
and a little bit of organization.
Brandon Welch (00:35):
I don't know about your kids, but summer is
fun but it also I wouldn't know,because I never participate in-
such things.
Caleb Agee (00:42):
Well, there you go.
Yeah, you don't do fun.
Brandon Welch (00:45):
No, I don't do.
Structure, structure, yeah,summer just lends itself to a
little more chaos.
Caleb Agee (00:51):
School's coming back and school's coming back.
I'm excited about it.
Brandon Welch (00:54):
So this is why we make good podcast hosts
together.
Yeah, because opposites attractand I actually get legit
depressed.
I haven't been to school in 20years and just the
back-to-school mode just is alead balloon for me emotionally.
But I get over it pretty quick.
Caleb Agee (01:11):
I love it.
I actually talked my wife intotaking our kids back-to-school
shopping because it's such acore memory for me, really Going
to Walmart with mom.
Brandon Welch (01:19):
Oh, and buying erasers.
Caleb Agee (01:21):
Yeah, picking what color folder.
You know 10 cent folder you'rebuying.
I don't know why, but thatmentally I was like you know
what?
Brandon Welch (01:28):
We're going to Walmart, we're not ordering all
this online that can make a guyfeel good.
Caleb Agee (01:32):
It makes me feel good.
Brandon Welch (01:34):
Well, I'm happy for you and your back to school
blues, because no says I no.
Okay, hey, speaking of back toschool, that was actually a
really good transition.
Caleb Agee (01:52):
We are going to talk today about why is august so
slow, except for it's not aboutjust august, yeah, yeah, and I
think we're, you know, part waythrough august, couple weeks in
now, and, uh, we get this callevery year from somebody from
somebody.
I don't know who it's going tobe.
This year, by the time thisepisode drops, they may have
already called.
I don't really know.
Yeah, but somebody's going tosay hey schedule's looking a
little light next week.
(02:14):
People aren't picking up.
I feel like we're having tofight really hard to get sales.
It sounds like a lot of things,but it's mostly is August is
down.
Brandon Welch (02:22):
Especially marketers who are earlier in
their tenure at FrankenMavenLike, especially if you're
building something like maybeyou're in years three through
five and you just you've got alot of this momentum and you've
got a lot of, maybe, money out,you've got a lot invested in
your marketing plan and you know, on the whole you're like, yeah
, it's good.
But then when you have theselittle you know three or four
week dips, you're like, ooh,what's wrong?
(02:43):
Right, what's wrong.
And so we've been wanting to dothis episode for like way
before the podcast.
We're like you know, we'regoing to record this because for
well over a decade we've beendoing call notes.
Every time we have a call withsomebody, we document that.
And there was this thing thathappened four or five years ago
where I was like you know what,go, pull, go, pull up last
year's notes and I think it wasAugust, it was the same and go
(03:05):
pull up the August before.
And so it's not that August isslow for everybody, but this is
a metaphor for trends in yourbusiness and I think mature
business owners understand it,they get it.
They're not even remotelyconcerned about it.
But if you are buildingsomething at speed and cashflow
is cashflow as a, you know, as afluid thing for you, and it's
(03:27):
like, especially if you'reinvesting in in really strong
tomorrow marketing campaigns.
Those are expensive, right, andso we just want to talk to
everybody who may be feeling alittle off right now, yeah, or
if not today, it's going to beyeah.
Caleb Agee (03:43):
It's life has seasons.
Sometimes it's summertime,sometimes you're going back to
school, you know, and sometimesyou enjoy that and sometimes you
don't.
Brandon Welch (03:51):
And some people are hearing this going well, no,
duh, I don't need to listen tothis, but we have, we do have
some.
We have some actual, we havesome real data that actually
points to Scientifical stuff.
Caleb Agee (04:00):
August is down economically in America.
According to the NFIB smallbusiness optimism index, august
fell two and a half points.
They do it on a percentage of ahundred, down to 91% in 2024.
In 2023, it dropped again samething, and they haven't come up
(04:22):
with this month's numbers yet,but I'm going to guess the
pattern will remain.
Brandon Welch (04:27):
It's the craziest thing All the people decide to
drive home from work at the sametime and all the kids decide to
go back to school at the sametime of year, Unless you're
weird like Caleb and I.
Caleb Agee (04:36):
Yeah, and you do homeschool, homeschool.
But yeah, you could start itwhenever you want.
Brandon Welch (04:41):
There's just a couple common sense reasons.
There's just a couple likecommon sense reasons.
Just step back before you startblaming your marketing plan,
especially if you've got theprinciples that we talk about
here on the Maven MarketingPodcast a good tomorrow
marketing, a good todaymarketing, a good yesterday
marketing plan.
If those things are in place,like two or three weeks can't
knock that off of its course,right, Probably even a month or
(05:03):
two can't knock that off of itscourse, and I think everybody
understands their seasonalbusiness.
But just look at what humanityis doing.
Caleb Agee (05:09):
What is?
Brandon Welch (05:09):
your customer doing Like go go, creep 10 of
their Facebook pages.
They were probably on vacationin the last couple of weeks,
which probably means they're notrushing to Probably meant they
spent a lot of cash on thatvacation.
Caleb Agee (05:23):
all of their excess money for this year or for maybe
for a season, they just spentOkay.
So if you're a large purchaseitem, I'm going to guess, unless
they have lots of liquid cashlaying around, they're going to
hold off for a little bit longer, or even if they just feel like
they should wait.
Brandon Welch (05:40):
Yeah, also, I don't have any data on this, but
I think that hot temperaturesjust make people tired and they
make them less.
You know, 20, 30 minutes lessthan a day where they're
thinking like freely and incomfort could make a huge
difference, right, yeah.
Caleb Agee (05:56):
We ran actually ahead of a couple more data
points.
I had Productivity.
According to ACUDA, they didthis productivity report In
August workers' productivity isdown 20%, attendance is down 19%
and distractions are up 45%.
Isn't that crazy?
So not just what your customersare feeling, but what your
(06:19):
employees, your team, is feeling, you have to pay attention.
These are internal and externalfactors.
Yes, is feeling.
You have to pay attention.
These are internal and externalfactors.
Yes, a little bonus one For thelast decade, 10 years, the S&P
500 has had an annual average ofminus 0.78%.
So almost down 1% every Augustfor 10 years.
Brandon Welch (06:42):
The key is like- don't stop, it's not like we're
going.
oh well, it's you know what'sthe point in even trying.
It's just going be one that'sable to ride the trends.
Maybe a mature?
I would not, I would notprobably adjust my budget with
this, but I would say a maturemarketing plan and a mature like
(07:04):
just growth plan.
I would be thinking ahead.
Okay, August is going to be alittle slow.
Maybe that's the time I paintmy store, or maybe that's the
time I get my service trucksready, or maybe that's the time
I do this improvement project,because things are going to be
down a little bit and it's justlike prepare for it, Know what's
coming so it doesn't surpriseyou, and then get yourself a
(07:26):
really good promotion in yourback pocket.
Caleb Agee (07:29):
Yeah.
Brandon Welch (07:29):
Like we're running some really good
promotions for some servicecompanies that we're working
with right now, and it's a goodtime to do that.
Caleb Agee (07:36):
Yeah.
Brandon Welch (07:36):
We did an episode on this earlier in the year
about like there's a time topush, or actually it was for
election cycle last year it waslike how to get people to buy
during election season.
Make it the best time to buy,right.
Yeah, during election season,make it the best time to buy,
right.
Yep.
And so it might be smart foryou to do things more than just
the seasonal, like culturalback-to-school shopping type
thing.
Yeah, and whatever season youmight be thriving, in August
(07:58):
Maybe you are the one sellingpencils and erasers and
computers and all that.
But it's going to come for youin January, right yeah?
Caleb Agee (08:09):
Everybody has that season and I think where this,
where the rubber really hits theroad is, you're basing your
opinion of August being downusually against what you've been
used to or what you enjoyed inthe last few months.
That's the feeling it's.
August is down.
And when you call anybody overhere, we're going to say,
compared to what?
That is the first questionwe're going to say.
Compared to what?
(08:30):
Yeah, that is the firstquestion we're going to ask.
And if you say, well, I don'tknow, it just feels down, I feel
like the calendar's light orwhatever the symptom is, we're
going to say, okay, well, get inyour CRM, get in your data,
look at your reports, let's goback.
We're not going to compareAugust to July.
Brandon Welch (08:47):
Yeah, we're not going to compare August and July
to the beginning of the summer,we're going to compare year
over year.
I think it was Edward Demingthat said without data, you're
just another opinion.
Caleb Agee (09:00):
You have to track this data.
If you don't have good data,you're going to base all of your
decisions off of feelings, andfeelings will only get you so
far, and so we want to takeAugust this year, we're going to
look specifically at Augustlast year and then, by
(09:21):
comparison, we're going to takeJuly this year and compare it to
July last year.
Brandon Welch (09:24):
You back out and you have 90 days over 90 days.
That's a trend you can startacting on.
Caleb Agee (09:29):
Yeah.
Brandon Welch (09:29):
So, um, I would say, with that, ask why look for
the outliers?
With that, look for theoutliers.
Yeah.
So if last year was an electioncycle or there's some really
goofy stuff going on and it wasdown to like, don't, maybe don't
take as good a credit for youryear over year being up, yeah,
like cause that that can happen.
(09:50):
Yeah, we have this tool that wehave that's like literally four
years of trending and whatpercentages of growth happen in
which months.
That's a really good thing todo, just like you know, gross
revenue, expenses, net profitand like, looking at that over a
four-year trend is even better.
Caleb Agee (10:07):
So much better yeah.
Brandon Welch (10:08):
And most of your accounting softwares will do
that for you.
And then, with that say withthose outliers, also ask what
right now could be an externalfactor that is going to release
at some point.
Yeah, and there's economicheadwind.
Back in 21, 22, when everybodywas having 40% growth years, our
(10:29):
advice even then was like putit in the bank, put it in the
ground.
This is artificial growth.
You are stealing sales from thefuture and so you just want to
have this gentle like.
If you think about theFrankenmaven logo, it's this up
and down thing.
That is the journey of abusiness owner.
They ride the ups and downs andwe're like you know what?
It would be a lot better, yourlife would be so much better if
you just stayed in the middle.
(10:49):
And so that's the key, andfinancially you've got to set
yourself up for that.
It's not that cash doesn'tmatter, but hopefully you are
able to ride those disruptionsand if you're doing that, if you
are the mature competitor inyour space, that can afford to
be good news today, good newstomorrow, good news when you
(11:09):
need us.
We're going to keep being thesame people we're being in our
ads, in the brightness of ourvoice, in the certainty of our
salespeople.
If we can keep doing that whileeverybody else is sucking wind,
you automatically pick upmarket share.
Caleb Agee (11:24):
Yeah.
Brandon Welch (11:25):
Because you're telling good news while the rest
of the world is being reactive.
What you want to do is be thecommitted steady provider so
that you get committed steadycustomers.
Caleb Agee (11:34):
Yeah, and I think what we want to, what we assume
or what we want to make sure istrue or not true when we make a
claim like this month is down orthis month is up.
Even if you're talking aboutgood news, you need to compare,
you need to take a wider look.
Kyle last week I don't knowwhere he got it he said when in
doubt, zoom out.
Brandon Welch (11:55):
I love that.
Caleb Agee (11:55):
That's a good catchphrase.
Brandon Welch (11:57):
Kyle DeVries.
Caleb Agee (11:58):
Yeah, I don't know if he stole it from somebody,
but I'm giving him credit rightnow.
So, zoom out, look further,figure out.
Brandon mentioned outliers.
I also want to say, for thegood, look at outliers.
Did you get a monster sale lastmonth?
Or, if you did see the dip lastyear, did you get a monster
sale in one of those months thatcauses it to look like it fell
(12:21):
a lot harder than it should have?
So pay attention to that.
Look at all those littleoutliers, pay attention to it
and then make consistent, makedecisions based on the plan you
set forth that you're looking atone year, three years, five
years.
You're not making plans thatreact to soft months.
You have a plan, you have acash flow in place, you have a
(12:43):
budget in place to account forall of these ups and downs and
you're not changing your, yourum, how you handle your profit.
You're not changing yourinvestments.
You're not changing yourlifestyle necessarily based on a
good month or a short goodseason, because you're a steady
steward of this.
And then when you do that, um,the quote I love is times of
(13:09):
poverty always follow times ofmisplaced abundance.
Brandon Welch (13:13):
Yes, they do.
Caleb Agee (13:14):
And so if you misplace let's say you're having
a great August If you misplacethis abundance right now, I am
sorry to say, but times ofpoverty will follow very shortly
.
If you are riding high on thatwave and you're spending all
that extra cash and you'reliving like you're going to make
that much money forever, I'dlove to say that you're going to
(13:34):
keep going up and up.
But the reality of look at thestock market, if they could keep
it going up and up, they would.
They would Like, right?
I mean, that's the reality.
If we could keep all thesethings continuously pointing up
always, we would do that.
Brandon Welch (13:47):
But we can't.
Gravity, yeah, gravity is notjust a good idea, it's the law.
Yeah, what goes up has to comedown right.
So what is the maven marketingresponse to all this?
We've kind of said it, butlet's just lay it down, like if
you're going, ah, things aresoft, maybe you're even 20%, 30%
down month over month,hopefully you've done the one
(14:09):
three and five-year planning.
Hopefully you are thinkingquarter to quarter, not week to
week or month to month or evenyear to year.
Our best and most profitableclients, I promise you are
thinking year to year.
We check in monthly, we measuremonthly, we adjust quarterly,
but we plan annually right, yeah.
But if you're in this position,you're like okay, it's August,
(14:31):
it's slow One, use it to restand plan Like this could be a
gift for you.
I will say, if you're an owner,operator and things just get a
little quiet, that is yoursignal to be like okay, it's
time to put seeds in the groundand it's time to let my soil
rest and it's time to maybe nottotally reevaluate, but just
(14:52):
take a breather and that's okay,that will pay dividends.
The second thing maybe refineyour messaging.
Caleb Agee (14:59):
Yeah, I would say, if you need to, if it's down a
tremendous amount, you've gotpeople sitting around, they're
not busy.
You need to shake some thingsloose.
You may consider limited timeoffers.
You may consider some sort ofway to make it the best time to
buy right now.
You may consider some sort ofway to make it the best time to
buy right now, and that alwayscomes with a caveat of the more
(15:19):
you do that, the worse it willwork.
Brandon Welch (15:21):
Yes, the less it will work, the less it will work
in the future and, frankly,you're just stealing sales from
the future.
Yes, you are, so be carefulwith that.
Caleb Agee (15:29):
For your own comfortability really.
Yeah, be careful with that.
Brandon Welch (15:36):
But it is a mechanism you can do to have
some short-term games, there arecashflow stabilization.
Caleb Agee (15:38):
I mean, the rule of life is that anything that comes
quickly and easily can go justas fast, and so if you're able
to get it that quickly, there'sprobably a downside to it.
Brandon Welch (15:48):
Yeah, um, with that, refined your messaging on
the today side, definitely addyour, add your um, your
promotions, your today marketingoffers.
You want to save them time,speed or hassle, but the biggest
part of the Maven marketingplan.
We suggest at least a 60-40balance, if not a 70-30 balance,
60 being tomorrow marketing.
(16:08):
And so get in step with fall.
Use this to call your scriptwriting team together or write
your next messaging that'stalking about things that are
going to be relevant coming upin one month.
Like football will be in fullswing.
You won't need to say the wordsback to school, but you can
speak to people like isn'troutine, nice, like you can
start speaking to people as ifyou're in their living room with
(16:29):
them, you can start hintingtowards end of year stuff.
Isn't it going to be nice?
The cold snap's about to happenfor most people in the Midwest,
east and South.
Right yeah, wouldn't it be niceto have that XYZ thing done
before the end of the year, orbefore you know it, it's going
to be November, and that thingyou wanted to have done by
August is going to be looking atMarch.
(16:50):
So I'm talking to my estateplanners, I'm talking about any
and all of my service folks, bigticket items like now there's
going to be an abundance of cash.
I say abundance, but more thanthere's going to be in November,
and November is begging for itin 100 different ways, and
that's just a horrible time tosuddenly be relevant.
Caleb Agee (17:11):
So start refining that message and then the bottom
line is really stay the course,stay connected, be be a steady
steward of what you have rightnow, the marketing you are doing
.
Um, if it was working a fewmonths ago, uh, I this is a very
broad statement, so it was kindof dangerous to make.
(17:32):
I'm going to assume it willcontinue working and that you
should go look at your data andyou should compare and prove to
yourself.
Maybe August is down and Ishouldn't make crazy dramatic
changes.
I'm not going to canceleverything.
I'm not going to stopeverything.
That's that's the risk.
Or or completely pick it up andput in a different media, a
(17:52):
different channel, a differentprogram.
Brandon Welch (17:54):
That is the last thing you want to do, unless
you're selling cheeseburger ortoilet papers or pencil erasers.
Your customer journey is alwaysa process.
Yes, it is always.
I'm kind of sort of thinkingabout buying it.
I'm going to kind of sort ofthink a little bit more tomorrow
about buying it, and thenthere's going to be this grand,
you know, four to 12 week spanwhere it's going to be the right
time and all you can reallyhope for is to pull them into
(18:16):
that a little sooner.
And then really the onlyadvantage there is that you
might get them before yourcompetitor got them.
Caleb Agee (18:21):
Yeah, any any great therapist will tell you to never
make large life decisions intimes of crisis.
And business owners, you have adanger about you that if you're
in a time of crisis, cash islow, if leads are low, things
are slow.
You're going to want to changeeverything.
(18:41):
Don't do it.
Great pilots.
Brandon Welch (18:44):
Great pilots.
Do you know any of those?
Oh, I met one one time.
Caleb Agee (18:48):
Yeah, I'll let you know when.
Brandon Welch (18:50):
I find it Slow it down.
We pull back the throttles,right, yeah, turbulent air.
So, um, hey, this was all along way to say stay the course,
do what you're doing well.
And if you need a little moreguidance, a little more uh, help
, or just would find it fun tobounce these ideas off of people
, we have the perfectopportunity for you.
It's called the Maven MarketingMastermind.
(19:12):
I did it, you got it.
The Maven Marketing Mastermind.
We get together every otherweek with business owners just
like you, very smart people,very passionate people about
what they do, and they're tryingto make their thing work, just
like you.
But oftentimes you just seeingsomebody else put their
promotion together or make theirmedia plan or make their hiring
(19:34):
or sales decision.
You're just like, huh, I'mgoing to learn from that and
I'll either never make thatmistake or that's going to help
me apply it to this situation.
And then, on top of that, yougot Caleb and I.
Caleb Agee (19:43):
Yeah, we're here to answer those real questions and
everybody literally turns inthings for review questions.
They have.
We answer them live and we'reliterally seeing results.
We're seeing sales happen, newbusiness, new clients added, and
then people are also gettingmaterials out that they have
been sitting on for forever.
(20:04):
I think that's the other-.
Brandon Welch (20:04):
Get them across the finish line faster.
Caleb Agee (20:06):
There's an accountability element to it,
that you kind of have yourhomework to do, you have things
to finish and you want to beable to say on the next call I
did it.
And this really helps, I think,a lot of marketers and small
business owners to get thatgoing.
Brandon Welch (20:19):
The Maven Marketing Mastermind.
You want to get to that atmavenmethodtrainingcom.
It's a fraction of a fractionof a fraction of what it costs
to work with our team directly,and it's just a ton of fun.
Caleb Agee (20:30):
You do it in this room.
Brandon Welch (20:36):
You get to send your questions in, and there's
also some cool freebies in that,if you sign up, you get a
one-on-one call with Caleb and I.
We're going to work on yourbusiness.
Caleb Agee (20:41):
It's a good time.
Brandon Welch (20:43):
Work it out.
Mavenmethodtrainingcom Is thatit?
That's it.
Keep the course.
We're going to stay the course.
We'll be back here every Mondayanswering your real life
marketing questions, because wewant your business to grow.
We want you to do it with alittle more peace, a little more
certainty and a little more funand, as we like to say, because
(21:06):
marketers who can't teach youwhy are just a fancy lie.
Have a great week.
welcome to the maven marketing podcast.
Today is maven monday.
I'm your host, brandon welch,and I'm joined by Caleb, give us
a win, Agee.
ooh, win, um.
Caleb Agee (00:17):
You know I school is coming back and actually count
that as a win in my house.
But we've got activitieschanging and there's a shift
happening and I love it.
I think actually kids, my kidsthrive better in some structure
and a little bit of organization.
Brandon Welch (00:35):
I don't know about your kids, but summer is
fun but it also I wouldn't know,because I never participate in-
such things.
Caleb Agee (00:42):
Well, there you go.
Yeah, you don't do fun.
Brandon Welch (00:45):
No, I don't do.
Structure, structure, yeah,summer just lends itself to a
little more chaos.
Caleb Agee (00:51):
School's coming back and school's coming back.
I'm excited about it.
Brandon Welch (00:54):
So this is why we make good podcast hosts
together.
Yeah, because opposites attractand I actually get legit
depressed.
I haven't been to school in 20years and just the
back-to-school mode just is alead balloon for me emotionally.
But I get over it pretty quick.
Caleb Agee (01:11):
I love it.
I actually talked my wife intotaking our kids back-to-school
shopping because it's such acore memory for me, really Going
to Walmart with mom.
Brandon Welch (01:19):
Oh, and buying erasers.
Caleb Agee (01:21):
Yeah, picking what color folder.
You know 10 cent folder you'rebuying.
I don't know why, but thatmentally I was like you know
what?
Brandon Welch (01:28):
We're going to Walmart, we're not ordering all
this online that can make a guyfeel good.
Caleb Agee (01:32):
It makes me feel good.
Brandon Welch (01:34):
Well, I'm happy for you and your back to school
blues, because no says I no.
Okay, hey, speaking of back toschool, that was actually a
really good transition.
Caleb Agee (01:52):
We are going to talk today about why is august so
slow, except for it's not aboutjust august, yeah, yeah, and I
think we're, you know, part waythrough august, couple weeks in
now, and, uh, we get this callevery year from somebody from
somebody.
I don't know who it's going tobe.
This year, by the time thisepisode drops, they may have
already called.
I don't really know.
Yeah, but somebody's going tosay hey schedule's looking a
little light next week.
(02:14):
People aren't picking up.
I feel like we're having tofight really hard to get sales.
It sounds like a lot of things,but it's mostly is August is
down.
Brandon Welch (02:22):
Especially marketers who are earlier in
their tenure at FrankenMavenLike, especially if you're
building something like maybeyou're in years three through
five and you just you've got alot of this momentum and you've
got a lot of, maybe, money out,you've got a lot invested in
your marketing plan and you know, on the whole you're like, yeah
, it's good.
But then when you have theselittle you know three or four
week dips, you're like, ooh,what's wrong?
(02:43):
Right, what's wrong.
And so we've been wanting to dothis episode for like way
before the podcast.
We're like you know, we'regoing to record this because for
well over a decade we've beendoing call notes.
Every time we have a call withsomebody, we document that.
And there was this thing thathappened four or five years ago
where I was like you know what,go, pull, go, pull up last
year's notes and I think it wasAugust, it was the same and go
(03:05):
pull up the August before.
And so it's not that August isslow for everybody, but this is
a metaphor for trends in yourbusiness and I think mature
business owners understand it,they get it.
They're not even remotelyconcerned about it.
But if you are buildingsomething at speed and cashflow
is cashflow as a, you know, as afluid thing for you, and it's
(03:27):
like, especially if you'reinvesting in in really strong
tomorrow marketing campaigns.
Those are expensive, right, andso we just want to talk to
everybody who may be feeling alittle off right now, yeah, or
if not today, it's going to beyeah.
Caleb Agee (03:43):
It's life has seasons.
Sometimes it's summertime,sometimes you're going back to
school, you know, and sometimesyou enjoy that and sometimes you
don't.
Brandon Welch (03:51):
And some people are hearing this going well, no,
duh, I don't need to listen tothis, but we have, we do have
some.
We have some actual, we havesome real data that actually
points to Scientifical stuff.
Caleb Agee (04:00):
August is down economically in America.
According to the NFIB smallbusiness optimism index, august
fell two and a half points.
They do it on a percentage of ahundred, down to 91% in 2024.
In 2023, it dropped again samething, and they haven't come up
(04:22):
with this month's numbers yet,but I'm going to guess the
pattern will remain.
Brandon Welch (04:27):
It's the craziest thing All the people decide to
drive home from work at the sametime and all the kids decide to
go back to school at the sametime of year, Unless you're
weird like Caleb and I.
Caleb Agee (04:36):
Yeah, and you do homeschool, homeschool.
But yeah, you could start itwhenever you want.
Brandon Welch (04:41):
There's just a couple common sense reasons.
There's just a couple likecommon sense reasons.
Just step back before you startblaming your marketing plan,
especially if you've got theprinciples that we talk about
here on the Maven MarketingPodcast a good tomorrow
marketing, a good todaymarketing, a good yesterday
marketing plan.
If those things are in place,like two or three weeks can't
knock that off of its course,right, Probably even a month or
(05:03):
two can't knock that off of itscourse, and I think everybody
understands their seasonalbusiness.
But just look at what humanityis doing.
Caleb Agee (05:09):
What is?
Brandon Welch (05:09):
your customer doing Like go go, creep 10 of
their Facebook pages.
They were probably on vacationin the last couple of weeks,
which probably means they're notrushing to Probably meant they
spent a lot of cash on thatvacation.
Caleb Agee (05:23):
all of their excess money for this year or for maybe
for a season, they just spentOkay.
So if you're a large purchaseitem, I'm going to guess, unless
they have lots of liquid cashlaying around, they're going to
hold off for a little bit longer, or even if they just feel like
they should wait.
Brandon Welch (05:40):
Yeah, also, I don't have any data on this, but
I think that hot temperaturesjust make people tired and they
make them less.
You know, 20, 30 minutes lessthan a day where they're
thinking like freely and incomfort could make a huge
difference, right, yeah.
Caleb Agee (05:56):
We ran actually ahead of a couple more data
points.
I had Productivity.
According to ACUDA, they didthis productivity report In
August workers' productivity isdown 20%, attendance is down 19%
and distractions are up 45%.
Isn't that crazy?
So not just what your customersare feeling, but what your
(06:19):
employees, your team, is feeling, you have to pay attention.
These are internal and externalfactors.
Yes, is feeling.
You have to pay attention.
These are internal and externalfactors.
Yes, a little bonus one For thelast decade, 10 years, the S&P
500 has had an annual average ofminus 0.78%.
So almost down 1% every Augustfor 10 years.
Brandon Welch (06:42):
The key is like- don't stop, it's not like we're
going.
oh well, it's you know what'sthe point in even trying.
It's just going be one that'sable to ride the trends.
Maybe a mature?
I would not, I would notprobably adjust my budget with
this, but I would say a maturemarketing plan and a mature like
(07:04):
just growth plan.
I would be thinking ahead.
Okay, August is going to be alittle slow.
Maybe that's the time I paintmy store, or maybe that's the
time I get my service trucksready, or maybe that's the time
I do this improvement project,because things are going to be
down a little bit and it's justlike prepare for it, Know what's
coming so it doesn't surpriseyou, and then get yourself a
(07:26):
really good promotion in yourback pocket.
Caleb Agee (07:29):
Yeah.
Brandon Welch (07:29):
Like we're running some really good
promotions for some servicecompanies that we're working
with right now, and it's a goodtime to do that.
Caleb Agee (07:36):
Yeah.
Brandon Welch (07:36):
We did an episode on this earlier in the year
about like there's a time topush, or actually it was for
election cycle last year it waslike how to get people to buy
during election season.
Make it the best time to buy,right.
Yeah, during election season,make it the best time to buy,
right.
Yep.
And so it might be smart foryou to do things more than just
the seasonal, like culturalback-to-school shopping type
thing.
Yeah, and whatever season youmight be thriving, in August
(07:58):
Maybe you are the one sellingpencils and erasers and
computers and all that.
But it's going to come for youin January, right yeah?
Caleb Agee (08:09):
Everybody has that season and I think where this,
where the rubber really hits theroad is, you're basing your
opinion of August being downusually against what you've been
used to or what you enjoyed inthe last few months.
That's the feeling it's.
August is down.
And when you call anybody overhere, we're going to say,
compared to what?
That is the first questionwe're going to say.
Compared to what?
(08:30):
Yeah, that is the firstquestion we're going to ask.
And if you say, well, I don'tknow, it just feels down, I feel
like the calendar's light orwhatever the symptom is, we're
going to say, okay, well, get inyour CRM, get in your data,
look at your reports, let's goback.
We're not going to compareAugust to July.
Brandon Welch (08:47):
Yeah, we're not going to compare August and July
to the beginning of the summer,we're going to compare year
over year.
I think it was Edward Demingthat said without data, you're
just another opinion.
Caleb Agee (09:00):
You have to track this data.
If you don't have good data,you're going to base all of your
decisions off of feelings, andfeelings will only get you so
far, and so we want to takeAugust this year, we're going to
look specifically at Augustlast year and then, by
(09:21):
comparison, we're going to takeJuly this year and compare it to
July last year.
Brandon Welch (09:24):
You back out and you have 90 days over 90 days.
That's a trend you can startacting on.
Caleb Agee (09:29):
Yeah.
Brandon Welch (09:29):
So, um, I would say, with that, ask why look for
the outliers?
With that, look for theoutliers.
Yeah.
So if last year was an electioncycle or there's some really
goofy stuff going on and it wasdown to like, don't, maybe don't
take as good a credit for youryear over year being up, yeah,
like cause that that can happen.
(09:50):
Yeah, we have this tool that wehave that's like literally four
years of trending and whatpercentages of growth happen in
which months.
That's a really good thing todo, just like you know, gross
revenue, expenses, net profitand like, looking at that over a
four-year trend is even better.
Caleb Agee (10:07):
So much better yeah.
Brandon Welch (10:08):
And most of your accounting softwares will do
that for you.
And then, with that say withthose outliers, also ask what
right now could be an externalfactor that is going to release
at some point.
Yeah, and there's economicheadwind.
Back in 21, 22, when everybodywas having 40% growth years, our
(10:29):
advice even then was like putit in the bank, put it in the
ground.
This is artificial growth.
You are stealing sales from thefuture and so you just want to
have this gentle like.
If you think about theFrankenmaven logo, it's this up
and down thing.
That is the journey of abusiness owner.
They ride the ups and downs andwe're like you know what?
It would be a lot better, yourlife would be so much better if
you just stayed in the middle.
(10:49):
And so that's the key, andfinancially you've got to set
yourself up for that.
It's not that cash doesn'tmatter, but hopefully you are
able to ride those disruptionsand if you're doing that, if you
are the mature competitor inyour space, that can afford to
be good news today, good newstomorrow, good news when you
(11:09):
need us.
We're going to keep being thesame people we're being in our
ads, in the brightness of ourvoice, in the certainty of our
salespeople.
If we can keep doing that whileeverybody else is sucking wind,
you automatically pick upmarket share.
Caleb Agee (11:24):
Yeah.
Brandon Welch (11:25):
Because you're telling good news while the rest
of the world is being reactive.
What you want to do is be thecommitted steady provider so
that you get committed steadycustomers.
Caleb Agee (11:34):
Yeah, and I think what we want to, what we assume
or what we want to make sure istrue or not true when we make a
claim like this month is down orthis month is up.
Even if you're talking aboutgood news, you need to compare,
you need to take a wider look.
Kyle last week I don't knowwhere he got it he said when in
doubt, zoom out.
Brandon Welch (11:55):
I love that.
Caleb Agee (11:55):
That's a good catchphrase.
Brandon Welch (11:57):
Kyle DeVries.
Caleb Agee (11:58):
Yeah, I don't know if he stole it from somebody,
but I'm giving him credit rightnow.
So, zoom out, look further,figure out.
Brandon mentioned outliers.
I also want to say, for thegood, look at outliers.
Did you get a monster sale lastmonth?
Or, if you did see the dip lastyear, did you get a monster
sale in one of those months thatcauses it to look like it fell
(12:21):
a lot harder than it should have?
So pay attention to that.
Look at all those littleoutliers, pay attention to it
and then make consistent, makedecisions based on the plan you
set forth that you're looking atone year, three years, five
years.
You're not making plans thatreact to soft months.
You have a plan, you have acash flow in place, you have a
(12:43):
budget in place to account forall of these ups and downs and
you're not changing your, yourum, how you handle your profit.
You're not changing yourinvestments.
You're not changing yourlifestyle necessarily based on a
good month or a short goodseason, because you're a steady
steward of this.
And then when you do that, um,the quote I love is times of
(13:09):
poverty always follow times ofmisplaced abundance.
Brandon Welch (13:13):
Yes, they do.
Caleb Agee (13:14):
And so if you misplace let's say you're having
a great August If you misplacethis abundance right now, I am
sorry to say, but times ofpoverty will follow very shortly
.
If you are riding high on thatwave and you're spending all
that extra cash and you'reliving like you're going to make
that much money forever, I'dlove to say that you're going to
(13:34):
keep going up and up.
But the reality of look at thestock market, if they could keep
it going up and up, they would.
They would Like, right?
I mean, that's the reality.
If we could keep all thesethings continuously pointing up
always, we would do that.
Brandon Welch (13:47):
But we can't.
Gravity, yeah, gravity is notjust a good idea, it's the law.
Yeah, what goes up has to comedown right.
So what is the maven marketingresponse to all this?
We've kind of said it, butlet's just lay it down, like if
you're going, ah, things aresoft, maybe you're even 20%, 30%
down month over month,hopefully you've done the one
(14:09):
three and five-year planning.
Hopefully you are thinkingquarter to quarter, not week to
week or month to month or evenyear to year.
Our best and most profitableclients, I promise you are
thinking year to year.
We check in monthly, we measuremonthly, we adjust quarterly,
but we plan annually right, yeah.
But if you're in this position,you're like okay, it's August,
(14:31):
it's slow One, use it to restand plan Like this could be a
gift for you.
I will say, if you're an owner,operator and things just get a
little quiet, that is yoursignal to be like okay, it's
time to put seeds in the groundand it's time to let my soil
rest and it's time to maybe nottotally reevaluate, but just
(14:52):
take a breather and that's okay,that will pay dividends.
The second thing maybe refineyour messaging.
Caleb Agee (14:59):
Yeah, I would say, if you need to, if it's down a
tremendous amount, you've gotpeople sitting around, they're
not busy.
You need to shake some thingsloose.
You may consider limited timeoffers.
You may consider some sort ofway to make it the best time to
buy right now.
You may consider some sort ofway to make it the best time to
buy right now, and that alwayscomes with a caveat of the more
(15:19):
you do that, the worse it willwork.
Brandon Welch (15:21):
Yes, the less it will work, the less it will work
in the future and, frankly,you're just stealing sales from
the future.
Yes, you are, so be carefulwith that.
Caleb Agee (15:29):
For your own comfortability really.
Yeah, be careful with that.
Brandon Welch (15:36):
But it is a mechanism you can do to have
some short-term games, there arecashflow stabilization.
Caleb Agee (15:38):
I mean, the rule of life is that anything that comes
quickly and easily can go justas fast, and so if you're able
to get it that quickly, there'sprobably a downside to it.
Brandon Welch (15:48):
Yeah, um, with that, refined your messaging on
the today side, definitely addyour, add your um, your
promotions, your today marketingoffers.
You want to save them time,speed or hassle, but the biggest
part of the Maven marketingplan.
We suggest at least a 60-40balance, if not a 70-30 balance,
60 being tomorrow marketing.
(16:08):
And so get in step with fall.
Use this to call your scriptwriting team together or write
your next messaging that'stalking about things that are
going to be relevant coming upin one month.
Like football will be in fullswing.
You won't need to say the wordsback to school, but you can
speak to people like isn'troutine, nice, like you can
start speaking to people as ifyou're in their living room with
(16:29):
them, you can start hintingtowards end of year stuff.
Isn't it going to be nice?
The cold snap's about to happenfor most people in the Midwest,
east and South.
Right yeah, wouldn't it be niceto have that XYZ thing done
before the end of the year, orbefore you know it, it's going
to be November, and that thingyou wanted to have done by
August is going to be looking atMarch.
(16:50):
So I'm talking to my estateplanners, I'm talking about any
and all of my service folks, bigticket items like now there's
going to be an abundance of cash.
I say abundance, but more thanthere's going to be in November,
and November is begging for itin 100 different ways, and
that's just a horrible time tosuddenly be relevant.
Caleb Agee (17:11):
So start refining that message and then the bottom
line is really stay the course,stay connected, be be a steady
steward of what you have rightnow, the marketing you are doing
.
Um, if it was working a fewmonths ago, uh, I this is a very
broad statement, so it was kindof dangerous to make.
(17:32):
I'm going to assume it willcontinue working and that you
should go look at your data andyou should compare and prove to
yourself.
Maybe August is down and Ishouldn't make crazy dramatic
changes.
I'm not going to canceleverything.
I'm not going to stopeverything.
That's that's the risk.
Or or completely pick it up andput in a different media, a
(17:52):
different channel, a differentprogram.
Brandon Welch (17:54):
That is the last thing you want to do, unless
you're selling cheeseburger ortoilet papers or pencil erasers.
Your customer journey is alwaysa process.
Yes, it is always.
I'm kind of sort of thinkingabout buying it.
I'm going to kind of sort ofthink a little bit more tomorrow
about buying it, and thenthere's going to be this grand,
you know, four to 12 week spanwhere it's going to be the right
time and all you can reallyhope for is to pull them into
(18:16):
that a little sooner.
And then really the onlyadvantage there is that you
might get them before yourcompetitor got them.
Caleb Agee (18:21):
Yeah, any any great therapist will tell you to never
make large life decisions intimes of crisis.
And business owners, you have adanger about you that if you're
in a time of crisis, cash islow, if leads are low, things
are slow.
You're going to want to changeeverything.
(18:41):
Don't do it.
Great pilots.
Brandon Welch (18:44):
Great pilots.
Do you know any of those?
Oh, I met one one time.
Caleb Agee (18:48):
Yeah, I'll let you know when.
Brandon Welch (18:50):
I find it Slow it down.
We pull back the throttles,right, yeah, turbulent air.
So, um, hey, this was all along way to say stay the course,
do what you're doing well.
And if you need a little moreguidance, a little more uh, help
, or just would find it fun tobounce these ideas off of people
, we have the perfectopportunity for you.
It's called the Maven MarketingMastermind.
(19:12):
I did it, you got it.
The Maven Marketing Mastermind.
We get together every otherweek with business owners just
like you, very smart people,very passionate people about
what they do, and they're tryingto make their thing work, just
like you.
But oftentimes you just seeingsomebody else put their
promotion together or make theirmedia plan or make their hiring
(19:34):
or sales decision.
You're just like, huh, I'mgoing to learn from that and
I'll either never make thatmistake or that's going to help
me apply it to this situation.
And then, on top of that, yougot Caleb and I.
Caleb Agee (19:43):
Yeah, we're here to answer those real questions and
everybody literally turns inthings for review questions.
They have.
We answer them live and we'reliterally seeing results.
We're seeing sales happen, newbusiness, new clients added, and
then people are also gettingmaterials out that they have
been sitting on for forever.
(20:04):
I think that's the other-.
Brandon Welch (20:04):
Get them across the finish line faster.
Caleb Agee (20:06):
There's an accountability element to it,
that you kind of have yourhomework to do, you have things
to finish and you want to beable to say on the next call I
did it.
And this really helps, I think,a lot of marketers and small
business owners to get thatgoing.
Brandon Welch (20:19):
The Maven Marketing Mastermind.
You want to get to that atmavenmethodtrainingcom.
It's a fraction of a fractionof a fraction of what it costs
to work with our team directly,and it's just a ton of fun.
Caleb Agee (20:30):
You do it in this room.
Brandon Welch (20:36):
You get to send your questions in, and there's
also some cool freebies in that,if you sign up, you get a
one-on-one call with Caleb and I.
We're going to work on yourbusiness.
Caleb Agee (20:41):
It's a good time.
Brandon Welch (20:43):
Work it out.
Mavenmethodtrainingcom Is thatit?
That's it.
Keep the course.
We're going to stay the course.
We'll be back here every Mondayanswering your real life
marketing questions, because wewant your business to grow.
We want you to do it with alittle more peace, a little more
certainty and a little more funand, as we like to say, because
(21:06):
marketers who can't teach youwhy are just a fancy lie.
Have a great week.
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