September 1, 2025 • 49 mins
Welcome to The Power Lounge. This week, host Amy Vaughan sits down with Holly Fisher, founder and CEO of Fisher Creative Marketing and a certified “Unreasonable Hospitality” coach. They explore how hospitality can become a key marketing strategy, even in an era dominated by automation and AI.
Holly shares her transition from traditional marketing to embracing hospitality as a core business approach. Through practical examples, Amy and Holly demonstrate how sincere, thoughtful gestures can drive word-of-mouth referrals, enhance client loyalty, and differentiate your business across various industries and sizes—all without significant costs or time investments.
If you’re aiming to convert customers into dedicated advocates or want to understand the impact of small, deliberate actions, this episode provides actionable insights. Join us in The Power Lounge to learn how hospitality can elevate your marketing efforts.
Chapters:
00:00 - Introduction
01:30 - Value-Driven Marketing Conversation
05:18 - "Human-Centric Customer Experience Strategy"
07:52 - Accessible Hospitality for All Businesses
12:01 - Intentional Scheduling for Connection
13:58 - Glove Box Surprise Gesture
19:51 - Connecting Remotely Through Thoughtful Gestures
23:40 - Redefining Hospitality Beyond Service
24:57 - "Managing Project Touchpoints Post-Completion"
29:53 - Unreasonable Hospitality in Practice
30:53 - The Power of Listening in Business
36:44 - "Small Steps for Big Changes"
40:21 - "Effective Messaging Beats Viral Hype"
41:49 - "Collaborative Women, Sacred Space"
44:56 - Disney Map Mishap Resolution
47:38 - Everyone's in Hospitality
49:12 - Outro
Quotes:
"Hospitality isn’t about surprise and delight as a one-off tactic; it’s a mindset that consistently makes people feel valued."- Amy Vaughan
“We’re all in the hospitality business. No matter your industry, it’s the small, intentional gestures that turn customers into lifelong advocates.”- Holly Fisher
Key Takekaways:
Human Connection is Your Secret Weapon
Hospitality = Marketing
Small Gestures, Big Impact
Active Listening is Everything
Systematize Kindness Without Losing Heart
Digital Doesn’t Mean Distant
Hospitality is Everyone’s Business
Play the Long Game
Connect with Holly Fisher:
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/hollyannfisher/
Website:https://fisher-creative.com/
Connect with the host Amy Vaughan:
LinkedIn: http://linkedin.com/in/amypvaughan
Podcast:Power Lounge Podcast - Together Digital
Learn more about Together Digital and consider joining the movement by visitingHome - Together Digital
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:10):
Hello everyone and welcome to our weekly Power
Lounge.
This is your place to hearauthentic conversations from
those who have power to share.
My name is Amy Vaughn and I amthe owner and Chief Empowerment
Officer of Together Digital, adiverse and collaborative
community of women who work indigital and choose to share
their knowledge, power andconnections.
You can join the movement attogetherindigitalcom and I want
(00:33):
to say welcome to everyone today, to our listeners and our live
listeners as well, as we beginto explore how hospitality can
become one of the most powerfulmarketing tools at your disposal
.
In a world where automation andAI dominate our interactions,
there's something magical thathappens when we inject a genuine
human connection into ourbusiness relationships.
(00:53):
It's actually a two-way street,folks.
Our guest, holly Fisher, is thefounder and CEO of Fisher
Creative Marketing and a StoryBrand Certified Guide.
With over a decade ofexperience, holly helps
businesses simplify theirmessage and enhance customer
experience.
As an unreasonable hospitalitycoach, she's passionate about
(01:14):
helping brands build loyaltythrough care, clarity and a
compelling story.
Holly is here to share howsmall, intentional gestures can
turn your clients into loyaladvocates who can't stop talking
about you, which is kind ofsomething we all want, right?
Not through bigger budgets orflashier campaigns, but through
the timeless power of makingpeople feel truly seen and
(01:35):
valued.
Welcome, holly, we're thrilledto have you here with us today.
Speaker 2 (01:39):
Yeah, thanks for having me Happy to be here.
I'm excited for thisconversation.
Speaker 1 (01:44):
Yes, me too.
We are very much aligned invalues and philosophy.
We were just talking before wecame on live.
Even you know just about thesepassion points of ours and
putting people at the front andcenter and how it's.
You know it really is the wayto create sustainable business
and really kind of have amarketing strategy that's just
out there in the wild doing thework for you, which is something
(02:06):
I think all of us marketersdream of right, and business
owners so excited to have ourlive listening audience with us
here today.
As always, folks, be sure to usethe chat, say hi, but also drop
your questions If you havesomething specific that you want
to know from Holly at TogetherDigital, we want you to ask for
what you need and to get used toasking the questions.
There's no such thing as a bador wrong question.
(02:26):
So if you have something thatyou would like to know, please
drop it in the chat and I willmake sure it gets answered
before we end and wrap today.
So, holly, let's give ourlisteners a little bit more
about you and your backstory.
How did you go from atraditional marketer to becoming
an unreasonable hospitalitycoach, which I would love for
you to kind of give them somecontext of that as well and what
(02:47):
that moment looked like for youwhen you made that pivot.
Speaker 2 (02:50):
Sure, yeah.
So I have been working inmarketing for a number of years,
almost 15 years.
I was a journalist before that,so long time writer and
storyteller and I've been astory brand certified guide
since early 2018.
So I'm certified in theStoryBrand marketing framework
created by Donald Miller.
I'm sure a lot of folks arefamiliar with that.
(03:11):
That book and that frameworkhas been out for a number of
years.
So I've been working in thatspace and really just helping
folks with their messaging andtheir marketing for quite some
time.
And last year I actually readthe book Unreasonable
Hospitality by Will Godera and alot it was.
It had been on my to read list,you know, for a minute, right
(03:32):
as we get our stacks get reallytall and a lot of folks were
really buzzing about this book.
So I picked it up and read itand it's a.
It's a great read.
It's full of some reallyfantastic stories and actionable
ideas and I just blew throughthat in just like a couple of
weeks.
Really great book, will.
If you're not familiar withthat book, he owned a restaurant
(03:52):
and ran restaurants in New YorkCity and really talks about how
they were able to take a reallyhigh-end restaurant in New.
York City to the number onerestaurant in the world, and
that was largely through thepower of hospitality to the
number one restaurant in theworld, and that was largely
through the power of hospitality.
And so I was really justimpressed with his story.
(04:14):
Just, this concept, this idea,so something that even in my own
business I always, you know,I'm striving to practice, and so
I just really loved this ideaof this hospitality as a
marketing concept and this ideaof unreasonable hospitality.
So the opportunity presenteditself last fall for a new
certification to become anunreasonable hospitality
certified coach, and so I jumpedon that and I thought, well,
(04:35):
this just aligns really wellwith marketing, right?
This is just a really wonderfulway for businesses to uplevel
their marketing and really havethose, those marketing and brand
ambassadors out in the worldwho are talking about what a
wonderful business you are so.
So I've been doing now can doworkshops and trainings with
(04:57):
folks to help them figure outhow they can infuse more
hospitality into their business.
Speaker 1 (05:02):
I love it.
Yeah, because you say thatbasically hospitality is
marketing, which is a prettybold statement, because when you
think about marketers and liketheir pillars and their themes
and their topics and theirchannel strategies, you often
don't hear those things puttogether.
So it's a pretty bold statement.
Could you break down for ourlisteners a little bit about
what you mean by that and thenwhy traditional marketing
(05:23):
approaches might be fallingshort of hospitality?
Speaker 2 (05:27):
Yeah, I think, at the end of the day, our customers
and clients.
They really do want to dobusiness with other people.
They want to know thatbusinesses are valuing them as
customers and clients, thatthey're being seen, they're
being heard.
They want that relationship andyou know, we do kind of live in
this automated, now sort of AIdriven world right, where
(05:52):
sometimes it's hard to even justget like a live person on the
phone to answer a question.
And so being able to have thislevel of hospitality and think
about how we can not justprovide a nice level of service
for people, but how we canreally again make them see, make
(06:12):
them feel seen and valued andmake them feel really special as
customers and clients, that isgoing to really impact your
marketing Cause.
Then you're going to havepeople who are out there talking
about your business.
They're going to be repeatcustomers, they're going to be
sending you referrals, and sothat's a great way to have this
these brand ambassadors out inthe marketplace sending you
(06:36):
business that you know it'sessentially free marketing for
you, just because you took thetime to really put the customer
and the client experience frontand center.
Speaker 1 (06:46):
Yeah, I mean for us as a membership organization, I
couldn't agree more.
I mean, women's time is limited, their finances might be
limited and like even more sincethe pandemic, and so I think
leaning in harder tounderstanding that the word of
mouth.
For us it's like 90% of ourbusiness, right, I think it is
such a shortcut to a sale thatwe take it for granted.
(07:07):
And it's funny because as youwere speaking, holly, for some
reason my brain went back to myagency days when it was just
like the clients would alwaysask for surprise and delight.
And why did that?
It's one of those terms thatwould always rub me the wrong
way.
But as you were speaking, Ithink I finally figured out why.
Because just good customerservice shouldn't be a surprise
and delight.
It shouldn't be just a random,one-off instance.
(07:29):
It's not like a strategy or atactic.
It is a consistent way of beingright as a business, absolutely
.
Speaker 2 (07:37):
And I always wondered why that's so funny.
Speaker 1 (07:42):
All right, so I also know that our listeners, who are
here with us and listening tothe podcast after we publish it,
they're probably thinking thathospitality sounds either
expensive and or time consuming.
Could you maybe paint a picturefor them about what
unreasonable hospitality lookslike in practice?
Speaker 2 (08:05):
us?
Yeah, that's a great questionand that's something that I
share with people a lot is thatthis doesn't have to be
expensive, doesn't have to betime consuming you don't have to
hire a whole new team ofhospitality folks for your
business that you can do this atany business, any size, any
scale.
So this is certainly not justfor folks that might consider
themselves to be in thetraditional hospitality industry
(08:25):
of restaurants and hotels.
Right, we're all in thehospitality industry if we have
customers and clients that we'reserving.
And so, thinking about justthose little things that you can
do, again, doesn't have to beexpensive, doesn't have to be
big, doesn't have to be big, canbe, if you want, you can do
(08:47):
something grandiose, buthonestly, it might be things
like thank you cards, justlittle notes that you're sending
people.
Just, you know, payingattention to what clients and
customers are saying and how youcan just like show up for them
in a way that they know you werelistening, you know.
(09:12):
Let's say, for example, you werekind of in this back to school
season right now.
So let's say, you have a clientwhose first child is going off
to college.
Right, it's a big, that's a bigdeal, right, what if you just
sent them a note.
Hey, I know your son ordaughter is going off to college
this week.
I'm just thinking about you.
You know, here's a Starbucksgift card.
You might need a little extracoffee to keep going this week.
What did that cost you Right?
(09:33):
Almost nothing, right.
But your client is like wow one, somebody actually paid
attention to what I said.
Right, I took some time tobuild that relationship.
um knew that I had an importantlife event going on, and so it's
(09:54):
going back to that person goingwow, I feel really seen and
valued by this business, and sothat's a just a you know, simple
example of something you can dothat's going to have a great
impact, right, but doesn't costreally anything else A couple
minutes of your time and youknow a five or $10 Starbucks
card maybe.
Speaker 1 (10:11):
Right, right, and it really just takes that action
right.
I think sometimes it's hard.
We get caught up in all the dayto day and I know for us, for
example, I do member one-on-oneonboardings with all of our new
members.
It really helps me understand.
Why are women joining?
What do they need?
What are they looking for?
Because it's a little differentfor everyone and while we can't
be everything for everyone, wehave a lot to offer as a
(10:31):
community and I know their timeis precious and limited because
they don't get to prioritizethemselves in their careers
often, which is usually why theyjoin.
And so for me to open my doorand say my time is for you, to
help you go in the rightdirection and use this most
effectively.
I just really felt like wedidn't use to do those and once
we started doing those, it wasreally great to see the
(10:51):
increased engagement, theloyalty, the renewals that came
and they were more likely to usetheir membership as well,
versus just kind of do it, payfor it and then resent it
because they never got thechance to really dig in and
figure it out and it'ssystematized.
I was going to say I know wetalked a little bit about
automation, but I actually thinkautomation can help with
hospitality to a degree.
Right, I talk to and onboard alot of people every month, but I
(11:14):
use Read AI for my notes and soif I can't remember or call
something specific and I reallywant to go back and send like a
note or thanks to somebody andmake it meaningful, can go back
to that and be like please helpme remember, you know.
So I think between likeAbsolutely, yeah, absolutely.
Speaker 2 (11:31):
Or if you're talking to somebody, you know, maybe you
have a monthly call withsomeone and you're like I know
they told me about somethingthat was happening with their
kids or their family or theirbusiness or whatever.
You know, we're all human,right, it's hard to remember
everything.
So absolutely you can go backand check that recording so that
you can mention it in the nextcall, because you do want to
(11:53):
know what's going on with themand you are interested and
invested.
Speaker 1 (11:58):
Yeah, yeah.
It's just the older I get I'mlike, the less that fits up here
in this head of mine.
Speaker 2 (12:02):
So I'm like I need all the help I can get.
Yeah, I definitely need likethe note taker following me
around 24-7.
Speaker 1 (12:09):
It's amazing and if I think, if somebody mentioned
something specific, I can startto like just search up a couple
of phrases that I know maybe weshared, because I'm trying to
remember the name of somethingyou know and, like I said, I'm
very much like driven by mycalendar.
So it's like making myselfavailable at certain times is
important so that people knowthat I'm always there for them.
From a hospitality standpoint,it also helps keep me sane and
(12:29):
in check, so I'm not all overthe place at different times.
And then, even with thatworkflow, I use Calendly
personally.
There's always follow-ups thatI have set up and created to
really just make sure they gotwhat they needed out of it and
to ask for feedback and thingslike that.
So there's really a lot of waysyou can do it that, like you
said, aren't expensive andactually aren't time consuming,
(12:50):
but are intentional andthoughtful and hopefully make
people feel seen and heard aswell.
Awesome let's talk about littlemoments with big impact
philosophy and if you couldshare like a specific example of
a small gesture that createdmaybe a disproportionate loyalty
or word of mouth situation.
Speaker 2 (13:08):
Mm.
Hmm, I'm actually going toshare an example that Will
Gadeer gave in a talk last yearwhen I was listening to him at a
workshop.
He was doing some consultingwork with car dealerships and
they were a little, you know,hesitant about all of this, like
this whole concept ofhospitality, and so he was
(13:29):
really digging in with them andasking questions about the whole
customer experience.
Right, because the customerjourney is fast.
Right, there's things thatpeople experience with your
business before they ever even,you know, walk in the door or
engage with you all the way upto post purchase.
Right, that he was asking thesecar dealers was what happens
(13:57):
the first time someone opens theglove box of their new car.
Because we're all going to doit.
Right, we got to put ourinsurance in there, registration
, our Chick-fil-A napkins right,we got to have all that stuff
in the glove box.
So at some point we're openingthe glove box.
And he said you know what, ifyou put in there a note, maybe
from the manager of thedealership, you know, thanks for
(14:18):
buying the new car.
If you need anything, here's mynumber.
And then they put you know, acoffee gift card and have a
coffee on us.
So they did that and had justan amazing reaction from
customers because that was justagain not expensive.
I mean, you're talking aboutwhat a car that could be 30, 40,
(14:41):
50, $60,000 and you're givingsomeone a 10 or $15 gift card
like not a big deal, right.
Quick note put that in theglove box Again.
It's a system, right.
So we know we're going to dothat with everyone.
Put that in the glove box again.
It's a system, right.
We know we're gonna do thatwith everyone.
Put in the box.
Wonderful surprise when I openthe glove box and see that I
(15:03):
have a note from the cardealership and a gift gift card
to go grab a coffee.
That's again, it's just a smallthing but can have a really big
impact and is going to justestablish that business in my
mind in a positive way.
Yeah, I'm probably not going tobuy another car next week,
(15:25):
right, at some point I'm goingto go buy another car purchase,
yeah, right.
And so those little touchpoints like that that just kind
of make people go wow, there'sthat was really nice, Like I
can't believe they did.
That Is really going to make methink.
Maybe I'll go back to thatdealership Right.
Speaker 1 (15:41):
And I'll refer people Absolutely, or I tell someone.
Speaker 2 (15:44):
Oh my gosh, you're not going to believe what
happened.
I opened the glove box of mynew car and guess what was there
?
Because it's not something thata lot of other people are doing
right.
So it is a real surprise, areal treat and something that
can those little things likethat can really have a big
impact.
Speaker 1 (16:04):
Right, yeah, one of my favorite examples is Chewy.
If you guys are familiar withChewy, they do like the pet food
delivery and I think theirintentionality within their
business model is so wonderful.
I mean a lot of us, you knowwe've got our fur babies and
they're basically like family.
So you know, when you're kindof getting that subscription
order every week, every month,whatever you have it set up as
Chewy has it set up, where it'slike if you lose your pet, like
(16:26):
they will send you like a cardfor grievance, they will take
the pet food that you have leftover and donate it to a shelter,
and it's just like and theyjust built it into their
business model from the start.
And I think it's little thingslike that that actually made
them kind of come out ahead ofthe race when it came to online
pet food subscriptions.
Right Cause, I mean, anybodycould kind of jump in and do
(16:46):
that.
But to me, what has always madethem stand out is like that
little bit of understanding thatour pets are family.
Yes, and so making that wholeexperience, especially when
you're suffering from like aloss, it's just, it's tremendous
, and I've had so many peoplecomment on it and recommend it
and all of that good stuff.
So yeah, even though it's likea little bit more expensive
(17:07):
sometimes, we're like we're justgoing to do it, because then we
know that it's a good businessand we know that they care.
Speaker 2 (17:12):
It's a great example I've heard other people talk
about that that as well afteryeah, a pet passes away and then
they'll get a little somethingfrom from Chewy about that, and
that's a wonderful example ofjust going a little bit above
and beyond.
But again, just really.
Now we're just like Chewy, yay.
Speaker 1 (17:33):
Right Like they really like.
Speaker 2 (17:34):
That's how you build that customer loyalty.
Um, and you're right, Sometimesmaybe it, maybe it is a couple
of dollars more, but I'm likeman, they, they care, so I'm
going to stick with them, go outof my way.
Speaker 1 (17:47):
Another great example I had was the woman that I used
to work with at an agency andit was kind of before Lululemon
blew up, but she had beenwearing it for years.
And she was a woman that I usedto work with at an agency and it
was kind of before Lululemonblew up, but she had been
wearing it for years and she wasa runner and they had a pair of
tights that were like herabsolute favorites and you know,
I think she paid like a hundredplus dollars for these pair of
running tights and she had leftthem in the locker room at the
gym at the office and somebodyhad stolen them and she was
(18:10):
pretty devastated and I thinkthat they weren't making these
particular ones anymore maybe.
And so she went to the store andwas shopping for a new pair and
when somebody came to ask tohelp her, she kind of told them
what happened and they gave hera gift card to buy whatever pair
that she felt was the next bestthing to the one that they
discontinued for her, becausethat was like the really thing
that made her live it.
(18:31):
She was obviously upsettinghaving a hundred dollar plus
pants stolen, but also latestolen, but then also to know
that, like those, that design isnot around anymore and you
can't buy them again.
Yes.
Yeah, I think that was reallysweet and I think that's another
great you know.
Thought too is like empoweringyour employees and your team
with the ability to providethose hospitable moments is
(18:53):
really powerful as well.
Speaker 2 (18:55):
Yeah, I think that's huge.
You have to give your team theability to make those decisions
and to be able to do you knowthose kinds of things right,
because that's not, it's notgoing to have the same impact.
If you're like, I don't know,let me run it up the chain of
command and go through a bunchof red tape and kind of figure
it out, like you.
(19:15):
Just your team just has to knowthat they have the freedom to
make those decisions.
And if it's going to, if it'sgoing to really be a moment of
hospitality, like, do it youknow, yeah, yeah, empower them
to be able to do that.
Speaker 1 (19:28):
Yeah, I agree, because it's.
It feels weird when it feelslike the bureaucracy cause, then
you, as the person and thecustomer, you're like I feel
like I'm being a burden and I'mcreating more work on somebody
else's part, so that doesn'tfeel like hospitality at all.
Well, I mean, our community is,you know, vastly hybrid.
We do in person, but we're alsovery much digital, and then our
whole industry has become verymuch remote teams, online
(19:50):
services, digital products.
So I'm kind of curious for ourlisteners, especially like how
do you create hospitality magicwhen you're not physically
face-to-face with folks?
Speaker 2 (20:00):
Yeah, that's definitely a little harder if
you don't have kind of that likebrick and mortar or kind of
like face-to-face interaction.
For sure, but just even some ofthe other things that we've
talked about, whether it's justsending notes or sending people
little gifts, or I know I workwith a lot of folks remotely and
usually when someone startsworking with me I'll send them a
(20:20):
little something in the mail.
You know, maybe it's a copy oflike the story brand book or the
unreasonable hospitality book,or maybe it's a little um, I
like to send people things.
I'm based in Asheville, northCarolina, so sometimes I like to
send people things from likelocal businesses, right, like
little you know goodies orsomething like that.
So even just putting togethersort of a little you know, I'm
(20:43):
excited to work with you kind ofpacket, a little gift, a little
you know birthday card or youknow just even little things
like that that you can do thatagain are small, they're not
super expensive, but they'rejust kind of letting people know
that you care and that can be agood way to connect with folks
when you're not like right inthe same same space.
Speaker 1 (21:06):
I feel like it kind of goes a little bit farther too
right when you're not in thesame physical space, and then
you send something that liketactile farther too right when
you're not in the same physicalspace, and then you send
something that like tactile.
It's always kind of like, oh,that's so cool, like I wasn't
expecting that.
I mean, I've had calls withpeople that have done that, that
have sent thank you, likehandwritten thank you cards.
After like a coffee chat, I'mlike, oh my gosh, that's so cool
.
And it's been a, it's been aminute, but I had oh my gosh,
(21:30):
it's been more than a minute.
So my memory is going to fail mehere, but we had another
podcast guest Gosh.
I want to say it was like twoyears ago when we were talking
about connection and actually italso came up in that podcast
episode and the one with NancyHarhut which talks about using
behavioral psychology formarketing and it's that like
(21:51):
rule of reciprocity, right, whensomebody does something nice
for us, we kind of want to dosomething nice in return, and so
that's what I meant when wewere talking through the opening
is like you being morehospitable towards your
customers, your clients,whomever it gives something back
to you.
Right, it makes us feel good tomake other people feel good,
right, it's not completelyselfless.
Speaker 2 (22:12):
That's right, a hundred percent.
Yeah, I mean we love likesending.
I mean I love like kind ofsending people things, or like
putting together a little noteor something like that for folks
just to kind of, you know, justbrighten people's day, right.
Or again it kind of goes backto that paying attention to the
things that people are talkingabout, right, so you can send
(22:33):
something.
You know you mentioned the, youknow the pets, right, maybe
somebody got a new pet or theylost their pet, or you know they
love, you know they love dogs,so you send them a little
something you know for their petor that's pet themed, right.
So so it, it goes even just alittle bit step further than
just kind of a more generic giftor note, but it shows that you
(22:56):
actually paid attention tosomething that they told you
about themselves.
Speaker 1 (23:01):
I love it.
I mean I think that's a greatnote too to our job seekers who
are listening as well, you know,because it's a tough market out
there right now in the jobworld.
So yeah, kind of thinking outof the box when you're reaching
out, but also kind of with thatfollow up.
I think people sometimes arelike I feel like such a nag
following up.
So maybe just find fun,creative, interesting ways to
kind of follow up to.
(23:21):
One, it'll be more fun for you,and two, it'll probably be more
fun for the recruiters too,cause I mean they're on the
other side of things veryoverwhelmed, and so finding that
opportunity and the ability tokind of make that connection
stronger through a little bit ofhospitality in that realm too,
it was like why not?
Speaker 2 (23:34):
100%, absolutely.
Speaker 1 (23:36):
Yeah for sure.
So for our listeners who areworking with and serving clients
, I'm curious how do you beginto identify some of the key
touch points where hospitalitycan make a big difference?
Could you walk us through thatprocess and what that might look
like?
Speaker 2 (23:49):
Yeah, and what that might look like.
Yeah, so this is actually partof the workshop that I will do
with folks is really kind oftaking a minute to first kind of
get our heads wrapped around.
you know what is hospitality andhow that how that is different
from just providing people witha service, like the thing
they're paying us for.
So how can we start to go aboveand beyond?
And then we'll really take sometime to map out all of those
(24:10):
customer touch points and youknow some of them are going to
come to you like really quickly.
Right, they're obvious, butwhen you really start like
digging deeper and reallystarting to think about it, I
mean, you're just going to startto have 50, 60, you might even
get into a hundred or more touchpoints that customers have with
you and and I like to encouragepeople to think about those
(24:31):
before um, you know, people buyfrom you.
That might be consuming contenton your social media, that
might be going to your website.
How easy is it for people tonavigate around your website and
schedule an appointment withyou or make a purchase, right,
that's a customer touch point.
Then, of course, there's theactual, you know, purchase or
(24:52):
working together, right, all thedifferent ways.
What are the emailcommunications that people get,
the meetings like, all thedifferent ways that you're
interacting with them.
And then even you know beyond,right, the end of a engagement,
right?
Or you finish a project orsomething like what's happening
after the fact.
Are there some things built inthat you can continue to kind of
(25:14):
stay in touch with them?
So, yeah, really taking sometime to map all of those out,
that can take a minute.
You really start, startthinking about it and then you
can start to look at thedifferent impacts of those.
Are there some of those thatare naturally like positive and
fun for people?
Are there some that are alittle more negative and I don't
(25:39):
necessarily mean that negativein that you're doing a bad job
but a really good example ofthat is when you go out to
dinner.
A quote negative touch point isgetting your your bill.
Yeah, right, cause you werejust like oh, I didn't order
that, I got to pay for this.
So, it's not that they didanything wrong, it's just a
(26:00):
negative um experience Causewe're like shoot, I've got to
pay for it.
Um same thing If we're sendingclients invoices or things like
that right.
Again, they know they're goingto have to pay for it, but it's
not the most fun part of ourtime together.
So what can I do to maybe makethat a little better?
Are there touch points alongthat journey that you're just
(26:21):
not even paying that muchattention to?
They're just kind of happeningand you're like you know what,
actually, if we did this thing,that would that would actually
really make that experiencebetter for people.
You know, a really commonexample is thinking about if you
, if you have a brick and mortarbusiness, you know the
(26:41):
restrooms, right, that's one,that's one that sometimes gets
overlooked.
So what's the restroom in yourbusiness?
Right?
If it's virtual, the thing thatyou're just kind of like, yeah,
people use this, but I didn'treally I didn't really pay that
much attention to it, like it'sjust okay.
So how can I start to level upthose touch points?
And again, you know, if youhave a hundred of them, you
(27:01):
can't do them all at once.
So start to prioritize andmaybe you just pick.
You know we're going to startwith three, right, and we're
going to do that, and then we'regoing to add like a couple more
and we're just going tocontinue to work our way through
this list of touch points andhow can we just make that
experience just a little bitbetter for clients?
(27:22):
And again, it doesn't have tobe huge, big, grandiose or
expensive.
It can be just really like evensmall stuff, really simple
things.
Speaker 1 (27:33):
Yeah, and I love your point.
There too, I think we oftendisregard.
You know, when a client isleaving, or a customer is
canceling, or they're asking fora return or a refund, it's so
easy, I think, especially as abusiness owner, sometimes to be
like, fine, be gone, but it'slike, no like.
To me.
The best thing you can do isactually me even making the the
(27:56):
point like you're saying, thepain point of partying as
pleasant as possible.
Now, I'm not saying be adoormat, but I'm saying like for
me, if somebody is like, hey, Ineed to cancel, for whatever
reason, I'm always like listen,we're going to do what we can
for you.
That's totally fine, weunderstand.
But please know that we arehere for you, even if you're not
(28:17):
within the community and amember right now.
Because to me it's like younever want to burn a bridge,
like unless they were just anawful customer and they need to
go.
That's maybe a different thing,right, that's right, and that
does happen sometimes, right,right, right, and that's that's
a whole nother story.
But I think you know, really,looking at when that point of
departure is like so for yourcar example, you know the car is
(28:42):
sold, they didn't need to doanything extra, but by putting
that gift card into the glovecompartment it just, you know,
again takes it that extra mile.
Pun intended on, kind ofemphasizing, you know, the
desire to make sure that therelationship continues, I was
going to say too.
It also reminds me of even my,our realtor.
I mean we bought our house 12years ago.
She's amazing.
The reason why she's one of thetop realtors in our area is
because she invites us to herhouse for like get togethers and
(29:06):
she sends a Christmas card andyou know she sends like things
for the birthdays and I mean shedoesn't have to go out of her
way and do all of that.
But because she does that, Iwill always recommend her
because she was a good realtoras well, obviously.
But just that little extra, Imean this always keeps her top
of mind and as a realtor,referrals number one in getting
(29:26):
new business.
Speaker 2 (29:27):
We've had real estate agents that have done that
before too, and we'll stillsometimes send us things, even
though we don't even live in thesame city.
We wouldn't be using them again, necessarily.
They'll still send us a littlesomething, or send me a little
notes or something like that.
And so just those and againsmall things.
Right, We've really emphasizedthat this does not have to be
(29:49):
bigger, expensive stuff, it justtakes a little bit of thought.
Speaker 1 (29:53):
Yeah, yeah.
So I guess that that leadsperfectly into the next question
.
Or what are some low cost, highimpact hospitality strategies
that someone could implementLike yeah, I think, yeah, I
think we've talked about a lotof things like that.
Speaker 2 (30:05):
I mean just even little small notes and reminders
and gestures, things that youcan do there.
I think it again.
I think one of the reallyimportant things is just paying
attention to people.
So I'll actually share a littlestory from the unreasonable
hospitality book that um willhas talked about a lot some
(30:26):
people might have heard.
But um again, he has a veryhigh-end restaurant in new york
city and he um just they were alittle bit short-staffed, I
believe, and he was just kind ofhelping pitch in and clear a
couple of tables, do a fewthings Happens to hear a group
of people who had been in NewYork city.
They were big foodies.
(30:46):
They had gone to all of thelike really top-notch
restaurants all around town.
They were ending eating at hisrestaurant and then they were
off, you know, back to whereverthey came from.
So he happens to overhear themtalking about all the different
places that they've been eating,but their one, um gosh, the one
regret they had was they neveractually got to have a hot dog
(31:07):
from a New York city hot dogstand Right.
And so he pops out, goes outside, gets the $2 hot dog from the
hot dog cart outside therestaurant, takes it into the
kitchen, convinces the the chefto cut it up into like three
little pieces, put it on one oftheir fancy plates you know
(31:28):
little fancy, you know dash ofketchup and take it out to the
table and those people were like, oh my gosh, blown away right
over the again this two dollarhot Um.
But it wasn't so much about thehot dog, it was the gesture, it
was the fact that he had sloweddown enough to hear that
(31:49):
conversation, and so I thinkthat's where we can really have
a lot of impact is going.
Okay, let me listen to thethings that my my clients and my
customers are telling me.
Um, especially when you workwith, you know, if you're in
like consulting or coaching andyou have a lot of like
one-on-one interactions withpeople, I think that can be a
really wonderful opportunity tohear what people are saying here
(32:12):
.
You know, what can you do tomake just either add a little
fun right, a little hot dog totheir life um or or something
else that you can do for themthat's really going to help them
in their business as well.
And again, that's a small, youknow, low cost example, but it
just requires you to be mindfuland to always have this idea of
(32:35):
hospitality at the forefront ofyour mind yeah, it sounds like a
little bit of active listeningand action, right, just kind of
like don't even wait, just gooutside.
Speaker 1 (32:43):
outside, buy the hot dog, bring it in.
I love that story yeah.
Speaker 2 (32:46):
And same thing, you know.
If that had been a staff member, you know, I think, letting the
staff member again, like wetalked about earlier, feel
empowered they could have beenlike hey, no, I'm going to dash
outside and grab this hot dogreal quick, you know it'd be
really cool.
Speaker 1 (33:00):
Yeah, yeah, so all right.
So you also mentioned thatkindness scales, how and I kind
of alluded to some of thisearlier, but I'm sure you've
probably got some other ways toshare of how you systematize
hospitality without losing itsauthentic and more personal feel
.
Speaker 2 (33:14):
Yeah, and I think that's huge because you you do
want people to feel like theyare special and like they're
getting something really unique,but at the same time, as a
business, you do have to havesome systems in place so you can
do this.
So I think one of those is oneof the ways that you can do that
is look for what we call therecurring moments in your
(33:36):
business.
What are the things that happenwith some regularities, and how
can you build a system in placethat says, okay, when this
happens, we do this thing.
So you know, for example, Iwork with a lot of folks that,
um, I'm helping them, you know,build a new website.
So an example of that could belike great, when a person's
(33:59):
person's, when a client'swebsite launches, they get.
You know, maybe they get somekind of a gift, they get.
You know, one time I sent aclient some cupcakes, you know,
just to kind of celebrate thelaunch of their new website
because they had been working onit for such a long time, and it
was a really big website andtook, you know, took a minute,
and so having those kinds ofthings go great.
(34:20):
When we launch a new websitefor a client, they get this.
Or when someone starts anengagement with us, they get a
little kind of welcome gift or awelcome note or something like
that.
Again, just thinking about whatare the things that happen on a
regular basis.
(34:41):
That also helps if you have ateam, then they're going to know
like, oh great, whenever thisthing occurs, we do this or
maybe you know you work with um,let's say you work with a lot
of moms right and they have, andso you have a lot of moms maybe
they're having.
If they're young moms, they'rehaving a baby, right.
And so every time one of ourclients has a baby, we send them
(35:02):
this thing or whatever rightFlowers or a onesie or whatever
Right, but just having thatsystem in place.
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (35:11):
Yeah, systems and process, I think, make all of it
easier, and then I make surethat it is always happening and
it's staying top of mind.
Speaker 2 (35:18):
Because, again, being a business owner, oh my God,
look what I got Right.
It doesn't matter thateverybody else you know is also
getting that.
They don't care, they're justthinking like wow this is
awesome.
Speaker 1 (35:28):
I feel really special .
No, I agree, I agree.
So what would you say are thebiggest mistakes you see
businesses make when they try toimplement hospitality driven
marketing?
Are there any pitfalls or trapsthey should be on the lookout
for?
Speaker 2 (35:40):
I think one is making sure that it is genuine, right.
I mean, we don't.
Yes, at the end of the day,this will help us grow our
business, it will help us getrepeat customers and referrals
and marketing and all of that.
So there's certainly thatbenefit to us.
But we also want to make surethat we're not just like, well,
I just I need to do hospitalitybecause I need to do it Right.
(36:02):
We want that genuine connectionand relationship with our
customers and clients.
So so, making sure that ourmotives are pure, I guess, um,
and that you know this issomething that we really believe
in, um, and that's also howwe're going to get our team you
know, if you have a team reallygetting everybody on the same
page with this, so that you knowit really can come from top
(36:27):
down and everybody has thisbuy-in, this sense of ownership,
this culture of hospitalitywithin your organization.
So I think that's huge, that'shuge.
And then I think again, justlike, as we mentioned earlier,
just not making the assumptionthat this is going to be a big
undertaking, right, that it canbe something simple.
You can just pick one thingright next month that you're
(36:50):
going to do right, one littlething.
Speaker 1 (36:53):
Yeah, I think that's the best way.
When things feel big, right,what's the next little little
step we need to take when maybeit feels overwhelming and kind
of on that note, like I canimagine a lot of our listeners
wanting to go back right andmaybe talk to their bosses
because you're a hundred percentright, it has to be bought in
from the top down if it's goingto be implemented and done well,
and we're adding it to process,like we're talking about
(37:14):
oftentimes as a marketing.
You know we are constantlyasked like what's the ROI?
How do you measure the ROI?
Constantly asked like whatwhat's the ROI?
How do you measure the ROI?
Right, so you know what aresome of the ways in which we can
either be looking at, talkingabout tracking, you know the
ways in which hospitality mighttruly be working to help the
bottom line of a business,because sometimes that's just
(37:35):
what people care about,unfortunately.
Speaker 2 (37:37):
For sure.
Yeah, that's true, absolutely.
And I think you can, I can use,I think you can use some of
your traditional marketingmetrics as well, right?
So even looking at things likereferrals, reviews, right, those
kinds of things, maybe you havesome stuff set up where people
are more apt to share, like onsocial media things like that,
(37:59):
right, so you can do some ofthose things.
I also think that this fallsinto that long game concept,
right, I mean, this is notnecessarily the kind of thing
that you're like great, westarted sending thank you notes
today and tomorrow we doubledour business.
Right, with like, with a lot ofour marketing.
Yes, sometimes we do seeimmediate results, sometimes the
(38:21):
results are over time.
Right, right, and it's just.
It's building the relationship,building the trust and the
rapport with the customers andclients.
That's going to take youthrough the long, long game.
Right, I mean, it's like thecar example we talked about.
I'm not going to buy the carfrom you today and then buy
(38:42):
another car from you tomorrow,but I may come back in seven,
eight, nine years.
Speaker 1 (38:48):
Right, buying the car from you well, and I also would
think that I might go to them.
Now it might not go out of myway to like get oil change
somewhere.
I might go there to get the carservice and oil change because
I felt that much more taken careof when I was there versus
doing like a jiffy lube.
You know what I mean, whereit's like I'm in and out and bam
.
Thank you, ma'am, now we'removing on, so yeah.
Speaker 2 (39:09):
Absolutely.
I think it's it's it's havingthat, that perspective of going.
You know, I'm in this for thelong haul and I will see the
results.
They may not necessarily betomorrow, but I will see the
results of this effort.
Speaker 1 (39:21):
Agree, agree.
Yeah, it's like that long leadmarketing nobody ever wants to
talk about.
We always want, like, theimmediate results.
We're all too overstimulatedand too used to immediate
gratification that it's kind ofa bummer because you're leaving
money on the table.
You're literally leaving moneyon the table by not putting into
place like hospitable practiceswithin your business to make
sure that you sustain the leads,the business, the relationships
(39:42):
that you currently have,because those are going to be
your best bet.
Right, it's like marketingone-on-one.
So it's like so funny that thisthese feel like revelations
because they really shouldn't beright, I know, but we kind of
live in this world of like let'sgo viral, Right, Like people
just want to be like.
Speaker 2 (39:57):
I did this thing and I went viral and I'm like okay,
well, sometimes that happensRight, but not very often.
Speaker 1 (40:05):
Right, not very often .
And then what?
Oh, that's another good podcastepisode of ours too Y'all
should go back and listen to,with Kenya Kelly talking about
TikTok and that whole sense oflike she had a law firm come to
her and they were like we wantto go viral.
And she's like she had a lawfirm come to her and they were
like we want to go viral.
And she's like do you want togo viral or do you actually want
leads you can close?
They were like oh, we wantleads, we can close.
(40:26):
She's like then let me do whatI need to do and I'm going to
get you a hundred new leads.
And they're like what?
Nothing we've ever done hascreated a hundred leads.
She's like well, going viral,that'll get you there.
And so, yeah, she got them overa hundred leads and I think
they got like 20 of those closedand it was like the biggest
boom in their business they hadseen.
(40:47):
And you know again I think thatflash in the pan notion for as
long as I've been in thisbusiness.
It's like is are we done withthat?
Yet it's been like 15, 20 years.
Folks, can we not use the wordviral anymore?
Because I mean it doesn't have.
And then it's funny becausethey put the pressure on ROI.
But what's the ROI of viral?
Speaker 2 (41:07):
Right, yeah, right.
I think it's always about.
I think in 99.9% of cases it isquality over quantity.
Yes, right, so I would muchrather have a hundred like
really solid leads than amillion people that just saw it
and just moved on.
(41:27):
Yep, Right, I am with you, yeah.
You're going to get much betterresults that way, so Absolutely
Well.
Speaker 1 (41:34):
And then not only that, but you're just kind of
working with the kinds of peoplethat you want to be working
with.
I think that's like thephilosophy I've taken on with
Together Digital and ourmembership.
It's like how are you going togrow?
How are you going to scale?
You're at 500.
You're going to get to 2000.
I'm like no dude.
It's like I'm not trying topack a room, I'm trying to make
an impact on an individual levelwith women who don't feel seen
and heard.
And so I said I want qualityover quantity.
(41:57):
I want the kinds of women whoare collaborative, who are open
to listening and learning andhelping others, and not power
hoarding or shaming or blamingor any of that stuff that a lot
of us get conditioned to do inmost other environments.
And so to me that's a verysacred space, you know.
And so, yeah, I am I've saidthat so many times the quality
over quantity and the sustainversus scale.
(42:19):
And again, it just comes withthe nature of our business and
what we're trying to do, becausewe're trying to achieve a
mission.
So does it like really make thebottom line big?
No, but it helps us keep goingto achieve the goal that we're
out to do so obviously I know mybusiness is coming from a
different place.
No, that's awesome.
Yeah, awesome, awesome, allright.
(42:39):
Well, I'm going to check inwith our live listening audience
real quick.
I just thought my phone was mymouse gosh.
It's Friday.
You guys, I went to go, clickmy phone.
If you have questions, feelfree to drop them in the chat.
But we're going to take a quickpivot over into our power round
, which are like kind of our funquick questions and then we'll
wrap for the day if we don'thave any questions from you all.
But we appreciate you alllistening in.
(43:01):
All right, what is the smallestgesture that's created the
biggest client reaction for you?
Speaker 2 (43:07):
I think for me it is I mentioned earlier like just
sending people little gifts,sometimes when we start working
together or sometimes at theholiday.
If I did a big project forsomeone, I'll send something,
and I usually will always try tosend something from a local
business because I like tosupport other local business and
so I'll send, you know, maybe agift basket or something like
(43:29):
that and, um, you know, thenI'll get like a text from
someone with a picture of that.
Oh my gosh, I can't believe youdid this.
This was so wonderful.
You know how nice, what a greatgesture.
Or you know, last year someonedid say, well, I loved
everything that you sent.
It was all from, from Asheville, you know, that was so great.
And so, um, I think those kindsof things just as a little bit
(43:50):
unexpected, um, surprises, oroccasionally I'll send a client
like maybe just a book that Ithought they would be interested
in, um, and people will textagain, text me a picture and be
like my gosh, thanks for sendingthis.
You know, what a great littlesurprise.
So, again, just kind of thoselittle small things that just
show you're thinking aboutpeople and committed to their
(44:11):
success and the success of otherbusinesses in your community.
Speaker 1 (44:15):
Yeah, I love it.
I love it.
All right.
What's the unexpected placethat you've seen?
Amazing hospitality thatinspired your business approach.
Speaker 2 (44:22):
Oh gosh, that's a tough one.
I was trying to think of anunexpected place.
A little story came to mind.
This is not an unexpected place, but I was thinking about this
yesterday when we took a trip toDisney several years ago.
So, again, not really anunexpected place, but just
another example of kind ofhospitality and action when, uh,
(44:43):
we went to animal kingdom andmy daughter was probably like
maybe like nine or so.
You know, they have those likescavenger hunt, map kind of
things and, um, she always lovedthose as a kid, so she wanted
to like check off all the thingsyou were supposed to do, and
then you were supposed to turnin your map or whatever the end
of the day and you got some kindof little prize it was probably
like a sticker or something.
(45:04):
Yeah, something happened and wehad gotten a little bit delayed
and we ended up not getting themap back in time and, uh, she
was quite upset, yeah, and therewere tears, and we were with
some friends of ours who, um,live in Orlando and they're
Disney pass holders and so theygo to Disney all the time, and
(45:24):
so she went up and spoke to um,a staff member, and um explained
what had happened, and so youknow, there was a little bit of
back and forth and then theyactually ended up letting her
pick out, um, like a stuffedanimal from one of the gift
shops, right?
So tears are gone, she's happy,everybody's happy.
But that was just another goodexample of like making sure that
(45:45):
your staff is empowered to dothat.
Obviously that's, that's part ofdisney's culture, right?
They want everybody to leavehappy.
They don't want tears, right?
So that's a part of their thing.
It's like you know what, if it,if that kid is going to be
happy and that family is goingto be happy, take the stuffed
animal and off you go.
I think she still has thatstuffed animal.
She's 17.
Speaker 1 (46:06):
So you know what we need to do.
We I need to introduce you toRita Richa, who is has another
podcast as well, called BippityBoppity Business.
I loved her podcast so much itwas just absolutely delightful.
I am I am a Disney nerd.
My family, like I, grew uppodcast so much.
It was just absolutelydelightful.
I am, I am a Disney nerd.
My family, like I, grew upwatching the movies.
My mom is a great illustratorand you know, if she'd had her
(46:26):
way, maybe been an animator withthem at some point, but, um,
life never got her there.
Um, but because of that, likethis, her approach on the
podcast is really like what canwe learn from?
Like the Disney business modeland a lot of it has to do with
the hospitality you know and howit's absolutely deeply
ingrained in everything thatthey do and the approach and it
(46:47):
all stemmed from Walt's initialvision of what that world, he
wanted that world to be like andit's such a fun and it really
makes you look at and thinkabout your business differently
in the ways that she asks youquestions and framing things up
in like a Disney mindset.
So if you're a Disney nerds,definitely tune in to Rita's
podcast and Holly, I'll have tointroduce the two of you.
Speaker 2 (47:07):
Yeah, we'll be doing a great job of that of just
making sure that people feelreally well cared for.
Speaker 1 (47:13):
So yeah, yeah, and it's brilliant because it's like
so many people and it's funnypeople have been like it feels
childish, rita, that you'redoing like a whole podcast.
It's like so many people andit's funny People have been like
it feels childish, rita, thatyou're doing like a whole
podcast.
It's like the philosophy ofDisney and business and I'm like
but tell me another businessthat is as successful as Disney
is doing what they do.
Yeah, you know, I'm like how isthat not a good business case
(47:34):
to study?
Oh, all right, last power roundquestion and then we'll wrap
for the day One hospitality myththat you wish you could bust
for marketers right now.
Speaker 2 (47:46):
Yeah, I think it's reminding people that we're all
in the hospitality business.
Some people do say, well, thisdoesn't apply to me.
I'm not a hotel, I'm not arestaurant, I'm not a tourist
attraction Right, the thingsthat we sort of typically think
of as hospitality.
But if you have people thatyou're serving, if you have
customers, if you have clients,if you have people that you want
to hire you or buy from you,you're in the hospitality
(48:09):
business.
And so I think that we justhave to get into that mindset.
I'm going all of us, ourbusiness, our clients, whatever,
like they are all in thehospitality business and we can
all have a hospitality mindset.
Speaker 1 (48:22):
Yeah, amen to that.
Well, we will wrap it there.
Thank you so much, holly.
This has been such a thoughtfulconversation about how
transforming clientrelationships through genuine
care and attention can reallytake your business farther and,
honestly, be a genuinecompetitive advantage.
So excited to share this morewith our community For our
listeners.
Remember, this Power Lounge isbeing recorded live and it'll be
(48:43):
available next week on YouTubeand our podcast, so be sure to
check those out and subscribe.
Like and subscribe, as my kidswould say.
If you're inspired byconversations like this and want
to be a part of our communitythat is navigating the future of
what it means to be workingtogether both digitally and in
person, again go check out ourwebsite at togetherindigitalcom.
Thank you all for joining ustoday and we hope to see you all
(49:05):
next week.
And be sure to connect withHolly on LinkedIn.
Holly Fisher, thank you forjoining us again today.
Speaker 2 (49:12):
Thanks, this was really a lot of fun.
Appreciate it.
Speaker 1 (49:14):
Absolutely All right, everyone.
We hope to see you all nextweek.
Until then, keep asking, keepgiving and keep growing.
We'll see you all next week,until then keep asking, keep
giving and keep growing.
Speaker 2 (49:25):
We'll see you soon.
La, la, la, la, la, la, la, la,la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la,
la, la, la la.
Produced by Heartcast Media.
Hello everyone and welcome to our weekly Power
Lounge.
This is your place to hearauthentic conversations from
those who have power to share.
My name is Amy Vaughn and I amthe owner and Chief Empowerment
Officer of Together Digital, adiverse and collaborative
community of women who work indigital and choose to share
their knowledge, power andconnections.
You can join the movement attogetherindigitalcom and I want
(00:33):
to say welcome to everyone today, to our listeners and our live
listeners as well, as we beginto explore how hospitality can
become one of the most powerfulmarketing tools at your disposal
.
In a world where automation andAI dominate our interactions,
there's something magical thathappens when we inject a genuine
human connection into ourbusiness relationships.
(00:53):
It's actually a two-way street,folks.
Our guest, holly Fisher, is thefounder and CEO of Fisher
Creative Marketing and a StoryBrand Certified Guide.
With over a decade ofexperience, holly helps
businesses simplify theirmessage and enhance customer
experience.
As an unreasonable hospitalitycoach, she's passionate about
(01:14):
helping brands build loyaltythrough care, clarity and a
compelling story.
Holly is here to share howsmall, intentional gestures can
turn your clients into loyaladvocates who can't stop talking
about you, which is kind ofsomething we all want, right?
Not through bigger budgets orflashier campaigns, but through
the timeless power of makingpeople feel truly seen and
(01:35):
valued.
Welcome, holly, we're thrilledto have you here with us today.
Speaker 2 (01:39):
Yeah, thanks for having me Happy to be here.
I'm excited for thisconversation.
Speaker 1 (01:44):
Yes, me too.
We are very much aligned invalues and philosophy.
We were just talking before wecame on live.
Even you know just about thesepassion points of ours and
putting people at the front andcenter and how it's.
You know it really is the wayto create sustainable business
and really kind of have amarketing strategy that's just
out there in the wild doing thework for you, which is something
(02:06):
I think all of us marketersdream of right, and business
owners so excited to have ourlive listening audience with us
here today.
As always, folks, be sure to usethe chat, say hi, but also drop
your questions If you havesomething specific that you want
to know from Holly at TogetherDigital, we want you to ask for
what you need and to get used toasking the questions.
There's no such thing as a bador wrong question.
(02:26):
So if you have something thatyou would like to know, please
drop it in the chat and I willmake sure it gets answered
before we end and wrap today.
So, holly, let's give ourlisteners a little bit more
about you and your backstory.
How did you go from atraditional marketer to becoming
an unreasonable hospitalitycoach, which I would love for
you to kind of give them somecontext of that as well and what
(02:47):
that moment looked like for youwhen you made that pivot.
Speaker 2 (02:50):
Sure, yeah.
So I have been working inmarketing for a number of years,
almost 15 years.
I was a journalist before that,so long time writer and
storyteller and I've been astory brand certified guide
since early 2018.
So I'm certified in theStoryBrand marketing framework
created by Donald Miller.
I'm sure a lot of folks arefamiliar with that.
(03:11):
That book and that frameworkhas been out for a number of
years.
So I've been working in thatspace and really just helping
folks with their messaging andtheir marketing for quite some
time.
And last year I actually readthe book Unreasonable
Hospitality by Will Godera and alot it was.
It had been on my to read list,you know, for a minute, right
(03:32):
as we get our stacks get reallytall and a lot of folks were
really buzzing about this book.
So I picked it up and read itand it's a.
It's a great read.
It's full of some reallyfantastic stories and actionable
ideas and I just blew throughthat in just like a couple of
weeks.
Really great book, will.
If you're not familiar withthat book, he owned a restaurant
(03:52):
and ran restaurants in New YorkCity and really talks about how
they were able to take a reallyhigh-end restaurant in New.
York City to the number onerestaurant in the world, and
that was largely through thepower of hospitality to the
number one restaurant in theworld, and that was largely
through the power of hospitality.
And so I was really justimpressed with his story.
(04:14):
Just, this concept, this idea,so something that even in my own
business I always, you know,I'm striving to practice, and so
I just really loved this ideaof this hospitality as a
marketing concept and this ideaof unreasonable hospitality.
So the opportunity presenteditself last fall for a new
certification to become anunreasonable hospitality
certified coach, and so I jumpedon that and I thought, well,
(04:35):
this just aligns really wellwith marketing, right?
This is just a really wonderfulway for businesses to uplevel
their marketing and really havethose, those marketing and brand
ambassadors out in the worldwho are talking about what a
wonderful business you are so.
So I've been doing now can doworkshops and trainings with
(04:57):
folks to help them figure outhow they can infuse more
hospitality into their business.
Speaker 1 (05:02):
I love it.
Yeah, because you say thatbasically hospitality is
marketing, which is a prettybold statement, because when you
think about marketers and liketheir pillars and their themes
and their topics and theirchannel strategies, you often
don't hear those things puttogether.
So it's a pretty bold statement.
Could you break down for ourlisteners a little bit about
what you mean by that and thenwhy traditional marketing
(05:23):
approaches might be fallingshort of hospitality?
Speaker 2 (05:27):
Yeah, I think, at the end of the day, our customers
and clients.
They really do want to dobusiness with other people.
They want to know thatbusinesses are valuing them as
customers and clients, thatthey're being seen, they're
being heard.
They want that relationship andyou know, we do kind of live in
this automated, now sort of AIdriven world right, where
(05:52):
sometimes it's hard to even justget like a live person on the
phone to answer a question.
And so being able to have thislevel of hospitality and think
about how we can not justprovide a nice level of service
for people, but how we canreally again make them see, make
(06:12):
them feel seen and valued andmake them feel really special as
customers and clients, that isgoing to really impact your
marketing Cause.
Then you're going to havepeople who are out there talking
about your business.
They're going to be repeatcustomers, they're going to be
sending you referrals, and sothat's a great way to have this
these brand ambassadors out inthe marketplace sending you
(06:36):
business that you know it'sessentially free marketing for
you, just because you took thetime to really put the customer
and the client experience frontand center.
Speaker 1 (06:46):
Yeah, I mean for us as a membership organization, I
couldn't agree more.
I mean, women's time is limited, their finances might be
limited and like even more sincethe pandemic, and so I think
leaning in harder tounderstanding that the word of
mouth.
For us it's like 90% of ourbusiness, right, I think it is
such a shortcut to a sale thatwe take it for granted.
(07:07):
And it's funny because as youwere speaking, holly, for some
reason my brain went back to myagency days when it was just
like the clients would alwaysask for surprise and delight.
And why did that?
It's one of those terms thatwould always rub me the wrong
way.
But as you were speaking, Ithink I finally figured out why.
Because just good customerservice shouldn't be a surprise
and delight.
It shouldn't be just a random,one-off instance.
(07:29):
It's not like a strategy or atactic.
It is a consistent way of beingright as a business, absolutely
.
Speaker 2 (07:37):
And I always wondered why that's so funny.
Speaker 1 (07:42):
All right, so I also know that our listeners, who are
here with us and listening tothe podcast after we publish it,
they're probably thinking thathospitality sounds either
expensive and or time consuming.
Could you maybe paint a picturefor them about what
unreasonable hospitality lookslike in practice?
Speaker 2 (08:05):
us?
Yeah, that's a great questionand that's something that I
share with people a lot is thatthis doesn't have to be
expensive, doesn't have to betime consuming you don't have to
hire a whole new team ofhospitality folks for your
business that you can do this atany business, any size, any
scale.
So this is certainly not justfor folks that might consider
themselves to be in thetraditional hospitality industry
(08:25):
of restaurants and hotels.
Right, we're all in thehospitality industry if we have
customers and clients that we'reserving.
And so, thinking about justthose little things that you can
do, again, doesn't have to beexpensive, doesn't have to be
big, doesn't have to be big, canbe, if you want, you can do
(08:47):
something grandiose, buthonestly, it might be things
like thank you cards, justlittle notes that you're sending
people.
Just, you know, payingattention to what clients and
customers are saying and how youcan just like show up for them
in a way that they know you werelistening, you know.
(09:12):
Let's say, for example, you werekind of in this back to school
season right now.
So let's say, you have a clientwhose first child is going off
to college.
Right, it's a big, that's a bigdeal, right, what if you just
sent them a note.
Hey, I know your son ordaughter is going off to college
this week.
I'm just thinking about you.
You know, here's a Starbucksgift card.
You might need a little extracoffee to keep going this week.
What did that cost you Right?
(09:33):
Almost nothing, right.
But your client is like wow one, somebody actually paid
attention to what I said.
Right, I took some time tobuild that relationship.
um knew that I had an importantlife event going on, and so it's
(09:54):
going back to that person goingwow, I feel really seen and
valued by this business, and sothat's a just a you know, simple
example of something you can dothat's going to have a great
impact, right, but doesn't costreally anything else A couple
minutes of your time and youknow a five or $10 Starbucks
card maybe.
Speaker 1 (10:11):
Right, right, and it really just takes that action
right.
I think sometimes it's hard.
We get caught up in all the dayto day and I know for us, for
example, I do member one-on-oneonboardings with all of our new
members.
It really helps me understand.
Why are women joining?
What do they need?
What are they looking for?
Because it's a little differentfor everyone and while we can't
be everything for everyone, wehave a lot to offer as a
(10:31):
community and I know their timeis precious and limited because
they don't get to prioritizethemselves in their careers
often, which is usually why theyjoin.
And so for me to open my doorand say my time is for you, to
help you go in the rightdirection and use this most
effectively.
I just really felt like wedidn't use to do those and once
we started doing those, it wasreally great to see the
(10:51):
increased engagement, theloyalty, the renewals that came
and they were more likely to usetheir membership as well,
versus just kind of do it, payfor it and then resent it
because they never got thechance to really dig in and
figure it out and it'ssystematized.
I was going to say I know wetalked a little bit about
automation, but I actually thinkautomation can help with
hospitality to a degree.
Right, I talk to and onboard alot of people every month, but I
(11:14):
use Read AI for my notes and soif I can't remember or call
something specific and I reallywant to go back and send like a
note or thanks to somebody andmake it meaningful, can go back
to that and be like please helpme remember, you know.
So I think between likeAbsolutely, yeah, absolutely.
Speaker 2 (11:31):
Or if you're talking to somebody, you know, maybe you
have a monthly call withsomeone and you're like I know
they told me about somethingthat was happening with their
kids or their family or theirbusiness or whatever.
You know, we're all human,right, it's hard to remember
everything.
So absolutely you can go backand check that recording so that
you can mention it in the nextcall, because you do want to
(11:53):
know what's going on with themand you are interested and
invested.
Speaker 1 (11:58):
Yeah, yeah.
It's just the older I get I'mlike, the less that fits up here
in this head of mine.
Speaker 2 (12:02):
So I'm like I need all the help I can get.
Yeah, I definitely need likethe note taker following me
around 24-7.
Speaker 1 (12:09):
It's amazing and if I think, if somebody mentioned
something specific, I can startto like just search up a couple
of phrases that I know maybe weshared, because I'm trying to
remember the name of somethingyou know and, like I said, I'm
very much like driven by mycalendar.
So it's like making myselfavailable at certain times is
important so that people knowthat I'm always there for them.
From a hospitality standpoint,it also helps keep me sane and
(12:29):
in check, so I'm not all overthe place at different times.
And then, even with thatworkflow, I use Calendly
personally.
There's always follow-ups thatI have set up and created to
really just make sure they gotwhat they needed out of it and
to ask for feedback and thingslike that.
So there's really a lot of waysyou can do it that, like you
said, aren't expensive andactually aren't time consuming,
(12:50):
but are intentional andthoughtful and hopefully make
people feel seen and heard aswell.
Awesome let's talk about littlemoments with big impact
philosophy and if you couldshare like a specific example of
a small gesture that createdmaybe a disproportionate loyalty
or word of mouth situation.
Speaker 2 (13:08):
Mm.
Hmm, I'm actually going toshare an example that Will
Gadeer gave in a talk last yearwhen I was listening to him at a
workshop.
He was doing some consultingwork with car dealerships and
they were a little, you know,hesitant about all of this, like
this whole concept ofhospitality, and so he was
(13:29):
really digging in with them andasking questions about the whole
customer experience.
Right, because the customerjourney is fast.
Right, there's things thatpeople experience with your
business before they ever even,you know, walk in the door or
engage with you all the way upto post purchase.
Right, that he was asking thesecar dealers was what happens
(13:57):
the first time someone opens theglove box of their new car.
Because we're all going to doit.
Right, we got to put ourinsurance in there, registration
, our Chick-fil-A napkins right,we got to have all that stuff
in the glove box.
So at some point we're openingthe glove box.
And he said you know what, ifyou put in there a note, maybe
from the manager of thedealership, you know, thanks for
(14:18):
buying the new car.
If you need anything, here's mynumber.
And then they put you know, acoffee gift card and have a
coffee on us.
So they did that and had justan amazing reaction from
customers because that was justagain not expensive.
I mean, you're talking aboutwhat a car that could be 30, 40,
(14:41):
50, $60,000 and you're givingsomeone a 10 or $15 gift card
like not a big deal, right.
Quick note put that in theglove box Again.
It's a system, right.
So we know we're going to dothat with everyone.
Put that in the glove box again.
It's a system, right.
We know we're gonna do thatwith everyone.
Put in the box.
Wonderful surprise when I openthe glove box and see that I
(15:03):
have a note from the cardealership and a gift gift card
to go grab a coffee.
That's again, it's just a smallthing but can have a really big
impact and is going to justestablish that business in my
mind in a positive way.
Yeah, I'm probably not going tobuy another car next week,
(15:25):
right, at some point I'm goingto go buy another car purchase,
yeah, right.
And so those little touchpoints like that that just kind
of make people go wow, there'sthat was really nice, Like I
can't believe they did.
That Is really going to make methink.
Maybe I'll go back to thatdealership Right.
Speaker 1 (15:41):
And I'll refer people Absolutely, or I tell someone.
Speaker 2 (15:44):
Oh my gosh, you're not going to believe what
happened.
I opened the glove box of mynew car and guess what was there
?
Because it's not something thata lot of other people are doing
right.
So it is a real surprise, areal treat and something that
can those little things likethat can really have a big
impact.
Speaker 1 (16:04):
Right, yeah, one of my favorite examples is Chewy.
If you guys are familiar withChewy, they do like the pet food
delivery and I think theirintentionality within their
business model is so wonderful.
I mean a lot of us, you knowwe've got our fur babies and
they're basically like family.
So you know, when you're kindof getting that subscription
order every week, every month,whatever you have it set up as
Chewy has it set up, where it'slike if you lose your pet, like
(16:26):
they will send you like a cardfor grievance, they will take
the pet food that you have leftover and donate it to a shelter,
and it's just like and theyjust built it into their
business model from the start.
And I think it's little thingslike that that actually made
them kind of come out ahead ofthe race when it came to online
pet food subscriptions.
Right Cause, I mean, anybodycould kind of jump in and do
(16:46):
that.
But to me, what has always madethem stand out is like that
little bit of understanding thatour pets are family.
Yes, and so making that wholeexperience, especially when
you're suffering from like aloss, it's just, it's tremendous
, and I've had so many peoplecomment on it and recommend it
and all of that good stuff.
So yeah, even though it's likea little bit more expensive
(17:07):
sometimes, we're like we're justgoing to do it, because then we
know that it's a good businessand we know that they care.
Speaker 2 (17:12):
It's a great example I've heard other people talk
about that that as well afteryeah, a pet passes away and then
they'll get a little somethingfrom from Chewy about that, and
that's a wonderful example ofjust going a little bit above
and beyond.
But again, just really.
Now we're just like Chewy, yay.
Speaker 1 (17:33):
Right Like they really like.
Speaker 2 (17:34):
That's how you build that customer loyalty.
Um, and you're right, Sometimesmaybe it, maybe it is a couple
of dollars more, but I'm likeman, they, they care, so I'm
going to stick with them, go outof my way.
Speaker 1 (17:47):
Another great example I had was the woman that I used
to work with at an agency andit was kind of before Lululemon
blew up, but she had beenwearing it for years.
And she was a woman that I usedto work with at an agency and it
was kind of before Lululemonblew up, but she had been
wearing it for years and she wasa runner and they had a pair of
tights that were like herabsolute favorites and you know,
I think she paid like a hundredplus dollars for these pair of
running tights and she had leftthem in the locker room at the
gym at the office and somebodyhad stolen them and she was
(18:10):
pretty devastated and I thinkthat they weren't making these
particular ones anymore maybe.
And so she went to the store andwas shopping for a new pair and
when somebody came to ask tohelp her, she kind of told them
what happened and they gave hera gift card to buy whatever pair
that she felt was the next bestthing to the one that they
discontinued for her, becausethat was like the really thing
that made her live it.
(18:31):
She was obviously upsettinghaving a hundred dollar plus
pants stolen, but also latestolen, but then also to know
that, like those, that design isnot around anymore and you
can't buy them again.
Yes.
Yeah, I think that was reallysweet and I think that's another
great you know.
Thought too is like empoweringyour employees and your team
with the ability to providethose hospitable moments is
(18:53):
really powerful as well.
Speaker 2 (18:55):
Yeah, I think that's huge.
You have to give your team theability to make those decisions
and to be able to do you knowthose kinds of things right,
because that's not, it's notgoing to have the same impact.
If you're like, I don't know,let me run it up the chain of
command and go through a bunchof red tape and kind of figure
it out, like you.
(19:15):
Just your team just has to knowthat they have the freedom to
make those decisions.
And if it's going to, if it'sgoing to really be a moment of
hospitality, like, do it youknow, yeah, yeah, empower them
to be able to do that.
Speaker 1 (19:28):
Yeah, I agree, because it's.
It feels weird when it feelslike the bureaucracy cause, then
you, as the person and thecustomer, you're like I feel
like I'm being a burden and I'mcreating more work on somebody
else's part, so that doesn'tfeel like hospitality at all.
Well, I mean, our community is,you know, vastly hybrid.
We do in person, but we're alsovery much digital, and then our
whole industry has become verymuch remote teams, online
(19:50):
services, digital products.
So I'm kind of curious for ourlisteners, especially like how
do you create hospitality magicwhen you're not physically
face-to-face with folks?
Speaker 2 (20:00):
Yeah, that's definitely a little harder if
you don't have kind of that likebrick and mortar or kind of
like face-to-face interaction.
For sure, but just even some ofthe other things that we've
talked about, whether it's justsending notes or sending people
little gifts, or I know I workwith a lot of folks remotely and
usually when someone startsworking with me I'll send them a
(20:20):
little something in the mail.
You know, maybe it's a copy oflike the story brand book or the
unreasonable hospitality book,or maybe it's a little um, I
like to send people things.
I'm based in Asheville, northCarolina, so sometimes I like to
send people things from likelocal businesses, right, like
little you know goodies orsomething like that.
So even just putting togethersort of a little you know, I'm
(20:43):
excited to work with you kind ofpacket, a little gift, a little
you know birthday card or youknow just even little things
like that that you can do thatagain are small, they're not
super expensive, but they'rejust kind of letting people know
that you care and that can be agood way to connect with folks
when you're not like right inthe same same space.
Speaker 1 (21:06):
I feel like it kind of goes a little bit farther too
right when you're not in thesame physical space, and then
you send something that liketactile farther too right when
you're not in the same physicalspace, and then you send
something that like tactile.
It's always kind of like, oh,that's so cool, like I wasn't
expecting that.
I mean, I've had calls withpeople that have done that, that
have sent thank you, likehandwritten thank you cards.
After like a coffee chat, I'mlike, oh my gosh, that's so cool
.
And it's been a, it's been aminute, but I had oh my gosh,
(21:30):
it's been more than a minute.
So my memory is going to fail mehere, but we had another
podcast guest Gosh.
I want to say it was like twoyears ago when we were talking
about connection and actually italso came up in that podcast
episode and the one with NancyHarhut which talks about using
behavioral psychology formarketing and it's that like
(21:51):
rule of reciprocity, right, whensomebody does something nice
for us, we kind of want to dosomething nice in return, and so
that's what I meant when wewere talking through the opening
is like you being morehospitable towards your
customers, your clients,whomever it gives something back
to you.
Right, it makes us feel good tomake other people feel good,
right, it's not completelyselfless.
Speaker 2 (22:12):
That's right, a hundred percent.
Yeah, I mean we love likesending.
I mean I love like kind ofsending people things, or like
putting together a little noteor something like that for folks
just to kind of, you know, justbrighten people's day, right.
Or again it kind of goes backto that paying attention to the
things that people are talkingabout, right, so you can send
(22:33):
something.
You know you mentioned the, youknow the pets, right, maybe
somebody got a new pet or theylost their pet, or you know they
love, you know they love dogs,so you send them a little
something you know for their petor that's pet themed, right.
So so it, it goes even just alittle bit step further than
just kind of a more generic giftor note, but it shows that you
(22:56):
actually paid attention tosomething that they told you
about themselves.
Speaker 1 (23:01):
I love it.
I mean I think that's a greatnote too to our job seekers who
are listening as well, you know,because it's a tough market out
there right now in the jobworld.
So yeah, kind of thinking outof the box when you're reaching
out, but also kind of with thatfollow up.
I think people sometimes arelike I feel like such a nag
following up.
So maybe just find fun,creative, interesting ways to
kind of follow up to.
(23:21):
One, it'll be more fun for you,and two, it'll probably be more
fun for the recruiters too,cause I mean they're on the
other side of things veryoverwhelmed, and so finding that
opportunity and the ability tokind of make that connection
stronger through a little bit ofhospitality in that realm too,
it was like why not?
Speaker 2 (23:34):
100%, absolutely.
Speaker 1 (23:36):
Yeah for sure.
So for our listeners who areworking with and serving clients
, I'm curious how do you beginto identify some of the key
touch points where hospitalitycan make a big difference?
Could you walk us through thatprocess and what that might look
like?
Speaker 2 (23:49):
Yeah, and what that might look like.
Yeah, so this is actually partof the workshop that I will do
with folks is really kind oftaking a minute to first kind of
get our heads wrapped around.
you know what is hospitality andhow that how that is different
from just providing people witha service, like the thing
they're paying us for.
So how can we start to go aboveand beyond?
And then we'll really take sometime to map out all of those
(24:10):
customer touch points and youknow some of them are going to
come to you like really quickly.
Right, they're obvious, butwhen you really start like
digging deeper and reallystarting to think about it, I
mean, you're just going to startto have 50, 60, you might even
get into a hundred or more touchpoints that customers have with
you and and I like to encouragepeople to think about those
(24:31):
before um, you know, people buyfrom you.
That might be consuming contenton your social media, that
might be going to your website.
How easy is it for people tonavigate around your website and
schedule an appointment withyou or make a purchase, right,
that's a customer touch point.
Then, of course, there's theactual, you know, purchase or
(24:52):
working together, right, all thedifferent ways.
What are the emailcommunications that people get,
the meetings like, all thedifferent ways that you're
interacting with them.
And then even you know beyond,right, the end of a engagement,
right?
Or you finish a project orsomething like what's happening
after the fact.
Are there some things built inthat you can continue to kind of
(25:14):
stay in touch with them?
So, yeah, really taking sometime to map all of those out,
that can take a minute.
You really start, startthinking about it and then you
can start to look at thedifferent impacts of those.
Are there some of those thatare naturally like positive and
fun for people?
Are there some that are alittle more negative and I don't
(25:39):
necessarily mean that negativein that you're doing a bad job
but a really good example ofthat is when you go out to
dinner.
A quote negative touch point isgetting your your bill.
Yeah, right, cause you werejust like oh, I didn't order
that, I got to pay for this.
So, it's not that they didanything wrong, it's just a
(26:00):
negative um experience Causewe're like shoot, I've got to
pay for it.
Um same thing If we're sendingclients invoices or things like
that right.
Again, they know they're goingto have to pay for it, but it's
not the most fun part of ourtime together.
So what can I do to maybe makethat a little better?
Are there touch points alongthat journey that you're just
(26:21):
not even paying that muchattention to?
They're just kind of happeningand you're like you know what,
actually, if we did this thing,that would that would actually
really make that experiencebetter for people.
You know, a really commonexample is thinking about if you
, if you have a brick and mortarbusiness, you know the
(26:41):
restrooms, right, that's one,that's one that sometimes gets
overlooked.
So what's the restroom in yourbusiness?
Right?
If it's virtual, the thing thatyou're just kind of like, yeah,
people use this, but I didn'treally I didn't really pay that
much attention to it, like it'sjust okay.
So how can I start to level upthose touch points?
And again, you know, if youhave a hundred of them, you
(27:01):
can't do them all at once.
So start to prioritize andmaybe you just pick.
You know we're going to startwith three, right, and we're
going to do that, and then we'regoing to add like a couple more
and we're just going tocontinue to work our way through
this list of touch points andhow can we just make that
experience just a little bitbetter for clients?
(27:22):
And again, it doesn't have tobe huge, big, grandiose or
expensive.
It can be just really like evensmall stuff, really simple
things.
Speaker 1 (27:33):
Yeah, and I love your point.
There too, I think we oftendisregard.
You know, when a client isleaving, or a customer is
canceling, or they're asking fora return or a refund, it's so
easy, I think, especially as abusiness owner, sometimes to be
like, fine, be gone, but it'slike, no like.
To me.
The best thing you can do isactually me even making the the
(27:56):
point like you're saying, thepain point of partying as
pleasant as possible.
Now, I'm not saying be adoormat, but I'm saying like for
me, if somebody is like, hey, Ineed to cancel, for whatever
reason, I'm always like listen,we're going to do what we can
for you.
That's totally fine, weunderstand.
But please know that we arehere for you, even if you're not
(28:17):
within the community and amember right now.
Because to me it's like younever want to burn a bridge,
like unless they were just anawful customer and they need to
go.
That's maybe a different thing,right, that's right, and that
does happen sometimes, right,right, right, and that's that's
a whole nother story.
But I think you know, really,looking at when that point of
departure is like so for yourcar example, you know the car is
(28:42):
sold, they didn't need to doanything extra, but by putting
that gift card into the glovecompartment it just, you know,
again takes it that extra mile.
Pun intended on, kind ofemphasizing, you know, the
desire to make sure that therelationship continues, I was
going to say too.
It also reminds me of even my,our realtor.
I mean we bought our house 12years ago.
She's amazing.
The reason why she's one of thetop realtors in our area is
because she invites us to herhouse for like get togethers and
(29:06):
she sends a Christmas card andyou know she sends like things
for the birthdays and I mean shedoesn't have to go out of her
way and do all of that.
But because she does that, Iwill always recommend her
because she was a good realtoras well, obviously.
But just that little extra, Imean this always keeps her top
of mind and as a realtor,referrals number one in getting
(29:26):
new business.
Speaker 2 (29:27):
We've had real estate agents that have done that
before too, and we'll stillsometimes send us things, even
though we don't even live in thesame city.
We wouldn't be using them again, necessarily.
They'll still send us a littlesomething, or send me a little
notes or something like that.
And so just those and againsmall things.
Right, We've really emphasizedthat this does not have to be
(29:49):
bigger, expensive stuff, it justtakes a little bit of thought.
Speaker 1 (29:53):
Yeah, yeah.
So I guess that that leadsperfectly into the next question
.
Or what are some low cost, highimpact hospitality strategies
that someone could implementLike yeah, I think, yeah, I
think we've talked about a lotof things like that.
Speaker 2 (30:05):
I mean just even little small notes and reminders
and gestures, things that youcan do there.
I think it again.
I think one of the reallyimportant things is just paying
attention to people.
So I'll actually share a littlestory from the unreasonable
hospitality book that um willhas talked about a lot some
(30:26):
people might have heard.
But um again, he has a veryhigh-end restaurant in new york
city and he um just they were alittle bit short-staffed, I
believe, and he was just kind ofhelping pitch in and clear a
couple of tables, do a fewthings Happens to hear a group
of people who had been in NewYork city.
They were big foodies.
(30:46):
They had gone to all of thelike really top-notch
restaurants all around town.
They were ending eating at hisrestaurant and then they were
off, you know, back to whereverthey came from.
So he happens to overhear themtalking about all the different
places that they've been eating,but their one, um gosh, the one
regret they had was they neveractually got to have a hot dog
(31:07):
from a New York city hot dogstand Right.
And so he pops out, goes outside, gets the $2 hot dog from the
hot dog cart outside therestaurant, takes it into the
kitchen, convinces the the chefto cut it up into like three
little pieces, put it on one oftheir fancy plates you know
(31:28):
little fancy, you know dash ofketchup and take it out to the
table and those people were like, oh my gosh, blown away right
over the again this two dollarhot Um.
But it wasn't so much about thehot dog, it was the gesture, it
was the fact that he had sloweddown enough to hear that
(31:49):
conversation, and so I thinkthat's where we can really have
a lot of impact is going.
Okay, let me listen to thethings that my my clients and my
customers are telling me.
Um, especially when you workwith, you know, if you're in
like consulting or coaching andyou have a lot of like
one-on-one interactions withpeople, I think that can be a
really wonderful opportunity tohear what people are saying here
(32:12):
.
You know, what can you do tomake just either add a little
fun right, a little hot dog totheir life um or or something
else that you can do for themthat's really going to help them
in their business as well.
And again, that's a small, youknow, low cost example, but it
just requires you to be mindfuland to always have this idea of
(32:35):
hospitality at the forefront ofyour mind yeah, it sounds like a
little bit of active listeningand action, right, just kind of
like don't even wait, just gooutside.
Speaker 1 (32:43):
outside, buy the hot dog, bring it in.
I love that story yeah.
Speaker 2 (32:46):
And same thing, you know.
If that had been a staff member, you know, I think, letting the
staff member again, like wetalked about earlier, feel
empowered they could have beenlike hey, no, I'm going to dash
outside and grab this hot dogreal quick, you know it'd be
really cool.
Speaker 1 (33:00):
Yeah, yeah, so all right.
So you also mentioned thatkindness scales, how and I kind
of alluded to some of thisearlier, but I'm sure you've
probably got some other ways toshare of how you systematize
hospitality without losing itsauthentic and more personal feel
.
Speaker 2 (33:14):
Yeah, and I think that's huge because you you do
want people to feel like theyare special and like they're
getting something really unique,but at the same time, as a
business, you do have to havesome systems in place so you can
do this.
So I think one of those is oneof the ways that you can do that
is look for what we call therecurring moments in your
(33:36):
business.
What are the things that happenwith some regularities, and how
can you build a system in placethat says, okay, when this
happens, we do this thing.
So you know, for example, Iwork with a lot of folks that,
um, I'm helping them, you know,build a new website.
So an example of that could belike great, when a person's
(33:59):
person's, when a client'swebsite launches, they get.
You know, maybe they get somekind of a gift, they get.
You know, one time I sent aclient some cupcakes, you know,
just to kind of celebrate thelaunch of their new website
because they had been working onit for such a long time, and it
was a really big website andtook, you know, took a minute,
and so having those kinds ofthings go great.
(34:20):
When we launch a new websitefor a client, they get this.
Or when someone starts anengagement with us, they get a
little kind of welcome gift or awelcome note or something like
that.
Again, just thinking about whatare the things that happen on a
regular basis.
(34:41):
That also helps if you have ateam, then they're going to know
like, oh great, whenever thisthing occurs, we do this or
maybe you know you work with um,let's say you work with a lot
of moms right and they have, andso you have a lot of moms maybe
they're having.
If they're young moms, they'rehaving a baby, right.
And so every time one of ourclients has a baby, we send them
(35:02):
this thing or whatever rightFlowers or a onesie or whatever
Right, but just having thatsystem in place.
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (35:11):
Yeah, systems and process, I think, make all of it
easier, and then I make surethat it is always happening and
it's staying top of mind.
Speaker 2 (35:18):
Because, again, being a business owner, oh my God,
look what I got Right.
It doesn't matter thateverybody else you know is also
getting that.
They don't care, they're justthinking like wow this is
awesome.
Speaker 1 (35:28):
I feel really special .
No, I agree, I agree.
So what would you say are thebiggest mistakes you see
businesses make when they try toimplement hospitality driven
marketing?
Are there any pitfalls or trapsthey should be on the lookout
for?
Speaker 2 (35:40):
I think one is making sure that it is genuine, right.
I mean, we don't.
Yes, at the end of the day,this will help us grow our
business, it will help us getrepeat customers and referrals
and marketing and all of that.
So there's certainly thatbenefit to us.
But we also want to make surethat we're not just like, well,
I just I need to do hospitalitybecause I need to do it Right.
(36:02):
We want that genuine connectionand relationship with our
customers and clients.
So so, making sure that ourmotives are pure, I guess, um,
and that you know this issomething that we really believe
in, um, and that's also howwe're going to get our team you
know, if you have a team reallygetting everybody on the same
page with this, so that you knowit really can come from top
(36:27):
down and everybody has thisbuy-in, this sense of ownership,
this culture of hospitalitywithin your organization.
So I think that's huge, that'shuge.
And then I think again, justlike, as we mentioned earlier,
just not making the assumptionthat this is going to be a big
undertaking, right, that it canbe something simple.
You can just pick one thingright next month that you're
(36:50):
going to do right, one littlething.
Speaker 1 (36:53):
Yeah, I think that's the best way.
When things feel big, right,what's the next little little
step we need to take when maybeit feels overwhelming and kind
of on that note, like I canimagine a lot of our listeners
wanting to go back right andmaybe talk to their bosses
because you're a hundred percentright, it has to be bought in
from the top down if it's goingto be implemented and done well,
and we're adding it to process,like we're talking about
(37:14):
oftentimes as a marketing.
You know we are constantlyasked like what's the ROI?
How do you measure the ROI?
Constantly asked like whatwhat's the ROI?
How do you measure the ROI?
Right, so you know what aresome of the ways in which we can
either be looking at, talkingabout tracking, you know the
ways in which hospitality mighttruly be working to help the
bottom line of a business,because sometimes that's just
(37:35):
what people care about,unfortunately.
Speaker 2 (37:37):
For sure.
Yeah, that's true, absolutely.
And I think you can, I can use,I think you can use some of
your traditional marketingmetrics as well, right?
So even looking at things likereferrals, reviews, right, those
kinds of things, maybe you havesome stuff set up where people
are more apt to share, like onsocial media things like that,
(37:59):
right, so you can do some ofthose things.
I also think that this fallsinto that long game concept,
right, I mean, this is notnecessarily the kind of thing
that you're like great, westarted sending thank you notes
today and tomorrow we doubledour business.
Right, with like, with a lot ofour marketing.
Yes, sometimes we do seeimmediate results, sometimes the
(38:21):
results are over time.
Right, right, and it's just.
It's building the relationship,building the trust and the
rapport with the customers andclients.
That's going to take youthrough the long, long game.
Right, I mean, it's like thecar example we talked about.
I'm not going to buy the carfrom you today and then buy
(38:42):
another car from you tomorrow,but I may come back in seven,
eight, nine years.
Speaker 1 (38:48):
Right, buying the car from you well, and I also would
think that I might go to them.
Now it might not go out of myway to like get oil change
somewhere.
I might go there to get the carservice and oil change because
I felt that much more taken careof when I was there versus
doing like a jiffy lube.
You know what I mean, whereit's like I'm in and out and bam
.
Thank you, ma'am, now we'removing on, so yeah.
Speaker 2 (39:09):
Absolutely.
I think it's it's it's havingthat, that perspective of going.
You know, I'm in this for thelong haul and I will see the
results.
They may not necessarily betomorrow, but I will see the
results of this effort.
Speaker 1 (39:21):
Agree, agree.
Yeah, it's like that long leadmarketing nobody ever wants to
talk about.
We always want, like, theimmediate results.
We're all too overstimulatedand too used to immediate
gratification that it's kind ofa bummer because you're leaving
money on the table.
You're literally leaving moneyon the table by not putting into
place like hospitable practiceswithin your business to make
sure that you sustain the leads,the business, the relationships
(39:42):
that you currently have,because those are going to be
your best bet.
Right, it's like marketingone-on-one.
So it's like so funny that thisthese feel like revelations
because they really shouldn't beright, I know, but we kind of
live in this world of like let'sgo viral, Right, Like people
just want to be like.
Speaker 2 (39:57):
I did this thing and I went viral and I'm like okay,
well, sometimes that happensRight, but not very often.
Speaker 1 (40:05):
Right, not very often .
And then what?
Oh, that's another good podcastepisode of ours too Y'all
should go back and listen to,with Kenya Kelly talking about
TikTok and that whole sense oflike she had a law firm come to
her and they were like we wantto go viral.
And she's like she had a lawfirm come to her and they were
like we want to go viral.
And she's like do you want togo viral or do you actually want
leads you can close?
They were like oh, we wantleads, we can close.
(40:26):
She's like then let me do whatI need to do and I'm going to
get you a hundred new leads.
And they're like what?
Nothing we've ever done hascreated a hundred leads.
She's like well, going viral,that'll get you there.
And so, yeah, she got them overa hundred leads and I think
they got like 20 of those closedand it was like the biggest
boom in their business they hadseen.
(40:47):
And you know again I think thatflash in the pan notion for as
long as I've been in thisbusiness.
It's like is are we done withthat?
Yet it's been like 15, 20 years.
Folks, can we not use the wordviral anymore?
Because I mean it doesn't have.
And then it's funny becausethey put the pressure on ROI.
But what's the ROI of viral?
Speaker 2 (41:07):
Right, yeah, right.
I think it's always about.
I think in 99.9% of cases it isquality over quantity.
Yes, right, so I would muchrather have a hundred like
really solid leads than amillion people that just saw it
and just moved on.
(41:27):
Yep, Right, I am with you, yeah.
You're going to get much betterresults that way, so Absolutely
Well.
Speaker 1 (41:34):
And then not only that, but you're just kind of
working with the kinds of peoplethat you want to be working
with.
I think that's like thephilosophy I've taken on with
Together Digital and ourmembership.
It's like how are you going togrow?
How are you going to scale?
You're at 500.
You're going to get to 2000.
I'm like no dude.
It's like I'm not trying topack a room, I'm trying to make
an impact on an individual levelwith women who don't feel seen
and heard.
And so I said I want qualityover quantity.
(41:57):
I want the kinds of women whoare collaborative, who are open
to listening and learning andhelping others, and not power
hoarding or shaming or blamingor any of that stuff that a lot
of us get conditioned to do inmost other environments.
And so to me that's a verysacred space, you know.
And so, yeah, I am I've saidthat so many times the quality
over quantity and the sustainversus scale.
(42:19):
And again, it just comes withthe nature of our business and
what we're trying to do, becausewe're trying to achieve a
mission.
So does it like really make thebottom line big?
No, but it helps us keep goingto achieve the goal that we're
out to do so obviously I know mybusiness is coming from a
different place.
No, that's awesome.
Yeah, awesome, awesome, allright.
(42:39):
Well, I'm going to check inwith our live listening audience
real quick.
I just thought my phone was mymouse gosh.
It's Friday.
You guys, I went to go, clickmy phone.
If you have questions, feelfree to drop them in the chat.
But we're going to take a quickpivot over into our power round
, which are like kind of our funquick questions and then we'll
wrap for the day if we don'thave any questions from you all.
But we appreciate you alllistening in.
(43:01):
All right, what is the smallestgesture that's created the
biggest client reaction for you?
Speaker 2 (43:07):
I think for me it is I mentioned earlier like just
sending people little gifts,sometimes when we start working
together or sometimes at theholiday.
If I did a big project forsomeone, I'll send something,
and I usually will always try tosend something from a local
business because I like tosupport other local business and
so I'll send, you know, maybe agift basket or something like
(43:29):
that and, um, you know, thenI'll get like a text from
someone with a picture of that.
Oh my gosh, I can't believe youdid this.
This was so wonderful.
You know how nice, what a greatgesture.
Or you know, last year someonedid say, well, I loved
everything that you sent.
It was all from, from Asheville, you know, that was so great.
And so, um, I think those kindsof things just as a little bit
(43:50):
unexpected, um, surprises, oroccasionally I'll send a client
like maybe just a book that Ithought they would be interested
in, um, and people will textagain, text me a picture and be
like my gosh, thanks for sendingthis.
You know, what a great littlesurprise.
So, again, just kind of thoselittle small things that just
show you're thinking aboutpeople and committed to their
(44:11):
success and the success of otherbusinesses in your community.
Speaker 1 (44:15):
Yeah, I love it.
I love it.
All right.
What's the unexpected placethat you've seen?
Amazing hospitality thatinspired your business approach.
Speaker 2 (44:22):
Oh gosh, that's a tough one.
I was trying to think of anunexpected place.
A little story came to mind.
This is not an unexpected place, but I was thinking about this
yesterday when we took a trip toDisney several years ago.
So, again, not really anunexpected place, but just
another example of kind ofhospitality and action when, uh,
(44:43):
we went to animal kingdom andmy daughter was probably like
maybe like nine or so.
You know, they have those likescavenger hunt, map kind of
things and, um, she always lovedthose as a kid, so she wanted
to like check off all the thingsyou were supposed to do, and
then you were supposed to turnin your map or whatever the end
of the day and you got some kindof little prize it was probably
like a sticker or something.
(45:04):
Yeah, something happened and wehad gotten a little bit delayed
and we ended up not getting themap back in time and, uh, she
was quite upset, yeah, and therewere tears, and we were with
some friends of ours who, um,live in Orlando and they're
Disney pass holders and so theygo to Disney all the time, and
(45:24):
so she went up and spoke to um,a staff member, and um explained
what had happened, and so youknow, there was a little bit of
back and forth and then theyactually ended up letting her
pick out, um, like a stuffedanimal from one of the gift
shops, right?
So tears are gone, she's happy,everybody's happy.
But that was just another goodexample of like making sure that
(45:45):
your staff is empowered to dothat.
Obviously that's, that's part ofdisney's culture, right?
They want everybody to leavehappy.
They don't want tears, right?
So that's a part of their thing.
It's like you know what, if it,if that kid is going to be
happy and that family is goingto be happy, take the stuffed
animal and off you go.
I think she still has thatstuffed animal.
She's 17.
Speaker 1 (46:06):
So you know what we need to do.
We I need to introduce you toRita Richa, who is has another
podcast as well, called BippityBoppity Business.
I loved her podcast so much itwas just absolutely delightful.
I am I am a Disney nerd.
My family, like I, grew uppodcast so much.
It was just absolutelydelightful.
I am, I am a Disney nerd.
My family, like I, grew upwatching the movies.
My mom is a great illustratorand you know, if she'd had her
(46:26):
way, maybe been an animator withthem at some point, but, um,
life never got her there.
Um, but because of that, likethis, her approach on the
podcast is really like what canwe learn from?
Like the Disney business modeland a lot of it has to do with
the hospitality you know and howit's absolutely deeply
ingrained in everything thatthey do and the approach and it
(46:47):
all stemmed from Walt's initialvision of what that world, he
wanted that world to be like andit's such a fun and it really
makes you look at and thinkabout your business differently
in the ways that she asks youquestions and framing things up
in like a Disney mindset.
So if you're a Disney nerds,definitely tune in to Rita's
podcast and Holly, I'll have tointroduce the two of you.
Speaker 2 (47:07):
Yeah, we'll be doing a great job of that of just
making sure that people feelreally well cared for.
Speaker 1 (47:13):
So yeah, yeah, and it's brilliant because it's like
so many people and it's funnypeople have been like it feels
childish, rita, that you'redoing like a whole podcast.
It's like so many people andit's funny People have been like
it feels childish, rita, thatyou're doing like a whole
podcast.
It's like the philosophy ofDisney and business and I'm like
but tell me another businessthat is as successful as Disney
is doing what they do.
Yeah, you know, I'm like how isthat not a good business case
(47:34):
to study?
Oh, all right, last power roundquestion and then we'll wrap
for the day One hospitality myththat you wish you could bust
for marketers right now.
Speaker 2 (47:46):
Yeah, I think it's reminding people that we're all
in the hospitality business.
Some people do say, well, thisdoesn't apply to me.
I'm not a hotel, I'm not arestaurant, I'm not a tourist
attraction Right, the thingsthat we sort of typically think
of as hospitality.
But if you have people thatyou're serving, if you have
customers, if you have clients,if you have people that you want
to hire you or buy from you,you're in the hospitality
(48:09):
business.
And so I think that we justhave to get into that mindset.
I'm going all of us, ourbusiness, our clients, whatever,
like they are all in thehospitality business and we can
all have a hospitality mindset.
Speaker 1 (48:22):
Yeah, amen to that.
Well, we will wrap it there.
Thank you so much, holly.
This has been such a thoughtfulconversation about how
transforming clientrelationships through genuine
care and attention can reallytake your business farther and,
honestly, be a genuinecompetitive advantage.
So excited to share this morewith our community For our
listeners.
Remember, this Power Lounge isbeing recorded live and it'll be
(48:43):
available next week on YouTubeand our podcast, so be sure to
check those out and subscribe.
Like and subscribe, as my kidswould say.
If you're inspired byconversations like this and want
to be a part of our communitythat is navigating the future of
what it means to be workingtogether both digitally and in
person, again go check out ourwebsite at togetherindigitalcom.
Thank you all for joining ustoday and we hope to see you all
(49:05):
next week.
And be sure to connect withHolly on LinkedIn.
Holly Fisher, thank you forjoining us again today.
Speaker 2 (49:12):
Thanks, this was really a lot of fun.
Appreciate it.
Speaker 1 (49:14):
Absolutely All right, everyone.
We hope to see you all nextweek.
Until then, keep asking, keepgiving and keep growing.
We'll see you all next week,until then keep asking, keep
giving and keep growing.
Speaker 2 (49:25):
We'll see you soon.
La, la, la, la, la, la, la, la,la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la,
la, la, la la.
Produced by Heartcast Media.
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