Hello and welcome back!

In honor of Nat’l Get to Know Your Customers Day on 7/20, we are chatting with Alishia today. She is a social media advertising strategist and owner of Social EllaMents. Over the course of a decade of working for corporations specializing in Operations and Marketing Management, Alishia decided it was time to step away from the corporate grind. Still having a passion for marketing and helping businesses grow she found a fantastic mentorship program to help start up her own social media advertising agency, Social EllaMents Marketing. Now she's able to help businesses grow online (which she loves!) and has the flexibility needed for her family of four, plus two dogs, and a handful of chickens. It's a win-win in her book!

Main Topics included in this Episode

  • Alishia’s background with marketing
  • Her journey into Mompreneurship and current daily rhythm
  • The social media advertising services she specializes in
  • Facebook Ads and the benefits of focusing on them
  • Identifying your customers and marketing to them in a genuine way

Connect with Alishia

Connect with Alysha

Music Licensing Info

Music by Eli Lev - Dancin' on the Lawn

Link

Episode Transcription

Speaker 1

Hello and welcome back to the Messy Mompreneur podcast. I'm your host, Alysha Sanford, and I'm so happy to have you here today we're chatting with another Alishia. She is the boss. Mama over at social elements marketing. She's local to the Roseburg area, but of course offers her services virtually so you don't have to be local. But if you're a local listener and you find her to be helpful and want to connect. Care for possibly checking into her services? Definitely connect and support another local mompreneur she helps coaches, consultants and entrepreneurs grow exponentially online using social media advertising. She's going to be sharing more about her expertise and her journey into mompreneurship. Yourself, I am excited to chat with her and for you guys to hear. Her everything she has to offer because I am sure if you're anything like me, we can always do a little more and put in a little more effort into our business marketing. So without further ado, let's chat with Alishia. Thank you so much for joining me as we get started, can you share a little bit about yourself and your family?

Speaker 2

So I am a mom and wife first. So I'm married to my high school sweetheart and we have two children, ages 8 and 10. And you know, we've been in Roseburg, local Roseburg residents for most of our lives, and my husband and I met in high school. So we've kind of been through this whole journey of growing up together and learning how to be parents and all the things that come along with that, so yeah.

Speaker 1

So can you tell us a bit about your journey into your, well, I guess your timeline as far as your career and motherhood and then entrepreneurship and kind of how that all came about?

Speaker 2

Yeah, for sure. I think like I've always known that I wanted to be a business owner like deep down, but it didn't really hit me until like much later in life. I started my journey. In like the safe zone, I went to college and did like, you know, the right thing. Got a job in the medical field, worked in the medical field for, like, over 10 years. And it was great. And I learned a lot. And I really learned marketing through that also. But then the pandemic happened, and those of us that were in the medical field. Like our lives kind. Of got flipped upside down. And at that time, it was like time to reevaluate like priorities and. And so I tried something different and I worked for a marketing agency for a little while. And there is just like this like this overwhelming poll to just be home with my kids at that moment. And I've always felt that way working that like 9 to 5 gig. So we just decided. That we were going to try and. Make it work and. So I could be home with the kids and. So we did it and there's like this part of me that's like something still missing. Like I'm a mom, but there's, like, more to me than just being a mom and a parent like I have. I have more to give to the world. And I found a program, a mentorship program that specialized in digital marketing. And what I do now and I. Was like I'm just going to do it going try it and see like. How this goes? And I did it and I started my own company and here we are. So yeah, that was kind. Of my in a short. Summed up version my journey from. College to where I am now, and that desire of wanting to be home but be able to still provide more than just. Being a mom, you know I love being a mom, but I think there's more that I can. Give to the. World so.

Speaker 1

I love that I resonate with that too, because I. I've got a toddler and she's my only kiddo. I was already in the journey of entrepreneurship, but doing them signal simultaneously, I think about what it would be like if I was, you know, not I don't want to say just a mom, but if I didn't have the pull and distraction and deadlines of, you know, running a business on the side. And I'm like, I don't know if I. I don't know. I could see my mind going crazy and like stir crazy in certain ways because I just feel like I want to be building something as well, making memories of my kiddo, but also building something.

Speaker 2

Yeah, there's like that side of us. That's like I can do bigger. And more things.

Speaker 1

No, you're good. We have an indoor cat. We don't have any dogs, but I can only imagine. The cute noises. They'd make.

Speaker 2

This one, she's like, anticipating dad to get home. So she's out the window so.

Speaker 1

So is this your, this is your first year in your business then?

Speaker 2

Yes, it is. Yeah. Yeah. I officially launched in December of 2022. So I'm really only like 6 months into my own business, but been in the marketing space for many years.

Speaker 1

So you're bringing all your expertise and your experience.

Speaker 2

Yes, trying.

Speaker 1

Your how to. This is also the first summer that you are working from home with having the kids home too.

Speaker 2

So this is my first summer, which, you know, summers are always like they bring like this level of like uncertainty with childcare. And like all the things and like ohh I need to get to basketball camp. You know, like from this time to this time and whatever else it is, when your kids get older. And so this is my first summer. And it's been so far. It's been great, but it also comes with, like, a little bit more chaos too.

Speaker 1

I can totally see. Can you? OK, so I'm going to see if you can share a bit more about the marketing services that you offer and you specialize in, I know it's all social media based, right or primarily. OK.

Speaker 2

So, yeah, I specialize in social media advertising. That's why I am like certified in, you know, went through a mentorship program for that was, like, more targeted for that. But with social media advertising comes like. Other things obviously, so I can do many other things, including building out web pages and funnels and e-mail marketing. And all of. The other parts and pieces that go because it's not just like one thing, it usually branches into multiple things. But yeah, so I specialize in the social media advertising. But along with that comes many, many other things that I can help businesses with and kind of dial it in.

Speaker 1

I see you share a lot about Facebook ads. Would you say that something that you maybe primarily focus on or that you have most clients reaching out to you for?

Speaker 2

So that's like my like, I guess you would say it's my like bread and butter of what I do for business and with the social media ads comes along, many other things cause you start with the ad and then from the ad it usually takes you somewhere. It could be like a landing page, it could be a messaging bot, it. Just depends on what you're trying to get from those customers that are interacting with. Those ads. So yeah, I specialize in the whole picture of that is not just like getting the ad onto Facebook and getting it in front of the audience. It's like, what kind of journey are we? Going to take them through once they click into the ad once they opt in and making sure that it all. Flows and is fluid and is the messaging is you know what you want to portray as a business owner.

Speaker 1

I have to admit I haven't run any Facebook ads in years and I'm sure it's wildly different and probably a lot more dialed in and more successful than they used to be with, you know, the technology and everything changing. So I this is something that I am making a priority. Soon to get on to, and I'll probably be reaching out to you because I have no idea what I'm doing. They used to have this system where you could go in and kind. Of set. Your I guess criteria of who you're trying to. Each and I don't know I'm. I would imagine they still have that, but it's probably a lot more involved than. It used to be.

Speaker 2

Yeah, yeah. I mean, Facebook ads have been around for a long time. I did when I worked in the medical field way back when. I honestly like they have changed so much in Facebook just alone. If you use Facebook as a business owner, you're like, hey, what's going to be new on Facebook today? Like they like to change things up. Some people. So yeah, there is a team, the back end of Facebook are really like robust ads management system that is like. I mean, like I you don't see this kind of tracking with other kind of advertising. I mean you see it with Google a little bit, but just in general like they're tracking their ability with their advertising is just completely different than other platforms and that's why I. Focused on this because I knew going into it like it's just a robust program, it's free to use the program, which is awesome. And then with it you get so many pieces like you get the tracking, you get the targeting. There's no other digital platform that tracks the way that Facebook does for targeting. You can just dial it in to demographics location, like likes, interest. There's so many ways that you can target. The audience.

Speaker 1

Is it still a system to where you're able to set your starting budget and it works within that? As far as the reach?

Speaker 2

So when clients come to me, that's like one of the biggest parts that we. Talk about is budget, obviously. What do you want to spend on? Ad spend and. What's a realistic ad spend? So we I set a daily budget, I break it. Out like this for a month. You want to spend this much money, so how is that per day? And does that make sense for your industry? True because it is. A bidding game. With the advertising, so I like jokingly call it. Like if you're competing against a bother, a bunch of other similar businesses that are in your industry and they're spending more on advertising, you're going to be outbid. So your ads are going to be seen as frequently, so that's a big topic that we talked about is budget. But yes, the answer to your question is, yeah, you can. Break it down to a daily budget.

Speaker 1

Well, so Speaking of budget, if a client of yours or an entrepreneur in general had to pick. Just one of the social marketing services that you offer to invest in first, which would you feel is potentially the best to start with?

Speaker 2

Yeah, 100% advertising. So back in. 2014 fifteen or so, Facebook changed the way they treat businesses in their algorithm. And it's like. And it's changed over the years even more, but if you're only posting organically, that's just like, you know, putting posts. On your page. Your posts are only being seen about 5% of the time, so you're not going to see exponential growth with that, and Facebook has it set up this way. Because and this is with all digital platforms. It's all pay to play. The more you're spending, the more you're like putting into the system, the more your advertising is going to be seen. So if you want to kind of have. The cutting edge. Above other businesses you want to be putting advertising? Into your marketing plan because it will get you seen and I recommend Facebook for the targeting because you can target very specifically who you're looking for your client that you want to work with.

Speaker 1

And that leads into a next question for you. So July 20th is one of the four national get to know your customers customer days, I think it's four every year. It's like a specific day out of every. So I wanted to touch on that and tie our conversation into that. You mentioned selecting your demographics of who you're trying to reach. Do you have any specific methods that you would that you feel help truly get to know your customers and market to them in a genuine way? To identify who they are.

Speaker 2

Yeah, I mean. I always start with like kind of diving deep into. You and your business but the key factor with marketing these days is that you want to be personable. You want to have a personality like the brands that and businesses that have like a face and like a story to them are going to resonate better with. Customers than the ones that are like faceless and like just buying my shiny product over here. You know, there's. Thousands of businesses on the Internet and anybody can sell on the Internet the ones that are going to do better and this is the kind of the shift that's happening is the ones that have that personality that are telling a story of, like, you know, why would I want to buy it from you? You want to, like, be that likeable, you know, person. So it's got no like and trust factors that I like to call it. So any messaging that you're putting out there, you want to be the lead like lead with knowledge, but also? Like, have that personality in you too, so that people seek you out for those services.

Speaker 1

But it's very, very good advice. I do. I'm thinking about the brands that I follow because I'm sure all of us follow a ton of brands, whether they're local or, you know, not local at all or across the world. And yeah, you, you do really connect with those that share. You don't have to share everything, obviously. I'm a very shy person. I don't really share my face a whole lot because I have plenty of insecurities. Of my own. But I do see a lot of them sharing, like their day-to-day, the behind the scenes, what goes into packing an order and all of the things that just make them a real person as opposed to just a logo in their profile photo, so that's awesome. Awesome advice that you just shared.

Speaker 2

Yeah, yeah. And that's the really like the key factor in this day and age with marketing. It's just be personable.

Speaker 1

Well, I'm going to ask a few questions that are a bit more like with your day-to-day as a mom and business owner and the first one relating to home and Mom life and business. Have you personally outsourced anything task wise that you have no regrets about?

Speaker 2

Ohh I wish I have not, but I wish I could. I'm not at that point yet though, you know. But the first thing I would probably outsource is like somebody that like meal prepper, clean my house for years because yeah, in a day-to-day life as a parent. Like those are like the things that kind of get, like, forgotten about. Yeah, so. That that's my dream. And then as a business owner eventually having somebody doing my, my billing and financial side of things. So I can just be creative. And in my like happy.

Speaker 1

All those things would be such huge time savers.

Speaker 2

Huge. Yes. Yeah, yeah, I'm. You know from experience too. Like, yeah, if you could just kill one of those things, you'd have. So much more time in the day.

Speaker 1

Yeah, I know. I we I've talked about this on here before. I don't have a working dish. At least one that will rinse off the soap fully without running like 5 cycles. So we just gave up, but it's amazing how much time that consumes in itself.

Speaker 2

Ohh gosh.

Speaker 1

Yeah, I would you. I'm putting on the spot here. You mentioned ideally having someone doing the billing and back work. Have you considered like virtual assistance or would you seek out a bookkeeper? Typically, do you?

Speaker 2

Think you know I haven't really thought about like who I would hired to do that. I guess initially I was thinking like a bookkeeping company, but my like bigger goals for my company is might be skipping ahead here is that I want to eventually be able to hire employees. To work with me too, so it could be somebody in house potentially too. So as we go, yeah.

Speaker 1

Yeah, that is a question that I was going to have later we'll. Touch back on that for. So can you walk us through like your current weekly routine? I know that it's different, you know, being in summer. But your weekly, like rhythm and schedule for home and work responsibilities when you're carving out time for client work deadlines, things like that.

Speaker 2

So typically my kids are at school, so that's like school. I work school hours because it's the best use of my time when they're away and I'm here. But summer time brings a whole. New level of thing. So I try and you know get up, do my morning routine and. And carve out, you know, a few hours a day at minimum to meet with clients, do other, you know, tasks I'm checking in on ads and everything daily responding to emails, all those little tedious tasks. And then also setting aside time for myself. To you know, do my own business marketing with like social media posting and website edits or whatever else I'm working on in the moment. So I live by my planner. I the weeks that I don't plan out my week like it's absolute chaos in our house. Like I don't know who's. Going where or what or. When so every Monday morning, the first thing I do is I carve. Out my week and. And figure out where am I going to fit in the work time and then around all the other family things. So I kind of fit my work time around my family schedule, I guess you would say, that's the perks of being your own boss and working from home.

Speaker 1

In the. Mompreneurial space, I hear a lot about them, kind of trying to stop using the balance word like the word balance isn't a thing. They have been switching it to blending and it sounds like that's you're doing. Blending your worlds.

Speaker 2

I haven't heard that, but I actually love that. I haven't heard. That that's funny. Yeah, it sounds like that's what I'm doing. Blending, trying to make. It all fit in. Yeah, I'm learning as. I go.

Speaker 1

Same I think we all. Are that's. That's the goal here is to just share real life of people in the journey, not necessarily completely past it. You know, our complete experts, we're all learning.

Speaker 2

I love that, yeah.

Speaker 1

On the busy, so you mentioned wanting to outsource like meal prep on the busy nights. Where you don't have a whole lot of time in the kitchen. Do you have any go to dinners or meal plans or hacks that you'd?

Speaker 2

When I'm like really on top. Of it, I'm meal planning for our week. Like if I'm like super on top of it, but that doesn't always happen. That's like the first thing to get checked out. The window right? But I, you know, crock pot meals are great in the winter time especially but. Houses chicken that you can buy from Costco in the freezer section and it's so easy to make it like it's called the rotisserie chicken. Not the stuff you buy. That's like already, like hot and fresh. And I just throw it in. A PAN and cook it and. You can put it with rice. You can put it with like chicken wraps or salads or whatever. And that's like a go to for me because it's so easy on those busy nights. And then worst case scenario to order pizza.

Speaker 1

OK, you have me interested in this rotisserie chicken. Is it already precooked and that you're just? Kind of reheating.

Speaker 2

It's not precooked, but you cook it from frozen, so I don't know how other people feel about that, but it works for us. And yeah, it's a Tyson. So just to eat chicken.

Speaker 1

OK, I got to go check it out, cause we've been doing the instant pot like salsa, chicken breast and just shredding that up and putting it in just about everything but.

Speaker 2

You buy it at Costco.

Speaker 1

You can only do so much of A salsa, you know before just competes with ingredients. Anyway, I'm going to check it out thanks.

Speaker 2

Or you get like, tired of eating the same thing over and over again, yeah.

Speaker 1

OK. Yeah, we're getting there. I. It's, I don't know. Salsa chicken. It's awesome. But you know, I'm starting to see multiple meals a week with it. I'm like, OK, we got to introduce some new stuff. Something new. Well, OK, So what does self-care look like for you? How do you? Enjoy recharging. And how do you make time for it?

Speaker 2

Oh, that's a tough one. As a mom. Like, right. I know you did a podcast on this recently, too. I am not the greatest about carving out healthcare time other than my hair appointments. That's like hair day is like my time. You know, kids go somewhere else. But you know, I try to do. As much as I can, and, but most of it's like in the evenings when kids are put to bed and that's where I'll have like, mom time and I can do whatever I want during that time. But yeah, yeah, I'm. I'll be honest, I'm. Not the greatest at carving out long time.

Speaker 1

Well, hair appointments count. That's totally valid. OK.

Speaker 2

We'll count it then.

Speaker 1

So at night. If you are sitting down and you have a free hour of TV time, do you have a guilty pleasure TV show?

Speaker 2

I will binge watch Netflix shows like crazy, but personally. A couple of. My favorites currently right now are Firefly Lane and Sweet Magnolias on Netflix, and then my husband and I. If the kids are, you know, put to bed and stuff, we'll do like the 90s sitcom shows like. That your mother or. Friends or something like that. But yeah, those are kind of our go to. Sitcoms and.

Speaker 1

I haven't tried those first too.

Speaker 2

Yeah, you should check them out. They're really good. They're good. A lot of my other friends really love them. So we bonded over it.

Speaker 1

If you could go back and tell yourself something as a tired, fresh and first time parent, what would it be?

Speaker 2

Things can wait like enjoy the time that you have and. With them being little like it all goes by so fast, I feel like I just had my kids and they're 10 and 8 already. So enjoy those little moments. Enjoy that time that you get with them as much as you can. Like I know life still has to happen, but. Certain things can wait. The dishes can wait, the laundry will get done like it all will get done. Enjoy those little moments.

Speaker 1

That's good. And I hear that I, I've heard that for sure. It's just when you're in the. The middle of it. It's so hard to actually just. Take that advice. I wish I could go. I wish I could have my future. Me come back and tell me stuff. Cause then I might you. Know truly listen. It's so easy to just get swept up and everything you have to get done because it's just surrounding you and you know that if you don't do it, it's possible that it won't get done unless you're good about asking for help or. Outsourcing, which I'm not.

Speaker 2

So do that too. Ask for help when you need it. Have that community to, like, bring you in and take care of you and let them. Sometimes our pride gets in the way, but let them help you.

Speaker 1

Find your village. Yeah. Well, do you have anything else that you're really looking forward to in the next couple of years for work or home? I know you mentioned potentially hiring and bringing, you know, someone new to the team, but is there anything else?

Speaker 2

So my business is still. You know, like we talked. About and it's infancy. I would say it's, you know, it's growing and I feel like we're gaining momentum. But my big goal hasn't always when I started, this company was to be able to provide an opportunity for moms or dads. To be able to work from. For a company that values family over like anything else, and so my bigger goal is to eventually hire on team members that are seeking out, you know that that ultimate pull that I felt of like, I just have this overwhelming desire to be home with my family and be able to, like, take care of my kids and like. When, like you mentioned, my schedule around my family and I want to be able to provide that to other moms and or dads someday. So that's my big vision going forward and. Maybe I'll get there someday. I'm not sure when, but that's kind of where I see the future headed.

Speaker 1

That is super cool to hear. That's awesome. I love that. That is something that you're really striving for because. Working from home is it's definitely a blessing to be able to do, but it's also really hard or can be. So that's awesome and it's hard to find the right opportunities sometimes if you're not maybe carving out your own path if you're just trying to figure out how to jump into it from. You know, working a day job and don't have any leaves. So that's.

Speaker 2

Thank you. Yeah, yeah.

Speaker 1

Well, as we wrap up, if you'd like to allow any listeners to follow or connect with you and seek out your services, can you tell us where to find you?

Speaker 2

So I have a website, it's Social EllaMents and Ella is E-L-L-A-M-E-N-T-S, so Social EllaMents -- It's my daughter's name -- .com and then you can find me on Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, Alishia Egenhoff and there. And then can I just say one more thing just for anybody that's listening? If you are looking into doing advertising and it's just not in the budget right now, my best advice to you, like this is something I was thinking about, is to just keep showing up. Just keep doing what you're doing. Keep showing up. Keep putting yourself out there. Keep showing that personality and what sets you apart from other businesses and you will grow. It's just going to take longer so. I wanted to say that. And just you know, it's possible so.

Speaker 1

Thank you for that. That's awesome. You're welcome. It's a good reminder and it's definitely a good starting point for sure.

Speaker 2

Yes, absolutely. Like you, you can do it like you can grow. Just put yourself out there and show the world who you are and what. You have to offer.

Speaker 1

That well, alrighty. Thank you so. Much for sharing your heart and your journey.

Speaker 2

Thank you for inviting me on here. It was very excited to come talk to you about all things Mom and business related.

Speaker 1

All right. Well, I hope you have a good rest of your day.

Speaker 2

You too. Thank you.