Coffee chats will return in 2 weeks! Would've been today, but I was a little busy with previously-made plans to recharge for 2026... 😏 In the comments, tell me how you're refilling your cup for 2026 and what you might like to chat about!

Sometimes we need to post details that fall more under the "housekeeping" category for our various types of business ventures. We might be repeating a deadline for our networking event or we might need to, yet again, stress the importance of not parking in the neighbor's lot. Think about how you can liven up that information to not only make it more interesting but more effective and likely to stick. Typically this will include a visual to make it really stick--maybe a funny video skit about registering at the last minute, or a gif of a car being towed. Brands of all sizes do this regularly to keep their audience engaged and absorb even their 'housekeeping' notes. As a sports fan, it always gets my attention when the mascots make the video reminding people the game is home or away or for the 10,000th time you can't bring glass bottles... Share in the comments if you've seen a brand post lately that put some fun in their more 'basic' posts!

Good morning, everyone! I'm back from vacation and while there was plenty of sunshine and sand... there were also plenty of Cracker Barrel billboards! Stick with me for a second, I promise this goes somewhere... Even though Cracker Barrel launched then pulled back on their latest logo and it seemed the logo didn't creep out into the world too much (no commercials that I know of, etc.), they do have plenty of billboards out there, and when you're southbound on I-65 and there's nothing else but trees... you notice every last billboard (I'm the navigator, I don't get to sleep!). But here's the thing-- I didn't immediately notice the "new" logo was on the billboard. Why? Because I knew that was a Cracker Barrel billboard without a logo. The photos of homestyle food like bacon and eggs or fried chicken, the general "warmth" of the photos and their signature gold and brown tones told me this was a Cracker Barrel ad even if they'd completely skipped the logo or left their name off of it. So-- how do your visuals tell your story and who you are? Could your brand get by on visuals alone? If you left off your name or logo, could someone spot you?

Hey everyone! Not sure how many of you utilize any kind of email system whether it's through a platform aimed at email (FloDesk, Mail Chimp, etc.), through a sales system (Square, etc.) or something else (Substack sends)... but... going to share my tip/observation anyway :) Before you send anything from any of those platforms out into the world, double check the "from" line, as in what will/is likely to display as "from" in someone's inbox. I've received emails from large fashion companies to entrepreneur newsletters and if the "from" line is something not related to you I'm likely to skip it and thus miss out. Your name or your brand name makes it clear who sent said email and can have people excited to open and hear from you instead of wondering "what in the heck is this...?"

Hey everyone! A wave of scam DMs are hitting business/page inboxes pretending to be from Meta/Facebook/Instagram. Said DMs mention "violations", "copyright issues", or to "verify your account". ✅ Meta NEVER contacts users via DM. ✅ All legit messages are in your Support Inbox. If you get one of these: 🚫 Don’t click. 🚫 Don’t respond. ✅ Report & block. These have made the rounds of some accounts before, but they're revving up again and you'll see us spreading this message on social media the rest of this week. Additional food for thought if you're still with me :) 1) Share with other page owners/managers who aren't in this group (although, they're missing out!), 2) Scams are also prevalent in the comments of posts of select themes such as posts about events. Scammer comments may try to sell or re-sell tickets or promote a live feed (which makes me laugh when the original post says "there is no live feed available"...). So keep an eye on your comments. And last 3) If you've seen some other common social media scams not mentioned, feel free to discuss in the comments so we can all be in the know.