Baking it Down with Sugar Cookie Marketing 🍪

Heather and Corrie Miracle

👋 Hey - Heather and Corrie here with the Baking it Down Podcast with Sugar Cookie Marketing (a group on Facebook full of sugar cookiers turned business owners). 🍪 We're here to help you rise with your reach, flood with new followers, bake up new ideas, and make that all-important dough (while makin' that dough - see the pun there?) 🤑. What’s it about? We’re a Facebook Group turned Podcast, Membership, Book Club, and Baking 101 that’s dedicated to assisting bakers in effectively marketing online to generate more sales and better manage their businesses. 🧠 With free Facebook Live classes, hundreds of resources, and thousands of like-minded bakers, there’s a lot to learn in "SCM" (aka Sugar Cookie Marketing). ️🎧 As an extension of our Facebook group, this podcast is here to let you learn by listening. 📈 We'll cover group topics, marketing trends, and more (leaving this wide open in case Corrie wants to start singing). 💸 We take the sweet art of selling online to the cottage bakery world with marketing methods that move products (and pastries).👂 So open up those glorious ear canals because we have a podcast! Just when you’ve thought you’ve “heard” it all with those marketing "miracle" twins (that's our last name - not a proclamation), we’ve got something just for you each week! 🥣 As a baker, you don't always have the luxury of two hands needed to scroll in Sugar Cookie Marketing Group or crack open a book in Sugar Cookie Bookies, but what you can do is listen (unless you're my kid asking “what’s for dinner” for the millionth time). 👐 Hands full of flour? No problem! 👍 18 dozen iced cookies due tomorrow? Let’s do this. The Baking it Down Podcast by Sugar Cookie Marketing is a weekly podcast geared toward helping you grow your bakery business - dropping (almost) every Tuesday. 📅 We choose a topic each week that's either something new and emerging in the world of social media or something that we saw in "The Group" that was a hot topic and we bake it down... I mean, "break" it down for you. 🗯️ What you can expect in the podcast is about an hour of chit-chat with the meat and potatoes right at the beginning of the episode. 🥔 That’s when we dive into the marketing topic of the week! 📞 Oh yeah, folks can call / text / email in with their questions too - a fun way to hear from other bakers out there. Our promises to you: 1️⃣ We always make it clean = no cursing. We understand that you are busy and could be around little ones while also trying to get your weekly dose of business growth so we make sure that each episode would make our grandma proud and keep it clean so you can listen while also living your life. 2️⃣ We always make it fun. There’s a lot of negativity in the world so we try and make the podcast an upbeat and fun learning experience for you. I mean, we try to make the Instagram updates and changes as happy as we can, but come on Instagram! Give it a rest! No more changes! 3️⃣ Other than that, we take a positive approach to marketing We are also *not* professional podcasters. I feel like we need to say this because, hey, sometimes we get giggles! We do our best to extend our marketing knowledge to you all free of charge each week at the cost of listening to our higher-than-normal pitched voices and the occasional giggle spree. 4️⃣ You can find the podcast on all the major platforms and you can typically expect a new episode each Tuesday afternoon (unless life happens). We invite everyone to listen. Either start from the beginning or work backward! The episodes don’t build off themselves so you won’t be confused hearing one before the other. You just might miss new Lives we mention but you can always catch the replay in the Sugar Cookie Marketing Group on Facebook!

  1. 1D AGO

    241. Baking it Down - Stay on Track Track Track

    Send us a text 🧮 Stay on Track Track Track - Metrics to guide your marketing. In this week's Baking it Down Podcast - Episode 241 - Stay on Track Track Track, the twins have spreadsheets on the brain just in time for the new year. While yes, you can start a spreadsheet any time on any day in any month of the year, it does help to have it ready to go on January 1 - that way, you can look at your bakery's entire fiscal year, start to finish. The key to spreadsheets and data tracking is this: first, determine the goal, then let the goal guide what you track. If you want to become a social media influencer, you'll focus on content and views. If you want to increase sales, you're going to focus on customer acquisition. If you want to focus on corporate orders, you're going to track business networking event contacts. That's why there's no "one size fits all" for reporting and record keeping. What your goals are in 2026 =/= the goals of your closest competitor. So stop lookin' over the fence at what they're doing and focus on the reports. 🧮 Increasing Returning Customers Let's say your focus for the first 3 months of the year (Q1) is to cultivate returning leads. You're going to shift from finding new clients (yes, you can still look for new clients, but it's not our driving metric). To cultivate returning clients, you may be tracking these types of metrics: 🔢 How many past clients did you add to your CRM? 🔢 How many emails have I sent to past clients? What was the open rate? 🔢 How many past clients placed new orders in 2026 YTD?  🧮 Increasing Corporate Leads If you want to set a goal of increasing corporate leads, you're not going to naturally do a hard push towards cookie classes, right? That's not the right fit for the goal = corporate girly era. To increase corporate leads, you must increase corporate exposure, and that's likely through business-centric networking events and apps like LinkedIn. You're likely going to create a segmented email list for corporate contacts. To cultivate corporate orders, you may be tracking these types of metrics: 🔢 How many networking events have you attended?🔢 From those events, how many contacts did you add on LinkedIn?🔢 From those LinkedIn contacts, how many did you drop off a "pop-by" to? 🧮 Increase Order Totals If you're looking to increase the total ticket sale (the amount you make per order), you're going to focus on tracking your price increase, your production costs, and your upsells. To increase order totals, you may be tracking these types of metrics: 🔢 How many clients added an upsell to their order?🔢 By what percentage did I increase my custom orders?🔢 What was my order ticket average in 2025? What is my order ticket average in 2026? Yes, you can run concurrent goals, you can run campaigns for various durations, and you can absolutely abandon a goal if you determine it hasn't been fitting your overall strategy. Knowing when to cut a goal off can be just as valuable as knowing when to double down. When determining which metrics to track, ask yourself: 🧮 What is my primary goal?🧮 And if that's my primary goal, what metrics support being able to track and determine if that goal is being met, missed, or in progress? 👂 Snag this podcast on any major podcast player (Spotify, Apple Music, Audible, Amazon Music, or watch it on YouTube) by searching for Baking it Down Podcast - Episode 241 - Stay on Track Track Track.

    1h 10m
  2. DEC 16

    240. Baking it Down - Burke Lake vs Everest

    Send us a text ⛰️ Burke Lake vs Everest - Accomplishing small goals in 2026. In this week's Baking it Down Podcast - Episode 240 - Burke Lake versus Everest, we're winding down 2025 and taking a look at 2026 through the lens of goals. 🥾 Yeah, yeah - you look back on this past year and realize you can't even remember what your new year's resolutions were, let alone whether you met them or not - and for good reason. Sometimes our "bright and flashy" goals are more claimed to summit Mt. Everest rather than to walk the local park a few times a month.  👣 While telling people you're trekkin' down the local hiking path (which is Burke Lake for me) won't garner many likes on social media, it's the "walking path" goals that actually get you to Mt. Everest, 🧗 not the other way around. Find your "Burke Lake" and then build small steps to that. Everest will come in time - and that time may be a few years from now. But a 1% improvement across 10 areas of your business each month in 2026 = 120% improvement. 🏔️ And that is how you climb mountains. 🏔️Social Media Instead of the mountain of "I'm going to add 1,000 followers this year," consider a small path approach to social growth in 2026. 🏔️ I will feature 1 local business each week on my page.🏔️ I will cross-post that feature to 1 local group.🏔️ Grow my page by 3 local followers each week👍 These small steps will put you in front of your target audience who actually can place an order. I can get 1,000 followers from a viral reel or a cookie group follow train - but what then? Maybe a few likes if I'm lucky. But three locals each week? 😍 That's 156 local people by the end of 2026 who can actually give me their money and eat my cookies. Bonus = featuring a local business = potential for corporate orders too. 🏔️ Email Marketing 📧📧📧📧📧📧📧 "I'm going to send out a newsletter every month."  Solid goal, and I love it. But if that was the same goal you had in 2025 and didn't meet, maybe it's a bit too aggressive. Let's "Burke Lake" it a bit. 💌 Just getting started can be half the battle - so break down "getting started" into three small steps.  🏔️ I will organize my client emails into a spreadsheet.🏔️ I will sign up for MailChimp and import my list.🏔️ I want to send out 1 email each quarter.One email a quarter doesn't sound like much, but if you sent 0 emails later year, that's 4 more chances to make sales to your audience than you had last year. Plus, it's consistent, which means good marketing. If you want to send more than 4, great! But set the goal bar at an attainable distance so you're guaranteed a win. 🏔️ Websites So many bakers start their year off claiming, "I'm going to get a new website." And for all the right reasons. 💻 Websites = more sales. But often they get overwhelmed with the myriad of endless options recommended by other bakers - Shopify, WordPress, Hotplate, MyCustomBakes, Square, Jotform, Bakesy... you get the point - it's seemingly endless.  Burke Lake-ify it. 🌐 Start by setting up a simple form. Yes, it's not a website. But yes, it'll start you in the right direction and buy you some time and space to work up to that. 🏔️ I'm going to start taking orders through JotForm.🏔️ I will test out MyCustomBakes and Square.🏔️ I will choose one of those platforms. And if you feel like switching it next year, you can. Sky's the limit. But at least this year, you can say you got the website monkey off your shoulders.  🏔️ Photography "I'm going to improve photography," is

    1h 35m
  3. DEC 9

    239. Baking it Down - 2025 Best Baker Gift List

    Send us a text 🎁 Baker Holiday Gift Guide - 2025 list of gifts for bakers. In this week's Baking it Down Podcast - Episode 239 - 2025 Best Bakers Gift List, it's the most wonderful tiiiime of the yeeear. It's the Top Baker Gift Ideas podcast you're supposed to intentionally accidentally leave playing for the gift buyer in your life. This is twin2's favorite yearly podcast tradition, and she states, "If I got just about anything on this list, I'd be stoked," and now you can window shop her wishlist with today's 2025 Best Bakers Gift Guide. Want hyperlinks? Here's the Google Doc with links (I don't think any of them are affiliate, but if we have a discount code, I included that where I could).  🎁 Stocking Stuffers - Sub $50 Being generous here, but anything sub-$50 we threw in as a decent stocking stuffer. Listen - the cookie hustle is willing to take as much of your money as you're willing to give it, so we had to draw a line somewhere.  Some of my favorites from this list: 🎄 The Flour Funnel - $24.99🎄 Uber Eats Gift Card🎄 Moft Phone Stand - $39.99🎄 Duke Cannon Bloody Knuckles hand cream - $11🎁 Under the Tree - $50 - $500 Probably our best mid-range options, these "under the tree" gifts range between $50 and $500 (wide range, we know, but the podcast needed to draw a line somewhere). We tried to come up with a list for the business baker, so one that doesn't feature a bunch of stuff you likely already have, and if you have it, it was something you'd be again (think: food coloring).  Some of my favorites from this list: 🎄 Hulken Bag (Large) - $125🎄 Amazon Hand Massager ($79+)🎄 NutriMill Artiste Mixer - $249 (use code SUGARCOOKIES)🎄 Stand-Up Freezer ($298)🎁 Subscriptions Kinda needs to be in a list of its own, but for the hobby-turned-hustler, subscriptions are always a welcome gift to save us from our recurring nightmares. And we've got a creative list of them, too. If the baker in your life already has it all, taking on a few of their software payments would be very welcome (even if you can't easily wrap it). Some of my favorites from this list: 🎄 Sprinkle Factory STL Library - $250/yr🎄 Spotify Gift Card🎄 Cookie Design Lab - $100 (use code TWINS)🎄 The Cookie College (use code BAKINGITDOWN for 10% off any subscription for the next 7 days - consider it an early Christmas gift)🎁 Santa's Chosen Bakers - $500+ Maybe you're the baker who never thought ill of a late-showing client. Maybe you're the baker who was always prepared for class and never forgot the icing or the HDMI cable. And maybe you're the baker whose icing refuses to bleed. In that case, you may have made Santa's Chosen Baker list this year, where budget isn't an issue.  Some of my favorites from this list: 🎄 Bosch Universal Plus - Stainless Steel - $549 (use code SUGARCOOKIES)🎄 Eugene's Electric Dough Sheeter - $1,005🎄Eddie D2F Printer - $2,995 (they have cheaper refurbed options)🎄 Dreambox - $2,800Check out this week's podcast to hear how we came up with this list, which was twin2's favorites, and what she wouldn't buy a second time. And to all you good bakers out there who Santa may have missed - maybe a decent time to play your own secret Santa and treat yaself!  👂 Snag this podcast on any major podcast player (Spotify, Apple Music, Audible, Amazon Music, or watch it on YouTube) by searching for Baking it Down Podcast - Episode 239 - 2025 Best Baker Gift List.

    1h 41m
  4. NOV 25

    238. Baking it Down - Vendy Blendy Insider Info

    Send us a text 🎓 Vendy Blendy - Insider info. In this week's Baking it Down Podcast - Episode 238 - Vendy Blendy Inside Info, we're in the final stretch of the Vendy Blendy - and we're spillin' all the secrets in this final-prep podcast for Friday's BIG Baker Sale.  Are we hype? Yes. Are we delirious? Also yes. Are we tired of saying the word Vendy Blendy? Getting close. But it's the f-i-n-a-l c-o-u-n-t-d-o-wn-. 🟠 The Most Important Stuff If you read nothing more than this - here's the most important stuff to get the quickest bang for your buck on Friday: 🟠 Join this Facebook Group: https://www.facebook.com/groups/vendyblendy/🟠 Save this Google spreadsheet: http://thevendys.com/ That's it - two links. And even ig you only clicked the second link (the spreadsheet with the discount codes), you can shop 68 Vendys at 25% off (or more) for 24 hours and never have to even touch Facebook on Friday.  Got that saved? Good. 👇 Read on if you want day-of insider info. 🟠 Day-Of Insiders  🤫 First - Heather isn't making the event posts (like the BIG DOOR PRIZE posts). A page is - it's called Vendy Blendy. And yes, it still is Heather - but it's also now Corrie, that way we can both help you instead of Heather getting 1,452,693 notifications and Corrie living her best life scrolling mindlessly on TikTok.  🤫 Second - the BIG DOOR PRIZE entry posts start going up at 7:00 AM est. This is different than what we said earlier - because building out the schedule, we have a lot more door prizes this year than last year (10 Bambu Minis, 5 Bosch Mixers). Then they go up every 45 minutes - but some of the threads will lock, but not all of them (despite each post saying that it will lock). 🤫 Third - each post made by the page (the event posts) will tell you the next 5 things on the event's schedule, but the Vendys can post whenever (we don't collect this info from them). The group is set by chronological order, meaning check back a few times throughout the day, and just scroll down to catch up. 🤫 Fourth - the valuation of all the day-of door prizes is over $18,000, and the pre-event hype prizes total just under $3,000 - so you have the chance to snag a portion of the $21,000 pie (free from purchase requirements).  🤫 Fifth - The door prizes of each Vendy and the valuation have now been added to the Vendy spreadsheet - you can check that out here: http://thevendys.com. Some Vendys are giving away multiple door prizes, but they'll tell you how to win them all in the same post. They can post these whenever, but the winners must be posted at 9:00 PM est. 🤫 Sixth - The Bosch mixers must be claimed by Dec 1 by 6 PM est - no exceptions. That's different than the 7 days you'll have to claim the Vendys door prizes and the Bambus. Why? We can only budget all these BIG door prizes if we shop their sales, and NutriMill's sale ends on Dec 1 (use code SUGARCOOKIES to save $20 at checkout - shameless affiliate plug). Bosch doesn't ship to your address? You claim the Black Friday sale cash equivalent instead - so yes, enter Canadians!  🤫 Seventh - The Live Google Sheet gets deleted at midnight. Want to shop these Vendys at a later date? Go to File > Make a Copy. There will be no posting, commenting, or emails about the Vendy Blendy after Black Friday. Have an issue with a Vendy? Their support email is in that spreadsheet too (another reason you should save it), but the twins ain't your life raft if something sinks instead of swims.

    1h 24m
  5. NOV 18

    237. Baking it Down - Once a Year Cookie College Stealios

    Send us a text 🎓 Cookie College  - Vendy Blendy Deals Breakdown. In this week's Baking it Down Podcast - Episode 237 - The Cookie College Stealios, Corrie and I go through our Vendy Blendy 2025 Cookie College offerings, and... ️🥁️🥁️🥁 drumroll please... they're once-a-year good. 🎓 The Cookie College - $64/mo or $576/yr The best product we offer is The Cookie College (typically $76/mo, but on sale on Black Friday for $64/mo or $576/yr, which takes it down to $48/mo). It's the best because it gets everything we offer, including its own proprietary content (the marketing courses and private FB group). 👉 86 Marketing Courses👉 The Private Facebook Group👉 The Freebie Photos👉 The 2023 Cookie Class Kits ($300)👉 The 2024 Cookie Class Kits ($300) 👉 The 2025 Cookie Class Kits Membership ($63/mo)👉 The Bakers Business Basics Membership ($36/mo)👉 The Digital Downloads Membership ($10/mo)👉 The Two Dollar Transfer Club Membership ($2/mo) If you bought these separately, it'd be $187 in membership costs per month, plus the $300 for each year of the Cookie Class Kits. Those are our prices for 50.9 weeks of the year. But for ONE day, you can get all of that for our lowest monthly price - $64/mo. But wanna save even more?? When you sign up for a yearly membership for $576 on Black Friday (usually $760), you automatically get THREE months free. That takes the monthly equivalent to $48/mo. That's the cheapest you'll ever get the Cookie College. 🎓 The Cookie Class Kits - $44/mo  The Cookie Class Kit is discounted too - you can get the 2025 Class Kits (there are currently 12 of them that'll archive on January 7th) for just $44/mo (usually $63/mo). Per class, that's just $5.25 a class!  The class kits are the curriculum you'd need to teach an in-person cookie class. For reference, we taught a private in-home class (listen to last week's podcast Episode 235 and 236 for more on that), and cleared 10 tickets at $85/ea plus a DIY kit for $35/ea. That's gross $885 just from teaching a cookie class. Those classes included in this membership are: 👉 CCK - January Cookie Class - Happy New Year Cookie Class👉 CCK - February Cookie Class - Galentine's Day Cookie Class👉 CCK - March Cookie Class - K9 Cookies Cookie Class👉 CCK - April Cookie Class - Happy Moms Day Cookie Class👉 CCK - May Cookie Class - Cookies de Mayo Cookie Class👉 CCK - June Cookie Class - Frosting Father Cookie Class👉 CCK - July Cookie Class - Patriotic Piping Cookie Class👉 CCK - August Cookie Class - School and Scribes Cookie Class👉 CCK - September Cookie Class - Happy Birthday! Cookie Class👉 CCK - October Cookie Class - BOO!-kie Class Cookie Class👉 CCK - November Cookie Class - Frosting Feast Class Cookie Class👉 CCK - December Cookie Class - Santa's Set Cookie Class ✅ Each class includes the photography of the class, the video step-by-step tutorials, the social media posts and stories, the Eventbrite cover and listing info, the email copy, the social media copy, the step-by-step PowerPoint, the bake math spreadsheet for planning, the Eddie outline prints, and the supply lists to recreate the class setup yourself. We also throw in printables like a custom piping practice sheet and coloring sheet.

    1h 51m
  6. NOV 11

    236. Baking it Down - The Most BORING Podcast Ever Recorded

    Send us a text ☝️ Private Class Pt 2 - A BORING podcast. In this week's Baking it Down Podcast - Episode 236 - The Most BORING Podcast Ever Recorded, I paid my nephew (Corrie's son, Archer) $10 to do the podcast intro (and just when you thought no one could talk faster than Heather), and we recapped the private in-home cookie class we taught last week. Also, (hilariously and probably not totally wrong), someone texted into the podcast that it was boring - ergo the name of this week's episode. 👩‍🏫 The Private Cookie Class - Pt 2 Of course, not everything went according to plan, and I think that's the value of the podcast - listening to what not to do and what to take into consideration. Here's what I'd consider more closely if we did this again: 🎟️ Lead acquisition - Turns out, this lead came from a referral that turned into a failed custom order (Corrie was out for that cancer surgery), that, through cross promotion of cookie classes, was reacquired through consistent marketing.🎟️  Room Configuration Issues - Dining rooms mean heavy furniture and carpeting, so there was no ability for attendees to swivel and face, and single direction. This created a bit of frustration since folk had to wait for me to walk the laptop around. There was no room for a TV, and the document camera was a no-go.🎟️ Technical Difficulties - Would it be a cookie class without tech problems?! The IPEVO document camera that was working mere minutes before class suddenly couldn't be read by the laptop on location, so we dropped the concept completely. Thank goodness Corrie had those display cookie stands - they loved referencing those.🎟️ Parking and Logistics -  Private classes mean private driveways - and this one was super tight. I wish we'd considered this before, although I'm not sure there was too much we could do about it.🎟️ Class Flow and Student Engagement - The class was longer than anticipated due to interruptions like serving food and increased chatter among friends versus in a public class where we have a bunch of strangers in a room together (wine, anyone?). We didn't have as much power since we were just the hired teachers in someone else's home - maybe I wish we had something to amplify our voices?🎟️ Financial Aspects - Was it worth it? Yep - we cleared $85/ticket and one $35 take-home kit (I wish we had called these "practice kits" and not DIY kits). Plus, teaching in a private home means no venue fees, and we didn't have to fill the room - Mary did that all on her own (saving us marketing labor costs).🎟️ Piping Practice - Still a huge fan of spending 15 minutes on a piping practice sheet. We do this in all of our classes, and it really sets the students up for success. Remember, a student who liked their results = a potential for a future returning ticket sale.🎟️ Communication Importance - Remember - organization is key for private classes. Staying on top of the host to ensure everyone's on the same page keeps us all on track.🟠 The Vendy Blendy - Pt 2  The Vendy Blendy is just 16 (basically no 15) days away, and we've got a really stellar lineup (list below). You can find out everything you need to know here: 🟠 https://www.sugarcookiemarketing.com/vendyblendy If you missed my Facebook Lives - catch the replays here: 🧡 Live 1 - Vendy Blendy 101🧡 Live 2 - Pre-Shop the Vendys🧡 Live 3 - Secrets to the Vendy BlendyTomorrow, Thursday, 🎓 I'll cover the Vendy Blendy Deals for The Cookie College - it'll be a great sale, and one we've never run before *and probably won't again until next Black Friday.

    1h 33m
  7. NOV 4

    235. Baking it Down - Private Class + Vendy Blendy pt. 1

    Send us a text ☝️ Private Class + VB - Part one of a two-part series. In this week's Baking it Down Podcast - Episode 235 - Private Class + The Vendy Blendy Pt 1, we're doing a two-part two-part series (not a typo) so I can check the box that we effectively spammed you with the Vendy Blendy this week while also providing some marketing value.  We're teaching an in-home private class. Now, typically, you've heard me state (vehemently) that we don't teach private in-home classes anymore after a wild adventure with a class of 5 - 7 year olds once years ago, but Corrie said, "For the podcast!" so for the podcast, we must.  👩‍🏫 The Private Cookie Class - Pt 1 Mary is the client here, and she found Corrie through her custom cookie Instagram when Corrie had cross-promoted an in-person cookie class we were hosting back in October.  Mary DMed asking if we would be open to an in-home private class with her and her friends, so Corrie said if she was willing to play "private class guinea pig," we're in. Mary happily took the bait, and we set these parameters up months before the event. ✅ She had to sell all 10 tickets.✅ All 10 tickets needed to be sold 2 weeks prior to the event.✅ Mary had to handle the marketing.✅ We allowed her to sell individual tickets (versus a lump sum payment) through Eventbrite (yes, we incurred the fees). ✅ We were not offering a discount. 📧 I followed up with Mary via email each week once we sent her the class link (since I was managing the Eventbrite, she didn't have access to attendee lists) with the list of names + a confirmation of her class details.  To keep it easy, 🖼 we sent her the photo collage of our Cookie Class Kits membership class offerings (hey, yeah - we like them so much, we teach them ourselves), and she went with "the pie slice Thanksgiving one" - risky click here, because we actually have two pie slice Thanksgiving classes, but I can't get Mary to confirm.  That said - I have requested a picture of the event space, and that will be the challenge to overcome this Thursday when we finally teach the class. Next week's podcast will feature a pt. 2 recap on how it all went - stay tuned! 🛍️ The Vendy Blendy - Pt 1  Now back to Vendy Blendy spam - each year, our returning list of Vendys gets shorter and shorter due to turnover in the industry, so to replace the shops that dropped out or disappeared on their marketing, we worked on finding fresh blood that y'all begged for - and let's just say, it's comin' together nicely!  ️🛒 If you're new here - the Vendy Blendy is a private Facebook group that opens for only 24 hours on Black Friday (Nov 28th). We gather a bunch of cookie-related shops and get them to offer you all 25% off or more. It's utter mayhem - the deals aren't the only fun part because each shop can make 3 sales pitches to ya 🎁 while also hosting their own door prize giveaways throughout the day. 🤯 Not overwhelming enough? Hold on tight - 🎁🎁🎁 the event also hosts the "BIG Door Prizes" given away all day on Black Friday, too. It's organized mayhem, and folks love it. And we think you'll love it too. Go "Pendy" so you can "Spendy" this "Novemy" at the "Vendy Blendy"!  Find all the info you need at https://www.sugarcookiemarketing.com/vendyblendy. 👂 Snag this podcast on any major podcast player (Spotify, Apple Music, Audible, Amazon Music, or watch it on YouTube) by searching for Baking it Down Podcast - Episode 235 - Private Class + The Vendy Blendy Pt. 1.

    1h 15m
  8. OCT 28

    234. Baking it Down - Food-tography

    Send us a text 📸 Food-tography - Staging, props, gear, software.In this week's Baking it Down Podcast - Episode 234 - Food-Tography, we're concluding our "📅 Content Theme" for the month of October, which focused on... well, focusing that camera lens. 💡 Check out #OctoberPhotographyMonth in the Sugar Cookie Marketing (Group) to see more content on staging and gear. 📸 Food photography is a must when it comes to slingin' sugar cookies. Our customers "buy with their eyes," meaning that the photos have a big part in selling our bakes. If your photo quality and staging are poor = your business bank account will soon follow. While we may be able to get around not having a website, posting up lackluster photos will rob you of sales. So investing in quality gear to produce quality product photos is a business-savvy expenditure. 🤑 But we do talk about the cost-conscious approach in this week's Baking it Down podcast episode on cookie photography. 📸 The Power of Photography Good photos sell food! Consistent, high-quality photography can act as a watermark for your brand (especially when you dial in your own photography style), making your products instantly recognizable. Easily recognizable = branding. You're seein' how this all works together, right?   When your photos do the talking, you won't have to pitch as hard. Consider your own buying process. When you want a car, you search up "Mercedes" and see glamorous photos of beautiful red cars with big boys and sparkly wheels. What you don't see is the car covered in a layer of dirt and bird poop.  Showing the car and our cookies in their best light will increase sales. 📸 Lighting The best option happens to be the cheapest option = ☀️ the sun. Indirect natural sunlight is a phrase you've heard us spout for YEARS on this podcast. Having a mobile setup (backdrops help with this), where you can follow the ever-moving sunlight around your house, will help with "chasing daylight."  🕯️ Otherwise, you may need to consider a lighting system, a diffuser, and/or a light box (harder to use - I always find myself frustrated with them). 📸 Cameras Cell phone cameras have come a long way and can really hold their own next to dedicated cameras. That said, for me, the dedicated camera still adds that extra pizzazz that manufactured blur and digital zoom just can't recreate (yet).  If you have an older cell phone, with how quickly technology and built-in cell phone camera abilities have increased, it may be worth the upgrade to the latest model. Otherwise, consider a dedicated camera - specifically with a macro zoom lens - to really capture that cookie. 📸 Stands While 92% of bakers opted for hand-held photography (meaning no stands), when it comes to videography, you may have to consider a stand setup. Moft is a neat stand that uses the cell phone's mag-safe magnet for quick setup. ShopCanvas lamps have a built-in light and a goose-neck clamp, and dedicated tripods can help with heavier cameras. Have an Arkon mount? You can make that work too, although the ball joints don't lend themselves to easy adjustment.  📸 Software If you're not taking your photos through software (cell or desktop), you're leaving money on the table. Post-processing software like Lightroom or Snapseed can make the difference between dull pics and products that pop off the page. I'd wager just about every creator you jealously look at and think, "They take such good photos," is using a post-processing software to level up their photography game.  👂 Snag this podcast on any major podcast player (Spotify, Apple Music, Audible, Amazon Music, or watch it on YouTube) by searching for B

    1h 42m
4.8
out of 5
304 Ratings

About

👋 Hey - Heather and Corrie here with the Baking it Down Podcast with Sugar Cookie Marketing (a group on Facebook full of sugar cookiers turned business owners). 🍪 We're here to help you rise with your reach, flood with new followers, bake up new ideas, and make that all-important dough (while makin' that dough - see the pun there?) 🤑. What’s it about? We’re a Facebook Group turned Podcast, Membership, Book Club, and Baking 101 that’s dedicated to assisting bakers in effectively marketing online to generate more sales and better manage their businesses. 🧠 With free Facebook Live classes, hundreds of resources, and thousands of like-minded bakers, there’s a lot to learn in "SCM" (aka Sugar Cookie Marketing). ️🎧 As an extension of our Facebook group, this podcast is here to let you learn by listening. 📈 We'll cover group topics, marketing trends, and more (leaving this wide open in case Corrie wants to start singing). 💸 We take the sweet art of selling online to the cottage bakery world with marketing methods that move products (and pastries).👂 So open up those glorious ear canals because we have a podcast! Just when you’ve thought you’ve “heard” it all with those marketing "miracle" twins (that's our last name - not a proclamation), we’ve got something just for you each week! 🥣 As a baker, you don't always have the luxury of two hands needed to scroll in Sugar Cookie Marketing Group or crack open a book in Sugar Cookie Bookies, but what you can do is listen (unless you're my kid asking “what’s for dinner” for the millionth time). 👐 Hands full of flour? No problem! 👍 18 dozen iced cookies due tomorrow? Let’s do this. The Baking it Down Podcast by Sugar Cookie Marketing is a weekly podcast geared toward helping you grow your bakery business - dropping (almost) every Tuesday. 📅 We choose a topic each week that's either something new and emerging in the world of social media or something that we saw in "The Group" that was a hot topic and we bake it down... I mean, "break" it down for you. 🗯️ What you can expect in the podcast is about an hour of chit-chat with the meat and potatoes right at the beginning of the episode. 🥔 That’s when we dive into the marketing topic of the week! 📞 Oh yeah, folks can call / text / email in with their questions too - a fun way to hear from other bakers out there. Our promises to you: 1️⃣ We always make it clean = no cursing. We understand that you are busy and could be around little ones while also trying to get your weekly dose of business growth so we make sure that each episode would make our grandma proud and keep it clean so you can listen while also living your life. 2️⃣ We always make it fun. There’s a lot of negativity in the world so we try and make the podcast an upbeat and fun learning experience for you. I mean, we try to make the Instagram updates and changes as happy as we can, but come on Instagram! Give it a rest! No more changes! 3️⃣ Other than that, we take a positive approach to marketing We are also *not* professional podcasters. I feel like we need to say this because, hey, sometimes we get giggles! We do our best to extend our marketing knowledge to you all free of charge each week at the cost of listening to our higher-than-normal pitched voices and the occasional giggle spree. 4️⃣ You can find the podcast on all the major platforms and you can typically expect a new episode each Tuesday afternoon (unless life happens). We invite everyone to listen. Either start from the beginning or work backward! The episodes don’t build off themselves so you won’t be confused hearing one before the other. You just might miss new Lives we mention but you can always catch the replay in the Sugar Cookie Marketing Group on Facebook!

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