Getting started with content marketing

Brad Poirier: I should have brought some fake coffee cups here or something.

Charles Tendell: My New Bern live one. That's the one I should have brought.

Charles Tendell: I like live.

Brad Poirier: Live is cool, but I like edited. I'm an edited fan. Fortunately I can't hide my moobs because of the way I'm sitting down. So we're just going to kind of deal with that.

Brad Poirier: All right, so welcome to episode one of the Bear City Beat video edition I'm sitting here today with Charles Tendell of the Tendell Studio in Downtown New Bern at the O'Mark's building. You are also an ethical hackers that correct?

Charles Tendell: I am indeed and ethical hacker. I am Charles Tendell of the Charles Tendell Studio. Those are two accurate statements.

Brad Poirier: You know, we're just going to kick this off. And basically the topic of you know, if you're watching the Bear City Beat for the first time, what I'm doing is interviewing local business owners, what their business is and how they go out and marketing their business. Perhaps you're another small local business that can maybe get a tip or two from Charles and the other guests on how you can market your business and start exploding this year and getting more customers.

Brad Poirier: So Charles, tell us a little bit about what is your business? What is the Charles Tendell Studio?

Charles Tendell: Oh, well the studio is, there's this new phenomenon, right as we, just as we're sitting here creating live video, we're creating recorded and edited videos. We're creating, people are creating massive amounts of content online. And there's this, there's a little bit of a gap between the people who want to create content and the resources necessary to create good content. And a lot of people aren't the, the technical type. They are the, they want to be able to do what it is they do, right? The studio is designed to allow people the platform to talk about what they want to create, the content that they want to help with audio and to educate and to give people some insight into what new technology can bring to them.

Brad Poirier: So tell me a little bit about a couple of people that you know, I see the New Bern Live a lot of time, which is also Charles Tendell. So I see that a lot of times, but besides your own podcast or your own video live video that you do, who are some people that come to you then? So tell me a little about some people that come to you because they don't have the technical or the hardware set up.

Charles Tendell: Well, the people who come to me are usually the ones, like I said, who have those ideas and they want to just come into a space where they can sit down and get going without having to set up microphones, setting up cameras, making sure levels are right, make sure we're doing all the right connectivity, things of that nature.

Charles Tendell: Some of the people that have had come in there are like Wendy card who does New Bern Now and the Ledger magazine. They do their every other week podcast called New Bern Now (PODSQUAD) and it's fantastic. We've got Lee Bettis and Sabrina Bengel who do City Talk, and that is all about local city politics and things are happening in and around New Bern. M.O.R.O.N.S. who are Men On Radio Offering Nonsensical Solutions. Those guys are on Thursday, which is all the Thursday stuff and then also Thursday we have the Federal Emergency Management Agency that comes into the studio and produces a, I wouldn't call it a podcast, but they do like a really short kind of live stream thing going on. Okay. Here locally we do a lot with business owners. We do a lot with entrepreneurs. A lot of people want to be able to reach their target market and ways they've never reached them before and what better way to do it than to go live and reach right into their pocket.

Brad Poirier: By the way, is it just me, or do you feel like we should be holding like a coffee Mug or something? I mean, I have a couple empty coffee mugs and I feel like, would it be inauthentic? Is that the right word? Would it be inauthentic to be holding a empty coffee mug? Just for the effect.

Charles Tendell: That we're we're drinking coffee?

Brad Poirier: Yeah,

Charles Tendell: It would have to be a big, big ironic novelty mug. I've been eyeing that one there since I came in.

Brad Poirier: Let's do it.

Charles Tendell: I like Big Mugs and I cannot lie.

Brad Poirier: There's some stuff in it, but that's okay. It'll be kind of funny. A little gym kind of be fun. All right, and we're back. We just had to just get a coffee break, you know? So just full disclosure, there's no coffee in here. I think it gets you in the mood for coffee talk. Getting ideas going. Just the, just the feeling that you got a coffee cup in your hand. I feel like I have ideas flowing right now.

Charles Tendell: You know? For me though, I feel like, I feel like this is about to turn into a sir mix a lot video though. It's just one of those things.

Brad Poirier: I think you should rap that phrase to the sir mix a lot song right now.

Charles Tendell: I couldn't do it.

Brad Poirier: I think you can, all you have to do is read it and just,

Charles Tendell: I like big mugs and I cannot lie.

Brad Poirier: There we go. There we go. That's it. That's all I, that's it. That's perfect. We should continue the lyrics. We should not right now cause I'm not that creative lyrically. But yeah, we should, uh, we should write down some lyrics and then just kinda like make a, you know, fun speaking. We can be the new Weird Al. We could be basically the new weird al of New Bern. I'm weird. And you're Al. Perfect.

Charles Tendell: Now we can make that work. He's the perfect. You're the, you can be the weird one.

Brad Poirier: You can call me Al.

Charles Tendell: But then that would make you weird all by yourself and the one

Brad Poirier: It was a song. It was another song. Nevermind.

Brad Poirier: [SINGING] You can callll me Al.

Charles Tendell: I have not heard this or way who sings that song?

Brad Poirier: The guy from Simon and Garfunkel.

Charles Tendell: Nope.

Brad Poirier: The Simon Guy.

Charles Tendell: You'll have to, you'll have to...

Brad Poirier: PIf aul Simon.

Charles Tendell: You have to let me listen to it. And then I then will be able to say whether I know.

Brad Poirier: Okay. All right. Sounds good. All right, well, uh, I'll, I'll cue it up in the music here somewhere. Hopefully I don't get hit with youtube copyright.

Charles Tendell: Oh, you will. Youtube will get you what they do.

Brad Poirier: So, uh, back to the program here, now that we have our fictitious, uh, vicarious coffee mugs. So how do you go about marketing your studio space? Cause obviously, you know, you're, you're, you're renting or you're leasing the space out so to speak.

Charles Tendell: You know, that's a really good question because I honestly, I don't, I don't go about, and I'm not seeking to attract new customers. Honestly in my business, if my business is, it's content driven. And what I originally built the studio for was not only my personal podcast, my show, the Charles Tendell Show, but then New Bern Live and the reason New Bern Live was there was to get the city engaged with itself to get the people locally engaged with. So I actually built the thing to, to, to serve a need to, for, to fulfill a purpose through a, to actually make something better. And one of the cool side effects of that is it, it's a business. It became a business. It became something that people are willing to pay me to produce their content and to put it on my airways or on the live stream and or wherever it's going to go for them to get their message out. So for me, marketing is being that content that I want to inspire someone else to create. Right? So like if I'm like, like we produce good content on New Bern Live and I'm a little biased, right? We produce good content, but it's not the best. Right? My whole hope is that someone sees what we're doing is inspired and comes out and creates something bigger, even more. So I hope that they come out and want to create that something better in my studio and it costs to do stuff in my studio.

Brad Poirier: I could take a little inspiration from that. So, you know, I moved into the town, my business about eight months ago or so. And uh, this, I don't you just feel like, I feel like the energy is just, there's so much more energy now. I just feel like, you know, yeah. [inaudible]

Charles Tendell: I like big cups that I can not lie.

Brad Poirier: Oh, okay. you changed it up.

Charles Tendell: You other coffee shops can't deny.

Brad Poirier: And when a girl walks in with a little bitty Latte, I dunno, that's children shouldn't watch this viewer discretion. Actually no one should be watching this.

Charles Tendell: Everyone should watch.

Brad Poirier: Everyone should be watching this. Yeah. Um, yeah. You know, so I've, I popped into your studio a bunch of times, a lot of times just kind of Chit Chat and you know, about what we do. And I've used your studio a couple of times once to live stream myself before I had a set up. So can, so, you know, so I've utilized your space before and of course I've also joined in with the New Bern Now podcast.

Charles Tendell: You're, you're a pod squatter cup

Brad Poirier: There's, I can get my thought. This is the best part about not going to live by this.

Charles Tendell: One of the things that I like about it, what I try to say to a lot of people who are trying to figure out the marketing angle and stuff, you do what you do best, right, and the marketing will figure itself out like it is. I get it. Marketing is a huge thing that you need to do if you want your business to be successful, but as an entrepreneur you got into this business to create whatever it was you were going to create and that creation will speak for itself. Like how did I learn about Bear City Impact? I learned about Bear City Impact because I saw your logo, I saw your enthusiasm, I saw you out there doing what you were best at doing and that marketing by itself is priceless. Like you can't pay anybody for that. Big Mug!

Brad Poirier: You've got to create something memorable and what I think is really interesting about your business is your business is content marketing. Content marketing has been around for years. One of my favorite content marketing stories to talk about is GI Joe and Hasbro. So, you know, I'm originally from Rhode Island and Hasbro was right in my backyard and the GI Joe show the cartoon and the GI Joe Comic books, you know, they weren't making, you know, they were making some money from the advertising of the cartoon and they were making some money from selling the magazines, but they weren't, that wasn't where their money was from. Their money was from the action figures and selling all of the toys

Charles Tendell: It was from the kung fu grip.

Brad Poirier: And we'll just start from there and we'll just go, go with a thin amateur hour here, baby woo.

Charles Tendell: With our big mugs.

Brad Poirier: Yeah, we're not amateur coffee drinkers obviousl

Charles Tendell: Cause we get big. We go big or go home.

Brad Poirier: Hasbro was, uh, you know, putting this content out there for, uh, you know, the comic books and the cartoon they were doing to sell action figures. That was really the product they were selling. The other thing was a byproduct of it and they made some money from that. But their end goal is to sell more action figures

Charles Tendell: And I mean that's, that's the spot on. I mean, the, the studio itself, I'm like, like when you came in, I loaned you microphones. Anybody can set up a studio anywhere. My studio, you don't have to come in and pay me to do it. I will teach you. Right. I want people to get in on this craft. I want them to be, to be, to, I want somebody to eventually be better than me because then it gives me someone to compete against. Right. But the, the, the back to the...

Brad Poirier: Challenge accepted.

Charles Tendell: That's the GI Joe kind of thing. Right. They created something that people wanted to see, something to talk about. They created some, they saw a need for something. Right. And whether or not they were doing it just for marketing or not. That's a different aspect. But every time I watched GI Joe, right. I felt like I knew and knewing was half the battle. I remember. Right. It had a moral to it.

Brad Poirier: [G.I. Joeeeee]

Charles Tendell: It brought something. It was something that that if you watched GI Joe growing up, you know, other than other than other than, you know, learn about what Cobra was doing or anything like that, there was always a moral to that story and it kept people coming back. It served a purpose and the byproduct of serving that, serving that purpose was selling a bunch of kung fu grip enabled gi joe guys. Now I don't have a product, right? I mean I have services and I teach and I do all those things. I don't have like a physical, tangible product

Brad Poirier: Sure you do, you have a studio?

Charles Tendell: Yeah, the studio, I guess could be a physical, tangible product that could be, you could definitely be it a product, but I mean like off the shelf

Brad Poirier: Right, nothing that people can take home with them.

Charles Tendell: Yeah. You know, maybe I'll get a little bear. There's a lot of people have trouble with though is it's right now technology and the Internet and all of those things has made it really easy to start creating content, but really, really. There's two things that I see that are missing with a lot of people when they create content. All right? Some are the, they lack the inspiration, like they've got the inspiration to build whatever's they want, but then they're standing there as a content creator and what isn't nearly as big as they think it is. They stand there and they see what they believe is a wall of creativity. Like how do I get started where I get off the ground? We're going to do this and we're perfectionist. If you're going to step up and be a creator or creator of anything, you want it to be the absolute best on something that you're doing, but they need a coach. They need somebody to help them get past that first and foremost, right? Then they need someone to, to kind of roadmap them. Like one of the first productions that I did in the studio that was a personal podcast for someone was a... Hold on. That's Parker. I have to call him back.

Charles Tendell: One of the first things I did when in the studio was a personal podcast for someone. And for the first 10 minutes or the, for the first time they had, they had their podcast planned out just the first 10 minutes of it. They knew, they knew what they were going to say to bring it in. They knew how they were going to introduce their guests. Right. But after the third question, they couldn't figure out where to go next. And the cameras, the lighting is kind of intimidating. And in the studio I hit a button and through their headset comes Charles, take a breath, do this and it flows like one of the, that particular episode, we spend an entire hour session. The first 30 minutes.

Brad Poirier: So you were like the Robert Deval to the Tom Cruise and Tom and a not top gun and a day's a thunder. So you could man, I got all the wrong movie references.

Charles Tendell: Oh, so, mm. No.

Brad Poirier: NASCAR top gun. Let's see, I need a football movie. Okay. You can be the Denzel Washington to the uh, blue was his name, blue blue. If no, I think I missed mixed two movies up.

Charles Tendell: We'll have, we're going to fix some movie references.

Brad Poirier: This is really...

Charles Tendell: But, but yeah, I'm kind of a coach. I'm in there, I'm in people's ear. But that's what people really, really need, right? They need, not only do they need the gear, not only do they need a platform, they need someone that's going to reassure them and tell them the next thing you're about to do, regardless of whether you screw it up completely or whether you knock it out of the park, I'm going to care and it's going to be amazing and we're going to smile and we're going to have a good time with it and we're going to keep going. The more people that are inspired that way, the more, and if you can figure out a product or if you can figure out your, your mission, whatever it's going to be, if you can do that for people, if you can be a problem solver for someone else, your business will almost automatically mark it.

Brad Poirier: When I talk to people about video, I find that the biggest barrier that people have with getting into video for their business, whether they're brick and mortar, retail, their service space, whatever they are, is they see these really nice polished videos

Charles Tendell: And they want to be that right out of the gate.

Brad Poirier: That's exactly it. What would be your tip? Someone that wants to get into content marketing and specifically video content marketing, which is really what you're skilled at. Uh, so if your business out there watching this, what few tips can give them to get started right now, creating their own video content,

Charles Tendell: Do it. That's the number one tip I can give anybody. All right? You're going to come up with a hundred different reasons why not to. A hundred different reasons. I don't have the right lighting. I don't have the right this, I don't have the right that. You don't know what you need until you've done it. So whip out your phone, take the risk, do the first one. You're going to hate your first video, right? But put it out there anyway. It's not for you, it's for people to consume. It's for people to get that, so be okay with that. Be Okay with with putting it out there early on. Technology wise, there's a lot to be said with the quality of your gear, but there's also a lot to be said with making this a smart investment. Know where you want to get to. You look at somebody who's already established, who's already got something going and you're like, I want to be like them. How can I be just like that? How can I do a lot of stuff? There's a path you have to walk to get through there, but know that destination. Know that's what you're after and know that's what you're going for so you're not buying the same equipment over and over and over again in different iterations. I can't tell you how much money I spent buying this kind of mic or that kind of mic or this kind of camera, that kind of camera because I was like, this might work, this might work. I had a whole..

New Speaker: Every A/V nerd just collects.

Charles Tendell: Yeah. See I have, I have a whole, I have three different iterations of what my studio is right now. One that will fit one, that one that'll fit in just like a shoe box, right? One that took up my personal pride of room in my personal private man cave and the one that you see right now, and there's probably gonna be 10 more after this, but I have an idea as to where I want to go, right? I know what my functionality is, right? I had to do it first, figure out where I was lacking and then invest wisely. I feel like I should give you another tip.

Charles Tendell: [THINKING]

Brad Poirier: What would you do if you were live right now?

Charles Tendell: If I were live at this very moment.

Brad Poirier: And someone asks you like give you give, give me three tips and you're sitting there thinking you don't want dead air space like this.

Charles Tendell: Three tips, three tips for doing what? For being live. We're creating content

Brad Poirier: For creating content. You're gonna give us two and you wanted a third tip. So I'm just saying you're trying to think of it right now. So what would you be doing if were a live?

Charles Tendell: If I were, if I were live right now, I'd probably be rereading copy to give my my time. That's the trick. That's what most people don't realize in radio and in podcasting. If you can't see me right, I can totally b-roll. Ah, perfect. Right? B roll is your friend in video, in content creation. B Roll is your friend. If you can't figure out what you want to do next. You're trying to figure out how not to look, unkept or disorganized on camera. Right? Remember that if you're, if you're editing video and even if you're live, if you've got a producer switched to a b-roll. Switch to something that's closely related to the topic that you're talking about. Switch to a different kind of image. Switch to something else. And if you're editing, I'll never worry about it. You'll never get dead air if you're editing, right? Right. It's going to be like "ahhh jump clip right here."

Brad Poirier: All right, cool. Wow. So that concludes out the first episode or the first season of the Bear City Beat video edition. Look at this millennial who's already gone back to his phone, he just cannot stay away from it. Unreal.

Charles Tendell: Wait a minute, aren't you a millennial?

Brad Poirier: Yeah. Proud of it. I'm like a millennial on the gen x line.

Brad Poirier: So how old are you?

Charles Tendell: I'm not going to say it on camera.

Brad Poirier: Okay. It's not recording anymore.

Charles Tendell: YOU CAN'T TELL ME IT'S NOT RECORDING ANYMORE!

Brad Poirier: Um, yeah, so I'm 37 now and uh, I'll be, well I'll be 37 in June, so just a few months from now. Um, people have indicated that the millennial line started around the 82 year until I was born in 82. Some people say that gen x lines ended around the 83 some kind of like on that tipping point. The 36 and 37 year olds. We got another little weird that specific year. Uh, we got a little bit weird because we're, we're like on that transitionary period.

Charles Tendell: So I'm a transitionary millennial, right? We'll call it the over trend.

Brad Poirier: Oh my God. We just created a new label. Hashtag transitionary millennial.

Charles Tendell: I'm on the cusp, so maybe we should call it. Maybe we should just use the old language. We're, we're not millennials. We're on the millennial gen x cusp.

Charles Tendell: Well that sounds like a website you don't want to go to.

Brad Poirier: We're migennial.?

Charles Tendell: That sounds like a website I don't want to go to

Brad Poirier: Hashtag Migennial. You just see, I told you just getting weird now. Totally. If we don't hit stop. Queue the outro. Okay. So anyways, so that, so that actually really does conclude it this time. So if you want to be a guest and you're in the New Bern area, just get to hit me up. I'll leave some contact information down below. I have a few more guests already lined up, but I'd love to have you on talk about your business, promote your business, and just help my viewers learn a little bit about how you market your business.

Brad Poirier: If you're not in the New Bern area, consider subscribing and hitting that like button, smashing it and dropping a comment, what was your favorite part of this episode? Or if you didn't like it, just hit the like button anyway. That'd be great. Otherwise just a like, subscribe and throw a comment down below. That'd be awesome for the algorithm. I'd really appreciate it.

Brad Poirier: Thanks. I'm done

Charles Tendell: You sure?

Brad Poirier: Positive. It's got to end some time.

Charles Tendell: Oh, that was fun, man. Thank you.

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