Empowering Local Business with Emma Kisby, founder of Face2Face Maidenhead

Episode Description:
How do you build a thriving business community without a massive marketing budget? In this episode, Krista Madden chats with Emma Kisby, founder of Face2Face Maidenhead. Emma shares her blueprint for monetising niche directories, capturing authentic user-generated content, and driving real growth for local independent businesses. Whether you are a small business owner in Berkshire or an entrepreneur looking to launch a hyper-local network, this episode is packed with practical strategies on networking, branding, and event planning.

Connect with Emma:

• Website: Face2Face Maidenhead Directory
• Instagram: @Face2FaceMaidenhead

Key Topics 

Building and monetizing niche online communities and directories for local businesses

The importance of authentic reviews and user-generated content in today's digital landscape

Organizing local events and community networking in Maidenhead

Strategies for maintaining visibility and engagement without large budgets or followings

Practical tips for entrepreneurs on branding, networking, and event planning

Tune in to learn how building authentic connections and trusting community support can propel local businesses and towns forward!

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YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCwVSEldi1G2_w_mgaGkFmJA

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:07

Hello, welcome to Monte Carlo to Marlo. Good morning, Emma. Hello. Hi, Krista. So today we're gonna do a little bit of a Maidenhead meets Marlowe collab. You are the Girl About Town Face-to-face Maidenhead. We're gonna do a podcast today, which is me talking to you about what you're doing over. We're over a bridge, over the water, we are. Yep. And and then you can interview me. So anyone that's listening to this beginning, we're gonna split this into two and do two parts. So I'm gonna start off talking to you about what you started to do as a career and then leading you to where you are now with all your fabulous networking events and all the things that you're doing in Maidenhead. So let's start with young Emma. What did she want to do when she was leaving school or going to college?

SPEAKER_00 0:58

So when I was leaving school, going to college, I had done some work experience as a journalist, and that was something that I kind of I was really, really interested in. I loved English creative writing. That's what I'd studied as well. And that was my passion, being creative. And I knew that I wanted to do something along those lines, but not for a newspaper. So I used to read an awful lot of magazines. I loved just 17 when I was young. I was into all the sort of editorial stuff. And I always thought one day that'd be me going and sampling things, trying things, going to launches. And that was something that kind of was always in the back of my mind. But I was a very shy young person, very shy for a even into my adulthood. And back then it was pre-social media, pre-blogging, you know, that that wasn't a thing. So I ended up very randomly working in healthcare. I kind of fell into it. I'd done college, I decided that I didn't want to go to university. I'd applied, I was accepted, I was going to go to Lancaster University to study English language. I got I got all my grades and I bottled it. Why do you think that was? I was, I just the thought of leaving home and moving out and being a bit of a grown-up and possibly having to pay university for it, doing all that kind of everything just so it was so overwhelming.

SPEAKER_01 2:26

Yeah, you just couldn't place it.

SPEAKER_00 2:27

I just was so scared. And I even said to my parents, can I just live at home and commute? And they're like, no. So I because I held myself back really. Um, so I'm kind of making up for it now. Fell into healthcare. I worked in various roles. I actually set up my own child mining business at one point when I was kind of in between things. Um, I had my son when I was 23. What two children? Oh, he is now 23, and I have an 11-year-old as well. Things were very different. I'd moved as well. So at the time I was living in Lancashire. So I was I grew up in Buckinghamshire, and my parents moved when I was sort of college age. Lots of transitions, lots of changes in my life. Um, and then when I was 29, I met my now husband who was living in West London, and we moved. Well, I moved, I moved my son down. I was still working in healthcare and I ended up working for a large healthcare company in when I was when we moved to Maidenhead as an area trainer. Um, but I've always done freelance writing, so that was something that I kind of set up on the side, very self-taught. So I learned how to blog, I learned how to write online. So everything previous to that was old school. You know, I knew how to write, but this was different. This was like learning SEO and learning all the tech side as well, and then the social media as well. So how that kind of funnels into it.

SPEAKER_01 3:55

So who who were you writing for when you say you were doing freelance writing? What kind of publications or was it straight onto digital?

SPEAKER_00 4:02

It was all digital. Um, what year was it? Around 2010 it was. I wasn't on Instagram for a long, long time. Yeah, I held off actually.

SPEAKER_01 4:11

I was a Twitter was 2006. I'm terrible with years, but I don't know where they stick in my mind. Uh I was uh Twitter was a thing, and that was fun until it became not fun. And I held off Instagram thinking I don't need another thing to do, which is strange because I love taking photos, and really that's what it's about.

SPEAKER_00 4:28

And yeah, I start I was on Twitter. I loved it when it was Twitter, the old school, a bit like what um Instagram threads had created now. It was that old school. I loved all of that, I loved the engaging. I set up a blogger, which I still have. I think I've had two of those. It was Blogspot, and then it was Blogger, and one's still floating around out there, and um a WordPress. And I've done different ones and scrapped them. But then I was writing on this platform, I don't think it exists anymore. It's an American platform called Hub Pages. It was a bit like a social media platform that you could monetize off. Um, so I did monetize through that, and off the back of that, I did get a few people just saying, you know, can you write me? I think I did one on coffee, and then somebody wanted me to write them a just ghostwrite for them an article on coffee. And I just I did a few page things as well. The last blog that I did before face-to-face maintenance, which I still have, is called All She Loves. So and I still have the Instagram attached to that. I think it was 2018. I set that up. So I was working for a large health, private healthcare company as an area trainer. I'd had my daughter, I'd gone back off maternity leave, I was part-time, wasn't loving my role. I was very kind of detached from my team, very fast-paced company, very difficult to do. Um, everything was remote. And I just felt I just had this creative need. Like this, this isn't fulfilling. I was writing on all she loves, lots of articles, lots of different things. Life's got Lifestyle Family, da-da-da. Then I was, and then I had the Instagram, I had about 200 followers, and Matalan reached out, the PR for Matalan saying, We're opening in Bracknell, come along to the launch. And that was my first gig, if you like. So went along and I thought I've had experience as journalists. It felt very much like that to sort of get into the front, you know, hi, I'm here, I'm press. You know, I kind of had all that, so it felt very natural to me to kind of be there and be kind of you know reporting on this brand new shop that's opening. And then I started to get collabs um from then you kind of you do one, it's snowballs, so all very local businesses. So you know, it was uh Panto, it was the Carter Steam Fair, all the local stuff. And then one day a friend of mine, so she runs Paddleboard Maidenheads, my friend Tara, she's a yoga teacher, and I met her when she was doing baby yoga. I had my daughter, we used to do baby yoga. She then decided that she wanted to go into the paddleboarding, and she does yoga on the boards, she still does all her yoga stuff. It was brand new business for her, and she said to me, I need to get onto Facebook and I used to do lives because at the time I remember Facebook lives. Yeah, they're a big thing, they're a big way to get. I mean, the algorithms changed, everything's just social media's changed since then, changes really quickly. She said to me, I need to do a live. Can you come down to the river? I'll stand on the board, you hold it. And I thought, as long as I'm behind the camera, you go for it. At one point, she did get me on the board live, but that was that was another thing. Sounds a bit risky with a camera. It was, yeah. Well, actually, she had a daughter there. That was another time she had a daughter filming me. But this particular day, it was March um 2019, and she did this live, so I was filming her. Afterwards, we sat. This was in between the Sounding Arch in Maidenhead and the Maidenhead Bridge. So a little park there, and we sat on the the paddle board. She got out like tea, she had some tea, and we just sat there. And I said, you know, I don't know what to do. I was really miserable, actually, I have to say. And I said, you know, I love my blogging, love doing all of that, but you can't monetize from it. You can only monetize if you've got service or you stick Google ads all over it. And even like ad programs are really hard to monetize because you need a lot of traffic to make anything from it.

SPEAKER_01 8:25

Yeah, definitely. I mean, there was a time when you could get a decent CPM from an ad campaign when I had my network, my blogger network. We had an ops manager and we, you know, we were serving ads on blogs, and they just became so ugly. And the ads just were like folding out, coming in, taking over your site. And it was really hard to try and convince bloggers it's really worth it for this for 15p a day, you know, or something ridiculous.

SPEAKER_00 8:51

Yeah, and also it slows the site down, it's loading, it's yeah, there's something really quite ugly about these sort of these these ads that that pop up. So I was I was quite against doing all of that. I said to Tara, what can I do? I want something local, I want to do something for the local town, but I don't want to do anything that anybody else is doing. And that was a big thing for me. So I I like to be unique, I don't like to step on toes either. So she said, Well, why don't you set up a directory and put videos on it? Because everyone wants a video. And she said, call it face-to-face Maidenhead. So face-to-face Maidenhead was born on the river in Maidenhead that day. Although I called it face-to-face direct, I played around with it. I went home and kind of thought about it. I already have my blog. So I thought, right, that's fine because I can just create another website. It's really easy because I've already got that web hosting there. So all that side of it was quite easy. But it's like, what do I want it to look like? And I had it in my head because I said to Tara's that I don't do videos, I'm a blogger, I'm a writer. It's like video is not something that that I know how to do. So I thought, actually, we can make this like an editorial about the business. So this magazine that I craved when I was young that I really wanted to do, this sort of magazine editorial. I can have these like QA's with the business, you know, about the business. We have the little kind of blurb. What service do they offer? Have all the images, make it all glossy and magazine-y, and then we can stick a video underneath it. So we've got that visual, can see the face behind the business. So that's what it was all about, and that's where it stemmed from. Then I did a business course, and I was sort of trying to grow it, and I was learning video, and I was going to invest heavily into all the equipment, and we went into lockdown.

SPEAKER_01 10:47

So I was gonna say, I was just waiting for 2020 to hit when you said that you launched it in 2019. I was like, I know where this is going. Where is it going?

SPEAKER_00 10:56

So we we had a lovely group of people that had done this um business course that we'd done, and a load of them just we're all on the WhatsApp group, and a load of them went, I'm taking a step back, it's just not gonna work for me. And I'm like, if I take a step back, I'm not gonna get anywhere. I cannot risk just doing nothing. I can't sit and do nothing, it's just not gonna happen.

SPEAKER_01 11:18

Also, it's a digital business, so actually, lockdown shouldn't really have had a massive effect, it should have given you more time to concentrate on because you had nothing else to do other than look at your laptop. Well, apart from having a child, obviously.

SPEAKER_00 11:31

Following the child, yeah, and homeschooling. She was five at the time, so I was homeschooling. My husband was working from home. But um the difficulty, but I kind of used it as a positive, was it wasn't my business. My business was digital, so that was fine. But what about the hairdressers that had to they couldn't work? Yeah, the people you wanted to approach all these people, as you remember, like the Facebook groups were swamped, everything, everyone was uh in all the groups, everyone was online because like what do we do?

SPEAKER_01 12:01

Everyone was trying to turn their business online and also you know, a very hard time to ask people to contribute financially because they were suffering. Your business model, I'm sure, that you had in your mind of people paying to be on the directory and paying for your services because they're just struggling to stay afloat.

SPEAKER_00 12:17

Yeah, nobody had that money. It wasn't like, oh, we don't have this this spare cash, and we don't know what the future, we don't know what's around the corner.

SPEAKER_01 12:24

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 12:24

So I thought, right, well, let's grow this and let's give them a free listing for a year because then I'm supporting local, which is what I'm all about. That's what I wanted to do. Support local, be part of the local community. I have to step back and do it behind the screen. It will also give me an opportunity, yes, people will take advantage. Like, great, yeah, free listing, free advertising, whatever, and I'm doing all the hard work, but it worked for me as well because I could then grow the website because it's chicken and egg. Like, what is this thing gonna look like? And also, how can I ask somebody to pay for a service that didn't exist?

SPEAKER_01 13:02

Yeah, absolutely. But so many businesses are chicken and egg, aren't they? You just gotta free yourself into it.

SPEAKER_00 13:09

Yeah, and that was it. And it was I went here with my eyes wide open, like, I'm gonna make loads of mistakes here, but I'm just gonna do it.

SPEAKER_01 13:16

So making mistakes when you're small is the best time to make the mistakes, isn't it? Because there's less people looking at you. Yeah. And you know, we've all been there where you know you've just got to try something out. If you don't try, you you'll never get anywhere.

SPEAKER_00 13:28

Yeah, and it's fine to rebrand, it's fine to re-reinvent yourself. Start again and it didn't work, and let's try it this way.

SPEAKER_01 13:35

Yeah, absolutely.

SPEAKER_00 13:36

So, yeah, my websites had lots of different looks and features. So I really did evolve it. So I had lots and lots of businesses on throughout lockdown, lots of businesses that kind of popped up and disappeared, you know, these kind of makeshift. Um I had somebody that was delivering cocktails to the door, you know, people who were just trying.

SPEAKER_01 13:57

And did you get anybody to pay at that point, or were you just doing it all delivery?

SPEAKER_00 14:02

What I was doing was I was creating videos for people, which I quickly decided that I didn't want to do, uh, which was fine because this again it was all part of the learning code. So what I was doing was um I couldn't come out and film anybody, so they were sending me video clips and I was making videos for them. And this was just before Reels came along, and TikTok was big in lockdown. Yeah, so I was I created a few videos, so I did earn from those, and that was something that I could create for them, and then it can sit on my YouTube, you can have it, did it? And it can sit on your your listing as well. So, and then they could have it and repurpose it. So I did do a few of those. I found that was really challenging, but doing anything creative with somebody is um it was it was hard work, so I thought actually when we kind of came out of Lockdown, I thought, you know what? Lots of people actually it's quite a few people that didn't didn't require a video, they didn't actually want that part, or we're already on Reels at this point, we're already on socials, we're already on TikTok, so everybody had their own videos. So it's like, well, I can just sort of link to one of those, and then if you want a video, that is there, and then if you don't want a video, we can just leave that as an optional as long as I've got that kind of QA with you. I'm keeping it.

SPEAKER_01 15:17

Yeah, so people get to know your business because that's the point of what you're doing, isn't it? You're trying to showcase who people are and try and have a kind of a discovery website, really, in a way.

SPEAKER_00 15:28

Exactly. They don't have um uh reviews on there unless like somebody puts their own kind of review on there. But it's very much a kind of sort of let's find out about the baseline of the business before we then inquire, or we go and have a look at their social media, and then we'll inquire, you know, we might kind of lurk a little bit. So it's just a different way of kind of getting to know that business. I kept that model, and so many people are like, Oh, why don't you have tiers? Why don't you have packages? Why don't you have, you know, just like an entry and it'll cost you this, and then just you have the QA and it'll cost you this, and then put a video on it'll cost you this. And it's like because I didn't want just entries, I don't want people to go with that lower option, and then I just don't have what I wanted to create.

SPEAKER_01 16:15

Yeah, and every business is different, isn't it? A kind of offering someone who's got a solicitors to offering to someone who's a yoga teacher. Yes, they're just two very different models, and you're gonna approach them with a different creative way of promoting their business. So it's really hard, I think, to do a one-size fits all with that kind of business.

SPEAKER_00 16:35

It's really hard. I mean, I've got some businesses that don't want to show the faces, they want to be faceless, it might be, you know, counselors, you know, those those sorts of businesses. Because somebody did ask me quite recently, do you just like send the same questions to everyone? It's like, no, because you've all got different businesses. I can't, you know, we're not going to find out about you if I just sell when did you start? Did you know, you need we need to know about you. Yeah, exactly. So yeah, and then the other thing that I wanted to do just before lockdown was put events on there. So not my events, I wasn't running any events at the time, but just um things that are going on. So I actually have and I I discovered it quite recently. I was pulling all my stuff out of my cupboards, and I have this little drawing of like how my my homepage looked, and it actually doesn't look that much different. It's had lots of facelifts, but the last- I remember doing that.

SPEAKER_01 17:28

I remember doing sketches of how a homepage to can look. Yeah. It just reminded me I didn't do that for my most recent. Well, maybe I did actually. But yeah, it's a really good way, isn't it, to imagine your homepage. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 17:40

I think I'd send it to a website designer. This is what because that was the thing. It's like when I first started, I had this idea, but it's like I need the web designer to really understand what I'm trying to create.

SPEAKER_01 17:52

Because I mean Yeah, and it's hard when you're looking through templates, isn't it? Because you like you want a bit of that and a bit of that. It's never quite exactly what you want. You have to compromise at some point unless you've got the money to pay for a bespoke website to be built.

SPEAKER_00 18:05

Yeah. I mean, lit at the beginning, I did kind of lift the template from my All She Loves blog. And I thought, no, this isn't working because what I want is a page that goes to the categories, and then we kind of click into those categories and then it lists all the business. And I knew what I wanted to look what it wanted to look like. But when you say directory to somebody, just think of a yellow pages or classified. Yeah, it's like just think magazine. Think you know, it's like Yeah, try and think of it in a more editorial way. Yeah, and so I really had to get somebody that really understood. So I kind of made it up a little bit myself, had somebody that did create the categories for me, didn't think she totally understood it. And then once it kind of got big enough, I found another chap. I was like, This is what I want, and he he got it. Was looking on all the Facebook groups, social media, and I was seeing this wave of people going, What do we where do we go? Like people had babies in lockdown, and they're like, We don't know what baby groups are on because we've never stepped outside the house. People going, Do we have to book for this? What's you know? They wanted to know what was going on. So I thought, right, here we go, let's listen. That's where I'll go. Yeah, let's just let's just listen to what people are after here, and then we can put it on the website. So that's when um I'd started with the monthly events. So I do like a monthly roundup of what's on in Maidenheads. Um, I do a weekend one as well. So like if people just want to know what's on at the weekends, and then I do a gig guide. So it's it's for all, it's not, it's not like focused on families with young kids, it's for anybody locally. So on the roundups, there'll be something for everyone, really. So there'll be the kids staff, there'll be the the party stuff that's going on, the markets, the repair cafe.

SPEAKER_01 19:55

You do a lot of work, Emma. I always look at what you do and think it's really full on. It must take you quite a long time to because you know, you're gathering all this information every every weekend, every month. It's a lot, and people don't realise how much work that goes into that. There is that you're promoting them.

SPEAKER_00 20:13

I am, yeah. So it's a it is a lot of work. I do work hard, so I won't deny. Um it get it is easier because when you've done it one year, you go back. So I've just literally done my as we're talking now, we're coming into June. So I've just done my June roundup, and then I'm looking, I'm just refreshing last year's.

SPEAKER_01 20:33

Yeah, so there's a bit of a formula in some ways for some of the events.

SPEAKER_00 20:37

So a lot of them, it's like, oh, that's happening again, da da da. And then also it's really quite easy when you live here. Well, no, it's easy for me to know, right? So I've had somebody said, Oh, because you've put the work in, it's easier for you because you've put the hours in. And I live here, so I know what's going on. So somebody said to me, Can you do Windsor and Maidenhead? And I thought, well, I don't live there, so it's harder. So I'm very so I'm not just behind the screen. So the one thing that you mentioned right at the top of this was networking. So I did take it offline. So that was really to give the directory members more value. So I thought, if I do some networking, and that kind of stemmed from I was doing networking with somebody, which is a free thing that she kind of set up, and then I ended up taking over. And I thought actually it's quite a nice thing to do, you know, even for me, just to get out and just talk to people. I don't charge for netwalks, but we were doing that. But when we first started, she kept saying to me, Should we do some networking? And I was like, Yeah, I'm up for it. And then like she'd go quiet, and then I'd kind of come back to her, go, Are we doing this networking? And she oh, I don't know if I can. And I thought, actually, it'd be really complicated for me to do it with somebody because I've got the the directory. I would have to call it face to face maiden hair because it just all part of my brand. So it'd be really hard to do it with somebody else. So I just thought, I'm just gonna have to do it. So I thought she doesn't want to do it. So I got onto Instagram. I DM'd the local cafe, the local soft play cafe, and I said, I want to do some networking. Can I do it here? She went, come down, have a coffee. So I went down, had a coffee, and I said, I just I've never done it before, but you know, I used to be a trainer, you know, I can manage a room. It's it's it should be second nature to me. So um we did it, and that was the first time I did this sort of face-to-camera reel of going, hi, we're doing this network, I'm really excited. And I thought, I this is it now, it's out there.

SPEAKER_01 22:36

I cannot I remember s meeting you when I first moved here, yeah, or whenever it was in the last sort of three and a half years, and I remember saying to you, and I say this to everyone, you've got to talk to camera. And we were both saying how much we hated talking to camera. And I still say it now to everyone, and I still don't even do it on my own page because I mean that's how rubbish I am. But I'll tell everyone else what they should do. And I have been doing that properly for decades. But it is, you've really got to step out of your comfort zone and talk to camera. And it it is engaging, it does resonate with people, so it is one of the best free ways that you can promote yourself, isn't it?

SPEAKER_00 23:14

It yeah, it is. It's a free way, it's authentic, it's raw, so it's not a polished thing, it's just I'm telling you what you know, and also that's the mindset you've got to be. And it's like no one's sort of looking at me going, oh my god, she's got grey hair and she's got wrinkles. So that that's what it is. I just thought that's what you're there for, yeah. I'm just giving you some information. If you're a a local business or not even a business, you might be a charity, you might be thinking about starting a business, you might just you might be from a company or you might just want to get out there, then this is for you. So I'm talking to you. Like if you once come to some networking, here it is. This is the date, you can make it, book it. So you're just sort of you're telling people, and the more you kind of tell people, and the more you have to really shout about it, that's when you sell the ticket.

SPEAKER_01 24:03

And events are hard, aren't they? Because I don't know if it's post-COVID that people tend to commit and get their tickets later and later for anything. So it's always such a risk when you think, no one's booked yet, and then suddenly, you know, two days before your event, everybody's booking their tickets. So it's a really hard thing to do.

SPEAKER_00 24:21

It's do you know what? So when I started, I think the first one I did, I think I got about 15 or 16 people, which actually was nice because it was a small cafe. That's a good number. And it was a good number. And I had the speaker was going, she kept saying to me, like, how many have you got booked on? I was like, Oh, five. It's like, oh, I've got seven this time. But yeah, it was a real thing, it was a real struggle. Every month needed to get people, but I always had like at least 15 or 16 people, and I capped it to 20 initially, although it's sort of going up now. So I I didn't sell out for until I think until the following January, I think. It was a long time, and then I was selling out, and then it went quiet again. So then it was like, and then it was that panic, panic. And then for the last sort of I'd say year and a half, they've all sold out.

SPEAKER_01 25:16

Your events look so busy on Instagram, and they just it's such a a big group of people that you can tell absolutely love it because it it's it's something that even comes across on your reels. And I don't know, is there anyone else? I'm not asking you to promote anyone else in Maidenhead, but yeah, there isn't anyone else doing what you're doing in Maidenhead, is there?

SPEAKER_00 25:35

I think that's the thing. I think I've got space. There are a couple of networking, I mean we've got the chamber who do a lot of networking, sort of Windsor and Maidenhead and surrounding. There are some kind of membership groups. Um the real five, they're kind of win again, they're Windsor and Maidenhead, and then the My Royal Borough do free ones. They're quite often in Windsor, although this week they're in Maidenhead, so I will be attending. Um, but then you've you've got like other ones that kind of float around. So you've got the Marlowe ones, you've got ones sort of Berkshire, Windsor.

SPEAKER_01 26:11

You find though that a lot of them start off all guns blazing, and then it's really hard. They don't actually maintain, you know, that they don't really go beyond three or four meetups because they know how hard it is to promote it.

SPEAKER_00 26:24

Yeah, it's still it is hard. And I think the one thing that I do is I keep my ticket prices low. So you don't make money off events really. You're not to doing an awful lot of them and the big ones. Um, this is just an extent, it's just part of what I do. So everything that I do is bits and pieces of what I do, and it's all part of the marketing, and it's growing me as a brand as well. You know, the 12 quid a ticket. So you can't get coffee, and if you're on the directory, it's six quid a ticket. So that just covers my admin fee because that's your coffee as well. So I'm giving value, and that was the whole point is I'm giving value to people that are on the directory. So everything that I do is for them. All the stuff that I do on the website, or the what's on guides, or the sponsored posts, or you know, anything that I do, it's all traffic to the website ultimately. So people are visiting that directory. So everything that I'm doing is for them, all the showing up. So I'm getting out there, I'm talking about it, I'm online talking about it. So you have to show up all the time because I've got to do it for them.

SPEAKER_01 27:27

It's my duty to kind of you know if you're charging people, I feel the same about anything that I do, is that it's all very well. It's great to get people to believe in you and sponsor you and do something and give you handover money that's hard for them to earn. But yeah, that's that's just the start of it. Then you've got to deliver, haven't you? You can't just say, Okay, thanks for that. You've got to make sure people are visiting my website. I've got to make sure I get more signups for the newsletter. You've got to keep going all the time. I mean, that's the relentlessness of social media, unfortunately. No as well.

SPEAKER_00 28:00

And I might have a business that might kind of not get any sales from you know, I can't even guarantee that. But what I can do is that I'll showcase you on my socials and you might get some followers from it, and then in time they might buy from you.

SPEAKER_01 28:16

Yeah, that visibility is more valuable. It doesn't just convert overnight. It's you know, there's statistics, isn't there, about how many times people need to see you before it register to who they are, and then before they might come and visit you. But you're all part of that for someone, aren't you? Your marketing is extending their reach beyond their own followers, which is really valuable.

SPEAKER_00 28:39

Yeah, and that's that's a message you have to get across to people. Not very many people question what I do. I think they they lurk a little bit, they've seen me grow on socials, and I think she's she's got something. And as you say, I I mean, I'm the only one that's got the website for Maidenhead, as far as I'm aware, unless there's one lurking around and they're very quiet about it. There's nothing like this for Maidenhead. I'm keeping on top of it all the time. Even like the council, they have their Facebook page, the make Maidenhead, but they don't have like the website.

SPEAKER_01 29:08

It's a different, it's a different vibe anyway, isn't it? You know, the chamber meetings and the council. Yeah, it's very different to what you're doing.

SPEAKER_00 29:15

Yeah, and I'm not political, I'm not I'm not part of the council, I'm independent from them, I collaborate with them, I've got good relationship with them because we're all shouting from the same or singing from Yeah, you're all promoting the area, which is a win-win for everyone. Yeah, exactly. So we're all kind of we're all shouting the same thing. So it's not like it's a competition or anything like that. I'm just trying to create this platform to showcase what we've got. And Maidenhead at the moment, you know, we're going into this sort of regeneration, you know, with with the Nicholson Centre is being flattened in a matter of weeks. We're gonna be losing some of our shops that are situated in our shopping centre. You know, we do a lot of events here, there's a lot of people that criticize the area. I've lived in different places, and I've never known a community like it. And I don't think I could do this anywhere else. And I'm very lucky that I've got this space because the one thing that I didn't want to do right from the beginning was step on toes. And I researched and researched, and nobody was doing directory with videos when I set up, and there was nothing in my area. So there's no point in trying to slide in and just sort of take home from what somebody else is doing. There's no point in trying to just fight people.

SPEAKER_01 30:33

I kind of stay in that space, I stay in that lane, it's that I don't try and kind of filter out too much because No, you know what you do, you've got your niche, and you know, even you know, when I had my blogger network, I always used to say to people and they say, I want to do a blog, but I don't really know what to do it about. And I always used to say, like, don't try and do everything, just try and find something that you're passionate about, because then you'll get the followers and then you'll get an audience. Because if you try and be Sunday Times style magazine, you know, as one person, you're not gonna get there. No. But if you love winemaking or if you love something, people are gonna come to you because they're passionate about the same thing as you. So I think finding a niche online because we're so saturated with content, yeah, that that's a way for people to find you.

SPEAKER_00 31:20

Yeah, exactly. And there are people that don't know face-to-face maidenhead, and there are people that do know. I mean, I might kind of see somebody in a cafe and somebody will introduce me and they'll go, Oh, she runs face mainhead. And I've had people go, Oh, yeah, you're the one that shares all the events, and well, that's great. I found Christmas event through your website, or you know, it might just be you know, somebody that lives here is looking for things to do.

SPEAKER_01 31:43

But there's always an opportunity to grow, isn't there? There's always going to be new businesses, there's always gonna be new people moving into the area, exactly all evolve in a way that you see another little space that you think, oh, I could be doing that. I mean, it things never stay the same, do they? That's the beauty of bit of working for yourself.

SPEAKER_00 31:59

And you've got to keep on top of that, you've got to listen to what people want and you've got to look at what's working. I mean, I've spent sort of years of doing different things. So last year it was all about my branding and I was doing my podcast. I set that all up because I thought I'd bring me into it. I'm face-to-face after all, and it was another way of showcasing businesses as well. The year before was like growing the networking. So, like this year, it's like, right, let's get back on the directory. And I've been listing, listing, listing because I've been shouting about it. So, where at one point I thought, directories, is it still a thing? I know I call it a directory, maybe it's the language I'm using, da da da. But actually, I think people are are seeing what I'm doing. As you say, it's not just this directory, it's visibility all around.

SPEAKER_01 32:48

I've got, I think it should be called discovery.

SPEAKER_00 32:51

It should be, yeah. Maybe I should change directory and call it discovery.

SPEAKER_01 32:55

It's all good for SEO, isn't it? You know, the the link backs and the you know, it's it's a good SEO for both businesses for you and the other business. And you know, that people spend a lot of money trying to get a good SEO. And SEO is it works over time. So all those links that you put up a year ago are becoming more and more valuable as time goes on.

SPEAKER_00 33:15

Exactly. And also, um, my husband keeps pointing out it's the AI agents these days as well. Like people are scanning the internet.

SPEAKER_01 33:22

I did a a podcast with someone who works in PR and we were talking about AI, and she said the AI results that you get from you know your question, they're scanning the internet. So if you're keeping your content up to date and valuable, and they you're gonna show up in the AI searches. AI is not really creating content, it's just stealing it from everyone else. So you've got to be having decent content for them to scan and steal, really.

SPEAKER_00 33:48

Yeah, exactly. Because you know, there's people like, is this is there still a place for blogging? Is there still a place to AI is not gonna steal that because they need to steal it from somewhere. And obviously it will put the links where it comes from, but yeah, it's quality content that it finds. So yeah, it's I'm quite flattered when I'm looking for things to do in Maidenhead. And if I do a Google search, it just brings me up.

SPEAKER_01 34:11

It should do, it should bring you up.

SPEAKER_00 34:13

It does, it brings me up. So I I can't look online. I have to find other ways to find out what it's it. I know, yeah. I mean, I I'm very well connected, just it's just been organic and over time. I work for the local art centre, I freelance them, so I'm very well, I know exactly what's going on there.

SPEAKER_01 34:34

What are some of the new exciting places in Maidenhead that you've discovered and that people can look out for if they visit Maidenhead this summer?

SPEAKER_00 34:43

Um, so yeah, they might not necessarily be on the directory. Obviously, you need to go to face to face, but if you listen to this. I've got one that is coming on, and that's our board game cafe. They are listing, uh they're called um Sip and Conquer, and they are girls after my own heart, they're young girls that have opened this business, and they're all about the community. So I love that. I went down Friday and had a chat and a coffee with them. Um, yeah, they're doing all these different events, and it's all about sort of getting off the digital stuff, you know, and getting the board games out, and they do other events as well. They're doing um networking in there and sip and I don't know, painting and all different things. So I love that. A lot of our cafes are starting to do that, lots of community things. Another one that opened last year, I did go to the invite was Piccolo Land. That's for little children. It's like a play village, if you like, for children. Set it up so they've got like um these little rooms, so they've got little shops and they can go in and role play. Cute. So it's really cute. And she loves a bit. It's for six years and and younger. So that's quite a nice thing that we've got here. So, as I mentioned, we are kind of losing our shopping centre. So um I you know, I fear a little bit for the high street because will people still be going down? But I did notice at the weekend that the shopping centre, although things were like closing, there were loads of people in there. So I thought this is amazing that people are still coming out and the water side quarters are always bustling, so especially in the summer.

SPEAKER_01 36:21

People do want to have a wander down their uh their high street, don't they? So hopefully, you know, people will just discover new places to go. Absolutely, absolutely. Thanks very much today, um, Emma. I think we might need to do a little check in with you seasonally to find out what's happening locally.

SPEAKER_00 36:37

Or just go to the site, face to face maidenhead.

SPEAKER_01 36:40

Always go to face to face Maidenhead. And that's where it is, and you'll find it all in one place. Amazing. Thanks so much. Thank you, thank you so much.