The Power of Repetition in Small Business Marketing
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You guys put so much sweat and tears into stuff. You're doing a disservice if you are not out there repeating yourself.

Hey everyone, welcome to the SOB Marketing Podcast where we celebrate the SOB that you are and if you haven't figured it out yet we mean small owned business we don't mean SOB. Listen we know that as a small business owner you are working hard on the daily to keep your business fully operational while trying to promote it and while some days it may feel like the business is owning you

If we're being honest with each other, I bet you would admit that you wouldn't give up the insanity for anything. Our commitment here at the SOB Marketing Podcast is to give you the real talk, what works when it comes to advertising, marketing, promoting your business, and then what doesn't really work. And Chelsea and I promise to always keep the conversation real. Welcome back, you little SOB smaller business.

This is Chelsea's eye got really big. Yeah. We are back for another episode of the SOB Marketing Podcast. Y'all, if you're new around here, all we do is talk shop. We not car shop. We talk marketing, all things marketing to help you promote your small business, especially because we know that

A lot of you, even if you think you want to outsource some part of your marketing in 2025, you got to handle a lot of it in house. - Yeah. - Okay. And so we just want to provide you guys ideas, topics, research, information that we have gained over the last 15 plus years as well, way over 15 years now for me.

as a marketing professional. So that way you guys aren't having to make these mistakes, right? We're cutting and saving you time on that end.

So friendly reminder, we have a TLDL section. Every episode we do this thing where if you are in a rush, in a hurry, because you're a busy small business owner, you can go to the TLDL chapter at the end of this episode. Chelsea will give you a quick rundown of what we talked about today. And then we always highly encourage you to come back and listen to the full length episode because context, y'all. You need the conversation to kind of understand it a little better. Also,

You know, if you haven't, hit subscribe. Hit follow. Yeah.

Leave a review. Leave a review. Pretty please. Tell people about your SOB marketing besties over here. And, you know, we're trying to build a cult. We're working really hard. A cult for good, not for bad. Yes, not for bad. We would never. Yeah, that's right. So, Chelsea, what topic are we going to be covering today in the marketing world? Okay, Vivian, today we are talking about something that we've talked about before. Oh. Which is repetition. Yes.

Yeah, so we're repeating this conversation. Today's conversation is going to be about repetition and why it is so important in marketing. Y'all, I know you feel like you're saying the same thing over and over again, and it feels exhausting. That's how marketing works. Unfortunately, it's all about reminding people constantly that

your business, of your brand. Y'all, why do you think we come on here every single week and say, leave us a review to get on your nerves? No, no.

Well, here's I want you guys to right now. We're going to start this conversation by just putting this out there. Repetition is not annoying. No. OK. And we're going to tell you why it's not annoying and why it's actually probably the best thing you can do as a small business owner, because y'all have got to quit assuming that people see you.

and engage and digest every single little thing you put out there. I hate to spoil it for you. They don't. Well, let's be honest, y'all. The only person who is always interacting with your content is you. Your mom. You know what? That's true. Yes. And your mother. Yes. Shout out to Raina. Thank you for listening, mom. We love you. Thanks, mom. Love you. Thanks for leaving that review. Actually, I don't think she left a review. What? Mom!

What's that about? But my point stands. Okay, you and your mom are the only two that consume all of your content. Everyone else... Poor moms. I know, right? What if you're making bad content and your mom just has to constantly... And your mom just has to constantly consume the bad content? That sucks. My point is...

No one is consuming all of your content. Think about how often you as a consumer don't see a business's content that you love. You like miss something. Yeah. The way these platforms work, the way that life works, like no one's going to be able to see everything you do at all times. Your repetition is not repetitive because no one's consuming it.

enough for it to be repetitive, except for you. Well, and so let's give some structure to this conversation, Chelsea. How do we want to, in this episode, how are we going to talk about repetition? So I know maybe first, let's, we've already kind of started in, let's finish this

Okay, perfect.

Perfect. Because it is. Perfect. And then in there, we're also going to talk about the, what are the, what's the rule we're going to talk about? We're going to talk about one, the seven to eight touch points and two, the seven, 11, four rule. Oh, seven, 11, four. Do you guys know about that? It's a rule. It's a rule that people don't talk about. I know. Right.

We'll get into that conversation when we get into that conversation. I want to stick to, you know, why repetitive is not actually or why repetition is not actually annoying. Annoying. Well, can I put a fine point on something you were just talking about? Chelsea, Chelsea mentioned this very casually. She said people are not seeing everything that you're putting out there. These these platforms don't do that. OK, so.

two things to that platform conversation. One, just a reminder that a person who loves the ticky-tocky is not gonna be the same person sometimes that loves Instagram. That's not gonna be the same person that likes Pinterest or LinkedIn or Facebook.

Everybody has preferences in the platforms that they use. And so therefore, if you post a video on TikTok, but I prefer to just be on Instagram all day long, but I like following your Instagram page.

then that means that I didn't see your TikTok and you're not being repetitive to me on Instagram because I just don't cross over that way. There's no crossover. Yeah, there are instances where that is the case. So yeah, you might have a small percentage of that, but I promise you if someone has decided to follow you, they don't care that you're repeating a video or you're repeating the message. The other thing I want to say is these platforms,

Even if Chelsea is following a certain business on Instagram, she's not seeing every single post or every single real, the algorithm we already know. And you small business owners have told us yourself, you're fed up with it. You don't like it. But that's what these algorithms are doing. They're always like testing new things out, which means that one month, Chelsea might not see half the stuff from a business that she's actually following. Right.

Half the time, I don't see the stuff I post on the season marketer. All of that just to say, you guys, it is okay for you to repeat a message, a promotion, or an idea. And that's what I was going to say earlier, and I'm glad you clarified. When we say repetition, we mean you're repeating a message, or you're repeating the content, or you're repeating like you just said. Yeah.

You don't have to literally just take the same video and plaster it across. Like, that's not the type of repetition we're talking about. We're talking about, we know that sometimes you guys feel like, oh my gosh, do I have to talk about the SOB community that we have opened again, right? That's $50 a month that you guys can join today if you want by going to school.com slash SOB. I mean, yeah.

You you're sometimes thinking like I'm on there promoting my sale again. I'm on there reminding people that we're having this open house. We get it. You sound you feel like you sound like a broken record, but you do not. Yes. Also, let's say on the off. I have an example. Let's say there's a very small percentage of people that are getting annoyed with your repetition. OK, so.

Those people are not going to be consumers. They're not going to be the people who interact and who purchase something from your brand. They're just haters. Let's be honest. You know what's funny is I actually had the idea of starting this episode with, because you had posted a story on your personal Instagram. Okay. That was a metal...

metal rock girl and she was like this song is for all my haters i was no it was courtney little plant okay spirit box and she said this song goes out to everybody i hate oh okay yeah so not to all her haters but just everybody she everybody she hates well i was gonna do our version of it which is this podcast episode goes out to all our haters because i know you listen then

Y'all, my list of haters is very short, I think. What if we had like a long list of haters? Okay, so next time we're going to add an easel right here and we're just going to keep a tally. We're going to start a tally. People who hate us, love us. And we're putting your first and last names on there, y'all. She said do it. She said try us. Do it. My example...

for repetition and people getting annoyed with it is I listen to Legends of Adventress on YouTube. It's a D&D podcast, y'all. Okay.

And they started, they did a Kickstarter called the Crooked Moon. They're hardcore promoting it, right? Like that's their baby. That's their whole thing. They created an entire, like that's a lot of work. Like a D&D world, a lot of work. Also tied to their livelihood, correct? Yes. Okay. Yes. Like it's... The way they make money. It's the way they make money. Yeah. So they're pushing it real hard. And...

They started like you just did with the SOB community. They're being immersive about it too. Right? And they, at the beginning of every episode, they read comments. Like from haters? Well, no. Not necessarily. They just pick their favorite comments from last week's video. And they picked one where it was someone saying...

We get it. Your Kickstarter isn't doing good. Stop with this immersive stuff. We don't want to hear it anymore. And they made it, they turned it into a joke. They're like, yeah, this goes out to all our haters and stuff like that. It could be that people are getting annoyed. They're not your target audience. Yeah, and I think really the crux of it all, too, is as Chelsea just mentioned, when you are...

I'm going to give you a little tough love. You guys did not go into business to not make money. Yeah. Okay. If you wanted to do that, you would have just picked a hobby and gone with it. Okay. But you, the moment you decided I am going to create an LLC, I am going to start to sell a product. I'm going to start to offer a service. Yeah.

You have to be sure that you are taking care of yourself in the sense that the time that you are investing in this, you're getting back at least double, triple, right? You're in business. Nobody faults you for that. Yeah. Yeah. All right. And so, you know, if that is your you guys put so much sweat and tears into stuff, you're doing a disservice if you are not out there repeating yourself.

All right. Because the person I don't know about you guys, I'm very busy. I have a lot of stuff going on. You tell me something one time, you're probably going to have to tell me again two to three more times. So that way I'm like, oh, yeah, by the way, I want to go to this event. Oh, yeah. By the way, I want to you know, I've been meaning to buy this thing on Amazon or well, Amazon's a bad thing. I shouldn't buy anything off Amazon.

Bad example there. Yeah. But, you know, it's just one of those things. I know. Well, I have been looking at some stuff on Amazon, so I am telling on myself. Go ahead. Girl, absolutely not. We don't buy stuff from Amazon. So let me just quickly sum it up like this. Don't confuse people being distracted. Okay. As people being disinterested. Love. Okay. Yes. Their life is busy, especially we don't have children. Right.

to you mom and dads out there that are dealing with kids and going to work and trying to run a business and doing all that stuff, more power to you. You're distracted. You have a lot going on. That doesn't mean you're disinterested in what somebody is selling or what someone's message is. It's just that you need to see it several times before it sinks in or it cuts through all that busyness that you have going on. Well, yeah, I mean, this comes back to the

People need to interact with your business seven to eight times. You need seven to eight touch points before someone is going to be willing to actually make a purchase with you. Perfect. Yeah. Which I think, Vivian, now that we're kind of moving into why repetition is important and why it matters, and since we just said the seven to eight touch points thing, can we talk about...

the 7-11-4 rule yeah let's do it let's do it let's hear it okay 7-11-4 rule um the reason chelsea and i were talking about this earlier and she was like why do we never talk about this rule we always hear the seven to eight touch points right you have to have seven to eight touch points with your business before someone decides to shell out money and buy from you

This rule is a little different because it's coming directly from Google. Okay. And so Google, obviously you guys know because they sneaky, sneaky, they getting all this research on consumers on how people buy. And so they have found that when it comes to video specifically that people need seven hours of content consumed, 11 touch points with your business,

on four separate locations. Yeah. Okay, so what does that translate to you, Chelsea? What does that mean, like in layman's terms? So in layman's terms, this means if you're on YouTube and on social media and you have a website, let's say you're on Facebook and Instagram, for someone to be ready to interact with your brand and ready to make a purchase from you, they need to consume seven hours of the content you're creating. Okay.

So that might be seven hours worth of combined long form YouTube videos plus the three minute reels that you're doing plus that video that you have posted on your website. Yeah. Okay. So it combines to seven hours. 11 touch points. That means they need to be interacting with you 11 different times across four platforms. Okay.

Yeah. So whether that be website, YouTube, Instagram, Facebook, whether that be Google, you know, whatever those are, it's just in four different email marketing. Yes. Four different versions ways. What

I think what was kind of tripping us up and what the conclusion we came to is specifically because we always hear the seven to eight touch points for marketing in general. We were like, why are they saying 11 touch points? But remember, we said this is video specific. OK, so it may be that video.

when it comes to video content, people are just needing a little more of that repetition in order for it to stick, you know, in their head. Yeah, absolutely. But this is just another reiteration that,

You need to be repetitive and need to be constantly making those connections with your target audience. I think this also brings something else up. When I listen to statistics like this, I think what it definitely does is it leans into what we always tell you guys, which is,

Listen, we're never going to give you some secret formula or potion. I mean, Chelsea likes making potions, but she ain't going to tell you her formula, her recipe. Yeah, don't worry about it. Yeah. But there is no quick way for you to create

create a solid relationship with somebody. And these metrics should all tell you that basically at the end of the day, what it is is your marketing needs to be a long-term approach. Yes. Okay, it's not a one and done. Somebody is not going to buy from you just because they saw a 10-second reel. Maybe if you go viral, that could happen, you know, but what's the probability of that? And also,

The end goal is not just a one-time purchase. It's a repeat purchase. And the only way you're going to build that up is through that long-term relationship. Repetition is all about building your brand awareness. It's building those connections because the whole point of marketing is to create a relationship. Right.

I also want to mention that repetition is going to help you reinforce your messaging so people know what your business is about. And it's going to help you with consistency because if you are being repetitive, that helps you stay consistent with what you want to say. Your messaging, y'all, should not switch up that much.

Oh, I love that approach. Yeah. So it makes it, you know, why make it harder on yourself? You guys have have four to five bullet points of things that you're always sticking to. And I guess that's the repetition part of it, too, is

We mentioned this a little earlier. Repetition does not mean being repetitive. I know that sounds bad, but what it means is taking the idea and being sure that you're communicating whatever base idea you have over and over again, but that can come in many different forms. So when Vivian and I talk about the SOB community, we're not always saying the exact same words. Yeah.

But we're always hitting on the exact same points. Right. We're always saying you get to be a part of the community of other small business owners. Right. You get an hour long Zoom call every single week. You get access to an online forum. But we can say all those things. In different ways. Like your messaging. Yes.

When I say your messaging is going to become consistent, I don't mean you're going to say the same thing over and over again. I mean, you're going to make sure you're always hitting the important bullet points so you're not leaving out valuable information. Oh, you know what? That kind of got me thinking just now. I wonder how many of us are scared of repetition or we give it a bad name because we think it's...

boring that was supposed to be that was supposed to be a snore by the way i don't know that that's what you thought you were trying to be lord woldemort or something like i thought that's what you were going for i was trying to do a snoring sound okay that wasn't very good but it's fine why don't you put one right here this is what it was supposed to sound like yes absolutely why were we pointing it's audio it's fine uh

Yes. That's 100% what it is. We find it boring because we are constantly listening to the same thing. Right.

that's why at the beginning of this episode we want to hit home so much that you're the only one yeah that's getting tired of it because you're the only one who's constantly hearing so what i was saying though is okay rise up to the challenge my very creative people no no no i'm sorry no it was good go ahead rise into the challenge my very creative small business owners i

I have complete confidence in you that you can figure out 20 different ways to say the same thing. I promise you, you can. Okay. So just try to be a little creative with it. If you are getting tired of it because you think it's boring.

Spice it up a little. You can relay, convey the same idea, the same benefits, the same key talking points in different ways. It just requires that you look at it from a different perspective or just think of it a little differently, right? Approach it from outside the box. I once worked with an ad agency where I had to go through and revise all of their work

because it would be laden with misspellings and wrong information. We were spending thousands of dollars for me to do double the work. Sometimes you don't need an ad agency. You just need resources to be able to figure it out on your own.

Yeah, that's why we created the SOB community for the small business owners who want to keep their marketing in-house but still need some support. You get templates, courses, downloads, expert advice, weekly live calls, and a supportive group of other small business owners for just $50 a month. So head over to school.com slash SOB. That's S-K-O-O-L dot com.

slash S-O-B, all lowercase. Join today and feel confident in your marketing. Can I drive this home by adding something else, you guys? Okay. Let me give you two very...

convenient examples the other reason that repetition is not your enemy is because if you have a different type of an idea or you're selling a product or service that people are just not familiar with okay maybe you're not the first to do it but maybe it just hasn't gained popularity and so you're having to do a little bit of that education part of it too um repetitions your bff okay so

let's take for example Airbnb do you think that when Airbnb showed up on the scene that people were like oh yeah because I'm used to staying in a hotel right oh yeah let me just like stay in someone's personal home pay them for it and that was a very weird concept to a lot of people and it took

and repetition for them to finally get the idea into, you know, through their ads, through their website, through the messaging, drive home the point like, no, this is the new innovative way for people to actually, you know, stay with comfort, right?

All right. For you to be able to stretch out your legs and not be confined to a one small room with two beds in it and one bathroom. Okay. Instead, why not stay in this luxurious home near the water and you pay the same rates? Yeah. Very new concept that they had to reiterate time over time. Absolutely. The other product that did this was Peloton.

Okay. Peloton. Yeah. People had done exercise or they knew what exercise bikes were used for and the benefits to it, but their subscription that was added on top of it was a newer concept. Okay. What do you mean? It's not just a bike. Oh, I can actually stream all of these classes that became their big selling point, right? It was the subscription part of it. And Peloton,

joining this community of people, you know, that we're all wanting to be healthy and do all that. So I say all that just to tell you, you're going to have to do the repetition part if you're trying to sell a product or service that's not mainstream quite yet or that you're having to explain. And we run up against this too. I feel like with our SOB community, it's a membership community, but I feel like people

People still don't see that as an option for marketing, right? They still think of like, if I want to do my marketing, I have two options. I either do it myself or I outsource it to somebody. Oh, well, there's an in-between in there, which is, hey, you do it yourself, but you get access and support to marketing professionals, right?

that help you along the way, right? So that way you're not dishing out thousands of dollars. But so that's where repetition for us, y'all, we're not gonna be able to get sick of it. Yeah. So absolutely. Also, just real quick, like, it encourages action over time. Yes. Yeah, I want I wrote that in my notes. And I wanted to make sure I said that because it's,

Just real simple, real clear. It encourages action over time because it does. You need to be constantly interacting with your potential customer audience. Your potential customers slash target audience. That's what I meant to say. Customer audience. Your customer audience. I also, Vivian, my last bullet point that I want to reiterate and I want, I think is really important. Repetition does not only mean social media.

Right. I mean, y'all, there's so much more to marketing than social media. Yeah. Okay. Repetition means making sure you are, not constantly, you are consistently, that's the correct word, sending out email marketing, your email newsletters. It means, you know, thinking about the events that you routinely participate in. Are you always at the farmer's market?

That's repetition. It's, you know, is there a monthly event that you host at your store? That's repetition. Yeah. And the repetition and consistency go hand in hand. I say it every time. I'm like, I wish I didn't use the word train, but that's exactly kind of what it is. You know, you, you do have to, in a sense, train your customers, potential customers. And what

with the examples that Chelsea just shared, those are wonderful ways to do that. You have a, you know, consistent, uh, repetitive thing that you do every Friday in store in your physical store. Great. You do, um, a perfect example. We shop at earth fair.

And yeah, I shop at Earth Fair. And so on my husband's also a veteran, they give discounts on Sunday specifically for military. And so that's the thing. It's a repetitive thing. But I also know they've now trained me that like if I can train,

managed to go shopping on a Sunday as opposed to like, you know, Wednesday night, then I would rather do that. But these are all things that you can do to, you know, that it all goes hand in hand. It lines up nicely. Even something as simple as like, you know, when I think

when you said repetition isn't just social media, how many of you guys for your, your phone system? Okay. You have a phone number attached to your small business. How many of you on there have a recording that kicks in that, um,

reiterates the message that you want them to hear. There are small things like this that I think, um, you know, we talk about you having so much free digital real estate now and taking full advantage of that. It's the same thing with all of these other things. So think outside of Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest, LinkedIn, Tikitaki, all that. Yeah.

Okay, Vivian. Well, I think we're ready for the TLDL. Do it. Okay, let's do it. So if you skipped ahead to this TLDL chapter, I am going to give you a brief summary of what we just talked about. However, when you get the chance, make sure you go back and listen to this entire conversation because, you know, that's where...

the good parts are, right? - That sounded like a threat, but yes. - So today we talked about repetition, why it matters for your small business and why it's not annoying anyone, okay?

The only person it could possibly be annoying is you because you are the only one who always hears all of your content. But it is important and matters because it reinforces your messaging. It helps you stay consistent. It helps build brand awareness. You're building connections and it encourages action over time.

Remember, it takes seven to eight touch points for people to feel comfortable enough to make a purchase with you. We also talked about the 7-11-4 rule. So if you're curious as to what that is, make sure you go back and listen to the full conversation. But really at the core of it, repetition is not hurting your small business. It is helping it.

So I'm sorry that you feel like you're being repetitive and that it's annoying. Just find creative ways to share your messaging. Also want to say before we wrap up, thank you so much for listening. If you found this conversation was helpful, make sure you send it to another small business owner. We want to help.

everyone feel comfortable handling their marketing on their own. Don't forget about the SOB community where we have a group of small business owners who are looking to build their business and feel comfortable with marketing their business on their own. And you get access to Vivian and I, two marketing professionals. We are there to help you. Make sure you leave a review. Pretty please.

Thank you so much and go be the best SOB you can be.