Episode 49: Crafting Compelling Video Content

Lisa Buffo

Hi, everybody. Welcome to today’s episode of Party like a marketer, the podcast dedicated to cannabis marketing, public relations and storytelling. My name is Lisa buffo, and I am your host, and today’s guest is Julie Baco. It’s the founder and owner of onward content, a video production company based in Denver, Colorado that covers everything from concept to creation from live action to animation. Julie has been in the industry for a very long time and has a lot of expertise in marketing, and a very keen lens on video. So we’re going to talk about the role that video plays in marketing today and what it means for the bigger picture in cannabis marketing. Julie, thank you so much for coming on the show today.

 

Julie Batkiewicz

Thanks for inviting me

 

Lisa Buffo  

of course. So just to get started, can you tell our audience a little bit about yourself, your professional background, how you got started in cannabis, and what brought you to today, founding onward content and the role that it plays in the industry.

 

Julie Batkiewicz  

So I’ve actually been in cannabis, nine years, in total, I had been working in New York in animation and design and post production. I actually like looked at the years recently, and I have about 20 years experience working in the field. And I’ve I’ve done everything from like corporate video to working in advertising and motion graphics and visual effects. Even dabbling in some like children’s animation projects. But I was actually trying to get out of it. And I we moved to Colorado, my husband got a job here and I sort of fell into it back into it again. Because I saw the need for educational information. You know, I loved weed my whole life and walking into a dispensary. And not seeing any real information was kind of alarming. And I saw an opportunity because you’d be sitting in these waiting rooms and in most, most situations I’d be playing like Netflix or something like that. So I got the idea to basically create a library of content that can run on these dispensary screens. And that’s how I basically got into like digital signage. So my my bread and butter is actually like digital signage content, where I’m making video content for dispensary screens, I have a library of content that I license but in addition to that, I also create all of the branded content, so all the promo content, that kind of stuff. So when you walk into any of these dispensaries that I manage, it kind of looks like they’ve made all this because my logos anywhere on it, I sort of have bundled everything into like a custom content network. And that’s one side of the business. And then the other side is just custom content. I get hired to do training videos, to do social media content, you know, to do like, testimonial videos, so I can really kind of come in as your video partner for all your video needs.

 

Lisa Buffo 

Thank you that makes sense. And when you so to follow up to that, what role does video play and the marketing matrix for cannabis marketers in this industry? Cannabis is very visual and to your point about education, there is a need for that. So can you speak to the role it plays in the overall marketing matrix like as far as strategy and like what what is that? How do you define its role kind of in the bigger picture for marketing,

 

Julie Batkiewicz

it’s becoming a bigger and bigger role every year when I started you know, most people were kind of just putting up some still images but now everything is moving to video and not just like iPhone videos but like high quality video like you know, shooting really nice beauty flower images that we can, we can actually do something with you know, like not to like Bash iPhone photos, but when you hire a professional videographer or photographer and you get really professional high quality shots, that content does better. I have the data to back it up like the these beauty flower shots, the beauty concentrate shots, all of that stuff performs really well on social media. And I sit in dispensary waiting rooms a lot and like watch people watch the screens and that’s what they always want to see. They want to see processes they want to see macro shots of flower they want to see you Know the golden concentrates coming out of the live rosin press like, all of that stuff does really well, and it’s what people want to see. So, you know, I’m always looking at the data because I can run any reports on some of those social media content that I’m creating for clients to see like what kind of content performs well. And that’s always it. It’s like the same thing over and over again, oh, another beauty flower shot. Great. So like, I’ve built so many montages of just like macro flower content. But again, and again, people love to see that. So I’m seeing just more and more, not just video content, but also like professional video content come into come into the marketing space. Because you’re right, it is visual, they will want to see those trichomes and the beautiful colors and all that stuff. And then as far as like, educational goes, yeah, when I first started, I really pushed the educational side of things. But I’ll say that there’s been a major shift in the industry in that, yeah, education is nice. But ultimately, it needs to be sales driven. So I would say like, up until a few years ago, I was almost exclusively producing what I would refer to as like educational content, that’s like covering cannabinoids, and terpenes, and delivery methods and kind of like the standard informational stuff. But most of the consumers are aware of that. Now, we’re sort of over that. And now we’re moving into what I refer to as like, like selling content without really selling it, because, you know, we’re also viewing it through the eyes of compliance. So if we want it to live on social media, or like, live in places where it’s visible, we got to make sure it’s really compliant. So there’s this specific language and, and, and specific strategy that I’m using where, you know, we’re calling it educational, but ultimately, it’s also has a lot of like products in it, that we’re able to kind of skirt that by compliance is like, yeah, it’s a video maybe about cannabinoids, or sleep or terpenes. But we’re always making sure that there are a ton of products featured and that like that can we can always like tie that back in. And that’s really like kind of the all the custom stuff that I’m doing right now where we’re taking the like, traditional informational, or like educational content, and, and selling it as that. But ultimately, it has a sales focus. Because at the end of the day, like we’re here to drive sales.

 

Lisa Buffo

Yeah, that makes sense. And so what is can you speak to some of that data as far as like the results you’ve seen, or like the difference from if you have a top of mind from professional video content, and or what you just mentioned, having these educational videos that do have like more product shots than versus just somebody talking to them, or, you know, a tour of the facility, not that there’s not a time and place for that, but I think it’s really interesting what you said about just marrying those two having educational content, but it is a sales tool and being able to do both at the same time.

 

Julie Batkiewicz

Right. Yeah. And I used to always say like, an educated customer is a loyal customer. Because ultimately, like you want them to have a positive experience with your products and they need to understand how to use them. But we’re sort of over that like, like consumers are educated right now. They they’re familiar with the products and the processes and everything. But as far as like engagement rate rates go it’s it’s it’s always the beauty stuff even and I always try to incorporate the beauty stuff into everything because I know that’s what people want to see. So even if it is a video, you know about what does it mean? When you say beauty stuff like can you just like yeah, like like beauty flower shots like really nice macro flower, the bubbly and the golden oil from concentrates. Anything where you can show healthy flowers to like I have done my fair share of retouching flower Yeah, but and I always recommend this with any anybody I’m working with if you can hire a professional videographer or photographer who who works in cultivation spaces and is familiar with it is such a niche and you have to know how to film it what to look for. You have to have the right lenses and the right filters because like if you’re shooting in high pressure sodium you’re going to need a So filter for that, even if you’re shooting in, like with in a cultivation facility with LEDs and that they’re more purple hue, you need a separate filter for that. So like hiring somebody who really understands the process. I work with a guy in Denver named Dan Curtis, who looks like almost all he does. And he knows the plant, he knows the processes, and he also knows how to talk to the cultivation team. And that’s critical. And sometimes there’s a disconnect, where marketing calls a cultivation and says, we’re coming to film today, or we’re coming to film next week. And cultivation goes, Yeah, well, we’re harvesting or, you know, we were turning the lights off, or, you know, like the plants just like aren’t going to be in a state that you want them to be in. So like, making sure you’re coordinating with them. And also making sure that like, they’re on site, and somebody is with you, when you’re filming these flowers, so you’re getting the healthiest, best looking flowers. So like all of those components go into it to make sure that you’re getting these really nice, beautiful photographs, or, or video, when you’re doing the macro shots, I always recommend photography over videography. And I can do a ton of cool stuff with that with like animation and motion graphics. And, you know, when it comes to videography, you know, just like showing the processes and sort of like showing the cultivation, but also just making sure that you’re showing clean healthy flowers. Yeah,

 

Lisa Buffo 

that’s not so when you say that, that means sometimes that’s not the standard, or people aren’t always doing that?

 

Julie Batkiewicz

Well, I think what happens is, in my experience, you hire just like a local photographer, you hire somebody who might be like a great lifestyle photographer, a great tabletop photographer, there’s like all these different niches within photography and videography as well. It’s not just, you know, run of the mill. I mean, those people certainly exists. But you certainly have to have to educate them on how to how to actually capture these products. Because the consumers know, the consumers know what fertilizer burden looks like, they know what spider mites look like, they know what mold like mildew looks like, like they know. And getting all those components together with marketing, whoever you’re hiring to do the work and then with cultivation is is really critical to make the product successful. And like I said, I have done my fair share of retouching on all of this stuff. And if you just go into it with the with the more information, you can avoid all that.

 

Lisa Buffo 

So if you were a dispensary marketing team, and you were considering hiring a videographer to get these assets, what would be some of the things you would suggest they do to prepare for that conversation? And what would be some of the key the questions that they would ask you, like how does a marketing team get ready to approach this if they don’t know that much about about these details in these nuances, because I would have never thought to me that would have been obvious but that makes so much sense that like marketing needs to talk to cultivation and like you don’t know what questions to ask. So like what should they think about? When what are some of those things that come up in those first conversations?

 

Julie Batkiewicz

How do you talk to cultivation first and see like what days the best day to go and what time you know, really work closely with them and give them plenty of time to also sort of like select the plants like the healthiest plants because they’re going to they’re going to know making sure the lights are on you do you do not want to piss off cultivation when you’re like oh I need to pull that plant because we got to take a picture of it and they’re like absolutely not. We’re not We’re not messing with the the light cycle. That’s your first step get in touch with cultivation see when the best time is to come also if you want to be capturing harvest and you want to be capturing trim and you want to be capturing like kind of like the whole process coordinating with them is going to be really important. And then also educating the the video and the the photography team making sure they have the right filters. Like if you’re shooting in high pressure sodium Method Seven Who makes the classes for cultivation they also make camera lens filters and even like little clip on filters that go on the back of a phone. So if you are in high pressure sodium like otherwise everything that you film is like that bright yellow color and you cannot color correct that doesn’t matter. Are how much you try, like, just get the right filter. And those are like, pretty, pretty standard things. But also just again, making sure you’re watching what they’re filming. And what they’re capturing, again, that they’re capturing the highest quality the healthiest plants, it’s they just don’t know if they’re, if they haven’t ever filmed in a facility before, they they just aren’t familiar with, like what to look for. And you’re going to need as a marketing team, to like, have a cultivation person with you at all times, to make sure that that person is the photographer and videographer or capturing the right stuff. And make sure everyone is like, compliant. Like everybody’s badged, who’s like in the images that they’re wearing gloves, like, the last thing you want to show is also like, capturing anything that’s like, not compliant. So that’s like another key component. And also, I came up with this, I recommended this to a client recently, get a work for hire agreement with all of the vendors that you work with. So you own that content. So a lot of times what happens is, they hire a video team, the video team films everything and then cuts an edit and delivers the final edit, but they don’t deliver the raw files. And you want all of it, you want the raw files you want, like everything that they’ve done. And a work for hire agreement, will will transfer the intellectual property over to you. Because when you just hire somebody, and you don’t have that in place, intellectual property law says that the Creator owns it. So that videographer and that production team technically owns everything, the raw files, even the project files, unless you have a work for hire agreement, because time and time again, I have a client will be like, well, we hired this video team. And like, you know, we just want to like send you all the files, but like we can’t get it. And I’m like, Well, what kind of agreement do you have in place? Did you? Is there a service agreement? Is there a work for hire agreement, and a lot of cases like a service agreement from the production company should have a paragraph about intellectual property transfer? If it doesn’t, make sure it does, you want to own those raw files, you do not want to like later have to negotiate a fee for a hard drive or transfer or anything like that just like get it locked in place from the very beginning.

 

Lisa Buffo 

That’s a great, great point. And I’m guessing that would come at a premium, like, is this standard to have the videographer own that IP, or it’s really on the client to kind of bring that up first and make sure that’s in place?

 

Julie Batkiewicz

It depends. If you’re just a run, like I’ve found that if there is no service agreement in place, nobody has thought about it. Yeah, yeah. So if you’re hiring, and this goes really in my opinion for anybody that you hire, if you’re hiring designers, if you’re hire any vendor that you’re hiring, you should always have a work for hire agreement in place that has information about intellectual property that is transferred to you. Because that also means that you own the design files or the project files. And that usually comes at a separate fee. Like I don’t hand over a project files that that is like something else that I will charge for but it just comes at a fee and like then you have everything then it’s like and when you say project

 

Lisa Buffo  

files are saying like the near final or the final product, like

 

Julie Batkiewicz

I was saying is your I’m saying your InDesign files your Illustrator files, your Photoshop files, your premiere After Effects, you know, anything that they’re basically anything in Adobe that they’re creating, because then you do sort of like own the process and that does come at a premium like don’t expect that to be part of the of the service agreement it and mine clearly states like if you want the project file, it’s it’s a negotiated fee depending on like the size of the project, but definitely getting stuff like that locked in place because I have a lot of clients that are constantly chasing after old vendors, vendors, they don’t have a good relationship with anymore, trying to get the project files, the raw files and So, if you are upfront from the very beginning about how you how you want things to run, that is really critical, because a lot of photographers are also I find photographers more than videographers, photographers are, are very sort of afraid to do that they don’t like doing that. Because they think maybe they’re, they’re owed a royalty or they’re like owed something, it definitely comes from, like the old school thinking of when before things for digital, and they had to print everything because they made money on the printing. So that sort of mentality has still, I’ve found still exists in the digital world, even though it shouldn’t, you should literally like, hand them a drive and be like, put everything on here. I own it.

 

Lisa Buffo  

Yeah, that makes sense. Okay, great advice. I’ve learned a few things so far. Anything else that you would suggest that either you wish was talked about upfront or for marketers, as far as figuring out how to best engage with video and put video into their marketing mix? Like anything we haven’t covered on that topic so far?

 

Julie Batkiewicz

Data? I mean, looking actually at the numbers you know, I find a lot of a lot of people are just like, whatever, just throw something up. Just make just put a video up people like video video performs better. Yeah, performance better about like, let’s actually think about, like what we’re doing here. Is it part of the larger marketing strategy? How, how is that one video gonna live on multiple channels. So like, you’ve got content for digital signage, you’ve got content for social media, you’ve got content for your web, those are all different formats, not just like spaces, like vertical versus horizontal versus square, but also the length. And whether or not you’re putting subtitles on stuff like in store has to be subtitle if you have anybody on the screen. Also, like the length of which the comps, like the text is on the screen has to be taken into consideration, it’s a different experience, when you’re like looking at a phone when you’re looking at a screen, like in a store, or when you’re like looking at on a website. So just just thinking through all the channels of like, where this could live, and how many times you can also like cut it up into different pieces. So like a reel is going to be like 10 seconds, but like a website, video is going to be a lot longer than that. And, and taking the same piece of content, and being able to use it in all these different ways. So it might be, I don’t know, a video about sleep or whatever. How are you going to cut that up? And resize it and reuse it in all these places? And also, how does it align with the rest of your marketing strategy? Like we’re also talking about sleep? Well, we’re also talking about these things. So oftentimes, I like get hired and they’re just like, we just need this video and you’re like, okay, but this is a marketing exercise to plug into the larger marketing plan. And oftentimes, I will like walk the client through in the very beginning, like some basic questions around like, what I just talked about, like where is this going to live? Who are you talking to? What kind of customer data do you have that supports this? Are we talking to this group of people or this group of people or this group of people so having the data and the larger marketing strategy is just going to make it more successful?

 

Lisa Buffo 

Okay, let’s go. Okay. Hi, Julie. So it sounds like you also act as a marketing consultant. And that seems very important in the sense that marketers who may not understand the nuances of video, you know, shooting the right, the right plants and cultivation, what lens do you need? How does the color of the LED lights impact that, you know, if you’re a marketer, and that’s not your expertise, you might not know to ask that questions. But conversely, in video, it sounds like you’re acting as like a strategist and a marketing consultant as far as making sure the video is tying into the bigger picture and the bigger marketing matrix. So can you talk about how those conversations go with brands? And kind of what that how that plays into the marketing strategy?

 

Julie Batkiewicz

Sure, yeah, I think if you’re creating any kind of marketing content, regardless of what it is to sort of have the overall marketing strategy. The it’s going to be more successful like you, you can, you can make suggestions, if you’re aware of, of more of what they’re actually trying to do. You know, just asking the simple question of like, what’s your goal? Like, what do you want to happen with this video? Where is it going to live? For Utah? Talking to what data points? Do you have to support any of this? And I think that should go for any creator. Like, my husband, is a carpenter. And he always jokes that like, when people call him and they’re like, I need a circle cut out of what he’s like, why? Like, what for? So just taking it like a few more steps, in a lot of cases, changes the concept, or we’re just educates the video team. So much more that they can they can make recommendations or, or, or maybe change the format, I’ve done that a few times to make sure that that it actually fits within the larger, like marketing plan. So yeah, if you’re not asking those questions, and some people disregard them entirely, and they’re like, No, this is the plan. This is what we want. And that’s perfectly fine, too. I, you know, they’ve done their homework. But it does, it’s so much more helpful to just dive a little bit deeper to fully comprehend what the overall goal is.

 

Lisa Buffo 

Yeah, work smart and not hard. And knowing your your buyer persona and what they want, where they’re communicating, and how a starting with the end in mind, so that this strategy and this tool, and I always say like I get asked a lot, what’s the best? What’s the best place to advertise or market my cannabis business? And I’m like, that is question five, we need to go back five more questions and understand Who are you trying to market to? And where are they getting their information? How do they like to be communicated with and then we can get to the channel and the strategy. And I think you’re bridging that gap nicely by saying video is a tool. It is a it is a strategy that gets put into different channels, but we want to understand the why and the how, so that when you do the technical part, it is fitting into that picture, and it can become something that they can use an extended its life, so to speak. Right? Yeah, it’s expensive. Yeah, yeah. Yes.

 

Julie Batkiewicz

So you better better not, you’re gonna use it.

 

Lisa Buffo  

Yes, definitely. And it like you said, with cultivation, if there’s a certain window, it has to get done. If you know, this is the time to film the plants before the harvest before for 20 You have to make sure you’re thinking about it. Because once that window has closed, say there is a hard deadline like that. It’s not going to open again, you can’t just go back and reshoot. So yeah, that’s, that’s super important. I want to talk about the project you’ve been working on that we’ve talked a little bit about brandfolder. So as someone who has worked in marketing for a very long time, and worked with different clients, there is the asset management issue as far as different logos, different colors. How do you know it’s one thing it’s easier to say? Conceptually, this is our brand and this is how it’s going to be overlaid. And this is this is what it’s going to look like. But then in practice and in technicality is a whole kind of nother beast. So can you speak to that issue, how it shows up in your work and then you know, tell us a little bit about what you’re doing with brandfolder

 

Julie Batkiewicz

Sure, so I work with brands and dispensaries across the US and off when I’m making the content, I need high quality assets, I need a high quality png logo or or an AI file or a vector file. And I can’t tell you how many times over the years I’ve been sent low resolution assets, whether it’s a product image, or a logo or whatever, it’s, it’s kind of mind blowing, that someone like thinks it’s okay that like this is going to look good. And it does not take a lot of work to make it look good if you’re well organized. And, you know, most people are sending Dropbox links or drive links or you know, box links or SharePoint, don’t even get me started on SharePoint, it’s a nightmare dealing with SharePoint. But that’s your storage unit. Like you’re like, I don’t show anyone my storage unit, or like the shed in my backyard crammed full of crap. It is not well organized, and not showing that the door is locked. I go in there when I need to find something, but I am not putting that on display. brandfolder is the nicely organized bookshelf, credenza, whatever you have like in your home, that shows off your stuff. But you show it to company like you, you maintain that you dust it, you organize it, it looks good. It’s company facing, if you will. And that’s what brandfolder does. bradco takes all of your assets and organizes them in a way where you have the idea is like a one true asset kind of thing. And it’s not a it’s not a like million subfolder situation that you’re seeing in all the other platforms, it’s a completely different mentality. And the reason I love it so much is because it’s this thumbnail system, that just allows you to reorganize things in in really easy ways to find it, and then present it to people. So when I get sent a dropbox link, and there’s 1000 subfolders, nothing’s organized, nothing’s labeled. I, like you’re you’re, you’re really making it difficult for people like me, and any partner, any partner that you’re working with, I mean, I have a design background, like I can pull what I need. But if you’re just throwing links around with all of your assets, and it’s and it’s not organized, you’re putting yourself at risk. One, like for being out of for like it’s a compliance risk, especially if you’re like a multi state operator, and you’re just like literally sending the like, folder of the brand and all the state assets are in it, and you’re relying on an end user to figure that out. There’s a risk there. But also, they could pull the wrong thing or you know, and, and brands that are using dams. That’s what they’re called, like digital asset management systems have thought that process through so that they’re delivering the right asset. And I am now brandfolder partner, because when I first saw it, I was like, oh my god, this is this is amazing. It’s one asset that you can organize in all these different ways. So you’re not like duplicating assets for certain people or making it you know, creating a separate folder and duplicating everything. It’s literally just like you’ve got all of your assets and thumbnails. And you can kind of reorganize them how you need through a bunch of different ways. And when you open it, you can literally just see everything right away. It’s like so easy to, to navigate. And, and it. I will tell you the brands that are using brandfolder are some kind of Damn, they get more marketing play. Because when I get asked to make a promo or a video or like something for a client, like say there’s like an edibles special going on. I’m gonna go straight to those brand folders. Kiva is the perfect example. Kiva has a very well managed, updated, you can tell they’re updating it regularly. I go straight to them, because I know everything’s there. They’ve made it so easy for me. So they’re actually getting a lot more marketing play because they’ve literally made the whole process so simple. And I don’t have to like dig through 1000 Dropbox links that honestly are like in emails or whatever. I can just go there and be like, I need the Camino assets or I need a Gumby asset done and it’s got Kiba on it. And guess what? All the other edibles brands that didn’t make it easy for me are not going to get that play. They’re just not. So I’m actually building a resource on If my website have all the damn links for brands, so retail marketing teams can easily go and like find and it’s all organized by state, they can find those brand assets. And they’re not digging through their emails or trying to like find whatever Dropbox whatever, like it’s literally all laid out, it’s like, you need this asset for the state, you can go there, you can find it. And like, then you’re good to go. It’s not quite done yet, I’m still kind of working on it. But as a brandfolder partner, I can now kind of like close the loop on that where I can say I can onboard you, I can even build the whole dam for you, I can show you how it works in the cannabis space. And then I can also make it as part of a resource on on my website. And the reason I’m such a big proponent of brandfolder is that they have something called CDN links. And that could potentially solve this menu image asset problem that we have in the industry. Right now, whether using duchy I hurt Jane, whatever POS system, online menu, digital menu, every SKU has an image and some platforms, you can override what the brand is putting up there. And that means that the brands are relying on the retailers to basically upload each individual asset asset. And sometimes they’re like just taking pictures with their iPhone, you can tell. Instead, you could just embed the image from the dam, where that’s the one true asset anyway, that’s the asset that you’re sharing to everybody. And if your packaging changes, you’re not trying to chase everybody to be like, Oh, I have the new asset. Here it is, it’s embedded, you replace that. And then it goes straight through to all those platforms. So that’s kind of like the next big thing that I’m working on. Because really, that is that is such a major challenge for brands and retailers. They’re irritated with that system, too. I just got to get the POS systems and the online menu systems to adopt it. But it it should not be difficult.

 

Lisa Buffo

That’s awesome. That makes sense. It didn’t occur to me that the retailer could put whatever image they wanted, if they didn’t have, like, I could see how in this case, having the organization of the brand files is more than just is it in Google Drive? Is it in Dropbox? Is this the AI? Is it the jpg, JPEG? It’s like, No, you have different products you have, they’re labeled different in different states. That that becomes so much to organize that there’s a lot of time and energy saved in having it visually laid out that anyone can access.

 

Julie Batkiewicz

Right? Especially if you’re in multiple states. And you’re just sending that one dropbox link, and they pull a Massachusetts asset and they’re in Maryland. Yeah, that’s a risk as well. Yeah. So like there’s there’s so much room for error, and it’s such a tedious, tedious task. A lot of my clients dispensary clients are just relying on like the front desk people to do it. And if they don’t, if they don’t have access to the assets, they’re literally taking pictures with their phone. Yeah. So and all of the platforms that I’ve talked to I heard Jane duchy, whatever. They all say that the products that have high quality imagery have higher sales.

 

Lisa Buffo  

Yeah. Yeah, that’s I mean, that’s true ecommerce. That’s just a best practice there. Yeah.

 

Julie Batkiewicz

And I’m sorry, there’s like a comp going on behind me. Can you read a little

 

Lisa Buffo 

bit but it’s okay. It’s very low. All right. Don’t worry about Okay. Are you on time?

 

Julie Batkiewicz

I have a little bit more time. Yeah.

 

Lisa Buffo  

Okay, I was gonna just ask you if there’s anything else you want to talk about? And then we can like wrap it up? Was there anything we missed outside that? That’s kind of

 

Julie Batkiewicz

it like? I mean, I did kind of want to talk a little bit more about the video stuff with I have this one client I talked to yesterday and told him that I was doing this and there there are ones there in Nevada. They’re called deep roots harvest. And their, their ex their whole, like social media content strategy is pretty interesting, because that’s one where we’re like really looking at data and really looking at engagement. And with them, I work closely with their PR firm Maverick PR. And we’re constantly reviewing Okay, all right, what what’s the engagement for this and we’ve kind of also like broken the video content down a bunch of different categories. within, like, one of the categories is beauty. And those are always the ones that that have the highest rates. So they’ve been just like a great client to really dive into this and get real results. And then we’re able to take that information, and make sure that we’re creating content that that historically has had more engagement. So we’ve been, we’ve been working together for like, almost a year now. And then we have these monthly meetings where we just kind of like look at the rates, we look at, like the product releases, we look at anything else that’s like going on, in their marketing calendar to curate everything that we’re putting on social media, and then I’m able to create weekly content for them based on all that information. So that’s like a really good example of like coming in as their content partner in a much bigger way. Because I’m not just like, you know, creating whatever content that they, they they think we should, should make. We’re all like collaborating on like, okay, these things are happening this month, how do we create strategic content that we know gets high engagement rates historically. So there’s always like a good review of like, this works, this doesn’t works, what’s happening next month that we can take all that information and then create content that we know resonates with their customer base?

 

Lisa Buffo

So you do you you are a content partner? You’re like a marketing strategist and content partner from the lens of video.

 

Julie Batkiewicz

Yeah, exactly. Yeah. I mean, I come in, I have these monthly meetings with clients. And we take all that information to plug into their their content calendar. So, you know, like, right now we’re working on a lot of Black Friday and green Wednesday stuff, like what does that what does that kind of content look like? Talking about rescheduling, talking about kind of like some of the stuff like going on in the news. So having, having just like a larger idea of, of all the different types of content you create, but with the data and information that is gonna also guide that is really critical, and especially having the industry knowledge and the compliance knowledge. Like, I have an entire like, poster that I’ve created that I worked with a compliance lawyer on, like how you’re allowed to talk about this. So I can really take all that information and guide them through the whole like content strategy process, because like if I was just like a videographer, and they were just or an animator, and they’re just hiring me to make like XYZ content, but they have a bunch of noncompliant information in it. Like, that’s where I can come back and reel him back and be like, we gotta say this in a different way.

 

Lisa Buffo

Yeah. Yeah, that makes sense. The compliance is the base of all of it, and marketing. And you got to get that right so that it can be used, and it can be measured and iterated from there. Yeah, I

 

Julie Batkiewicz

have this great poster, I’ll send you a link to it. If anybody wants it, I always draw, I drop it in the mail all the time I ordered like 500, because they were like on sale and Vistaprint. So I have this like, massive stack of them. And I send them out to clients because they hang them up in their break room. And it’s like the do’s and don’ts of how you can talk about cannabis. So I’ve got the like, you know, what you might want to say especially like referring to like qualifying conditions, and then there’s some, you know, language that is a little bit safer that you could say instead. So I fully adopted that for all the content and i i also consult with my clients on like how we can best most compliantly say things.

 

Lisa Buffo  

That’s, that’s a really helpful value add for cannabis companies and marketers who may have not that full picture. So I’m really glad that your service exists and that cannabis marketers can work with you. Do you work just in Denver, or do you have a larger footprint?

 

Julie Batkiewicz

I work all over. Initially, I worked. I obviously started here. But a lot of my bigger clients are now on the East Coast. At this point, there’s been a lot of acquisitions and mergers. So I’ve had some mom and pops that have like gotten me in some of these bigger places. And I would say the majority are from one of two groups, like larger regional players that kind of understand their regional targets, or MSOs that have, you know, a national footprint. I don’t really have too many of the smaller clients anymore. They’re all they all kind of either fit in one of those two categories.

 

Lisa Buffo

That makes sense. Well, Julie, how can thank you so much for your time today? Do you have any other closing thoughts you haven’t mentioned? And can you share whatever contact information website, email or social handles that you want with our audience, and we will post them in the show description where we publish?

 

Julie Batkiewicz

Sure, I have to admit I am terrible on social media, so I

 

Lisa Buffo

No worries.

 

Julie Batkiewicz

I actually only have it to like, watch what I’m doing for my clients. So I can, like I rarely post my website is onward. content.com or you can reach me, Juliette? Onward. content.com. Happy to ship out that poster of the do’s and don’ts if you want to email me I can I can drop it in the mail. And or yeah, if you need any, any video or digital signage, I work with a ton of like menu providers as well. So I’m, I’m integrated with all these digital signage providers. So give me a call.

 

Lisa Buffo  

Thank you so much for your time. We really appreciate you coming on.

 

Julie Batkiewicz

Thanks, Lisa. Have a good one.