We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Lillian Brummet a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.
Lillian, appreciate you joining us today. What’s the backstory behind how you came up with the idea for your business?
The concept of being an entrepreneur sparked after an experience I had working for a hotel company. You see, after attaining hospitality management certification, I took on a small section of the hotel – I gave them my all, my everything. I was there when they needed me, when an employee didn’t show I’d fill the spot… but when I had been hit by a car and needed a year of recovery time, they were not there for me. They got weird actually and eventually gave my position away, which I’m sure they had to do. But I was hurt. I took it hard, and decided I didn’t want to work under anyone again. I explored the options I had and did a huge amount of research by calling each potential competing outlet and requesting information as if I was going to be a customer. That research helped me figure out how I could stand out and who my customer goal would be.
I had very little money that only allowed for the equipment and supplies, uniform and shoes. At that point I was ready, but then I had to figure out how to reach the customer base. I got busy making nice flyers, rolled them up and tied them with a fancy ribbon – like a diploma – strapped on the Walkman (remember those?) and began walking the neighbourhoods I wanted to service. Placing each flyer in the door or mailbox or gate, I got lots of exercise for a couple of weeks. That was all it took – I began working the 3rd week, was working full time by the 4th week and was turning away work due to schedule constraints within 6 months. 5 years later, I was hiring staff with the goal of taking on a more administrable role. Sadly I was involved in a 3-car pile-up by year 6, and lost the business – due to not having a contingency plan in place. It was a hard lesson to learn.
A couple years after the accident I was ready to work again, but with physical limitations and an anxiety disorder I felt my options were limited. My husband was already doing a side gig thing as a musician, teacher, drum repair and drum manufacturing as a paying hobby. While learning how I could help his work along, I began exploring the world of writing as a career. Soon, I had a column published internationally that ran for 6 years, had taken work as a freelance, assignment and staff writer at various outlets, and was publishing my first book. We realized that having all our services and products underneath one “roof” would simplify the tax and bookkeeping tasks… and so Brummet Media Group was born. We just celebrated its 25th year in business.
More than 2 decades of delving into many different activities, from hosting a radio show (Conscious Discussions; 10 years), a podcast (Authors Read; 2 years), managing a newsletter (Brummet’s Muse; 6 years), blogging (Brummet’s Conscious Blog; 21 years – Drum It With Brummet; 2 years), decades of freelance work, staff positions as a paid reviewer, and publishing our books. Today, Brummet Media Group (1998-present) involves a drum teaching/repair studio, 2 blogs, 6 published books (so far) and the Brummet Media Channel (YouTube).
Great, appreciate you sharing that with us. Before we ask you to share more of your insights, can you take a moment to introduce yourself and how you got to where you are today to our readers.
I am in my mid-50’s, Dave’s my business partner and husband – and he’s heading into his 60’s; we’ve been together since 1990 – about, 34 years. When I am not in the office, I’m busily doing house manager duties or yard and garden care and menu planning. I am a passionate gardener and enjoy spending time out there with our dogs. Dogs are one of the tools for keeping my sanity – as an entrepreneur there are a lot of things going on and the dogs keep me grounded, make me take breaks and bring cuddly giggles into the day. Dave is a musician at heart and loves sharing his skills through his Drum It With Brummet blog and the Angle Hill Studio portions of our business. As a married couple who run a business together, we have learned to collaborate and support each other effectively. Dave is much more talented with technology, setting up electronics, dealing with ads, graphics, sound, audio and video. He is also very good at proof reading, editing, formatting and cover design. Therefore his talents are put to use there. I am more proficient in the office, doing secretarial, marketing and communication tasks. Typically I handle the Brummet Media Channel and both our blog content. I tend to create the manuscript content, hand it over to Dave and he takes it on from there. Once it is published, it is my turn – and I take on the marketing tasks. Dave does public appearances, I’m typically the person you see online and in the media. We each have our own office in separate areas of the home to allow for contemplation and content creation. And so by splitting the chores according to our natural talents and interests has been a great benefit for running our business all these years.
We started our individual services as separate entities, but when we merged them with one business name we felt it was important to keep Brummet as a keyword because we had already begun building name recognition. We chose Media because we worked with various media and produced content on a variety of platforms. Group – the word implies that that business is established, works with others and has plans to expand. We didn’t want to be too specific in the business name because we were exploring various paths, and didn’t want to limit that journey.
Our books are all available on Amazon, and we have 6 more in the publication schedule. So far we have written in non-fiction and poetry genres. That will change as time marches forward and we are able to release more books. The Trash Talk series (2-books) helps people green their business and home, save money, reduce waste and make a difference… with their so called “waste “, lifestyle and consumer habits. The Purple Snowflake Marketing genre will soon be a series, we have a 2nd book coming out soon – it guides authors and entrepreneurs to develop frugal, effective marketing and business plans that have them standing out among a snowstorm of their peers like a purple snowflake. While mainly written for authors, this guide can apply to most entrepreneurial businesses. The Playing With Words falls within the poetry genre. We also have a cookbook out titled From One Small Garden – Over 300 Delicious Nutritious Recipes, inspired by garden harvests.
Any thoughts, advice, or strategies you can share for fostering brand loyalty?
It is interesting that you ask this question because we have recently published a series of articles on networking and follow-up activities on the Brummet’s Conscious Blog and also over on the Brummet Media Channel. I really love the question because so few entrepreneurs use these tools effectively. Once we have attained a list of contacts, sent out queries after doing all that research, signed up for memberships and so forth… we want to maintain that. When we follow-up, we are building up a reputation for being someone they can rely on, that is easy to work with and doesn’t make them wait for long periods of time. We become a valuable resource for them, and they may even recommend us to others. This is only possible, however, if we have been keeping records in a spreadsheet that we can refer to and know what was talked about, and where you are at with that person.
There are 3 types of follow up:
Weekly
Monthly
Annual
The follow-up letter will focus on strengthening the relationship but will also have a goal in mind, a call to action. This activity will remind you of any unfinished projects so that nothing is neglected.
There are many ways of reaching out with a purpose without becoming a pest. A communication’s goal might be:
To thank them for working with you in the past.
To share experiences you had as a result of networking with them.
To celebrate or congratulate them on their projects.
To invite future networking (be specific about what kind of networking you are thinking of).
To offer something that could help them.
To introduce them to another connection.
To share a helpful resource.
We often hear about learning lessons – but just as important is unlearning lessons. Have you ever had to unlearn a lesson?
Image design is very tricky, and we’ve had to learn through trial and error when a certain type of image is appropriate
There are times when you want the image to communicate a message so that you can use the other valuable real estate (space) to write copy instead.
There are times when the image is meant to tell the story, and times when the image is meant to invoke a feeling. All of this is very helpful in creating print, media or online imagery.
Sometimes when that image is solely meant to stop the person from scrolling and take a look at your product, book or ad copy.
Images need to blend in, and yet stand out from others – which is always a difficult task. This means we are looking not only at the magazine’s guidelines but we are also looking at other advertisers and from those – which ones are most similar to your business. Evaluating what they have done will influence your ad design, at the same time the ad must jump out on the printed page because people are used to scrolling over them to get to the content.
Book images are very similar in that the cover must fit in with the best sellers, it must stop people from scrolling when they are only seeing a thumbnail size of the book’s cover. In this situation the image is not telling the story, or invoking a feeling – which is definitely a change of mindset since this is exactly what the book cover used to do. Since a majority of readers are purchasing online, book cover design must keep this in mind.
The research must be up to date, so if you researched an ad design last year – you’ll need to do it again. Consumer habits, online options and tools on that site have changed since then.
Therefore image priorities must be take in into consideration in regards to how these items are designed as time marches forward.
Contact Info:
- Website: http://BrummetMedia.ca
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/brummetmediagroup
- Facebook: http://facebook.com/lillian.brummet
- Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ldbrummet
- Twitter: http://twitter.com/brummet
- Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@BrummetMedia
- Other: https://www.amazon.ca/Lillian-Brummet/e/B0845RLK1X https://www.amazon.com/stores/Lillian-Brummet/author/B0845RLK1X https://ConsciousDiscussions.blogspot.com https://DrumItWithBrummet.blogspot.com
Image Credits
Dave & Lillian Brummet