We recently connected with Raven Diggs-Hardy and have shared our conversation below.
Raven , appreciate you joining us today. Do you think folks should manage their own social media or hire a professional? What do you do?
I currently manage ALL of my social media pages, business and personal. I do hope one day to hire some one to be in charge of all of my business pages along with marketing material. As the sole worker of my business, the social media aspect of it will sometimes get draining, but I feel like I have some dope content that my supporters absolutely love! That along with my drive in my field, helps keep the consistency coming.
As always, we appreciate you sharing your insights and we’ve got a few more questions for you, but before we get to all of that can you take a minute to introduce yourself and give our readers some of your back background and context?
My name is Raven Diggs-Hardy, born & raised in Fort Worth Tx & Owner of aDIGGtiveTreats. The way that my baking business came about isn’t a magical story but a quite simple one. Growing Up, I was watched by my great- grandmother sometimes while my mom would work. She made some of the best food & desserts. One day she taught me her secret on making absolutely delicious cakes. Ever since then I would bake something sweet on holiday’s for my family. If you know one thing about family, it’s that if something is super delicious, the word will get out! Some days people would randomly contact me and ask “How much can I pay you to make this dessert?” & it got me to thinking….. People would pay for my dessert? I didn’t act on it immediately because at the time I was pursuing my dream as a cosmetologist. But that dream slowed down once the pandemic surfaced. I didn’t want to be around a lot of people especially since I’d just given birth. Then out of the no where, here would come people asking if I could make them a dessert. I assume sitting in the house more often you’d want something sweet right?
So this is the moment when I decided to take a leap & those leaps became bigger & greater!
When building aDIGGtiveTreats I knew that I wanted to set myself apart. I didn’t want some one to describe my dessert as just “something sweet.” I wanted to give them an experience. I wanted to hear things like “That taste just like some one’s grandma made it” or “This is the best dessert I’ve ever tasted!” & I managed to formulate my recipes to do just that.
Next I needed a name. I knew that I wanted to incorporate my family “Diggs” in some unique way while also relating it to delicious things.
That’s how the name a-DIGG-tive came about. A nice play on the word “addictive”. At first I was thinking aDIGGtiveSweets , but the word “Treats” stuck out to me more. “aDIGGtiveTreats”, nice huh?! Fast forward, I started to get requests involving custom cakes and treats tables. Turns out that people want the cake & treats for their special day, to be as delicious as it looks on the outside, go figure. So of course, I practiced, perfected & delivered!
Custom cakes & treats tables have become the biggest force & success of my business. It has become the great talk of weddings, baby showers & birthdays. It’s given me an opportunity to push my creativity to limits that I’ve never imagined. And the lasting joy on customer’s faces will forever stay in my memory.
One thing that I feel sets me apart from others is that I truly value the “customer experience.” Through out the entire journey from a simple inquiry all the way up to the finished product, I make sure that they are heard and that their visions are executed properly, if there are any hiccups throughout the process, my customer will rarely hear about it because if it’s in my hands, it will always get it handled with no stress to the customer.
What I’m most proud of with my business so far is the recent release of my Cake mix & Buttercream|Glaze combo. That’s right, anyone in the US can have the aDIGGtiveTreats cake experience right in their own homes! This took a lot of hard work, testing, consistency & persistence. The fact that I never gave up despite the road blocks thrown at me is very empowering.
This amazing product can be purchased on aDIGGtiveTreats.com.
Honestly, without God & the support of my family, my church family & my new social media audience, I do not think that this business would be this far within only a span of 2years but I’m grateful! aDIGGtiveTreats takes great pride in everything it puts out into the world & you can feel that with every bite that you take. There’s no stopping anywhere in site and I plan on gaining even more awesome support and fans along the way to help with this journey. This business was literally started off of a “thought.” Look how far that has gotten me. Anything is truly possible when you’re truly committed and when you’re constantly centered on the next move. You’d be surprised at the gifts & creativity that God has given you if you just try.
Be on the lookout because aDIGGtiveTreats is a force that was built on faith & a business that can’t be messed with!
How did you build your audience on social media?
Building social media platforms has been the most challenging with algorithms constantly changing. I’m still constantly trying to build! Right now we’re hitting a sweet spot on TikTok & constantly pulling in followers daily. Keeping up with the trends is a huge building block for social media growth! Using trending sounds and scenarios. Also, on any social media platform you have to stay consistent or engagement will drop! This is the challenging part but eventually it will pay off. Sometimes I will record 3-4 content videos in a day just to post them one at a time over the next few days so that I won’t tire myself while still posting daily. Also creating a hashtag like #adiggtivetreats that only has your content under it will bring in some more followers.
What’s a lesson you had to unlearn and what’s the backstory?
A lesson that I’ve had to unlearn is that, if you plan ahead everything will work out smoothly. Let me tell you, I unlearned that real fast! I’ve had so many instances were I’ve had every detail planned out to a T & yet it still blew up in my face. A more recent time that this has happened is when I was preparing for my cake mix & buttercream launch. Everything from inventory to ingredients to thank you cards, to shipping material was set to be ready for launching 1 month in advance. Out of no where, all of my inventory & additional material were delayed & once things started looking up, packages were being sent to the wrong areas! OMG!! I was so prepared but nothing went accordingly. I was so mad that I wanted to cancel my launch & honestly me and God had some one sided conversations… but I prevailed. Situations like that create resilience which is dangerously needed when you’re a business owner! Pivoting in turmoil is a super power! Nothing can ever stop you with that characteristic. You have to have a backup plan just in case your 1st, 2nd & even 3rd plan doesn’t go accordingly. But that is a lesson that you can only be taught by life itself.
Contact Info:
- Website: aDIGGtiveTreats.com
- Instagram: @adiggtivetreats
- Facebook: aDIGGtiveTreats
- Other: TikTok: @ravenadiggtive
Image Credits
Photography: Raven Diggs-Hardy & Leonard Hardy Jr..