We recently connected with Terrance Hill and have shared our conversation below.
Terrance, appreciate you joining us today. We’d love for you to start by sharing your thoughts about the pros and cons of family businesses.
Since the inception of the Great Slave Trade in 1619, there has been a huge gap in Wealth Development between African Americans and other races in the USA. The concept of Families building Generational Wealth should be everyone’s ultimate goal. Historically, black-owned companies, like Madam C.J. Walker’s hair-care line and the businesses that formed Tulsa, Oklahoma’s Black Wall Street, were developed in direct response to racial discrimination. “These segregation patterns then created market opportunities for black entrepreneurs to step in, make money and meet the demands of the black community,” says Mehrsa Baradaran, author of The Color of Money: Black Banks and the Racial Wealth Gap. With few work opportunities and high job instability, many black pioneers took matters into their own hands, building small enterprises that served and employed fellow African-Americans. According to Inc. Magazine below are the 10 things to consider when starting a Family Business: 1. All the traditional rules of business still apply
2. It WILL affect your relationship.
3. Someone has to be in charge.
4. Just because it’s your dream doesn’t mean it’s theirs.
5. Traditional roles (CEO, CFO, COO, etc.) may have loose or unclear boundaries.
6. The learning curve may be huge.
7. You will need time off.
8. Your existing baggage will be magnified in times of stress.
9. Mutual respect and clear communication are critical.
10. It will be fun… and it will also be hard.
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
First to tell you a little bit about myself and the company I have started. I learned the art of American Regional BBQ from my dad and uncle at the age of 10. Later I trained at the Le Cordon Bleu Culinary School and worked at several top restaurants from Dallas, Texas to Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. In 2010 I became a Certified Judge for the Kansas City BBQ Society judging BBQ competitions all around the USA. I have consulted numerous BBQ and other restaurant establishments in creating that one-of-a-kind flavor from Toronto, ON to Dallas, Texas., as well as hosted Pitmaster Bootcamp classes around the country teaching the Art of Authentic Southern BBQ. For The Southern Gentleman’s Table menu, I drew on my family’s Southern African-American heritage to create dishes that have won prizes at cooking competitions and received rave reviews in our taste testing. Together we have come up with a fresh concept, a popular menu, and an ambitious but achievable plan to build it into a thriving new business.
I am most proud of the fact that I have taken a God-Given gift and tried to perfect it every day I have breath in my lungs and I have fun doing it. When you are doing what you love and operating in your purpose most days it doesn’t feel like work at all
Where do you think you get most of your clients from?
Even in 2022 Word of mouth is still the most effective way in building your business. You have to combine that with a good Social Media Strategy, but scheduling calls every day to new potential customers and providing samples of your business products still draws people towards your business.
We’d love to hear the story of how you built up your social media audience?
Every business needs to have a “Social Marketing Strategy”. A social marketing strategy gives you a big-picture view of your social media marketing goals and how you can best achieve those outcomes. I had to learn how to create a Content Calendar, which tells me based on the statistics the optimal engagement times when to create a Social Media Post. For instance, on Mondays, the Stats day at 11:00 AM is the most effective time to create an Instagram Post, and 9 AM for TikTok. Break down your Social Marketing Strategy into 7 areas:
1. Goals: The outcomes you want from your efforts and how you’ll measure them.
2. Target audiences: Researching and defining your easiest customers.
3. Metrics: Creating a data-driven marketing strategy.
4. Content mix: Recurring ideas or post types to include in your social media programming.
5. Channels: The social networks you want to dedicate your time to and what you’ll use them for.
6. Infrastructure: Setting up the process and tools to execute your strategy efficiently.
7. Improvements: Adapting and innovating on your progress during the year.
Contact Info:
- Website: www.southerngenttable.com
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/thesoutherngentlemanstable/
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/southerngentlemanstable
- Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC0RvyogxrFEYOUun2M18zvg
- Other: https://www.thechronicleherald.ca/lifestyles/barbecue-pitmaster-big-texas-terrance-hill-loved-little-pei-313357/