In this week’s show we’re joined by Brittany Centers, founder of Centers Social, to get a little more social with our laundromats. If you’ve ever wondered how to utilize social media for your laundromat business, this is the episode for you!
In this episode, Brittany and I discuss:
* A better way to use social media for your coin laundry business
* How to use social media for your self service laundry business
* How to use social media for your wash-dry-fold laundry business
* How to use social media for your pick-up and delivery laundry business
* What platforms you should be on
* Tik Toc for laundromats
* #1 thing businesses do wrong on social media
* Facebook for laundromats
* Instagram for laundromats
* Twitter for laundromats
* Getting found on Google
* What to do with social media when you’re just starting your business
* How to handle your social media challenges
And more!
Watch The Podcast Here
TODAY'S SPONSORS
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Episode Transcript
what’s up guys it’s jordan with
laundromat resource podcast and this is
show 73 and i’ll pump you here today
because today we’re going to get social
we got brittany centers on the podcast
today talking about how you can utilize
social media to help you improve your
business we haven’t done an episode like
this yet and it was it’s super good
you’re gonna love it tons of practical
tips
tricks on how to
manage your social media what you should
be posting what platforms you should be
on you know what your goal should be we
go through a ton of stuff on this it’s
really really good episode uh with
brittany today so you’re gonna love it
uh real quick before we jump into it
with brittany i want to just take a
second i haven’t really done this in a
little while but welcome a bunch of the
new members a ton of you guys have been
signing up every single day it’s been
like seriously wild to see how fast uh
everything’s been grown it’s been pretty
crazy but a few of you guys have posted
over the last few days on the new
members introduction forum which you
should go check out
laurentimeresource.com forums click on
the new member introductions go
introduce yourself to the community over
there and uh you know that link all the
other links from this whole episode will
be in the show notes which you can find
at laundromat resource dot com slash
show 73 or if you’re on youtube all
those links will be down below in the
description so quick i just want to say
welcome to caleb michelle scott steven
jonathan chris tara kelsey and more
that’s just in the last week or so
more uh just so cool over there make
sure you’re heading over there and going
to meet those guys introduce yourself
welcome them to the community and uh
then jump into some of the other forums
that we have over there we have a bunch
of forums
over there commercial real estate we
have a financing forum we have
laundromat general
forum we have a repairs forum go jump
over there join some conversations ask a
question answer a question just a quick
highlight of some of the conversations
going on over there in the laundromat
forums we’re talking about coin
collections contingency verbiages uh
what to do with old inventory laundromat
insurance laundromat business plans
equipment inspection companies for due
diligence demographics in australia
pretty crazy um
ideas for a small space there’s all
kinds of app or credit card i mean
machine price there’s bookkeeping
franchise mod i mean there’s a lot of
conversations happening uh over there on
the forum so go jump in there whether
you have similar questions and you want
to jump into conversation or maybe you
have something to contribute to those
discussions go be a part of it and uh
man it’s what makes everything that’s
happening at laundromat resource
worth it you know we can give a ton of
information over here and it’s all good
and helpful
but by far the thing i get most excited
about is when i get to connect with you
guys and when you guys get to connect
with each other and we’re all helping
each other elevate our businesses taking
us to the next level uh together so jump
in over there uh and there’s there’s
more conversations going on in the other
forms that’s just the laundromat forum
there’s discussions going on in the
financing forums and the uh commercial
real estate forum and all kinds of stuff
going on over there so go check it out
laurentresource.com
forums over there also just real quick i
want to point you to laundromat
resource.com events
we have stuff going on all the time we
have a live free live webinar every
single week you can check those out
over there
this week if you’re listening to this
one this is first coming out uh this
week is on how to buy your first
laundromat
next week
very cool very excited to have the human
laundromat encyclopedia himself andrew
cunningham is going to be joining me for
the webinar on how to sell your
laundromat for the most money all right
so whether you own a laundromat you’re
thinking about selling now or if you own
a laundromat and you may sell someday or
if you’re thinking about buying a
laundromat there’s going to be tips for
everybody no matter what phase you’re in
and how to sell your laundry map for the
most money how to get it prepped what
you should be doing before you buy your
laundromat to prep it to sell it for the
most money what you should be doing when
you own your laundromat to make it worth
the most to raise the value the most
when you are ready to sell it and
obviously what you should be doing when
you’re actually prepping it to sell so
super cool i’m like super excited about
that and there’s going to be a pretty
big announcement coming on that live
webinar which i’m very very excited
about that’ll be the first place that
goes out and then you’ll start hearing
about it you know it’ll start trickling
out other
avenues too so anyways load of
myresource.com events we got stuff going
on all the time so
join us check it out
super cool okay uh man i am just super
excited for this conversation with
brittany i thoroughly enjoyed it and
learned a lot about social media and
laundromats um
i’ve always struggled with what do i do
with uh what do i do with a facebook
page or an instagram account for a
laundromat who’s going to follow that
and why and what should i be
communicating with them so we get into
that and a whole lot more in this
episode let’s jump into it right after
this word from our sponsor all right
guys today’s episode is brought to you
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brittany thank you for coming on the
show how are you doing today
i’m doing well how are you
i
to be honest i’m a little bit nervous
and let me tell you why i know that you
well we’ll get there in a second but i
know you’re from the south
and
my family is all from tennessee and i
get nervous when i talk to people from
the south because i slowly develop
my accent back and it starts to come
back so i’m a little nervous i’m gonna
be straight up southern by the end of
this thing but uh
yes that could you know that could be a
possibility i know i know i already get
made fun of for my
quote unquote accent here anyways
uh but uh hey why don’t you tell us a
little bit about who you are because
this is a little bit of a unique episode
that i’m very actually very excited
about and i think are going to help a
lot of people but why don’t you tell us
a little bit about who you are
um well my name is brittany centers and
i am from kentucky
um i
own a marketing company called center
social and we have over 100 clients now
and we have over 80 laundry mats that we
do marketing for
um we are i started the company in
like 2014 but legally it was all filed
in 2015 because i didn’t quite realize
like what was going to happen
um
but the cool fact is is that i’ve never
been in a laundromat until i started
marketing one
this is pretty awesome because that’s
actually kind of like a lot of
laundromat owners that i talk about
i’ve never actually used a laundromat
until i bought one yes well i’ve been a
guest speaker i love laundromat shows
and um
my husband is a high school teacher and
he
um
we both have slowly realized like
how amazing wonderments are and we’re
actually trying to own our own
laundromat uh
yeah so we have three boys and
eventually we’d like to leave each of
them a laundry mat
i was thinking you have free labor
already built in so
yeah
yeah how old are they
five
two
and ten months oh my goodness you were
in the thick of it
but fun fun ages super fun ages but man
it’s a lot of work when they’re that
when they’re that age
that it is there um the five-year-old
and my husband are both on fall break
this week so
um everybody’s home and i’m not quite
used to that anymore you can’t handle
that yeah
that’s pretty funny um oh man so that
means we’re gonna have to have you back
on the podcast at some point
as a laundromat owner and not as a
marketing expert so yes um we are
negotiating right now so hopefully soon
oh what
you’re like deep into the process you
caught the bug
yes um well so i’ve been marketing
laundry since um 2016 2017. okay so it’s
been a long
i actually started
with a
um
laundry in lexington kentucky but it was
all speed queen
okay um and i know
you know california most of the time is
dexter like speaking we’ve got a lot of
speed queen here too
oh
um and so i actually since
i really need to look up the date but
since 2016 2017 i’ve been doing the
marketing um for star distributing um
which is a speed clean
um distributor
um
and still
you know we’re still doing but um i’ve
been against speakers at their show and
everything and that’s how i got
introduced into the laundry business was
i met up with michael davis who is the
owner of star distributing
and i also own parks king which is a
global parts
distributor um
and
so i was doing the shows and then it
just led
to
you know other laundry mat owners and
then some dexter owners were at the show
and then it led to me being a speech
speaker at um dexter shows and so it’s
just gone
[Music]
that’s like power power of networking in
action right there right you get your
foot in one door and then you just kind
of work your way all through
yes now here you are i mean you’re
probably going to be just overwhelmed
with people by the end of this thing so
we
we are prepared for that um you know
we’ve been working with a
major
distributor
um
with like some
other stuff that’s going on so we hope
so awesome
uh all right well take me back a little
bit so you that’s kind of how you got
into laundromat marketing can you tell
me a little bit about your
background to get into marketing
marketing
yes um
so i
um went to the university of louisville
louisville
uh no more
okay
um and i
was a biology major like from the time
that i was
naturally yeah i don’t know four
um and i was raised in eastern kentucky
which um
any thing that you ever have heard about
eastern kentucky about like dirt floors
no electricity no shoes whatever you
know that’s that’s the part of eastern
kentucky that i’m from okay
um
however i wasn’t like i was raised on
the more like
um
privileged side of eastern kentucky but
not to discredit my parents or say that
they just like handed me loads and loads
of money like my parents neither one of
my parents went to college like they
worked very hard for what they got you
know
um but
one of
my mom had two daughters and she put us
both from college and one of the most
powerful statements to her to me after i
had already graduated college is she
looked at me and said i would have dug
ditches to get you through
college so that’s kind of like the
background like very very hard working
parents like
i’m not a good stock yeah yeah i didn’t
even realize it you know at the time but
um they wanted more for us
um and so you know i went to the
university of louisville which um i am
the second person ever so you know
louisville is in kentucky but i’m the
second person
that i know of to ever attend the
university of louisville from where i’m
from wow
geez
yeah
um it’s three hours away so like you
know
yeah
it’s a big deal
it is yeah it’s a big deal
yeah um and so
i
was a biology major i really wanted to
be a doctor
um and then i woke up one day my senior
year and i was like i do not want to do
this
like i was just burnt out yeah and um my
sister is eight years older than me and
she’s a teacher um she’s a teacher in
jcps which is jefferson county public
schools school
and whenever i told her i was like i
don’t want to do this i want to do
business
and you know the older sister like she
was always very hard on me and all that
stuff um but she
looked at me and she goes it’s about
time
uh
so she saw
yeah yeah
yeah but i was
like when i said business she was like
it’s about time like
you know i knew that this is what you
were supposed to do yeah so did you
finish your biology degree or did you
change majors what did you do
no i graduated with a business
administration degree okay did it take
you a lot longer or were you able to one
extra year extra year
so i took um i even took 18 hours in the
summer
yeah just to
get out
the the true story is my parents were
really tired of paying for college
i bet
like i knew i had to get out there
digging ditches and you’re
she really didn’t have to do that
yeah but she would have but she was at
her like within like you know i’m done
like get out
yeah yeah
all right so you graduated then
you went and got a marketing job what
happened
um
this is what i call i got lucky or by
the grace of god
um
so i live in bardstown kentucky which is
bourbon capital of the world and
um i
originally started working for a
marketing company
um
in out of louisville and
i was trying to close um
a
big deal
and i was then
i
was like i would really like to work
there in the bourbon industry
and so i went and asked him for a job
and i was 23 and i became a marketing
director of a multi-million dollar
company
but it was like a startup company but it
was still a multi-million dollar company
um
and
they so it was a strong spirits it’s a
contract bottling company they bought
all distilled spirits um
i don’t know a whole lot about them
anymore but whenever i was there it was
a lot of bourbon and a lot of big
bourbon brands that um you would know
now
yeah crazy so i mean
it’s funny because when i got into
marketing i
randomly and weirdly uh was doing
marketing for a casino but i feel like
you know casinos they’re really
marketing companies and i feel same with
like alcohol they’re
i mean yes they
have you know the gambling side of
things and they have the alcohol side of
things but really they’re big marketing
companies so but it’s pretty cool to
land that position and to be able to
learn
in a company like that where you’re
basically just thrown in the deep end
like hey here you go
100 like i um for many years i’ve said
knowing what i don’t know i would have
paid them to let me work for him yeah
yeah but even better to get paid by them
to learn and work for them yeah and so
while i was there um i had some people
in community so my husband is a high
school music
director and he
um was a church director at the same
time
and so people on our church started
asking like hey can you do my social
medias can you do my social media i was
like yeah i can yeah i can’t and then
that’s whenever i realized that there
was a business in this
and that was in 2014.
okay and at that point you were doing
both still right you were still working
at your director marketing position and
you started so you’re working
you’re doing a lot of marketing long
hours
yes um it was
minimum 16 hours a day seven days a week
yeah
no rest
in
december 18th 2015
i left to work for myself
okay
and get the date the
see you later i’m on my own date that’s
awesome that’s a huge date do you
celebrate that every year with a glass
of bourbon
i don’t um but what makes it even more
special was that i was actually pregnant
with my first child at that day oh
man awesome awesome awesome so you did
celebrate that date
yeah uh okay so
you started your own company
and then
i mean what were you doing early on how
did you
how did you turn that into
an actual company where you could leave
your job
[Music]
um
i really
have always been good at sales like i’ve
had a lot of other sales jobs and i know
that that sounds like
sales people are sometimes very shady um
and i always like when i’m training
employees or anything like that in sales
i always say don’t be the
used car salesman
um
but
i’ve always been kind of or pretty good
at sales and meeting people and talking
to people
and that’s just where it started and
it’s just grown you know there was
many or there were many years where i
was out there hitting the pavement you
know cold calling on businesses to try
to do their marketing to try to figure
it out
and then it just so happens that we
entered the laundromat world which not
that i’m still not out there come
calling because we are
um training
but
um
we
oftentimes have a lot of laundry right
owners that like reach out to us and to
want us for their marketing
awesome awesome awesome and i’d love to
hear that i love to hear that you’re
still pounding the pavement still
looking to grow i mean you got 100
clients and it sounds like you’re you’re
rearing to get some more and and ready
to rear and dude that’s that’s a very
southern thing to say i feel like do you
guys say that
rare to go
that’s happening i got really intrigued
when you were talking about bourbon and
i just looked up some fun facts on
bourbon and one of them was
uh there are more barrels of bourbon
than people and complex crazy
yeah that’s a lot of bra and like 95 of
all bourbon is coming out of there so
yes
um
so bourbon’s produced other places but
it’s kind of a sore subject like with
people from kentucky if they’re in the
bourbon industry like it’s not really
bourbon
got it
that’s all that real bourbon has to come
from kentucky yes according to people
from louisville
all right so i mean here’s what i want
to get into a little bit today i mean
i hear from a lot of owners like hey do
i need to have this social media or this
social media for my laundromat i don’t
know what to do with it i don’t know
what to post i don’t you know
i think people have a hard time wrapping
their heads around what do we do with
social media as a laundromat like who’s
going to follow us why would they even
care
oh they follow us so i thought maybe we
could chat a little bit about that
uh for a little bit and get your take as
the pro
on
what laundromat should be doing and and
how that’s going to help them benefit
their business so
oh good um absolutely so let’s break it
down into three different categories of
client for a laundromat okay
um so you have the self-service
laundromat clients
um and
unfortunately those are usually
um a lot of times stay-at-home moms or
uh
in like poorer parts of the area that
kind of stuff but
and i hate to say that but it’s
just the facts okay so um those
they’re gonna be on social media
especially on facebook instagram while
they’re sitting or tick tock while
they’re sitting there waiting for their
clothes to be washed clothes to be dry
whatever um and then you have the middle
of the road which is washer i felt
um and they’re gonna be on social media
not as often as the
um self-service
but
and then the third category will be the
pickup and delivery
so each of those are a different
demographic now sometimes yes they can
overlap like but primarily they’re not
um and so one of the reasons about
social media um do you follow tick-tock
a lot
uh i wouldn’t say a lot but i’ve been on
it i go on it every now and then check
out what’s going on over there i get
sucked in too easily you know what i
mean so just roll one right into the
other and i’m like well how do i how do
i stop so how many lawyers or doctors do
you find do you see on tick tock
i
can’t remember ever seeing any
oh well normally it’s a lot okay
maybe you should spend a lot more time
on tech talk maybe i need more time on
tick tock i’m gonna write that down put
more time on tick tock that’s gonna be
my one action step for me yes goals
okay good so the doctors and lawyers
they’re all on tick tock they’re all on
social media which is the third category
of pickup and delivery because normally
that’s your targeted demographic
a higher class people that are going to
be able to afford the pickup and
delivery depending on where you are
so that’s how we kind of break it down
um and what social media you know
with radio television all that stuff
back in the day you you didn’t know who
was going to see your ads or who’s going
to see your brand
but now you can specifically target
those people so if we work for a client
that is
that does self-service washroom fold and
pick up and delivery then at that point
we’re running three different
campaigns um specifically to target
those different
demographics right
yeah that makes a lot of sense uh okay
so i mean i want to get a little bit
more into that here in a second but let
me ask let me back up a little bit
because now you’re bringing up tick-tock
making me feel like very old and out of
touch and
uh you know
so
let me ask you this what
what platforms should launder mats be on
or should they be exploring
um
um that is a difficult question but
100 percent
answered the hard stuff uh 100
facebook and instagram okay um so every
platform has a different demographic
so
and with that being said like if you’re
in a huge college town and you just want
to call it or target college individuals
then you need to be on instagram
snapchat tick tock
okay
uh what about if i’m just in like
you know regular old suburbia or or even
an urban area do i need to be on
tick tock snapchat
um
facebook and instagram is what you 100
need to be on um tick tock and snapchat
i mean snapchat has been around for so
long and it’s still just hanging on do i
think that it’s going to
grow in the future i don’t
i mean
it’s one of those things where
all social media like it develops
teenagers are on it then their parents
start to get on it and they jump off
um so no i don’t think snapchat’s going
to be around forever and plus their
average advertising costs are out of
this world
that’s good to know
um
tick tock
is going to be around for a while and
it’s the fastest growing social media
network ever so
if you’re on tick tock you know there’s
like 90 year olds 80 year olds on tick
tock and
it grew so quickly but i mean that’s
never been done before like tig talk was
a game changer
um
tick tock is very important for
businesses especially if you’re
targeting younger people
okay let’s back up for a second because
now you’re telling me there’s 80 90 year
olds on this now and i don’t just feel
old i just feel like way out of touch so
tell me okay
i’m a laundromat i am a lot of men okay
so i’m a laundromat owner what in the
world should i be doing on tiktok what
do i even
what do i put on there
um
that’s
a complicated question do you do wash
dry fold or pick up and delivery
yeah
okay um just a
like one great example would be a video
of the clothes being loaded into a van
or car like whatever you do for delivery
um
or
a pro example have you heard the song
man i wish my husband was in here
because i could not sing that’s his
thing never heard that but like oh no no
no like
oh
i cannot do it
the oh no no no
turn it loose
no that is okay
uh the answer to your question is
probably no i don’t listen to a whole
lot of music but okay
me either but it’s a tick-tock talk
thing where it’s like oh no and then oh
no no no like it and that’s what’s up
so say that you are loading in
to your van um a big bag of clothing
that’s been folded or something and say
that it like accidentally
spills
and then you like pair that song with it
and then lots of people would watch that
especially mothers um and then you could
target them in their area because they
all know how terrible it is especially
when like your children grab your
newly folded clothing and pull it off
right just if you’re listening on the
podcast that accidentally was in quotes
yeah production not so so like having
fun with it right and and kind of
showing behind the scenes but also
having a little fun with it making it a
little you know entertaining to watch
well that’s the number one thing that
people struggle with with social media
is that um i mean you can have companies
out there
that are strictly just always
professional but that’s not what social
media is especially for laundromats um
social media it’s real life people want
to see what’s really going on they don’t
want
like over-the-top
professional pictures or videos which we
you know we do videos and pictures and
you know all that stuff um
but
they also want it to be real life they
want to see what’s really going on it’s
like part of like um the
stories that are on instagram and
facebook now and it’s strictly that
because people buy from who they like
and if they feel a connection with you
then they’re going to attend your store
or
use wash dry phone or pick up and
delivery
yeah
yeah well i mean i like that because i
do think that you know
when older people like me try to get on
younger platf that’s so funny
anyways try to get on platforms right
like a lot of times we’re just trying to
you know say hey i have this
option or you know it gets very
businessy it’s very formal
and
you know
those
kinds of platforms like the instagram
stories like the tick tock like that
stuff they like
a little bit more entertainment value
and
yes informational also i mean there’s a
ton of
great informational stuff on there that
i’m sure that you can
you know add to with i don’t know stain
removers or
how to use your app i don’t know but
mixing in some of the fun
stuff too and a little more entertaining
as a way to communicate that your
business is there and what your business
does you can do it in in some fun ways
yes well and also one of the
the biggest suggestions for laundromat
owners
is that oftentimes they don’t realize
that social media is all an algorithm
like the way that you’re posting
everything that you’re posting it all
matters like the date the time the
pictures that you’re posting so say that
you go to google and you download a
picture
and use that stock photo
the algorithm knows that that’s not your
photo
and they’re going to push you down and
not allow the exposure that you’re
wanting
um which there’s often times where we
have clients that aren’t quite open yet
and that we have to use some stock
photos but even then we don’t recommend
that’s why we do like photo shoots um we
have so many clients in california that
we actually have a photographer and a
video editor in cal or videographer in
california
um because you want it to be real
content
and
um even if you pay for it which we pay
for some stock photos when we
well every month but we try not to use
them unless we absolutely have to
because even though we’re paying for
them they know the algorithm knows that
it’s stock photos so you want the or
organic content you want people to
realize like you know this is our
laundromat this is what it is like come
visit us
yeah i love that i love that well i want
to talk i mean if we can
uh chat about a couple of the other
platforms and like what we should be
doing on
those platforms
[Music]
uh if that’s okay and then i have some
other question i’ve been writing down a
ton of questions so
uh we may be here all day i don’t know
uh just kidding uh maybe i don’t know uh
all right so you said 100
be on facebook be on instagram let’s
take facebook first uh
what i mean what do we need on facebook
what should we be doing on facebook
who you know how do we
how do we engage people on facebook
um so
that is a two-part question okay so a
lot of times i have
owner my owners that will say like oh i
only got two likes
let’s be real honest whoever
or anyone do you ever look at some
laundry and want to click like
i’m going to go with no not even as a
laundromat owner no you don’t so
i describe it as
like disney um do you have children or
nieces or nephews or anything like that
i got children yeah all right okay so
how many times do you see something with
a disney logo on it
uh
well we go to disneyland at least once a
week usually so at least once a week but
probably more than that yes um even and
so you’re kind of the exception to the
rule so let’s pretend you didn’t have
children and that you have nieces and
nephews okay
um do you have those also
yes you would see
the disney logo so often and like and
usually like if someone doesn’t have
children then they like think about it
and they realize oh i see that all the
time
and it’s to get that get you to make
that person’s purchasing decision even
if you don’t have children because you
know you have great grandparents you
have aunts uncles all of us and so
that’s what we want for a laundry mat
owner is because
laundering is not that exciting there’s
no way you can spin it
um to be that exciting i mean yes you
can do it there spin it like a dryer or
a washer okay
um i mean there’s just no way to do it
for it to be over the topic starting
like
disney for example um
but it’s the reach so in the back end of
what we do it’s that we’re targeting
people to get their eyes on your brand
um and though it’s the same with disney
the more times they can get your
eyeballs on their
brand then the more likely you are to
make that person purchasing decision
[Music]
yeah so okay so
even if we’re posting on facebook and
it’s getting just a couple of likes what
you’re saying is there’s more eyeballs
that are seeing it and that in
combination with
the other stuff that you’re doing is
helping
brand exposure is that is that what
you’re saying
uh yes
it’s the back end for laundry mats that
matters okay
like the ads that you’re running the
targeting that you’re running
all of that
now it’s also very important to keep
posting those posts that are maybe just
like getting two likes because
um a lot of times clients will go and
look at your social media to see if
you’re a reliable business or if you’re
real
because there are lots of you know scams
out there
and
so your social media is actually like a
um
like social verification yeah
verification yeah exactly
yeah and you’re right people will go
look up your business on different
platforms and stuff and see
if you’re there
okay so you said it’s for facebook it’s
the back end that matters and
can you just explain what you mean by
that a little bit more i mean you
mentioned ads what is that what does
that mean
um truthfully there are at least 20
different ads that you can run
okay um
and
it it really just depends on your
demographic um you’re always going to
want to do like a local reach no matter
what
um and that’s just putting it out there
and
um i’ve literally told you more than i
normally tell people oh man that’s
awesome okay
uh all right so that’s important for
facebook that’s why it’s important to
have facebook right is so that you have
an audience it’s one way to build an
audience so that you can
you know target
and the age so like um facebook still
you’re gonna reach 35 year olds to
80.
instagram
um
you know
20 maybe maybe maybe a little younger
like this is all like subjective but 20
on average to
45
and then you have snapchat which all
these platforms are growing and
that’s where the
i would use the word evolution of social
media platforms comes on because then
now there’s tick tock you know it was
facebook instagram snapchat well it
really started with my space but we
weren’t even talking about that right
i got a lot of space floating out there
somewhere i think me too
we do i was in middle school when my
space came out
um
but
so like there’s always another platform
and that’s why it’s important or
difficult for a laundromat owner
to realize or to be on these platforms
because you know
back in
the day
most people didn’t have washers and
dryers
or
you know it was just like go to wherever
it is local but now you know we’ve
entered a whole new world
with the technology of machines or you
know who want if so if there’s a
laundromat that is one more so that
there’s two laundry mats one mile from
each other
one is all old-school machined and
sketchy and the other one is
brand new machines
but how do we get
those people
sorry they’re so popular i know they’re
texting
there’s people are texting me um how do
we get those people to come from
if they’re closer to that first laundry
mat that has run down to your brand new
laundromat and that’s where social media
comes in because i mean tv commercials a
two-year-old could be watching that or
radio um
you know who knows who’s listening to
that well social media we can
specifically target the people like say
that you’re on a laundromat where
there’s a bunch of apartment complexes
nearby then we can target those specific
apartment complexes to get those
individuals that live in there into your
laundromat
i love that
love that and i think that is the power
of social media and online marketing in
general
you know uh being able to to target not
only location but also different
demographics and you know facebook
specifically you can get real specific
income with hobbies with i mean a whole
bunch of different stuff so
you can get real targeted if you want
there and run different campaigns to
different demographics like you said but
you can even get
more niche than just
you know self-serve watch drive fold
pick up a delivery if you really wanted
to and you know we have clients in over
16 different states so
and we study that
so it’s all sunny for us like you know
and tennessee uh which we have lots of
clients in tennessee and kentucky but
you know it’s like a minimum of a five
mile
uh
i apologize i even have my phone on
airplane airplane mode but
you know
it’s connected to the internet it
doesn’t matter
yeah got us
um
ironically
um one of them is my client slash best
friend so it’s about work but um come on
i know
um okay so in tennessee you know it’s a
five mile radius minimum
and then it could go all the way up to
25 mile radius that would target people
but in california i mean you’re at
me the absolute max is five miles
yeah you’re gonna be targeting people
and
we study all that like
if you are if if it’s the laundry mat
that is in
you know a big shopping center and
there’s a laundromat within a mile down
the road we studied that laundry mat and
figure out a way to get your marketing
on top of them
i love that
i love that okay uh
can you talk to me briefly about
instagram instagram i feel like has been
picking up
for a little while now has been picking
up in popularity yes but also
um has been picking up in popularity
with businesses uh in general so can you
talk to me a little bit about like what
should we be doing on instagram there’s
all different ways to
you know
uh post content um maybe you can talk
about that and maybe a little bit
different demographics what should we be
posting there
so
funny do we get more serious
um facebook abs what do i do
well let’s start from the the beginning
so facebook is a storytelling platform
instagram is a like
they use pictures to tell their stories
um and then stories literally came
around along and most people actually on
instagram no longer use or even scroll
down
through their news feed and it’s all
about stories stories are taking over
and um
it
people on instagram they just want you
to be real like they just want you know
original contact or content which is
hard when you’re running a business
and
part of that is that you need people to
do it for you but it doesn’t need to be
anything for show
you know you don’t even need to edit it
it just needs to be
real content
yeah
yeah it’s funny because i’ll post on
i’m pretty terrible
at doing instagram for a lot of my
resource stuff but every now and then
i’ll post uh you know on instagram and
my post will get i don’t know like 20
likes or 30 likes or something but then
i’ll post something on my stories and it
gets like a few hundred
you know eyeballs there
and uh it’s like a pretty big obviously
more people are looking at the stories
but i think also part of that is by
design that instagram is going to
you know give you a little more views
that way but people are watching
those stories
so part of the you’re 100 correct so
instagram and so facebook owns instagram
um and they actually tried to buy
snapchat
and
they wouldn’t sell it to them
and so then at that point they were like
okay
and so that’s when they already started
editing their platform and that’s when
their stories started to come along and
all that um
so that’s where it’s all transpiring
from
yeah and i feel like a lot of the uh
a lot of the
platforms especially like uh the
facebook
controlled platforms are
kind of cannibalizing the other
you know the other
platforms you know for example i just i
accidentally did this weird because we
were originally talking on facebook
messenger
and i
went to like refresh the screen or
something but it and i didn’t even know
you could do this but it turned it into
uh like
a vanishing chat or something basically
like snapchat where it goes away and i
was like whoa what happened uh and you
know like youtube for example has you
know like stories basically or reels
they have going on there instagram has
the longer form instagram tv
you know going on which is more you know
youtubey
than so i feel like they’re kind of
cannibalizing each other’s features in a
way is that true or am i just
so old
yes and no and
this is how i describe it so imagine a
circle okay i can do that so if it’s all
working together then it’s all in like
peace and
uh
harmony
yeah heart yes so it’s all working
together yeah and so that is how it
works because you know used to for
google what let’s let’s just talk about
google for a second okay um whoever paid
the most on google was who’s going to be
on the top
of google searches but then everybody
started paying for google and so how do
they
decide who’s going to be on top
and then that’s when they were they
started writing you on your social media
they started writing you on your website
so like if you’re not updating your
website at least once a month like
you are doing it wrong especially for
google
um
google ads are still very important like
don’t get me wrong about that but
there’s so much more to play with that
and your social media is
is in there so like if you google um
i don’t know pick your what’s your
laundry max name
montebello laundromat
so
if you google that does your facebook
come up
uh
no
my website does but not my facebook
well i don’t i haven’t really updated my
facebook i’ll be honest with you exactly
so your facebook should be coming up
because social media facebook instagram
all that is becoming a search engine
and so people are going to and and when
i say that um when covid first hit
i had to go to
north carolina um to film for some
clients and
i couldn’t find any or it wasn’t when it
first hit it was like in the
middle to end of corona and i
just wanted to eat up like because
kentucky where i’m from was still super
shut down but north carolina was not
like they were
more open
and i went to google and google would
tell me nothing
but i went to facebook
and it would actually it was correct
information of where i could go and eat
in person like it was still spaced out
you know like i um
i’m all about the corona i’m you know
i’m vaccinated getting ready to get the
third or you know the booster and that
kind of stuff but i really just wanted
to eat in a restaurant
um but facebook gave me that information
and google did not
because
social media is updated more frequently
yep
and that is one of the powers of social
media so
when you you have to add in facebook you
have to add an instagram you have to add
in google you have to add in your
website and i mean it’s very complicated
you know if you’re an individual
business owner
but
once you have it all working together
it works in harmony
yeah yeah and and going back to your
google thing you know
and going back also to what you said
about
you know your social media is
verification well it’s not just
verification for customers
who are looking you up it’s also
verification for google they’re waiting
yeah you know they want to see that you
you know are a legitimate business that
you
you know have some reviews on different
platforms that
specifically theirs obviously
uh and that’s why you know google my
business is such a big deal to help you
show up in google searches but also
you know for people to find information
on maps and google
uh but uh yeah i mean it’s it’s a tool
that google uses for verification
purposes you know that you have these
social media platforms for your business
and that they’re semi
regularly updated at least
100
and
most of the time whenever i first start
working
with a laundromat if i say google my
business they have no idea what i’m
talking about yeah yeah
yeah i’ve said
i’m by far the best thing that most
laundromat owners can do is claim their
business on google my business
and just update it once a week like add
a picture add a post make sure your
times are correct and if you do that you
almost don’t really even need anything
else google wise because google’s you’re
gonna be one of the top laundromats in
your area because nobody else is doing
that
you know
um that is true and
not true depending on your identity
let’s do it
um it depends on your demographic like
if you have okay so like say that you
did that and then your neighbor
one mile down the road did that yeah
then who’s gonna be on top yeah well
here in l.a it’s a little bit different
you know because there’s a lot of people
here and the competition is high so you
got to be on top of your game here you
know in any of the bigger metro
areas you got to be on top of your game
absolutely like in kentucky or tennessee
you could get involved with that yeah
yeah
yeah cool okay i mean are there any
are there any platforms to avoid like
that are just aren’t gonna be worth your
time
twitter
twitter which is funny because just a
couple days ago from when we’re
recording this at least you know
facebook and instagram shut down forever
and i heard there’s like a mad flock to
twitter people trying to figure out
what’s going on which is pretty funny
but anyways why twitter tell me
um twitter
you know when i first started this
company and and twitter’s trying to make
a comeback which in a year or two years
it really could like you know i can’t
perceive the future but as of right now
it’s twitter um when i first started
this company you know i would say be on
facebook and twitter and that’s what we
would do
and then instagram came along and
by no means am i being political with
this but
political
um
developments
ruined
twitter
and it’s all
celebrities and
political officials
even still in the state like most people
i mean you can do all the oh sorry i
just hit my computer you can do all the
google searches most people aren’t going
on to twitter to find
a business they’re going on twitter to
find news or to be you know updated on
the newest thing that is out there
yeah that is true actually yeah i i for
sure see that
um man twitter
it’s been it’s been a rough go for
twitter the last couple years i feel
like it 100 has been and i have not even
pitched twitter in
years
uh
five
yeah maybe six yeah yeah it’s been it’s
been a while since twitter’s been
yeah i mean it serves its point i mean
if you want to know what
kim kardashian is doing then you know
it’s great
probably instagram’s still better for
that
well she’ll lease up on a picture there
yeah i guess depending on
what you’re interested about with kim
kardashian
uh okay so uh
let me just let me i’m gonna i got a
question for you but let me just start
with this uh and this is not directed to
you this is to anybody listening to this
right now i highly recommend if you are
going to
you know
have a business
laundromat or otherwise
you need marketing and if you’re gonna
do marketing
it it’s gonna pay off for you to
hire somebody who knows marketing you
spend your time building your business
let them spend their time helping you
market your business and build your
business that way it’s going to pay off
more than trying to learn
marketing yourself but with all that
said and and we’re going to get to how
you can get a hold of brittany here in a
second but
with all that said
if somebody wants to
you know just
do a little bit on their maybe they’re
just getting started they have a zombie
map they have very little funds
you know they’re trying to get things
off the ground
how should they be spending their time
marketing wise or maybe social media
wise that’s going to give them the most
bang for their buck until they can get
to a point where they can hire you
absolutely um post frequently
and
make sure that it’s real life like don’t
over think it
don’t
you know you’re not
um
laundromats are never gonna be
you know some insane major corporation
um i say that but they are because you
know
there are distributors that own
laundromats but
for the most part they’re never gonna be
some
you know insane amazing thing yeah
they’re small businesses
correct
just make it real life like make people
it’s like talking to someone make people
like you like you’re selling yourself is
how i would describe it
and
post on social media let them see you
you want them
to want to walk in your doors
[Music]
yeah i think that’s really
uh because
sorry i’m just writing down your i don’t
know what you just said because it was
so good you’re selling yourself
uh because you know
i can’t do two things at once okay uh
because i i mean i think that’s so good
because it really is about that right
it’s your business whether it’s a small
business or a big business your business
is gonna take on your
personality to an extent your
characteristics your management style
all that stuff is going to be your
business so giving people kind of a
behind the scenes and selling people on
hey here’s what we’re all about as a
business you know we’re all about being
clean and safe we’re all about a
positive environment we’re all about
you know convenience we’re all about
speed whatever you’re all about like
that is
you know what you’re selling that’s what
your your
uh uh
differentiator distinguisher uh that you
have there and you’re selling yourself
and i think that’s that’s huge advice
especially for somebody who’s starting
out who’s trying to get things moving
you know
let the community know who you are what
you’re all about and why they should
come check you out
great advice
um okay well
do you
are you
do you know of any like tools or
resources that could be helpful for
laundromat owners that maybe if they’re
trying to get started
or anything
so
there’s a few not necessarily tools
but i always um whenever so like i have
a lot of people that are a lot of
laundry owners that reach out to me and
talk to me even if they don’t use my
services like hey what do you recommend
um always a kids center
i mean
for the most part like if you’re in an
area where
you know it’s just single couples then
that would make sense but um it’s always
a kids center that really makes sense
and
it’s um
you know
card systems there’s so many different
card systems out there currently that
are and even more coming into the market
and that
honestly is my two biggest
recommendations
well and what’s cool about the
both of those actually is that they’re
fairly
easy to market at the you know too
because i mean it’s really easy to post
pictures of your
kids corner you know i think you got to
be careful about posting pictures of
actual kids but um but you know your
kid’s corner being able to highlight
that and it’s also
uh those card systems make it pretty
easy to run different promotions that
then you can you know shout about on
your social
you know media sites or your website or
whatever
um
and you know and integrate into your
whole marketing plan um that you have so
i think those are great
uh what about uh
i was just thinking about like
posting on facebook or instagram or
something like i’ve used
uh like tools like canva or something to
be able to like throw some text on
or you know or a border or something
on in no hand is okay
um facebook so like
have you ever heard sleep yeah hootsuite
yep
so his feet used to be really big back
in the day and it still is big
but
it is not good
and and i don’t
it is a it’s a great platform
but the facebook algorithm has gotten
so smart that they want people to use
business suite or creator studio
or facebook and they
want people to use their own platforms
instead of another platform um
so with that being said is that anytime
that you can use your own platform
um it’s better like canva is fantastic
but if you know how to use um
illustrator adobe illustrator
then that’s always going to be better
because it’s coming like when you create
something in illustrator it’s cr coming
as in
like your own original content which i
talked about earlier and that’s going to
allow more exposure so canva is it’s
great for beginners
but it is not the best i mean you’re not
the algorithm’s smart enough to know
that
it is what it is you only came from
canva yeah just so anybody just
everybody’s on the same page hootsuite
is a platform where you can post to
different social media
accounts kind of from one on the
hootsuite platform um it allows you to
post to facebook pages or instagram or
you know whatever
your platform of choices
uh so yeah and it all makes sense right
so
you know put yourself in in facebook’s
shoes or any of these platforms put
yourself in their shoes right they want
you to be on their platform
and because they make money when
when you and your customers are on the
platform right
so when you do things that take people
off the platform or when you’re doing
things from outside the platform and
putting it on
it it’s not as beneficial to them
than if you have original content that
you’re uploading to their platform it’s
you know it’s natively uploaded to their
you know to facebook to instagram to
whatever um it’s something that you
created from scratch and that adds a lot
of value
to the community but it also adds a lot
of value to the platform whatever the
platform is so that makes a lot of sense
there
yeah and we have a system where
like if it’s a brand new laundry mat
that’s just being built then you know
it’s a little different but if it’s a
you know the laundromat’s open and stuff
we so i have um what i call the in-house
editor
and so all of my social media
strategists they will po like create
their post and then the in-house editor
will go through and edit them all
and
we don’t even allow
the same picture normally unless like
we’re low on content because if we’re
working with the laundromat owner or
something but normally we don’t even
want the content the same picture to be
posted within three months um
yeah that’s smart
that’s smart because those algorithms
are smart smarter than us
and way
way smarter than that yeah
yeah uh well this has been awesome i you
have brought a ton of good information
about social media i think it’s a big
puzzle for a lot of small business
owners in general
and not sure what they should be doing
but i thought you brought a lot of
really great tips and really great
advice and also some kind of
behind-the-scenes knowledge on these
platforms and how they work and how to
use them so thanks for coming on i got a
couple more questions for you so don’t
you know don’t wrap up yet
um but i mean the biggest one is can you
tell us a little bit about your company
and what exactly you guys do and what
you offer to laundromat owners yes
um so
i own center social that’s the name
of the company that i started in 2014
and we offer all types of online
marketing um but we also do
like graphic design so if laundromats
wanting printing
or anything like that
and a little bit about us is that in
april we did a grand reopening because
the first marketing company epically
failed
at the grand opening so we did the grand
reopening and they were averaging on and
i mean i’m talking a huge huge laundry
mat okay
um i
can’t quite say
the name and that kind of stuff because
i’m
under a
non-disclosure agreement
but the first marketing company epically
failed and
they when we did it we had one month to
pull it off and they were averaging
during their week grand opening seven
turns a day
all right
we’ll take that all day
every day yep
that’s pretty cool
yep
uh so how does it work so say you know
somebody wants to sign up with you
what is it that they need to do to help
you guys help them do they need to get
you
content how does that all work yes so we
have a list of questions when a client
signs up with us like your machine brand
your machine sizes like we need to know
all that and that pictures is one of the
most important things
um we don’t have any type of a contract
because if we’re making money you’re
going to keep paying us like that’s our
motto
um so
it’s just about going back and forth
which marketing changes so
um you know in october you may want to
be pushing one thing and then november
starting to get closer to
the holidays and you want to push like
you know the bigger blankets bringing
your bigger blankets for your
out-of-town guests that are coming in
or something like that so it’s it is a
partnership um we don’t have to talk to
you all the time but we do like to talk
to each individual owner at least once a
month
nice that doesn’t sound too bad
in terms of labor intensive for an owner
uh
man that’s awesome okay so how do people
find you how do they get in touch with
you if they’re interested in whatever
you’re doing there’s always facebook and
instagram um my phone number is 606
two seven two
seven five two four
and then
um you can reach me at info at
centersocial.com or brittany
centersocial.com
awesome and i will have links
to
all of that to email address i’ll have
the phone number and i’ll have your
uh
social media
links in the show notes and if you’re on
youtube they’ll be down below in the
description
brittany anything else you want to say
before we wrap up this has been awesome
um
one thing is that
if you think that your demographic is
not on social media
you’re wrong they’re on one of those
platforms
and you’re missing out by not reaching
out to them
in the laundromat world
yeah if you’re selling lamborghinis
different story but if you’re in the
laundromat world great there you go
brittany this has been incredible thank
you so much for coming on the show
sharing a little bit about social media
helping us solve the social media puzzle
uh and man we cannot wait to have you
back on when you’re a laundromat owner
to hear about that experience
all right what a cool episode with
brittany she was super super fun to have
on the podcast and we got to talk about
a lot of very cool stuff uh you know
about social media and and launder
mastermind very very cool
but as always i just want to encourage
you
to uh man
pick something from the episode put it
into action uh for me
this week uh my i mean i kind of got
called out a little bit on the tick tock
thing so i gotta get on tick tock check
that out a little bit more and see if
maybe there’s an opportunity there for
my laundromats or maybe even here
unloaded my resource i’m not really sure
still
exactly what that would look like but
i’m going to check it out because i you
know brittany called me out so good for
her
so that’s my to do what’s your to do you
know pick something put it into action
again action is what’s going to help you
accomplish your goals it’s going to lead
you to success and just learning about
stuff hearing these great stories
hearing these great tips
is awesome as a first step but it’s not
going to get you all the way there so go
take some action this week maybe head
over to the forums laundrymat
resource.com forums and share what your
action step is for this week i think
that would be very cool if we all
started doing that add a little bit of
accountability to what we’re doing and
uh who knows maybe we’ll make a make a
special friend while we’re at it
all right lineup resource.com forums to
go make a special friend all right guys
super cool we will see you at the next
thing whatever that might be if you’re
going to join us for a webinar or if
you’re going to be on a youtube channel
or if you’re going to be listening to
the podcast if you’re going to be on the
blog or whatever i mean we got a ton of
stuff going on so wherever you’re gonna
join us we’ll see you there and if
nothing else we’ll see in the next
episode of the laundromat resource
podcast next week all right guys peace
[Music]
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