Let's make marketing easier! Welcome to your field guide to smarter, stress-free marketing. Get actionable tips, how-tos, new tools, marketing trends, and solid strategies delivered to your inbox twice a month.

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Hey Reader!

I have to tell you, I'm not ashamed to admit I am obsessed with organizing. I have every Home Edit book, I have a love affair with spreadsheets, and I get a legit thrill every time I check something off of my to-do list.

Why am I so nuts for this kind of stuff? Because it helps me take the chaos and find a way to put it into categories so life doesn't feel so overwhelming. And marketing is no different.

In this week's Field Guide I am sharing the system I use to help me streamline my own marketing tasks to save time and save my sanity.

Small actions can make a big impact.

Here are a few ideas from the field to get you started:

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Upcoming Holidays

Don't miss out on these great marketing / content ideas for the upcoming month!

February 13 – Galentine’s Day (Perfect for female-focused marketing!)

February 14 – Valentine’s Day

February 20 – National Love Your Pet Day

February 22 – National Margarita Day

February 25 – Mardi Gras

March 1 – Start of Women's History Month

March 7 – National Employee Appreciation Day

March 10 – Daylight Saving Time Begins (Woohoo! Spring forward)

March 14 – Pi Day (3.14 – I love this day - but I'm a geek)

March 17 – St. Patrick’s Day

March 20 – First Day of Spring

March 29 – National Mom and Pop Business Owners Day (Hey-oh!)

March 31 – Easter Sunday

Your Action List

Two quick and easy ways to move your marketing forward this week:

✅ Start Thinking Spring!

The sun is shining longer each day and spring fever is starting to set in. Even if you live in a snowy place (hello, McCall!), people are ready to start seeing some fresh, colorful content. They want a shift to sunny and warm even if the weather outside isn't there yet ☀️

Start thinking now about how you can shift toward warmer feeling content come March 1st and take advantage of some of the upcoming holidays like the Spring Equinox, Easter, Mother's Day, and Earth Day. Who else is ready for tulips and daffodils?!

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✅ Post a Trial Reel

If you haven't tried this yet, make this week your week! Trail reels are pretty cool...they are only shown to your NON-FOLLOWERS. That means you can do some great experimentation when it comes to figuring out what resonates and attracts new followers. Have fun!

If something performs well you can choose to share it to your regular feed. If not, delete it and try a new trial reel! Not sure how to post a Trial Reel? Scroll below for a step-by-step guide!

My organizing secret weapon...

I keep seeing a lot of chatter out there promising hacks that will allow you to magically create 30 days of content in an hour or generate six months of email content with subject lines that will get you 80% open rates with a few clicks of a button.

I will be the first to admit that all sounds amazing, and I have been sucked into the promise in these pitches. But the reality is that marketing takes time. And practice.

And while I have not found an easy way to create 30 days of content in an hour (and trust me, I have been trying for many years!), I DO think there is a really simple way to make creating content so much easier - from social posts to emails to ads to website content.

Enter batching.

In the last 12 months, I have committed to setting aside a few hours twice a week to really FOCUS on my own marketing. For me, this means Wednesday and Friday mornings. I have found that I am most productive before noon, so knocking these sessions out before I check email or take a meeting has been key.

I would love to tell you I have a full-proof schedule where I only do one single task in each batching session, but that hasn't panned out for me.

Instead, I pre-plan what each session will look like and batch WITHIN that session.

A typical Wednesday morning session for social media planning looks like:

1. Film + upload reels for next 7 days (45 minutes)
2. Design this week's carousel (30 min)
3. Captions and scripts for next 8-14 days (45 minutes)
4. Ideation for next 15-21 days (30 minutes)

My typical Friday sessions look something like this:

1. First Friday of each month: blog and newsletter ideation for next 30 days
2. Second Friday of each month: write blog post #1
3. Third Friday of each month: write next two newsletters
4. Fourth Friday of each month: write blog post #2

Setting up a framework for dedicated, concentrated time to work ON my business rather than IN my business has been a game-changer. I don't feel so scattered and I find that I am wasting a lot less time producing the content I want to share.

As an added bonus, a few months of doing this put me two weeks ahead of the content I want to push out (social's, emails, blog posts - everything!) which means I am not scrambling last minute anymore.

My exact setup won't work for everyone, but this month my challenge to you is to schedule at least two dedicated content batching sessions on your calendar. Plan your to-do list for each session before you start and stick to that plan. Start building a content creation framework that fits into YOUR schedule so you aren't ruled by it!

No quick fixes promised here, but sanity and clarity of purpose definitely are!

Your back-to-basics marketing primer

How to Post a Trial Reel

If a "Trial Reel" is new to you, here is a quick guide on how to get your first one posted!

📱Open Instagram and add a reel (per usual)

• Tap the + button at the bottom of the screen.
• Select Reel and either record a video or upload existing clips.

📱Edit Your Reel like you normally would

• Trim, adjust speed, add text, stickers, or filters.
• Select audio if you want to add music.
• Choose a cover image (either from the reel or upload one).

📱Select "Trial Reel" (see image below)

• When ready to post, locate the "Trial" toggle switch before hitting share and turn it on.
• You can also choose to have a high-performing Trial Reel be automatically shared on your feed - just select that option (tap the "How it Works" link in the Trial Reel to turn this function on or off).

📱Review Analytics

• After posting, you can access insights to see how your trial reel is performing with non-followers.
• Find Trail Reels by toggling to your Reels tab - they show up under "Drafts and Trial Reels"
• If the trial performs well, but you didn't choose to automatically share this to your followers, you can opt to do that here. If you don't want to share, just delete the reel whenever you want to!

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