It's Friday! That means another week of LeapIN Online wrapped up! Can you believe that we are already halfway through the program! It's flying by and we're learning so much so fast that sometimes I feel like our brains might turn to Jello! It's all good though because we had another amazing week with so many accomplished and dedicated speakers! It was also a week of change for a few of our cohort! We were excited to welcome Jesse from The Hot Sauce Co. and Kelly from Studio KVR tuning in from new locations this week. It goes to show that when you are an entrepreneur, you hustle, no matter where you are!
Day 13- Lucky number 13! We started our Monday with a game, it had been a while since we played one so we played an old favourite: A Photo that Means Something! In this game, we each share a photo that doesn't have to do with our business and we tell the story of it. Some of our crew shared photos of their families and loved ones, travels, pets, and previous experiences that brought them to us. Overall, this is a great way to learn more about each other as we spend so much time together. We then moved into the workshops with another dynamic duo! Mya and Jenn from the Lawrence Kinlin School of Business taught us about breaking through the clutter online. They gave us a great overview of Search Engin Optimization (SEO) and Social Media Marketing and helped us to understand a bit more about digital marketing as a whole. As we went off for lunch we all took some time to look at our web presence and implement the advice Mya and Jenn had given us!
Day 14- Tuesdays mean value proposition roulette! We started our day by having each cohort member tell us a bit about their business and what value they can bring to their customer. It's so great to see them continue to change as the program progresses! After that, we were joined by Craig from the Lawrence Kinlin School of Business who gave us a deep dive into digital marketing as a whole. Craig was great because he answered a tonne of questions we had about concepts we had to hear about but didn't understand very well! We learned a lot about Marketing on Monday and Tuesday so we were excited to get a bit of an early lunch break so we could take some time to work on our homework!
Day 15- We started today with an Icebreaker, How does your family cook rice? it helped us learn a bit more about each other culture and understand our backgrounds and how they influence us. This morning we welcomed Eric from Fanshawe's Organizational Development and Learning. He led us through an introduction to our Emotional Intelligence and let us discuss in small groups! Next, we had Matt from Bend Bus join us! He told us the story of his business, how he grew it by using exceptional PR and Communications skills to leverage some free press! Our speakers today gave us lots to reflect on as we wrapped up the day and went to work on applying these skills to our businesses.
Day 16 - Thursdays mean Brag and Drag! LeapIN grad, Alexander Leonard of AL Media joined us to lead us through this week's session where we each share something good and something unfortunate about our week. It's so great to have our former LeapIN clients come back and participate in the program like this! Today's lesson was all about Google Ad Words and Google Analytics with Liz from the Lawrence Kinlin School of Business. Liz taught us about the platforms and, by using Chintan from Greenovation - Eco Dinnerware as an example, we all got a look at how the platform works! Lastly, Maxwell from Face Two Face Vintage taught us all a bit about his trade by showing us how to identify vintage T-shirts!
We were so thankful to have so many amazing speakers come and share their experience and skills with the cohort this week! Marketing is such a critical aspect of any small business and we are grateful to everyone who has contributed to making the skills of our entrepreneurs in the program a bit stronger. Next week is a short week as we're going to take some time off for the Civic Holiday, we'll be back on Tuesday where we are going to spend the next few weeks talking about the money sides of our business!
Curious about our cohort and their businesses, check them out below!
Tyler from Celebration
Sharelen from Real Model Mom
Jared from JR Welding
Swaraj from Taxably
Christine from Qualia Hub
Kelly from Studio KVR
Aaron and Omar from Fastrack
Jesse from The Hot Sauce Co.
Maxwell from Face Two Face Vintage
Chintan from Greenovation - Eco Dinnerware
Kristen from Soul Runners
Chris from Bernese
**You can find more about them on our social media @leapjunction!**
We hope you are enjoying this blog! If there is a skill we've talked about in here that you think you could improve for your business, why not Book a virtual appointment! Or, feel free to send us your questions and comments at leapjunction@fanshawec.ca.