Word & Mouth Blog
Where food, hospitality, branding, and human behavior all crash into each other. I write about restaurants, wine, placemaking, customer experience, and the small details that make people talk about a business long after they leave.
For even more snarky takes on marketing, pop culture, branding, and the internet, visit my Substack, Burnt Popcorn & Branding: Substack
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A mix of hospitality, branding, customer psychology, hospitality culture, and internet behavior from someone who’s worked behind the scenes in marketing long enough to know what feels authentic and what feels painfully forced.
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Yes. Especially if your marketing currently sounds like ChatGPT wrote it.
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No LinkedIn thought leadership energy here. Just strategy, storytelling, and occasional side-eye toward trends, Chat-GPT written branding advice, and “disruptive” ideas that all look the same.
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People in marketing, hospitality, branding, retail, wine, or anyone who secretly judges restaurants by their menu design before reading the food list.
Rediscovering Starbucks’ Core: A Lesson in Staying True to Your Brand
Starbucks' shift back to its core values offers key lessons for hospitality businesses—focus on quality, experience, and customer connection.
How To Start a NEW Business During a Crisis
Sisters, Claire + Bronwyn from Mighty Market planned on opening their zero waste, clean beauty, and bulk refill brick and mortar shop in Downtown Martinez East Bay) - little did they know, a worldwide pandemic would shut down retailers across the world. Quickly they adapted to creating an eCommerce website to sell products, and used social media to connect with customers.
Small Business Superpower: Connections with Your Customers Matter
The brick & mortar hair and skin salon has continued to focus on the connections that they have with their customers, and that can be seen as soon as you walk into the salon through smiling faces and repeat customers. When the SIP order went into place for Sonoma County, they had to shut down their salon and turn to online delivery orders, as well as a new Facebook group
Going From Selling Wine In-Person to Selling Wine Online Is No Easy Task
In the latest in my video interview series, Pivotal - a Focus on Digital Marketing, I talked to Hannah, the Assistant Manager, Marketing & eCommerce at Bottle Barn. The Santa Rosa brick & mortar wine, beer, and spirits retailer started their eCommerce website just a few years earlier, but the COVID-19 Pandemic made it a greater focus for the 30-Year-Old business.
Small Changes to Pivot Your Small Business Strategy During COVID -19
For some, when we are put in situations where we have to adapt quickly -- we find a way to pivot our small business strategy. For other business owners or marketers, it isn't so easy to change how you do business, but there are things you can do to make small steps to pivot your marketing.