Voice of the Fair Podcast
A Podcast for the Fair Industry.
On today’s episode, I sit down to chat with the Alameda County Fair marketing director, Angel Moore. We talk about how her fair is adjusting (not pivoting, we’re all tired of that word), to life in a pandemic. We also discuss the struggles of having to furlough staff and the real truth about social media algorithms. All that and more!
He's a rapidly ascending talent in the country music scene, winning over fans with his chart-topping single "Mr. Red, White & Blue" currently sitting comfortably at number 5 on the iTunes charts. In addition to his musical success, he's set to captivate audiences in the upcoming Netflix series "Country, Ever After," which is scheduled to debut on November 6th. The show promises an intimate portrayal of his remarkable journey in the industry, shedding light on his perseverance in the absence of a traditional record label.
(Albuquerque, NM) - Today Robert Smith Presents is pleased to announced the guest lineup and broadcast schedule for season 2 of the Fair Game podcast.
This purpose of this season is to help tell the stories throughout our fair and events industry surrounding the 2020 Covid-19 pandemic. This season includes guests from all across the United States and Australia . Our guests are fair managers, marketers, entertainers, carnival operators and association directors.
These 20 episodes are just the start. If you’re interested in being a guest on the show please contact us.
Here are the guests and air dates for season 2 of the Fair Game podcast.
Coffey Anderson, Country Music Artist, November 5, 2020
Angel Moore, Alameda County Fair, November 6, 2020
Jay Spicer, Martin County Fair, November 9, 2020
Tasha Hyder, Clay County Fair (FL), November 11, 2020
Marla Calico, IAFE, November 13, 2020
Courtny Conkle, Wyoming State Fair, November 16, 2020
Lynelle Smith, Sydney Royal Easter Show (Australia), November 18, 2020
Karla Majewski, Pacific Animal Productions, November 20, 2020
Stacey Wade, Lake County Fair (FL), November 23, 2020
Aaron Alejandro, Texas FFA Foundation, November 24, 2020
Coleen Gilboy, Verde Valley Fair, November 25, 2020
Dan Mourning & Antoinette Kulinna, New Mexico State Fair, November 27, 2020
Kevin Ridgeway & Kristen Johnson, Lady Houdini, November 30, 2020
Alan Bruess, December 1, 2020
Scott Tindle, Entrepreneur, December 2, 2020
Jessica Underberg, Erie County Fair, December 3, 2020
Chef Scott Landry, Chef Landry’s Comedy Cooking Show, December 4, 2020
Dennis Lee, Dennis Lee Band, December 7, 2020
Jay Strates, Strates Shows, December 8, 2020
Suzanne Neve, Florida Festivals and Events Association,, December 9, 2020
Tonya & Jory, Team T&J, December 10, 2020
Eric Wofford, Yuma County Fair, December 11, 2020
Jimmy Earhart, Sea Lion Splash, December 14, 2020
Chris Taylor, Waffle Chix, December 15, 2020
Jeremy Parsons, Clay County Fair, December 16, 2020
Kyle Palmer, Artists & Attractions, December 17, 2020
Amanda Frigon Northlands, December 18, 2020
Randall Reichert, Hot Wisconsin Cheese, December 21, 2020
Andrew Vandepopulier, Haas & Wilkerson Insurance, December 22, 2020
Michele Richards, OC Fair, December 23, 2020
*Airdates and guest lineup subject to change.
Please tune into the podcast on Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify. iHeartRadio or right here on robertsmithpresents.com.
Originally published February 7, 2019.
Just prior to heading out to the Western Fairs Association convention I sat down with the host of the ABQ Business Podcast. Jason and I had a great discussion about business and my history as an entertainer. Plus we also discussed what it’s like to work in the fair industry and I told the world what it was that saved the New Mexico State Fair.
Enjoy the episode.
Originally published January 31, 2019.
Last week at the Western Fairs Association convention, Robert went deep into advanced level social media marketing strategies for 2019.
Attendees were treated with ideas and tactics to improve their 2019 marketing campaigns
The content was so strong, one fair manager approached Robert about hiring him to present the information to the staff and board at his fair.
Two major ideas Robert shared were to use the Instagram hashtag search to seek out and engage your customers, and the bombshell idea was for fairs to create and or lease well crafted media from or to other fairs.
All that and more is in this podcast.
Thanks for listening!
Originally published December 1, 2018
(Laughlin, NV) - In November 2018 I flew to Las Vegas, NV and took a quick drive down to Laughlin in order to present my Social Media 434 ed session for them. This was the second consecutive year I’ve spoken with their group. The information the first time was so good I guess they had to have more.
I opened with a discussion question. What is the most important asset in your marketing plan? Answers typically range from television commercials to how you deliver your message. Great answers. But they’re not correct.
If you want to know the most important thing for all of us, every brand and every fair, when it comes to marketing, you’ll get that answer and much more on the podcast.
Enjoy.
Originally published November 9, 2018.
If you take a look around social media, it won’t take you long to realize that people have a thing for followers. The common thought tends to be the more followers you have, the “better/cooler/more in-demand” you must be. Follower counts have become the modern equivalent of having everyone want you to sign their high school yearbook back in the day. You must be so popular, right?
Nope. Not right.
Here’s my opinion on follower counts. They’re irrelevant. Here’s why.
Reason #1: Purchased Followers
That common thought I mentioned earlier that somehow lots of followers must mean you’re somehow more important is a gigantic misconception.
For starters, followers can be bought.
If you’re not deep into the social media ecosphere you may not even realize this is a thing. Social media users can go to certain companies and pay to get more followers on their account. Literally, they put their credit card in, and a computer program begins generating followers for that account. You might spend $100 for 2,500 followers. Or $500 for 20,000 followers.
Do the follower counts actually increase? In some case, yes, absolutely.
However, in most cases those are bot accounts. They’re not real. They’re just a computer generated fake account following that person.
Why do people buy fake followers? Super easy answer. They need fake followers to build up their fake self-esteem. It’s just true. If you’re confident in who you are, then it just doesn’t matter how many followers you have.
So how do you know if a person is buying fake followers? It’s not always easy. There’s apps and websites that claim to be able to indicate how many real vs. fake followers a user has. Accuracy can vary and in some cases only lead you to having to give up personal information to get the results. Not a great idea
One way I’ve found that’s pretty accurate is simply looking at the number of followers against the amount of engagement they have. By default, if you’ve got tens of thousands of followers, you should be getting some level of organic engagement, between .5% to 3%.
So someone with 25,000 followers should be getting at least several hundred likes and comments.
But take a look at some accounts on Instagram that have 27k, 45k, or even 100k followers. Yet they get 18 likes and 1 comment. You’ve just found someone who has bought their followers.
Reason #2: Your Goals Aren’t the Same as Someone Else’s Goals
This is a big one for me. Equating follower counts to some level of value or quality misses the very real possibility that the goals of one brand or person are different than the goals of another brand or person.
Here’s a couple of quick examples.
If you have Facebook then you likely have heard of these two companies: Purple Mattress and Squatty Potty. Each start up put out videos that went insanely viral.
Purple Mattress released a video with a character, “Goldilocks the Bed Expert,” dropping 4 raw eggs onto their Purple Mattress. It garnered 138 million views and shot Purple Mattress to the forefront of the direct-to-consumer mattress industry.
Squatty Potty released a video with a unicorn character dropping, well, you’ll have to watch the video. The video generated more than 140 million views and counting.
My point?
The company that created those videos has just 8,200 followers.
Your goals aren’t the same as someone else’s goals. So quit comparing your follower counts to someone else’s follower counts.
Reason #3: The Facebook Ad Product
Listen, if you’re a B2C business, having a high follower count in order to sell your watch, or your camera, or whatever your product is, intuitively seems like it would be helpful.
Or, if you’re like my business, and you provide a service to another business, so you deal in B2B, you might also think enormous follower counts are helpful.
But the Facebook ad product wipes away any advantage. Particularly, if we’re talking about entertainment service providers in the fair industry where our business serves.
“Follower counts are a nonsense vanity metric that says very little about the quality of a brand or product. -Robert Smith
As performers, we tend to log tens of thousands of miles traveling to fairs across the country. In one year I’ve picked up followers from southern California to Maryland. Other acts do the same.
Let’s take an example of two acts. One act has 20,000 followers while the other act has 1,000 followers.
The act with 20,000 followers gets booked at a fair in Minnesota. They put out a video on their Facebook page which generates an organic reach of 1,000 engagements. And that’s a generous estimate.
That’s good news for that fair, right? 1,000 people engaging with likes, comments and shares about an act coming to your fair.
Except where are those followers located? Remember as acts we generate followers from a variety of locations around America and Canada. If your fair is in Minnesota and the act has performed there before, maybe 25% of those engagements are in your area. If this is the acts first time to Minnesota, forget it. Few if any of those engagements will be from your fair’s area.
To recap: The act has 20,000 followers. They publish a post which organically generates 1,000 engagements of which 250 or less will be in your area.
Now let’s take a look at the act with 1,000 followers.
Understanding Facebook’s ad product, they deploy an “unpublished” Facebook post and target it to a given demographic within 25 miles of your fair. They get their message in front of 10,000 people, who are actually potential customers for that fair, for about $90 dollars.
The ad generates 1,000 engagements (likes, comments and shares). Because of Facebook’s targeting capabilities, all of those 1,000 engagements are in your fair’s immediate area.
See how that worked? One act gets in front of few if any of the fair’s potential customers. The other gets in front of 10,000 of the fair’s potential customers.
Don’t Be Fooled by Follower Counts.Follower counts are a nonsense vanity metric that says very little about the quality of a brand or product. If they do say something, then certainly there should be some graduated matrix of follower success.
What’s my value if I have 1 million plus followers? What about 500,000? Is my product any better or worse if I only have 100,000? What about 25,000? 1,000? 500?
No. Follower counts are irrelevant and I just gave you three good reasons why.
I wish you all nothing but happiness.
Originally published October 19, 2018.
A lot of you know I’m a fan of unique watches. Five years ago my best friend from college, Kevin, pointed me in the direction of a young upstart watch company. The company, Original Grain, was in the midst of their first Kickstarter campaign.
It would be another year before I received my first Original Grain watch as a gift from my wife, Sara.
Since then I’ve grown my collection and struck up a friendship with their co-founder, Andrew Beltran.
Earlier in August I was able to catch up with Andrew at the company’s headquarters in downtown San Diego.
We talked about the world of start ups, how social media marketing had built the company, and of course, we talk watches.
Thanks for listening.
