- PNC is proud to support "Business Forward," where community leaders discuss the issues confronting business in Central Illinois.

(light upbeat music) - Welcome to "Business Forward."

I'm your host, Matt George.

Joining me tonight, a good friend of mine, Jocelyn McDowell.

Jocelyn is a digital account exec at Hibu.

Welcome.

- Thank you for having me.

- Well, we have a long relationship in many different facets.

- Yeah.

- So we're gonna get to your current position now, what you do because I think it's fun and you're having fun, which that is the most important thing, right?

But let's start with you.

Where are you originally from?

- So, I'm originally from Charleston, Illinois, where Eastern Illinois is.

I always feel like I have to classify that 'cause having lived in the East Coast for 10 years, I'd say Charleston, and people would say West Virginia or South Carolina.

So, yeah.

So I grew up here in Central Illinois.

- So did you go to, where'd you go to school?

- I went to Southern Illinois because I wanted to go to college.

My dad taught English and then became a dean at Eastern.

And so I literally grew up on campus, going to class when I was sick, or if my dad didn't have a babysitter through, going to his office after school in high school.

- Well, that's pretty cool.

- Everybody on campus knows me.

- So what did he, what did he do there?

He was a dean of what?

- Arts and Humanities.

- Well, that's pretty cool.

So growing up I did a lot of, played a lot of tennis in Mattoon, Charleston.

So I know that area well.

- Yeah.

- All right.

So you go to Southern Illinois and what'd you study there?

- Public relations.

- Public relations.

And so, when you were in school, and I'm tying a little story here because when you're in school, you're looking at public relations.

What does the young 18, 19-year-old Jocelyn look at as the future of public relations?

What were you wanting to do?

- I wanted to do something that made a difference.

I wanted to work with organizations that would help their community.

And so I actually started as a part-time job in college, working at the school's foundation in their phone-a-thon.

And so that really catapulted my, took me transitioning from public relations to fundraising, although the two are really close together.

- They go along the same path.

So does marketing.

- Absolutely.

- So then how did you get to Peoria?

You graduate or whatever.

And then you come, you're done with Southern and now what?

- I packed up my car 10 days after graduation, drove out to a suburb of Washington DC to run George Mason University's phone-a-thon program.

And I was there for about a year.

I was very, very fortunate that through a family friend I was able to interview at Johns Hopkins University.

And I started working there, running their phone-a-thon.

- So early on you kind of had that bug, that fundraising bug slash really that thread that's woven through all of us fundraisers is that mission piece.

- Absolutely.

- Is that what it was?

- Absolutely.

- Did you have a certain mission in mind that you were wanting to, I'll give you an example.

When I was younger, I had a friend pass away from cancer.

And so I started my career at age 16 raising money for cancer and leukemia all the way through probably age 30.

And so I did a lot of, did you have something specific in mind that was special to you, or?

- Yeah, I wanted to make higher education affordable for people.

Having grown up on a college campus, I saw the great opportunities that a higher education can provide somebody.

And so I wanted to make that possible for people.

- That's pretty cool.

So now you get to Peoria.

What happened?

- Well, I did some fundraising here in town.

I worked at the Alzheimer's Association in the Bloomington office where we met, I worked at IPMR, the Institute of Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation.

I spent some time at Bradley, and then I did some fundraising for the Peoria Park District.

And through my journey, I was able to touch on all of the various facets of fundraising from phone-a-thon where you're calling alumni to legacy giving and planned giving and endowment fundraising.

And I hit a point in my career after 20 some odd years, where I felt like I was getting comfortable and I was ready for a new challenge.

But I still wanted to give back to the community.

And the universe just brought me to, or brought Hibu to me, I should say.

And ironically enough, my regional vice president worked with my stepmom back in the day in Charleston.

- Well, it's all relationship-driven.

- It is all relationship.

But what was funny is that my now boss, when she reached out to me, did not know the connection.

- Oh, how funny.

- 'Cause I'm Jocelyn McDowell and not Jocelyn Lynch.

- Gotcha.

- So, through the conversation we made that connection.

So it truly was the universe giving me just an incredible gift.

- I go back to those IPMR days and those were actually, that's when I not only first met you, but that's, and we worked closely together on a couple projects.

And you had a good leader in Rick Zehr and I still talk to him here and there, and I remember sitting down with you and talking about fundraising and talking about event planning but talking about pulling that relationship piece in to leverage everything that you're doing in your business.

And it's really, I remember having the conversation very clearly about, it took me years to develop that trust with people, to be able to know that whatever your mission is, and at that time for you, it was IPMR, that that's what you're there for.

And you guys did some pretty cool things during that time.

- Yeah, really did.

- But it also, you know, full transparency, it led to you and I having a mentor relationship back and forth to be able to really just, I saw something in you that I knew you had a drive and I knew you had something, but there's a piece I want to talk about that I've always respected about you and I do all women is that you're a working mom.

And I knew that was always the number one thing that we are talking about as we had our mentoring sessions is number one priority is your daughter.

And I don't think I've ever brought that up on a subject here on "Business Forward," which I kind of, as I was driving in today, I was thinking to myself, I don't know how that's never been brought up because having five kids and knowing what, but for you, I just always thought and respected how much you loved that piece of it.

And I obviously understand why.

Tell me what it means to you and then how you teach your daughter, in a sense, to be able to be a loving mother, a loving business person.

- Yeah, well, being a mom is a gift that I am forever grateful for.

Even on the very hard days, which she's a very sassy, strong-willed young girl, which one day we'll be very grateful for.

But, you know, it's just, it's an incredible opportunity that growing up I wasn't afforded because my mom was terminally ill. And so I was fortunate to have a relationship with her, but I didn't get to see the day-to-day.

And so it's not lost on me that I have this incredible opportunity to show Ainsley what it is like to give back to your community.

So when I was involved in Junior League, she went to meetings with me.

She went to volunteer events with me.

When I was at the Park District, she did the same thing.

She'd come to work with me, especially during COVID.

She would go to other events and learn what it means to give back.

And now with Hibu, I'm given this just incredible chance to show her what it means to work hard, to prioritize your time.

You know, it's not uncommon for her to wake up and I'm already working, or at the end of the day while she's watching her wind down show, I'm on my computer doing some emails and getting ready for the next day.

I celebrate my wins with her and I show her what it means to set a goal and maybe not make that goal.

And how you can persevere and not let that setback get you down.

- I think that's important because I think over, especially these past couple years, I've had some ups and downs in business and like everyone does.

And you sit there and you want to be, as your kids get older and this was different for Ainsley four years ago- Sure.

- 'Cause she's young.

But how old is she now?

- She's six.

- Yeah, six.

Now she's at the age she's starting to understand.

She's picking up on things.

Mom is in beast mode right now.

Mom is doing this.

- That's a good way to describe it.

- Mom's upset or mom's happy, or whatever it may be.

But at the same time, you're showing her grit.

You're showing her drive.

And for me, when I was doing so many things with my younger kids and over the years, Carly, Ally, and Allen, they would sit there and I would have them be a part of all the auctions I did.

And I had them be a part of these events and I'd have them know that I was the first one up in the morning, I'm the last one to go to bed.

And I want them to see all that just like you did.

So that's kind of the one theme that I wanted to take away from today for our viewers is that recognizing that today's world's changed.

It wasn't always like that.

Right?

I don't know if COVID changed it, probably had a piece of it- - I would say yeah.

- There's almost a little more of that compassion piece or that understanding and work-life balance or whatever you wanna call it.

I don't like that term, but- - Yeah 'cause I mean, we actually just had a company meeting yesterday.

I'm part of a group that is in a leadership training for Hibu and one of our speakers talked about the balance between work and life.

And it's not always a balance.

Sometimes it's a lot of work and your personal life gets put on the back burner for a little bit, but then you put that effort back to put the personal life ahead.

And I try very hard to do that with Ainsley as best I can, but then I'm also very open with her that mommy's working right now or why don't you play school and come up in my office and do that so that we can still be physically together and sort of interact while I'm doing some work.

- Yeah.

I mean, that's good.

So I'm gonna get to Hibu in a second, but I do like the way this conversation's going because you were at IPMR and then you did some other things but then when you were at the Park District, you actually got to see really a municipality that does a lot.

- Oh my gosh.

My mind still spins when I think of all of the things that organization does.

It is so crucial to the community and such an incredible organization.

- I mean, aren't you proud that when you look back at some of the things that you've done, you sit there and go, "I did have an impact on that," or "I did get to work with that leader who was-" - Oh, absolutely.

- I think I reminisce, as I'm getting older, I reminisce more about everybody else's wins and kind of not the wins that I had personally, I never really cared about my personal wins, even though I'm competitive.

But I really cared about the wins for the community and I cared about other people receiving those wins.

- Yeah, absolutely.

- So, all right, Hibu.

- [Jocelyn] Yes.

- Leading provider of digital marketing solutions to local businesses.

Now this, here's what's crazy, it's local businesses, but this is a nationwide company.

- [Jocelyn] Yep.

- So talk to me, you tell me, I just told you what I Googled.

(Jocelyn laughs) You tell me what the company is.

- Sure.

So you're right, we are a national company.

But what's very cool about being a national company and focusing on the local is that account executives like myself, I get to work with members of our community that serve our community.

You know, we specialize in working with your local plumber or your roofer.

You know, the one-man shop that they don't have an army of personnel that can do all of their marketing or do all of their PR work or do all of their scheduling.

It's them and then some contractors that they bring in to hire or to help with some jobs.

So we get to give them time back in their day by providing them the right customers and the right leads through digital marketing.

- Yeah.

So explain what digital marketing is.

- Sure.

So a lot of people, when they hear digital marketing, they immediately start to think about social media and like posting on Facebook.

But something that has been one of my favorite aspects of this job is the amount of knowledge I've gained in the last year.

And digital marketing to us means building or revamping websites, generating reviews online.

- Hold on, let's slow down because this is important for very, I'm gonna call it very small business.

You called it a one-man shop.

But let's say it's a five-person shop.

It's very hard for a five-person shop to sit here and say, let's do a website.

It actually freaks people out.

- [Jocelyn] Absolutely.

- And then when you get to a certain age, this isn't for everybody, but I'm just using me as a, I'll use me as a bad example, 'cause I'm actually, or a good example 'cause I'm bad at a lot of things like that.

Then you look at marketing of your socials, then you look at what your brand is, and then you look at and you start putting together this puzzle.

- Yeah.

- It freaks businesses out.

And what always comes to people's mind first is money.

- [Jocelyn] Yeah.

- Right?

So when I think of, if I think of that whole train I just told you, and the first thing I think of is website, I'm thinking, oh my goodness, how much is this gonna cost?

Right?

- Yep.

- And that's crazy.

All right, I interrupt you.

- No, no, and that's such a good- - Now you start with the website.

- Yes, and sometimes businesses have- - Potential.

- Yeah.

Sometimes businesses have great websites or in some of the cases in town, they're already working with another local agency on their website.

And I personally, not everybody in the company will, but my personal approach is I won't touch that relationship if they're happy.

If they're not happy, the conversation's open.

But then we then start talking about what are their business goals and okay, so you wanna grow by 10% over the next year.

Alright.

Here are some ideas of how we can do that through ads on social media.

Now, we don't post on social media, but we will put an ad on Facebook or Instagram.

We do ads on websites.

So like Yahoo, the Weather Channel, things like that.

Those, you know, on food blogs, things, you know, those pop-up ads or the sidebar ads, we create those.

Google ads, the sponsored posts at the top of a Google search.

We do that.

We do SEO work.

So the search engine optimization.

- Yeah, let's talk about that.

I hear this term more now than ever, SEO, SEO.

And some of our viewers may not know what that means.

So what does that mean?

- So what that means is, okay, so let's take you for an example, right?

You are, you know, for all intents and purposes, you are the nonprofit profit, correct?

And you want to build a campaign to coincide with your upcoming book tour.

And we want you to be found for changing lives, saving lives, helping the community, community strength.

So what we do is we come up with the keywords that you wanna be found in a Google search.

And then on your website we make sure on all of the pages where it's relevant, those words can be found very easily.

So like your tagline, changing lives, saving lives, that's at the top of your website, on all of the ad campaigns we build, that is folded into it.

Conversely, with the review generation, when you receive reviews, we always encourage people to respond and then use those keywords.

Because the more your name is associated with those, the higher you're gonna rank on Google.

- Okay, so rank on Google.

So let's say I put in here nonprofit, community, fundraising, people, whatever the words are.

Let's say there's 10 words.

And they're all tied to what I think I do.

But you're saying as you're building the SEO that you're additionally adding words as they go, because people are kind of compounding reviews.

- We're repeating those words.

It's not adding the words, it's repeating the words.

- Repeating the words.

- Yeah.

So your analogy of it being a puzzle is perfect.

So nonprofit is a puzzle piece.

Community is a puzzle piece.

- [George] Okay.

- And in all of the ways we can promote those words for you is how it's put together.

- So let's say somebody has a website and now you want to drive people to that website.

Now you talk about, now maybe I have a strategy for my business.

But I hired you because I don't know my strategy for marketing.

So how do you, what do you do?

Like review my goals and initiatives and then say here's how we can compliment?

Like customize almost?

- Yes, so the biggest draw for me as I was embarking on this journey of leaving fundraising and thinking about going into sales was the approach Hibu has to this.

And the approach is very much like what you do with a donor, right?

You don't ask somebody marry you on your first date.

I always equated fundraising to relationships.

But it's true.

And with fundraising, you don't ask a donor for the gift on the first meeting unless you already know them.

But chances are you don't because it's a first meeting.

So just like us, we have the first meeting to learn about the business.

So you outline your goals, you share your history, and then I explain our process and how we can do it.

And then I say, okay, so you mentioned, you want to increase your, we'll just use again your book sales over the next three years by 30%, what communities do you wanna serve?

What communities do you feel could best benefit from your leadership and your consulting experience?

Okay, so then you tell me the cities, and then the next step is that we actually bring in a digital partner of mine.

Her job, it's awesome, is to analyze your business, analyze where you wanna show up.

And then she does some reviews of who is in that market that also does that.

And then she said, okay, so if you're serious about, you know, selling the 30% increase in books in Vegas and Chicago and Charleston and Danville, and then let's also throw in Terre Haute, then here you need to be doing Google ads.

You need to be doing social media ads.

We really need to boost your review ratings.

Because down there you're not showing up very, your reviews aren't coming from those areas.

- [George] Okay.

- And then that's our strategy.

- How did you know I'm not doing well in Terre Haute?

No, I'm joking.

- I did my homework.

- All right, so once you come up with that so-called customizable solution, let's call it.

Is that fair?

- Totally appropriate.

Yeah, absolutely.

- So then is that when you come and sit down with me and say, well here's phase one, two, and three?

Or do you do it by cost?

Like do you sit here and say, we could go a la carte, you can do all these different things.

- So when we meet with my digital partner, that's when the full strategy and the cost comes in.

But in that initial first meeting, we've already talked about what your budget is.

- [George] Okay.

- Because I always ask, you know, what are you willing to spend and I'm getting better about this question.

You know, how serious are you about making this goal a reality?

- [George] That's a good question actually.

- Yeah, t's a tough question.

I sometimes struggle with sounding a little bit of a jerk by asking it.

But the reality is, if you truly want to, you know, I have customers all the time that say, "Well I wanna show up number one on page one of Google."

And I'll just look at them and be like, "Okay, but like, are you willing to-" - [George] To go all the way.

- To pay for it because it's gonna cost you.

- But to also go through the process.

Because a lot of times what I've talked to so many different businesses, and a lot of times what will happen is they'll start the process and let's say it's steps one through 10, they'll stop at four.

And then it screws up the whole first four phases of the process.

- Yep.

Well that's where that localness of the national company comes in, because I keep those steps in front of you.

- Well, I was gonna ask you about reputation, because I think that's important when you're talking about having a national brand, to be able to come and infiltrate in a smaller market and then be able to even take it a step down to some smaller clients.

Because if you think about it, there are so many great businesses in Central Illinois.

- [Jocelyn] Oh my gosh, yeah.

- And how many entrepreneurs came out of COVID?

A lot.

- Oh yeah, so many did.

- So the opportunity is 10x than it was, I feel it was 10s than what it was maybe four or five years ago.

So that is a good thing.

So marketing automation, what is that?

- So we have this new tool called the Hibu Assistant.

And what it does is we upload a list of contacts and we can, on a monthly basis, do a blast to ask for reviews.

I also have customers that will do like a cleaning special.

And so we send an e-blast out for that so that it's, and that's where my role switches from a digital account executive to a marketing consultant 'cause my relationship with the customer does not end when they agree to sign on with us.

It's not like, okay, see you later, good luck.

We then continue the relationship and we meet monthly to review how things are going.

Learn about, okay, so we've reached this goal.

What are you looking to next?

- That's cool.

So I didn't know this and it's kind of funny, I've known it a few years now, but at first I didn't know that like a lot of these people that post on a regular cadence that, and they're using all social media, that they actually map it out sometimes 30, 45 days ahead.

- Yep.

- And so they have Monday this on Facebook, Instagram here, LinkedIn here, Facebook here, Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday.

And they know exactly what they're putting out there and then they're just kind of like this.

And then I know somebody, I'll use his name, Kevin Harrington.

So he's original Shark on Shark Tank.

He actually spends a couple days in a studio, different outfits, doing things, and he can sit there and put together all these different clips 'cause he has the material, he knows what he wants to hit on.

He knows his strategy.

He knows his business.

So Jocelyn, I want to thank you for coming on.

I appreciate it.

A great mother.

- Thank you.

- And also with Hibu, thank you for coming on the show.

That was awesome.

I'm Matt George and this is another episode of "Business Forward."

(light upbeat music) - Thank you for tuning in to "Business Forward," brought to you by PNC.