Welcome one, welcome all – to the new video interview series that we’ll be putting out over 2018. We have some great video interviews lined up, so make sure to check back for more as they come out. In time, I also promise to get better at editing the videos and putting them together. For my first interview, I got to talk to someone who is has been a good friend for over 17 years now. I’ve watched him develop his own business and really put his all into becoming the best Maine DJ. I’d like to introduce Chris Bouchard and let the video do the talking. In this video, we’re going to talk about how Chris markets his business and what he sees as the future of marketing in his industry.
If you’d prefer to just read the transcript, we have it here for you!
Jesse Fowler:
Hey guys. Thank you for joining us today. Jesse, OSC Web Design. Today we have Chris Bouchard. Bouchard Entertainment.
Chris Bouchard:
Yeah.
Jesse Fowler:
We’re gonna do a little interview with him. We’re gonna talk about how his business got formed, talked about his marketing efforts, what’s helped him get to where he is today, and what he sees going forward. I’d love it, Chris, thank you first off for joining us.
Chris Bouchard:
Yeah, absolutely. Thank you for having me.
Jesse Fowler:
I’d love to hear a little bit about your business. Now, obviously, we know about your business. I’ve been friends with you for a million years. We did your website. I’ve seen you change over the years in your jobs, your career paths. What go you into being a DJ and what is it about being a DJ that you love, and keeps you going?
Chris Bouchard:
Well, the story … Getting into it was just chance. Everything kind of just happened, as life pushed me in that direction. What made me know that this is what I wanted to do was a passion for music as you know, growing up. Huge passion for music my entire life, so it’s a huge part of who I am, and who I will continue to be. I have a passion for making people happy and enjoying those special moments in their life. Music is an international language.
Jesse Fowler:
The language of love right there.
Chris Bouchard:
And everybody can come together around music, no matter the genre that you like. It’s a huge part of what I do. I’m highly organized and highly anal about what I do. It really comes in handy when you’re a wedding DJ, being able to be detail oriented.
Jesse Fowler:
Yes. You are detail oriented. As a client of mine, he is very detail oriented, which is awesome. I kind of want to start off by seeing the social proof that, you know, we were talking about earlier. Online, Chris gets a lot of reviews. He shares them. I know it’s an awesome feeling when we get a review from someone that they were happy with our service. I imagine it’s the same for you. Do you ever see that transpiring into new business, or at least other people can look at it? How do you think those types of reviews help you in your business?
Chris Bouchard:
I mean, like you said, it’s one of the most gratifying things in the world to get a good review from someone, cause you put so much effort and time into everything that you’re doing. There is nothing more satisfying. It’s also, there’s nothing more helpful than getting a great review.
Jesse Fowler:
Yeah.
Chris Bouchard:
Yeah. You get a lot of referral from your reviews, whether they’re all on one spot or on your website. Me, I have a couple outlets for it. You do get a lot of residual business based solely off past clients, how happy they were. It speaks to who you are as a business owner. There’s nothing more that could help you forward yourself.
Jesse Fowler:
Yeah, and it’s awesome. I’ve seen a lot of the reviews that you’ve gotten. They’re always positive. They’re always, you know, “Chris just did such a great job.” That’s really cool to watch. Now, I’m gonna kind of switch it a little bit and say, a question that we get asked a lot is, what type of social media, what platform should we be on? Should we be on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram? You know, I’ve seen you go live on Facebook all the time. I’m always getting alerts that you’ve gone live. Quite honestly, it’s a lot of fun to watch. They’re playing the shoe game or something like that. Do you find there’s a certain platform that has worked better for your demographic than, maybe some that don’t necessarily?
Chris Bouchard:
Facebook’s huge, but it’s hard. Running a business page on Facebook can be extraordinarily difficult. I personally feel that Instagram is one of the most under utilized … In the DJ world, I don’t know how a website company persay, would use Instagram, other than your blog posts, which I know you do. I have gotten a few leads from Instagram. It’s just the photo’s.
Chris Bouchard:
The live videos actually a little bit better on Instagram. They don’t instantly block stuff. They allow you to do silent videos. People can see you in action and really get a feel for what you’re doing as a company. Yeah. I would say that Instagram is really the most under utilized marketing platform that I’ve seen personally. I try to continually grow that aspect of my business.
Jesse Fowler:
That’s awesome. It’s neat that you say that. I have another client who is an Instagram marketer, so what he does actually will help boost posts, so if you wanted to reach people all over the country, he can help you get on the right channel and boost it for 12 hours. I would say he would agree that Instagram is huge. Also, Facebook is … Yeah, but I could see that Twitter may not be the right place for you.
Chris Bouchard:
It’s nice to put out, here’s a link to a blog I just did with a short description.
Jesse Fowler:
Right.
Chris Bouchard:
Other than that, there’s no real give back from it.
Jesse Fowler:
Yeah. I think that’s one of the important things that I’m always answering with people is that, not all social media platforms have to be for that company.
Chris Bouchard:
Right.
Jesse Fowler:
Twitter is not necessarily the one to be on. Other companies should be on Linkedin, versus not on Facebook, depending on their clientele. That’s helpful. Now, obviously we’re a web company. You’re a client of ours. I just wanna talk a little bit about your website. How has a website, or has it even helped you at all? Hopefully you’ll say yes. Being a client of ours. Has it made at least the process of getting new clients easier, being able to show them information … Has that worked for you at all?
Chris Bouchard:
Me speaking to everybody out here. The website has been huge. It’s been such a game changer for me. The reason behind that is because, doesn’t matter what you’re involved in, whether you’re a DJ, landscaper, whatever you do. Your website can, it can and it will set you apart from your competition. I’ve had clients come to me and say, “You know I’ve looked at all of these people, and you and maybe a handful of others, not even a handful, a couple of others …
Jesse Fowler:
Right.
Chris Bouchard:
have stood out, simply because you’re professionally showing yourself via website.” SEO and all of that stuff. That is a constant battle of blogging and all that. It may not generate what I want at the moment. It will, but when clients research me and look at me, the website does a huge beneficial factor in everything I’ve got going on.
Jesse Fowler:
Great. No. I didn’t pay him to say that. We have talked a lot about being on a blog. Yeah. I’ll pay you in beer later. No. We talked a lot about having a blog. You’ve put out a ton of articles. I know that can be really time consuming. Just like, we have 200 blog articles and now we’re gonna start doing these. It is tough to keep coming up with that content. Do you ever find that struggle of what do I write about next, or …
Chris Bouchard:
It is a struggle. I’ve been thinking about this a lot lately. For those that don’t know … A lot of people don’t know. You do. I’ve made the jump to full-time DJ going forward. One of my goals is to go back to the old blogs that I’ve done and update them with the help of my good friend Jesse, to make sure I’m doing everything right. Yeah. Content can be hard. What I try to do is write down ideas, while I’m out in the field, jot some stuff down, just to have something to go back and look at, just to have content generated. It can be simple stuff, but sometimes that simple stuff can be really hard …
Jesse Fowler:
Yeah.
Chris Bouchard:
to think about and come up with.
Jesse Fowler:
Yeah, especially when they ask you, just a simple question like, “Well, how much is it?” I’m like, “Okay.” I get asked that so many times. Maybe I should write a blog article explaining that, it’s not always just a simple price, but then how do I come up with a thousand worse to say how much that is.
Chris Bouchard:
Absolutely.
Jesse Fowler:
It can be difficult for sure. That seems to be something that a lot of our clients struggle with, is coming up with new content. I know I do like … I know that when I go to Google and I type in, you know, how to do X-Y-Z, whatever it may be. 90% of the time I land on a blog article that tells me how to do X-Y-Z.
Chris Bouchard:
Oh yeah, absolutely. Yeah.
Jesse Fowler:
It’s proof that SEO and proper content management and creation really can help boost your websites. I just got a couple more questions for ya. First I wanna talk about what your plans are for marketing in the future. Do you have anything moving forward? Something different? Maybe something you haven’t done before.
Chris Bouchard:
I do.
Jesse Fowler:
Anything you wanna share with us and tell us about?
Chris Bouchard:
Yeah, if you don’t mind. I haven’t done a wedding show yet Jesse. In a wedding show …
Jesse Fowler:
I’ve been to those. They are crazy.
Chris Bouchard:
It’s important.
Jesse Fowler:
Yeah, it’s very important. A lot of good people.
Chris Bouchard:
As much as your website puts you out there, you have to be out there as person, cause people are looking at who they’re hiring.
Jesse Fowler:
Absolutely.
Chris Bouchard:
It’s a little bit different for you. It’s not like you’re gonna go to a website convention or something, well you do.
Jesse Fowler:
Actually we do have conventions lined up this year. We’re gonna be doing a few of ’em.
Chris Bouchard:
If I was looking for a website as a big company …
Jesse Fowler:
Yeah, you wouldn’t necessarily …
Chris Bouchard:
I’m not necessarily worried about meeting Jesse Fowler.
Jesse Fowler:
Right.
Chris Bouchard:
I just wanna see your work. In the wedding business, it’s super important to get out there. I haven’t done it yet. I’m gonna do hopefully one in March and one in January for sure.
Jesse Fowler:
You’re doing the one in Portland, the one coming up?
Chris Bouchard:
The one in Portland already passed.
Jesse Fowler:
Nevermind.
Chris Bouchard:
It is coming up in January. Again in January …
Jesse Fowler:
Okay.
Chris Bouchard:
of 2019. I’ll be doing that and hopefully March in Freeport, Maine.
Jesse Fowler:
Awesome. For those … I assume you set up a booth. You’re kind of showing off what you’re doing …
Chris Bouchard:
Yeah.
Jesse Fowler:
Maybe have some music going.
Chris Bouchard:
Yep.
Jesse Fowler:
Just like a few other ones.
Chris Bouchard:
Yeah. Absolutely.
Jesse Fowler:
Are you collecting email addresses, trying to get them on your newsletter, or are you trying to sign them up there with a special? What are you gonna be, or have you even thought about, what is gonna set you apart from the other DJ’s that will be there?
Chris Bouchard:
I’m gonna take some advice from a good friend of mine, and go for the soft sell, just talk to ’em, hand them a business card, develop relationships, cause that’s what it’s all about. If they wanna come back to me, they will. If they wanna go somewhere else, they will.
Jesse Fowler:
You mentioned relationships. That’s something we focus on … There’s been so many of my clients that I end up being friends with, or maybe I’ve been friends with them already.
Chris Bouchard:
Right.
Jesse Fowler:
So in your case, building that relationship, that I’ve seen you do with your clients, it seems like every Facebook post you make you tag so many of your clients in it, because you’re friends.
Chris Bouchard:
Yes.
Jesse Fowler:
It’s cool that you’re able to do that. You understand and they understand that you just built that relationship and then you get to share the experience with them on social media, so that they can keep it, and then they share their review. It’s just, is a different experience than I’ve ever seen with another business, and in a very positive way. It’s really cool. Great. We’ll see you at a couple shows. Was there anything else you’re gonna be doing?
Chris Bouchard:
No. Well, other than we talked about it briefly with rehashing some blogs and some new blogs.
Jesse Fowler:
Yep.
Chris Bouchard:
I always do targeted ads and stuff like that on Facebook. Really honing in on the person-to-person, the relationship building …
Jesse Fowler:
Yep.
Chris Bouchard:
By being out there in public.
Jesse Fowler:
Awesome.
Chris Bouchard:
That’s my big plan for 2019.
Jesse Fowler:
All right. I gotta ask ya one thing, or one last thing. Do you ever go on a website and it just drives you insane? I think everyone has had that problem. What, maybe top one, top two things have driven you insane when you go on a website? You were telling me earlier. We didn’t get into the questions. We just kind of briefly talked about what the questions will be. When you were on that site the other day, that you said so many nice things about.
Chris Bouchard:
I didn’t mention the company. I just mentioned the website.
Jesse Fowler:
Yeah. No you didn’t. You said them off camera. What one or two things maybe really set that apart and caused you to never wanna go back there, never want to purchase from them?
Chris Bouchard:
It’s … First off, the speed.
Jesse Fowler:
Site speed. Yep.
Chris Bouchard:
Didn’t exist. There was no such thing. It was so slow, it was AOL 56K modem again. That’s what it felt like.
Jesse Fowler:
That’s some geek talk right there.
Chris Bouchard:
That was one thing. Just, the user friendly … It wasn’t available mobile. I did have to go to my computer to utilize this website. Yep.
Jesse Fowler:
You actually … I’m sorry, to cut you off, but you went to the site. You realized it’s not mobile friendly. You actually went home and then re-looked them up.
Chris Bouchard:
I was already at home.
Jesse Fowler:
Oh, okay.
Chris Bouchard:
My wife and I were …
Jesse Fowler:
It’s good. You made that effort to go …
Chris Bouchard:
Did go onto the computer.
Jesse Fowler:
Wow. Okay.
Chris Bouchard:
Which we both know is bad for business, to have, for someone to have to do that. Those are probably my two things. User friendly, whether it’s mobile. In that case it wasn’t mobile friendly in the speed are my two biggest things.
Jesse Fowler:
Gotcha.
Chris Bouchard:
User friendly’s a big category, cause you’re talking the way it’s organized or unorganized. Mobile or not mobile. All of those categories you can put under user friendly.
Jesse Fowler:
Yep.
Chris Bouchard:
Those are my top two.
Jesse Fowler:
Awesome. It’s actually really great to hear that, because those are the things I’ve been preaching. I did a local group, The Buy Local Scarborough Group the other day. Those were two of the things that are part of SEO. Site speed. Google looks for that, and then mobile friendly. This is another huge factor. It’s nice to know that I’m not just preaching it for the heck of it. It is bugging people. It’s something to consider. Chris, I wanna thank you so much for coming on.
Chris Bouchard:
Oh, thank you for having me. Thank you for watching.
Jesse Fowler:
Yeah, in our first interview. We’ll tweak out the bugs and we’ll edit a bunch of thing out where it actually looks decent. Thank you for joining me. Jesse, OSC Web Design. Chris.
Chris Bouchard:
I’m Chris Bouchard, of Bouchard Entertainment.
Jesse Fowler:
Awesome. Thanks guys. Take care.
Chris Bouchard:
Bye.
