C. STINNETT: Henderson native creating new social media app business

HENDERSON, Ky. – Starting and running a business can be a roller coaster. Buts Jonathan Burdon loves it anyway.

“I’m an entrepreneur,” the 27-year-old Henderson native said. “I’m not motivated by money. I’m motivated by challenge.”

His challenge now is SocialCoaster, a social media app he hopes will suck you into its special-interest communities.

“It allows people to connect with people who have similar interests rather than a community of friends” like Facebook, said Burdon, founder and CEO of SocialCoaster.

Burdon was born to Hendersonians Tim and Joyce (Kloke) Burdon. His father was pastor at New Hope Baptist Church, but was called to another church when Jonathan was a toddler. The family remained in Western Kentucky, however, and Jonathan graduated from Murray State University with degrees in organizational communication and marketing.

While still in college, he created an online marketing business, operating it for six years before selling it last year. Using some of the proceeds as well as capital from some angel investors around Western Kentucky, he created SocialCoaster, a Nashville-based company that employs five people.

Three developers write software for the iPhone and Android versions of the app while Burdon and another employee tend to business matters.

“My passion is the business side of things,” he said. “I’ve got an awesome team of developers; I’m the most replaceable member of the team.”

SocialCaster consists of a variety of special-interest communities or “loops” that people can join or create. There’s a loop for Murray State University alumni and foodies who like the blog TheSouthernLadyCooks.com and fans of Kentucky basketball. Followers of a loop can make comments or post photos.

Burdon said he has intentionally grown it gradually. “The product is constantly changing,” he said.

“With a lot of the most successful businesses, a core group of users provide a lot of great feedback, verbally and nonverbally, on what they use and what they don’t use.”

“Our goal is to become a more modern form of (online) forum and bulletin board,” Burdon said.

“We’re not there yet, where we want to be” — many loops have just a few dozen followers, although Phone Photographers have nearly 800.

But Burdon said that’s all right. “We’re trying to control our growth since we’re learning so much” about what users “do and don’t do, like and don’t like,” he said.

Right now, SocialCaster has no revenue. Burdon hopes by October to make the various loops available to sponsors who will be able to present exclusive content of interest to members of that community.

“I think we’ll be in a totally different place when we monetize” the app.

Business Editor Chuck Stinnett can be reached at 270-831-8343 or chuck.stinnett@thegleaner.com.

C. STINNETT: Henderson native creating new social media app business

C. STINNETT: There's still a role for email in marketing, consultant says

HENDERSON, Ky. – Don’t tell Dana M. Nelson that email is extinct.

“A lot of times you hear email is dead,” the Evansville marketing and social media consultant said.

Nelson disagrees. “At the core of the relationship you’re building with your customers or your donors or your volunteers is email,” she told Kyndle Brown Bag audience recently. “It still has the highest delivery response.”

Email, she noted, can be used to deliver newsletters, announcements, special offers, product and event promotions, surveys, event registrations and for gaining feedback.

Nelson is a Constant Contact Authorized Local Expert. Constant Contact is an online marketing service used by organizations such as Kyndle, the Downtown Henderson Project, Henderson Community College and the United Way of Henderson County.

Others use services such as Mail Chimp or Boomerang, among others. What they have in common is that they make it easy to send colorful messages with logos, photos and other graphics — a sort of portable Web page as opposed to plain-text email.

But that’s just the tool. What’s key to online marketing, she said, is strategy,

“At its core, marketing is about eliciting a physical and measurable response,” Nelson said.

In email marketing, she recommends asking the customer or recipient to take some kind of action that can be measured — to click on a link, download a document, call or come into the office, schedule an appointment or donate.

“Don’t just push information: ‘25 percent off,’ ” she advised. “Say, ‘25 percent off, come in today!’ “

The key, Nelson said, is to provide “information and offers relevant to those customers,” Nelson said. “If you do it right, they will bring their friends with them.”

“Your new best friends are ‘forward’ and ‘share,"” she said. “If you use an email marketing service, you’re going to have a ‘share’ button or a ‘like on Facebook’ ” link that can be part of every message.

Getting customers, donors or volunteers to interact with your organization on social media such as Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and Pinterest can increase their level of engagement.

“Word-of-mouth is now (happening) on those social media platforms,” she said.

“You need to make it easy to share your content” by incorporating links to such platforms in email messages.

“You want to be sure to give an opportunity (for people) to share with others,” such as after an event: “It was awesome, you should go to the next one!”

Nelson believes online marketing can be at its best when it reflects the personality of the business owner or the mission of the organization.

“You can be your authentic self,” she said. “You could have someone else do it, but they don’t have your passion.”

“You want it to seem like a genuine relationship, not a gimmick,” Nelson said.

A marketing campaign should have goals.

It can have general goals, such as to reach new customers or donors; drive repeat business; nurture leads and relationships; and engage members or volunteers.

But Nelson said it’s valuable to set specific goals, such as to drive donations up a certain amount this month or fill 90 percent of the seats in your church this Sunday.

“Put a specific measure on it,” she said.

Business Editor Chuck Stinnett can be reached at 270-831-8343 or cstinnett@thegleaner.com.

C. STINNETT: There"s still a role for email in marketing, consultant says