Introducing Special Eats Orange County.
We create Nutritious+Delicious meals for your home or your catered event. We provide multiple menu options for you to choose from, enabling you to choose your perfect meal. Our freshly prepared meals are either cooked on-site or delivered, and can be eaten fresh, or frozen for future use. We also meet the special dietary needs of the Autistic community and anyone who wants or needs to eat Gluten or Casein free.
I’m a motivated CSUF student entrepreneur with big dreams and lots of questions. One of which is: How can a soon-to-be-graduate build a brand image and a client base at low to no monetary cost? Why, with social media of course!
Launching http://www.facebook.com/SpecialEatsOC introduces my business, builds credibility, communicates my brand and mission, and creates a following of potential customers. I maintain an active fan page by tempting people with my Nutritious+Delicious recipes, posting pictures to illustrate my ideas, and providing helpful Tangie Tips that follow my mission of healing and nourishing people with food.
http://www.facebook.com/SpecialEatsOC was launched on March 1 and after 44 days has 132 active fans which have been gathered with the minimal marketing of friends and fellow entrepreneurs.
Sound easy? Well, it’s not as easy as it seems. Thankfully, I’ve found some help. Daniela Bolzmann and her Social Media Consulting Co., SocialSkoop created my Facebook fan page, linked my fan page to Twitter and my You Tube videos, and started a mailing list through Mail Chimps. Matthew Gallizzi, another brilliant CSUF graduate and entrepreneur assisted with any tech questions I had, helped me obtain my URL, and encouraged me every step of the way. Rose Agracewicz, yet another CSUF entrepreneurship student, recently developed a SWOT analysis of my Facebook page in order to explore ways to grow and she is helping with further development of my marketing strategy.
A social media schedule outlines my daily, weekly, and monthly tasks. I’ve even developed a month’s worth of content in one sitting so I have something to draw from when my creative juices aren’t flowing. I hope to enlighten people so they envision themselves living a Nutritious+Delicious lifestyle. In addition, promote my actual business services of weekly meal delivery, at home cooking jobs, and on site catering which will be launching soon.
Costs have been in the form of time, effort and the occasional bartering of services with my fellow entrepreneurs. Bartering is key! We all have something of value that can be exchanged, and it never hurts to ask.
What’s next? Building a mobile website with Matthew Gallizzi’s business www.Movuu.com will allow me to showcase a weekly menu, and facilitate easy customer ordering from their phones. Showcasing my menus and event pictures on Facebook, compiling a cookbook, cross promotion on complimentary blogs, receiving sponsors for paid advertisements… all in the process.
My parting advice is: Figure out your message, how you can reach your intended audience, then, find the cheapest way to do it and build from there. I’ve had a lot of struggles, but if you are willing to work hard, the possibilities are endless.
Join me in living a Nutritious+Delicious lifestyle!
Anais Tangie
Entrepreneurship Major
Facebook: www.facebook.com/SpecialEatsOC
E-mail: anais@specialeatsoc.com
Twitter: http://bit.ly/aC75eT