A latte with Pat Cooper

Episode Transcript

Matisse Hamel-Nelis  00:02

Hello and welcome back to another episode of PR & Lattes, the podcast where you can fill up your cup on everything PR and communications. I’m your host Matisse Hamel-Nelis. And I am so thrilled to have you join me for a brand new episode. Before we get started, make sure you subscribe to this podcast wherever you’re listening to it to get notified each week during the season when a new episode drops. You can also subscribe to our newsletter by visiting our website PRandlattes.com. On the website, you’ll find our podcast episodes, plus our amazing blogs with new ones being uploaded every Monday morning. And of course, make sure you’re following us on socials by following us on Instagram at @PRAndLattes and on LinkedIn PR & Lattes. On today’s episode, I’m chatting with Pat Cooper, a seasoned digital marketing strategist. With nearly a decade of experience helping brands redefine their marketing strategy to lower customer acquisition costs and accelerate revenue. He has worked alongside CMOs and CEOs on startups, in house, and agency teams, and has generated over $15 million in revenue. Pat is also the host of Brands Over Brews, a weekly podcast that dives into the deep minds of marketing and business leaders who are shaping the future of the industry. I’m so excited to chat with Pat about all things digital marketing. So grab your latte, sit back and enjoy. I am so excited for today’s episode, Pat, welcome to PR and lattes, how are you doing? How is life?

 

Pat Cooper  01:32

I’m doing well. It’s sunny over here in Tampa, Florida. So life is great as always amazing.

 

Matisse Hamel-Nelis  01:38

It’s sunny here. It’s weird for a March day in Toronto. But I’m not gonna complain. It’s great. It’s great. So let’s dive into it. Today we’re going to be talking about marketing and all that fun jazz. But before we get started, can you tell me a little bit about your own journey in marketing?

 

Pat Cooper  01:58

Yeah, so I had kind of a untypical journey into marketing. I started out as a theater major and a college drop out and all that stuff. I found a really cool gig writing content online. And I didn’t think it was real because I didn’t think you could write content online and make money off of that. So I thought it was a scam ended up not being a scam ended up turning into a really cool gig writing content for agencies, which I did for a few years, worked in the startup space, became a product manager for a cybersecurity publication, worked, returned back to agency life managing Fortune 5000 companies, which was, you know, a really cool experience. And then I ended up in house working for a really cool tech company. So it’s been a little bit all over the place. But it’s been a really cool creative process throughout my career.

 

Matisse Hamel-Nelis  02:56

Amazing. And you’ve had some significant achievements in your career. Can you pinpoint a strategy or campaign that really stands out for you in your that you’ve experienced that was really transformative for the brand that you worked for, but also for yourself?

 

Pat Cooper  03:10

Yeah, so some of the strategies that I really love are local strategies. I know that a lot of marketers they work with global brands with huge budgets. But I think some of the more fun campaigns come from when you can have a local impact, even with a small ad budget, being able to you know, churn leads for a business and see a small business grow and grow and bring more people onto their team and kind of fuel that business growth. It can have a real impact and it’s had an impact for my career. Of course, I do a lot of consulting and freelance work on the side. So working with local, you know, some like blue collar companies has been really cool because when you work with a lot of local clients that typically brings out new leads for your business and referrals and kind of turns your own business which is great, but you know, having a local impact, it’s it’s really great. It’s something that you know, you can go to sleep with, you know, feeling well rested that you did good for other people.

 

Matisse Hamel-Nelis  04:09

Yeah, I absolutely love that. Particularly the focus on local you know, there’s that whole push of shop local and stay local and all that fun jazz and helping those small businesses grow and thrive with the strategy I think is so imperative. So I love that that’s your favorite like your favorite thing. Right in the heart right in the heart.

 

Pat Cooper  04:30

Yeah.

 

Matisse Hamel-Nelis  04:31

So similar to me, you host a podcast, which I absolutely love the name Brands Over Brews. Fantastic. So you yourself have had the opportunity to dive into the minds of industry leaders, which you know, this is one of my favourite things about hosting a podcast is I get to learn from people I have looked up to who know things that I have always wanted to learn about and that sort of thing, which is also why you’re on the podcast today. So what do you think is one insight or trend that while you’ve been doing your podcast has really resonated or was uncovered, that’s changed your way of working.

 

Pat Cooper  05:07

Yeah, so something I’ve picked up from a lot of my guests when they speak to their success in their career, and what they do for marketing for other brands, is really tapping into authenticity and the human approach. And I think that that’s really impacted the marketing work I do, how I work with my own clients on a consulting basis, you know, really break things down to a level where they understand things and bring in more humanity to marketing, doing that local, you know, small business impact has been super important for my work. But you know, everyone’s kind of digging into the authenticity these days, doing things a bit more organically doing things off the cuff, not having things like super, super clean, I think a lot of that is rolled off from the pandemic, because we haven’t been able to do things as clean as you know, we did before. So I think it’s been a lot of pivoting. And when you see brands pivot and sometimes make mistakes, and maybe do things more geared towards like guerilla marketing, you do see that authenticity and that human approach to the brand and to people’s marketing. And I think that we need more brands to tap into that, you know, human element for the consumer.

 

Matisse Hamel-Nelis  06:16

I definitely agree there. Do you find ever that some brands are trying to be authentic without being authentic? And seeing if that sort of flies?

 

Pat Cooper  06:26

Yeah, you know, I just had a guest on yesterday where we talked about local impact, and, you know, economic impact and kind of like greenwashing and how a lot of brands can often say they’re doing something, but they’re not actually doing something. So yeah, I mean, I’ve definitely come across brands that, you know, when they don’t have necessarily as much impact as they want to be, or they try to tap into something that they aren’t, you know, we’ve we’ve, I think, seen that quite a bit. And it’s unfortunate, you know, I think when you need when you want to tap into authenticity as a brand, you’re gonna have to do a lot of self reflecting to kind of figure out who is your brand? What kind of impact do you want to make? on a human level? Like, who are you like, who you’re trying to reach who you’re trying to be? And, you know, using that to elevate your marketing, because obviously, you don’t want to have a very, you know, synthetic, authentic sort of look and feel, because then it just seems like you’re trying to copy other people or, you know, when consumers get that experience, they’re like, Yeah, I didn’t really like that. I don’t think I’m gonna shop with them again. So you have to be very, very mindful about what you’re actually putting out there.

 

Matisse Hamel-Nelis  07:38

Yeah. And then it leads into if that if you are creating that synthetic authenticity, then you’re leading to a PR situation.

 

Pat Cooper  07:46

Oh, my goodness, yeah.

 

Matisse Hamel-Nelis  07:49

We’re trying to manage that part of it. And it’s just a bit of a mess. The reason I ask is that, particularly with the DEI initiatives, at least, you know, that are getting pushed out and people not necessarily jumping on a bandwagon. But you know, saying we we are DEI-focus and DEI-centric or diversity, equity and inclusion centric, but then not having policies or item or aspects within their own inner workings that actually speak to that. But saying like, yes, we are this yes, we are that when really they’re not right. So that’s why I was curious about the synthetic authenticity, if that was something that you were noticing a bit more, or if it’s more leaning towards being truly authentic, and maybe opening up or acknowledging gaps that people may have organizations may have, and kind of owning up to that and be like, This is how we’re working on things.

 

Pat Cooper  08:43

Yeah, no, I mean, two things there. One, you know, it’s really disappointing with DEI, because you’ll see a lot more companies are laying off their DEI departments or their head of DEI even, you know, Google’s laying off, you know, DEI positions and getting rid of like, you know, AI vetting teams, which is very concerning. But it’s It’s so disappointing to, you know, see brands do that, where they, they hop on the bandwagon, say we need DEI and then you know, a few years later, they’re like, alright, we did it, we can get rid of them. It’s super disappointing. And in terms of authenticity, yeah, I do see a lot more brands tapping into it. But I also see a lot of brands like not sure what to do with it similar with DEI they’re like, well, we hired the person. So we’re done. Right?

 

Matisse Hamel-Nelis  09:29

Yeah, we’ve checked that box. We’re good. Yes. All right. So moving a little bit on to Upwork. You are considered a marketing expert on the platform. So what advice would you give freelancers who are looking to achieve similar success to you on that platform when they’re getting started?

 

Pat Cooper  09:50

Yeah, so I have a lot of so I was the former president of the American Market Association for Boston. So I have a lot of students reaching out to me and saying, How do I get my start working? Get my start, I see you on Upwork, you know, you make a lot of money on there. So like, how do I get my start there, and a lot of it is just starting, I didn’t start at, you know, what I’m currently making on Upwork, of course, and I got started, like, you know, six, seven years ago. But it’s like, take those small projects, build up that portfolio, build up the foundation, get those testimonials, you know, it’s, it really is a foundation they have to build. And then you have to layer into layer and to layer building up your skill set. And, you know, with those clients that you make connections with those turns, those turn into your network and those turned into referrals. So I think my biggest advice is, you know, going for the small jobs first, I think is always important to build up that foundation. But also don’t be scared to, you know, go for that bigger job, that bigger project that may be out of your scope, or, you know, what you’re comfortable with AI, you know, starting on the platform was very big on fake it till you make it. Yeah, saying, Can you do this, and I say, he up, and then I quickly google it to figure out how to do it. But that led to a lot of my own self teaching, which led to a lot of success. And clients feel like, he knows how to do everything. And I’m like, Well, Google knows how to do everything. So I know how to do everything. So that works out. But yeah, I’d say just you know, give it a go give it a try. Diversify, you know where you’re getting your your knowledge and skill sets from, because that’s super important.

 

Matisse Hamel-Nelis  11:26

Yeah, and you bring up a such a great point that self learning by Google, YouTube, LinkedIn Learning, you name it, there’s a way for us to find out things that we don’t know, to help us do the stuff that we don’t know. And I think in some cases, students, as a teacher, myself at Durham College, you’ll think of it as a job. You know, I work in PR as a job, I work in marketing as a job or advertising as a job. And it’s like, no, it’s it’s a career, it’s, it’s always evolving, you always have to stay on top of either trends or techniques or tools, or whatever the case is. So it’s not just your typical, you know, nine to five clock in clock out, but it’s gonna take some growth and development. So I’d love that you, you flag that for sure. Of course, yeah. Just sort of like re-affirming my whole point to my class, then they’ll just be like, Oh, great, somebody else’s said it.

 

Pat Cooper  12:19

It’s important to treat it like a career too. Because you know, sometimes over here answering emails to like midnight. So here’s some breathing room, make sure that you treat it like a career have a good work life balance that we’re all somewhat striving to maintain.

 

Matisse Hamel-Nelis  12:31

Yeah. So we’ve talked about from the student perspective, and like how they can get involved with up work. And you know, just anybody who’s starting out in, in this industry, what about organizations? What are common challenges that you’ve seen organizations face in their marketing efforts? And how do you typically advise them to overcome them? Or what kind of strategies do you recommend being put in place to help them understand or see what those challenges are, if maybe they’re not seeing them right up front?

 

Pat Cooper  13:01

Oh, that’s a really good one. So I’m seeing a lot of brands not investing as much as they need to in marketing operations, having their back end marketing figured out, especially with a lot of the updates that Google is rolling out with, you know, duly adopted J. Four, in our cookieless future and tapping into first party data. A lot of brands are collecting data, but they say, what do we do with it? What are we? How do we, you know, use it to amplify our marketing efforts. And they just don’t really know what to do, you know, they, they’re not really attuned to all the technical cadences of, you know, in Google and Bing, and all the AI that’s rolling out and all their algorithm changes. So I think brands need to be, you know, on top of their data on top of how they’re collecting data, and being able to use that data to paint a better picture of who their audiences.

 

Matisse Hamel-Nelis  13:57

And do you think, organizations, so you mentioned how organizations, you know, they’re collecting all this data and don’t know what to do with it? Do you think that it even takes a step back? And even the creation of what their ideal buyer persona would be? That that hasn’t been fully thought out? Either before they’re collecting this data? They’re like, yeah, we’ve got all this information. That is great. We still don’t know who our actual audiences or our target audiences.

 

Pat Cooper  14:23

Yeah, I saw a like hot take on LinkedIn a few months back that’s like, our target segments. Even that important is building out personas really that importance like yes, of course, it’s important. Like, if you don’t know who you’re targeting, if you don’t have an ideal like, you know, I am targeting Joe, he is this he comes from this background, this is what he needs. The these are the challenges that he’s facing. This is how we solved that problem. If you don’t have that, that formula laid out. You don’t really know who you are. You can’t really paint yourself as a brand. You can’t solve problems. You can’t bring more solutions to market to fix more problems that your, you know, target segments are having. So it can be incredibly challenging. If you don’t, you know, as much as people want to bring you new business to life, if you aren’t solving a problem that’s existing, you’re not going to have demand and ultimately, that’s going to be a big issue for your brand.

 

Matisse Hamel-Nelis  15:17

Yeah. How do you handle an organization or company that comes to you and says, everybody’s my target audience?

 

Pat Cooper  15:24

Oh, man, that’s a little bit too much. Yeah, I think you kind of have to break it out and be like, well, if everyone’s your target audience, then you’re gonna need a bigger marketing budget, you’re gonna need to pay me more. So I usually say like, I let’s break it down. What’s your product? How is it self things? Okay, it’s solving this problem? Well, you’re going to reach these people, welcome to your target audience. This is who you’re actively targeting and need to target. So it’s a lot about, you know, using their data that they probably don’t even remember that they’re collecting or, you know, they have a hard time translating it to an actual story and who their audience is, and developing a formula for them and say, you know, targeting this segment, you’re going to be leveraging these platforms that that segment is on with this creative with this marketing budget. So it you know, it all comes from a solid foundation of taking that data, building a story and helping either organizations or people that you work with, to understand that story and how it translates into the products that they sell.

 

Matisse Hamel-Nelis  16:28

I love that you brought up the story side of things. It’s all about storytelling at the end of the day, right? Whether it’s PR or marketing, we’re trying to tell a story trying to get you to buy into that story.

 

Pat Cooper  16:38

Yeah.

 

Matisse Hamel-Nelis  16:38

You mentioned budget, or you know, you’re gonna pay me more if that’s the case. What advice or what is the most effective tactic Do you think in helping companies and organizations sort of lower those acquisition costs, kind of customer acquisition costs, while accelerating the revenue making that money that they they’re looking for?

 

Pat Cooper  16:58

Yeah, so the first thing that I typically do or typically recommend, and it’s some first things I usually do when I join a company, is, once again, take a look at the data are conversions accurately being measured, do you know what your target lead is? What’s the quality of the leads that are coming in, because if you’re marketing, everyone, just a good lead, and your cost per lead is like 10 bucks, something might be off, depending on the industry that you’re in. So it’s a lot about qualifying the data that you have to get a better readout on the cost that your business is outputting. So that’s, that’s an important first step. And, you know, the second step is, of course, making sure that your conversions are accurately being measured. And, you know, you can provide some reporting that can, you know, paint a picture to how that setup is, whether it’s in your CMS or your ad marketing platform. And I always recommend scaling. So scaling is super important with lead generation starting small gathering that data, figuring the best creative, you know, how is it going to target and effectively convert those consumers, and then scaling up your budget, you know, scaling up your cost, based on the success that you’re seeing, or, you know, of course, seasonality plays a role, too. So, you know, just those three steps, I think, are incredibly crucial for organizations.

 

Matisse Hamel-Nelis  18:24

Amazing. For smaller businesses that maybe don’t have the budget to bring on a marketer or a PR practitioner to assist them, what are some easy low hanging fruit wins, if you will, from a marketing perspective that they can start to implement to help market their own business?

 

Pat Cooper  18:41

Yeah, so with businesses that don’t really have a budget to pay a marketer, either like a salary or just your monthly retainer, I typically recommend, you know, hopping on a nice, cool strategy session and kind of going through their data. And, I mean, I talk a lot of data, but data is super important. If you’re not collecting data, you don’t know what your marketing is even measuring. And you don’t know who’s coming into your business. Great thing about J. Four is that it, you know, shows you everything about your data, even though J four isn’t like isn’t the best right now, we all miss Universal Analytics. But, you know, I would just, you know, recommend getting a good understanding of your data, because whatever you put in the market, whether it’s backed by a marketer, or if it’s something that the business puts out internally, they need to understand, you know, once that’s out in the market, how is it reflecting within their data warehouse? Is that showing an uptick in impressions and clicks and leads? Or is it showing kind of a downtrend? People aren’t really resonating with that? Well, that well, so I always recommend, you know, understand your data. First, follow the data and then you can grow your marketing department that way.

 

Matisse Hamel-Nelis  19:53

Can you share a moment or a decision in your career, which has, you’ve already mentioned has started from one thing and went to completely different way that you felt was like a gamble at the time, but paid off more than you could have imagined.

 

Pat Cooper  20:08

I have a good story for this. I don’t recommend this, just to note. So this was the beginning the pandemic, I was working as a product manager. And it was it was freelance, you know, it was like 40 hours a week, you know, very temporary position. But I ended up working out for about two years. At the same time, I was looking for a full time job. And I ended up working with a startup with a great team, which was great. And I was working 80 hours a week. That’s what I don’t recommend working 80 hours a week, it was crazy. It was hectic, it was manageable since I was working from 6 a.m. to midnight. But it was very, very, very hard. And then the pandemic continued and continued. And then the startup I was working for was for a short term rental. So that got axed. And a lot of marketers during that time, were really struggling to find jobs, because you were in the middle of a pandemic, it’s a really tough time. But I had that backup that I didn’t tell my employer. I was saved, I essentially like saved myself a little bit. It really helped me, you know, continue into my career. And I was eventually okay, it paid off and you know, a big way. But I don’t typically recommend anyone working multiple jobs at once. I am definitely a hustler. I’m always looking to build things and create things. It’s just in my blood. But, you know, it’s I think it was a very unique scenario that paid off in a very unique way. But you know, hopefully, we won’t have to go through another pandemic. So hopefully, we won’t have to jump on over to a full-time job.

 

Matisse Hamel-Nelis  21:47

Like you mentioned, you’ve worked both at startup and agency life. What are the unique advantages for each of those environments from a digital marketing strategist perspective?

 

Pat Cooper  21:57

Yeah, so I have to admit, I think I like agency life more, it’s a bit more dynamic, it’s more fun, it’s a lot more fast paced, corporate life, and in house life has a lot more red tape, and, you know, legal around it, which I don’t love. So the cool thing about agency life is that you get to work with a lot of really dynamic clients, you know, you’re working with, you know, a dozen to, you know, a dozen more clients, managing media budgets, managing strategy, kind of, like, you know, the full nine yards there with, with marketing, and advertising in general, when I was working at one of my previous agencies earlier on in my career, I was working with a client called first watch, and it was great. I moved to Florida, and, you know, I was sitting in a first watch restaurant eating breakfast, while I was working on FirstWatch, it was a really crazy experience. And it made me just love agency life, you know, just meeting with the reps and meeting with the clients. And, you know, doing all this really interesting and dynamic, creative work across my team was, it was just a lot of fun. And I always recommend if you’re a college student, kind of just starting out your career, I would always recommend starting at an agency, you pick up a lot more a lot quicker, you work with a variety of different clients, you know, you don’t have to cut off your career to just one person or one one client, one industry, one marketing team, it’s very singular, I think working in house, it’s a lot slower in house, which can be a good thing. It’s a lot more laid back. Not as much pressure, I think, as an agency, agency, life can get really hectic. But I think in house work can feel a lot more secure, which is really nice. Especially as you get older and older into your career. There. I think there’s a bit more tenured in house work, which is cool. But I think you know, overall, agency life is super fun. If you’re looking to do something a little bit more fast paced work with a lot of different clients, if you want to something that’s a bit more, you know, secure, although I don’t want to use a surfboard secure. But if you want to use if you want to focus on, you know, more singular work, I want to work with this one brand. I’m really passionate about what they do that I think in house, work is perfect for you.

 

Matisse Hamel-Nelis  24:17

Yeah. And that’s funny that you say that all that because that’s exactly what I tell my students, if you can, when you’re starting out, do agency experience what agencies life is like, particularly because you kind of get thrown into the deep end. So you learn so much so quickly, versus when you’re in house and they sort of coddle you, if you will, like okay, you’re just starting out, it’s okay. Well, we’ll ease you in and eight times, like after you go.

 

Pat Cooper  24:42

Welcome to the fire. Absolutely.

 

Matisse Hamel-Nelis  24:47

Yeah. So I completely agree with you on that. There’s lots of talk about AI. No matter where you turn, there’s AI conversations, right? How has AI or maybe other emerging technologies or platforms helped you in your career? And what are the ones that you believe will be critical in digital marketing strategies going forward?

 

Pat Cooper  25:08

Okay, so for my career, Eric has helped you know, a bit, I think that there’s a lot of AI baked into marketing platforms these days. So obviously, that helps me on the day to day pumping out campaigns a lot quicker and, you know, managing performance a little bit easier, especially, you know, working a lot in Google ads, and Microsoft ads and meta ad. So I think that’s helped me in terms of, you know, I have a website that I run blog content for. So tapping into AI to help me build that content and build the structures made my life a lot easier. I would never recommend replacing any content people on your team with AI, but I think it’s a fundamental tool that marketing teams will need to tap into. And I think, you know, there’s a lot of opportunity for, for brands to tap into different elements of AI, there’s AI for everything these days, right, there’s AI to optimize SEO, there’s AI tools to optimize, you know, paid media budgets and paid media platforms, there’s AI to write blog posts, there’s a adequate headshots, and there’s like, there’s so many tools out there, I think that it’s more about leveraging it as a tool, rather than it is your go to for everything. Because, you know, people put in the the resources and the content that AI feeds out, we have to remember that AI isn’t just coming up with this content on its own, it can’t think for itself, it’s not going to, you know, know, these answers, you know, by its base code, it requires people and I think that we need to understand that there’s a better collaboration between the people and the tools and the AI that we’re, you know, really giving credit for. And I think we’re, you know, a lot of brands are moving too quickly into just wiping out their teams and replacing AI, like I saw a headline the other day that I think was Klarna got rid of like hundreds of their staff, because they’re getting rid of AI. And it’s, it’s horrible, because it’s like, well, I want to talk to someone, if I’m having an issue, I don’t want to talk to some AI generated, you know, response, it’s kind of a crappy experience, I feel like, you know, with, you know, going back and authenticity, it’s like, some brands haven’t nailed it out yet to a point where it has a good deliverable experience for their audience. So, you know, go hand in hand with it, don’t don’t let it over, overtake your your team and overtake how your brand is, you know, getting a response from.

 

Matisse Hamel-Nelis  27:37

I’ve heard a few conversations, and I’d love your insights on it, where, right now we’re sort of in that pendulum, pendulum swing all the way over to everything ai, ai, ai. And there’s going to be that pendulum swinging back where people are going to want that human generated content. And sort of the idea of, you know, we’re a marketing or PR agency, we can, you know, do it all AI, there’s a charge for that, or there’s made with heart, or made with, you know, made with by somebody or an actual person that you’ll have a different feed of that. Do you think that’s maybe something that we’ll be seeing more of? Or do you think it’s going to be more they go hand in hand, it’s just a tool, but the human is the one who’s really navigating that content and putting it forward versus that separation of AI fully generated or persons generated.

 

Pat Cooper  28:29

So that’s really interesting, because I can see a lot of agencies that are like, Hey, we’re not AI redevelop, we’re Content Agency, or an SEO agency that doesn’t use AI. But I think a lot of people fundamentally aren’t gonna like that, because it almost seems like you aren’t on top of today’s technology. So I think it’s going to be more hand holding with AI. And, you know, say like, you know, we use AI to fuel the creative impact or team has on, you know, your marketing efforts or something like that. I think that, you know, everyone wants to, especially if you’re working with agencies, everyone wants to have a creative team that’s developing, you know, amazing marketing that’s going to, you know, fuel their pipeline and fuel the ROI that they need for their company, but they don’t want to hire an agency just for AI to do the job, and what are they paying for, you know, just a tool to auto generate some blog posts or auto generate some images, they don’t like that. So I think it’s going to be more, you know, we use AI as a tool to fuel the work we do. We make quicker work, we make better work, our team works a lot more efficiently. Because, you know, efficiency is everything in the business world nowadays, with growth to scale. So, I think that, you know, AI is definitely going to need to go hand in hand with humans, it’s not going to be able to replace everything.

 

Matisse Hamel-Nelis  29:49

Amazing. This has been such a great chat. So, okay, I have one final question before we wrap things up. This like I said has been amazing. I, I’ve always wanted to learn more about the marketing side, and you’ve met some things that I’ve sort of written down if, for those who can’t see me, I’ve been frivolously writing down a bunch of stuff that he’d been saying. So furiously sorry, writing them down so that I can kind of go back and learn more about those tools that you mentioned, particularly when looking at data. Data for me is overwhelming. And when I look at, I’m like, Whoa, that’s a lot of information. Where do I even begin? So that’s a huge component that I think everyone who either has a business has a podcast has a whatever blog even, right you want to ensure that you know where that data is coming from and how you can properly use it to better market yourself. So thank you for all that information. The the secret sauce, the magic, the the knowledge that everything that you have to offer, can you share one piece of wisdom or that secret? Right, that magic sauce that you have found to be pivotal in your own success, but others have maybe overlooked?

 

Pat Cooper  31:01

Yeah, I think it’s okay to try something new. I’m definitely a hustler. I am building out, you know, a few side businesses right now as I’m talking. So, you know, I’m definitely into this space where I find something cool, I gotta try it, I gotta do something. And that’s really helped with my career with developing new skill sets and, you know, developing new talents and, you know, new strategies for marketing. I think that, you know, trying something new whether it’s, you know, doing a little bit of freelance work, and you know, building up your skill set there, or, you know, trying out a different marketing field and seeing if that’s the right fit for you, I think that a lot of people are afraid to kind of like, try something new. And you know, especially in today’s business environment, how tricky it is to land, you know, jobs and further careers because of AI. But I think it’s super, super fundamental to try something new. If I didn’t try to go after that weird random blog writing job that I found while I was working the backroom at Target. I wouldn’t be where I am in my career. So it’s okay to try something new. It may not work out. That’s fine. You just backpedal. But if it does work out, you just open up a whole new opportunity, potentially a career for yourself. So, you know, try something new. Try something creative. It doesn’t work out. It’s okay. It’s a lesson if it does work out. Great.

 

Matisse Hamel-Nelis  32:23

Amazing, amazing. So my last question for you is this is PR & Lattes. So I have to ask, what is your favorite go to caffeinated beverage?

 

Pat Cooper  32:33

Ooh, caffeinated. Um, I’m gonna say my morning Dunkin’s order. Is my I want a soda I think is like decaffeinated these days. So I can’t say soda. I would say a good large hot coffee from Dunkin Donuts is my go to caffeinated drink. Drink it every morning. I have a lot of guests on my show that share some good answers about caffeinated beverages that I cannot remember right now. But usually like for sugars, tons of tons of flavored crap in it. That’s probably a horrible for my health. But Dunk’s is by far my favorite go-to.

 

Matisse Hamel-Nelis  33:11

Amazing. It’s one of my favorite questions to ask on the podcast, because I’m like, oh, that sounds like a good order.

 

Pat Cooper  33:16

I have a whole book just writing down all the rest of us.

 

Matisse Hamel-Nelis  33:20

Exactly. Well, thank you so much for being on today’s podcast. Pat. I really appreciate all your time and your insights. If people want to get in touch with you or follow you on social where can they find you?

 

Pat Cooper  33:31

Yeah, so you can find me everywhere at Pat B. Cooper. pretty active on X. pretty active on LinkedIn. I think LinkedIn is just LinkedIn is Pat Cooper, I don’t really follow your URL there. And you can just find me on my site, PatBCooper.com If you want to connect with me, and of course you can follow Brands Over Brews, which is my podcast that goes out every Monday.

 

Matisse Hamel-Nelis  33:52

Amazing, and we’ll have links to all that in the podcast description so you can check it out. Thank you again so much for being on today’s podcast.

 

Pat Cooper  34:00

Thank you is great.

 

Matisse Hamel-Nelis  34:02

You’ve been listening to the PR & Lattes podcast. Make sure to subscribe wherever you listen to podcasts so you can get notified each week when a new episode drops. You can also subscribe to our weekly newsletter by visiting our website prandlattes.com. On the website, you’ll find our podcast episodes as well as amazing blogs with new ones being posted every Monday morning. And of course make sure to follow us on social on Instagram at @PRAndLattes and on LinkedIn. I’ve been your host Matisse Hamel-Nelis. Thank you so much for listening, and we’ll see you next week with a new latte and guest. Bye for now.