Consulting
Tim is a drum-centric music professional living just north of Chicago, Illinois. Tim has accrued years of social strategy, copywriting, product development, and MI retail operations experience bolstering manufacturers, distributors, and retailers alike. Check out some of Tim’s work below.
Social MEdia Strategy
I’ve always loved social media, from the inception of Myspace and Facebook into today’s prime platforms like YouTube, TikTok, and Instagram. The older I get, the more interest I’ve had in optimizing the use of these marketing tools (both on the influencer side and on the brand side) to better reach the audience and community that I want to target.
I took over the Visionary Drum Instagram page in mid-April 2019. In the first six months of my work, I grew the follower count by 70%. I did this by optimizing several factors, including hashtag usage, post tags, geo tags, and a technique I call micro-engagement efforts. The following explains my strategy behind Visionary Drum’s post from September 16, 2019. Here is a view of the original post:
Challenge
Create a post that got eyes on it from across the drumming community, while maintaining the light, comical, and far out branding Visionary Drum has become known for. Use Instagram to increase Visionary Drum’s following and ultimately support the company’s sales growth.
Solution
I did everything for this post from the ground up – the image, the copy, the tagging, and the community management. The image features several industry brands, while prominently displaying one of Visionary Drum’s best-selling products (the pizza-themed drum skin). This allows for effective hashtagging and post tagging. The copy upholds the brand’s far out, funny air and hooks the reader with all things pizza, because who doesn’t love a good pizza? The tagging methods got the photo featured on top posts for several hashtags and in the tagged sections of several large brands, getting many new eyes on product.
Community management following the post also bolstered Visionary Drum’s following. Drumtacs reposted the photo to their 80,000+ followers and garnered an additional 1,100 likes. South African-based account @sa.drummer also reposted the photo, which is great for international awareness and sales growth. I also used micro-engagements, a high touch community management technique, to further garner support for the brand following this particular post.
Results
The post garnered over 1,400 likes in the first 24 hours; and in the first week, it achieved over 2,500 likes. Content like this is what helped me achieve nearly tripling Visionary Drum’s following during my tenure with the company. This translates into increased revenue too! I helped support double digit sales growth in 2019.
The beauty of social media strategy is that it can be very driven by creativity, but posts, comments, and DMs with the community surrounding a brand provide scientific, actionable data. Quantitative and qualitative information can inform ways to improve a brand’s content that ultimately may drive sales growth. By taking a creative focus to the front end of things and a scientific eye to the back end, we’re able to reach more customers at a lower cost than ever before. Through continuing to build online community around your brand in this way, I can instill as much passion in every consumer about your brand as you may have yourself!
For more social media strategy work examples, click here.
copywriting
I originally come from a corporate copywriting environment, having been a part of Uline’s 125-person creative team for over five years. In this work, I set aside my personal voice, understood the client’s point of view, and wrote a powerful message that conveyed everything the client intended and nothing they didn’t. I left my own biases behind and got into the mindset of the clients I served. In crafting good copy, I continue to create profound, positive change for my clients and their industries at large.
Please view the writing example here and review the explanation to follow. This reviews the process behind an article authored by me for Uline President Liz Uihlein.
CHALLENGE
In the back of every Uline catalog, Liz Uihlein places a Liz Letter, a succinct article aiming to give her political views a voice. Each of Uline's several copywriters craft up to five letters on different topics, of which Liz chooses her favorite for publication. The writer must get into the mindset of an extremely successful 75-year old business executive and craft a compelling message that engages all customers.
SOLUTION
When deciding on the article topic, highly debated subjects to consider were the U.S. president's current activity and gun ownership laws. Choosing to write on these topics could be detrimental to Uline, so I chose to write on something else entirely – China's economy. Why? By choosing a topic that Liz would view as less controversial (but still highly relevant), I could craft an article that felt compelling to Liz, while having zero detriment to sales.
RESULTS
After the letter was presented to Liz, she immediately picked it for publication in 90 million catalogs. Following her approval, I was called into her conference room, where she offered her sincere gratitude for my work. She even pointed out how my writing was incredibly close to her own voice. My department VP and the leading directors also expressed their appreciation for my work.
For more copywriting work examples, click here.
PRODUCT DEVELOPMENT
One of my biggest joys in life has been exploring the history of the drum set and using that knowledge to help others push the instrument forward into its second century of being. After working five years in used music retail, I got hooked on vintage drums. I wanted to know every brand, every model, every material, and every detail that made drums sound any type of way. I used that knowledge to modify my own drum sets, and it yielded the adoration by many of my general drum sound.
Since spring of 2020, I’ve worked with Grady and Tim at Franklin Drum Co. to help them on every element of their rebrand from the Previous Risen Drums entity. I’ve provided art direction on the look of the Franklin logo. I’ve written copy for their website. And most notably, I’ve helped their team in the development of a proprietary drum shell.
Grady, who has built these drums for over a decade, now owns the company. He wanted to create a shell that had all the vintage vibe sound-wise, but he also needed the drum to retain modern durability. Since these drums are used by live performers with exhilarating shows, Grady was even concerned about singers or guitar players standing on the bass drums!
We had our work cut out for us; but after months of diving into historical designs and then re-imagining them for this modern application, we settled on two shell recipes – a five ply maple/poplar shell and a five ply mahogany/poplar shell. The maple/poplar shell is very reminiscent of Slingerland’s 1970s shell, but brings the manufacturing techniques forward. This ensures a consistent product every time. The mahogany/poplar shell is something all its own.
We were careful to craft this shell in such a way that it was fully and easily customizable for the consumer too. Both shells come without reinforcement rings. Thus, each tube from the manufacturer can be cut to any length. These shells aren’t confined to one depth, like they might be if they’d been purchased with reinforcement rings from the shell manufacturer. Now, adding those rings in shop becomes an upgrade, which creates healthier profit margins too.
I’m very proud of these drum shells, and I think they’re best in class. Next time you’re in between Chicago and Milwaukee, stop by my place and hit my kit. You’ll be sure to agree!
For more product development work examples, click here.
RETAIL OPERATIONS
My college years were spent working full time at Music Go Round in Kenosha, Wisconsin, which is a used and new music retail franchise. I was given free reign to do whatever I wanted to do to move the shop forward, and I did. From 2008 to the end of 2012, I helped increase yearly revenue 160%, while simultaneously increasing profit margins by double digits. And it wasn’t just about making the shop more profitable.
My experience at this shop taught me how to build community around a brick and mortar store. By bringing my best self to every work day, I garnered a clientele that came back week after week, even if just to look at the new offerings around the shop. And I wanted to ensure every consumer was empowered to make the best purchasing decision, so I moved the dial there too.
Customers would often come in and request all the nitty gritty details about guitar amps and drum sets, but we didn’t have a way to help them with some more obscure high end or vintage products without doing a google search. To help alleviate pressure on sales staff and to aid our customers at the same time, I developed a large hang tag that allowed a sales associate to write out all the info for a guitar amp or a drum set and then keep that tag with the product. For something like a guitar amp, it provides speaker size and quantity, tube types and quantity, footswitch information, and other pertinent data. My prototype tags were picked up by corporate for use in every franchise, and they continue to be used in store today.
I’m grateful for my time in Music Go Round’s retail setting and the work I’ve continued to do with the company via copywriting projects, social media efforts, and the occasional assembly work on 300+ drums.
For more retail operations work examples, click here.