Photo: Smith House Photo
If there’s one word we’ve heard over and over again this year, it’s pivot.
When COVID-19 hit, small businesses were challenged to throw out the playbook and think outside the box, whether that meant pivoting to digital, driving sales through social media, or partnering with other small businesses in order to thrive.
Seven months later—with brick-and-mortar locations still temporarily closed and in-person events continuing to be canceled or postponed—it’s just as important as ever for small businesses to re-evaluate their business models, reposition their brands, and restrategize their revenue streams.
At our recent Small Business Summit presented by Mastercard, Ginger Siegel, the North America Small Business Lead at Mastercard, hosted a thoughtful discussion on how small businesses can pivot during COVID and beyond with Mattie James, the influencer behind MattieJames.com, Sonja Rasula, the founder of Care Package and Unique Markets, Marissa Hermer, the owner of Olivetta and The Draycott, Jess Rona, an actress, comedian, and the founder of Jess Rona Grooming, and Patty Delgado, the CEO of Hija de tu Madre.
Scroll on to find out how these five powerhouse entrepreneurs are skillfully navigating this unprecedented period and optimistically starting to plan for the “new normal” post-pandemic.
On experiencing COVID-induced delays or disappointments…
“We are all human beings, and we have ups and downs, and I think all of us entrepreneurs have to be gentle and kind with ourselves.” -Jess Rona
“It’s all about your mindset as a business owner.” -Jess Rona
On practicing self-care and staying positive…
“I focus on meditation and self-care because when you’re good, you can handle anything.” -Jess Rona
“When I focus on the things that I do have, even if they’re teeny tiny, that is the real pivoting for me. The pivoting is actively being a puppeteer with your thoughts and pivoting into a positive mindset.” -Jess Rona
On being a DTC business in the current COVID climate…
“COVID has really pushed us to be more responsible for our own in-house production.” -Patty Delgado
“I’m really listening to the needs of my customers and adapting our business model, and all-around business decisions, based around the current climate.” -Patty Delgado
On owning and operating a restaurant during COVID…
“It’s not just about health and safety, but trust in us—in any business.” -Marissa Hermer
“We’re just not a restaurant. We’re a face and a family, and we care.” -Marissa Hermer
On pivoting to digital during COVID…
“We cultivated our community online.” -Sonja Rasula
“I truly am a fan of email marketing, so we really cultivated our email list because those are people who have given us something of value. They have given us their email address.” -Sonja Rasula
“We started talking to our email list a lot more and we are going to have a very specific plan for holiday months.” -Sonja Rasula
On pressing pause and looking ahead…
“For the last month or two, I did take a pause on doing as many things virtually.” -Sonja Rasula
“For me, I pressed pause, so that I could really focus on what the business could look like in 2021 and start to put things into place for that.” -Sonja Rasula
On changing your content strategy as an influencer…
“I noticed that all we really had to shift our story and talk about home life.” -Mattie James
“I had to be really careful that I was authentic to my story and being truthful, first and foremost, but then make sure that anything I told my audience, whether it was organic content about what I’m currently doing or even in partnership with a brand, that I was really speaking to home life.” -Mattie James
“It was really important to me to make sure that I even pivoted the language I used day to day.” -Mattie James
On launching online business courses…
“So many more people want to take online courses, want an online masterclass. Again, they are making that space to learn because people are a little bit more still right now.” -Mattie James
On making cybersecurity a priority…
“I’ve been really active in making sure that I’m paying attention to little things like my passwords.” -Mattie James
“We definitely do spend a lot of time working with the best third parties to ensure our customer and business safety.” -Patty Delgado
On supporting small businesses during this time…
“The whole idea behind Unique Markets was to feature and support small and independent businesses—designers, artists, makers—who are usually bootstrapped, independent, and own their businesses. And because we can no longer do that, I thought about how I could support all of these small businesses in a virtual space.” -Sonja Rasula
“So, I came up with this idea. My mom sends me care packages. No joke, I am a woman in my 40s, y’all, and my mom sends me care packages filled with random stuff, but it’s the thought that counts.” -Sonja Rasula
“I could take all these small businesses that I support and love and put them into a box.”-Sonja Rasula
“The idea is that everything in these care packages is curated by me or small independent businesses.” -Sonja Rasula
“This year it became very clear to me that I wanted to really help all of my fellow female founders, women-owned businesses and BIPOC businesses.” -Sonja Rasula
“Over 75% of the brands that are in all of the boxes are minority-owned or female-owned.” -Sonja Rasula
On paying it forward in the midst of the pandemic…
“It’s been the silver lining to this pandemic for me and our teams to know that we are facilitating and have created a platform for people to give back to the heroes and front line workers.” -Marissa Hermer
“We’ve raised over $50,000 and it truly gives us such joy to be able to give back, but equally our heroes are more nourished knowing that people around the world are thinking about them.” -Marissa Hermer
“I think that community, even global community, now more than ever, when our country feels equally divided, it’s really really important.” -Marissa Hermer
“Spreading happiness now is the most important thing we can do when there’s just so much doom and gloom.” -Marissa Hermer
On being a source of happiness and joy…
“I play with iMovie a lot and make fun videos. I’ll buy music from iTunes and tinker and play around, and tap into my creativity. If you are finding joy through that and you are getting that little fun out of that, I think people want to follow any joy right now.” -Jess Rona
“If you’re posting something that’s joyful, people will be attracted to it.” -Jess Rona
On adapting your selling strategy…
“Since day one, we’ve always been very digitally aggressive across every channel.” -Patty Delgado
“What has changed is our messaging. It’s really important for us to be mindful of our customer’s mental health.” - Patty Delgado
“We’ve shifted our focus from selling content to more mindful and empathetic content, and I think that’s been extremely beneficial for brand awareness and just overall brand-customer intimacy.” - Patty Delgado
On building community…
“While the pandemic has been very intense for all of us, this has been a time where community really does just organically explode if you give people a reason to come together and congregate.” -Mattie James
On the future of in-person pop-up events…
“For 2021, for all types of businesses, I think creating in-person experiences that can be safe and responsible are going to absolutely thrive.” -Sonja Rasula
Psst… If you’re having serious FOMO, join Create & Cultivate Insiders to get unlimited access to all of our Small Business Summit Presented by Mastercard content including video recordings of every panel and workshop download in C&C history.
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