Organization

Relaunch Your Catholic Small Business: The Proven Strategy to Reconnect with Customers and Revive Your Business After a Tough Year

/ chicoinematt

Are you struggling to relaunch your business after a challenging year? Here’s the proven strategy I used to reconnect with my customers and successfully get my business thriving again.

Use this strategy ⤵️

The What:

📬 Send them personalized postcards— in a digital world, paper will stand out

💬 Send personalized DMs to check in with them (don’t sell anything off the bat…that’s spammy/salesy)

Post consistently on social media about your products/services:

🔶 Be valuable (educational/entertaining depending on your brand voice) about it at least 80%.

🔷 The other 20% you can mention th products/services you offer but frame it from the problem you solve

✍️Publish regularly on your blog to help provide insights about your industry for your audience.

The When:

Reach out to your customers (works for prospects too) at natural checkpoints.

Holidays, weekends, end of the week, liturgical feast days (my clients are Catholic small business owners 🙂).

For example:

“Hi (insert first name)! Hope you are having a blessed Feast of Saints Peter and Paul.”

OR

“Hope you had a blessed Feast of the Most Holy Trinity (insert first name)! Here’s a funny meme I made for the occasion and thought you might like it”

At around 90 days before your relaunch start to be more overt in your messaging about the products/services you provide (thank you Stacked Marketer Holiday Marketing Guide for this tip!.

If you try to promote your work any sooner from a cold hiatus then your customers are going to notice and be turned off by the experience.

—–

Rebuild relationships first. Sell later. 👍

#customers#smallbusiness#relationships

Thank you for sharing!

Connecting Catholic Job Seekers and Employers: Inside Catholic Gigs

/ chicoinematt

Editor’s note: This article is sponsored by CatholicGigs.com.

Saint Josemaria Escriva wrote, “Professional work is also an apostolate, an opportunity to give ourselves to others, to reveal Christ to them and lead them to God the Father.” These words are true yet not always easy to live by during the job search process— it’s a full-time job looking for a full-time job.

Finding employment can be one of the more stressful activities in life. Over the years, I have struggled to find work that both paid the bills and gave me satisfaction. Starting The Simple Catholic blog was something I did out of a need to cope with loss and grief but also as a means to stay connected to the professional Catholic world.

The founder of Catholic Gigs reached out to me a few months ago about helping him create content for their website. I have found my writing can act as a bridge to lead others to Christ. Catholic Gigs also acts as a bridge connecting Catholic jobseekers and Catholic employers. I see this as an apostolate in fostering faith DURING the job process. Below is an interview I had with Paul Massell and Jacob Spence on the origin and journey of Catholic Gigs.

How did you come up with the idea for Catholic Gigs?

After graduating from Catholic universities, we each spent several years struggling to find employment that both aligned with our faith and provided a living wage. We ultimately decided to start our own company which offers marketing content and support primarily for Catholic organizations. One of our early ideas was to build an authentically Catholic job board to help our clients (and ourselves) find and collaborate on meaningful work.

While this project sat on the back burner for a few years, we continued developing professional relationships with a variety of Catholic organizations throughout the U.S. through the marketing work we did for them. Through these experiences, we learned a lot about the needs of Catholic organizations. We eventually met a Catholic investor who provided the seed funding that allowed us to build the Catholic Gigs site and begin sharing it with the Catholic organizations in our network, and beyond.

What makes Catholic Gigs different from other job search sites?

What makes Catholic Gigs unique boils down to our desire to build a Catholic community. Built into the site itself, as well as in all our communications with both job-seekers and employers, are a variety of features that facilitate and encourage more meaningful connections between Catholic organizations and their future employees. Our content-rich employer profiles offer insights about organizations that aren’t otherwise present in a single job description. This content includes photos and videos, background and history about organizations, and information about benefits offered to employees.

We regularly share authentically Catholic content with the goal of inspiring and motivating young Catholics to explore meaningful careers at Catholic organizations. We are also partnering with career centers at Catholic universities across the country to help match recent graduates with entry-level job openings at Catholic organizations. Beyond this, we are always attentive to

the needs of both job seekers and employers to better incorporate their suggestions into the site and the features we offer.

How do you plan to scale your business and what are your growth plans?

Our long-term vision is for every Catholic diocese, nonprofit, and Catholic-owned business to post their job openings on Catholic Gigs, but our first goal is to connect Catholic schools with recent graduates from Catholic universities to fill much-needed teaching roles.

What are some of the biggest challenges you’ve faced so far and how have you overcome them?

For years we had the idea for Catholic Gigs on the back burner while we worked on other marketing projects for a wide variety of Catholic businesses and non-profit clients. While we had built an early version of Catholic Gigs, most of our attention was focused on completing work for our clients.

Providentially, one of these projects introduced us to a Catholic investor who provided us with the seed funding and mentorship necessary to fully realize our idea for Catholic Gigs. Between his insights and our track record with this market, we feel primed to develop the best solution for Catholic employers and job seekers.

A lot of our past relationships with clients already laid a great foundation for Catholic Gigs. As soon as we launched the site, we reached out to many of our past customers and invited them to this new service.

What are your future plans for Catholic Gigs and what impact do you hope to have in the long-term?

Ultimately, we hope to bridge the gap between Catholic employers and individuals who seek to do meaningful work for the Church and the world, especially those just starting out on their career. For us, that entails sharing all the wisdom and goodness we’ve experienced through our work with Catholic organizations and passing that along to those who are in the midst of discerning their life’s work.

Describe the importance of Catholic education and its impact on society.

Catholic education plays an important role in shaping individuals and contributing to society. It instills values such as faith, compassion, empathy, and respect for human dignity, which can inspire people to be active and responsible citizens. Additionally, Catholic education provides a strong academic foundation and encourages critical thinking. This can contribute to individual

success and societal progress. Furthermore, Catholic education can provide a sense of community and belonging, which can foster social cohesion and support the common good.

Explore Catholic job opportunities by visiting Catholic Gigs today!

Thank you for sharing!

5 Actionable and Simple Tips to Help Parents Write (Right) Now

/ chicoinematt

“But I don’t have anything interesting to say.” “I am tired exhausted from work and household duties.” “I just cannot take time away from my family.” “This is going to add an additional burden on my spouse.” “Honey, there is literally no time. We both have full time and three kids to take of when we get home.”

These were some of the excuses I used in the past whenever I pondered a pursuit in a career in freelance writing. We have a finite amount of time each day. 24 hours. Doctors tell us at least a 1/3 of that should be used for sleeping. That leaves only16 hours a day at our disposal. Add in a full-time job, children and all the various school activities they are in, and meal time. Our time starts disappearing faster than a dozen eggs on sale at the store.

How to write and raise a family?

This article is specifically geared toward parents who want to develop a career in writing. As a father to four children ages 11,9,6, and 4, I completely understand the scheduling struggle. It might be more accurate to call it appointment acrobatics! I am also the husband of an elementary school teacher. Anyone who is married to or has a family member or friend who is an educator knows that profession involves A LOT of time—investing in lesson planning, parent meetings, professional development sessions, and staying up to do on current curriculum. Additionally, two of children have been diagnosed with autism spectrum disorder. Autism is a social communication disorder. We have weekly adaptive aquatics lessons for our six year old. We have also had to invest an incalculable amount of hours into research, therapy, and home reinforcement over the past several years.

Bottom line is I understand that life presents you many challenges that take up the vast majority of the day. It is not impossible, nor even merely improbable to start writing and creating content.

Martin Luther King Jr. once declared, “If you can’t fly, then run, if you can’t walk run, then walk, if you can’t walk, then , but by all means keep moving.” While you may not be able to soar now you can take action. Move towards your goal of being a writer! The tips in this article come from my experience and have proven to have worked for my impossibly busy schedule. Let’s now jump into these five actionable and simple strategies to help you write now!

Be prepared to sacrifice

“Wait! I thought you said these were actionable and simple steps. Right away you are asking me to give up something,” you might be thinking now. As much as this fact hurts to hear, it is necessary to learn. To love something [and someone] it involves a sacrifice. Foregoing the latest Netflix original series, shopping spree, or having to say “no” to one of your kids activities will be painful. I struggled mightily with watching just one episode of the latest series so I could have time to write daily.

Since my decision to leave my full-time job to pursue writing as a career, I have made several sacrifices: our family gave up eating fast food, limited television time, and I will be working a night job to help the bills until I can write full-time from home. This decision was not made lightly. Writing proved to be healing and therapeutic as reached a low point in my life in 2015. If after some deliberation you realize your gift to the world is to write, realize this tremendous joy does come with a price—sacrifice. But it is well worth it.

Narrow and Nest into a Niche

A second tactic to help you write now is to find a niche topic to write about. Ask yourself the following questions: What topic can I talk about for 30 minutes without needing any preparation? What subjects am I already an expert on? Select your writing niche based on either or both of the answers to those questions. My expertise is Catholic theology. I have also developed an interest in writing about anxiety, depression and other mental health issues. Finding a niche does not always happen overnight. Yet, you can still start the process of discovering your writing niche now!

Find Five Minutes

Finding time in the day to write can be challenging. I get it! Parenting is incredibly tough. Kids require physical, emotional, intellectual supports to grow and thrive. We all want our kids to grow up into mature and productive citizens. Some days all hell breaks loose. The children turn into frenzied creatures—especially during a full moon! Other times, the children coordinate an executed staggered schedule attack to ensure that you and your spouse never get more than 2 hours consecutive that night.

Don’t let that deter you from your dream to write. Find just 5 minutes per day to write. Schedule it at the exact same time and place in your house to journal or type out your thoughts. If your life is a bit more hectic, allow for flexibility of that 5 minutes to occur at various times. Always make sure you write for an absolute minimum of 5 minutes. When your routine is set, up your time to 10, 15, 30 minutes, or to 1 hour. Consistency is absolutely necessary for traction towards your goal. Move towards your goal of writing a bit each every.

Consume Content Daily

Another simple strategy to develop your writing skills is to consume content from your writing niche daily. Doctors prescribe patients to eat a and balanced nutrition. That same is true for content creators. Creativity does not occur in isolation. Read books, listen to podcasts, watch videos, connect with experts in your desired field of study on LinkedIn.

Use those short drives dropping the kids off at school, running errands, or returning home to listen to podcast episodes or an audio book about your niche subject. During those rare occasions when the kids actually nap or go to bed on time read a book for a few minutes. I have been starting to take a book to the park—even reading just a page or two daily will help build your knowledge in the long run!

Repeat—Key is Consistency

If you made it to this point of the article without interruption I want to congratulate you! Thank you for taking take out of your busy schedule to further your desire to write. My final strategy to help you write right now is simple—repeat strategies 1-4 daily! If you are running low on energy or motivation please message me on LinkedIn or email me at chicoine.matt@live.com. I would love to help you through any scheduling obstacles and mental roadblocks.

Related Links

The Origin Story of The Simple Catholic

3 Ways to Stay Relevant as a Catholic Blogger

Thank you for sharing!

Catholic Meme Monday— Issue 52

/ chicoinematt

Hope you had a blessed weekend!  

Time for another Catholic Meme Monday.

🎵🎶All you need is love 🎶🎵
Looks about right. 😆😀🤦
😆😆😆
😆😆
Never too early for a Saint Nick meme. 😆🙂🥊
You will never unsee it. 😆🙂
🙂😆😆
Noah’s ark memes are the best. 🙂⛵🛳️
A belated Saint Francis day meme. ♥️🙂
Can’t help sharing another pun. 🙂

That’s all I have this week. Stay tuned for next week’s Catholic Meme Monday. Receive updates straight to your email inbox by subscribing to The Simple Catholic blog.

Thank you for sharing!

How Tetherball is Like the Catholic Church

/ chicoinematt / 2 Comments
best game ever

 

 

 

 

 

 

Editor’s Note: This post was originally published on May 1, 2015.

I will begin today’s post by comparing the structure of the Catholic Church to a somewhat “elementary” thing. Let me give you some word clues. Hopscotch. Foursquare. Kickball. Red Rover. Before I confuse you anymore please let me briefly explain the context to why I am talking about children’s playground games and religion in the same paragraph.

During this past year I worked at a Catholic high school and taught Old and New Testament. On the day we discussed the epic first century saints Peter and Paul, I gave my students a simple analogy. A healthy Catholic Church is likened to a game of tetherball. To better help you understand what I mean precisely with that example please let us first discuss why Peter and Paul are important to Christianity.

Stability of the Rock

Matthew 16:16-19 has Peter clearly stating the identity of Jesus Christ and thereafter he is entrusted with the “keys to the kingdom of Heaven”. Catholics interpret this passage as hard and fast proof for the papacy. To cite Fr. Robert Barron in his book Catholicism [referring to Peter’s special insight], “And this knowledge did not come from Peter’s native intelligence or from an extraordinary education…It came as a gift from God, a special charism of the Holy Spirit.” (p. 121). Thus, God chose a pope from the very beginning to be that stability upon we, as Catholics, can rely on. If the Church had multiple heads its teachings would devolve into something ugly–like the multi-head monster in Greek myth– the hydra. In a similar way, the center-post in a tetherball game provides stability for the game to happen.

Creativity of a Theologian

creativity

Now let’s turn our attention to St. Paul. While the popes enjoy the office of St. Peter and provide stability to the Catholic Church, having this Petrine element alone would make Her teachings dry and rocky. Thus, to balance out the papacy there is a need for theology to make the Church healthy.

 After Paul’s conversion in Acts 9 until the end of the book, the saint is literally always on the move. As I told my students, “Paul does not have biblical ADD, but rather he was the spark of life that started the early Christian churches”. Citing from Fr. Barron again, “Paul stands for mission, the engagement of the culture and proclamation. Every missionary, teacher, preacher, and theologian, is, in this sense, a son or daughter of Paul.” (p. 141). Paul represents an archetype within the Catholic Church to adapt to different times and cultures. He represents the spunk that enlivens the Church. Going back to the tetherball analogy the rope and ball provide the excitement for the playground game.

always on the move

Structure + Flexibility= Healthy Church

A healthy Church needs both structure (papacy) and flexibility (theology). So too does a tetherball game needs the center-post= [representing the papacy/Petrine element] and the rope and ball= [representing theology/Pauline element]. 
 
The schoolyard game would be pointless if a center-post did not exist to keep the ball close for the players to bat around. At the same time a game consisting of only a metal pole would be stagnant and boring. Similarly, the Catholic Church without the dynamic element St. Paul brought in the first century and whose memory represents today.
tetherball

Which playground game is God’s favorite? I would imagine that God has all the time in the world to try them all and find them equally enjoyable, but if I had to venture a guess I would pick tetherball! 🙂

Thank you for sharing!

How to Help a Faithful Catholic Family in Need

/ chicoinematt

This is something my pride would ordinarily let get in the way of asking for help. But I have come to realize that asking for help isn’t a bad thing and can be a means to grow in holiness.

Thank you picture

I understand things are tight for nearly everyone in 2022 so if you can’t donate I 100000000% understand.

If you’re in a place to help it would be greatly appreciated. I’m not asking much from indviduals— $5 really is all I ask. If you feel compelled to give more feel free but I’m not asking for more than $5 per person.

Please send me and my family prayers regardless of your decision to donate.

Click on the following link to donate:

Help a Faithful Catholic Family to Repair a Vehicle

Thank you for any and all help.

P.S. I updated my original goal amount as I later learned the same vehicle needing the major repairs also require a new set of tires.

 

Thank you for sharing!

Pretzelgate 🥨

/ chicoinematt

Control reactions

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Editor’s Note: Post originally published on November 6, 2019.

🤔” Life is 10 percent what you make it and 90 percent how you take it.” ― Irving Berlin

🔶Reactionary responses rarely are the best—especially if you are in a stressful situation.

🔶Yesterday, I was trying to get some rest as I worked the overnight shift. Thankfully, I got a solid short nap in. I woke to the sight of the contents of a 20 Oz pretzel 🥨 bag scattered on the living room floor.

🔶Immediately, I fretted. I got angry. In hindsight I realized it was actually a bit humorous.

🔶The kids were just trying to get a snack without waking me. Plus, Avila did benefit from Pretzelgate!

🔶She crawled swiftly over and took a fistful of pretzels for her snack. Grinning from ear to ear she held up her delicious trophy triumphantly.

🤔” Life is 10 percent what you make it and 90 percent how you take it.”

🔶In the Chicoine House life is 10% of what you make of it, 90% of your perspective, and 100% about 🥨.

Pretzel day the office

🔶I needed not get salty in attitude. I should have merely gone to work cleaning up by enjoying the crunchy and salty snack.

🔶How has time changed your perspective on a negative event for you?

Share your thoughts in the comments below. 😊

#perspective  #chicoinecontent  #lifequotes  #lifelessons

Thank you for sharing!