April Frampton – guerrilla marketing B2B influencer

Recorded in the Grid Conference Room at Kiln SLC (Gateway Mall)

April’s company: Hey Ape! Instagram Page

Book Recommendation: The Psychology of Selling: Increase Your Sales Faster and Easier Than You Ever Thought Possible and The Art of Closing the Sale: The Key to Making More Money Faster in the World of Professional Selling by Brian Tracy

This episode features April Frampton, founder of Hey Ape, a unique marketing company that leverages both social media and face-to-face interactions to drive customer engagement. April shares her journey, insights, and the lessons she’s learned from running her business.

April’s entrepreneurial journey began with a stint at Sandman Studios, a visual effects company, where she worked for about ten years. However, she realized that her passion lay elsewhere and decided to start her own business. She came up with the idea of reaching out to companies to get products for them and then doing more business-to-business interactions. This led to the creation of Hey Ape.

One of the unique aspects of Hey Ape is its tracking system. April uses a code, “Hey Ape,” attached to any discount or giveaway, which allows companies to track what is being brought into them. This system was developed in collaboration with Shaun Banda of Nothing Bundt Cakes.

April emphasizes the importance of trust and consistency in business. She believes gaining customer trust and consistency with the mission statement is crucial for any business owner. She also encourages entrepreneurs to create vision boards and focus on two to three main goals for 90 days.

One of the challenges April faced when starting her business was capital. However, she emphasizes the importance of believing in oneself and one’s ideas, even facing obstacles. She advises entrepreneurs to be transparent with their mission statement and always consider the customer’s perspective.

April also discusses the importance of word-of-mouth advertising, which she believes is still incredibly strong for businesses. She has found a way to balance word-of-mouth advertising with social media to drive business traffic, especially franchises restricting what they can post on social media.

April’s story offers valuable insights for current and aspiring entrepreneurs, particularly those interested in unique marketing strategies that blend traditional and digital methods. She can be followed on Instagram at heyape@_ and on TikTok at @metal918.

Kyle Knowles:
Hello there. Welcome to episode number nine of the Maker Manager Money podcast. A podcast about entrepreneurs, solopreneurs, founders, business owners, and business partnerships. From startups to stay ups, to inspire entrepreneurs to keep going, and future entrepreneurs to just start. It’s simply a celebration of entrepreneurship, really. My name is Kyle Knowles, and I’m trying to make some cool content at Kiln, that’s K-I-L-N, as in gnarly, for you who are old enough to know what that word is. I know gnarly is spelled with a G, but still it’s the sound I was going for. We are recording in the Grid conference room just outside the main break room in Kiln, Salt Lake City, north. Kiln provides working communities that are handcrafted and programmed to elevate lifestyle and performance. Today’s guest is April Frampton. Actually, April Hey Ape Frampton.
Hey Ape’s mission, April’s mission is to connect businesses together by developing brand awareness through a grassroots approach with a flare of guerrilla marketing. She has years of collaborating experience in many industries, including film production, hospitality management, sales and event coordination. She developed a custom marketing strategy that is no-nonsense, focused, using the skill as she acquired from door-to-door sales. This strategy is so valuable because it is tailored to individual business needs. The name Hey Ape, and we can talk a little bit more about this, April, originates from an old 1970s cartoon nicknamed Grape Ape. The unique name fits April’s guerrilla marketing strategy and sticks with clients. Some of the services that Hey Ape and April provide are company awareness, door-to-door approach, connecting businesses together, grassroots marketing, guerrilla marketing, content creation, and facilitating of events. I just want to read a testimonial before we get into things, April. This one is from Shaun Banda, owner of Nothing Bundt Cakes.

April Frampton:
In Bountiful.

Kyle Knowles:
In West Bountiful. “April is an intelligent and hardworking individual who knows how to make genuine connections with the people she encounters. She has done a fantastic job of bringing in new leads, corporate accounts and fundraising opportunities.” Also, April and I have known each other since third grade. Welcome to the podcast, April.

April Frampton:
Thank you so much, Kyle. I’m really excited to be here. Because of what I do, that’s actually how we connected through social media. He was intrigued by what I was doing, which I think, thinking outside of the box, that’s basically what I do for any company, anybody that I work with. It’s always thinking outside of the box how to connect businesses and people together. When Kyle had reached out to me, this is actually a goal of mine for 2023, is to learn how to podcast. What better way than just jump right in and do it.

Kyle Knowles:
Well, I’m glad that you’ve been so generous with your time and it’s been fun catching up after many years of going different ways, and I’m so glad we reconnected. The main reason is because I’ve been following you on Instagram and I looked at your bio and it said entrepreneur. With that, I was like, “I’ve got to reach out to April and get her on the podcast.” Because there’s a lot of things that I can learn and everyone that listens to the podcast can learn from you. I know there’s a couple of other things I want to include in your introduction and bio, and we’ll include that on the website. One of them is that you do a live stream on Wednesdays, right?

April Frampton:
I do. I do a live stream on Wednesdays. It’s called Fun Facts and Trivia. Basically, what it is, it’s a program designed to talk about music, music trivia, genres of music, artist. Then we also incorporate film and TV in that. There is one thing that I probably didn’t mention to Kyle. In the years of being a performer, one of the skillsets that I acquired was doing makeup. Over probably almost three and a half years, I have turned myself into 40, I think I am now up to 48 different characters. The characters that I turn myself in is based on the trivia questions that we will be asked during my livestream. If I turn myself into say the Joker, we will talk about Joker movies and I will come up with questions based on that.
It’s been a great way to connect, not just on the local team, but now I’ve got followers all over the world between Facebook and TikTok Live. That has been really, and at the beginning and how this ties into what I do, at the very beginning of every live livestream that I do, I do a shout-out. On Wednesdays, I do a shout-out to all the businesses at the very beginning. When I’m doing a livestream in general, I will pick two businesses to do a shout-out so that they get a shout-out during every live stream that I’m doing. That’s how branding awareness is incorporated into everything that I’m doing by doing a shout-out.

Kyle Knowles:
That’s awesome. We will get more into how you ended up doing live-streaming shortly. I wanted to start with this question here is, were either of your parents entrepreneurs?

April Frampton:
Actually, they are. Both of them are. I guess that you asked me that question and it just kind of struck me. My mom has a hair shop in her home and my dad deals with guns and antiques. A lot of years spent at guns and antiques. He’s a teacher, or was a teacher by his profession. As a side gig, he would sell antiques and gens. They had their own business. Yes, both of them are entrepreneurs.

Kyle Knowles:
Nice. It’s a theory that one of the previous guest had, is that a lot of times entrepreneurs had entrepreneurial parents, and I’m finding that to be true in a lot of cases.

April Frampton:
I think it’s really interesting. I think if you think what entrepreneurs were maybe back, Baby Boomers, stuff like that in the early 60s, 70s, stuff like that. As times have changed, but I think now that you mentioned it, I think that my parents were ahead of the game because they were doing everything word of mouth. Word of mouth, they were going to swap meets or gun shows or whatever. This person knew that person, and that was their strategy for how they marketed, is that even my mom having a hair salon for 45 years, she never not had clients because it was that great word of mouth advertising that they really, our parents, grandparents, when they had a business, that is how it went for generations.

Kyle Knowles:
Face-to-face.

April Frampton:
Face-to-face.

Kyle Knowles:
Didn’t have Facebook.

April Frampton:
Didn’t have Facebook.

Kyle Knowles:
You have to get in front of people.

April Frampton:
All the new technology of stuff is awesome, but the word of mouth will never change how a business will influx customers and increase their business.

Kyle Knowles:
It’s interesting, because even today, I think when you think about social media and all these other things or email marketing, it’s that face-to-face people want. They want that authenticity. They want someone there, boots on the ground at a business and getting people to come together face-to-face. It’s really, I think more important now more than ever.

April Frampton:
It’s really interesting because over the last three and a half years I’ve worked with several franchise owners. Here’s something interesting that people may or may not know about franchises. Franchise owners are not allowed to post content aside from what the franchise allows them to do. With me being the in between of posting on social media for a franchise that cannot post really becomes very, very unique in how to still drive traffic to them aside from the word of mouth. I was actually researching about a month and a half ago on different marketing strategies. One thing that came really, really interesting is that to date, word of mouth advertising is creating a $6 billion global marketing campaign for the word of mouth. The thing with even being online, at certain times of the day, people might not see your post.
If they don’t see your post, they may not see what you’ve got. Because Instagram will move very quick on the feed. Facebook’s a little bit different, but TikTok is even kind of the same thing. Just depending on what platform you use, word of mouth is still incredibly, incredibly strong with companies, with business. I feel like where I’ve been boots on the ground, I’ve been able to figure out the dynamic between the word of mouth and social media and how they can work really well together. If you have a business, word of mouth, telling your friends, giving out product, giving out a little something, will drive customers through your door. We are in a different time because of the pandemic, businesses are having to figure out how to rethink, how to market their business. If they have a brick and mortar, they have to have people through their door. It is a very unique way to rethink how to do things.

Kyle Knowles:
For sure. Let’s go back to your childhood and growing up. Were there any indications of entrepreneurship as you were growing up?

April Frampton:
I think that there was. As silly as this sounds, like being a kid and coming up with ideas how to sell things to your friends and how to create little lemonade stands and stuff. Even being really young, those still take strategy and they take skills and figuring out how to do this. I think as a kid, it was always very, very appealing to me to have the ability to take my creative side and do something with it in a business.

Kyle Knowles:
Talk about your aspirations in theater and production. We talked about recently, road shows. I don’t know if anyone’s doing road shows these days, but back in the day it was a big deal.

April Frampton:
It was. Kyle and I, we had a pre-meeting yesterday and he had no idea that I had actually done, growing up, I had spent a lot of time doing theater, doing makeup and doing these things. I think sometimes the planets don’t align for you to maybe do it in school. I think at that time, thinking outside of the box was always something that I had always done. I actually got my first acting coach. I was probably in junior high when I first got my first acting coach. I remember thinking, “This is it. This is what I want to do for the rest of my life.” It was probably about in seventh grade, I remember sitting with a counselor and they’re like, “What do you want to do?” I’m like, “I want to be famous. I want to go to Hollywood.”
I don’t think that vision ever changed. It never changed. I never really thought about doing anything different. I think as I got older and had a lot of experience between performing, doing theater, being able to even direct, they call them road shows. Even jump in and be a producing element, it really gave me what I would say the life skills and the strategy to really get me to this point right now. I think back, that at the time, how silly it may have seemed. When you are an entrepreneur or want to do this, I’ve taken every skillset that I’ve acquired over the last 30 years and I’m putting it into the business that I’m doing now, which has been very, very helpful.

Kyle Knowles:
I believe any kind of acting training, speech training, communications training, all of those kinds of things serve you well when you’re in sales, when you’re an entrepreneur. All of those things play a big part in that. There’s all these kinds of books I’ve read where they talk about pivoting, oh, you really want to be an actor and you like to do theater and those kinds of things. Well, guess what? Those are really good leaders too. Because they have the communication skills. A lot of those shadow careers would be politics, sales, entrepreneurship. I hear you when you’re talking about, look, you’re taking acting classes in junior high, well that’s served you well and you’re in front of the camera all the time now. All of those things led you to what you’re doing today.

April Frampton:
It has. Kyle, it leads me back to a time, it was right around probably I would say around 2006, 2007. At the time, I was actually working on a film set, or well, on a TV series, Everwood. At the time, I was just doing background. What came from that opportunity really set a huge tone for producing. The director started taking notice that I was bringing, when they asked for extras, I would make calls and bring extras to the set. They’re like, “Hey, April, can you help us in this capacity?” I got a call from one of the main casting directors from Los Angeles. I’ll never forget, it was a Thursday at 5:00. She called me and she said, “April, I’ve been watching you over the last six months. I have an opportunity for you.” I’m like, “Oh, man. What’s coming?” She goes, “Chris Pratt and Justin Baldoni, a lot of times because actors, because even if they’re working on a production, they do independent projects. They wanted to do a short film.”
She said, “What I would like for you to do is, can you help us be their personal assistant?” I mean, inside, I was literally dying, going, “Oh my gosh.” I had to say, “Yeah.” I had to pretend that I was just so chill, and I couldn’t believe it. What came from that opportunity were more doors opened because of that experience. She said something that really resonated with me. She was like, “I’m giving you this opportunity, but I don’t want you to think you’re going to come in and take my job.” I didn’t really understood what she meant, but she just wanted me to make sure that she drew the line in the sand to make sure that I understood where I was going, where I was coming from, and to make sure that I stayed clear of the focus. It really was such a great opportunity to have that moment that I think really set the producing, wanting to be in charge of putting events or whatever come along. It just really helped me have that focus.

Kyle Knowles:
What’s Chris Pratt like?

April Frampton:
You know what? Chris Pratt is literally one of the nicest guys. What you see, and people just have watched his career grow and he really is what you see, a really nice guy. The one thing that really stands out for Chris, and even Justin Baldoni, is they’re pretty, they have integrity. They have integrity. What you see, what they stand by and their truth that they speak is exactly who they are. There’s a lot of actors that I’ve worked with, a lot of different people on production, but those two gentlemen have really stuck out. Even years down the road, I had reached out to Justin thinking he’ll never answer my call and he’s not going to talk to me. He’s kind of a big shot now.
No, actually, he actually answered my call. I said, “Hey, here’s what I’ve got going on.” What he said to me, he was like, “April, I will always remember the dedication that you had of what you did for us that night that you helped us get extras and food and all of that stuff.” I was like, “Wow.” I think if you’re going to do something, give it 110% because you literally, you may think that your efforts are going unnoticed or you may think what you’re doing is unnoticed. You had better believe it is not true. Because you never know who in the background that may never say a word to you, years down the road may be your number one biggest client because you didn’t allow someone’s opinion or something to come into your head and sway you.

Kyle Knowles:
I love that. Even the smallest tasks. That’s the thing.

April Frampton:
It is. At the time, I gave 110%. I was the best background actor. I think that what stood out to those guys is that there was a guy named Peter. He was the assistant on the production. I worked my way into getting to know him very well. I said, “You know what? I’m really curious, Peter.” I said, “I mean, I’m here as an extra, but this is not all I want to do. I’m here for other opportunities. Would you show me behind the scenes?” He literally took me under his wing and showed me how they mark for actors, the importance of lighting. I feel in that time, in that year, it was education. It is an education. You can go to school and have the best degree, but I’m telling you, what you get day-to-day listening to people. That’s the biggest thing.
You want to tell everybody what you think. No, you have to listen and really listen to what they’re telling you because it will resonate years down the road. I’m thinking about 2006, that time, it was some of the funnest time. Because I worked with Chris Pratt, Justin Baldoni, Emily VanCamp. They’ve all gone to have very solo, lucrative careers. I know Justin Baldoni is very passionate about, I mean, he’s married, he’s been doing this humanitarian type thing. They were filming. I’ve just watched their careers. To this day, I know Chris Pratt’s not going to remember some person that was on there, but I will always remember him. Those are A-list actors. To this day, I’ve worked around a lot of people and I will never forget how I was treated.
That is one thing as a business owner, even if you disagree with a client or you may have something you want to share with them, it’s how you talk to them and how you say it. Even if a client is wrong or a person is wrong, you have to be really careful how you address that in an email, in a text, because you can’t go back and change. If you send something in anger, you cannot change what you’ve done. I would just chalk this up to experience. That would be something I would leave your fans or your audience, is just be really mindful how you talk to people, text people and email people. Always be very professional, because you never know who they’re working with and that could hurt your business for a future client.

Kyle Knowles:
That’s great advice. Thank you. Talk about the path from, say high school to being on a set and being a background actor and meeting Chris Pratt and all that kind of stuff.

April Frampton:
I actually remember. I remember the very day that it transitioned for me. It was actually back in ’94 when it came to me. I was down at Trolley Square and they were filming a movie, and it really struck me. I was like, “Man, I want to get in on this action.” I went over and I talked to one of the PAs and they’re like, “Yeah, we’re filming this movie for HBO.” They gave me some information. At the time, the agency is called KLC. I had reached out to them to see what it would take to be an actor. They came in, they had me do a screen and said, “Here’s what you need to do.” They recommended getting an acting coach, because film and television wasn’t what I was used to. I realized that after doing theater and going in front of the camera is different. Because as a theater person, you talk with your hands, you talk with your body. In film, you talk with your mouth. You don’t move your head, you don’t move your hands. You have to be really still. It was a learning experience.
I can still remember getting one of my first commercial slot, and then I did some hair shows and they cut my hair off and my hair was really long. At that time, it changed everything for me because of the different look that I had. It got me into more auditions. With the opportunities of these auditions working with acting coaches, it’s something I really truly grew to love. I remember, I guess maybe I was maybe one of the extras up in Park City working on a Superbowl commercial. They had flown in the actors from Los Angeles and we were out there. I remember thinking to myself, walking and talking to the crews behind the scenes, the camera guide, the lighting people, and I was like, “This is so appealing to me.” Being around actors and stuff like that, you realize as a talent that it is your crews behind the scenes. It is a group effort and it is so crucial. Without them, you cannot be successful. That was where I really grew a love of film, television, and just really wanting to continue to pursue that over the years.

Kyle Knowles:
Nice. Then let’s talk about the transition to Hey Ape and doing guerrilla marketing and social media. That started a little bit before the pandemic or during the pandemic?

April Frampton:
I was working for a visual effects company. If you’re not familiar with what visual effects is, I was working for Sandman Studios. They are the behind the scenes when you talk about green screens, blue screens, CGI, stuff like that. The rolling credits on a film, that’s what the company would do. I had gotten introduced to the owner of Sandman Studios. I remember just thinking to myself going, “This is not really a world that I’m familiar, but I really want to get to know it.” I worked for them for about 10 years doing a lot of producing, project managing, stuff like that. I think it was probably right towards the end of 2018, beginning of 2019, right before the pandemic hit. There was a big, huge project that I was involved in. It was a global 9/11 project. I’m sitting in a meeting and I could just feel the sinking in my gut like, “You know what? This is no longer my passion.”
What I realized at that moment, in 10 years, they’ve never said, “April, what is your vision? What is your dream?” I was like, “They’ve never really asked that question.” I walked out of a meeting, and this is right before the pandemic hit. There was a photographer that was on our team, and I just said, “I’m getting a strange feeling that I need to look for other things.” I came up with this concept of between my filmmaking skills, networking and sales, I came up with an idea to start reaching out to companies to get product for them and then do more business to business. Give their product away to see how it would increase in sales. That’s where Shaun Banda, he had just moved here from Vegas when I reached out to him and I’m like, “Hey.” Told them my concept, told them my idea.
Because their marketing is very similar to a guerrilla marketing. When I started this, Hey Ape really hadn’t been born. It took me almost an entire year of getting on the livestream, doing fun facts and trivia. At the beginning of fun facts and trivia, I would do a shout-out to the businesses and I would do giveaways. I was doing giveaways from a lot of company, everything from Home Depot to Target to Chick-fil-A. I was getting a lot of giveaways. My program started growing that I could not keep up with the demand of giveaways. I was like, “Man, I got to keep up doing this, but I’ve got to figure out a different solution.” It was probably about maybe two years into what I’m doing, Shaun, we had taken some bun cakes up to the capitol during the riots to feed a lot of the staff and the people that were working up there.
As we’re walking out from the capitols, Shaun says, “You know April? We need to figure out a better tracking for you.” He said, “All right, here’s what we’re going to do.” We’re going to put Hey Ape on the back of his, it was BOGO, a buy one, get one free bundtlet, this little cake from Nothing Bundt Cakes. He gave me a thousand of the coupons. Of the thousand, a hundred came back. That is a huge tracking system for a company. This is where the tracking code for Hey Ape really came from. Now, any company I work with that has a Hey Ape code attached to it, whether it’s a discount or a giveaway, the companies keep track of what is being brought into them. That is the tracking system for the companies, is through the Hey Ape code. It’s almost like a value pack, is what it is.

Kyle Knowles:
When you were doing the livestream and you were doing giveaways, talk about what was the sequence of events that led to having product to give away? What were the steps you took to get free product to give away on your livestream?

April Frampton:
What I would say to them, and I’ll use Home Depot because that’s a pretty well-known, or Nothing Bundt Cakes. Basically, what I would say is I was like, “If you give me a product and you give me some little giveaways, I will do a shout-out on my live streams and give your company acknowledgement. Aside from that, you are also creating a community connection by giving back to the community, giving back to people.” That was the driving force of how I came up with the concept of doing giveaways. When I first started this whole process, something had come to me and the numbers one and the numbers 10 popped into my head when I broke it down into what it meant.
I would take one product within a very short mile radius, like one or two miles. I would go to 10 different companies, and I would write, at the time, I would just write April on there. Tell them April sent you or whatever. The company started seeing these coupons coming back to the business at a high amount. They’re like, “Wow, this is really setting a presence.” What also happens is that the companies can know exactly where the product is going by creating a livestream, tagging them in it, or when the coupon comes back, they know exactly where that’s come from.

Kyle Knowles:
You would go to Home Depot, talk to a manager and say, “Can I get some coupons? Can I get some free product? Can I get gift cards?”

April Frampton:
Yeah. George was the general manager at Home Depot. When I first went in there, it was actually taking Bundt cakes to them and said, “Hey, we just wanted to tell you thank you for all your hard work.” Because they were so appreciative of me bringing in the Bundt cakes to their employees, it started getting a really good collaboration for Home Depot and Bundt Cakes. The general manager at that time, he’s like, “Well, how can I help you out? I love what you’re doing for the community.” They started giving me, it started out at $200 a month on a gift card to come in and buy, actually use that to buy giveaways. They started giving me a $200 gift card, and then it went down to 150 and I would go in once a month.
They would get it. I would take everything up. Because I was trying to get as much product as I can for that amount, and I would give it away for the month. That’s how companies when I first started, I would say the first year, I would call it the no pay, but is it no pay? No, absolutely not. If you get a company that can give you monetary donations, product, it is as valuable to set that presence with a company and get a trust with them as it is a payment system. Because if you can cut down by partnering up with a company and they will give you product, gift cards, it cuts down on your cost, what you’re spending out of pocket.
They loved the concept that even though I could never post anything about Home Depot on social media because it’s a corporate company, but I would give them, like every other week, I would just give them quick updates on like, here’s what we’re doing. They would see, then I would take reference pictures to show exactly where I’ve been. I would take pictures of people holding up their product and show the general manager and send it to them. I created not just even a system through the Hey Ape tracking code. Through social media, through documentation of pictures, every single company will always know where their products are going and what’s happening with them, because I’m always tagging them or sending pictures or giving them updates.

Kyle Knowles:
Nice. Was this during the pandemic when you were taking Bundt cakes to Home Depot employees?

April Frampton:
Yes.

Kyle Knowles:
Because they had to go in. They weren’t able to work from home. Those were the types of employees that were out there despite the pandemic.

April Frampton:
What I pitched to Shaun, as I said, how about if we do an attitude of gratitude movement? We gave out thousands, I mean literally thousands of Bundt cakes. We went to like IHC, and we had the employees, I took pictures of them. We went to Harmons, went to Home Depot, we went to the employees of Target. We literally gave out these thousands of these Bundt cakes to many people across the state of Utah, really thanking them for their service, that they were being able to work and keep the businesses open. I think that they were so grateful and appreciative that we were willing to go the effort. There was one day, I had over 500 of the bundtlets and I gave them to IHC, the police station in Farmington, the fire department in Farmington and the sheriff’s department. We gave all that product out to those guys. That just went such a huge way to boost morale out and really keep these guys going, because it was tough. It was tough.
I was seeing boots on the ground going into these businesses, and it was not rainbows and butterflies. It was very stressful. It was very hard. People were scared, businesses were scared. What’s interesting is every single business I was marketing for, they were increasing their business 25% because of the guerrilla marketing. Because I was going out literally knocking doors of businesses, taking product in there between not just Bundt cakes, but other company’s products. It was still driving a ton of traffic. Now, on Bundt cakes, like on the national average, their average at, because they’re a franchise, is about a high, would be about 7%. Eight is really high. I was driving beyond 10% of traffic to their door through this approach. Those numbers were so significant to the, I guess the success of keeping their doors open. This is what I know that with one of the companies, even a small catering order could be the meaning of closing their door or keeping it open. That’s how crucial this is for them.

Kyle Knowles:
Nice. What are three things that any small business can start doing today to increase brand awareness?

April Frampton:
Three things, I would say, if you have a brick and mortar, it is sharing the wealth. If you’re in like, say a little complex and you’ve got other businesses, reach out to some of those other businesses and do trade. Get them to support you. Reach out to your friends and family and get those people through your door. Then the other thing is, is to go onto Google Review and leave a review for these companies to help boost their algorithm on Google Review. That’s the other one. I know that most companies have a marketing budget, and if they do some little giveaways, it will be very, very, like especially if they have a new company and nobody really knows about them, and you get two or three, ask two or three friends, create a concept that works for your business to get friends and family to do a referral program.
There are so many really, really honest shoestring budget. Because people think, because I’ve seen businesses, I just had a conversation with a business. This particular business was spending about $6,000 a month in marketing. He was not seeing his ROI. When he told me what it was, as I said, “Well, I can tell you why you’re not getting your rate of return.” Because even if you’re posting on social media, and that’s a great avenue as a sponsor, stuff like that. The word of mouth is always going to be a really crucial, because if one person really likes your business and they’re old school and they may not use social media and they tell two people and they tell two people. That is literally, if you say, “I want to increase my business five to six customers a month.” It might not be very much at the beginning, but it could be if they place one big order with you.
Yes, it is a huge, that’s what I would say for anybody starting. The other thing is, is think trust. Gaining a trust with your customers. If you always be who you say you’re going to be, like if they come in and if you offer a service, let’s say you have a heating company and you offer a service, just make sure that every employee, everybody across the board, they’re all on the same page. They treat your people kind. If you give them rebates, if you do, just make sure, because it only takes one person to have that not same synergy that really could ruin your business. By having a terrible food experience or a terrible experience just with a service, that can really hurt your business a lot. Because they can go on and leave a terrible review. It can, I mean, how many people will see it? Just be consistent with your mission statement.

Kyle Knowles:
Thank you. What was the number one obstacle you faced going into business for yourself?

April Frampton:
Honestly, capital, money. I literally had no, I mean, I started this on a whim. Not a whim. I had a plan of action, but I had done other entrepreneurial things that probably didn’t pan out as well. Going to family, going to friends, sometimes it gets a little hard if what your business that you’re pitching to someone they may not believe in. I would say the biggest obstacle was is just finding a little bit of the capital to start this. I think that when you grow or when you come into what you’re going to do, no matter what, still do it. Even if it means it feels like such a struggle, and you may not have that initial support in the beginning. If you believe in your heart, in your gut and you believe in yourself, that is the most important thing to just do it.
The biggest thing is, is in the beginning, that first year will either make or break. It can make or break. I’m coming up onto almost four years. What I loved is I would hear customers or I would hear businesses like, “Well, I want to think about it.” Or, “Well, if it works out for you, go ahead and come back to me.” Guess what? I will never ever go back to those businesses because they didn’t really believe in me in the beginning. I think you get to the point where you don’t have to beg for people to believe in you. If you believe in yourself, you have a great product, you’re very forthright. That is the biggest thing for any business owner to just be really transparent with your mission statement. That’s the biggest thing is, is come up with your mission statement of exactly what it is that you want to achieve with your business.
The other thing I do is vision boards, create your vision board. What I do with companies is I have them give me five focuses, and then at the five focuses, we focus only on three for 90 days. That’s why I can work with so many businesses doing so many events because I’m not trying to do and be everything for every single one of these businesses. Because in the beginning, I was trying to be everything. I was like an octopus. I was trying to be doing social media. I was the facilitator. I was all these things. What I realize, I’m to a point now, like April can only be so many places at one time. On the three, I would say two to three focuses, I will give 110% to every single one of those businesses.
When I’m creating these opportunities, I can take several businesses along with me for the same opportunity. You can do that as long as you have a clear vision, you write down your vision and you do, I would say when you’re first starting, do three months, six months, a year, and make sure that you have steps. Have somebody who is a little bit better than you being a mentor or being a coach or that you can get some feedback. Have somebody tell you things that are not great. Be honest with you. Hear the bad, hear the good, take the bad and be better at it.

Kyle Knowles:
Awesome. Who’s your bullshit detector?

April Frampton:
You know what? I’m going to give a shout-out to Greg Anderson over at Great Herb Escapes. I’m going to give a shout-out to Greg, because we had a situation where he had some concerns about, because he was giving me giveaways. He had some concerns about one of the companies that I was giving product to, and he brought it up to me. He goes, “April, I didn’t know how to go about telling you.” The great thing is, is that once you work out a good rapport with your businesses, if they talk to you and you can quit, you can turn off taking everything personal and you put your business cap on versus your personal account, you will always be successful. Even if somebody tells you, “You suck. You’re being terrible.” Take it as a compliment. Because you will never get better as a business owner if you have a bunch of employees who are always looking at you as the chief, as the boss. Who’s going to tell you to be better? Your clients. Listen to them. Make it right.
If you’ve done something that has offended one of your clients, and I’m not saying that you’re going to go to everybody, but it could make or break your business. I would have to say that I’ve really appreciated getting good and honest feedback from a business owner that’s been doing it a lot longer than me, had struggles, had struggles with employees. Where I have struggles, where I don’t have anybody who works for me, I work for a lot of people. All eyes are on me every single day, every time I go out, I represent a lot faces for a lot of businesses. If I was doing something that was questionable, you better believe that I will get called out. It’s only happened a few times, but I made a post for a company and literally within about a minute and a half, I got a text message, “April, you need to pull that post.” It was on social media.
I had put something on there, and I don’t know if I put the wrong website, but I did something wrong. My comment to them was like, “No problem. No big deal. I’ll fix it.” There’s been times I’ve created content. I’ve had to send a video or a certain content to a client, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8 times I’ve had to change it. One of the clients said to me, they’re like, “April, I’m sorry.” I’m like, “Look, no, it’s fine.” I said, “If you’re not happy, I’m not happy, then we fix it. It’s not a big deal.” Just if somebody gives you critical criticism, change your mindset. Take it as a positive. Because as a business owner, the only way that you and embrace your competition, see what they’re doing. Don’t think of it as a competition. Think of it as creating the competition or creating opportunities for yourself by what are other people doing.

Kyle Knowles:
What does your schedule look like the next 30, 60, 90 days? Give me a typical day, week for April.

April Frampton:
Before, I really dumbed down how much I was taking product out. When I first started with Shaun, Nothing Bundt Cakes, and then I have another company, Hungry Howie’s, because they’re the two main product companies that I go out for. I was going out about four times a week with product. I can’t do that anymore because it’s too busy. Generally, I call my Salt Lake, so on Tuesdays is any company I meet with in Salt Lake, I have two clients in Salt Lake. I go on Tuesdays to do stuff for them. Thursdays, I go out for two or three companies. Now, instead of going out four, five days a week, I’m limiting going out maybe two days a week. Then there’s other days that I might just be posting a lot on social media, and then there could be times that I’m setting up events. I’m reaching out, emailing people. I would say I don’t have a nine to five job. My schedule in the beginning was probably about 60 to 70 hours a week. A lot.
I was working on the weekends, I was working, I was gone all day and I was leaving no time left for family. They’re like, “Oh, my gosh. When are you going to be home?” Now, I feel like as a business owner, you have to put that boots on the ground efforts in to be successful. Anytime that you’re starting a business, you have insecurities like, what if they don’t like what I’m doing? Wipe it off the table because they’ll let you know. If it’s not done, they’ll let you know. Now, I would say I’ve gone down to about 30 to 40 hours a week and really limited how much time I’m really going out taking product. Because I’m going out less but getting the same results because I’m spending less time spinning my wheels. Now, when I go out, I feel like I do more research into the areas that I might be going to companies. It’s worth every effort that I’m going out in a day, or time.

Kyle Knowles:
You’ve developed your process. You’ve developed, here’s the standard operating procedure for how to do this, and you know how to do it now. You’re working smarter than harder, like you said. You’re not spinning your wheels anymore.

April Frampton:
It is. When I first started this, I didn’t realize how important these vision boards would come. I would say to date, I have done over, probably 160 vision boards for companies, for myself. Every single vision board has come to fruition. I don’t do a vision board without executing it. Because the difference that I’ve learned as being old school meets new school, is if you write it down on paper and you set it somewhere and you can type it in the computer, but if you physically write this down, have a little handbook with you, it will happen more times than not. That’s the key thing is, is that if you write something down, you create a vision board and you’ve got three levels that you’re trying to achieve, whoever is your go-to in life, just make sure that you’re accountable to somebody.
I’m accountable to a lot of people. There are some days I realize I just have to decompress because I’m like, “Nobody tells me to get up. Nobody tells me to go out and knock doors. Nobody tells me to do all these things.” Because when the pandemic hit, I think it was easy for a lot of us to get really depressed. Like, “Oh, my gosh. What am I going to do?” I literally created a purpose for me to get up every day to go out and talk to companies and set a strategy. Now, I don’t even need to think about it. It’s just inbred in my head. I’ve got to make a post or I’ve got to call a company.
I’ve taken a little bit of pressure off of myself to realize that it’s okay that some days, it’s okay to not be okay, and to question everything and to question whether I’m doing. What’s been really helpful is, is that the days that as a business owner that you’re sitting in the car literally questioning everything, and you get a text from a company or you get a text from somebody, “Ape, we really appreciate.” Or somebody has posted something, and you realize that what you’re doing is making a difference. If that’s the focus that you have that you want to create opportunities and difference, then being an entrepreneur is definitely something that will be very successful for you. Just do it and do it well.

Kyle Knowles:
Awesome. Is there someone out there who is your inspiration or your idol who does something similar to you? Or are you doing something so different that there isn’t anyone out there that you look up to and go, “I want to be like them.”

April Frampton:
Actually, there is. I think that there’s people who own businesses, and I look at these small businesses and what they’re doing. They’re truly people that I have so much respect for, for what they’re doing to start a new business. They’re dealing with employees. I feel like I’ve been very fortunate to be a part of the success of their business. I look at people like Tony Robbins, and he’s somebody that I follow and some of the things. I think what has inspired me is to be the voice of small businesses. I said this back in 2022, that one of my focuses for this year is helping other women in business, because it’s not a competition.
I want to be a strong suit for them and being a speaker and being an educator. I want to share the wealth. I actually had my first speaking gig in March. It was so exciting to be on that stage and talking to a bunch of entrepreneurs and small businesses. I thought, “Man, this is so inspiring to me.” Because it was like, I set a goal of three years to be on the stage. What I realize is in March, it was at the three-year mark that I said three years ago, I want to be on the stage as an educator. I hit my three-year goal on my bucket list.

Kyle Knowles:
That’s so awesome.

April Frampton:
That’s what I would say. I think that I hadn’t really thought about it, but when I was up on the stage, it hit me like a ton of bricks. It was really exciting to know that you have these baby steps that you’ve taken. I’m thinking two years ago, I went to a business meeting and we started talking. I ended up not getting him as a client, but what I learned from him was a pivotal point for me to be successful on Instagram. We got done with our meeting and his name is Justin. I said, “Justin, can I ask you a question about Instagram?” He spent 30 minutes with me. It changed everything. Because in the first year, I only posted on Facebook because I didn’t really understand Instagram. What I realized at that moment, you do not have to know everything.
Along the way, surround yourself with people who are really good in their field and learn. There’s a guy I follow. I strongly recommend anyone on this podcast, if you guys want to know social media. His name is Brock Johnson. The cool thing is, is he’s got like 600,000 followers, and I’ve sent him messages and he’s responded back, very quickly. The fact that I follow people who are really good, I’ve learned a lot of techniques, trial and error. I just stopped worrying so much about what people think and just do it. Just jump in and just do it. That’s what I would say. I would say that those are some of my mentors or people who I’ve really looked up to. I’m thinking, “Man, Tony Robbins just got out on the stage. Well, why can’t I be that person to get up and be the trainer, be the educator for small businesses to teach themselves, teach them training, teach them marketing like me?”
Because if it can mean keeping one more business open or helping somebody, then all these efforts and all this knowledge is paying off big time. That I’ve gone through the trials, and one thing I would also say, “Be really clear in your message.” I had brought a client and there was a miscommunication between what he thought I was doing and what I thought I was doing for him. I lost him as a client because he wanted me to create social media for him. I never went in and said, “Hey. I’m a content creator.” I think he thought I was going to do his whole campaign. There was a huge miscommunication. He got very frustrated with me. What I realized at that moment, because being a content creator does not make you a great social media manager. It’s a big difference. Be really clear in what you do, what you offer and your expectations. That, as a business owner. Don’t be shy about asking people who are really good about what they’re doing, ask them a lot of questions.
It will save you so much headache. Like setting stuff up, figuring stuff out. When I was setting up my business account at the bank, it was actually the branch manager who actually taught me about setting up a business account in a bank through like an America First. He had to actually teach me the steps. Because I’ve set up business accounts before. When you’re setting up a sole proprietor, LLC, all of it, it’s a little bit different. He went through the steps and actually helped me. He sent emails out for me. I will be forever indebted to him because I was asking other people and they didn’t know. It was literally somebody in that field that taught me what I needed to know.
Now, I’m like, “Wow.” Now, business owners are coming to me like, “Hey, Ape, what do you think? What would you do in this scenario?” Less than three years ago, I was that person asking for help. When I was feeling shy that I couldn’t ask for help, now I don’t have any problem asking for help. Or if I say I don’t know something, I don’t even pretend that I do. I’m just like, “I’m not familiar with that, but let me research it.” You can get around, instead of just saying, “Well, I don’t know.” Because it will put people off. If you just give them like, “I’m not really sure, but let me research. If I’m not 100%, I’ve got colleagues that I can reach out to. Let me find out for you.” It’s just how you change your verbiage when you’re talking to people.

Kyle Knowles:
I love it. It looks like we’ve spent almost an hour here. I wanted to get to just a lightning round of questions, and then I just have a few more things that I want to cover. These, I’ve been asking every guest, but what is your favorite candy bar?

April Frampton:
Oh, man. I would have to say Almond Joy. Almond Joy, man. Old school.

Kyle Knowles:
I love it. It was my mom’s favorite, so I love that answer. Favorite musical artist?

April Frampton:
Favorite musical artist. Well, I’m going to have to just straight up say Metallica.

Kyle Knowles:
Favorite cereal?

April Frampton:
Favorite cereal. Frosted Flakes.

Kyle Knowles:
Mac or PC?

April Frampton:
Mac.

Kyle Knowles:
Google Gmail, Workspace, whatever, or Microsoft Outlook and Office?

April Frampton:
Google Gmail.

Kyle Knowles:
Dogs or Cats?

April Frampton:
Cats.

Kyle Knowles:
Phantom or Les Mis?

April Frampton:
Oh, Les Mis. Les Mis.

Kyle Knowles:
I love it. Is there a book that you recommend the most to people?

April Frampton:
My go-to in the world of sales, and this thing has dog ear, it is called The Psychology of Selling. Even if you, as an entrepreneur, you still deal a lot. I don’t know. That’s been such a significant part of success for me. There is one that’s called The Site, it’s by, I can’t even think of his name. It’s called The Psychology of Selling, and then there’s the Art of Closing. They’re awesome. I think I’ve bought three different copies of the Psychology of Selling, because I think sometimes in business, when you think, “Well, I’m not into sales.” You actually are. You really are. I think if you get some really good, just some good facts from that and write them down in your mission statement of what you want to do. Because if you have any service that you’re providing, you are selling. that is 100, I mean, that’s just been a go-to for literally over 10 years for me.

Kyle Knowles:
I love it. I love the answer. How do you want to be remembered, April?

April Frampton:
I want to be remembered by literally changing the world. By setting a legacy for what I have done for these small businesses. I want to be known for making a difference in the world.

Kyle Knowles:
Then I did want to ask you, what’s different now, post-pandemic, than what was going on in the pandemic in the business community and business world and in the way you need to increase brand awareness and do guerrilla marketing or marketing, in general?

April Frampton:
I love this question. Because I actually figured it out. Companies, post-pandemic, are at a different level now. Because for two years, companies were not allowed to have people come in. It was social distancing and all of that. They were relying heavily on social media. Well, I think if you look at what’s going on right now, any store, anywhere you go, you’re going to see crowds of people. People are going back to concerts. You got to think outside of the box with your marketing. You got to get your customers back through your door. That is how guerrilla marketing would be very, very helpful for service, for companies. Because these companies that are spending thousands of dollars on social media, if you have a product, they’re still not tasting, they’re not seeing, they’re not feeling your product. It’s almost like the five senses.
Think of the five senses on your business and your marketing and how does that affect your customers. Then always put yourself as a client, as a customer, versus an owner and say, “Would I buy my product?” Or, “Would I use my service?” Trade, tit-for-tat and put yourself in the position. If they’re not happy with you, figure out why. Don’t just blow it off and say, “Well, the next customer.” You have no idea. I’ve seen this happen where we were at a car dealership and the salesman treated us like a salesman. You could tell they were there for a paycheck. They not only lost the business, it was a huge business to lose. Why we went to a different dealership was because the way you’re treated. Now, people are coming back to face-to-face marketing, face-to-face to your business.
You got to rethink how you think versus two years ago. Because marketing is different in two years and plus, I hear people talk about AI. If you are fearful of AI, do not be. Because you can have AI, but AI will never take your place. It will never take the place of a personal touch from the business. Especially, if you have a service or a product and even online, an online person could really probably benefit from having an AI. I think with the kind of marketing that I do or the people that I’m working with, don’t let a AI intimidate you. Just research and really research what it is that would make sense for your business. Don’t forget the people who supported you through the pandemic. You’ve got competition. Don’t worry about your competition. This is just an example. If you offer something that somebody in your same field offers, do something different. Focus on a different thing. That would be my 2 cents for them.

Kyle Knowles:
Thanks for answering that question. Thank you, April, for being so generous with your time. Tell us how we can find you online.

April Frampton:
Right now, I am getting my website redone. It’s like, you go to my website, it’s not pulling up, but you can follow me at heyape@_ on Instagram. Facebook is April Frampton. I’m trying to get it converted so that it’s got Hey Ape right in the title under that. Then if you are a TikToker and you want to follow me at TikTok, I do @metal918. Up above the thing, you’ll see Hey Ape. It all ties in together.

Kyle Knowles:
Metal?

April Frampton:
Metal918.

Kyle Knowles:

918. Is that an area code? What is 918?

April Frampton:
You know what? It’s actually what TikTok gave me. Because I looked under metal, so they give you like-

Kyle Knowles:
As in heavy metal?

April Frampton:
Like as in heavy metal? Yes, it was heavy metal. Because if you go to my TikTok content, there’s a lot of creative content on there. I do stuff for companies, but I do a lot of creative stuff on there. If you follow me in Instagram, Instagram is going to be a lot of awareness, brand awareness. I mostly just post for companies, their information. If you follow my stories.

Kyle Knowles:
That’s heyape_?

April Frampton:
Yep, heyape_.

Kyle Knowles:
It has an underscore at the end of it?

April Frampton:
Yep.

Kyle Knowles:
Heyape_.

April Frampton:
Then April Frampton at Facebook is a plethora of knowledge. Then you can also turn into my rock and roll program on Wednesday nights, Wednesday at 8:30, Mountain Standard Time. You can come, learn all the cool stuff about rock and roll trivia, film trivia and television trivia.

Kyle Knowles:
That’s awesome. I can’t wait to check it out.

April Frampton:
It’s good. I also, at TikTok, @metal918 on Wednesday nights. That is from 10:00 to midnight. My light-nighters. It just carries over. The difference between Facebook and TikTok, is Facebook will only allow me to play six seconds of a song because of copyright. You got to really know your music. On TikTok, I can play more songs. I get a lot of people who actually make music requests, so I become almost like a DJ.

Kyle Knowles:
That’s awesome.

April Frampton:
On my metal918. You can turn in, get your rock on, man.

Kyle Knowles:
I love it.

April Frampton:
Get your rock on.

Kyle Knowles:
I can’t wait to check it out. I’ll definitely join your livestream as soon as I can. Thank you so much for being here today.

April Frampton:
Thank you.

Kyle Knowles:
I look forward to seeing great things in the future for you. I look forward to you being an educator, teaching small businesses how to do marketing. I’m rooting for you 100%. Thanks for being here.

April Frampton:
Kyle, thanks for being you and being awesome. I’m glad that we’ve had this reconnection and a friendship for so many years. I get to give a shout-out here to Kyle in his successes with his family. He’s just starting his podcast, so follow him.

Kyle Knowles:
Awesome. Thanks, April.

April Frampton:
You’re welcome.