Member Spotlight |
Joy O’Neal is a valuable Forge member and the executive director of The Red Barn in Leeds. If you haven’t heard about The Red Barn, children and adults with disabilities can come to their facility to relax and learn with horses! The Red Barn strives to be a place where anyone can be loved and accepted. Joy’s story and life experience is inspiring, and we wanted to share more about her and this organization that has affected so many.
They serve over 100 individuals each week!
Who are your biggest influences? Who inspired you to do what you’re doing now?
I’ve been incredibly lucky to have so many amazing people to influence my life. I have a huge, close-knit family that have always set a great example of working hard, helping others, and sticking together. We’re far from a picture-perfect family, but I never doubted that I was loved.
In college, I met Julianne and Billy Phillips, known to everyone as “The P’s.” They opened their den to young people every night and loved us all unconditionally. Time in their den changed my life as I struggled through many difficult times as a young adult. Through the P’s, I met Fr. Frank Wade, a Catholic priest who strengthened my faith and taught me how to incorporate it into every day life.
All five of our children rode horses when they were growing up, so I’ve seen first hand how horses can help children. I was inspired by Anita Cowart to start a therapeutic riding agency that would help children with disabilities and special circumstances learn to work with horses since there are limited opportunities available to them.
“I see The Red Barn as the combination of the faith, hope and love that I learned from these influences in my life.”
What is your biggest challenge with continuing The Red Barn each day?
Raising the money to keep everything going. I’m sure this is the case for almost every nonprofit though. There’s such an incredible demand for our services with a long waiting list for children to participate. Before we can even think about serving more children, we have to raise the money to serve our existing students. Almost every day we get a request from a family or organization wanting to receive our services, but we have to just keep adding them to the waiting list because we can’t afford to expand. And, that makes me feel a lot of pressure because I know how much their lives would be changed if we could just get them in our programs.
What surprising lessons have you learned along the way?
Things that may seem bad or frustrating at the time often can turn out to be okay in the long run. For example, one year we were going to do a lot of work to our pastures, but the person doing it had to back out at the last minute due to his equipment breaking. I was so annoyed because I had really wanted to do this project. Since there was only a limited amount of time to get the work done, we had to postpone the project. A few weeks later there was a huge storm that would have destroyed the pasture work we had planned to do. So, in the end, the broken equipment kept us from doing work that would have been ruined by the storm. At the barn we refer to those types of annoyances as, “pasture rotation frustrations” to remind ourselves that sometimes a disappointment can be a blessing in disguise.
Where and how do you work best?
I can work pretty much anywhere, but I think the right environment helps facilitate the best work. Obviously, much of what I do needs to be done physically at the barn. But, sometimes I need a place like Forge where I can be focused because it’s easy for me to get distracted or interrupted at the barn. I also think a change of scenery helps re-charge my brain. Plus, it’s much easier to meet folks who work downtown at Forge rather than asking them to drive out to the barn.
Whats the best advice you ever received?
My grandmother had to drop out of school to help care for her family, but she always talked about how grateful she was that she learned to read because then she could teach herself anything she wanted to know. She died many years ago, but I can still hear her telling me to read and learn as much as I can.
Thanks to Joy for working so hard to establish this amazing organization and serving so many in need. We love having you as part of the Forge community!
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Forge News and Updates |
Forge is hosting it’s very first event and we’d love for you to join us! We’re bringing in local business founders who can offer advice and tell stories about the growth of their companies.
First up, Kasey Birdsong is our keynote speaker and he is the founder of Planet Fundraiser. They raise funds for schools and nonprofits through your everyday purchases. Businesses near you choose a percentage that they’d like to donate on purchases made at their stores. You simply upload your receipts to their app- it’s as easy as that!
Next up, Cindy Martin is the Founder and President of Bham Now. They are the modern, mobile guide to Birmingham and they’re invested in making our city better! They offer digital media and advertising that is engaging. To prove it, they have over 130,000 unique visitors to their site each month.
Then Jeremy Carter who is one of the owners at Breakout Birmingham. Breakout is pure entertainment- an escape game located in Homewood with a variety of different themed rooms. Go with a small group of people and you’ll have an hour to use clues and puzzles to escape the room!
Lastly, Luke Allen is the Vice President of sales at Occupational Health Dynamics (OHD). They provide top-quality equipment and services to health care providers of occupational medicine.
We’re so excited for our first event so come scope out the Forge workspace and hear these amazing speakers share their stories.
Join us September 21 from 7:30-9:30 for breakfast! Oh and Bham Now gave us a shoutout so check it out!
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Instagram Marketing, Lunch & Learn, Social Media |
Russell Hooks followed up last week’s Lunch & Learn with Part 2: Instagram Micro-Influencers. Russell says the role of social media influencers is changing. The Kardashians aren’t the only ones who can boost a brand! We delved into the emerging field of micro-influencers and talked about how to identify and work with an influencer who is right for you.
“Micro-influencers are testimonials on steroids- they’re effective for marketing your brand, service or product.”
In the beginning of Russell and Amber’s Happenin’s In The ‘Ham account, they wanted to keep their identity anonymous. They thought this would be a good way to focus solely on Birmingham and its activities and events. But their followers started to wonder if they were working for a company like Al.com or even the City of Birmingham. So they eventually decided to begin posting selfies at different events around Birmingham to personalize their Instagram account. This helped them continually gain more followers as people felt more connected to them!
Now they are micro-influencers in Birmingham! Many different local companies, nonprofits, brands and events partner with Russell and Amber to promote to the Birmingham population.
In the past, you needed to be rich to be a influencer! But Instagram has totally changed the game. Micro-Influencers can help get your product in front of a new population of customers who wouldn’t have previously seen it.
Happenin’s In The ‘Ham ‘swipe up’ feature
“Micro-influencers are identified by their industry or geographic location.”
Many ask, “How can you identify who a micro-influencer is?” Accounts with over 10,000 followers can add the swipe up feature on their Instagram story to provide a link to a website or product. So find someone who is in your industry! Think fashion, food, lifestyle blogging, travel, fitness, etc. Just make sure their following population aligns with yours. (Compare your Instagram insights if you have a business account)
Direct messaging on Instagram can easily connect you with an influencer who may help grow your business. Whoever runs that Instagram account clearly has influence over the company and makes big decisions for the brand!
“Treat Instagram as your storefront window- showcasing your product/service to your customers.”
So in conclusion, go after the personalities that fit your brand and align with your consumers.
Instagram Marketing, Lunch & Learn, Social Media |
It’s very likely that you’ve heard of Happenin’s In The Ham before. And if not, be sure to follow their website and social media accounts. Russell and Amber Hooks have a dedicated following and almost 20,000 followers on Instagram! They know exactly what’s going on Birmingham, and they’ll connect you with the best events and activities around town.
Russell Hooks is one of our founding members at Forge, and he led our first Lunch & Learn event. Focusing on the power of Instagram marketing, Russell talked through location tagging, organic engagement, Instagram stories, frequency and time of posting, hashtags and much more.
“Facebook, Instagram and Twitter all have their own language. You have to learn the native language for each of them.”
Over the last two and a half years Russell and Amber have developed their Instagram account without boosting any of their posts. They decided to use Instagram as a platform because it was the best way to show visually what they wanted to portray about Birmingham.
A few quick tips from Russell:
- Instagram is best for a quick overview. Use Facebook and your own personal website to go into more detail.
- Location tags on Instagram are often overlooked but they are valuable- USE THEM!
- Asking questions in your posts gives you more comments from followers…which brings you up in the algorithm feed!
- When you have 10,000 followers or more you can add the “swipe up” button to send people directly to a link.
- Most popular times to post: early morning, lunch, 4:30-6:30pm and right before bed!
“Social media is a lot like fitness- the results take time. It takes consistency.”
Many people ask “How many people should I be following on my Instagram account?” Russell says you should strive to get 2 followers for every 1 person you’re following. And avoid paying for followers- people can easily spot that and they’ll assume you’re disingenuous!
Forge Members at our very first Lunch & Learn!
Use Instagram for business purposes in the right way and you could have a viral marketing success. But use it incorrectly, and your efforts on the site could be a big fail. Thank you Russell for teaching us these valuable tips and tricks!
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Forge News and Updates |
Our space has drastically changed in the last few weeks! If you haven’t come to visit us yet, stop by the Pizitz building and come up the mezzanine level. Here’s a few pictures to show you around our space!
When you step off the elevator, you’ll see our front desk- complete with light-up Forge letters. All of our furniture was made locally- including this amazing desk!
Next up, our front lounge area. Comfy couch and chairs make it the perfect place for a casual meeting or phone call.
You can continue walking through our doors into the kitchen! We know the kitchen is at the heart of what Forge offers our members. This is where we’ll gather for fun, community-building and networking events. Happy hours. Brunch. Cookies. All the good stuff.
All the essentials- refrigerator, microwave, dishwasher. Oh and Revelator Coffee every single day. And some light snacks because we all need those during long work days.
Next to the kitchen you’ll see a light, airy, large conference room which is available for our members to book for meetings and events. This room holds 8-10 people and you an use our TV for presentations and videos.
Outside this conference room is our printer/copy machine. We’ve unanimously decided it has proven to be the most difficult part of opening Forge. Printer woes are real.
Oh and we are in love with this painting from Wellon Bridgers. Isn’t it beautiful?!
Our small conference room is also available to our members for meetings consisting of 4-6 people. We love this space and can’t wait for more Forge members to utilize it!
As you continue walking, you’ll enter into our common space. Our members have been spreading out into this area overlooking the hustle and bustle of the food hall.
We’ve got this additional room that we lovingly refer to as the “pow wow” room. This is a non-reservable area for our members to use for video chats, small meetings or phone calls.
Last but certainly not least, the penthouse conference room. This is the largest conference room available with space for up to 14 people. It’s up on the ninth floor next to the fitness center, pool and the picturesque view of Birmingham’s skyline.
We’d love for you to stop by and check us out!
Click here to schedule a tour today!
