HelloCMO worked with Watermelon Swim, a Florida-based swim school multi-location business, to establish the company’s digital presence, share the brand story across channels, build a team,  and create an analytics tracker in just 18 months.

When Liane Caruso of HelloCMO met Micha Seal, owner of Watermelon Swim, to discuss supporting the Florida-based swim brand as a fractional CMO, Micha’s focus for their marketing was clear: “I want us to be everywhere.” 

In 18 months, Liane helped Watermelon Swim do just that. 

From creating the budget and strategies, setting up a digital footprint across core marketing channels, launching ads on podcasts and radio, facilitating special projects and events, getting analytics and tracking set up, and helping to hire a marketing manager to support the company moving forward.

Meet Watermelon Swim, A Family Business

Let’s rewind! Micha Seal is the owner of Watermelon Swim, a locally owned swim school teaching swim, safety, and survival from birth to adulthood. 

Watermelon Swim is a true family business, founded as ‘Seal Swim’ by Micha’s mother 40+ years ago, Micha grew up in the business (it was started in her backyard!) and bought the company in 2020. She rebranded the business to ‘Watermelon Swim’ and began focusing on scaling the brand and expanding locations. 

Today, three of Micha’s six kids work for the business, making it a true family affair!

Watermelon Swim has grown COMPLETELY organically (word of mouth, traditional advertising) for the entirety of its existence — Incredibly impressive! But as Micha became the sole owner and focused on truly scaling, the company was missing out on competing in the digital space.

Enter Liane and HelloCMO.

Liane knew that with the right strategy and leveraging supportive partners, she could get Watermelon Swim everywhere online, establish the brand story across channels, and hire a marketing manager to move them forward.

Liane’s kids actually attended the swim program when they were small, so getting in touch with Micha to discuss working with Watermelon Swim was a full-circle moment and made their work together to grow the brand even more special.

Getting Started With A Fractional CMO

Working with a fractional CMO is bringing on C-suite leadership for your marketing, which means the first step is always to gain a deeper understanding of your brand, direction, challenges, and goals.

HelloCMO starts with a research and onboarding phase where Liane comes into your brand and gains that understanding, creates a marketing plan, and sets the marketing budget.

“I was impressed with how Liane picked up so quickly on how I operate,” Micha shares, “Liane understood how busy I was and how my personality worked pretty much right away.”

Being able to mesh well with an existing brand and team is an important part of coming on board as a fractional CMO. Liane is quick to catch on to team dynamics, how to work with different personalities, and how to get projects done with support from different team members.  

The Main Goal: Watermelon Swim Digital Footprint

The first and largest priority for this partnership was to focus on the digital footprint and strategic digital marketing for Watermelon Swim. 

“Online research was a huge missed opportunity. We decided to focus on the digital footprint first to make them competitive with local instructors, larger franchises, and other swim programs,” explained Liane.

THE MAIN FOCUS AREAS FOR THE DIGITAL FOOTPRINT

Setting up a robust online presence included adding and improving the Watermelon Swim:

• Local Directories
• Google Business Profiles 
• Online Reviews
• Social Media – LinkedIn, Facebook, and Instagram
• Paid search campaigns
• Updating the website to reflect each location as its own property
• Content and articles

This overhaul was executed strategically — starting with a deep dive into the brand story and how they want to be presented online – and included support from some key partners to create effective campaigns.

BRINGING ON THE RIGHT DIGITAL PARTNERS

“Liane knows so many people! She brought in some really great partners to help with things like review management and SEO,” says Micha.

Liane has a wide network of partners to support a variety of digital marketing needs. For the goals of Watermelon Swim, they decided to work with strategic partners for review management, SEO, and paid advertising. 

These partners were integral in the setup of the digital footprint and other successful online campaigns like a review contest that helped establish the Facebook page.

TRACKING DATA TO MEASURE AND GROW

Getting analytics and tracking put in place was the other large focus of the digital strategy. Setting up a thriving online presence is all well and good, but seeing the numbers and data come in felt like the biggest shift for the Watermelon Swim team.

“It was very cool and interesting for me to see the numbers change,” says Micha, “We started collecting data for our digital side and that felt like the most massive shift.”

Liane explained that this is a brand that KNOWS their community marketing and is amazing at growing through referrals and local connections but setting up the tactical digital side was crucial to help them compete in a whole different space and, quite frankly, low-hanging fruit. Setting up the analytics to see those results was a huge project that will create countless opportunities in the future.

Featured Projects With A Fractional CMO

The digital footprint and seeing a massive shift in how data is collected was just one of the projects taken on by HelloCMO and Watermelon Swim. As they identified the brand needs and areas for improvement, they assembled a list of other projects to prioritize. 

Here are some of the stand-out projects that were completed in the 18-month partnership.

GET THE BRAND EVERYWHERE 

Along with the overall digital footprint, Liane got Watermelon Swim on radio advertising (they did a partnership where the local DJ put his son through swim lessons) podcast advertising, and paid advertising on social media channels.

TELLING THE BRAND STORY

Rebranding a business takes a lot of effort. Liane came on board very shortly after Micha had renamed the company to Watermelon Swim so a big part of the digital marketing strategy and campaign plans were focused on telling the brand story, Micha’s story, and increasing awareness around the new brand name, all while still maintaining the great community relationships the business has had for decades.

STICKER BOOK FOR RETENTION & ENGAGEMENT

Micha wanted to execute a project that would keep families in the waiting areas engaged while kids were in swim lessons. The goal was to create something that would help with interest and retention. She had an idea for a custom-branded sticker book and Liane made it happen. Now families can stay engaged and feel that extra care in the waiting areas.

MICRO-INFLUENCER CAMPAIGN

Shaq Barrett is an NFL player who devastatingly lost his two-year-old child in an at-home drowning. He is a big advocate of water safety and Watermelon Swim engaged him to speak at a water safety program to help bring awareness to this important issue. Liane helped to coordinate this campaign and share the impact across other digital channels.

HIRED AN INTERNAL MARKETING MANAGER

Liane is passionate about setting up her fractional CMO clients for ongoing success so helping to hire a permanent marketing team is often a project she helps with in her engagements. 

For Watermelon Swim, Liane created the job description, assembled skills and prioritized experiences, vetted candidates, and handed over final selections for Micha to select from for expanding her team. Liane also supported training the new marketing manager on the strategy and campaigns in place.

SUPPORT PUBLISHING A BOOK

Micha wrote a book on water safety and Liane helped to get the book printed. “Liane is great at executing and leveraging her network to help make projects happen,” says Micha. The book is another example of how Watermelon Swim stands out in their commitment to water safety across age groups.

Marketing & Project Results

Seeing the numbers come in is always one of the most rewarding parts of setting up a solid digital marketing presence and executing strategic campaigns. The Watermelon Swim team loved seeing the data connect back to their business goals.

Here are some of the fantastic metrics we saw from the 18-month partnership…

• 114% Increase in website visitors QOQ
• 26% Increase in website leads in 3 months
• 42.8% Increase in website leads closed 
• 94% of target keywords ranked in the #1 spot on Google
• 203% Increase in Google Business Profile views

Watermelon Swim has always been a busy, growing business but since Micha started focusing on scaling strategically and implementing a digital strategy, the company has recently opened their fifth location, with two more in development. 

Exciting times for safe swim education and community-focused growth!

Kind Words: Testimonials From This Partnership

“I would highly recommend Liane! Especially for brands who are ready to set up their digital presence and the more ‘strategic’ parts of marketing for their company,” says Micha when asked about her work with HelloCMO.

Working with a brand that has such a rich story, a great mission, and an amazing skill at growing a community makes the process of growing the digital presence such a blast. Liane is so excited to see the continued growth of the Watermelon Swim brand as they expand their next locations.

Liane is especially excited to see how the analytic tracker will support the brand’s strategic growth along with having a skilled marketing manager on board to guide the way moving forward. 

The HelloCMO philosophy is always to set up brands and teams to thrive after they are no longer needed. “My goal is pretty much to strategize and implement myself out of a job,” laughs Liane. 

It’s part of why the fractional model is so unique, having a fractional leader set up a strategy, systems, and team members to eventually have them move on to support other companies with the same.

Interested in getting results like these for your business? HelloCMO helps franchise (and non-franchise) brands with digital marketing strategy, hiring for your marketing team, and more. Contact us about working with a Fractional CMO!