Introduction of Rein In Your Herd Co-Hosts

We’re April and Laura, and we’re the hosts of The Rein In Your Herd Podcast. In Episode 1, we discuss who we are, what we do, and why we started this podcast.

 

Meet April Hardeman, The Tech-Savvy Equestrian 

 

April has been a horse lover all of her life. Her mom started riding when she was five, and April’s passion blossomed alongside her. She got her first horse when she was in eighth grade.

 

April became a horse industry virtual assistant when she started working with Mary Phelps in her two companies, Horses Daily and Dressage Daily. After graduating from college, she worked in the corporate world for a while, but never enjoyed it and jumped at the opportunity to get back to doing what she truly loved, helping horse businesses.

 

She’s also a wife of an active-duty soldier, and they lived in Germany at the time we started the podcast. They have a nine-month-old daughter named Rosalinde whose going to be a horsewoman extraordinaire.

 

Meet Laura Langfitt, The Word Wrangler

 

Laura is comparatively new to the horse world. It all started in 2016. Laura was in grad school and struggling. She’d never tried so hard and failed so much in her life. One day she was getting coffee with a friend, and her friend realized she needed a distraction. 

 

She brought her to Orphan Acres, a 250 Acre horse rescue in the hills of Northern Idaho. Laura thought she was going to be shoveling poop and tossing hay. She did a fair about of that for sure, but once she started going out there every day, the owner of the rescue began having her work with horses.

 

She met this little Arab named Double Trouble, who was seized by the Sheriff because he kept escaping his pasture and breeding the neighbors’ mares. The rescue had him gelded, and Laura entered the picture about six months later. 

 

As they started working together, Laura’s only goal with him was to teach him to walk politely on a lead rope so that he could get adopted as a project horse. A few months went by, and they got pretty good at walking, so they entered the round pen. Six months later, they were riding the hills. 

 

Two years later, Laura and Quinn, her husband, completed their graduate degrees. Quinn got a job in Sacramento, California, and Laura refused to move without DT. 

 

Laura and DT had two incredible years in Sacramento before she lost him to colic. DT went out with his boots on. He galloped and flew with his hair in the wind the day he died. He loved to run on the trail more than anything. 

 

Laura is grateful that he got to go out with so much heart as he did. Six months later, Laura and Quinn made the Drive back to Idaho and adopted a herd mate of DT’s. She is a Quarab named Molly Jane, and they are excited to start the process again with her.

 

The best way to honor the life of the horse who rescued you is to save another in their honor. 

 

A Bit More About Horses

 

April was there when her paint, King, was born. She’s done all the training on him and enjoys working with young horses. The pair have been apart for three years while April has been living abroad in Germany. They are looking forward to being reunited in 2020. 

 

April’s mom has been riding and caring for King in her absence. He’s been great for her because she had a nasty fall a few years ago and lost a lot of confidence. He’s helped her get her confidence back. She’s even cantering now.

 

Let’s Talk Business – Make It Rein

 

When April first started her business, she named it Dream Virtual Assistant. She was nervous about niching down to just horse businesses. Her nerves were not needed. All of her clients are horse lovers. 

 

In mid-2019, she re-branded to Make it Rein. She loves the song, what it stands for, and that’s what she does for her clients. April helps with everything when it comes to computers. She does content creation, social media management, email marketing, membership websites, Search Engine Optimization, YouTube, Google Ads, and Facebook Ads. 

 

Unbridled Content Marketing

 

Laura started Unbridled Content Marketing in 2019. She was working as a content writer for a financial company in Sacramento, and they cut her team in half. All of a sudden, she was expected to do the work of four people, and they wouldn’t give her a raise.

 

She started helping a trail riding friend who owns an orthopedic massage clinic. Laura did a great job, so her friend started passing her name around, and the next thing she knew, she had five clients. 

 

She left her job and has been helping horse businesses find their voice and build social media audiences ever since. Everyone has a story, and telling that story makes your ideal client love you. 

 

Why Did We Start the Rein In Your Herd Podcast?

 

We want to help the equine community better understand the online business world. It can be overwhelming, especially with social media consistently changing and being continually glitchy. 

 

It can be difficult to prioritize what you should be doing and see the results that social media is getting for your businesses. What is the actual goal of having all those social media accounts? Should you be on every platform? There’re so many questions, and we’re here to help you gain a better grasp of everything. Knowledge is power, and we want to give you that knowledge.

 

You don’t have to love technology to show up online and to build an audience. Laura is a technology stick in the mud. She yells for help on the daily, but she gets it done. You can too.

 

We’re going to bring you some technology tips while keeping it pretty simple so you don’t get overwhelmed. We want to show you how to grow your online community. We’re going to call it your herd because we’re horse people.

 

You have to grow your herd if you want to sell your products or services online. If you’re sitting there thinking, “I’ve been trying to do this for years, and it’s not working,” hopefully you keep listening because we’re going to show you how it is possible and it does work and you don’t need a huge following, you need the right horses in your herd. 

 

In this first episode, we leave you with one tip to get started. Be yourself. Don’t see someone else who’s successful and try to copy them. You can’t fake it. People can tell when you aren’t yourself, and it’s not authentic. It won’t feel to you or anyone else. Show up as 100% you. If you’re quirky and weird, show up as a quirky person because the right people will love that about you.

 

Don’t just look at the numbers. Work to create connections, not get followers. So many people pay for their followers. That’s not authentic, and there’s no connection there. You can’t get clients if you don’t have a relationship. 

 

Don’t look at the number of followers you have and compare yourself to other accounts because it doesn’t matter. Anyone can hire companies to do fake engagement and grow their following fast. When you look at posts and see no meaningful conversations are going on, you’ll know those accounts aren’t doing their owners any good. They’re not creating real energy or community. 

 

Thanks for checking out Episode 1 of Rein In Your Herd. Go out there and ride your horses because that’s why we’re all here!