A BIT ABOUT ME
As a model, teacher, motivational speaker, and life enthusiast, I pride myself on having a strong and reputable personal brand that inspires as much as it empowers.
Having spent the past year working diligently growing my own social platform along with those of numerous clients and affiliates, I've seen first hand the positive impact that can come from meaningful social marketing and proper branding. With so many people plugged in on the daily, the impact of influencer, athlete, and social marketing is huge and it's my job to help you tap into that.
SPECIAL SKILLS
Adobe Suite | Web Design | Branding | Styling | Creative Direction | Management | Photography | Leadership building | Community Integration
SOCIAL IMPACT
At the moment my own personal network stands at 41.7k followers, with over 254,400 impressions a week. It's neat because as the network grows I've found that so does the engagement, community involvement, and impact. Through my own community service as well as through the SKYN network (an online magazine I co-founded that has a 327k network of it’s own) I've been able to reach out and speak to thousands of people nation wide about a wide variety of issues, topics, and causes. I honestly never expected I'd be able to make such an impact, but lo-and-behold, here we are, and I couldn't be more grateful. Now I find myself coaching others on self-confidence, career development, and self esteem, managing social marketing, modeling, designing, and acting as a national ambassador for some pretty neat brands such as Skechers, Spareparts, Blu-dot beverages, Jean Machine, and Hakim Optical to name a few.
MY SECRET
I don't regram. I create.
Forget regramming old content, I specialize in taking your product and lifting it to new heights through creating customized content that speaks directly to your audience.
It's not just about creating content, it's about creating a strong brand identity, a branded community, and brand loyalty. It's not just about creating content, it's about creating content that's going to resonate, entice, and engage your target market ensuring that you don't just gain followers, you actually gain customers. You don’t just outfit people with gear, you unite a community of likeminded individuals.
INTEGRATED CONTENT OPPORTUNITIES
SOCIAL MEDIA STRATEGY & CONSULTING
SOCIAL MEDIA ADVERTISING
EMAIL MARKETING CAMPAIGNS
GRAPHIC DESIGN/ PHOTOGRAPHY / VIDEO
SOCIAL MEDIA MANAGEMENT
INFLUENCER MARKETING
WEBSITE DESIGN/DEVELOPMENT
Clients, Affiliates, & Networks
SKYN MAGAZINE
ASHLEY HASSARD
KALEV ESTIENNE
"It's always a pleasant experience working with the team at SKYN Magazine. They're always a step ahead of me when executing any promotional work and features. The impact that they make as a publication is directly in line with why business at LD WEST is booming, and it's why I keep putting projects in their hands"
- Luis Marin, Public & Client Relations, LD West.
"Working with SKYN has been great. Eames and Ashley did an awesome shoot with our product. We will keep sending over pieces for review due to the quality of the press release + quality of content we received back to reuse."
- Zaid McGovern, Marketing Spinnaker Watches,
"We contacted Ashley via instagram and were extremely grateful with her amazing ideas and support of our brand and its causes to help others. We think we got great exposure from SKYN magazine and would love to work again."
- John Wright, Director, Lyfe Watches
"You could use all of the best words in the dictionary synonymous to 'amazing' to describe Ashley Hassard, and still not get the full picture. She is genuinely caring, hard-working, motivational, and simply someone you want on your team. If you can track her down to work with you on a project, you know it will be a big success. This girl is going places."
- LEILA, Co-Founder & Chief Partnerships Officer at Fitset
"Over the course of the past two years, I had the unique benefit of working alongside Ashley in several capacities. Ashley has been relied on by Me to We's China team to lead diverse groups of students through volunteer service experiences, speech and confidence strengthening workshops, as well as strategic reporting for the expansion of our programs across the country. To state that Ashley has been a beneficial addition to the team in China would be an understatement. Her energy, enthusiasm and leadership qualities have proven to be an unparalleled force that we are so fortunate to have support us. As one of the strongest team players I have had the opportunity to worked with, I do not hesitate for moment in providing Ashley with a strong recommendation to any of the causes she may choose in the future." - ROB PALMER, Director of Leadership Programs at Me to We
YOUR GOAL
Your goal is to bring them out of these places, even for just one day, and give the patients and their families experiences that will create lasting memories.
YOUR MISSION
To provide unforgettable memories of the performing and visual arts for children who may be faced with life-threatening illnesses or disability.
YOUR PASSION
You’re passionate about kids. You love supporting them in doing what they do best: being kids. But many children across Canada are challenged with a life-threatening illness or disability. So your mission is to spread hope and happiness by creating unforgettable memories through the power of performance and visual arts.
Let's face it, planning, executing, and fundraising is a full time job. Now try to imagine planning, executing, fundraising AND innovating!
Now, that's just silly. .
That's where I come in.
Let me take on the "humble brag" for you and help you step into the next best step you can make. Whether it's honoring your existing partnerships, showcasing what you're doing or helping you attract new great things to do, there's plenty that can come from having a fresh set of eyes, and I'm here to help make make it possible.
THE GAME PLAN
Showcase Lights Camera Imagine
Expand the brand/network
Fundraise more
Raise more awareness for the cause
Diversify audience/Appeal to a more gender neutral audience
Showcase Canadian Talent
Team up with other artistic non-profits for kids to maximize opportunities for Lights, Camera, Imagine Kids
Get your social media game on part
It’s your 8th annual Poker Tournament. Let’s make it a great one!
You’ve put on 7 phenomenal poker events, let’s give Lights, Camera, Imagine the 8th year encore it deserves!
Rosewater is a great first step, now let’s take that to the next level.
The first thing you mentioned to me was that you wanted to help expand the event to a larger, more diverse audience. So here are my initial thoughts on that…
Switch it up. Switch your Burlesque dancer to Brazilian - it sounds like a funny little tweak, but the twist will allow you to maintain that sexy draw, without it being too overtly sexual. Brazilian dancers tend to be a bit more socially acceptable and considered to be a tad more of a “family friendly” form of entertainment.
If you really want to keep the Burlesque dancer, as I know she’s a friend of yours, then try maybe having a variety of dance styles featured, ex. a local hip hop group, some Brazilian dancers, some ballet, gymnasts, etc.
The Mix-up will help defuse it a bit, and will also help fill some “entertainment time”
Double bonus, there’s a good chance many of these dance forms will be quite reasonable in terms of price, and/or possibly pro-bono as you could get student groups to perform or teams
POSSIBLE ENTERTAINMENT THAT MIGHT BE WILLING TO DONATE A PERFORMANCE or PERFORM FOR REASONABLE RATES
Hostesses or dancers from RS DIVAS - Toronto Performers
Contact here.
A one or two song performance by TYLER SHAW - Toronto based Singer
Contact here.
A runway show with LESLEY HAMPTON - Toronto Indigenous Designer
Contact here.
Add to the poker. I love that you’re expanding the Poker games this year to include more diversified casino games. I think you’re totally right, having alternative games will help not only draw more of a crowd, but lock in the crowd that you’ve got there.
If you haven’t already I’d look into having
Blackjack
Roulette
Poker (obviously)
War tables
Maybe a spin the wheel for a chance to win something
Toonie Toss (Old classic, but surprisingly engaging)
Silent’s good, but have you tried live? I can’t remember if you guys only did a silent auction last year or if you incorporated some part of it as a live auction, but if you haven’t already, consider having a live auction as a part of the event - it’s a little more interactive and gets people into it more. It also puts a little more pressure on them to amp up their donation game, and get involved.
Raffle it off. Raffles are a fun and easy way to raise even more funds by people who might otherwise not be able to attend your event. Sell tickets for $5 each, or something along those lines, and do something along the lines of a 50/50 draw, where half of the proceeds get donated towards the charity, and the other half get won by the person whose ticket gets drawn. You can continue selling tickets at the venue itself to increase sales, and boost engagement for those who are there.
I’ve also seen this done only on location and with dollar store raffle tickets, where people by “hugs” from ticket sellers - the purchaser pays $20 for one full arms length of tickets (which becomes comical as it ends up being quite a lot) and the ticket seller sells them to them with a big wrap around hug with all their tickets wrapped around them. It becomes a little silly, but is a great ice breaker at events and more fun to sell than just basic rolls of paper.
Rather than a 50/50 you could also have the tickets be things that people can use to “bid” towards auction items. So they place their purchased raffle tickets in a box in front of the item they want, and they have a chance for their ticket to be drawn for that specific item (saves you having to deal with licensing that can come with people winning “cash”).
Ramp up Promotions. You’ve done a phenomenal job so far at promoting within your own network, I’d love to now see what happens if you can expand outside of it! Odds are, a big part of why you’re attracting mainly men to your event, is because you’ve probably got a strong network of men. Try expanding to see what happens! Possible ways to do that would be:
Media circuits. If it’s for a charity odds are it’ll be pretty easy to get some great press on this. Think Breakfast Television, CP24, Radio stations, Upworthy, Now, Metro, etc.
Utilize your social media. You’re not doing too much with your social media right now, and that’s a solid shame. The potential for outreach is huge on social media so whether you’re just organizing your charities social page and fixing up the digital branding, or actually paying for paid promotions through facebook/instagram, there are a lot of opportunities for you to at least curate your brand a little more to provide a more united front for those already supporting or those who might want to help support in the future.
Promoters. Don’t underestimate the value of promoters. While I don’t know any poker player promoters offhand, I bet they wouldn’t be too hard to find if you just searched some other local poker events that are being promoted through social media. Looking for female attendees? Try female promoters.
Influence is key. Invite some local influencers for a fun “night on the town” - provide them with a free ticket to the event in exchange for some posts and promotions. Some will do it for the free ticket, some might ask for a small monetary donation, typically between $50-$150 per post, but it’s a great way to channel a very targeted audience and gain credible recommendations from local influential sources people follow.
Utilize established networks. We did a lot of this last year. Don’t underestimate the community that poker brings. There are a ton of great groups that already exist on Facebook that you can join and pump flyers into.
Draw the talent. You’re totally right when you say that talent draws people in and helps sells tickets, but you don’t have to go as big as you might think. Try shooting a little lower and aiming for some amazing local talent that will still be a draw but might be a little more attainable. All of the talent below would be pretty good fits for your audience, and would definitely help spice things up a bit. A lot of them would probably perform for a pretty reasonable honorarium allowing you to donate even more funds towards the actual charity with proceeds earned.
Putting the chats of the event on hold for a minute, let’s chat expanding some of what we can offer at Lights Camera Imagine.
While it’s PHENOMENAL what you’re already doing - there are a couple ways you might be able to do a bit more, or expand what you do a bit at relatively no additional cost to you.
Some ideas off the cusp would be:
Vibe Arts.ca - An incredible organization that works towards providing youth with artistic opportunities. They typically specialize in providing art programming towards inner city youth, but I’d bet they’d open their catchment if you explained what sort of youth you’re hoping to work with.
The free concert series at the Canadian Opera House. Did you know there’s a free opera series at the Canadian Opera House? You could easily coordinate a trip for some or all of your kids/families and go for a free excursion on one of their designated free days. I’d even bet if you explained to them the situation and organization that they’d provided reserved seating for some of your guests so you wouldn’t have to rely on that first-come-first-served business.
Register with Kids Up Front Foundation Toronto. They’re a charitable organization that provides access to arts, culture, sport and recreation for children and adults who otherwise do not have the opportunity. They distributed donated subscription tickets that people can’t use to children and families from more than 200 participating charities and social service agencies in and around Toronto. It probably wouldn’t yield you enough tickets for everyone in your organization, but I bet it could get at least a few free tickets for a couple kids/caregivers at least a couple times a year.
If you’re interested in working with them all you have to do is show that you’re working with underprivileged children and youth and have a charitable number - Just call Nicolle at 416-479-6710 or email nicolle@kidsupfronttoronto.com for more information on how to become a Kids Up Front Agency Partner
LCBO Fundraising. If you have a charity number you can register to fundraise outside the LCBO. It takes a little man/woman power as you need volunteers to actually stand outside and ask for donations, but with two or three people you can raise upwards of $2000 a day (if you pick the right day). I believe once you register you’re allowed to apply to have up to two days a year at two locations each appointed day. If you pick strategically, like right before Thanksgiving, or Super Bowl Sunday, it can be quite beneficial.
Go Local. There are a ton of free events for kids and students that go on across the city. Whether it’s the free Youth Day Concert in Dundas square, or Panfest in Downtown Toronto, there are a bunch of arts events you can bring the kids to that will grant you free tickets.
For any questions, comments, or concerns don't hestitate to reach out to me at:
info@ashleyhassard.com
www.ashleyhassard.com
647-262-1033
© 2020, All Rights Reserved
ALEXANDRA PORAT
Alexandra Porat’s first public performance occurred at the age of four during a visit to Beijing, China. She never forgot the enthusiastic encouragement expressed by the crowd, and continued to perform every chance she had, including school and shopping mall talent shows. She now has more than 20 million views on YouTube and was featured in the Shawn Mendes episode of Glamour’s online series You Sang My Song.