2023 Business Social Media Best Practices and Predictions with Andréa Jones

NOTE: This podcast was transcribed by an AI tool. Please forgive any typos or errors. SPEAKERS Andréa Jones, Erin Ollila Erin Ollila 00:04 Hey friends. Welcome to the Talk Copy to Me podcast. Here we empower small business owners to step into the spotlight with their marketing and messaging. I’m your host, Erin Ollila. Let’s get started and talk coffee. Erin Ollila 00:25 Hello friends today we are here to talk to Andrea Jones about all things social media, we’re kicking off a new series here on the podcast. And in this episode, what you can expect to hear from us is how to show up authentically, in addition to what you can expect from 2023. When it comes to social media. When you hear Andrea’s name, I’m sure you equate that with social media because she’s done so many wonderful things online encouraging small business owners to show up and stand out in a way that feels authentic, easy and really comfortable for them. But what you may not know about her is that she actually met her husband on YouTube. So spill the details. I need to know everything about that. Andréa Jones 01:08 Oh, yes, the year was 2013. So yeah, you know, still Erin Ollila 01:14 back in the day of the digital landscape. Andréa Jones 01:18 And at the time, I was a YouTube content creator. And this is before it was cool, because my friends were all like, That’s very odd behavior. You’re doing what now posting videos where I met my husband at the time, he was also recording YouTube videos. And we collaborated just like you and I are doing today, Aaron. And all I did. All I did was like I commented on one video and was like, Oh my gosh, I like your Canadian accent. Andréa Jones 01:44 The rest as they say is history. We started dating long distance and then I moved from Atlanta to we live now in a little town outside of Niagara Falls in Canada. Erin Ollila 01:54 Okay, Atlanta to Canada is is quite the move. That was the shock of winters. Big deal for you. Andréa Jones 02:01 Oh, yeah, I hibernate enters. I’m thankful that I work from home, and then I do not leave. Erin Ollila 02:06 So thanks so much for being here on the show. You know, before we really even begin, I kind of want to talk about the idea of annual planning when it comes to social media content, because I am an Ideator. Like it is easy peasy for me to sit down and come up with a year’s worth of content for anything. And get excited about that. And it is terrifying for every single one of my clients when I say something like let’s plan the year, and let’s plan six months or even a quarter. So now that everyone has kind of settled into the new year, and they’re thinking about like, oh, yeah, those goals I set for myself, What am I supposed to do with them again? How can they kind of not necessarily reset, but like review that? Or even start again, I’d say if they if they didn’t set some big goals for themselves when it comes to showing up on social? Andréa Jones 02:56 Yeah, you know, I think goals are so aspirational. And we make them from a really good place. But I personally don’t find them very helpful. So for me, I usually like to look at the year in campaign view. So looking at your business, what are the key components to the year key launches, key campaigns that you have coming up, and then you can start to frame your content around that. So for example, every year in my company, we do a LinkedIn challenge in January. So it’s very easy for me to go okay, LinkedIn is January, that means December in January, probably we’re talking about LinkedIn and our content. So kind of like theming it that way can be very helpful for business owners. And then you can zoom in to you know, that month view or that week view and then create content pieces from there. But once you have those key campaigns blocked out, it makes it a lot easier to kind of navigate through those. Now. I also want to kind of, for on the goal level, identify strategies versus tactics, because sometimes we put tactics down as a goal, when we really should, or what I recommend is to look at the strategy first. So the difference is strategy is saying, you know, I want to share my message through video. That’s a strategy that you want to do a tactic is posting once a week on tic tac, right? And so that tactic can actually if you write that down as a goal you can possibly be limiting yourself, especially if you start doing it and you go, I don’t like it here. And then you started to feel bad about that tactic that you put down as a goal. So when you’re looking at your strategy goals, we want to think about okay if you’re if you feel comfortable on video and you want to share your message through video, that could be a long form YouTube video. It could be a short form Tik Tok video, it could be something in between and now we can use the year to kind of start testing out some of those tax Next, and actually see what we like, like what feels good for us to create. And then also what works, what our audience likes to consume, Erin Ollila 05:07 even before we get started to like, encourage people review the goals that you have, right? And then like, determine that like, it’s, I’m just kind of echoing what you’re saying here, but determine what is the difference between the strategy and the tactic. And then make sure that when we’re considering things like tactics, like showing up on tick tock, for example, that we also realize that there’s no one checking up on us, right? Like, no one is I love consistency. I mean, consistency is what trains your like leads to your audience to know that you’re going to show up to know what we’re going to talk about. So I’m not encouraging people to just kind of like jump in and do whatever works for them. But know that you can still be consistent and give yourself some grace. And that is truly the way that you are going to show up in your business. That alongside knowing what the heck, you’re actually saying, when you show up on social, right, because without a plan, that’s where the overwhelm, overwhelm comes from people will be like, I don’t know what to say, I don’t know what to do, like, Yes, I’m supposed to show up on tick tock this week. But like, for what reason, right? Andréa Jones 06:10 Yeah, yeah. And I love what you said about consistency. Because sometimes we create frequencies in that consistency that we actually can’t commit to as business owners, especially those of us who are di wires, right? We want to do it ourselves. But when you’re doing it yourself, you know, maybe showing up weekly isn’t the thing for you, maybe it is every other week, or maybe it is once a month, you know what I mean? And being okay, with like, finding a frequency that you can actually commit to, instead of trying to post every day for a week, and then not posting for six months. We’ve all been there. So I think that that what you highlighted about the consistency piece is so valuable for business owners, and don’t beat yourself up over it, you can you can always adjust as the year goes on. Erin Ollila 06:57 Yeah, and part of like any marketing effort is really testing. And I think this is where there is a big, like chasm between big brands and tiny businesses that I’ve seen, right? Is that big brands one, of course, there’s a marketing budget, but let’s put that aside for a second, let’s consider a, like a playing field, they have the experience to know that testing things is what gets them answers to to determine the tactics, right. So they’re willing to say, Yeah, let’s try showing up in tic tac, you know, let’s, we’ll start with once a week, okay, maybe we’re going to try twice, oh, you know, this isn’t really working, let’s go to five days a week, whatever, I’m totally making this up right now. But they’re gonna test it and then determine what works for them. Like, in the sense of like practicality like this is working, I can show up with this regular regularity, I’m enjoying this, or they’re able to say like, this is too much, I’m just going to do it on this day. And this is how it’s going to work best for me. But what I’ve seen is small businesses, they come into this online marketing world, and they get advice from people who have large teams, huge budgets, who have years of experience practicing this within their own business. And they say, So and so emails their list Monday, Wednesday, and Friday, I have to do that. No, so and so does this. They post to Instagram, stories this many times a day, they do LinkedIn post, or like live videos with people, this is how I have to show up instead of just testing it out to see how they best perform. So I think it’s kind of you know, I know, we’re kind of giving a lot of advice of things to consider, before you even look at your social media output or planning. But I think this is really huge is just, it’s not even necessarily giving yourself the grace, it’s giving yourself the opportunity to prove to yourself that you’re gonna do really good at whatever goal it is that you want to set, because you’re effectively taking that risk to try it out. You’re showcasing what you like and what you don’t like what performs well, and what doesn’t. So look at the goals, determine the strategies, the tactics, and then consider how you are going to operate best when it comes to showing up online. Andréa Jones 09:06 You nailed it. And what I hear business owners say so often is they feel like it’s not working, right. So they maybe you’ve been posting for a while and they go, I feel like this isn’t working. And part of that is that iteration phase where they tried something one time, and that first time it didn’t work. But what you nailed about the big brands versus the smaller companies is that there’s lots of iteration I think about this with Google. I think they change the name Google Chat, Google Hangouts, we’re doing this we’re doing that. How many times have they changed it? And we’re still just all along for the ride like, oh, okay, it’s different now. And we need to give ourselves permission as business owners to also have that iteration. But that comes from reviewing what you’ve done, and actually analyzing it. So I’m a huge fan of looking at the numbers. I know it’s not like smexy but I I find it interesting to go into something like Instagram and see what’s the top performing posts in the past three months, the past month, going into something like Facebook and seeing how many comments that I get on this particular conversation or, you know, looking at, you know, YouTube videos and seeing which ones get the most views, and then recreating those moments again and again, in different ways, and not spending so much time creating content that isn’t actually working. So set a date with yourself, well, I like to do this monthly, first of the month, we’ll sit down, we’ll look at the past month, we’ll see what works so that anything that’s not working, we can iterate on it and anything that is we can double down on that and continue to do that again. And again. Erin Ollila 10:44 Yeah, I really love how you said that. Because I think especially the beauty of a new year is the opportunity to look at a whole previous year’s worth of efforts to see what worked and what didn’t. And I actually think this is I know, previously, you mentioned like, look at your business goals and the things that happen throughout the year as a way to create content. But I think this is another great way to create content, I think so often we have blinders on to what we think is working, either because it’s working because we have a word comfortable with the effort. You know, one of my business friends she is actually shows up excellently I think on Instagram, you know, there’s a great mix of personal and professional and then in conversation recently, she’s like, I hate Instagram. And I was like, oh, cool, what, because I think I think she’s really doing a great job of showing up and, and, you know, being visible on a platform, but for her, you know, because she spends a lot of times in stories. She’s really an introvert, and she’s just overwhelmed with, I guess content creation, right, like showing up in a way that’s personal, and the balance between personal professional, what to share what not to share. And when she looked at her efforts, yes, her Instagram followers have grown. And yes, she gets a lots of engagement on social media. But she booked one client last year through Instagram, and it was for one of her lowest paying offers. So that’s another thing I think we really need to consider, like, absolutely look at the data centers that show you things like engagement, but also look at our finances to see where our leads, not just our clients, but our leads are coming from, because you may be very surprised that they’re coming from a different platform that you expected. I recently checked my own. And I I mean, this isn’t at client acquisition, this was really just more engagement. And I realized to have a ton of engagement on Facebook, and I do zero on Facebook. Zero, so I’m like, okay, and the question here is, I didn’t really want to do any more marketing on Facebook. So sometimes I think when we make business decisions, we also have to think like, do I want to Yes, I’m getting some traction a little bit from Facebook. But do I really want to invest my time here? And if it doesn’t feel right, the answer is you do not need to invest more time. Maybe it’s just that you, when you do put in some effort in writing your social media captions, you have a stronger call to action on those platforms, where you’re really trying to encourage more to convert over. But besides that, that really can be a like we have to be where we feel best. Before I move on, I have a quick question for you. I’m not the best person to speak about what kind of data we really should be analyzing. So can you give me a quick overview on the best places people to look if they’re doing this on their own? Andréa Jones 13:41 Yeah, so there’s five different data points that I typically encourage business owners to look at. The first one is community growth. And we typically start and stop there with follower count. But it’s really just a high level view of like a Pulse Point are things moving in the right direction. We also have reach and impressions, which is really just how many people are viewing your content. And this is super important, depending on your business type. So I have a client, for instance, who is a dating coach, specifically for divorce women, and they’re not usually commenting I recently got divorced. So comments are not it right. So for her it’s things like impressions and reach how many people are even consuming this content. We also have engagement, so likes and comments, but also things like shares and saves. A lot of platforms have these data points as well. So another client of ours tends to get a lot of shares there in the sexuality space. And we actually can’t see where people are sharing this content. But it works really well for them because people will like text it to their girlfriends or anytime they hit that share button we can see that that action and so we want to measure that. We also have intent So we have community growth, reach and impressions, engagement and intent. intent is, you know, people clicking links on the social media app. So typically, we see this on Instagram, when we say go click the link in the bio, are people actually going to your profile, and then are they clicking the link, you can see this at the post level on Instagram. And you can see at the profile level. And then the last one is conversions. And I do like to use a platform like Google Analytics or phantom analytics, where you’re seeing how many people visited your website and the actions they’re taking after that. And I think that’s super important for business owners. A platform like Instagram is notorious for not having a ton of traffic. But most of my clients do see some of that traffic convert higher than other platforms like Pinterest, for instance, since tons of traffic, but the conversion rate is way lower than a platform like Instagram. So you want to kind of take some of those things into consideration. Erin Ollila 15:58 And I think that’s a lot of the reason why people don’t factor in data when they make, like planning for content. Because, you know, it’s overwhelming to think like, Well, where do I look? So I think just everything that you just shared is really helpful if someone is reviewing what they have in in regard to data before they make their content strategy for the year. So we’ve talked about like planning content around your business goals, planning content around the data that you have. And you know, now the listeners are sitting down with their blank notebooks. And they’re like, Okay, I know what I have to review. I know what my goals are. But how do I like come up with a plan? Like, how do I know where to show up? I guess is question number one. And then the frequency in which I should be showing up on that channel. Andréa Jones 16:48 Yeah, so I do like to tap into what you currently enjoy, especially for DIY buyers, because you’re going to be spending time here. And if you do not like it is going to go to the bottom of the checklist. This is my QuickBooks for me, y’all. So QuickBooks don’t like hanging out there, it’s the last thing on my to do list. And I know it has to get done. But for some reason I find other things to do every week, we don’t want that to be social media for you. So you know, starting with the platform that you enjoy spending time on is very helpful. And then giving yourself a time limit instead of a post limit is very helpful. Now you can always give yourself a number of posts to create each week after you understand how much time goes into creating it. And typically I recommend one to two hours a week for creating content. And the reason I recommend that is, as you expand your business, you’ll likely still spend one or two hours a week creating content, but doing different things, because now you have a graphic designer helping with graphics. Now you have a copywriter helping with copy. And so you’re able to spend more time on the deep work. In the early days, if you’re DIY, you may only get one or two posts out. And then as you get more sophisticated in your business that may creep up to three to five posts per week. So giving yourself that time limit is easier to commit to every week than you know I have to post five times on LinkedIn right can be very overwhelming within that time limit at what helps what’s helpful as well as to give yourself two different types of posts to create. So you want to look at either building connection or converting. And mostly what folks are here on social media hanging out for is connection, I want to learn something I want to feel something I want to laugh. And so as a business owner, we have to be mindful that our posts are mixed in with like Susie’s granddaughter’s vacation and Billy’s new dog, and then it’s our post selling our thing. So we want to kind of fit in with the landscape of social media, and then also sell our stuff. So that’s where the conversion posts come in. So typically one in every five posts, which is designed to convert, the rest are designed to connect. As you get more sophisticated. You were weaving those two ideas together even more connection and conversion really can blend together. Erin Ollila 19:22 Yeah, that’s great. What is your suggestion about, like recycling content or reusing content? So people who maybe have a podcast that their writing show notes for? Ebook, blog posts, things like that, oh, emails, even, you know, we talk about, you know, the goals and the planning. Well, I think that sometimes what reduces overwhelm, overwhelm is just looking at what we do have and seeing, can we like incorporate that into things like the connection and the conversion. Do you have any advice for people who maybe have created content elsewhere, but they’re looking to bring that into their social media presence? Andréa Jones 20:00 Yeah, I’m a huge fan of like recycling content. I think one of the challenges with social media is we we think, as we’re looking at our feed that we’re observing all new content, right. But I want you to think about this like that formulaic cop drama, I’m a huge fan of law and order, I will watch all of them. And it’s the same thing. So with our content, we’re kind of taking this episodic approach to it, where we don’t need to recreate the wheel, right? If you’re talking about it in the podcast, talk about it on social, talk about it in your newsletter, talk about it everywhere, and you’ll reach different people with different mediums. And then you’ll also people need to hear it again. And again, the reason why I can sing the Folgers jingle isn’t because I heard the commercial one time, I’ve heard it a million times. And even if I saw it again, it looks slightly different. So I’m still gonna watch it and sing along with it now. So that’s the kind of approach I do suggest for business owners, especially something to work towards. It’s something that I do a lot in my content. And I’ll even take posts that I posted a year ago and repost the exact same thing today. And that’s kind of the goal I recommend a lot of business owners work towards, because then you can free up your own mental space to create more in different ways. And also, simultaneously, you’re probably growing your audience and your audience size is different from a year ago. So we’re bringing that content back to new people. And this is where the the data comes into play. If it worked really well, a year ago, let’s bring it back. Maybe we freshen it up a little bit for today. But the concept is the same. Erin Ollila 21:44 If you create something that’s good, just keep reusing it every year. And then the first reaction is like, Oh, I can’t do that people will recognize that. Friends, friends, I don’t even recognize who people are in my inbox. Nevermind, like what they created the year before. And in the instances where I actually did recognize someone who had recycled content. You know who it was, it was the people I really love following online, and it did not bother me in the slightest, because it was still valuable, right. So a quick win here is if you’re looking to do this, maybe you know you have some posts that were related to like a silly national holiday. An example here is I always pick up post about national taco day love tacos, and I had this one really great social media post, where I compared a taco to a website, which sounds ridiculous, but it was a really straight line, I promise here. So I reshare every year, this past year 2022. Taco national taco day was also on Taco Tuesday. So what did I do? I looked at the post. And I adjusted it with like two sentences to indicate that it was on Taco Tuesday and how exciting that is, for someone as corny as I am. That national taco day was on Taco Tuesday. In 2023, I’ll probably also I will, I will I’ll talk about national taco day. Again, I’ll compare it to their own websites. But I’m not going to say that it’s on Taco Tuesday, because it’s not, I’m gonna remove that. So it really is that simple as looking at content you’ve created ie if you’re going to use it annually, and just say they’re a tiny thing I can add here. Maybe I can say something like, you know, if you posted and you said like your favorite color and one, you maybe have a new favorite color you added in there, whatever it is, you can make tiny tweaks to these things if it’s if you’re really struggling with the exact replication of something you’ve done in the past. But I want to confirm with you it is okay to replicate what has worked in the past. No one is going to care here or even potentially recognize, right? Andréa Jones 23:47 No, they’re not going to recognize it. And as you said, if they do they’re super fans, and they’re cheering for you. Um, think about this, like the pumpkin spice latte at Starbucks. No one’s mad that it’s coming back again. Everyone’s excited. That’s coming back again. They look forward to it coming back again. So think about your message that you share on social media as exciting as pumpkin spice lattes are for me. And, you know, bring it back with that that level of enthusiasm. And I think that enthusiasm is contagious. Erin Ollila 24:18 Yeah, I love that. And for the people who don’t love pumpkin spice lattes, of course. Of course, you see some grumbling of like, oh, I don’t care about this. But it’s not changing their life. Like right? Like, you might hear one person be like, Why does everyone care about pumpkin spice lattes, and then they forget about it and move on. They don’t unfollow businesses because of pumpkin spice lattes. And if they do, that is awesome. I am constantly trying to remind people about how repelling people in our audiences is one of the best things that we can do for ourselves and for the people in our audiences because we want the right fit people to pay attention to us. If you’re constantly rubbing someone the wrong way with things that may be important to you. They’re just not the right person to be in your audience. That’s right. And I think that goes on social media too. Like, yes, you might not know who’s following you as well, as you may know, in smaller things like an email list, even though that could be impossible as well. But you don’t want the people to follow you who just are not paying attention to the things that work for you the things that you like, the ways that you like showing up online. Andréa Jones 25:23 Yeah, exactly, exactly. And I like to think about this as, like creating teams of people. For example, my husband and my brother will argue all day long about PlayStation versus Xbox. To me, they’re the same thing. I don’t care. I’m not their customer, though, right. So me not caring doesn’t affect PlayStation or x boxes sales at all. What does affect their sales is that camaraderie for Team X, Xbox or team PlayStation, they are so adamant about their team, that they will go and be evangelists, to other people about their team. And that’s kind of what we’re getting at here with social media is, you know, that repelling also attracts and creates communities that really are advocates for your brand. And you don’t have to do all the heavy lifting of gathering people around you. People will do it for you, once they, their team, whatever your business name is. Erin Ollila 26:23 So before we jump away, I really loved how you were talking about like the connection and conversion types of post. So let’s stay on conversion for a second. What are some of the ways that you recommend business owners promote their work on on social because I think it’s easier for people, especially if they’re doing it themselves? Or or if they’re actually hiring out to be able to, like verbalize this to the people who are doing their content creation for them. When it comes to connection, right. Like it’s story formed, its personal aspects, its explanations, education, but Conversions can be a little bit trickier. So do you have any suggestions there for promotion, promoting work or promoting things you’ve created in a way that helps with conversion? Andréa Jones 27:08 Yes, and I like to focus on feelings in marketing, because as human beings, we make a lot of our decisions with feelings and facts. So I like to use an exercise I call the before and after exercise, probably you have something similar in copywriting where, on a piece of paper, I’ll draw a line down the middle. And on one side, I’ll write out everything the audience or potential clients are feeling before purchasing from me, and everything they’ll feel after. So for me in social media, it’s not oftentimes, like I need to know how to post an Instagram story. That’s a very fact based thing. Usually, it’s like, I feel embarrassed, I can’t even find this Instagram story thing, or what is a story? How is it different from a real so embarrassment is a feeling overwhelm is a feeling. Confusion is a feeling. And so when I’m talking about social media, I’m addressing those feelings. If you’re feeling confused about if you should be on tick tock or not come my way, I will help reduce that feeling so that you can feel confident at the after, or you can feel successful or you can have you can achieve what you want to achieve in your business. So it’s kind of zooming out a little bit and focusing on there those feelings, and really meeting the client where they are. So we internally we call this the I feel seen type of content, where if someone’s looking at it, they go, Oh, that’s me. So here’s another example. I have a six month old baby, and we’re starting to feed her. And like real people food, I thought it’s a call this. So for me, when I see videos of a baby like eating food, I’m watching the whole thing because I’m like, Oh, that’s my baby. That’s exactly what I’m going through. And so like if they sold some sort of bib or spoon or something, I’m gonna buy it because I want to try it on my baby. So I think that the kind of emotional connection we’re aiming for here with conversion based content is the type of content where someone goes, Oh, that’s exactly where I am right now. Or that’s exactly where I’m trying to go. Erin Ollila 29:14 Yeah, I really love that. And I think the way that you do that before and after works really well for two reasons, especially for people who are struggling with problem based marketing. You can take a before and after and you can do it like problem solution. So it’s like pain point and solution, right? Oh, you’re struggling with this. This is really difficult, like and then there’s the conversion. It’s like come to me and I’ll help you and make it less difficult. But you can also flip that exact exercise and do desire solution, right? So our delight, our desire and then maybe like, way to get to that desire, right? So it’s like, you’re so close to purchasing the house of your dreams. Like you can feel it in your bones. You know what it looks like? You know what it smells like? He knew what the outside was going to do in the winter when it’s potentially snowing. That’s a desire. So there’s no pain point there, right? And then like, especially works well, for industries like photography, if you’re doing wedding photos, like what’s the pain point, right? Like, besides the fact that there’s too many photographers to choose from, or price point potentially, but like a desire here could be like, you know, you know that that wedding scrapbook is the one thing you have your heart set on. So it’s a very easy exercise, I’d say, for both sides of the coin, where you can create content that is both problem driven, as well as desires driven. Do you have any other quick copy specific suggestions when it comes to creating your content? Andréa Jones 30:43 Yeah, so just to wrap up the before and after, I will also say if you have a team, you give that to the team, and now they can go and write it for you. That’s a that’s a lot of our goals, I know. But another thing for writing copy that works really well in social media is having a hook. Social media moves so quickly. So we want to hook people in to our story. And oftentimes, there’s that like truncated see more or read more option in the caption, a lot of platforms only count a video is viewed if they watch more than three seconds. So those first three seconds are vital to whether someone sees on your post or keep scrolling. Okay, so we want to hook them in. I do find it challenging, though, because platforms do reward controversial topics. And if you’re a photographer, there may not be a controversy here. Right? So sometimes we’re hooking people in with the visuals. So if you’re a photographer, you’re hooking people in with like, Oh, this is what this person did with that wedding. I’m like scrolling through this whole Instagram carousel, right? If you are, we have an accountant we work with who talks a lot about lifestyle thing. So his hook is he’s usually coming in from somewhere this last one, he drove in on his four wheeler and then gave the tip, right. And so you’re really leaning into your personality, your business’s personality, but creating things that actually make people pause on that post can be very, very helpful here. Erin Ollila 32:18 Yeah, we talked about consistency earlier. And I wasn’t actually thinking about this at all for this episode. But I think one way to do that, especially if you’re in an industry where it feels less a hook. Like I hear this again, I love the brought up accountants, I work with a bookkeeper. And she’s like, I have zero clue what to say on social media, because I just don’t want to like I don’t have anything sexy to bring up and I’m like, Listen, you do not have to be like wild and sexy on your social, you’re providing great content, you just have to find a way to do it that feels good for you. And feels really good for the people who are watching you. So one way that worked for them that I think could potentially work for especially like the hesitant social media posters is to come up with like, throw some huge air quotes on this a template of sorts. So maybe it’s for example, it’s like, Tip Tuesday and every Tuesday you’re showing up in a certain way, with and that’s a general type of post. I don’t I think you should be a lot more specific here. So boring, industry specific type of template posts, right? So maybe for the bookkeeping people, and I’m really the wrong person to speak about bookkeeping, it’s like, you know, like, review, review your data Wednesday, right? Whatever, I’m not going to get the content idea there. But doing that I think could help you be consistent. It can help you plan very easily. Because if you’re doing something once a week, you have Max 52 ideas that you need to create. And you can batch those ideas into the future, right? So you have a content pool, and just pull from them. But I’d say yeah, if you’re in an industry that doesn’t feel like it’s very sexy for social media content, just recognize that there are ways that you can get around that the hooks a great idea, like when it comes to visual industries, you’re saying this for photographers, same works for interior designers for home builders, use your visuals as the hook right, maybe before and after posts are something that’s going to perform really well for you like literal before and after post. But I would say like, don’t despair, and do not try to place your social posts and what you think you have to do try to come up with a way that works best for how you want to present yourself and your specific industry and business needs. Andréa Jones 34:36 Yeah, and you’re so knowledgeable in what you do. Sometimes a quick brainstorming session will help pull out that knowledge. You know, you know, what’s a question that a client asked you recently? Or what’s a feeling that a potential client brought up on a call? Use the bookkeeping example and I’ll use that as well because like I said, QuickBooks and I do not get along. And I think even just admitting that if a bookkeeper Get it out on social, I’m hitting follow like, I need to follow someone who actually likes QuickBooks because it’s not me. It’s not me. Erin Ollila 35:07 Right? And you’re gonna feel excited about watching them because it’s this big mysterious thing to you as the like, now you as the audience member is like, Wait, QuickBooks does that. Like, wait, they just pressed that one button, and that happened. So you might not you might be hiring them. Because you’re like, I’m not going to do that. You know, a lot of people like I’ve talked to on the show, they’ll say, like, I listened to you, because I really want to understand these things. But I do not want to write that on my own. I just want to get it right. Same goes for bookkeeping, I’m not gonna go on social media and be like, Oh, now I know everything about QuickBooks because that one person showed me how to click that button. Let me click all of the buttons within QuickBooks right? Nope, not happening. I’m going to consume content, I’m going to build that like, like no, like trust factor, I’m going to look at them as if they are like, the best QuickBooks creator slash user in the world and give them like, you know, ballot their feet. And then I’m going to hire them. So they can touch those buttons for me, because I’ve seen it, I trust them. I’m excited about it. I’m not going to do it myself. So I also think that’s another thing I see people fear a lot about in overall content creation is giving it all away, like the content, the education, the know how to give it all away, give away everything that you know how to do, because your clients are still going to hire you. I don’t even know if it will be if it’s on my Instagram, by the time that’s coming live. But I had a highlight of my Instagram that kind of walked through an email I got from Chipotle. And in the email from Chipotle, it said exactly how to make their salsa, every single ingredient, the amount of the ingredients. Basically how to make salsa. Now, this was years ago, too, by the way, but let me tell you, the the overall point I’m trying to make here is are the chipotle executives, all of a sudden losing millions of dollars because people saw that email and they’re stopping their trips to Chipotle. Absolutely not. That I want Chipotle to make me salsa. I don’t want to do it at home. But if I ever really wanted, like was just craving salsa one day, and I happen to have ingredients, or maybe I was having a party and I just never make salsa before. So I went over to my email and said, Oh, here’s some ingredients I can put in my salsa. Yes. Secondarily, as a consumer, what it what it does is showcasing expertise again, right, it’s showcasing that we can trust this brand that they’re going to share with us. So it’s just a reminder that if you share your best stuff like Chipotle has not lost millions and millions of dollars because consumers are now no longer getting salsa from them at all. So if one of the biggest like semi fast food restaurants can share their recipes, their secrets, and continue to thrive as a business, you as a small business will also be able to continue to thrive if you’re showcasing your expertise. Yep, Andréa Jones 38:07 100%. I am team Chipotle, and I don’t want to make it myself. That’s why I’m at Chipotle, Erin Ollila 38:13 right? All right. So we have covered so much ground here. Following this episode, we’re actually going to cover the major social media platforms. So I guess a question that I have for you is, how, what is your best advice before we dive deep into each and every platform? If someone’s listening to this, and they’re saying, Well, I don’t really know where I want to show up? How can we choose the best platforms to focus on? Andréa Jones 38:38 Yeah, so number one, I do recommend focusing on a platform you enjoy. If I tell you LinkedIn is the bee’s knees, and then you log in and you don’t like it there at that party, then you’re allowed to leave the party, go find a different one. Most of the major platforms LinkedIn, Twitter, Instagram, Facebook, Pinterest, likely have your audience on those platforms. And then lead into how you create content. If you’d like written content, then you may want to choose a platform that that favors written content. If you prefer video content, then you may want to choose a platform where you can easily create video. So going on those platforms can be very helpful. A lot of them have similar features, especially with the rise of tick tock, there’s a lot of micro video happening on all platforms right now. So they’re kind of all merging into similar having similar features. So that’s a benefit to business owners. The big players it for 2023 is definitely tick tock tick tock is a rising one. So if you enjoy video, I highly recommend that platform. And then I think Twitter is going to have some interesting things this year, especially now that Elon Musk has purchased the company so be interesting to see what happens there. And then lastly, LinkedIn, especially if you’re b2b if you’re a service based business owner servicing other business owners accountants photographers bookkeepers at LinkedIn is like a must place for me. So I’d highly recommend that one. Erin Ollila 40:08 Yeah, I love that you just had a few suggestions for potential social media platforms that may have some changes this year are, you know, are we good places to spend time this year? Before we end and I asked you a couple quick connection questions, I think my final question for you, and this is kind of a big one. So feel free to answer it in like the shortest way possible, if that works for you or go on and on. But what are your predictions for social media in 2023? Andréa Jones 40:34 My biggest prediction is that curated content and kind of like the glammed up content is going away. So overly designed graphics, stylized photo shoots. This is great news for business owners, because showing up as you are, without studio lights, cameras, fancy equipment is actually going to build a better connection with the audience. Erin Ollila 40:56 Thank you so much. I think there’s so much great insight in this entire episode. So I really hope people I shouldn’t should have said this at the beginning. But hope you brought your pen and paper and took some really good notes. If not rewind and re Listen again. I asked always ask a few connection questions at the end of this conversation. And the first one is if you could share a easy homework assignment with the listeners about what we’re talking about. What was your homework assignment for them? They Andréa Jones 41:25 my homework is find one person, new person to connect with. Today, I think we focus a lot on content and I don’t want to miss the connection piece. Erin Ollila 41:34 Love that. If you could meet anyone in the online business world, who would it be and why? Andréa Jones 41:41 Oh, I love my leek teal. She’s the founder of curlBOX, an amazing business owner and like I have a parasocial relationship with her. She has no idea who I am. And I watch and consume all of her content. She’s my mentor. Erin Ollila 41:55 All right, so I’m sure she’s listening right now. And if not, we’ll make sure we send her the episode and let her know that she has been one person that you should be contacting with and vice versa today. What is your favorite way that you’ve grown in your social media creation over you know, starting point back in those early days of YouTube to now like what’s your favorite things that maybe something you’re proud of? Or you didn’t expect in your own social media growth? Andréa Jones 42:23 I think the biggest thing for me is being comfortable on camera, y’all. I’ve been doing videos since 2004. So and I’m super introverted, like super highly introverted. So that to me, is my biggest accomplishment. You know, people compliment me on it. And I always remind that like, this is like decades in the making. This isn’t like I just woke up like this, like years and years of practice that I’m proud of. Erin Ollila 42:47 I love that. It’s a great way to end and it’s a great way to end Andréa Jones 42:52 like that. Thank you. Erin Ollila 42:57 Thank you so much for listening to this episode of Top copy to me. If you enjoyed spending your time with me today. I would be so honored if you could subscribe to the show and leave a review. Want to continue the conversation. Head on over to Instagram and follow me Erin Ollila. Until next time friends