Social Media: Expand Your Reach with Effective Engagement

[00:00:00] The Women Conquer Business show is an educational how-to women in business podcast. That features stories, marketing news and real life experiences from fun and friendly hosts. Jen McFarland and Shelley Carney. Join us as we dive into the details. So you can slay marketing, overwhelm, streamline processes and amplify your impact.

[00:00:23] You'll learn strategies and tactics, leadership skills, and practical advice from successful women entrepreneurs. To help you grow, nurture, and sustain your

[00:00:36] business. Hey, hello. Welcome to Women Conquer Business, I'm Jen McFarland joined by the wonderful, fantastic Shelley Carney. Woohoo. And today we're gonna talk about how to expand your reach on social media. With effective engagement. This is what we all want, right? Reach people. How do you increase your engagement and reach on social media?

[00:01:00] In 2022, the landscape is changing. How we communicate on social media is changing and every entrepreneur and small business owner needs a strategy for using social media effectively to increase their visibility and credibility. So that's exactly what we're gonna talk about today, but first we'll have some breaking news and we're gonna talk about what we've been up to over the last week.

[00:01:22] So Shelley, why don't you lead us off?

[00:01:25] Yeah. Okay. Yesterday I got up in the morning and I was going on my walk and I opened up my podcasting app and I saw, Hey, there's a new episode on this podcast that I like to listen to called Chasing the Insights with Vince Warnock. And I was like, it's me.

[00:01:45] I was on the, on, on his show and now I recorded it back in April. When you finally get around to being on it, it's all excitement again. So I was on Chasing the Insights, I talked about consistent content creation and [00:02:00] distribution. And I had a great time. I love getting into that with him because he is so experienced at marketing.

[00:02:08] He was the CMO at Cigna for many years. He's from New Zealand and he's just a very full of life, full of excitement, a guy. So he's fun to collaborate with. And I sent it out, shared it out with all of my Closest friends and family on text. And Jen was one of those people, but my brother was one of those people too.

[00:02:28] And he sent me this wonderful message about how great it was to learn more about what I do and how I was clear and concise. And he, because of that, he really understood that world, that he'd never, he'd never looked into before, because he's not an entrepreneur. He works for a large company.

[00:02:46] He works for pet smart. And so he's always worked for large companies like that. So being an entrepreneur is a mystery to him. So he really got a lot out of it. I hope that, oh, cool. If that's something that you're interested in that you go check it out as.

[00:03:00] Yeah. I haven't had a time to listen to it yet.

[00:03:02] As I was telling Shelley before the show, my mom is visiting from Boise, Idaho, and her birthday is tomorrow . So we have been hanging out and getting a lot of the, to do list things that I've had around the house. I feel like when it's summer, all of sudden I'm like fix up the house mode.

[00:03:19] And so we've been running back and forth to home Depot and like taking care of all the things that have been on the list. I haven't had time to listen to the podcast I've been taking breaks to meet with clients. It's the, it's been opposite week. Usually you meet with clients and do all of the work and then you do house stuff afterwards.

[00:03:36] This week has been opposite where I've been just doing all of the house things and visiting and all of that. And then coming back and meeting with clients. So it's been really fun. I haven't had a chance to listen to the podcast yet, but I will. And in terms of breaking news, I haven't, to be honest, been keeping up

[00:03:55] on marketing trends as much this week, because I've been having a good time [00:04:00] visiting with mom and stuff. So what I did do this was right before mom came, I have a marketing person that I really appreciate. His name is Mark Schaefer. He wrote the book Cumulative Advantage, which I think everybody should read.

[00:04:16] if you have a business and you wanna get traction, he's a futurist and a marketer and he's a realist. So he, and he studied, I think it's under Peter Drucker, somebody like, so he knows business management and then he talks also about marketing. And what I appreciate about what I appreciate about his books are they are not just fluff high level stuff.

[00:04:41] It's really about how to do some of these things. So I went on his website. He's also, he also wrote marketing rebellion, which is another fantastic book. And I went on his website and I saw that he had a crypto coin available called rise. And I was like, oh, now I'm curious. And so I went and I bought some $RISE coin, and I also, he, part of it is that he has this community based on crypto.

[00:05:09] He's like learning about crypto too and talking about it and has like a community for the people who buy rise coin. His tagline is something like rising above the noise, I think. And that's why it's called the rise coin. What fascinated me the most. And if people have been listening to this show for a while, I'm usually pretty down about crypto and NFTs and stuff as being a distraction for many entrepreneurs.

[00:05:35] And I think it's because a lot of the chatter about it, isn't about how you can use it as a creator, as an entrepreneur to really use it as your advantage. It's more like you should just get into crypto and it's all very vague and making it sound like it's a get rich quick scheme. Yeah. This is different in that.

[00:05:56] Mark Schaefer has created community around it. You buy [00:06:00] crypto. It's not very expensive. I think I got 200 coins and it was like 20 bucks, so it's not a big thing, but then you get bonuses just by being part of the community and access to information and all kinds of stuff. And one of the reasons I was willing to do it was not only because I respect him and the work that he does, but also because the company he's using, which is rally.io is environmentally friendly.

[00:06:26] What many people maybe don't realize is that most crypto is an environmental disaster. Like the amount of energy required to mine, like a Bitcoin. Phenomenal. So it's always been a big disconnect for me that so many young people really want to save the environment and they want to do crypto because those two things, they don't really overlap.

[00:06:54] So I've been looking into it. You bought tilt and that was, or got some tilt by subscribing. And it was on rally. Yeah. Now Ann Handley

[00:07:02] on it. That's what I've been seeing. $TILT is more of a, you earn it by signing up by getting other people to sign up. They also have, they.

[00:07:12] It's Joe Pulizzi. And he also put together the CEX Creator Economy Expo. And he also had a ticket that you could buy a V I P ticket. That was a an NFT so that if you purchased that you were giving more money for that, but it's an everlasting ticket that you can always go to the next CEX until you decide you're done with that.

[00:07:34] And then you can sell it to somebody else. So he's incorporating the, that into his business as, a special VIP add-on that you can, if you want to be really a big fan, a big involvement in that event or that company, then you can earn that or buy that. And then it's just, it's more about investing in that company.

[00:07:58] Yeah. And that was, a lot of what we [00:08:00] shared last week came from tilt. We were giving our own insights based on their creator survey that they did. And part of that survey was talking about NFTs and coins and things. And it was the first time that I'd seen it used in a really positive, like business context.

[00:08:16] And so Ann Handley's on there, Mark Schaefer's on there. Tilt, I can't say Joe Piluzzi, is that how you Joe Pulizzi, Joe Pulizzi and Brian Fanzo and a bunch of other people are on there. So anyway, all of which is to say it's interesting. I'm seeing it being used in a way to bring people together.

[00:08:34] Of course you join a lot of these communities and then you can be on discord, which is a really popular. Blockchain slack channel really. I've been in a few of those and you can do that through a lot of these too. So it's interesting. A lot of you're probably like well I already did crypto , but it's interesting to see it being used in a very structured way that can really benefit small businesses and creators that isn't, or doesn't feel like a pyramid scheme to get rich quick, which has always been my concern with it.

[00:09:08] I've seen a lot of things like that in the last

[00:09:10] it's more of a, I've joined this club and here's my little badge of honor than I joined this

[00:09:15] club. Yeah. Yeah. So I thought it was neat. Maybe I'll make a coin at some point. I don't know. Seems like fun. Why not? Yeah.

[00:09:21] We Toby and I actually had real coins that we had made and , yeah. So we're like, okay, we're just a little too far ahead of our it wasn't a crypto coin. It

[00:09:31] was a real one. So now you can take, but you can take that design and make it into a rally coin if you want. Yeah. Say it's

[00:09:36] I still have mine for one side and it's our logo on the other side and it's our colors.

[00:09:40] Purple and gold. So it's an actual coin.

[00:09:43] Yeah. Yeah. And I have the one that you gave me from She Podcasts after I did my interview. Oh, that's right. So for reals, it's cool. And it's just cool. It's cool for people to have a token of appreciation. And it's a literal token. Like it's not just like a thank you.

[00:09:59] [00:10:00] So I think that this is pretty interesting, are you ready for the training? Yeah, let's

[00:10:05] get into

[00:10:05] it. Okay. We don't have sound effects today. Oh,

[00:10:12] how was that? I liked it. That's

[00:10:14] all I got. That's fun. I like the, I do the eighties video game stuff, but that's a that's groovy. I like that. Yeah. Yeah. So today we're gonna talk about how do you increase your engagement and reach on social media in 2020.

[00:10:28] TA . And we're gonna talk about that because Jen has been really doubling down on her social media engagement and it's been working for her and I wanna dig into what's working and how she's doing it and how she schedules that makes time for it.

[00:10:43] So go for it, Jen.

[00:10:44] Yeah. So we'll talk about a couple of different things. One of the things that I've been talking about in my newsletter and the newsletter's actually part of it. So that's why we'll talk about this, but in the newsletter, I've talked about social media a few times and I've noticed that it's super popular.

[00:10:56] I think I sent you, did I send you that screenshot of like I sent out a newsletter and three minutes later, I had a spike on my internet or my website because within three minutes everybody saw it hit and then they just all went to the website. So it's pretty fascinating stuff because I don't consider myself to, I'm not like a social media manager.

[00:11:17] But I've been doing a lot of tests on what works, what doesn't work. And also as a casual observer of how people respond to certain things in the conversations that are going on social media. So I've been sharing that. And so what I wanna kinda lead off with is what the purpose of social media is because in the small business community, there seems to be some confusion about that.

[00:11:40] Or somebody on the internet is sharing bad tactics and people keep doing it over and over again. And I keep thinking I'm not gonna have to talk about this anymore because people aren't gonna do this, but they keep doing it. So I feel like I need to share it. So the purpose of social media, just to start off [00:12:00] with are things like brand awareness, meaning you stay top of mind, people remember who you are, you.

[00:12:07] Talk about the things in your sphere of knowledge and influence. The second thing you can really use social media for, especially since COVID, this is something that's really shifted is customer service. So a lot of people now are using social media as the customer service channel. The third thing is sharing fun and interesting posts.

[00:12:31] So part of what you have to do is think about the things that you're influenced by the things that you think are fun or interesting. And you share that with other people , you don't just keep it to yourself. You share that. And then the last thing really is thought leadership. These are blogs and podcasts, but these are also articles and things that it's not just owned media.

[00:12:57] It's also. Media owned by other people, meaning things that other people have written podcasts that you've been on. All of these things are the purpose of social media. You're gonna notice nowhere on this list. Have I said sales, social media, what I know? You can promote things you can get, you can generate excitement around an event.

[00:13:20] It's not the place really for hard sales. Sorry. Turns people off. I, I had an example of this it was yesterday. I was, I told Shelley about this as much as I've been working around the house, I'm still monitoring, some things. And I had a friend or a connection request on LinkedIn and this person said, oh, my daughter drew a picture.

[00:13:41] And it's in my, in. Chat or whatever, in my messages. And I was like, oh, this is gonna be really bad. Isn't it? . And I cause I'm like, there's no way. This is like a salesy, like connection request. There's no way that this person is having their daughter [00:14:00] actually draw pictures, so I go over there and they had used like a crayon script font and written like all of their, it wasn't drawn by a child.

[00:14:11] And it was like all of their kind of high level sales copy. in a crayon font next to my logo. And I was like, this is really bad. This is worse than. Racing up to somebody at a networking event and jamming your business card in somebody's mouth of walking away and , which is really what that feels like.

[00:14:33] And I think that people just don't think about it, like in real life, if you would just walk up to somebody and be like I do this ma and leave that's not really networking. , you're not building relationships, you're not doing anything. And I've been to some networking events where people are really just shoving business cards in everybody's hands and that kind of thing.

[00:14:55] And it's a turnoff. Like I later look at it, this was both in the before times. I don't think people really use business cards anymore. This is before COVID. But in the before times, like I'd have all these business cards and I'd be like, I don't even know who these people are, but the people that may or may not have even given me a business card that actually talked to me, I remember who they are.

[00:15:13] And it's the same thing on social media. So the people who like to just slide into DMS and make the sale, that's a big turnoff. It doesn't mean that you don't do that. There is such a thing as social selling. It means that you don't just come out of the gate with it. and that's the difference. There's a difference between being tactical, being strategic, finding the right time to do that and saying, hi, my name is Jen and shoving a business card in somebody's face.

[00:15:43] That's different. Those are the difference.

[00:15:46] Yeah. I let me share something as well. So I got a connection on LinkedIn and this guy he sounded he would be in my realm. So I went ahead and accepted the connection and then he just, and he's doing friendly questions, how do [00:16:00] you feel about this?

[00:16:00] And what's going on with that and what, what. Like software do you use for your multi streaming? And so I'm like Streamyard, duh, and and then he got to like the fifth question and I answered it shortly. And then I said, if you'd like to know more about what's going on in my life, go ahead and subscribe to my LinkedIn newsletter.

[00:16:18] Because it's there, it's out there for everyone to see. So if you are trying to connect with somebody and they have a social media presence, go find out about them, instead of asking stupid questions that you could have just looked on their Facebook page or their LinkedIn page and found out for yourself.

[00:16:36] And instead of asking them those things, ask them deeper things that nobody asks them. That's not on your front page, get into a real conversation instead of just this, these, oh, it just irritates me something fierce. Number one, if they misspell my name because it's out there everywhere. And number two, asking me questions that are answered on the first page of my Facebook or my LinkedIn

[00:17:00] just go along.

[00:17:00] Yeah. A clever thing. So my LinkedIn coach, Andy Foote, he's also a thought leader on LinkedIn. He does a thing cuz he has. Hundreds of thousands of followers or to, tons and tons of people. He's been doing LinkedIn for years and studying it and researching it and he talks about it. So what he does is he buries in the copy.

[00:17:25] So you actually have to read in order to be his LinkedIn friend, you have to read the copy and he puts something in there. That's like somewhere in there, I don't know where it is now, but somewhere in there he puts something like, if if, if you ask, if you want to connect, use this code word to let me know you read it.

[00:17:43] Yeah. And I think it's so brilliant, because he doesn't wanna just be a connection with everybody. He wants most people to follow him and he knows that you've at least read the profile if, and gone and taken the time to do it. What it sounds was happening with the questions there's [00:18:00] software out there that.

[00:18:02] That's not even technically, it completely breaks the terms of service on LinkedIn, but people use it where they're sending you like a welcome series, automated welcome series. On LinkedIn and they just ask all those questions. And that's also a turnoff because there's nothing personal about it.

[00:18:20] You're just trolling people for information. You might not even be reading the response, but if they get to a certain point, then the next automated one is do you want my widget or whatever, and my favorites are all of the requests and things that, what's really ineffective is when it's clear that somebody is trying to sell me something that I'm an expert in.

[00:18:40] I think that happens a lot too. Like I'm like, just read it, find what I do. Yeah. So these are all the things that are turnoffs, but what really turns people on, which is really what we wanna talk about are remembering that social media social. So think of it like a conversation, think of it. What would happen if I met this person on the street and that's a good place to start.

[00:19:06] Think of it as if you're talking about things with a client, with a friend, but not in the super salesy part. You want people to want more from you because they enjoy you. and you'll turn people off. They'll stop reading you if it's not interesting. So the way to do that is to really create a strategy for visibility and credibility.

[00:19:31] Like you have to really think about. What it is you're putting out there and it takes a little bit more time, which means you might not have as much content and that's okay, but you need to create a strategy for visibility and credibility. So one of the places to start, and we should put a link, maybe I should use this hand.

[00:19:50] We should put a link in the YouTube channel for sure, to get people to go to that elsewhere. We'll put a card up and then we'll also put it in the show [00:20:00] notes to go to our topic clusters episode. And that's how to generate content ideas in the framework, or in the episode, we talk about it in terms of the blog, you can also use the tools and the framework in there to generate ideas for social media.

[00:20:16] There's nothing like if you're generating ideas about your thought leadership and what you know, and how you help people, you can use that in any way that you want. You can write blog posts and then also post about it on social media. A lot of people can consume content in different ways. Some people prefer blogs.

[00:20:35] Some people prefer videos. Some people prefer podcasts. You need to create a general list based on major categories of how you help people. And then you need to figure out how it is that you want to share it. And you have to realize that some of the, some of what you do in a social media strategy is it's really, it's about commenting on other people's things.

[00:21:04] So that's one of the, one of the tests that I ran that's in the newsletter as well. And my newsletter are, they are all articles on my website. So there's one called. I guess like the art of social commenting and then the other one is about social sharing. But when we, when it comes to, what do I do on social media?

[00:21:25] if you don't have time to post a lot, go comment on other people's stuff, go find people that are in your area or adjacent or people who might be your ideal client and watch what they post and then comment on it and share what it is that or how you can help in a way that offers value that isn't just sending someone to a website.

[00:21:50] It's about like really breaking stuff down and talking about it. There are entire websites or entire like kind of quasi social media, places like Quora, [00:22:00] where you can go and do that. But you can also do that on LinkedIn. If you see something that's really interesting, that's a chance for you to stop the scroll and comment on what somebody else has said.

[00:22:12] And it positions you as a thought leader. If you are professional and you are sharing something of value to other people. And one of the tests that I ran that I talked about in the newsletter is the number of connections and followers and impressions that I was getting to my profile to other posts based on doing nothing else, except commenting on other people's posts.

[00:22:39] It makes a tremendous difference because when you comment on other people's posts, guess what? You're expanding your reach beyond your own followers and into you're opening the door for other people to find out about you find out what it is that you do. And people get curious. They may like your comment.

[00:22:57] They will go and look at what else has this person got to say? And there is, it's easy to track the data you can go out and you can comment a lot on a lot of things. And then look at the statistics in, LinkedIn, Facebook, all of the other, whatever social media platform you're using to see the increase.

[00:23:17] And in the newsletter I talk about like I've had this huge spike of interest in what it is that I'm doing only by commenting on other people's stuff. So if you are a lurker. And you don't like social media, but you like to read what else is going on? Take a break from just lurking and comment on other people's thought leadership comment on what's going on in other people's lives.

[00:23:44] Think about how you can help all of this stuff. It boosts your visibility, it boosts your credibility. And if you don't feel like you have time to create a lot of stuff, it can really help you up.

[00:23:57] Yes. And can you give [00:24:00] us an example of, you don't need to name names, but why did you pick the people that you picked and which one seemed to work best for you

[00:24:09] in commenting?

[00:24:11] Yeah. Who, what type of people did you choose to comment on their posts and what kind of comments were you making that got the most value for. You and them,

[00:24:22] It's interesting. I think recently one of the things, there was a post about how you can reach out to introverts in presentations.

[00:24:33] And I give a lot of presentations and I learned a lot from that post and I, what I said was. Or no, it wasn't I translated it into speaking engagements. They were talking about in meetings, how you get introverts to participate in a meeting and believe it or not, despite all the evidence to the contrary for anybody who's watching right now, I'm actually an introvert.

[00:24:55] So when I'm in a meeting and even slightly uncomfortable, I am very unlikely to just jump in and share ideas. Like I, I need to feel like I have time to really consider things. Like I have a chance to really engage. So what I said, and this was a whole thing about how to engage introverts in a meeting.

[00:25:14] And I was like, wow, this and my comment was, wow, this is really important. I'm an introvert. I think more people need to consider that. Not everyone can just jump into a conversation that some of us need to really think about it. And as someone who does a lot of public speaking, This is something I feel like I need to think about are the introverts in the room who maybe don't wanna raise their hand and maybe don't wanna participate.

[00:25:44] I do a lot of teaching and presenting and sometimes people aren't as willing to ask questions. I think I could do this and really honor the introverts in the room. What do you think? And so the author of the post commented and then other [00:26:00] people were like piling on with what they thought could happen.

[00:26:03] Like in the context of speaking engagement, that's the thing, like I'm positioning myself, I'm saying, wow I really appreciate what you wrote. I can relate to that as an introvert and the positioning part. I talk in public a lot. I share these types of things with people. Here's how I think I can take what you've taught me and apply that to the work that I do.

[00:26:27] And it just shot things up through the roof. Now, who do I follow? Certainly you wanna follow the people in your own industry. So I follow a lot of marketing people and sometimes I comment on things like Semrush. That's an SEO company. Recently. I shared a post from Rand Fishkin. He owns Sparktoro and gave my insights on that.

[00:26:49] So I do things like that when I share it. And I'll comment on those, but a lot of times I'm commenting on posts of people who are potentially someone that could be a client. They're not necessarily in my industry. I'm not pitching them as like I, , that I wanna have them as a client, but what I tend to do is post, I really appreciate really smart people.

[00:27:13] I love working with really smart consultants. And so I seek people out that are gonna share something interesting with me. And if it strikes a nerve, then I comment on. And at some point, if it works out that they work with me, that's great. If not, I feel like all of us smart people follow each other and it's a way to increase reach.

[00:27:33] So that's my commenting strategy. I think that people like Bridget Willard and a few other people who provide social media management and have a lot more strategy around this they probably have a number for like how many comments you need to do in a day. How many people you need to follow for me?

[00:27:52] I think that for everybody out there, you just need to start following more people and you need to start commenting on more things because [00:28:00] that's how you reach the people. You don't know if you're a lurker and you're only blasting like your events and you're not commenting on other people's stuff.

[00:28:08] You're missing like the whole conversation and the community, which is really the essence of social media

[00:28:15] is do you have a certain. Amount of time that you spend each week or each day doing

[00:28:25] that? I don't, I try not to spend more than a half an hour in the morning and a half an hour in the evening. If I have breaks between meetings sometimes I'll, I like Twitter, so I'll spend some time on Twitter, commenting on people's stuff. That's easier, cuz it's shorter.

[00:28:38] For LinkedIn, I have to block out that's the half hour time, to block it out and really make comments. I also am using that time to comment and engage with the people who've commented on my posts. So if I write, if I have a post that I definitely wanna make sure that I reply to anybody's comments on there that also boosts everything that you're doing.

[00:28:59] So it's not just commenting on other people's stuff. It's also replying to the people that have commented on your posts as well.

[00:29:09] Very good. .

[00:29:10] Yeah. And it's, again, it's just a big part of fundamentally what social media is about, and that does lead into things like social show, social selling. See, I did it again.

[00:29:23] I was doing it before we started the show and , I can't say social selling quickly. So in, when I've talked about this before, I would say that the company to watch that's really good at social selling is lately that's lately.ai, and they are phenomenal most of the content and it is to be fair.

[00:29:48] They are social media marketing company, and it's the company that I use for podcast clips. You can, upload a video or a podcast and it will clip the [00:30:00] audio and the video, and then you can edit posts and it'll share out the video. So if you go to my feed, oftentimes I think the latest one that I shared is the Tactus Media Podcast.

[00:30:11] And it's all different clips and of parts of the interview. But if you look at lately.ai and if, and follow them, see on LinkedIn or Facebook, and if you follow. Kate Bradley Chernis, who was a guest on an earlier episode. And she's the founder, the co-founder and CEO of lately, primarily what they are sharing on their own social media feed are all of Kate's appearances on other podcasts.

[00:30:39] Kate doesn't have a podcast, but she's sharing over and over again, all of this earned media, all of these places where she goes out and she's appearing on somebody else's show. And she's hyping that show by saying, Hey, this show's great. I was on here and also positioning herself as a guest.

[00:30:57] And why lately is so awesome. Cuz she's showing people what lately can do. That brings a lot of attention and a lot of people, because they're not just sitting around saying we're so great. even though they are, they're sharing other people's stuff. And then when people get really interested in what does lately do?

[00:31:16] What do you mean that I can do this stuff with AI? And how does all this work at a certain point? I'm sure they have some secret sauce in there where they realize somebody could really become a customer and they move them into more of the sales piece, so it's not like upfront, I'm just gonna sell to you.

[00:31:37] It takes some time they have something internal. And then at that point they start talking to people in direct messages and things like that. So that's really the art of. Social selling. And lately is great at it. And their business has grown tremendously as a result of that. They're not spending a jillion dollars on ads or anything.

[00:31:55] They're spending their time going out, being on [00:32:00] podcasts. doing speaking engagements, doing the work of outreach and then sharing that, which helps the creator out and also helps lately out. It's a brilliant strategy and they've found that it really works for them. And it's one way of doing it. So if you don't have a lot of money, , go out, be on shows, do speaking engagements use that as the lead that brings people in and then share the heck out of it.

[00:32:27] Like this used to women, conquer business used to be an interview show. And frankly, I got frustrated cuz so few people would share the episodes over and over again. I was like I'm, I'm just promoting somebody else and then they're not even sharing it. Kate did when Kate was on and some other people were really great about sharing the episode, but a lot.

[00:32:46] A lot of people didn't they just were using, it felt like they were using this platform as a way to promote their business to my followers, but then they weren't sharing it out to their followers. And it gets a little frustrating after a while as a creator when that happens. So that's the other side of it is it provides a lot of Goodwill if you go out and you're showing up on other people's platforms, if you then go and share that with other.

[00:33:15] That's right. It's part of being part of a community ,

[00:33:18] That's the collaboration part of it's it takes two people to work together. And that includes sharing the podcast. Like I did, when we first started today, I talked about being on chasing the insights and when Vince was on our show, he shared that.

[00:33:34] But that's the collaboration and if you want to be a guest, you're going to need to offer great value to that audience, to that host and bring your own audience by sharing that episode. That is your responsibility as a guest to do that.

[00:33:51] Absolutely. And the link to the episode of the podcast that you were on, we will include in the show notes for this show.

[00:33:59] That's right. And it [00:34:00] will be in the notes for YouTube. Like we're doing our part to also promote that show.

[00:34:05] And on the episode, I talked about Women Conquer Business and how Jen and I got together. It all ties together and it's important to, to present yourself as a whole person in that way.

[00:34:18] Yeah. A lot of times the mistake that business leaders make is they think of social media as a place where they can just dump their stuff and move on to the next things. Like I checked that box. I talked about my event on social media and that's just not interesting. Yeah. You have to think about. The conversation of social media, you have to do the outreach.

[00:34:40] You have to take the time to appreciate other people's work. And guess what? That's, how then you generate the attention and the awareness. So people will appreciate your work too. That's right.

[00:34:53] I feel like and I was listening to Social Media Examiner's Podcast this morning, and they were talking about social media and how to build your brand on social media.

[00:35:03] And they talked a lot about sharing who you are, sharing your values putting that out there for people, because if you don't. People don't know who you are. They don't know if they even resonate with you and they'll just pass on by. But if you say if you're just sitting there saying, I love lucky charms and then somebody walks by and sees that.

[00:35:22] And they're like, I love lucky charms, and they feel that, and it doesn't ha like I'm saying, it doesn't have to be a big secret of yours. It could be just something as simple as, identifying with another product that they like. So just keep putting that out there. I like this. I like that.

[00:35:39] I'm, I wanna be more helpful in this area of life, and yeah, this is going on in my life and bringing all of that in to show that, yes, I am a person because even if you work B2B, you're still selling human to human and people wanna know you're a real person and not a bot.

[00:35:56] absolutely. And, hat tip credit to Shelley. [00:36:00] Who's always encouraging me to share a little bit about myself because. For various reasons. It's not a natural thing for me to do. And she's pushed me into that. And I think that it has made what I share more relatable and relevant. And those are like the two big RS I think if you're gonna have two RS for social media, it's relatability and relevant, it has to be both.

[00:36:26] You have to be relatable and you have to be relevant. A lot of people go out there and they put up this like veneer of oh my business and my life are just perfect. . And after a while, people are like that's not interesting, they start to doubt whether it's real because honestly, behind the curtain, everybody, no, nobody's perfect.

[00:36:43] Everybody has things that are happening, it doesn't, you can't be friends with a

[00:36:47] picture on Instagram, you've got to know the whole person

[00:36:50] right. So it's important. It's important to be relevant. It's also important for the content to be related to your expertise as much as possible. Like it it just is helpful.

[00:37:01] It, make sure that people always know what it is that you do and that what you're sharing is relevant to them. It really is about other people on social media, you share what's going on in a way that makes it relatable and relevant to other people.

[00:37:18] In Jen's example of going on somebody's post and saying, I learned from you and here is how I'm going to use that information.

[00:37:26] As a coach or a teacher online, there's nothing that's going to get my attention more than that. Somebody took what I said and applied it. That is the whole reason that coaches. Come out here and coach and we'll do it for free. If somebody's actually going to take the information and apply it and have good positive responses and then share that with others, that's all we really want.

[00:37:52] And a lot of times people overlook things like hashtags and tagging other people. So if somebody shares [00:38:00] something and they're like, oh, I really liked this blog post. If they tag me and say Jen wrote this post, and I really liked it, guess what I'm gonna do? I'm gonna comment on it and I'm gonna go share it and be like, Hey look, somebody else said, this was really cool.

[00:38:13] And that's part of it too, is you have to share what other people are doing and give them credit for it. And then they're more likely to engage with you and share it themselves. So that's another way that you increase, reach what people don't understand. Sometimes I know all of you are very smart and you probably already know this, but in case you don't hashtags are topic.

[00:38:36] People follow hashtags as topics that they wanna see more of. So if the hashtags that you're sharing are all branded and a bunch of words that you think go together, but they're not actually topics that people follow, it's not as useful. So one of the things that you can do is click on a hashtag in somebody else's post and look at the URL.

[00:39:00] And then you can just put, you can change the URL to put these different hashtags or topics that you're interested in. And you can see how many people are following a particular tag, and that can really help you decide what the hashtags are. And then you also wanna share other people's content. And if you can tag.

[00:39:19] It's hard to do scheduling. So sometimes if I wanna tag somebody actually go into the program itself and either update the post and put the tag in, or I do it native inside of, Facebook or LinkedIn to do that. So I can tag somebody else.

[00:39:35] So did you get did you get my newsletter because I tagged you I did.

[00:39:40] I thought I liked it. Commented. Did I not see, was I working in the yard? I'm so Sunkissed from working in the yard I have social proof. That was working in the yard. So

[00:39:50] I, I talked about Women Conquer Business, and I talked about Jen and what we were gonna talk about. And so when I put the post out about the [00:40:00] sharing, the LinkedIn newsletter, I tagged her.

[00:40:03] So she saw it and then way she could look at and go, oh, Shelley's talking about our show. Hooray, and then she could share it. And that gets me more. I thought I did

[00:40:11] visibility. Ugh. Dang it. Dang it. Okay. I'll have to go back. I'll share it. , I've been in the yard

[00:40:20] but most people will share it. And then . Yeah, and I

[00:40:24] usually man, I'm like being a little called out. Oh, wa so, but it's good. It's don't be like, I was on that post. Do you share it? If somebody tags you cuz that's right. That's how that's supposed to work. Especially if it's something you're working on with somebody.

[00:40:42] Indeed Shelley

[00:40:44] indeed.

[00:40:47] So if you're thinking I see all these posts and they're written in a certain format or, all of this kind of thing. If you're struggling with what do I, how do I write some of these posts? What is it that people are using? Cuz you're starting to see like how people talk about what it is that they do.

[00:41:07] And it seems like a good positioning. There are a couple of tools that you can use that really will help you formulate and craft posts that are more intriguing and are likely to get more engagement. I think I'm just gonna probably end up spoiling my tweak of the week. end up adding it here. We'll talk about it.

[00:41:29] So I've already mentioned lately, which is really great with if you have a lot of content and you want to share, we use it for the podcast where we break up the podcast and the video, so that there's video content and pithy comment about that specific section of the podcast. And we use lately for that.

[00:41:47] There are a couple of other tools out there that are really cool, that can really help you with formulating like blog posts social media posts, cuz now social media posts are beginning to be a little more longer. I think you've probably [00:42:00] noticed that on LinkedIn. It's always been fairly long on Instagram, some of these different platforms but you can even use these tools.

[00:42:07] Not hype fury, but you can use type, share also on medium, if you wanna publish like a blog post. And so these two tools are type share, and hype fury type share is at typeshare.co. Let me, I'm gonna share my screen here for just a second so that people can see this

[00:42:29] okay. And hypefury.com. Oh, Hype Fury Hype

[00:42:33] Fury.

[00:42:34] So the first one is typeshare.co Type Share. So what type share does is it's actually like a, it's so interesting. So it's a blog platform. There's somebody named Dickie Bush and he does. These like writing challenges and they do like a social blog and there are these little like micro blog posts, and you can do that, but most of the people who are watching or listening to this show already have a website so they're gonna use it how I use it, my free trial's about to end.

[00:43:04] And I've really enjoyed it. So what this does is it's a platform where they give you like a template that you can follow for like how to structure your posts or how to structure your blog that make it a lot easier to create. And it's based on other blog posts, other social media posts that have been successful.

[00:43:26] Now you wanna change it and make sure that whatever it is is aligned with your voice, how you share things. I'm not suggesting that you change. Everything to follow like a pattern, but it is good to see and they have a lot for free, or you can pay $20 a month for the structure. But what it does is it really helps you formulate how you can structure your posts to give people an arc of your thought.

[00:43:55] And I think that's, what's important is, a lot of times we just say, I did this thing it's [00:44:00] done. this gives you a little bit more of an opportunity to look at some things from the idea of positioning, right? So here is what the inside of my type share account looks like. So you'll see in here, there are all these templates, right?

[00:44:18] So it's like myths or five main points and. So these are like some essay templates. They also have sub atomic essay templates. So these are ways that you can, I use these for my newsletter. So it helps me go in and say five things that you wanna do. Or last week I talked about myths on social media.

[00:44:41] So this is a good structure, right? So it gives me a structure for like how, I still use my voice. I still talk about it, but it gives me a structure. So I don't just go on and on and I'm keeping it like concise enough that people are actually gonna follow it. Then they have these sub atomic essays.

[00:44:55] So anything that's not marked pro in here is free. They have an excellent amount of templates in here that you can use for free without paying the $20 a month. And then if you go down to the very bottom, they have thread templates. and these are typically Twitter, but you can also use these thread templates on LinkedIn and it gives you as you can see and if you're listening, a lot of the template types are things like credibility and lessons where you're breaking through a topic and you're describing in detail, like what you've learned about something.

[00:45:28] It also is a positioning piece. So you can be talking about what you do and how you do it in a way that really breaks through for people. It makes a lot of sense. And then they have transformation stories, personal stories, things like that. And again, it's just a framework that then you can talk through your expertise and it gives people an idea for like how to structure posts.

[00:45:48] If you do things on Twitter is a thread. So it like has the break points, and from type share, you can actually post to Twitter and I, and medium and [00:46:00] LinkedIn, I think the other tool that's really interesting. Is called hype fury. And it is primarily focused on Twitter, but it also does LinkedIn posts.

[00:46:12] And I've been using it for LinkedIn as well. And it is, it has very similar to type share in some ways. But it does a little bit of automation that encourages people to subscribe to your newsletter, to go onto your offer. , if you're engaging with all of this then, take the next step and go to subscribe to my newsletter.

[00:46:31] That's typically what it is. Or some people use it to. Sell a mini course and things like that. And that's what hype fury does. They really have a lot. They have a lot of templates in there as well that help people grow. And they have templates for LinkedIn and they have templates for also Twitter.

[00:46:48] It's primarily Twitter. And those are really both of those tools are really good for helping you structure your content structure, things out so that you can be sharing your expertise on these social channels. Or even in, like I said, newsletters and blogs in a way that is concise, keeps you positioned and fits what is trending more on social in some ways, like some of these posts you've seen, I try to change it up enough that it's not oh, what's another thread post, but I try to make it in a way that's still interesting. And I think that what a lot of people do is, we don't always know. You know how to say what we, our expertise. We don't know how to share it necessarily in a way that makes it easy for people to consume. And I think that at least looking at something like type share and taking the time, or using something like hype fury to, to post, to schedule out your posts can really help you formulate that and structure that conversation in a way.

[00:47:52] That's interesting for people who are following you, was that all new? [00:48:00] Yes. Did I just lay a knowledge bomb on

[00:48:02] you? Oh, so many new things this week. I tell you.

[00:48:04] That's CTA. Let's do a CTA. That's it. If you have not yet subscribed to Jen. Women Conquer Business Newsletter, please do you're missing out if you're not subscribed because she lays knowledge bombs every Sunday. And if you don't have time to read it on Sunday, you can wait for Monday, but it'll still be there waiting for you.

[00:48:24] And that is at womenconquerbiz.com/newsletter, easy peasy. I, yeah. And of course I'm still working on my course, of course, of

[00:48:34] course you can, if you go to womenconquerbiz.com/newsletter, you can also read all of the previous newsletters, cuz I also use it as a blog post. And so please consider doing that.

[00:48:47] And then here is the link to become. To get on the waiting list for the upcoming livecast lifestyle course. I don't know why I'm my alliteration today is not good. Yeah. Livecast Lifestyle course. And so what have

[00:49:05] you code? Or you can just go to course.livecast.life and get signed up to be on the waiting list.

[00:49:10] And we have decided that we're combining the course with six months. Of our membership, which includes weekly coaching. So it's gonna be a screaming deal. So get on the list to get the, get in the get in there for the friends and family founders price which is coming. And the whole reason it's not out yet is because I have been going through all of these different course platforms to make that decision.

[00:49:40] Oh, I like this one. This is great. Let me, no. Gosh, this is having problems. Oh, look over here. I see one that's on sale at AppSumo this week. Let me get that. Oh, it's beautiful. I love it. Oh, I'm gonna have to do all this cobbling together when he went, oh, here's another one. Let me try that out because everything's in there all in one place.

[00:49:57] Let me try that. So that's what I've been doing [00:50:00] this week and I think found settled on one. Did you? So

[00:50:04] yeah. So stay tuned. We'll find out

[00:50:08] it's called Vonza. Okay. And it's got email and it's got landing pages and it's got a website and it's got a course and a platform and it's got a membership platform and it's all in one.

[00:50:20] So I'm just like, okay, this had better be it because I've just been through so many this last couple of weeks that I'm going

[00:50:27] crazy

[00:50:27] a little bit. oh, that's exciting. That's exciting. I, I like testing software of course, but it's also cool. When you finally find the one that's gonna do it. I

[00:50:35] really hope this is it because I don't wanna I, I keep tar, I keep starting to set up the course and then I see something else and it's oh, that's what I that's, what's missing on this other one.

[00:50:45] Let me go over there and do that one instead. So luckily we're doing it through app Sumo. And if it's six, it's less than 60 days that you've had the product, you can get the refund, you can get the credits, you can use your credits on the next thing. And this week they're having app Sumo days. So everything's 10% off of, not everything, but all the things that they've chosen to put on their.

[00:51:05] Their AppSumo days specials. So we've been saving money as we're doing it. So that's pretty cool too.

[00:51:12] Actually, do you wanna know how that works? I still have my product up on app Sumo. The, yeah. Planning podcast, planning checklist, like $3. It's three bucks. Yeah. Actually's this week it's on sale.

[00:51:23] Cause they give sellers the opportunity to participate in that. So if you go to podcast planning, checklist on app Sumo, that's actually my other company epiphany courses, but it's me, teaching people how to plan out their podcast, make some decisions, get the equipment and things like that. And it is yeah.

[00:51:45] It's app Sumo days. I think it goes until tomorrow. I

[00:51:47] think so that was it. Yeah. Yeah. And and they, I think they keep it in line with the prime day, like Amazon prime days was this week and I think they do it at the same time to. so okay, you're buying stuff anyway.

[00:51:59] Why

[00:51:59] don't you buy this? Some [00:52:00] of this , I've managed to stay away from it cuz you know how I am with software. I really need to talk to somebody about my software addiction. So yeah, , I feel like I shared my tweak of the week. Do you wanna talk anymore? And you just shared Vonza, which is really cool. Yeah.

[00:52:14] And so if it's V O N Z A and if you look that up on app Sumo, how much was that? Do you remember? Or have you tried so many? You can't remember tier

[00:52:23] two is 199. Of course it's on sale this week for 179. Nice. And again, it's got all those different pieces of email. It's got your website, it's got your landing pages.

[00:52:34] It's got CRM it's oh my gosh. Membership course, all of it in one place. So I was pretty excited about it. That's awesome. Cool. Yeah.

[00:52:43] Yeah. Let's hope it works out. The cool thing about app Sumo is when you find something like heartbeat really like heartbeat, that's my latest find. That's the best , you just embrace it and you get into it.

[00:52:53] If they're gonna keep it updated and stuff, because you only have to pay for it one time. Yeah, and yeah, absolutely. It's high risk in some ways. And, but the reward can be really fantastic if you find, and I did try up

[00:53:04] coach and up coach is beautiful. If you are a coach and you have clients that you're working with and you need to constantly be in communication and reminding them to do things and setting up tasks and habits, it's an excellent product, but you're still going to need your own email, your own payment processor and all of the other things.

[00:53:27] So I tested it out. I've really liked it. Todd Herman is the one behind it and he has been coaching for 20 years. So he knows what needs to go into a coaching program, but it didn't have those other pieces. And I was going to have to tack them together. So I found Vonza and that's the way I went. Nice.

[00:53:44] That's cool. Yeah. That's cool. Would you like a little inspiration now? Yes, please. Inspirational nugget time. Let's see. Do I have a sound well? Oh, Nope. Nope, not that one.[00:54:00]

[00:54:02] all right. We'll just go with that for now. Next week, we'll have better sounds inspirational nugget when you've done well, and another has benefited by it. Why like a fool? Do you look for a third thing on top credit for the good deed or a favor in return and that's Marcus Aurelius Meditations. The answer to the question.

[00:54:21] Why did you do the right thing? Should always be because it was the right thing to do after all, when you hear or see another person do that, especially when they might have endured some hardship or difficulties, a consequence of doing that right thing. Do you not think there that is a human being at their finest?

[00:54:40] So why on earth do you need thanks or recognition for having done the right thing? Can I do the right thing even without the promise of rewards? And this is goes against human nature, cuz we're always wondering what's in it for me. If I'm gonna offer value and freebies and all this information, I'm gonna show up live every week and give you all my best stuff.

[00:55:02] What do I get in return? How many downloads am I getting? How many viewers are showing up? Is it worth it for me? Part of learning to be a philosophical, human being and evolving is to offer that value and that helpful advice and those tips and all your best stuff for free, because it's the right thing to do because it helps other people.

[00:55:24] And it's gonna come back to you. The universe is gonna take care of you if you take care of other people. So that's my,

[00:55:31] I agree with that. I agree with that a hundred percent. So keep making your stuff, keep sharing it, keep tagging other people because it's the right thing to do. Keep sharing other people's things because it's the right thing to do and it will come back and it really ties into what we talked about today.

[00:55:47] So I hope you really enjoyed this week's show, please, everybody have a great week. If you enjoyed the show, please share it with a friend and we look forward to meeting with you again next week.[00:56:00]

[00:56:04] Thank you for joining the Women Conquer Business podcast, posted by Shelley Carney and Jen McFarland. Please subscribe and leave a comment or question regarding your most challenging content creation or business problem. Then share this podcast with family and friends so they can find the support they need to expand their brand and share their message with the world.

[00:56:25] Check the show notes for links to valuable resources and come back again next week.