Social media has been acclaimed as a revolutionary way to connect with people around the globe. But not everyone is a fan. As a business owner, you may wonder if it’s worth your time to be active on social media. But ultimately, you want to be where your customers are. And these days, that means being on social media. But how do you grow your business on social media even if you hate it? In this episode, Kendra Perry gives tips and tricks to help you get started. As a business strategist for health coaches, Kendra dives into why and how social media is good for business growth, how to create content, and how frequently you should post content.
—
Listen to the podcast here
I F*cking Hate Social Media
I don’t hate social media. I love social media but this is the sentiment of a lot of health coaches. I had a health coach accelerator student say something similar to me and I thought it would be helpful for me to address it on the show. I’m paraphrasing but the question goes something like this, “Kendra, I’m wondering. Is there any way to grow my business without social media? I hate social media. I’m posting one time per day and I’m exhausted. I feel like nothing is happening. FYI, I’ve been posting consistently for months. Any suggestions?”
Growing Business On Social Media
Let’s talk about social media and whether or not you need it to grow a business. Can you grow online without social media? It will be very hard. You could run something like Google Ads but they are very expensive and tricky to optimize. You would need a good website and an intentional funnel but potentially, you could set that up. You would need to be willing to invest in that.
Here’s the caveat to that. Even with something like Google Ads, you probably still need to be on social media. Think about the last time you came across someone through an ad, a podcast or some online event and you liked them. You’re like, “They’re cool. I dig them.” Did you go check them out on social media? There’s a good chance that you did. Anytime I’m thinking about buying something from someone, I always check them out on social media first.
Imagine you saw a product through an ad and you were interested in it but you were a little bit skeptical. You wanted to learn a little bit more about the person selling it to you but they were MIA on social media. You couldn’t find anything from them. You couldn’t find them on Instagram, Facebook or TikTok. How would that make you feel? What assumptions would you have about this person? Would you maybe assume they’re not serious about their business or their business is no longer active?
You might and a lot of people do. Whether you like social media or not, this is the way of the world. This is how everyone is interacting especially in 2022. People won’t buy from you if they don’t trust you and don’t feel like they know you. You may have found my webinar on Facebook Ads or Instagram Ads because I advertise there. You may have gone through my webinar where I pitched you Health Coach Accelerator but you may not have bought it because you weren’t ready.
What happens next is you go onto my email list. I’m going to engage with you and create relationships but probably you’re going to end up following me on social media as well. At least, I hope you are. I tell you to so you should do it. Follow me on Instagram. What that does is it gives me this greater opportunity to engage, build a relationship with you and get you to know, like and trust me because people buy from people who they know, like and trust. Social media is a great place to do that.
Email marketing is fantastic but the great thing about social media is it gives you the opportunity to show people the human side of yourself. If you follow me on Instagram and my stories, you can get a little behind the scenes of my life. You can meet my Calico kitty named Smudge and see my beautiful garden, the beautiful view from my deck that looks onto the mountains, the food I eat, the supplements I take and the weird biohacking things that I do. These are things that I share on my Instagram stories. They don’t have much to do with my business but they do allow you to get to know me a little bit further.
You can engage further with my content, watch me be a weirdo on Reels and engage with a live video. There are all these amazing opportunities that you get through social media to engage with a person further and build relationships with them. Also, it’s super important to have conversations with people. Email is critical. We all need an email list. It is the most powerful asset in your business. Email is not a great way to have a back and forth conversation but a direct message on Instagram, Facebook, LinkedIn or wherever is.
The more we can have conversations with people back and forth, in real-time, the easier it is for us to connect with that person and build a relationship with them. Social media presence is critical for all businesses, in my opinion, even offline businesses. One time, I was trying to decide between two spa retreats. I went through their websites but there’s only so much you can get from a website. They both seem pretty good. I’m not sure so I wouldn’t follow them both on Instagram.
From Instagram, I was instantly able to tell which spa was better for me. What I noticed from social media is that one spa seemed to be a little bit posher, partier and into the nightlife, whereas the other one was more health, wellness-oriented, relaxed and rejuvenation. That’s what I was looking for. Social media is important because it can help someone make a decision as to whether they’re going to invest in your program or not.
If you don’t have that, there’s not a great way for people to connect with you and have conversations with you. I love it when people watch my webinar and then reach out to me on Instagram and say, “Kendra, I’m interested in the Health Coach Accelerator but I’m not sure if it’s right for me. What do you think?” That’s amazing because I can go look at their social media and website and get an idea if they’re going to be a good fit for Health Coach Accelerator.
If they’re not, then I can be very transparent with them and tell them, “This is not the right fit for you. I’m probably not the person to help you but maybe go check out this person,” or I can say, “You were exactly the perfect fit for Health Coach Accelerator.” That conversation is important but if I wasn’t available on social media then they would never be able to talk to me. If they couldn’t get in touch with me, they’d probably forget about HCA and end up working with another coach.
Social Media As A Good Marketing Tool
When it comes to social media, it’s important that we shift our mindset around it. Social media is a valuable tool and also a free marketing tool. It’s a lifeline to the person whom you want to serve. Think about that. It is a way that you can impact and change the lives of your audience. I know you didn’t just get into this thing for the money. Money is great. We all want money and there’s nothing wrong with that but the impact part of this is important to you. You want to change lives, help people and transform people’s health but that goes beyond the people who pay you and who you work with.
You are also impacting the lives of your audience. I want you to think about that because when we conceptualize that, it’s beautiful. How amazing is that? The content that you create can be incredibly impactful even if that person never decides to work with you because the truth is, the great majority of people will never work with you. We’re lucky to convert maybe 1% to 5% of our audience so that means the very large majority of our audience will never pay us or work with us but that doesn’t mean that they aren’t impacted by us.
This client, a student of mine, feels like they’re not getting traction on social media but just because you’re not seeing traction doesn’t mean you aren’t impacting people. I talk about this a lot on my Instagram account. As health coaches, we’re dealing with sensitive topics. Things like periods, poop and infertility. People don’t always feel comfortable talking about it in a public forum like social media. I did a survey of my students and asked them, “With your current clients, how many of them previously engaged with a social media post?”
Overwhelmingly, the answer was none. Many people who sign up for Health Coach Accelerator, I never see them on my Instagram, TikTok or YouTube. They feel like they came out of nowhere but they didn’t come out of anywhere. They’ve been there the whole time following me for some amount of time. They just haven’t been saying anything. I’m like this too. I’m a total creep on social media. I follow people. I rarely engage, comment, like or send DMS but it doesn’t mean I’m not there.
Selfish Why Vs. Selfless Why
We have to connect to the reason why we do what we do that goes beyond the selfish reason why we do what we do. I’m going to talk a little bit about what I call the selfish why versus the selfless why. When I say selfish, I am not saying selfish negatively. It’s super important to be selfish. Being selfish is critical to our self-care, health and happiness. There’s nothing wrong with being selfish so I want to make that clear.
When we think about what I call the selfish reasons for starting a business, it’s usually how or what the business is going to give to us like money, freedom, flexibility, those things. It’s going to allow us to live this truly amazing lifestyle that we’ve always dreamed up. That’s the selfish reason but the selfless reason goes beyond us. For example, I believe that we need a shift in the collective consciousness on the planet.
I believe that the key and the secret ingredient to that are health coaches. People who work with health coaches learn incredible things about their bodies and health. They take responsibility for their health and lives and they get healthier. As someone who is chronically sick for seven years, I understand how awful it is and how much you don’t give a damn when you feel like crap. Now that I’m feeling better, I’m doing so many more amazing things. I’m happier. I’m putting out better vibes and energy into the world. I’m able to help my fellow humans more.
That shift in the collective consciousness that we need, the key to getting there is having more health coaches and people work with health coaches. That’s the selfless reason why I do what I do but it’s not the main reason. I want money, freedom and flexibility. I never want to work a corporate job or have an employer. Early on in your business, it’s important to connect with that because we’re not getting a lot of external validation, especially through something like social media.
Social media is a long game. It’s not instant. It can feel instant when you see your colleagues or other people on TikTok or Instagram going viral and getting so many followers overnight but for most of us, it’s a long game. I’ve never gone viral on social media. I don’t expect to go viral. I’m very niched. There are only so many health coaches on the planet. I do feel that if I went viral, I would end up with a lot of people in my audience who aren’t my ideal person.
As a health coach, you have a bigger opportunity to go viral, which is cool. Keep in mind that it’s a bit of a double-edged sword. I have a good friend of mine who went viral on TikTok. It’s awesome. It’s great to see that traction. With that comes all the negative, the hate, the comments, the trolls and the overwhelm. I’ve known a lot of coaches. I’ve had a lot of students go viral. While it’s amazing, there’s a lot of stress and overwhelm that comes with it.
Also, you have to deal with the emotions and your nervous system when you start getting all the hate because ultimately, that will come too. I’m on a bit of a little sidetrack here but what I’m trying to say is it’s a tool and a lifeline to the people that we serve. It’s a way in which we can impact people and play out our missions. Our mission is to help the planet in whatever way we deeply want to help. There needs to be a bit of a mindset shift around this rather than I have to do social media. I get to.
Consistency Vs. Frequency
The other thing I want to discuss in this is part of this question where my students said, “I’ve been posting consistently for two months.” Two months’ consistency on social media is minimal in the grand scheme of things. I’ve been on social media since 2012. It’s a long game. It’s not surprising that you’re not getting traction after two months of posting consistently. There could be a lot of things going on because consistency does not guarantee success on social media.
Being consistent is important. We need to be consistent but if your content isn’t resonating with your audience, then it doesn’t matter how consistent you are. You have to speak to them, understand them and see them in their day-to-day experience. You have to be able to speak to that experience, talk about it and the things that only they would understand because of who they are based on the problem they have.
I’m going to discuss a study that was done a couple of years ago by a social media examiner. They did a study of 5,200 marketers. Out of those 5,200 marketers, the majority said that it took them at least 1 year to see increased sales from consistency on social media. They were consistent with social media for at least a year before they saw an increase in sales. I don’t want that to make you feel frustrated because you might be feeling like, “Kendra, one year? That’s forever. I’m never going to get there.” You can get there. It’s a long game.
It may not take you a year. It could take you less but consistency is key here. It takes this consistent action and you have to do it without that external validation of the engagement because the engagement takes time. Also, you may get less engaged engagement. Not everyone wants to comment or talk about their personal health information on TikTok or Instagram.
I also want to preface. Having engagements doesn’t equal clients. A lot of coaches get caught in the engagement trap, which is they post content that they know is going to get views, likes or whatever engagement but it doesn’t necessarily serve their client. A good example of this is Instagram Reels or TikTok because there are those trending things like the trending reels where people repeat the same thing. I know that if I post a trending reel, I’m going to get way more views than anything else.
A trendy reel is great and it might get me a lot of views. When I look at the people who liked that video, it’s rarely health coaches. It’s usually a bunch of random people, which honestly, doesn’t serve me but when I post a reel that is me talking to the camera and sharing valuable information, I will get fewer views but the comments that I do get tend to be from my ideal client. Remember the engagement trap and remember that a lot of the people who will end up working with you will never outwardly engage with you on social. They’ve seen your social and been following you but haven’t said anything.
The other thing I want to talk about here is the difference between consistency versus frequency. I always say be consistent but being consistent does not mean frequent. This student said that she’s posting one time per day. I’m exhausted. Posting every day on social media is a lot. Consistency doesn’t mean frequency, meaning that you don’t need to post every day to be consistent. You could post once a week but do it consistently. Be consistent with your posting schedule.
It’s important to go with a realistic posting schedule. Realistic is going to be different depending on who you are, your lifestyle and what’s going on. Maybe you’re still in your 9:00 to 5:00 corporate job. Posting every day is ridiculous. You could never do that but maybe you can commit to posting twice a week. Figure out what’s realistic for you. It can increase over time as you get a team and help but come up with what is consistent for you. Posting a lot and getting exhausted doing it is not going to help you. It’s typically going to make you post crappy low-quality content, which doesn’t serve you.
Creating Content That You Enjoy
Post less but post higher quality. Figure out what is that realistic posting schedule that you can stick to consistently and doesn’t make you feel exhausted. The other thing I want to talk about is the importance of creating content that you enjoy. You’re not going to enjoy every type of content, even if it’s the hot thing. Reels and TikTok are hot but maybe you don’t like a short-form video so you don’t need to do it or maybe you don’t need to do it the way everyone else is doing it.
For example, these trending reels and TikTok, I don’t like to post a lot of those. Sometimes I do. They’re fun but for the most part, I’d rather do a direct-to-camera. A content that I enjoy is short-form direct-to-camera content. I also love live videos. That’s content that I love because imagine the energetic signature on content that you hated creating. Do you think that’s going to serve you? I don’t think it will. I’m a big fan of energetics. There’s a lot of energy and energetics that go into marketing, messaging and sales.
If you hate something and you’re making it, you’re mad that you have to do it, you’re resentful and hateful towards it, I don’t think that content is going to serve you or your audience. You need to find a type of content that you enjoy doing or create a type of content that’s doing well in a way that is authentic to you and you enjoy. Remember, coming back to that selfless reason why you do what you do, you are impacting someone, even if it’s just one person who sees your posts and they decide to make a different choice the next day. That is impact. That is legacy.
I want you to keep that in mind because if you’re saying, “I hate social media. I don’t even want to be on it,” it’s going to be a problem for your business. It’s going to hold you back. If you don’t want to be on social media all the time, maybe you don’t want to be posting on Instagram stories all day long or you don’t want to post daily, that’s fine. Maybe you only want to post once or twice a week but you should be considering something like ads.
You can top up your social media by running paid ads. You need the budget and the know-how to do it. As we grow, we can do that more. I’m pumping more money and effort into paid ads because I want to spend less on my organic social media but I’m not going to give it up altogether. I still post on Instagram. I still have my YouTube and my show. There are a lot of ways that you can make social media better for you and more enjoyable.
The first thing comes down to the mindset. We have to switch from that mindset of, “I have to,” to, “I get to.” We have to know and understand that this is a beautiful lifeline for our clients. We get to serve, help and impact them, even if they never work with us and that’s amazing. That’s legacy. We’ve become a part of their story. How amazing is that? We have to remember that it takes time. Social media is not a good place for you to be if you’re looking for overnight success or instant results.
When you’re new and starting, it’s probably at least 1 year or 6 months. It’s going to take time. You need to figure out how to be consistent realistically. Don’t post daily if that’s exhausting. You don’t need to post every day. Post 3 to 4 times a week or twice a week. Figure out something you can be consistent with. You can always increase it as you get a team. You have to create content that you enjoy making and whatever that is. Maybe it’s a live video, long-form captions, blogs or YouTube videos. Figure out what it is and make sure you enjoy creating it.
Batching Content
The other thing that I wanted here is to consider batching your content. It’s exhausting to post on social media daily. Every day, we don’t necessarily have to create creative power or energy. I create content once a week. I have a content week. This show is content. I wrote all my Instagram posts for the month. I started my day by writing YouTube scripts and recording for the show. I will record my YouTube videos and then on Friday, I am going to record my TikTok. I spend an entire week creating my content. I have a lot of content. I’m on a lot of platforms. Do you remember I have a team? You don’t need to be on all these platforms.
Start with one social media platform that works for you, where you know your ideal client hangs out and master it. You can start repurposing content once you get a team. I hope this episode of the show was helpful for you. If you love this episode, you can leave me a five-star review on Apple Podcasts or iTunes. I would greatly appreciate it but if that’s too much effort for you, which I get because you’re busy, all you need to do is hit subscribe.
I would love it. Make sure you’re subscribed to this show and maybe download the last three episodes because that will help me get in front of more people. It’s a very simple and free way to support me. Thank you so much for hanging out with me. I will see you on the next episode where I help you become wealthy AF.
Important Links
- Health Coach Accelerator
- Instagram – Kendra Perry
- Apple Podcasts – The Wealthy Coach
