EntreLeadership - The Top Business Strategies for Social Media with Jasmine Star

Episode Date: November 29, 2021

Is social media a big waste of time, or is it another way you can build your business? On this episode of The EntreLeadership Podcast, we sit down with Jasmine Star—a business strategist who empowers entrepreneurs to build a brand, market it on social media, and create a life they love. This conversation is full of tactical tips and tricks you can use to market your business on social media. Then, in our second conversation, we sit down with Ramsey Solutions' Senior Director of B2C Marketing, Jenny Driessen. She provides helpful insight into how you can more effectively use social media to build relationships with your customers.   The EntreLeadership Podcast Jasmine Star's Website Learn more about Social Curator. Korrect Plumbing, Heating & Air Conditioning, Inc. Download Key Result Areas (KRAs) template. Schedule a call with Tim, our producer.   Learn more about EntreLeadership Events: EntreLeadership Summit | EntreLeadership Master Series   Learn more about EntreLeadership Coaching: Elite | Advisory Groups | Executive Coaching | Workshops | Weekly Report Tool   Learn more about the offers from our EntreLeadership Partners: BELAY | Gravy | Hite Digital | NetSuite Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Social media is one of those things you know you need to be doing for your business, but it can easily get put on the back burner. And in a digital age, if you're not engaging on social media, you're missing out on new customers and raving fans. So how can you make social media a sustainable part of your strategy and generate more business? From the Ramsey Network, this is the Entree Leadership podcast, where we help business leaders grow themselves, their teams, and their profits. I'm your host, George Camel, and today's episode is all about why social media marketing

matters, which connects to our business driver of plan. Our first guest today is Jasmine Starr. She's a business strategist who helps entrepreneurs build a brand and market it on social media. I sat down with her to talk about social media marketing and what you can do to implement it in your business today. In our second conversation, I talk with Ramsey leader Jenny Driesen, and we talk about the practical steps you can take to get social media to work for you. Up first, we've got my conversation with Jasmine Starr. Jasmine, it's so good to have you on the Entree Leadership Podcast. Thank you. I'm happy to be here.

You are doing some amazing things, and as we start here, I just want you to let the business leaders listening know what you do and what you're all about. I like to believe that I make people believe that the impossible is possible. And most of the time, people can achieve this by doing something they love, serving people well, and monetizing it along the way. Wow, nailed it. That was a great elevator pitch. Thanks. So one of your expertise out of many is social media, something that you've become known for. You love helping entrepreneurs use social media as a platform to grow their business. And a lot of business owners out there, they might be asking this question, is social media a waste of time for my business?

And before we go there, if you'll allow me to kind of detour a second, is at this point in time, at the time of this recording, people would introduce me as being Jasmine Star is known for X. but I have to tell you that it's been multiple iterations and I think that the core of it is Jasmine Star is known for taking whatever is affordable, accessible, quick, and highly effective. So next year, when I'm hopefully invited back to the show, I might be talking about something else where you might introduce me as Jasmine Star is great at

and then whatever is effective, cost, you know, it's not going to break the bank and gets results. That's what I'll be talking about. So today we can talk about social media because I'm all about it. But that's my pitch. And so if people are here being like, okay, I do want to do something

that's lightlifting, that's effective, that's affordable for my small business, then we can have a conversation. So let's go back to the question. I love it. Is it a waste of time? Well, I think in history, people could have said

that when you decided to run a radio commercial, it was a waste of time because who was listening to the radio. Likewise with television, likewise with blogging, likewise with early days of social media. So I don't think it's a waste of time. I think it's an art form.

and I do think that it's well worth your time if you have a plan and a strategy. Throwing darts in the wind, never a good idea. And that's what I see a lot happening on social media. So people are just going, well, I know I need to be on here, so I'm just going to make an account and kind of hope for the best and make it up as I go. Yes, and that's kind of like the same.

Like, I really want to lose 10 pounds, so I'm going to go to the gym. I'm just going to stare at the treadmill. This felt like a personal attack, Jasmine. You know me. You know me. That is me. I walk in, I go, there's a lot of machines. I'm just going to walk around and look. like I know what I'm doing. Or like, I'm going to find myself in the sauna. That's my workout. Yeah,

that's what a lot of people do on social as well. And it works when you work. And oftentimes, people, and I get it, that struggle is real. Small business owners have 10,000 things that they need to do. And so social media feels like another thing to do. And I truly get it. But when it comes to marketing your business, if you're not talking about your business, very few other people will. So I think that this is our opportunity to take control of the narrative, give people, things to talk about, make them think favorably of your brand, and then have that result in sales. So it's not just a box you check off on the business checklist. It is a foundation for your business. So what are the top reasons businesses should be on social media if they're not already?

I think I said it, it's free. So that in and of itself. And it's very, very easy to learn. But people like to complicate things. And if the idea is just to get content out and to speak to a singular customer who will then have long-term ramifications and ripples in your business, then the idea is like, what could you say in a singular post that's going to make somebody think favorably about your business? And that could be wildly effective, cost virtually nothing at all, and have like long-term effects. And this is what we see on like very like inspirational, helpful, educational post on social media. So it's not about, you know, if I'm a business owner, I'm thinking, well, I can get a sales guy or saleswoman to make a call today and get money in the door. But what am I going to do with

this Twitter feed or this Facebook account that's going to actually impact my business revenue-wise. What do you say to that person? So I think that salespeople are great for sales. I think that social media is great for brand. And over time, we are going to be competing more on brand than we are on the efficacy of a salesperson. And it is not currently the over-indexed in the present. It is the future, though. Like had wonderful conversations with a couple by the name of Rory and AJ Vaden.

and they focus on brands. And they were talking about how the next big buyer sector is going to be millennials. And like 70, 80% of millennials want to choose a doctor or a lawyer based on their personal brand. Never mind the fact that they went to Harvard or Yale. It's the fact of like, what are you putting out on Twitter? What are you putting out on Instagram that's making me feel an affinity for you so that I can then trust you? So if that's going to be the demand on the highest educated in the land, Imagine what the demand will be for somebody who wants to bring in a plumber, a locksmith, a photographer into their life.

The brand is going to be the thing, especially as we move to voice. People are going to say, don't give me a plumber, Alexa. They're going to say, please send me John in Nashville on 8th Street plumber. It's going to get very specific. Yeah, so as we get more competitive and we're in the information age, people have access to every single contact for every plumber in your area. And so it's going to get a little, it's going to become harder to compete. So you've got to have a strong brand out front. And social media is one of the best ways to do that.

Absolutely. Like when you think about it, like if you were to look at your own buying behavior and you are looking for, you move to a new town or perhaps your vacationing and you need something last minute, a haircut, a massage, a manicure, oftentimes the next biggest buying sector are going to go to, yes, a website, but they're going to check out social media. What's happening on social media? How current is it? Can I picture myself getting a haircut, getting a manicure, getting a massage by this

particular person. That is way easily shown on social media and a very quick consumption as people make decisions quickly now. Social media really buttresses that. Yeah. So what are the two main components you would say you need to create this compelling content? Is there a formula for this? Well, if it was formulaic, I'd probably be a billionaire. I'm hoping that for you. I will manifest that. You know, when it becomes formulaic, it doesn't become effective. And I do think that there are certain foundational things. like obviously educating, entertaining, or empowering, if it falls into one of those three buckets, you're already off onto the right foot. And then you, secondly, the two things, I mean, the thing that you really want to focus on is not talking about the thing you sell, but talking about

how the thing you sell benefits your followers. And that small distinction is I could tell you to buy a coffee cup. Buy my coffee mug. It's great. My coffee mug is great for coffee, but it's not necessarily compelling you. I could tell you about the process of how I made the coffee mug because when you become part of the process, you have a more likelihood of buy. I could say that when you buy a coffee mug, I have a charitable organization that I donate to. Then you have a higher affinity. I could talk about the reasons why I started my coffee mug. Oh, well, my grandfather from Columbia sourced beans and now this is his legacy here in America. All of a sudden, in all three of those fictitional situations, you might be like, you know what? I like a coffee mug. Because we're

emotional beings buying out of emotion where a salespeople want to sell an intellect. And it doesn't really work that way and doesn't translate well in modern day marketing. Yeah, it really comes down to that emotion. Are you pulling me into your story? And do I feel a connection to your brand and to your business? Yes. And imperfection is perfect. This is where a lot of people have the opportunity to tell themselves a different story. I want social media. It needs to be perfect. It needs to look like a movie reel. It needs to look like a magazine. It needs to look like, a curator curating content in museum. And I do believe, I used to preach that that was the case in 2016 and 2017. And now it's like, social media is show up as you are. People want to work and invest with people

who they know like and trust. And that's done easily and effectively on things opening up and you making a smoothie in the morning. You're not talking about the smoothie. You're talking about how the smoothie is impacting you to run your business. Small nuances become highly effective

when it comes to sales. Yeah, we had a kibosh on stock photos here at Ramsey because we decided as a brand, we need to be authentic. We need to be warm, real, and bold and stock photos are not going to cut it. Absolutely. People need to feel like this is a real person.

These are real things. Absolutely. And then all of a sudden, though, like you say that, and then there's business owners who are just like, oh, no, no. It's like I'm hardly posting on social as it is. You want to take my own photos down?

Absolutely, absolutely. And so that's where I think that the content I create is for that person. The content I create is like, how do you take your own iPhone photos? How do you have a quick and effective way to show up on, let's say, Instagram stories or Facebook stories? How then can you create a powerful post on LinkedIn in less than four minutes? The strategies are simple yet effective without giving yourself an excuse. You have to find a reason. Yeah.

So let's jump into where a business owner can start. So to be successful, do you need to be on all the platforms in all places? No. Let's all just take a collective sigh. It feels good. Yeah. I felt it. Okay, but then maybe in like sound effects, like we do it at the end of the sigh, you hear like, ding.

They'll put it in post, I'm sure. Okay. Okay, so no, we put so much pressure on ourselves thinking we have to be all the things and all the ways, and it's absolutely not. I highly encourage somebody to pick a platform, not that they really, really love, but to pick a platform where they think their dream customer is. you might not want to be in Facebook groups, but if you know your customer is there, they're going to be spending your marketing time effectively inside of Facebook groups to attract the person you want to work with.

Master your approach on one platform and then slowly iterate from there. But if you aren't consistent on one platform, then do not think about iteration. Choose consistency, come up with a plan and your strategy, deploy against it, and then repurpose it on other platforms. It's about working smarter and not harder. Yeah, so you don't need to be in 17 places. You can choose one where you know your target customer might be.

and we're going to go all in on this one and get really good at this. Absolutely. Yeah. So where do you start? Let's say you have zero followers. I just created my Facebook page for my plumbing company. I have zero followers and I'm going, this feels like a long way from having any impact. Where do I go from there?

If you were to walk into a networking event and you had your badge and then you have like your plastic cup of really cheap wine and your objective was to make the most of the networking party, you wouldn't say I need to have everybody in this room like me and give me their business card you would start off with a few people you would start off with a few people who you think you can make an impact with and then those two people tell two people tell two people and I've had like the blessing of working with lots of influencers who people would look at and immediately think oh they must be raking in the dough because they have 100 200,000 followers but what people don't know on the outside is that an influencer without a business is an influencer and the path ends there it ends with quick monetization without the long tail and i have

seen business owners with less than a thousand followers on instagram have multiple six figure businesses so optics don't matter it's what are you doing on the back end of it so you have a facebook page and nobody's there well guess what get one and then get two and then get three and then have zero expectation sometimes we tell ourselves oh like our facebook page should have 500 people the next five months who said that we make up these numbers and then hold ourselves accountable and then we beat ourselves up if we're not actually getting the thing that we clearly made up out of thin air. Why don't we put our intentions out, create great content, and then let's say over the span of 30, 60, or 90 days, there was one particular post on your page that surprised you.

Why not put $5 behind it and then target people within a specific 5 to 10 mile radius of your physical location? Or target against a page of somebody else who might be interested in the thing that you're doing. We're talking about working smarter, not harder, looking at what performed on the past and it over-indexing it for the future. we can take the pressure off of ourselves and go, hey, it's okay. I don't need to get a thousand followers tomorrow. Oh my goodness.

But I do need to track what I'm doing and see what's working and double down on those things. Absolutely. A thousand percent. I love that. So what does winning look like on social media? We're talking a little bit about those metrics. How do you figure out if what I'm doing is actually working? Well, it depends on what your objectives are. Like if your objective is to get a lot of followers because you think it'll lead it to brand deals or it lead to collaborations,

well, then that's what your metric of success is. my metric of success is am I making sales? Like, how do I know what's actually working is when I see a piece of content that has performed well organically. And then I turn that piece of content into an ad and run it against people who have previously indicated that they're interested in the thing that I am teaching. Ah, there it is. We start off with something that's free, carefully watch the metrics.

And when I say carefully watch the metrics, I'm not even talking about necessary insights or analytics. I'm literally talking about who has saved the post, shared the post, like, and comments. This is just like some really like back of the napkin math and I'm like this right here. So like for instance, I might create a reel. And then I notice that the song and the text on the reel has performed well. What I then can do is take the same reel, have the same text, but have a different call to action at the end. So instead of like leave a comment or tag a friend, I could say click on the link to learn more. So we've proven something that worked, repurpose it for other audiences

who would be most likely to click on the link. And so you kind of continually tweak your content and post to see, oh, we got seven more people to call us to schedule an appointment because we change the language. So that's smart. You've got to be looking at this stuff. It's not just let's post and post and hope for the best to know we're doing it. It's tracking it, having goals, but also taking these crazy expectations off of yourself. And also, you get more results, the more you post. The frequency, if you and I both started with zero on our Facebook page and I made the dedication to post at minimum once a day, at minimum go live once a week, you would see our data and analytics look different simply because I'm creating content with frequency

and frequency gives us data. And we use that data to be like, hey, this particular topic on this particular day worked, let me see if I can do it again. And all of a sudden, if it proves that it works just as well or even better the next time, now we find a little formula that we could, now when we create content, we're going to try to replicate that particular model. And then the algorithms and the, you know, the gods above and social media world, they like when we post and they like when there's engagement. They love it. start to show that to more people and reward you reward you for it yes okay so it is important consistency is key absolutely it doesn't have to be amazing when you start no no so don't get scared

and say it will be terrible when you start who are we kidding that's the truth well we got on a bike and we were terrible and we learned a second language and we were terrible and thankfully my husband's here in the control room but the first time you had a kiss it was probably not very you know the more you do something the better you get at it same with social media yeah can you see his face right now no I'm intentionally not looking at him because I think I'd probably blush and like my mom's listen to this podcast. I'm like, Mom, I don't kiss him. Like, you know, we're, we're, avoid eye contact. So let's talk about customers. You're talking about the people you're trying to reach. How do you know where these customers are at? I mean, if I'm a dentist's office, my customers are people who want

their teeth cleaned and fixed. Where are those people? Well, if you're a dentist, probably within 10 to 50 miles of your office. So you're sticking very local for a service-based business like that. 100%. There is riches and niches. And your neighborhood specifically, I actually think that physical locations are better off. You can get super, super, super tactical because let's just say I am a dentist. Well, chances are I'm going to be doing tutorials. If pediatric dentistry, child comes in, I want to talk about how I approach a child. It would be a 15 second of how you can come down and you give them a sticker and you're like, I want to give you another one. Moms and dads who are booking for their children, they want to know how will you behave with my child. Another one would be a quick story

going over the sticker collection, talking about have you gotten your sticker yet. Another one would be a PDF download of an activity book preparing your child for 30 days before they have their teeth cleaning. Like, it's just content. And I think this is the difficulty is that we get into business to wanting to do X. I got into dentistry because I believe in teeth. Great. In order to be successful in digital age, you have to create content to show how passionate you are about the thing that you're passionate about. And people hate the reality of it.

But as soon as we embrace that, we are ahead of the curve. and we do that to create some level of trust to where I go I like this person, I trust them, now I will do business with them. Absolutely. And people often say, but Jasmine, I'm not getting sales on social media. And I have come to believe and know that these people are wildly talented and brilliant. And they're probably better than their competitors. And people often say, I don't get how that person is doing better in business. Like, they're not as good as me.

And I'm like, I know. But we are emotional creatures making emotional decisions about intellectual products or services. And so people want to speak to the intellect instead of speaking to the emotion. And I think that I've become like a banner waiver of sorts of people who are underqualified, under talented, underfunded, and yet we still continue to rise, not because we're the best, but because we know how to treat people really, really, really well and build relationships with them. So when people say, Jasmine, I'm not getting sales on social media, I think it comes back down to, I don't know if you've given enough people enough ways for able to trust you.

And that then becomes entirely different conversation. Yeah. So it's about, you know, providing that value. in creating that trust over maybe a long period of time, especially if it's a bigger purchase. Oh, I mean, look, we're just detouring this conversation. You're like, Jasmine, I want to talk to you for 27 minutes. I'm like, we're now going on 87 minutes. No, but like, that's what it is.

That's truly what it's about is our expectations of what we think in reality. So we pull ideas and numbers and analytics from thin air and then hold them to be sacrosanct. No, that's not the case, not remotely. Yes, this is a much more philosophical conversation than it is a social media conversation. And you've got to start there to build the right foundation. So what are some of the biggest mistakes that you see businesses make with their social media accounts, especially some of these small businesses, the service-based businesses out there? They all feel like QVC.

They're all selling. And I understand why this is the case. And so I'm going to say something and it's probably going to ruffle some feathers and make somebody feel something. And that's what I'm called to do. I'm called to push you into inaction. I do not think that I'm a motivational speaker. I don't even think that I inspire people. I simply call it the truth and then people have to rectify.

if I believe it's a truth, then I must change. And what it really comes back down to is, are you okay with what people think? That's it. The biggest mistakes boil down to, are you okay with what that 10th grade bully is going to say about that post? Are you okay with your mother-in-law is going to say? Are you okay with what your dad is going to say?

Are you okay with your coworkers who know that you have a side hustle when they haven't told your boss? And they see them, they're just kind of like waiting and watching. Are you okay with what they are going to say? Because at the end of the day, you must be consistent. and if all you're doing is running on social, buy my mug, and then you disappear. Or, oh, that Cyber Monday comes around and there's Black Friday, and you go in and it's a bunch of just like promote, promote, promote, and then it goes silent.

Or it's like you finally saved up enough from your Etsy sales and you're sending your family on vacation for Disney. And so, of course, well, when you're living in high life, it's like a week of endless post about you and Mickey and Minnie and life is great. And then it goes quiet until you have another sale for your mugs. That's devastating. You're not going to see results. Yeah. No one wants to be sold to constantly. Absolutely.

Now we're okay with it if you provide so much value that I'm like, oh my gosh, I need this and I want this because of that trust. Tell me. I don't ever think that people are okay. Like I will say I believe in that 95, 5%. I give 95% of everything I know in every which way. And when there is an opportunity for me to promote something, oh, unfollow. Too much selling. You're talking about yourself.

And I know in integrity, the math. And so I have to look and understand that I will not be for everybody. My objective when it comes to the business is to either attract people into my orbit or repel. And as business people, the greatest thing that you could do is to cut out the noise, people who are never going to buy for me anyway. So people say, I'm just unfollowing because you're talking too much about your business. Bye. See you. Yeah.

Find the people who care. Absolutely. Yeah. So when and how should you use social media to make a profit? Because it sounds like there's a time in place for this. We're saying you can't sell all the time, but there is a time. How do you do that the right way? So very strategically, I like to put out moments of my cyclical business year in terms of promotions.

And so if I know I'm going to be promoting during a particular time, I like to have a promotional launch runway. So it's going to be like a four-week strategy specifically when there's like an end of cart or like a closing cart, the limited amount of seats or a time frame. There's a sense of urgency here. Absolutely, absolutely. For all types of promotions. So I have to even use this promotional strategy when I had launched by podcast because I knew that when you're asking somebody to do something, thing people feel like now she's asking me so there is a four-week strategy so week number one would be the warm-up sequence this is when you're reminding your

followers what it is that you do and oftentimes you're like no they should know actually they don't because statistically only 3% of your audience is actually seeing any organic posts so you would have to say the same thing again and again again again again to actually hit all of your audience so you're gonna be spending a week just reminding people what it is that you do and what makes you special and sets you apart your why about you about your team what got you to start pulling them into the story absolutely then week number two is the nurture sequence this is where you start applying pressure on their desired result so you might

be selling a mug but people aren't buying a mug they're buying a desired result did you like how my my throat got caught there because i'm trying to play it off and it's like i literally had a brain fart my brain could not keep up with my words i was like uh remix okay so then week number two would be the nurture sequence this is where you're applying pressure on that desired result week number three this isn't the offer this is when you're going to come in and have a hard right hook without apologies so during this time during my podcast lunch i was saying please go and subscribe and leave a review. It was a very clear ask, and it was not for everybody.

But in order to drive home what I wanted them to do at the end of week four, this is where you go into the closing sequence. I was having a contest during that time to say, if you want the last minute for this contest, it's by this date. That was the four-week sequence. And I think that every business owner could absolutely use that, and we've provided tools and resources for them to stay aligned and to show up on social every single day following that strategy.

And we have seen people get powerful results. Yeah, so you've got to have a strategy here. You can't just walk in cold on the day you have the sale and go, hey, buy from us or not? Right. Right. Okay. When we talk about strategy, there's a lot of trends out there that you might feel like, okay, well, I feel like I need to be doing this thing over here. How do you know which trends to be following or should you be following the trends at all?

Specifically right now, at the time of this recording, I would say that trends are really, really good thing. So TikTok heavily in competition with Instagram. So what they're trying to do is to make it easy for people to make content. So this is why TikTok first started highlighting trending songs, trending themes, trending backgrounds. And now Instagram has started implementing some of that because people, it's a hard thing to become creative on the drop of the hat. So what TikTok and Instagram want to do is like just copy the trend.

And so you're giving the algorithm inventory to show people, which then keeps more people on the platform. So at this point in time, if I see a trending song or a trending action, I really do want to hop into it, but then it's important for us to contextualize it. It's not enough for you to do a dance on TikTok because what's the point of it? My goal is to find a trend on TikTok or reels, do the trend, even if it is a dance. And oh, God, it's cringeworthy. Like, I don't wake up and be like, you know what I want to do?

I want to sell my business for tens of million dollars. But in order for me to do that, I must point at videos and I must shake and I must twirl and I must lip sync. Nobody thinks that. But I always think I'm going to do what I need to do to get where I want to go. go. So if I know that that's what's being indexed, that's what's getting the most engagement, I'm going to do something that's going to get a desired result. So I do find trends, but then I try to contextualize it for my dream customer, a business owner. So you can take that trend and go, I'm going to make this my own and make sure it connects with who I'm trying to reach. That makes

sense. So how do we simplify the content creation process? Because this is where a lot of business owners get hung up and they go, I need a content strategy and there's spreadsheets. My brain is spinning and I don't have a social media person full time right now to help with this. How can we simplify this process and make it a part of our daily workflow? So the good news and the not so good news is I talk with thousands of business owners a month. And every I am talking about 99% of the people who say, I'm just so overwhelmed, I don't have time, what do I do? How do I be strategic?

And it simply boils down to not having a plan. Of course it feels overwhelming. Of course you don't have a strategy. if you don't know where to begin. So it always feels like you're just wasting time. But if you went in and I said, hey, can you get to New York? You'd get to New York. But if I gave you the path to get to New York driving X amount of hours and the quickest

route possible, you feel a lot more confident. That's all you have to do. So inside of Social Curator, I'm a CEO and co-founder of Social Curator, there's seven caption categories. What you want to do is just apply a caption category every single day of the week. Let's not reinvent the wheel. We know that there are certain things that drive engagement. So seven Cineck said that people don't buy what you sell.

they buy why you sell it and so if you're not sharing your why you're doing a complete disservice to your business so why not have one of your whys be one of your seven content categories when you talk about behind the scenes one of the most effective ways to sell what it is you do is to show what you do behind the scenes and yet be like no that's not professional no people really do want to see the warehouse or your messy office people want to see I can't tell you so we had this challenge we had business owners take a picture of your workspace and it was part of like a five-day engagement challenge and the post that did the best, where when people were showing the behind the scenes of their workspace,

oftentimes a bed with a cat in it, an office space in a really cute coffee shop, or at their kitchen table next to their kids' piles of soccer cleats and paperwork, and people were endeared to the creator and less to the creation. So why not just apply one category to talk about every single day of the week and change the topic, week of week? Category the same, topic be different. So you can just have, you know, three, five, seven content buckets. And you say every Monday, we're going to do behind the scenes of the office and highlight one of the employees and their favorite snacks.

Yes. Just something fun like that where people feel like, okay, I'm getting to know these people and it's creating trust. Absolutely. I love that. Absolutely. This is good stuff. Okay, I feel a lot better about I don't even run a business. And I'm like, let's do this thing.

I'm ready. I kind of find that I'm a little intimidated right now. Why? I kind of feel like you're like a legit podcaster and I'm like, I am speaking my truth. I'm like, I am being out podcasting. It's because I have glasses. It makes you just feel like this guy's a nerdy podcast. That's what it is.

Well, here's the thing. When I had mentioned the ding, like at some point in the podcast, I was like, oh, you have to add a ding. I thought you brought out your pen. I was like, is he going to really write a note and add the ding? Because he's like, this is like NPR style like podcasting and I'm like, girl, you better up your game. The producer just let me know he added that note for you. That's amazing. We're going to do it for you.

Man, y'all, Ramsey, you guys do not drop the ball around here. We don't fool around. So, Jasmine, I want to make this really practical for the listeners. And I'm thinking of one of our Entree Leadership elite members, Martha, who runs a company called Correct Plumbing. And on her page, she does have a link to a Facebook page, but I'm wondering, how could I help Martha today do better with social media? Is she doing enough?

Is she in the right amount of places? What would be a simple strategy, you know, and some napkin strategy you could give Martha to move her business forward today with social media? Well, I have to tell you, I cheated, because I did get the link to Martha's website. And Martha has a good headshot. Great headshot.

Great headshot. I was convinced. I want her to do my plumbing. So I went through this site. I think the site is highly effective. And based on what you told me, her business is killing it. So I think, now I'm not saying that this is Martha. I think people in Martha's position might be tempted to think, listen, we're really doing

great. Year every year, we're growing. I don't really see the necessity for social media. To which I might say, I agree. That's fantastic. With the exception that Martha, who's 22, has one employee who's a contracted employee, I mean, sorry, contractor, not even an employee. So, Martha, he's making TikToks.

And he's getting reels and targeting them towards people in Martha's neck of the wood. So where Martha is growing now, absolutely plateau. Over a couple of years, since millennials are the next wave of buyers, they're going to want to go to Martha's website and Martha's, and they're going to see that when I clicked on Martha's Facebook page, it was a testimonial, which is great. was a highlighted of one of their employees, which was great. But it was again talking about the plumbing, aka the creation instead of the creators. I want to see, and you know it sounds ridiculous,

but these are the demands of marketing. I want to see the people who they're featuring. How do they enter a house? How do they prepare to enter a house? What are the tools of the trade? Five tips for women at home alone before they let somebody into their house. Creating content that is less about we-fix toilets to how to make you feel more confident about your decision. Or five ways that you know you're getting ripped off by a plumber. Okay. And here's the beauty of this, is that this could be a blog post. So we can index it for SEO.

You can truncate it and you can make it into a Facebook post. And then you can make just five tips that you can easily, you don't even need to use words. You can get a trending song. And all Martha has to do, it's just like, not even Martha. It could be Martha, can be anybody in the team. And all she's to do is point downwards. and say five ways not to get ripped off by a plumber. And all she has to do is right hand, point over her left shoulder.

Left hand point over her right shoulder, over her right shoulder, over her left shoulder, and then a call to action. What does Martha want them to do? That piece of content could legitimately be filmed in less than two minutes and so highly effective. This is the kind of content that gets shared by other women who want to know the five tips that they need to know before they let somebody into their house. That price is marketing until two minutes and no money. Incredible. And I feel like I trust Martha already now because they're telling me here's five ways to not get ripped off.

And I think, well, Martha's not going to rip me off. She's trying to help me. Absolutely. So this is some great stuff here. So as we wrap here, what are some things that are grinding your gears on social media that just make you angry? They're like, please stop this. You know, it boils down to anything but social media. And this is just the pain. I feel wildly empathetic towards people who don't feel comfortable being themselves. when they know that they have like a purpose and they know that they love what they do

and they won't give themselves the permission to actually show up for fear of what other people will say, think, or do. And I think to myself, my goodness, people are going to have opinions anyway. They're going to have opinions if you decide to go on a run or if you decide to sit on the couch. They're going to have opinions if you decide to drink a smoothie or eat a slice of pizza. They're going to have a decision if you run a business or you don't.

So if you know that they're going to have an opinion anyway and their opinions don't pay your bills, why not do the thing that you think you've been called to do? Why not be young and reckless, not around age, but on ideology, and try things that you've never done before to get results in a different way? I cannot tell you about race or gender or age or orientation or anything that would ever stop somebody or should ever stop somebody from creating the thing that they know that they've created to do.

If not you, then who? And if not you, it will be somebody else. So why let the thing that you've been put on this earth do go to somebody else when that blessing was entirely yours. That'll preach. We're not going to let the critics stop us from what we know we've got to do, especially as business owners who are supporting the entire economy. They're the backbone.

It's so important that they're out there every day. In spite of all the criticism, which they've got plenty of in the last 18 months, they've been through it. And so as the business owner starts to go, right, I like what Jasmine is saying. I want to implement this. What is the one thing, regardless of the type of business that that business owner can do this week to move forward? in social media. As to create a very basic plan.

So I am not sitting here saying that you must show up for seven days a week. What is your capacity? If you tell me my capacity is three times a week, great. I'm going to invite you to do four because if you can do three, you can do four. Then what I want you to do is take a pen. And just write down, I don't even need you to create the post. Write down, I'm going to share behind the scenes on this day. And now that you have a plan in advance, if you happen to walk into your office and you have somebody who's volunteering or

maybe it's just you and there is a mirror take a picture of yourself in the mirror in your office now you already have the content for that plan because you know where you're going with it day two you want to talk about your why maybe it was your grandfather who inspired you why not take the little time go through your digital files and find a photo of your grandfather why not when it comes to a testimonial have reach out to a client ask them dare them hey can you send me a 10 second video about how three words that you would use to describe working with me they send you that and that becomes your content have a plan execute on the the plane. That's all they need to do. It's inertia. You get it going and it will stay going.

Jasmine, this has been incredibly helpful. I know it's going to help a lot of listeners out there who are going. I didn't know a thing about social media and now I want to run through a wall and get the team fired up about this. So I love what you're doing to help entrepreneurs daily fight through all of the doubt in their mind and the things that are holding them back in order to see their businesses, their teams, their communities flourish. So thanks so much for being on. Thank you. I appreciate it. Huge thanks to Jasmine Starr for a great conversation about social media. As she talked about, it is a key to your marketing strategy.

So what are some practical ways you can use social media in your business? We'll have a conversation about that right after this. All right, in our second conversation, I sit down with Jenny Driesen. She's our Senior Director of Marketing for Business to Consumer here at Ramsey Solutions. And we talk about the practical steps you can take to get social media to work for you. Jenny, it's your debut on the Entree Leadership Podcast. Welcome. Thanks, George. Happy to be here. So you lead the charge here at Ramsey when it comes to social media, and you have years and years of experience in this area.

And I want to help the listeners out there who may not be a super fan of social media for a lot of reasons. It can be confusing, overwhelming, it can be a time suck. And so I want to kind of help them get some tactical strategies in this conversation so that they can implement this stuff. You ready? Let's do it. So first off, what are some practical ways? businesses should be using social media. Yeah, the first thing to really think about is that social media is first and foremost social.

So the focus should really be on connecting with your customer day in and day out. And that's the beauty of it, is quick access to the people that you're going to be building these relationships with so that you can sell to them and have products and services that meet their needs. So when you're looking at that, it is a long-term relationship play. But it's so valuable because it creates retention. and customers that can continue to build for your business. When you say social, you're saying,

hey, this is not talk at me and post and sell. You've really got to create this relationship. What does that look like tactically? Yeah, absolutely. So what that looks like tactically is figuring out what you want to post and what you're trying to communicate to your customer. So showcasing your authenticity and who you are to them. Like, why did you create your business in the first place?

What problem are you looking to solve for your customer and show them how you can help them. Show them. You don't need to be communicating your sales day in and day out. They hear that enough and they're going to see that when they are ready. So when you're thinking about that, you want to post consistently. That's the most important thing, creating an opportunity to have a conversation with them. So if they comment, if they send you a message, reply. Crazy concept, but it is the digital version of building a relationship in real life. And when it comes to this, you talk a lot about the customer and the user mindset. Why is it important to consider the user's mindset before posting on social media? Yeah, that's really important. That's something we talk about a lot here, particularly, is thinking about, okay, you have so many different avenues where you can communicate with your customer or potential customer. You have social media, you have email, you have your website, you have in real life, you have all of these avenues. Social media particularly is you need to think about what are they thinking about when you're talking about.

talking to them. So customer intent is really important in each of these avenues. If we take podcasts, for example, so like right now, these people are actively listening to us. They are intentionally focused on whatever the words that are coming out of our mouth. That is attention that is captured right now. Social media, when you think about, we always use the persona of Bachelor Becky, right? So someone who is on their Instagram is likely, maybe a rough day at work. They came home, sat on their couch, made dinner for the family, the kids, finally. got them wrestled down after a crazy bedtime routine

and turns on the TV a commercial's playing so they log on their phone and are looking to consume content for the day. They're not automatically looking to purchase an $100 item when they're just logging in during a commercial break, right? So trying to figure out the right time, when to

sell and when to communicate what you need to communicate with them, intent is really important in order to get a conversion. And I assume Becky is watching the show The Bachelor. Is that where that comes from? Yeah, Becky is watching The Bachelor. Okay, I want to make it clear for the listeners. She's a Bachelor, but she's got this family?

What's going on? Yeah, we personified her as Bachelor Becky. It is Becky, who is the mom and comes home from work, and then she is now watching The Bachelor on Monday nights. I love it. So are there mindsets for each specific platform, you know, Facebook versus Twitter versus Instagram? Yes, so each social platform has a different ecosystem

attached to each of those. So it's not a one-size-fits-all, and you can't approach them all the same. So when you think about Facebook, there was actually a meme going around earlier this year that was kind of showcased this, but it was like Facebook is where you're talking and communicating with your family and friends. Instagram is kind of where it's the highlight reel to your life, but it's very visual-oriented. So it really has an opportunity from a visual perspective, photography, food, design, decor, anything that has photos attached to it visually appeal is really strong there.

LinkedIn, workplace connections, trying to personal development, a lot of those different ecosystems, Twitter, huge for news, sports, real-time updates, right? So each of those, again, from an intent perspective, have different purposes for why people are going on those platforms in the first place. So you've really got to be thinking intentionally about what am I posting here and why and who's out there and what are they looking for. These are a lot of questions for a busy business owner to go, I've got to think about this. Is this something that's realistic to go, I'm going to craft a lot of,

different posts for each medium. Yeah, well, something that Jasmine mentioned earlier, which I was like spot on, is really focusing and picking just one. You don't have to be everywhere. So figure out who is your target demographic, figure out where they are, and just really crush it on that one platform.

Again, you have so many other aspects to your role that you have to focus on. So how can we leverage and really lean in to the one platform that's really going to make you successful with the audience that you, you need to capture and talk to specifically. So put us in the business owner's shoes. If I'm a business owner, what type of content should I be focused on making for social media?

That's a great question. So I don't want to get too prescriptive with this, but I want to give some guardrails to be considering so that everyone can kind of, it's not, again, not a one-size-fits-all. So each business or service is going to have something unique to their approach in their content that's going to be valuable. But I'll give an example. you really want to make sure that you have content buckets. And what that means is just categories of how you want to talk about something.

So what we do here at Ramsey is we have three main buckets that you'll see. If you filter any of our social content, it will at least hit at minimum one of those. And if we can do two out of three or three out of three, the more, the better. That would be educational, motivational, and relevant. And relevant can take on a bunch of different spins. So relevant could be social culture like memes, or relevant could be something. something that's in the news. So when we're looking at the content we're producing, we have to fit one of those buckets. If it doesn't, we're not doing it. So define a couple, three content buckets

that really fit within your business's ecosystem. I pick three content themes that fit for your business, and then you can create different variances of your content within those. And you could even try the educational, motivational, and relevant. That applies for many things. So no matter what industry you're in, you can take these buckets and go, okay, what does that look like for construction or for manufacturing or I run a dental office? How can I use that, leverage those buckets to go, I want to post testimonials from a customer who had an incredible experience who was afraid of the dentist. I'm going to post some tips on flossing. And so you can start to really get creative and think what kind of content would help my audience, my potential customers, so that it can create some

trust. Absolutely. You know, that was something that, you know, I've talked to a lot of business owners who just want to figure out how to get started. And you just got to think back to why did you create this business in the first place and showcase that. And it's totally okay to give people tips on the thing that you're showcasing. If you have a plumbing business, show them how they can DIY something. Because what you're creating there is value for that customer. And then when they have a serious problem or something that they just don't want to DIY,

they're going to be thinking of you first and foremost. That brand recall is going to be so much stronger because you've already given them insight or education into something that they just saw on social media that they needed a quick help with. And they're going to remember that. Yeah, that's so true. I do that as well. I follow accounts and I go, I wish they were in my area. I'd call them right now to help with this problem. So let's talk about some metrics here because, you know, they're business owners. They want to win in this space and the metrics do matter. But I've heard you say before that followers don't matter. What do you mean by that? Yes. So when you look at metrics, there are leading metrics and lagging metrics. So

when we talk about a leading metric, that's something you want to look at in real time, because that's going to be indicative of how something's going to be performing later on. A lagging metric is just the outcome of something that you've been working on at the beginning, right? If you're going to the gym, and it's like, I'm going to go work out, lift weights, and do X amount of reps per day. Well, that is a leading metric. You're doing 20 reps daily. That's the work that you're putting in. Later on, you're going to lose all of this body fat percentage and gain muscle and whatever.

That's a lagging metric. That's the outcome of something that you put in. So when we're talking leading metrics and performance, that's really where you've got to keep an eye on. So when we look at that, followers, lagging. Leading metric, engagement. Engagement is your number one metric. Now, you've got to filter that through because you also are running a business here. So it's not just all sunshine and rainbows all day, every day.

So something else you want to look at additionally is the metrics kind of under the hood or on the back end as well which would be like your website, your sales, what is coming from that from the business impact side? So you're going to monitor both of those as you keep going. So the engagement is more important than just trying to spike your follower number

and we have a thousand people, yay! It's more about do I have 20 people that actually care that are commenting that actually want to do business with me. Exactly. I mean, you just said it, right? If you have a thousand followers and no one is interested in whatever you have to sell them, well, then those 1,000 followers are literally useless. Or you have 100 people who follow you and 50 of them are actively using your business.

I'd say the 50 who are using your business versus the zero is the stronger number there. Yeah. So we've got to talk about revenue here because business owners, they're interested in growing the revenue. And if social media isn't helping that, even if it is on the long term, that lagging metric that you talked about, how do they start to do that without just making it a giant sales pitch. Yeah, that's a great question. So when you're talking about your posts and the things that you're putting out into the world, this is not just a space to put advertising. Again, you're building a relationship. So if you're just posting promotions, sales, deals, and just sale, sale, buy this, buy this, buy this, buy this, buy this, buy this, well, you're just sounding

like a television channel that's only playing commercials. People don't come to TV to watch the commercials that come to watch the content, and then they might be influenced by the commercials that they happen to come across. And in that same way, you really want to balance what you're posting there. So we always say here, we try to do what we call give content and ask content.

That is our easiest way to define the things that we're publishing. So when we say give, that just means posts that we're trying to get engagement on in a good way. Like we want to educate them, we want to motivate them. we want to motivate them. The asks are our promotional content. So that's where we have a sale. We have a book launch that's coming up. That's where you're going to see a lot of our promotional posts that we're asking something of the customer. And when we talk proportions, we're looking at 80% of our content is going to be purely gives, gives with our relationship

with the customer. And then the 20% is the ask or promotional post. That's a good framework there. So if I'm a business owner, if I have 10 posts in a week, eight of them should really be trying to add value to my customers, to the fans, and two of them can be promotional in nature. At that level, I don't feel like, wow, they're constantly selling me. Exactly. You're giving them the most relevant information in them at any given time. You're super serving them in its own right. So as we wrap here, for people listening who think social media is a waste of time, they go, Jenny, listen, my business is crushing it, my profits are great, why do I need to add social media onto the plate here? What would you say to that business owner?

I would say that social media is the best place for you to connect with your customer. You are going to be able to increase that relationship, build the influence you need. So then all the legwork later on, it's not really legwork anymore. It's easy click of the button or sitting there and having fun with them. I can't tell you the amount of times that when we say comments coming in or building a relationship with someone that once we see them in person, it feels like you know them. Like they're part of the family, which is the best experience you can ever have, is having built a relationship with your customers so much so that they trust you,

you trust them, and then you can leverage that for your business, and they're going to benefit from that in the long run. So it's a great 360 degree experience, if you will. So I would say do it. It's worth it. And you're investing in that long run for your customers. So if you are looking at this as a quick money-making scheme, then just don't do it at that point. But if you're doing it to connect with the customers, to understand them better, to add value to their life, to engage with them, then you're on the right track.

And then all of a sudden, you have more customers, which makes more profit. Yes, it continues to build off of that. Genius. My mind is blown. Well, Jenny, thank you so much for coming on the podcast. Appreciate the way you love our customers and deeply want to understand where they're at and how we can help and the way you're leading the team here. Thanks for having me, George. Jasmine and Jenny both talked about the key role social media plays in your business. If it's time for you to delegate your social media or hire someone dedicated to it,

you need to have clear expectations of what they need to do. We use key results areas or KRAs to state in writing what succeeding in a role looks like so that expectations are aligned. And the Entry leadership team has put together a free template for you to use to write these KRAs as you delegate or hire. To get this free template, just click the link in the show notes. Hope you enjoyed today's episode of the show. If you did, leave us a review and subscribe so you don't miss the next one. And we want to hear what you think of the show, what you like, what you don't like, and what we could do better.

You can give us your feedback by clicking the link in the show notes to schedule a call with Tim, our producer. If you want to keep up with us on social media, you can follow us at Entree Leadership. This episode was produced by Tim Hull, edited by Jacob Harrison and Bob Orquez, and mixed and mastered by Will Rudder. I'm your host, George Camel, and on behalf of the entire Entree Leadership team, Thanks for listening. Until next time, keep learning and keep leading. If you enjoy this podcast, you should check out other great podcasts from the Ramsey Network, like Ramsey Call of the Day. Check out our new Ramsey Call of the Day podcast. It'll give you a quick hit of advice about life and money in under 10 minutes. Listen to the Ramsey Call of the Day, wherever you listen to podcasts.