9 | Should you take your business off of social?
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[00:00:00] Hey friends. So who's excited to continue this conversation around looking for ways to scale and grow your business without having to become a social media influencer. I know I am. And I can't wait to share a little update with you guys along with three questions that you can ask yourself. To get a little more insight into whether or not you are ready to take your business off of social media.
We're all going to be at different places in this. And we are all learning and growing together. But it's my goal in today's episode to get a little bit introspective. And share some, both tactical tips and strategies to help you make that decision, but also to dive a little bit deeper behind why you might want to consider. Other avenues outside of social media for your business so becca left get excited you're probably gonna [00:01:00] want to break out your notepad and maybe a calculator for this one so Are you ready? Let's do this
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Okay. Oh my goodness. You guys, I'm just, I I'm speechless and completely blown away by the response from last week's episode and the big shift of this podcast and helping all of you who are either wanting to scale and grow your business off of social or entertaining the idea of it, or just for being a part of the conversation or sharing with someone.
That, you know, this message is what they need to hear. I just could not be more grateful and I'm truly blown away. Just a little fun fact. We actually hit the top charts in the entrepreneurship category in the United States, Australia and Canada. And I'm just. I'm going, I'm dying. I'm literally dying. And I'm so, so, so [00:03:00] thankful.
So if this is resonating with you, please, help me continue to spread the word because this is something I know I'm passionate about. And just the response so far shows me that it's something that you care about too. And so leave me a review. That's a great way to kind of help spread the word.
If this has been valuable for you, share it with a friend again, you can just click the little box to share it way or share with a group or a team that you have. And. I am also so excited about the incredible community that is building already over on the scale without social for female entrepreneur telegram thread.
So you can join that group. If you liked by texting podcast to 9 1 2 4 0 5. 8 9 1 2. And it's pretty special because there's some awesome results happening already and some great examples and conversations that if you are enjoying this podcast so far, that you're definitely going to want to be a part.
So let's dive into today's episode because I know [00:04:00] you're probably like, okay, Heather, show us how this can be done. Right. Like I get that it's possible, or that it's been done before, but what does it look like in today's environment? And I want to start by just addressing where you are, how are you feeling?
And if you're listening, you are probably in one of three different. One, you might be like me and you're like, okay. Yes, Heather, you're speaking to my heart. I want to be done with social. I'm ready to move on. I'm ready to try something new. I want to release that weight. I want to lean into the freedom of what it looks like to not even have to worry about social media being an aspect of my.
And if that is for you, yay. You might even be in the minority, but I am excited to continue equipping you. And I think today's message will serve you for sure. And help you gain some clarity around if that is the decision that you want to take in your business. So that's the first camp, if you will, or the first group you might be in.
The second [00:05:00] one is, and I know there are some of you guys. This camps that are thriving on social, you love it. You are having so much fun. You're having results. You see it as something that is a light to you, to your business. And you certainly don't have any intentions of doing anything differently with your social media, but you're listening because you might have either team members or friends that do need to hear this.
And that's, that's awesome too. That's a beautiful thing. Almost every business model is there is a different way to do it. There are many different ways that you can do it. And so it's my goal to help, you know, what is the best choice for you by just talking through some options and what's working , for others.
So if you are loving and thriving on social, yay, I'm certainly not asking you to stop doing that in any way, shape or form, or I'm not shaming, the power of social work. But I'm so glad you're here for those that you might be connected with, who are excited about this message. And then the last group for the [00:06:00] last camp is those of you that are thriving on social right now, you are having results.
You are doing all the things you are showing up. You are doing reels every day. You're posting in all the places you are on multiple platforms at one time, but you're feeling. Tired. You're tired of the rat race. You're tired of feeling like a slave to social media. You're wanting more of a long-term passive income.
That's not necessarily tied to your output. You want your income, especially your long-term income to be more of a residual effort versus a result from the work that you're doing today. And I would say those of you who are in that camp, I am so excited to connect with you because I would say that's, that was exactly where I was before I moved over into camp.
Number one and doubled my social media following this past week. That that was probably my last post. So just no. Wherever you are. I [00:07:00] 100% support you. This is not a place to tell you how you should or shouldn't be showing up in your business. It is truly just a place where we can again, have this community and conversation around some alternatives.
And it's my goal, personally. And my. To be able to equip you through this podcast and through serving my existing team within my makeup company and to exemplify what it looks like. So for that reason, I was even talking with my husband and that's, that's why I decided for the last post on my social media to be my last post for a while, because it can be a little confusing if I'm going to be.
Sharing pictures of our Costa Rica trip next week, or, you know, recognition for my team, things like that. I will be finding outside alternatives for ways to achieve the same results without having to let social media be that platform. So I want to equip, exemplify and create a community around this conversation.
And. Like I said, I'm just so grateful that you're here. [00:08:00] So today's episode is going to be asking some questions for yourself to help you determine whether you are ready to take your business offline or off of social media. So I've got three questions for you, and I want to get a little introspective and of course we'll have some homework at the end as well.
So let's start with first things. First question number two. Where do you feel most comfortable? Is that going live? Is it creating content for social media? Is it connecting with people individually, meeting new friends, making new connections, maybe you're an extrovert like me and you thrive on those connections or maybe conversations and connections.
Absolutely suck the energy in life. Out of. You'd rather just, you know, take a more passive. And again, all of us are different. Like I, when I started my, my makeup business, I was so excited because that meant I actually had a reason to go live. I was like, oh, I can finally try out this [00:09:00] new Facebook live feature.
And I can show people the simplicity of this makeup line. And so I actually felt really comfortable. I mean, I was still a little nervous to hit that button, but I felt pretty comfortable going live. Just like I feel comfortable showing up and sharing my heart on this platform of the party, So that's me, but I also know that probably 98% of people have a fear of public speaking or fear of doing something like that.
And so, you know, that's okay. Too. Same thing, content creation. That's not necessarily something I like for that to feel organic. I like to, for it to just come with me and let it flow rather than having to be super strategic, which is funny. Cause I'm a strategic person, but you you're going to be on two different sides of.
S creating captions and words and language and telling stories that might come naturally to you and social media as an incredible outlet for what that looks like. So as you kind of think about where do you feel comfortable, what, what do you thrive on personally? Where are your gifts and strengths and how does social media play [00:10:00] into that?
Or how does in-person connections or other alternatives play into that? And the first thing I want you to know is. Any business, I don't care what business model it is. Any business it's going to take two things. Number one, hard work and action steps. And what I mean by hard work is you are going to have to lean into some things that make you feel uncomfortable.
You are going to have to do some things that scare you and. Absolutely surprised the heck out of yourself. When you lean into those things that do scare you. It's kind of like when we take our kids, , to like a theme park, right. And they're terrified to ride the rollercoaster and they're waiting in line and it's the anticipation that I don't know what it's going to be like, and I'm scared.
And I think I want to leave and then they get to. The actual ride itself, they finish it. And what do they do? They say, ma can I do it again? And in business, sometimes those hard things feel that way. And other times, those hard things, you do it. And you're like, yep. Nope. That's [00:11:00] yeah. That's not for me. I'm totally fine.
If I never do that again for me, actually that's roller coasters. I had some friends convinced me at Disneyland to ride that. I don't even know what it's called, but the loopy thing, I think it's like a toy story, right? And I did it and Nope, I will never do it again. It's not for me. So there's a difference between leaning into your fear and doing the hard things.
And I promise you whatever business you're in, you're going to have to do those things so lean into it. Right. Um, but also know what you find passionate and that the aspects of the heart that you love and the areas that, that builds you up. And then action steps are also required. So again, creating a passive income on the backend, it requires a lot of work and effort and connections and conversations on the front end.
So you're still going to have to do the work friends. You're gonna have to, do some hard things, lean into your fears and take the steps. But. Social media is a different kind of hard. So social media, [00:12:00] for example, you, especially right now with trying to keep up with the landscape of what's effective on Instagram or what Facebook's algorithm has, looking like, and do you post on your personal feed or a business page or in a group there's so many choices or all of the above, right?
So there's a lot of technical skill that comes with learning to essentially be a social media influencer. And that's kind of how. And again, if that is something you want to do or thrive off of, maybe you enjoy learning technical skills, right? Like my friend, Kate twig, she's incredible on Instagram.
And that's one of the reasons why she loves it. She loves tackling a new platform or learning a new skill and it starts. Social media is the, has that technical skill aspect that you've got to kind of learn. You've got to figure out what apps to use. You've got to figure out how to Curt, not even create the words in the captions, but where did they go and how do you move them and how do you change the font?
All of those things are things that you kind of have to learn and they do take skill and they do take time. They take time. [00:13:00] And your business and social media does also require mindset growth for some of you guys. So again, it is probably a lot of people's biggest fear to actually have to put themselves out there on, on social media, whether it's for us and our makeup company, we encourage.
Posted before and after, because it's such a beautiful way to share the power of the instant transformation of this makeup that we sell. But for a lot of people, they're like, what do you want me to put my face with no makeup out, out there online? And I'm like, yup. I promise people. Aren't looking at it the way that you do in it.
It is an effective way to do it. If that makes sense. So with social media, what makes it hard is the technical skill and some mindset growth that you have to do. Off of social media or in person connections, things like that. It is primarily the hard part within your mind. I would say like social media might be 80% technical skills and figuring out what's working and [00:14:00] 20% mindset.
I would say the actions outside of social are probably 80% courage and mindset shifts and changes and 20% technical because my friends, how long does it take to send a voice message or a text message or connect with a friend? Bring up your business and a conversation, or even better make it about the person you're with and ask them about their business, which is naturally going to transition into what it is that you do.
And that can be scary. And I know that it's, it's kind of crazy actually for me. I would say that the mindset came easy to me with social media, as I mentioned, whereas off of social media, that's been a muscle or a skill set that I've had to build. I used to be terrified to talk about my business in person or terrified to, just say something as simple as, Hey, have you ever thought about doing what I do, but guess what?
The more times that I did it. And the more times that not only did [00:15:00] people say, actually yes, I, I have thought about that. Tell me more. And then they decided to join me in business, and then they had results sometimes even greater than the results that I had, that my friends is the type of. Like ride that I want to ride again.
Right. And so for me, even though it was hard mentally to build up that courage and build up that muscle or that skill set of the right words to say to someone, and also eliminating the expectation of what I'm going to get from them too, because that's another mindset thing. Like when you are diving into any business where you're selling a product or a.
It can be really scary to put yourself out there in the way. And if you're kind of doing it from what you are going to get from them. So if your intention behind the conversation or the connection is more to achieve some sort of result from, from that person, they're probably going to feel that. But if you are just committing to the process of finding out more about them sharing.
More about you [00:16:00] and what it is that you love and what it is that you do. And what you're passionate about. People are naturally going to see that and they're going to be drawn to that. They're going to want to learn more and it might be something that they're interested in.
It might not, but if you don't talk about it, if you don't connect with them, if you don't build that relationship or ask the hard questions, Nothing's going to come from it, right? So it is, it is harder in terms of mindset, but it's ridiculously easy in terms of skill. You just talk, you are a real person talking to a real person and connecting, using things that you're already using.
Text message, your voice lunches with friends. You know that little minutes as you're waiting for your kids to get out of there sporting practice. So wherever you are with social media or off social media, and what's comfortable for you. I want you to number one, lean into the hard don't let fear be what holds you back either way.
So if that's severe putting yourself out there, or the fear of connecting with others, don't let the fear be what [00:17:00] holds you back because you will have to do hard things in business. You absolutely will. But I do want you to try the things out, to see like, is this a ride that you want to ride again?
And that also leads me to my number two question, which is where do you convert? So most of you, if you're listening to this right now, you are a business. You might be starting your business and I'll do an entire episode centered around how you can start your business off of social media. But right now I'm talking to you, entrepreneurs who already have an established business.
So where do you convert? And what I mean by converting is what is working for you? Like when you look at your customers that have purchased from you recently, how did they find you? What language did you use in talking to them? Was it. On social media. Did they come to you? Did you go to them?
I also want you to think about where you grew your business initially? How did you convert then? Because a lot of times, [00:18:00] especially if we are years down the road, we can tend to forget what got us to where we are now.
Where do you convert?
Where are you having results right now? How does that compare to how you initially grew your business and the strategies that helped you to get to where you are today?
And that will kind of play into the decision for whether or not you're ready to take your business offline. And most social media training right now is focused on growing your following versus. The conversion of your existing following. So I'm going to encourage you whether or not you want to do social media, even just a little bit or dabble in it, or, you know, just use the existing social media that you have.
Or if you are in the camp of like, I'm not going anywhere on social media, I love this. I want you to feel. Less on growing your following and focus more on building relationships and engaging with and serving the followers and the connections that you already have. [00:19:00] On and off social media, because guess what?
Friends, social media just makes your funnel bigger. And we'll talk a little bit more about the funnel and what that looks like to take some one from just being out there in the world. Someone who may or may not better your product to actually purchasing your product or your service.
But what you want to focus on is not necessarily making the federal. But you want to focus on the conversion. And most of the training out there right now is focused on growing your social media following by doing a lot of, again, technically hard things in most cases. So we'll do a little bit of math to help you kind of figure out a couple of things.
So let's say your average sale for your product is $250, right? So if you have a thousand followers, which is awesome, , on social media, on whatever platform or a thousand email, campaign followers, whatever it is. So a thousand people, and you get 10 new sales a month. That's 1% conversion, which equates to $2,500 in business.
Yay. Now, if you have [00:20:00] 10,000 followers and you get so 10 times 10 X, the number of followers of the thousand one, right. And I know a lot of people are kind of like they see that 10,000 follower carrot as the ultimate goal in social media. Which PS, hopefully you all know this, but you can share your link now without having to have 10,000 followers.
So that is a huge update. You can do it in stories. There's a link button, which is really, really exciting. So the 10,000 follower thing in my mind is I'm just going to say it it's. I think it's kind of irrelevant. So wipe that, that clean, but for this purpose and example, if you have 10,000 followers and 20 new cells a month, yes.
You have 10 X, the number of followers and double the number of sales. Which has 5,000 in sales, but it's only 0.2% conversion 0.2, meaning you have more people, but are you engaging with and connecting and building a meaningful, deep relationship with the followers that you have? Or are you feeling a little overwhelmed by the [00:21:00] quantity of people that you have watching your stories?
Right. Because of the people who are watching you, they're the ones there watching you? They want to learn more. Right? So, , that's just a perfect little example of conversion from your social media. Following. Another example of conversion is, um, do you do a live, like a live video or an IgE TV or a real, and you get 10 inquiries.
And if five of those 10 inquiries. So like we, for us, within our federal and our business it's color matching, right? So if we get 10 color matches where people say, yeah, tell me which colors I need. And five of those 10 purchase, that's a 50% conversion rate. And your conversion is going to be different from.
My conversion,, depending on your business model, depending on your language, what you're using. Right? But just, that's another example of how you can know what you, what your conversion is, right. And something, it's a number, a metric you can look to grow versus if you do an in-person connection or like a face to face.
Demo or sales [00:22:00] call or conversation, whatever that looks like. And 80% of them purchase, which is exactly my results. I know that about 80% of my in-person makeovers or people that attend my makeup and contour classes. I know that about 80% of them purchase. So I know I can do 12 make-overs a month or three a week.
Whatever that looks like and get 10 new customers from those results, because that's my conversion. And for me, it's a lot higher than if I were to do like a reel or go live. I know that the fruit and the effort and the conversion for me is. I also know that at least half of my customers reorder with me and about 20% of them have ordered five or more times.
So for me, I focus on the residual income that comes from reorders. And almost always, those are based on the relationships built from those customers. Met in person. So I told you guys this in the last episode, but I'll say it [00:23:00] again. I was blown away when I did the math on my top 50 customers. And 60% of them came from in-person endeavors.
Meaning the people who are ordering the most, giving me the repeat business and the residual income that will continue to thrive my business. Right. Those came from in-person. So for me, it's clear where the conversion is strong. So I want you to, when you're thinking about where you convert, realize that the big number doesn't matter if the smaller number isn't happening, I'll say that again, the big number doesn't matter.
If the smaller number isn't happening, you could have a ton of followers and not have the results in your sales. And if that's not, if that's what you're experiencing right now, there's something broken in your funnel. And again, we'll talk more about that now. But I also want you to focus on, are your customers reordering?
Are you getting that residual income? Are they sending you new customers? So in my wedding dress business, obviously, well actually I did have some repeat bridal customers, [00:24:00] but for the most part, it came from referrals, right? Their sister, their friend from their hometown, one of their bridesmaids. Oh, shoot.
I even got an amazing sister-in-law from, from one of my, one of my brides. Um, I met her at one of my brides weddings and hooked her up with my brother in law. And it's just so special to know that that's like the ultimate kind of referral that are you getting referrals? Are you getting repeat customers?
That is ultimately the goal, right? What did those customers look like? Are they the ones that came from social media or are they the ones that maybe you went to high school with, or that you had those connections and relationships with in person do a little digging on that. And then lastly, the question I want you to ask yourself is where do you spend your time?
And how is that affecting your mental health and productivity? So where like right now, are you on social media? I know some of you listening are like, how Louie, I can't believe she's talking about this. I don't even have Facebook. I don't want Facebook, but I would totally love to start a [00:25:00] business. Right.
, other of you guys are totally lost in the scroll. You are spending hours at a time and we're going to look and you're going to know in a minute how much time, and you might be a little bit scared where you're. Way too much time lost in the scroll. Lost in the comparison game because we all know, and you can watch again, the social dilemma on Netflix.
If you want a deeper dive into this and are there's tons of books out there on what the effects of social media does to our brains and to our mental health and also our productivity. So I want you to think about right now, like where are you spending your time? Where do you want your kids to spend your time?
And again, if you are like, oh, well, I only spend about an hour a day on social media and I find it to be really fulfilling and I've connected with some great friends. I've learned some new things and. It's a healthy thing for me. I've got a good mindset then. Awesome. You might be in that camp that [00:26:00] like you could thrive on social media because you've set healthy boundaries for your mental health and for your mindset.
And for that reason, like you can totally keep doing it. But if you are fin feeling like you are a slave to social media, Or you are finding yourself lost in the scroll or when you do your homework in a minute and the results are a little bit, they make you kind of feel like a pit in your stomach, then you may know, like, do, should I lean into other alternatives and other options, if anything, just for my own mindset or to set the example for my child.
So, where do you spend your time and how is that affecting your mental health and your productivity? Okay. And let's wrap this up with two pieces of homework. Y'all know. I love to leave you with some clear action steps.
Okay. So step LUN. I want you to go into your phone, the settings on your phone, and I want you to look at the screen time.
So if you have an [00:27:00] iPhone like me, it is going to be in your settings and then you're going to go to screen time. And if you have an Android device, it is called digital wellbeing and it might be something that you have to actually set up.
This is going to be really eye-opening. If this isn't an exercise that you have done before, or if you haven't done it recently, because it's going to tell you certain things, it's going to tell you where you're spending most of your time on your phone. And if you work from your phone, like I do, are you really, for example, if you are spending hours on Facebook or Instagram, Are you actually working during that time?
Or are you spending a lot of that time and consumption mode or comparison mode? How are you spending that time on those particular apps? But this will also show you the apps that you enjoy consuming, right? So, it will show you where you're already connecting with other humans. So for me, telegram has been an [00:28:00] incredibly valuable resource for my team and my friends.
I am leading a Bible. My house and we have a chat for those of us who were in it. And that's awesome because we can share pictures and links to certain things, and we can use our voice or our faces via video to communicate with each other. But it's not like we're trying to show up and put a highlight.
Of the high points of our life or our day on there, right. It's real life, real connections. And it's an app that I'm already spending a lot of time on. So it's a natural way for me to continue to love and serve and connect with others. Like many of you who might be eager for more of a conversation. So when I look at mine is primarily telegram and I know that the time that I'm spending on there is very effective.
It is bringing me fruit and conversion in my. Whereas, now, I'm not really spending any time on Facebook or Instagram, since I'm not actively using it for my business or for that matter to consume on it. But if you go back and look, [00:29:00] months prior, I was spending way too much time, right.
And probably not contributing to the platform, more consuming on the planet. And it was sucking up my time, my focus and my energy. And so I don't miss it one bit. So this exercise is going to be helpful in both of those ways. Number one, it's going to tell you if you are spending too much time on these platforms and if you're spending that time effectively, and then it's also going to show you the places where you actually enjoy consuming.
So if you do want to build your business on social media, but you don't really like consuming on tick-tock. I wouldn't say that you should go build your business on Tik TOK. Show up where you are comfortable, where you are connected with other humans and on a platform that brings you joy?
Okay, so you, our next piece of homework is going to be kind of twofold. Two steps. Step one is I want you to go through your lab. 20 new customers. If [00:30:00] you're on the newer side, you can start maybe with 10, or if you have a high price point, low volume, you can do a smaller amount, but just go through the last 10 to 20 of your new customers, not talking about reorders and residual income.
If you're getting that yay, you go girl, that is the goal. But what we're going to focus on. Finding new customers and what that's looked like most recently for you, what's working and converting right now. I want you to look at where they came from. How did they find you? Do you know them? If you don't know them or you don't recognize their names, it's likely they did find you on social media.
And in that case, can you get to know them? Can you connect with. Individually to thank them, to find out more about them, to build a relationship of trust and connection, because I guarantee you that is what's going to convert them from just being a new customer, to being a repeat residual customer, which creates a scalable, passive income, which is our goal.
Am I right? And then the second step of [00:31:00] this is I want you to go back to the very beginning when you started your business and you might not have this information as readily available. So you can just think back to your first 10 to 20. Customers, where did they come from? How did they find you? Do you still know them?
Are they still customers? How does that compare to how you're building your business now? And this is a helpful exercise in a couple of ways. First, it will help you know, that if you built your business, which is likely what's created the momentum for you to continue moving forward. If you built your business in a way that's maybe different than how you're doing it.
Now you can do that again, friends. And if you find more joy, or if you find yourself a little bit lacking in joy or feeling a little bit less focused or fulfilled in the way that you're currently building your business, go back to the beginning. What, brought you those results at the beginning of your business?
And once again, can you reconnect with them to build that relationship and that trust, which [00:32:00] is going to create that long-term loyal fan base, which is what is always the goal in business.
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