Show notes

Episode 116 - Social media isn't free.

Esther

Hello and welcome to the Monday Morning Marketing Podcast. I'm Esther.

Melanie

And I'm Melanie.

Esther

And today we're talking about social media isn't free.

Melanie

Yeah, that's going to mess with their heads a little bit, isn't it?

Esther

Okay, so setting up a Facebook, Instagram insert, your social media platform here is free. They're not charging us to set it up. So why do we say that social media isn't free?

Melanie

Well, there's an awful lot of things that we need to do in order to make it look good.

Esther

Absolutely. For example, photographs, images, searching for things online that other people haven't used in their social media posts, using stock images that haven't been used millions of times by other people. Why is all that important?

Melanie

Well, otherwise we don't stand out from the crowd. We just look like everybody else.

Esther

Exactly. Especially if you're in this every let's just say web designer uses websites to just the generic www. Dot in their images. Yeah. You're going to know that they're a web designer, but they're not going to stand out from anybody else. So how can you stand out on social media?

Melanie

Well, for a start, you could perhaps instead of using stock photos, create your own, which is the first thing.

Esther

Which takes time, at least.

Melanie

You may have to buy lighting, you may have to hire a location,

Esther

pay a photographer

Melanie

to do all sorts of things.

Esther

Yeah, yeah.

Esther

I mean, I got headshots taken recently because it was just easier. We got a professional to come and take our headshots and capture that essence. That is the Monday Morning Marketing Podcast.

Melanie

Yeah. We just sat down and laughed basically, didn't we, for an hour and a half.

Esther

But I mean, the photographer made us feel comfortable that we could do that if we had been trying to do it ourselves and stand there and take the selfie and oh, no, the lighting was wrong.

Melanie

The patience of that woman, honestly, she's brilliant.

Esther

Karen Jenkins, if you need to contact her, let us know. We will be promoting her as well. But when you have products. Okay, so let's go into those that have products. Yes. You could put it down like a nice piece of jewelry, a candle, put it on a nice table and take a photograph. But you're probably going to get shadows. You're probably going to have something blurry, dirty camera. Who knows? Yes, we've got brilliant camera and photography equipment in our pocket being our cell phone. But you can do better.

Melanie

And that is going to be part and parcel of your social media packaging when it comes to imagery.

Esther

Exactly.

Melanie

Even if you're not taking getting somebody else to do photos for you, maybe you need to create some images of your own. And not everybody can get their head around canvas. So you're going to have to pay for a graphic designer.

Esther

Yeah, but even if you do take all your own photographs, design all your own things, design your own logo design, everything yourself using Canva, the free version of Canva, because there is a pro as well, which costs it still is your time. And unless you're not working for free, which I don't think anybody's working for free, then that costs as well. So what is more valuable to have someone else take the photographs, do the editing, remove the backgrounds, et cetera, et cetera, or to do it yourself and spend hours trying to learn all these platforms?

Melanie

But that's the other thing. That's the other thing. Spending hours.

Esther

Yeah. Because you've got all the platforms to learn. So you've got all the different social media platforms to learn in the first place. Then you go in to try and review your analytics and again, spend hours looking at numbers. And I mean, it all just looks like gobledygook

Melanie

certainly at the beginning. There are some helps out there. It doesn't matter where you are in the world. There'll be some agencies that will help with training you on these different platforms. But that takes time. Sometimes you have to pay commerce amount of money, small amount of money to go along. But time is money, basically.

Esther

Exactly. And do you really need to learn these platforms? Do you really need to know exactly the ins and outs? Because a lot of these courses that you could go on will cost money, but it will go into huge detail on the algorithms and different things that you might not need to know at all. And then you've got the billions of other people using the platform. So how can you stand out apart from taking your own photographs and using your own images? Paid ads.

Melanie

Yes. That is the only way. And that takes time and experience as well. And I'm not kidding. It really does take experience. Even the most well informed specialist in paid ads. There's still going to be a time of trial and error, certainly at the beginning when you're learning how current and new clients'account works and what their audience is like with the best intention in the world, nobody gets it right first time. And if you're completely brand new.

Esther

I don't have an audience.

Melanie

Yeah. It could be quite costly to get that started.

Esther

Yes. And to be seen above and beyond everybody else that is selling the CM your same area. Yeah. It's not free. Not even €2 or $2 or £2 a day would be enough to get seen through that. I mean, you have to invest. And I think at the end of the day, that's what these social media platforms want us to do. Yes. There are ways that you can get around not using paid ads, et cetera, by adding in more publications. But that again, comes back to your time and your time isn't free.

Melanie

It shouldn't be.

Esther

It shouldn't be. You shouldn't be working for free.

Melanie

So what can we do about this?

Esther

Well, we have to just there are things that you will have to learn. There are things that you can't get away with learning without learning. You can't get away without learning. Yeah. I'm confusing myself with the whole double negative. You want to be seen and you want to use social media to be seen there. So you either spend loads, loads and and loads of your time to be seen there or you spend some money to be seen there. You need to work out which is more efficient and cost effective to you, whether it's spending 6 hours making products and services or spending 6 hours promoting them.

Melanie

Just to really put an icing on this cake, I don't think you should use social media in isolation.

Esther

Oh, no, definitely not. You definitely need a website and you definitely need whether it be a landing page or...

Melanie

You need to network , you need to be a podcast guest, you need to write blogs for your own website and for other people as well.

Esther

Yes, definitely. And if you can become a member of a network, that's not going to be free either. Paid networking and you can start small 20 years, a month. You can start €150 a month. It's up to you. But do start a network, find one that works for you and promote yourself and help others so that people remember you years later down the line and they keep promoting you as well. It's not easy. It's not going to be instant success. But going into social media thinking that, oh, it's free. I don't need to do anything. I don't need to pay anything extra. Everything's going to be hunky Dory with the images that I have that I took on my phone, they're a little bit blurry, but everybody knows that I'm a single solopreneur working for myself, working on my own. So they don't expect anything more people do. They do expect more.

Melanie

Certainly over time they do. And that's the other thing is you may have the best images in the world, but you still need to update them. They don't last forever.

Esther

No, they don't. Unfortunately.

Melanie

Yeah. When are we going to get new headshots done?

Esther

Give me a while. Karen is great, but you can't work. Merkels.

Melanie

I know this may sound like a bit of a Downer episode, but there's too many businesses out there who don't measure their time well enough and they're just using social media and then wondering why they're just not driving enough traffic to their business and it simply just isn't enough.

Esther

Yeah, definitely. But bear in mind all the tips that Melanie gave you. And if you're in the marketing industry and you would like to come on this podcast, we are accepting applications. You can get in touch with us. If you have a topic that you would like us to discuss, please do get in touch with us as well. You can find us on our website the Mondaymorningmarketing.com. And until then you will see us on social media with fantastic images.

Melanie

And you'll see blogs from us. You'll see networks. You'll see us speaking. Yes.

Esther

All of the above. We practice what we preach.

Melanie

Yes.

Esther

That's. Okay. That's it for today, guys. Thanks for joining us and do join us again next week for more Monday morning marketing. Until then. Bye bye.

Melanie

Bye, guys.