EP #48 | How to Lose the Social Media Overwhelm with Jessica Norby
Welcome to the Designers Oasis podcast. I'm your host, Kate Bendewald, interior designer, mama and CEO of a thriving interior design business, built on authentic word of mouth referrals. It wasn't that long ago that I stepped away from my corporate architecture job to build my own dream, one that would allow me more time with the people that I love, the ability to serve my clients at the highest level, and to make a great living. It wasn't always easy, and I've made my share of mistakes along the way. Fast forward to today, and I've learned a thing or two. This podcast is for you - the inspired, creative, ambitious, and let's admit it, occasionally overwhelmed interior designer who shares this dream of transforming lives by transforming homes. Join me and my guests each week as we walk through practical ways to build an interior design business you love, and help you transform your clients' lives. You can do this.
Kate Bendewald
Today, my guest is Jessica Norby a social media strategist who is passionate about helping small business owners clearly define and map out their social media strategy. Through small group workshops and one on one consulting just makes a social media marketing simple, approachable and effective. Just as social media ethos hinges on it three concepts, creating brand awareness, nurturing your audience through consistency, and developing meaningful relationships with your customers. There's a refreshingly authentic approach to her strategies. Jess has been a guest expert inside my membership program for interior designers, but I wanted to invite her back to touch on a few of these concepts for my podcast listeners. Today, we're going to chat about how small business owners like yourself can start to build more connection with your audience through social media, no dancing required. Please welcome to the show, Jess Norby. Hi, Jess, Hi, I'm good. How are you? Well, I'm doing great. I am thrilled to have you back. I knew the last time we talked like, Okay, we got to have her back. This isn't the last time we're not done talking. We've got more to talk about. So it's time and I couldn't be more happy to see you again. And to chat.
Jessica Norby
Me too. It's really nice to just talk to you again. And I know we caught up a little bit before recording. And it's just wonderful to make these connections with people that live anywhere. And you can you know, just build relationships, which we know we're going to talk about today. Yes, perfect. Well, and I just I want to make a quick side note and apology to my listeners of my audio sounds a little wild today. It's because we I'm recording in a co working space because I found out this morning that we're having electrical work done and we wouldn't have power at our house for the day. So I'm in this little room, I've got all as much padding as I couldn't, I could have created without looking weird to the people the co working space. So it's definitely my little makeshift studio. And I know it's a little echoey but I don't think that's going to be a problem. We're just gonna dive right in. And just I wanted to bring you back because you have a special place in your heart for small business owners. That's that's really your clients. You work with small business owners that are service based, they have locally owned businesses. Can you talk about how the social media strategy might be different for someone who is a small business owner or they are service based provider there locally? You know, their services are local versus an online business owner or corporation and product based business. How does this strategy differ for somebody who's in that space versus those online business owners or product based businesses?
Jessica Norby
Yeah, I think to put it simply, it's easier. And it's simpler. And it's less complicated. And that was one of the reasons why I decided to focus on serving local service based business owners, because you know, all the things you see on Instagram or when you read these articles on how to get to X number of followers, or how to explode your marketing, like those tactics don't really apply to local service based business owners. And I think that's a good thing. I think, being local, focusing on providing a service like the people that like your listeners, you can really kind of strip away all the fancy things and come down to the basics, which is, how do I get people to stop what they're doing, to pay attention to the message I want to share with them, and to build a relationship with them so that they can hire me and I can help them? It just it really comes down to that like, how do we communicate better to get people to stop scrolling past us and start talking to us?
Kate Bendewald
Okay, so that makes a lot of sense. Can you be specific about like how, like, what, what would I do to get somebody to stop scrolling to pay attention to me? Yeah, that's
Jessica Norby
a really good question. I like to think of it as I like to take an approach from almost like a user experience standpoint, like if you think about the person on their phone, who's scrolling through Instagram, and what their experience is like, typically, what gets them to stop scrolling is a visual that's captivating, whether that's a photo, a graphic image, or a video. So if you're an interior designer, you own your business and you want to get someone to stop scrolling, that would be my first tip is to figure out what type of imagery or what type of visual is going to get them to stop scrolling past you. And oftentimes, that's a beautiful image, right of a spacer designing, oftentimes, it's a picture of someone's face a human. And then, you know, lately within the past, like two or three years video, if you have video content, that's well lit, it's crisp, there's no moving parts in the video, those are a few factors that can get someone to stop scrolling past. And then of course, after we get them to stop scrolling, well, what's next? What's in the first one or two lines of the caption that will get them to want to read more, right? Instagram only shows us the first one or the first two lines. So how do we get someone to tap like, read more or see more. So that's going to help them to spend more time on your posts, which is better, right? We want people to spend a lot of time in our posts to interact with us. That means they're going to see our content a lot more in the future. And then from there, it's really how do we get them to talk back? And I know, I think I answered, I hope that I didn't make it too complicated. But really, the first thing is visually, how do we visually get them to stop scrolling past us?
Kate Bendewald
Yeah, and so you're saying that could be with a really, you know, crisp, beautiful image, or it could be video. But it could also be a caption. And then when it comes to disability, because you talk to a lot about engagement and connection, what would be an example of a post that helps to build connection, because I know that it's really important to you, and it is to me too, but let's just re reiterate it, you know, people buy from people, right? So posting that really beautiful image is great. But if you were to mix that in with some other content type that's, you know, video or a talking head or just even a still image. What would it be an example of content that you could put alongside that that does build connection that helps people feel like they know you?
Jessica Norby
Yeah, that's a good question, too. One thing that comes to mind for me, and what I teach the business owners that I work with is, you know, the idea of connection comes from having one or both people one or more people feeling like they're seen and heard, and feeling like they can also relate to the person that's creating my post. So if I were to put a post out there in the hopes that I would build connection with someone, I would want to make sure that I'm not making it all about me, right? It's not ego driven. It's client driven, and really understanding who I'm trying to talk to, and catering to them. And I know that sounds really simple. I'm sure a lot of listeners have heard of that before. This isn't really new. But it really is reminding ourselves that yes, our position on Instagram, or social media is to show our expertise. But in order to get someone to know like and trust us, we have to know who they are. We have to know what bothers them. We have to know what they really want in life or with your service. We have to know what makes them really happy and what makes them feel inspired. And if we can talk to those things, then that person is going to feel like there's a window to step in and be like, Okay, I feel like I'm connecting with this person, because they know me, maybe I get to know a little bit more about them. Maybe I feel like we're related, like we can relate on some level. And there's an opportunity to connect and start this long term relationship. I like to tell people and caution people that using Instagram for your marketing, if you're not spending any ad money, and you're not going like all in working 40 hours a week on your Instagram, it's going
Kate Bendewald
to answer exactly,
Jessica Norby
you have to be in trouble in the long run, which means starting and building these connections and nurturing them over time, sometimes over the period of, you know, 369 12 months, which it sounds like for your people, like that's going to be the relationship that they're building anyway, with your clients.
Kate Bendewald
Yes, absolutely. I'm just riffing here for a second, I'm just thinking off the cuff. You know, we talk a lot in our program. And you know, any any business owner knows this is one of one is like really getting clear on who your ideal client is. We had we oh, yeah, it was we had a guest expert yesterday and said, the numbers are so cool, they don't end. And we went really deep on figuring out who your ideal client is, and understanding what their internal pain points are, in addition to their external pain points, using the story brand format, anyway, this conversation, like, you know, I, it's been obvious to me for a while, there's a lot of business owners, designers who don't go deep enough on understanding who their ideal client is, it's still too vague, it's still too high level. But I would say like, once you get that sort of deep knowledge of your ideal client, that can be a starting point for creating content and understanding what is it that they're struggling with, because when they feel seen, heard, understood, you're like, oh, my gosh, she gets it, right, that is inspiring, that will inspire somebody to take action. You know, and I just, if I'm thinking out loud, here about my own sort of ideal client entertaining is, is pretty high on the list of priorities for in terms of lifestyle for for my clients, you know, they want a space where they can entertain a crowd, they want a space that they feel proud of, they want a space that is super functional. They want a space where when somebody walks in the door, they feel like they can make themselves a drink, right? And so just using that, as an example, I could think of tons of content around, you know, what are some things that you can do to set up your home to help people feel like they can make themselves a journey that were entertaining is, you know, really easy. And so maybe that's like inspiration posts, maybe that's showing what you've done the past projects, maybe that's, you know, maybe that's showing like, a little cocktail bar, or whatever the case may be, or a welcoming entryway where they feel like, you know, they've got a place where they can set their stuff down. So I'm just brainstorming out loud here. Because I'm such a practice. When I when I have these conversations, I'm like, let's get down to the practicalities of it. So what I'm hearing from you is allowing or creating content that allows them to feel like oh, that she gets me she understands and whether they're acting in that moment, or whether they just start to follow you. Maybe they go download your thing. Maybe they do reach on your discovery call, you're playing the long game, and you're creating content that makes your ideal client feel like you got that my Am I Am I getting it here?
Jessica Norby
Yeah. And if I may, I would even take that a step further. Like if that ideal client wants to entertain and their values are bringing people together in their home and making other people feel welcome and being welcoming. I would even take that a step further and speak to maybe the person who hasn't completed that journey with you yet and say, hey, you know, maybe I'll speak to my own journey because right now we're in a rental. There's nothing on the walls, our furniture, nothing matches, everything is old from like college, IKEA. My husband, my husband was in medical school, and we were, you know, in a different just in a different space. Totally. And I am always hesitant to have people over because this sounds very vulnerable to share, but it's like, oh, what are they gonna think there's like, our house looks not great to think the vision I have for having a space that I'm proud of, and then I want to have people over so even speaking to that, like, you know, have you ever wanted to plan something or have you ever wanted to invite a group of people over to your house but hesitated because you're worried what they're going to think about your space and not that you know, what you have in your home matters. It's the people it's the energy, it's the experience, but I think it's safe to say like Clients have probably felt that way before they work with an interior designer. So even tapping into those emotions and those feelings of, you know, imagine going from feeling hesitant to having people over to, you know, easily without even questioning it, you saying, hey, let's have three to five of our closest friends over this weekend for some drinks, or for a game night or whatever, and not even worrying about how am I gonna make my space looks that people feel more comfortable, but having that sort of inner confidence that, hey, my house looks great, people are gonna have a great time here, because of the people in it. And because of the way the home is designed, like, if you can speak to that, that's going to really hit someone, right? Hit someone's nerves, because they're going to feel completely understood. Maybe even more than seeing inspirational posts and seeing different ways you could structure your home so that it's ready for entertainment and ready for someone to make a drink. And I think both of those, all of those types of posts can exist,
Kate Bendewald
right? It's yeah, so you can take the same idea. And you could extrapolate a number of different types of posts related on on one idea. And it is like, if they're your ideal client, if there's somebody who's interested in design services, they are going to be that person who, you know, their home is an extension of themselves, it's their second identity. And it just in the way that like, how you dress, you know, when you when you put on a dress, or an outfit that you feel really good in, like you walk out standing a little taller, you look people in the eyes, you know, I know, there's mornings where, like, I dropped my kids off at school, and then I popped into the grocery store to grab whatever. And I'm like, in my sweatpants, it's like you bet I've got a hoodie on, I've got my sunglasses on. And I'm like, I don't want anybody to see me. And we think about our homes in that way too. And there are people who I have an old neighbor, who they were, they were definitely not, you know, design clients, right? They, they have people over all the time, and they had the most welcoming and warm home from the standpoint of who they were as people that they could give to, it's about what the inside of their house look like. And that was fine with us. Like we didn't, we didn't care, we still love to see them, we still love to hang out, we still had so much joy and laughter when we went to their house, that just wasn't important to them. But for the for the people who were there, like you and me and designers and in this community, like we're people who are influenced by our space and how it feels. And because of that we want to extend that to people in in in their own homes and have have them if it feels important to them, have them feel a sense of peace and joy and gratitude for their space and pride too. And I don't think there's anything wrong with that. So oh, boy, I feel like it just went down a rabbit hole. Okay, so we've established that there are a number of ways that you can create content that engages your, your ideal client, keeping in the back of your mind that people buy from people, right. And so the next question I have for you is, and I'm paraphrasing here, because this is a question that comes up a lot inside the membership, there is a lot of distrust in the impact of social media and its ability to actually reach local clients. And the feeling of love designers have is that it's just a lot of effort without a lot of reach, meaningful reach toward people who may actually become clients. So how do you address this mistrust that designers have in the the ability for their work to actually have an effect or an impact?
Jessica Norby
Yeah, well, first, I would validate that feeling, I think that's such a natural thing, especially if you're local to be like, Well, I only have 100 followers, and Instagram is full of accounts that have millions and hundreds of 1000s. Like, how could I possibly make an impact? I think acknowledging that is, is important, and it's really valid. And then I would take that to my next question, which is, well, how do you define good reach? And how do you define reaching people in a meaningful way? Because if we look at TV, print and radio ads, how do we know how many people the newspaper is reaching? Like? How do you know when someone's reading a newspaper that your ad is in or opening up a magazine? Or you're you're not getting feedback from someone who opens up a magazine and sees your ad in there, they're not telling you they like it. They're not asking you a question on it. There's no way to have this back and forth relationship that social media has. And so I would really ask people to pause and really evaluate for themselves well, what is social media doing for me over all of these other avenues of advertisement that I can that I can kind of shift my mindset towards like social media is such a wonderful place to talk about our businesses for free. We just need to invest time like All those other avenues I talked about, you have to pay for that with money TV, print radio. So social media, it's free, you just have to invest time. And then also you're getting live feedback on whether or not your message is resonating through the form of likes, comments, saves, shares, direct messages. And so kind of shifting, I think our mindset around how we use social media is the first step. And then really thinking like, okay, if I'm a local business owner, and I want to make more of an impact on my local community, I should probably start doing things in real life to get to get more connected in the local community, you know, we, you and I talked about this people buy from people. And something that I recommend to local small business owners is to get off your phone and do things within your local community so that you can get more visibility, both on social media, and in real life, which I think is kind of hard for people to understand because they're like, Okay, well, we're talking about social media. And now you're telling me to like go out there? Well, yeah, that's the beauty of local business ownership is that the more you can get into the community, the more people are going to be aware of your business, probably follow you on social media, and then eventually hire you for your services. And so it really is shifting the way we think about social media. You know, if you're like a Starbucks or an REI, yeah, you're gonna make a huge impact on social media, because you've got a huge following. You're a huge national brand, and you've got the resources to really get your message out there. local business owners actually have an advantage because you don't need tons of dollars initially, to get your message out there. You just need to have some persistence and some consistency, and a willingness to get out into the local community in order to grow both on and offline. I hope that answer your question.
Kate Bendewald
Yeah, no, it absolutely did. And it actually is a surprising answer. I'll be honest, but it makes sense. Because let's think about this. Let's think about the journey on how you and I know each other, if I'm not mistaken, you you were introduced to me, I mean, I know I know this for a fact Meghan who works for me she's she might like ride or die here because under so aces, you guys that I believe in an in person event there because you guys live sort of close by and Carly Taylor, who's also been a guest here, both inside the membership and a podcast guests coming up soon, I believe all of that connection happened because of in person networking event. And then fast forward, those connections continued to happen through email, text, social media. And here you are being able to share about what what you do. So if we can take the same idea of connecting locally. And I will admit, this is something that I definitely need to improve upon, is getting off from behind and get the heck out of my office and go meet people. I used to be so much better about it. I think I just got old and cranky and lazy. And just, I think I speak for a few people. But it's just easier, it seems sometimes to just not, there are people who that is natural for them. But the impact can be really important is what I'm getting. So you can start with those in person connections. But that's not where they end. That's just the beginning. I have a very good network of people here in my local Denver community. And I know that anytime they have a friend who just bought a house, or they're renovating or they're thinking of moving or whatever, my name is coming off their tongue because they want to support that. So when they say oh, go follow her on Instagram. That's where you can see what she's up to. Right. They may not be ready in that moment, but it's just playing the long game, I think to both in, in person and online.
Jessica Norby
Yes, definitely. I think a lot of this might sound counterintuitive, but sometimes a lot of growth happens from talking about your Instagram and your social media presence when you're not online. I mean, this is I'm just reiterating what you're saying is just getting out there. And that's how people are going to stay connected with you is I think social media is a great kind of bridge between getting to know someone in person and then continuing that nurturing of the relationship online. And that's how we stay top of mind for people. That's how we get new referrals. It's, you know, with TV, print, and radio, as soon as you put the magazine down or recycle the newspaper, it's gone. But with social media, we can put the message out in front of them, and we can keep showing up and keep getting in front of them. And I mean, that's what that's what we want and social media can deliver that which I think is really powerful. Yeah,
Kate Bendewald
yeah, that makes a lot of sense. And this may be a very, like, social media, one of one realization that I recently have, it's like, Why do I keep seeing some of the same accounts over and over again, obviously, the algorithm working but if you create content and they like something Chances are next time they open the app, the app is going to show them you again. So they don't have to take action that first time. But they can if they comment, or like or save anything that you put out there. That's only going to increase your visibility to them for the next time that they open the app. And, yeah, I can just imagine right now I'm thinking of the accounts that I do see all the time. And I'm always, you know, every time I see them up in the like, stories section, I'm always tapping, like, oh, What's she up to today? Right?
Jessica Norby
Absolutely. And to kind of go along with that is, how many times you think about your consumer journey as someone who like buys products or shops, like, how many times do you have to see a post before you're like, oh, yeah, okay, I'm gonna buy like, I recently got my daughter a more, some more like Sarah's silks, like the place silks. But I had to see, I think I saw the Instagram ad, like, at least half a dozen or a dozen times before I decided, like, okay, you know what, I'm going to actually take a couple of minutes, go to their website and purchase a couple of them. I just kept seeing them over and over again. So if we think about consistency, and we think about nurturing, you know, how can we continue to deliver that message, because we know people don't always buy after the first time they see something? And, and that's, I think, reason for us to be consistent and to be persistent. It's because people don't buy right away, or at least most people don't. And so how can we stay top of mind for people and increase improve our algorithm ranking so that you know the sixth or seventh time or fill in whatever number you want, that nth time that someone sees something, then they'll be ready to purchase? I think that's the key is, you know, I have some business owners that will say, Look what I already posted gems week, every week, how come? How come the needles not moving or how come? Nothing's happening. And, of course, there's many other factors not just being consistent, but that's one of them. It's, well, we don't know how many times it's going to take the person that you want to serve, to see your posts before they decide to join your email list or sign up for a call with you. You know, we just have to keep trying keep testing new things.
Kate Bendewald
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Kate Bendewald
I have a sort of like technical or logistics question for you two of them to for one question here. There's been some debate recently, or chatter around the effectiveness of things like hashtags. So if I were to put Denver interior designer like Does that have any impact on somebody's ability to find me if they're not following that specific tag? And then also the geolocation like, you know, if I put my location in a post, how is that actually helping, especially because I'm a local service based business? So I'd love to hear what you have to say about that.
Jessica Norby
Yeah, I certainly don't think it will hurt if you remember to do a geolocation or to have some local hashtags. But I don't think hashtags matter as much as they used to even three or four years ago. I think I would have told you something different. I don't know if you've noticed or IF listeners have noticed, but the way we use and search on Instagram has changed like now in The search box when you type something, you can type in any keyword and it'll come up, whether it's in someone's hashtags, or in their captions, or even somebody's in their bio. And so I think that's a good thing for us. Because we don't necessarily need to put all of our eggs in the hashtag basket. Or if we forget to use geolocation like, we don't have to kick ourselves because we now know that within our content, and within our profile in our bio, if we have those keywords that we know people are searching for, there's an increased the likelihood that they can find us. And again, this isn't, you know, and I mean, like, this isn't to say, like, you know, just put your content out there and hope it makes move, like, yes, you still need to get into the local community. But I think now the way people are using Instagram, they can search for things and put in keywords in the search bar. And they can find things that aren't necessarily indexed and a hashtag, or they don't have to search in a location like they can just look for things they can probably type in Denver interior designer and things can come up with as long as it's in your profile and within your content.
Kate Bendewald
Interesting. I didn't know that. And so that's, that's definitely a new approach. And it makes sense, right? Because it's the these these applications. And I have this whole I didn't say this at the top, but this whole time, I've been really thinking about Instagram, specifically versus, say Pinterest, which probably would have a different strategy and a different way of engaging with it. And so do you agree that a lot of what we're talking about today, you know, is Instagram specific, because I know, I know, my audience. And I know, interior design clients, and Instagram is often the app of choice.
Jessica Norby
So yes, it will be transparent and say, I know nothing about Pinterest anymore. I did maybe like 10 years ago. But all of the things that we're talking about today apply to Instagram.
Kate Bendewald
Please story, I, just in the last couple of years, was cleaning out some books that I was getting ready to donate. And two of the books in there one, what actually they there were three, there was Facebook, Instagram and Pinterest marketing books, which now it's so hilarious. Like, nobody would write a book on this anymore, because it changes so fast that it becomes relevant. So quickly. So exactly. You know, that's why I will continue to help keep people like your business because you're you're gonna keep a finger on the pulse of the trends and the things that are changing and the things that are working that, you know, you know, the relevancy of hashtags has changed, obviously. So anyway, I just that's an aside, but I was I was cleaning out my book, and I started chuckling I was like, This is hilarious. Like, I've a never cracked when these books be, they are now obsolete. So I'll donate them. But I don't know if they'll ever end up in someone else's hands again. Okay. All right. I want to want to move into a couple of questions around just like thinking about time and balancing, kind of being a business owner, which every all the other hats that we wear, you yourself are a small business owner or parent, a wife, a friend, you know, all those things. So thinking about the designer who, you know, feels strapped for time, which I don't have any designer or small business owner that doesn't feel somewhat strapped for time. But they understand the importance of consistency, and showing up consistently to nurture their prospective clients through social media, what would be a good goal for them to set if if they're ready to re engage with their audience through social media? What would be like the low barrier of entry to just get get started? Or restarted? Whatever the case may be?
Jessica Norby
That's a great question, I would recommend two things just to start out. One is to manage and have concrete time increments for you're using the app. And when you're off of the app, I think that's one of the pitfalls of being as a small business owner on social media is that we can feel like we're in this rabbit hole, we're like, Okay, I'm gonna go make a post now. And then an hour and a half later, you're just scrolling through rails, you know what I mean. And so I think the first step to managing your time better is to set aside time where you know, you're going to be using the app, and you know, you're going to be off of it, because that's important is getting off of the app. So that will be my first recommendation, you know, just spent set a timer 10 or 15 minutes, at some point in the day where you're going to go on and engage, publish your post, like and comment on some posts. And then once the timer goes off, close the app, get up and do the other things that will move the needle forward in your business because you know, there's so many other things that will help get you more sales and more clients that don't require being Instagram scrolling. And then the second thing would be to determine how many days you need to be on and posting and publishing in order to feel consistent and productive. One thing that people come to me with is, okay, well I read some Whereas that I have to post two times a day, seven days a week in order to make an impact. But I'm so busy, I'm managing the business, I'm opening the store, I'm working with clients or customers, how am I going to do that I feel stressed, I hate Instagram. And so my answer to them would be like, don't, don't post 14 times a week, figure out a number that you can carry from week to week, I say it's much better to choose a number like two to three times a week, every single week, rather than posting seven times one week, one time, the next two times the following. So having a clear number in your mind that will help you feel consistent, I think is a good way to start. And then, you know, it's just doing the thing you know, the more you post, the more you learn how to post,
Kate Bendewald
this just seems so much more approachable. Like if you posted three times a week, think about it, that's 12 posts a month, you can sit down easily in one day. And if batching is the way that you're you work better it is for me create 12 pieces of content once a month and push them out. And then you're you're done. And I think so and I know that you hesitated to give a specific number you said like you think about what's going to work best for you. But if we were just to start with that number three, you know, three posts a week, that feels very manageable. And just try that for one month. One of the best pieces of advice I heard somewhere around planning is like, the first step to planning your social media doesn't start with the app, like do not pick up the app to start your planning. I was like, oh, yeah, the other side of that is it's like, well, whether it's pen and paper, or whether it's a Google Doc or whatever, like, Okay, well, let's think about what your who your ideal client is, what are they struggling with, and what messages are gonna resonate with them and just write it out, just type type it out, you know? And because for that very reason, it's like, well, I can open the app with good intentions of like, oh, I need some inspiration. And 30 minutes go by, and you've just gone for 30 minutes, you haven't achieved anything. And so getting off the app to get into the app is kind of the idea there. And I thought that
Jessica Norby
I like that. I haven't heard that before. But I really liked that because it's so true. I've fallen into that too. I'm like, Okay, I'm gonna open the app to make a post. And then I immediately get distracted. And I don't make a post,
Kate Bendewald
by the way with text messages. I'm like, it was it happened to me this morning, I picked up my phone to I think it was like check the weather or something. And of course, I saw a text message there. And so that prompted a response, which prompted a text to my husband to relay the message. And then I set my phone down. And I got back to what I was doing. And I realized I never did check the weather for the weekend. Definitely been there. Oh my gosh, oh, goodness. So the idea there is if you're looking to reengage with your audience, and you want to, you know, get serious about this, because you understand the importance of showing up being seen. Building that know, like and trust factor with your ideal audience. Pick a number that feels manageable for you know, how many posts a week am I going to put together decide? Are you going to batch create them? Are you going to do them individually? And just a simple goal like that. Fast forward? Let's say you've done that for a month. Do you have any advice on how would I look back? Because I'm a big numbers person i i sort of secretly nerd out on data. What? What would I be looking for to see what's working and what's not? Like? How would I How would I sort of decide how to pivot or change? If I feel is if I feel defeated? Chances are I'm not going to keep at it, right? So I know that you make the lessons just like that doesn't mean that you need to quit, it just means you need to change your approach. So how, what numbers would I be looking at to decide what's working? What's not?
Jessica Norby
Yeah, that's a really good question. So when I'm looking back at data, I'm looking at change. So I wouldn't necessarily even look at one month, I would look at the data over a period of at least 60 to 90 days. So we can see change from month to month or period to period and then kind of gauge from there and draw some form of a conclusion or a hypothesis. But if we're if we're just simply looking at one month like okay, I started posting more consistently starting on March one now it's March 31. What's going to be the difference? If we see some positive changes like that Increase in follower numbers increase in post interactions which you can access from your Instagram profile. If we see an increase in engagement, so likes comments saves and shares the total number of that divided by the number of followers you have. If we see an increase from the previous month, then we know, okay, we're probably on the right track, we probably have some more brand awareness, we have some more engagement, we have more of an opportunity to build a relationship. As far as like hard numbers. I've seen some data points in the past where if you're engaged, your average engagement is between like one and 5%. That's like pretty good. Obviously, the more the more followers you have, that engagement rate will decrease. So keeping that in mind, too, is like the more and more growth, you see, your engagement can potentially go down. And that's okay, we don't need to put all of our weight behind that metric, we can look at everything as a whole. So I'm looking at data specifically
Kate Bendewald
just for somebody who might be, you know, really new to this engagement specifically is likes, comments and shares.
Jessica Norby
Yeah, so likes, comments, saves and shares, Instagram kind of tallies all that up for you. And it gives you, you know, it can say like post interactions, it'll give you a number. If you also use a third party app, to analyze data, for example, I use Sprout Social, it'll come up with a percentage of engagement for each post, or, you know, for the month or for the that you're analyzing. And so I like to look at everything as a trend over time did we increase or decrease over time, if we increase rental, we're on the right track, let's keep doing the tactics that we were doing. If numbers go down, let's look back at the previous month's content or to whatever period you're analyzing, and take some notes like, okay, maybe we did more testimonial posts last month. And that's maybe why we saw a decrease let's tweak the number, maybe do less testimonial posts, and more, you know, connection posts or more value based posts for the following month, and then we'll see. And so I don't know if this is making sense. But I like to look at the data over time in order to tell me whether or not need to change a tactic.
Kate Bendewald
Absolutely. I mean, for those folks who are in the membership, they are familiar with the CEO Planning Toolkit, and this is exactly the the goal with that tool, which is you and I just had a podcast interview with my bookkeeper like to look at any sort of data point in isolation is never recommended. It's far more valuable to look at that data over time. And that three month increment is a pretty normal sort of chunk of time to look at things. So give yourself three months, look and see what content was receiving engagement and continue to think about more posts like that. And the ones that didn't, maybe not necessarily abandon them as I'm hearing, but keep an eye on that and see, maybe I need to switch that approach. And when I say post I I'm sort of generically talking about reels, post carousels, stories. And all of that, do you switch your strategy? Depending on what type of post it is?
Jessica Norby
Yeah, that's, that's such a good question. I would recommend that you do it in the feature that you like the boat the most. Because a lot of times what's stopping people from making a post is like, well, do I make it real? Or do I make it a post? I hate reels, but like that Instagram, the Instagram guru told me I needed to, but I hate it. And then and then you're not going to do it. So I mean, when I'm thinking about strategies, for small business owners, I'm thinking about what's going to be the most realistic, what's going to be the simplest and what's gonna be the most effective. So to me, seeing an arbitrary rule that you see on like an Instagram, quote, unquote, Instagram coach on social media is not going to necessarily work for your business. So the realistic answer to that would be well, what's going to help you get the post up there? Right. And that's it
Kate Bendewald
so much. And this is honestly, this is not you know, why really wanted you to come back was because the simplicity of your message is, I think one of your strengths, and you're saying like, it's better if it's just a stagnant photo, and it's a post, and it's authentic, and it's real versus nothing at all, because you got stuck on trying to decide how to put this meat like which media to work on. It's like, the more important thing is whatever it's going to take to get it up. It's like, oh, okay, it's actually that's the ball like, stop worrying about the details. Okay, that's me. I get I get caught in the weeds sometimes. So that's refreshing. Oh, goodness, well, it wouldn't wrap up with one live We could just pull up pull away from social media specifically for a minute. Because you are yourself a business owner serving clients and you do one on one work you do some some group workshops. And I want you to touch on that here in a minute. But in addition to being a business owner, you are a mom and a wife, and you are obviously working in your own community, whatever ways that shows up, but I strongly believe in working from a place of ease, and it's something that I'm constantly working at improving and continuing to try to get better at. I want to build a business that allows me to not destroy my business, but to be able to show up for my family and friends and community and neighbors. Because I've experienced burnout too many times, and it's just not in the cards for me anymore. I know from seeing your activity on social media, that this is also really, really important to you. If you've publicly shared about some personal challenges that that you've had, and how you address social media during those times, and how you, you know, revved revved the engine down a little bit. So can you just share a little bit about what what are some learnings for you that emerged during those times? And what are you doing today to help balance your responsibilities as a business owner with caring for yourself and your daughter and your family and those that you care about?
Jessica Norby
Who this is such a good question. And I want to try to answer it as concisely as I can. So I feel like being a small business owner, and someone who has a kid and is has a spouse and wants to be active in the community has taught me how to value myself, and has taught me how to honor the values that I want to work towards because they think as small business owners, we can and I've been here before get caught in this hustle mindset of like, okay, well, I'm a self made person, even though I had had lots of behind the scenes help, like, I need to show the world that I can do this on my own, I'm independent, I can be really success or whatever successful means. And I'll do it at any cost. And I think when I've gotten trapped in that, I've lost the reason why I wanted to continue the business. I didn't start the business, I started the business before I had my daughter. But in continuing my business, it's really helped remind me that, oh, wait, I started this business so that I can have more flexibility and more freedom in my schedule, and the ability and the privilege to decide when I want to do things, or when I don't want to do things, whether they're inside or outside of my business. And having a kid has certainly reminded me of that. Because when I start to fall into that hustle mindset of like, oh my God, I need another client. I'm wrapping up with one like, I can't take a break. I need to keep going because that's what you do. As a business owner, you're just always making more money and you always you know, you're always growing and it's like no wait, I actually wanted to continue this business so that I can have moments to slow down when things come up personally or when I'm just really frickin tired. Like, I was solo parenting. Last week. My husband was traveling, he was in Arizona for work and my daughter got very sick. It just happened to be perfect timing. And I couldn't get anything done. Like I couldn't respond. I didn't want to respond to emails. I didn't want to work while she was sick watching blue in the couch for like the third hour. And the moment. Yeah.
Kate Bendewald
Love bluey and I sat on the couch with my daughter who was sick a few months ago and watched like, short episodes, watch like 100 bluee episode that I'm like, I love blue in the song gets cut in your head. It's so funny. Anyway, it's there. But yeah, it's just
Jessica Norby
this reminder that oh, wait, like, even though my mindset is telling me and I'm sure there's like some money mindset things that I've carried with me through my childhood, like, I actually can stop, I am going to be okay, I can stop, I can breathe. I don't have to be stuck in this hustle mindset. Like that's why I started this business. And so it really has helped me learn to kind of relish in the freedom sometimes and decide what I want to do with it. Right? Because I'm speaking from a very privileged standpoint, like I do have the privilege and the freedom to stop when I need to. And I acknowledge that and so it's like, okay, well, what do I want to do with that I want to help more people feel the same way in a, you know, a small avenue of their life, be it social media marketing, and I do want to do some good in the community because I have this freedom to and it really opens up the doors for you I think as a small business owner to really evaluate like how do you want to live your life and have a place in your community, whether it's within your family community or within your greater community and I think that's something that's really beautiful about owning small businesses. As you work Have these things and work through these things. And I'm not immune to mindset and limitations and limiting beliefs. Like it happens to me all the time too. But as you learn to like, practice navigating through them, it opens the doors. And I think it kind of comes back to like, the reason why you started your business in the first place.
Kate Bendewald
Yeah, so getting getting really centered to your why sounds like the answer there. And I think that that why is so so so grounding. So, you know, I hadn't, I found myself doing that sort of unconsciously this week, I think it was just like daylight savings, or something kind of has me, I usually am an early riser. And I like to get up and work for a few hours before the kids do so that, you know, I can just, it feels like you're gonna jump on the day. And I just wasn't doing that. And so I wasn't sitting down at my desk until after they were at school to start my day. And I just, I felt so just like bogged down with time. And I felt like, just a bit overwhelmed with everything that I had to do and the time that I had to do it. And it just left me feeling kind of grumpy. And I'm like, oh, man, I need doing this. I don't like it. And I took a minute, I was like, You know what, think about yourself, like five years ago before designers are wasting this. And you know, if you had thought about what your daily life would look like doing what you're doing for designers always recorded podcast, I've had the chance to speak with some amazing women this week and record our conversations. We're finally putting the finishing touches on some on a new program that's going to really be able to help a lot of designers. And when I took a step back, and really looked at what it was that was lined up on my calendar for the week ahead. I was like, This is awesome. Like, this is so cool. Get to do it from home I except for today. You know, but but also the reason I'm where I'm I am is a place of privilege. So it is I think so important. And I'm grateful that you said that because it comes back to just remembering your why remembering the intention behind what it is that you're doing. And realizing that there's there's a lot I think we probably you know, as designers are people pleasers. And so we want to do things to the nth degree, right. And so just saying like, well, you want to do it to help other people, but you also wanted to do it because you wanted to, you know, make your kids proud or show your kids that you could do something or to to have more flexibility so that you can be there for your kids. And I think that sometimes that gets lost when we get into the thick of it right? From a day to day standpoint.
Jessica Norby
Yeah, and I think also tying in social media that I think that's why people fall into these traps of saying, Well, I only have 100 followers, I thought it was gonna get to 10k by now, Instagram, I should just like, throw the baby out with the bathwater. And it comes back to this maybe perfectionist or people pleasing stuff that I've dealt with. It's like, well, no, my goal wasn't to get on Instagram and have 100,000 followers. And that's not my goal. My goal is to help one person at a time. So you can help one person at a time with 100 followers. That's actually a lot of people to get in front of if you were in a room, a conference room with 100 people in it, you'd be like, Oh my gosh, I have so many people to speak to this is amazing. There's so many opportunities. And yet somehow, when we only see 100 followers on Instagram, we think it means nothing. And that does a disservice to the people who are already following us because they're following us to get help. And if we can be excited about that, of course, you'll have moments of not being excited. But if you can see that as an opportunity instead of a lack. I think that can also set you up for more success on Instagram, because you're realizing that it can be simple. I just needed to market to one person at a time. Even if you had 10 followers, you could probably help one of those people at least. And it's just a shift in how you think about the way you're using social media. And your your business. Right.
Kate Bendewald
Oh my gosh, that's so perfect. And so simple. And again, that's the simplicity of your message, I think is is the beauty here. And so I I'm so grateful because you know, I I'm classic like overcomplicate things case sometimes. So before we go, I want you see you do social media strategy, right? So you don't do implementation for clients necessarily. So if somebody came to you, you would help them to understand, or you want to learn more about their business specifically, and then kind of help them shape their content strategy. Tell us more about how you help people like interior designers who are running local service based businesses.
Jessica Norby
Yeah, so on paper, the primary way that I'll work with people is through VIP day. I know that word is tossed around a lot but I think it's because it just helps normalize what that is. So for me the VIP day is a two to four hour session where we sit down and we do everything from top to bottom we outline what it is you want to see happen on your social media? What do you see that's not happening right now? how comfortable you are using social media. So it really is teaching you how to use it from the standpoint of someone who is experienced, I feel like I'm experienced. And then from there we outline Okay, well, these are the things you're going to do week to week, day to day in order to get to these goals that you express. So it's really sitting down with you learning about your business, learning about what you need to see happen on Instagram, and then giving you the tools and kind of like the roadmap to get there. I had a client who recently equated the VIP day to like a social media bootcamp, we do a lot of stuff within the hours that we work together. And that's on purpose. It's meant to be very valuable. And you have lots of takeaways. So that's the primary way people can work with me, if they prefer to do it on their own time. I have an online course that goes over my four step framework, which I talked about in the class that I taught for you and your people. So there's a couple different ways people can work with me.
Kate Bendewald
I absolutely love that. So I think you also have a new freebie that is really cool. And I definitely I got my hands on it and I loved I loved his insides. I want to encourage people we'll be sure to link to it in the show notes, but it's the four simple Instagram productivity playbook. Four simple techniques for success. So I definitely want if you're listening, go check out her freebie because it's it's really good. And it's funny. Like I keep coming back to this I have this idea of like the the elegance of what you talk about is the simplicity. And I think that that is just so refreshing in a world that we're everything feels overcomplicated and layered. And so I love I love that. Where can people find you online and on Instagram? Yeah, thank you. I'm
Jessica Norby
on Instagram at Jessica Norby LLC. Also on Facebook like that my website is Jessica norby.com. And feel free to reach out and ask me questions. I love answering questions.
Kate Bendewald
Yes, go get that playbook. Awesome. Thank you so much, Jess, for hanging out with me again. This is so fun. I really love what you're doing. And I love following you on social media and and she actually does dance and she's so cute. And it just brings me so much joy. So
Jessica Norby
the answer flail however you want to think of it. It's a great, it's great.
Kate Bendewald
I love it. I think I think that you are an account to watch. Because you lead by example, you do everything that you say and recommend to people, you know, you, you show up just as you are right and you're you're doing your thing and inspiring people in really simple ways. And I love that about you. Awesome. Thank you. Thank you so much. Thank you, Danielle, I'll talk to you real soon.
Jessica Norby
Thank you hope you have a great day. And if this was a lot of fun,
Kate Bendewald
awesome. Bye for now. Bye.
Kate Bendewald
Thank you so much for letting me spend part of this day with you. If you're loving this podcast, please share it with a friend who you think might also love it. Or perhaps you can take just 30 seconds to open your podcast app and leave us a five star rating. And if you have just an extra minute, go ahead and leave a review. This helps me so much and it helps other designers like you to find the podcast. It also adds fuel to my motivation to keep making great episodes just for you. However you choose to help, please No, I appreciate you so very much. Thank you, my friend. Have a wonderful rest of your day and I'll see you next time
