- 7 hours ago
A discussion that will focus on the things that you should do more of and what you should stay away from as entrepreneurs whose businesses have a presence on social media.
MODERATOR
Sybil Clark Amuti
PANELISTS
Ashley Ann
Nana Aygemang
MODERATOR
Sybil Clark Amuti
PANELISTS
Ashley Ann
Nana Aygemang
Category
🛠️
LifestyleTranscript
00:00Hey, what's up, everyone? It's Sibylla Muti. I'm the founder and the host of The Great Girlfriends,
00:12and I am so excited to be here with you, all of you amazing entrepreneurs, to talk about
00:17the thing that we can't seem to get enough of, and that is social media.
00:23Specifically, the next discussion will focus on a couple of the things that we need to know
00:30as entrepreneurs and business owners about navigating social media from a professional
00:34and a personal standpoint. It's exciting, I know, and yet it's intimidating at the same time,
00:40but don't worry. We have two experts here today that are going to walk us through this
00:45to make it nice and smooth for each one of us to go out with some do's and don'ts today.
00:49So before we get started, just jump in the chat and give us your greatest social media
00:53fear. We'd love to hear about that. And now I'm going to introduce to you my two guests
00:57today. I am so excited to have digital marketer Ashley Ann joining us today.
01:03Hey, y'all.
01:04Hey, hey, hey. And last but not least, is joining us Nana Ajimai, who is the founder of Every
01:12Stylish Girl.
01:13Hi, pleasure to be here.
01:15Hey, let's do a quick dance break just to let people know we're having a good time
01:19today.
01:19Hey.
01:19Hey.
01:20Hey.
01:20Hey.
01:21I love it. I love it. I love it. That is the spirit of a woman who is winning professionally
01:31and personally. So I'm so happy to be here with you ladies today.
01:34I'm so happy to be here. This is so exciting.
01:38Yeah, I promise you, I would love to take notes, but I can't because I'm moderating. So I'm begging
01:43those of you in the chat, if you could take copious notes, grab pen and paper, take all the
01:47notes, and then send us the notes in the DM, because I promise you, I want to go back and
01:51take some of the gems that these ladies are going to leave with us today.
01:54Ditto. Nana, I know she was going to lay it on us. I love being here.
01:57No, I'm already stalking you, Ashley. Stop.
02:00I love it. I can't wait. I'm just over here salivating, like, what is she going to teach
02:05me?
02:07That's right. And listen, when the student is ready, the teacher appears. So hey, teachers.
02:11All right. Listen, we're going to kick off this conversation. There are so many questions
02:17that we have as business owners, myself specifically, and all of the other women who are watching
02:22about how do we do this thing personally and professionally? How do we have a personal
02:27persona that represents who we are and also represent our businesses and put our best foot
02:32forward in social media? So I want to kick this off to you, Nana. I want to know, first of
02:38all, you know, when you first got your first, I want to say love affair with social media,
02:43how did you learn to merge your personal and professional pages so that they were both a
02:49reflection of who you are? Yeah. So I love this question so much because I never had a personal
02:54Instagram. I always focused on my business page. So actually, when I founded Every Salish Girl,
03:01no one knew who I was. And I loved it like that because the whole focus of our brand is to tell
03:06stories of black and brown women in fashion and media, right? We wanted to give them a platform.
03:11We wanted them to network with each other and give them that exposure they needed to grow their
03:14personal brands. So it was me just like posting other people, interviewing them, sharing their story.
03:20And it was so interesting. And I think that was what I wanted it to be about. And that's what
03:25quickly brought about growth because each woman would then reshare her post on her page. And they all
03:30had a pretty strong following. It was from micro to nano influencers. And so I told myself that I
03:37wasn't going to create my personal Instagram until I hit 50,000 followers on Every Salish Girl. And that
03:43really motivated me to be consistent with my business. Okay. That's reverse engineering. I love
03:49that because so many, most people I would say will probably start personal and then professional. And I'm
03:53hearing you say, you started out the gate with a personal page that fully represented, embodied,
03:59everything you wanted to vocalize on social media. And then you went into a personal page.
04:04Yeah, exactly. Love that. Okay. And the reason why I did that too, as well as like, you know,
04:10every time I post something on a business account, I asked myself, does it fit into the three E's?
04:14Is it educational, engaging, and exciting? And once you have content that fits into those three E's,
04:20those buckets, and you have a business page, you're set, right? You're set because you know what
04:25your audience wants. Yes. Oh, teach the people. Teach the people. I love that. Okay. Ashley,
04:35I'm about to get all your business. I know that you are a digital marketing expert. And I happen to
04:39know that you focus on consumer behavior, which is very important, right? When you want to target
04:45the right people and say the right things. What do you think our entrepreneurs that are out there in
04:51the entrepreneur-verse need to know about targeting consumer behaviors to make sure they're saying the
04:55right thing, the right time to the right person? How do we do all of that? Always remember, you sell
05:00by listening. You sell by listening. You sell by listening. If you listen to people, they will tell
05:06you what they want, how they want it, what color, what variation, what time, what platform, all of that.
05:12The biggest thing that I see that people struggle with is that they're like,
05:16I'll have to try and sell to everyone. Everyone is my customer. And when you sell to everyone,
05:20you're selling to no one. It's really better to try and create like an avatar. And most people
05:25are going to have one to three of these avatars, AKA your niche. And so we're just looking for three
05:31really specific types of people that can use whatever our offer is, right? And so you want
05:37to learn everything about these people. A lot of people are focused on demographics, but I would
05:42challenge you to switch over to psychographics. So instead of being focused on, you know, educational
05:48parameters or age, right? Or, you know, geographical location, let's start thinking about like what
05:54cohort or community they're a part of. What are their hobbies and their interests? Kind of what's
05:59their motivation, their why, where are they at right now in life and where do they aspire to be? And how
06:04does that relate to what you offer to the client? So we can find one to three groups of these little
06:10people and say, my offer is going to benefit them or help their life be easier or make them happier,
06:16time or money or whatever it is that you're doing, but it's going to benefit these one to three people
06:20in this specific way. Well, now it's really easier to talk to them, right? So you can use a language
06:26that they can understand. You can choose images that look like those people, right? That look like
06:31those avatars. You can find the colors that they respond to and that they like. You can focus on
06:37television shows, right? And be able to take something that happened on last Tuesday night's episode
06:41and turn it into a meme so that it relates to your business and that's going to resonate with them.
06:46So literally, literally try and learn everything about your customer that you can. Like, for example,
06:51we target people that shop at like Fresh Market, Farmer's Markets, Whole Foods, stores like that,
06:58because those clients even target, they're more quality focused versus cost focused, right?
07:03A client, no disrespect to Walmart. I love Wally World, but if that's your first go to your primary
07:08store, you're probably more focused on convenience and cost more so than quality and customization,
07:15right? And so if you have a lower tier product, then you may say, well, I'm looking for people
07:19that are focused on convenience and cost, and you're going to be able to blow up your social media and
07:25your products and your offers that way. If you offer a high level service or a high level product,
07:31or maybe you have an exclusive community, well, then you may want to be more focused on a client
07:36that's going to be focused on quality. They want customization, right? They care a lot more
07:40about the experience and you're going to be able to blow up that way. So I would say really focus on
07:45getting to know everything you can know about your customer from the psychographical perspective
07:51versus, you know, just focusing on traditional demographics. Okay. Okay. Hold on.
07:57I mean, seriously, I feel like we just put together a rap song, the sell by listening and the psychographic,
08:11that is everything. Cause let me explain what I have, what I've realized more and more and see
08:16often is people don't understand the real time importance of social media, right? And when you
08:22say sell by listening, that's paying attention to what people are asking for communicating in the
08:26moment. So it's the, the, the demographic doesn't do you much good if you don't know what she wants
08:32right now. Right. So I'm hearing you say, pay attention and ask those big questions so that your
08:38consumers even, even they even know and can feel when you're connected to what they want. And I saw on
08:44one of your posts, Ashley, and you asked your consumers, should we put out this offering next year
08:49or should we hold off or something of the sort? You were offering a program and in the comments,
08:53they told you. So then there's a no brainer to it, right? You listen and then you respond to that.
08:59And that's the best thing about social media. And I see people not capitalizing on it. Like
09:03literally you can ask people right there and there in real time, what do they want? They will tell you,
09:09we have a sale at the top of the year and I will put up like three products and I say,
09:13which one of these do y'all want? I let them vote. And literally the next day I put it on sale at noon
09:17and people are like, how are you making all this money? Because I'm giving people what they're
09:21telling me that they want. You keep it simple, right? What do people want? And they, if you ask
09:27people, they will really tell you in social media, you're able to stock and chicken hock. You can go
09:32to your followers pages and see what they buy and what they like and what they do on the weekend.
09:36You can pay attention to their conversations. You can pop into their lives or their stories and kind
09:41of see what their day-to-day is like, like what their complaints are, what they're struggling with
09:45and be able to go and meet that need. So it's a really amazing time to be in business or to start
09:50a business right now. I love that. Thank you so much for sharing that. So ladies, I wanted, I want
09:57to just throw a question in about growth, you know, to grow or not to grow and how we do this. So
10:03you both have really large followings and you do a great job of nurturing your audiences
10:08authentically. Your captions and your photos and your videos are all beautiful and they all are
10:12very reflective of who you are to the point. I feel as though I've known you by paying attention
10:18to your content. What part of that is, what percentage of growth is content versus engagement?
10:25What is the formula for really hitting a sweet spot on growth? I think honestly, I would say
10:30community engagement is top of the line, right? Community engagement could say you're posting in
10:36your Instagram stories three to four times a day. You're using polls, you're using quizzes. I think
10:41Ashley had mentioned that before, like she's constantly communicating with her audience.
10:45And I think the worst thing to do, no matter how great your content is, is posting go. You don't
10:50want to do that, especially when you're trying to build an audience, right? I think Ashley had mentioned
10:55this earlier as well. You're speaking to your audience and you're selling what their wants and
10:59their needs are. However, there's people on here that have no audience and you're asking yourself,
11:04well, how do I grow when I'm starting for nothing, right? Or I'm trying to launch my company
11:08tomorrow. And what the secret is to that is you can hold small group sessions. So let's say you
11:13bring four to five people of your demographic together or people that are the market to what
11:19your product is. You can just ask them questions, right? And have these group sessions with them
11:24and talk to them. And that's how you can also cultivate what you want your community to be.
11:28So if you don't have anywhere to grow and you're trying to build a following, that's another way,
11:33right? It's figuring out what the market wants, even if that market is in your community,
11:36it's your friend group, it's your family, et cetera. But honestly, I really think community
11:42engagement is key. And then I'm going to go back to the three E's again, because when you post content
11:48that is informative, it will get shares. Listen, we don't care about them likes anymore. All right,
11:54y'all, we care about them shares. Shares and saves are what is going to get your content buzzing.
12:01You know, those of you, I'm sure you know about this, but Reels is truly the number one way to
12:06growing in terms of creating content on Instagram right now. As we're speaking in the moment,
12:11every sales girl just grew about 5,000 followers in like two days because one of our Reels hit 3
12:17million views. And so it's really, truly about creating content that speaks to your audience,
12:23right? And it is as simple as creating a Reels and being consistent, right? And then also checking
12:29in with yourself. I love that Instagram already provides you with insights. And I speak with a lot
12:35of clients and I ask them, I'm like, what is your top performing content? And they're like,
12:39I have no idea. Wow. Yeah. Just go to Instagram. They literally will tell you everything.
12:47Find out what is your top performing content and repeat it. Repeat what is working for you. Don't
12:54shy away from that because that's what's going to get you that growth that you're looking forward
12:57to as well. So if it is Reels, if it is quote graphics, if it is tweet graphics, figure out what's
13:03going to get you that growth and be consistent. You're both giving so much game. I hope that you
13:08all are really grabbing all of this valuable information that's pouring out of these two
13:12women. Ashley, go ahead. Yeah. So I agree with Nana. I just kind of want to add a little bit to it.
13:19But I have so much experience with just helping people build up. And I started with a big goose egg.
13:24And when I go to different social media platforms, I actually don't cross promote because I want to know
13:30that I'm good at understanding that platform and being able to build it up from nothing. And so
13:34when people come to me and they're like, I don't have a following. I don't have an audience. I'm
13:38like, and I didn't used to have one either. Like, come on, let's get to it. Okay. So yes, like your
13:43insights are so important. And so some of y'all are like, well, I don't even, nobody's even looking
13:48at anything. So a big secret that you can use good content is good content. Honey, TikTok is your
13:55friend right now. Okay. And the trending tool for Google and the trending tool for Twitter are your
14:01friends. Even if you don't want to put out TikToks, just get an account and scope around on there.
14:07If you see something that is trending or it's getting lots and lots and lots of views, you
14:11normally can recreate some version of that and put it on Instagram or Facebook. And like Nana said,
14:17use the reels because they're going to put a huge amount of organic reach and push towards that
14:24particular application right now. Anytime any social media platform spends a lot of money
14:29developing something, those people that adapt and use it, they're going to continue to push people
14:34your way. So if you're like, I don't know what content performs well, just go and look at other
14:40content that's performing well and recreate that and make it relevant to your page. The next thing I
14:45would tell you guys to do is come up with like your top 10 or your relevant 10. Look for industry leaders
14:50or influencers or just pages where your people like to be at. Cause that's the number one rule
14:56of marketing is be where your customer is. And so if you see that they're engaging and they're saving
15:01and they're sharing and they're liking different types of content, pay attention to what that content
15:06looks like. Pay attention to the colors, the images, the times of day that they're being posted,
15:11the topics that they're covering, and then sit back and think with yourself like, well, how can I do
15:16something like this for my product or my offer, um, or for my community? So that's a really easy
15:22way for people that just kind of like, you're starting from ground zero and you're like, I don't
15:26even have any insights and every, every, you know, some people like everything is bad. I don't know
15:31what I'm doing because what we think is good content. Our audience will be like, nah, that's not what
15:36we want today. Um, I remember sometimes I would put so much work into crafting these like really
15:41beautiful posts and all this editorial stuff. And it was like, womp, womp, womp. And then I put up
15:45a white post with a like plain black writing on it and it goes like through the roof and it has
15:50thousands of things and everybody's shared it everywhere. So the checkerboard format that's
15:55on my page, people think that I just was like a genius. No, I wasn't. Like Nana said, I paid attention
16:00to what people like. So if they like those types of posts for me, guess what? I'm going to make sure
16:05to put up something like that every single day because my audience responds well to it.
16:09Also collaborations are your friend, like peer to peer. Um, marketing is your friend. Everybody,
16:18when you start off, like when I first started, y'all only had a $50 budget. Like there was a month for
16:23my marketing, which is crazy now because I've spent, you know, like tens of thousands of dollars
16:28a week, you know, in marketing, but I used what I had and I kept reinvesting. And so like
16:33you can collaborate with four or five other people that have a complimentary business or a
16:39complimentary offer to yours. So like, let's say I sold peanut butter and Nana sold jelly,
16:44right? And Sybil, you have bread. Well, the jelly and the bread are complimentary to my peanut butter.
16:50So I may reach out to you guys and say, Hey, do y'all want to do a live stream together? And we can
16:56show people how to make, you know, 15 different dishes in a series on how to use this amazing bread
17:03that Sybil makes and this incredible jelly that Nana makes from scratch. You know what I'm saying?
17:08Out of her garden and the peanut butter. People can see me out here pressing all my peanuts,
17:12right? But we can work, we can work together and grow. And what happens is all of us get sales because
17:17our products are complimentary to one another. There are very few products in the marketplace that
17:22are independent. Almost everything is used in conjunction with something else, or there's going to
17:26be something that someone's using immediately before it or immediately after. So if you can understand
17:31where you are in the food chain, you can reach out to other people that have things that complement
17:35what you do. And that's a really easy way that you can grow really quickly too. And it's super cost
17:41effective and it's beneficial to everybody involved. Okay. So wait, are we giving out money today too?
17:47Is that what's happening? This is bankable content, folks. This is bankable information. Okay. So I know we
17:57have to get close to our clothes and I have, you have given so many dudes. I mean, I feel like,
18:02you know, if, if a person, one of our great girlfriends here in the chat took one or two of
18:06these away, they'd be winning. So what is, I want to know, Nana, from you, your number one,
18:12your absolute don't. I don't do this on social media. What don't you do, Nana?
18:18So this is a personal thing because I know social media is all about be yourself, this and this,
18:23but I do not go off on Instagram. I keep a professional. And the reason why is you never
18:29know who your next client is going to be. I've also worked in media so long that like,
18:34I know from that standpoint, it is very important on like media relationships and you getting featured
18:39in certain publications and et cetera. So just make sure like, yes, be transparent. Yes. Show yourself.
18:45But also remember like, it's a business for us, right? Like we got to have some level of
18:50professionalism on there. So yeah, you will not hear me going off Instagram stories about personal
18:55things. Um, but that is just personally me because I think as leaders, you represent yourself in a
19:02different light than others do. That's good stuff. Okay. Ashley, in 10 seconds, what's your don't?
19:06You do not do this. My don't, um, don't ram, ramming random acts of marketing. I think you should
19:13follow the 80 20 rule and 80% of your content should correlate or be around whatever that
19:19overall objective is or that offer is. And then the other 20% is you can put just kind of whatever
19:25makes you happy or what you're eating for lunch today. If you follow the 80 20 rule, it allows you
19:30to be able to put out content. That's going to establish you as a resource, help you become
19:34relatable and build relationships with your audience members. It's going to help you build up
19:38your list easier. And it's going to help you convert sales, like super duper easy. And you're
19:43not going to come off as salesy instead. You're going to be informative. Okay. I love it. I love
19:49everything that you two have given us today. And I know that our listeners and our viewers are going
19:54to want to know where we can find you and keep up with your social media to keep this conversation
19:58and learn more from both of you. So Nana, where can we find you on social media? Yes. So you can find
20:04me at it's really Nana and also slide in those DMS. I would love to know who came here today.
20:09If you have any more social media questions, let me know. And I just launched an ebook called
20:13social media tips. I wish more people knew about link in my bio. Nice. Ashley. Um, you can find me
20:20at King Ashley and on the gram and on Tik TOK. Um, that's where I spend most of my time. If you follow
20:26me on Facebook, it's probably one of my team members in there, not really me, but if you want to talk to
20:30me, come to the gram or Tik TOK at King Ashley and I, um, right now we're trying to help people
20:36get started up. So I have all kinds of free marketing trainings and a marketing plans and
20:41worksheets and a free video course right now. So you can actually text the word commas with a K
20:47that's K O M M A S to 5 0 1 2 8 5 8 9 6 6 100% free. Not going to ask you any credit card information
20:55or anything. Um, and you can go in there and get what you need. So you actually can get the ball
21:00rolling. Nice. Nice. I can't thank you ladies enough for being here with us today for sharing
21:05all that you shared for all of you that are watching. Be sure to stay tuned in for the
21:09essence and GU entrepreneurs summit, the boss up edition. Thank you so much for joining us.
21:14Oh, I definitely had to learn a few of those things the hard way as an entrepreneur,
21:28but guess what? I'm so glad I did. Okay. Okay. So let's recap a few do's and don'ts for entrepreneurs
21:36to keep in mind on social media. One, do learn your audience. Do they shop more at night or in the
21:43morning? Are they more responsive to videos or images? Are they buying significantly more of one
21:50product or service than the other? Truly knowing your audience is a key component of winning on
21:55social media as an entrepreneur. Two, don't rely on hashtags to do all the work for you. Staying up to
22:04date on trending hashtags can definitely help you get your products or services out there to a larger
22:10audience, but it's not a magic fix. Be strategic about which hashtags you attach to your business
22:17page and fly. Three, do engage, engage, engage. Consumers appreciate direct, honest, and timely feedback
22:29straight from the source when they have a question, complaint, or other concern. Engaging with your audience
22:36regularly can work wonders for customer retention, and it can also attract some new customers who were
22:42once on the fence about trying out a product or service.
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