The Social Media Strategy - Social Media Spiral
Welcome to the Social Media Strategy. I thought it would be appropriate to kick off the episode wearing my dental lab coat because of the unsponsored by products that I'm going to share with you today. I think it's so funny. I have this lava coat because when I work on projects with doctors and dentists and things like that, and I make the rough edits for the clients to see the type of content we're going to shoot, it helps for me to look like the character I'm portraying. So I ordered this, I think, $10 dental coat off Amazon to make those videos, and that's why I have it.
Helen:I almost got rid of it, but then I realized I've used it multiple times, so it's going nowhere. It's a staple in my closet now. I'm gonna take it off, but I wanted to kick it off with that. So the products I wanna talk about today in my unsponsored by series are two things that I use every single day. That is a theme, and I went deep into teeth at this point.
Helen:I forgot to bring in my floss, but okay. Hold on. So the products I wanna talk about today, yes, they are teeth related, and I'm gonna bring them in now. Sensodyne. Now, if you know, you know.
Helen:I work on Sensodyne, I work on this brand. I'm not being paid to talk about this on the podcast. I am paid by them to do shoots for their social media and their content. I don't I don't put myself in the content. So this is I shoot their content.
Helen:So I'm not getting paid to talk about this now on the podcast. But I will tell you, since working on the Sensodyne commercials, which has been since 02/2008, I have realized, because I talk to dentists all the time and I hear the interviews, I'm interviewing them and asking them the questions and everything, I have learned so much about sensitive teeth, what causes tooth sensitivity, how you can prevent it, what are the different things, the different triggers, etcetera. And so through the years, I've learned so much. But when on my first shoot, I'll never forget when I heard the dentist talking about, you know, taking a sip of cold water or or eating ice cream, and I was like, that happens to me. Never did I realize that tooth sensitivity was something that actually could be addressed with a toothpaste.
Helen:Like, I thought, I just have sensitive teeth. That's the way I'm wired, and I'm just gonna have to learn to live with it. But lo and behold, I literally after the shoot went out, got myself some Sensodyne, because they didn't even give us any free at that point. Got myself some Sensodyne, and it has been game changing to my life. I used to go running, and if I'd breathe in a cold air in the winter, it would be pain.
Helen:Ice cream, pain. Popsicles, pain. Brushing my tooth with and rinsing with cold water, never happening. I was always like the room temperature water or give me the hot water. I don't care.
Helen:It's not gonna or warm water, not gonna be hot or cold. So I am now a proponent of this brand. I am behind this brand so hardcore. That's why I think that's probably why they've stayed in my life all these years as a client because it's not just a fly by night thing. For me, I'm committed to the the brand.
Helen:And I am so excited to tell you that for a while, when I was doing the Pronamel commercials, which is also by the makers of Sensodyne, so Sensodyne and Pronamel. Sensodyne is for tooth sensitivity. It's more more it treats the sensitivity more hardcore, whereas Pronamel is for when you're enamel when you have eroding enamel, and that is caused by acidic foods, brushing your teeth right after you eat acidic foods when the enamel is soft, and then you're brushing the enamel right off. This is what I learned from the dentist. You need Pronamel re hardens the enamel, so that way it puts it takes it combines with the saliva to re harden your enamel, and then you don't brush the enamel off your teeth.
Helen:But because I my teeth are so sensitive, I would lean towards the Sensodyne more than the Pronamel as a rule. For a while there, I would brush with Sensodyne at night and Pronamel in the morning and vice versa just to try and reharden my enamel, but also address the sensitivity. Pronamel does address sensitivity, but not as hardcore as Sensodyne. So that's why I was leaning towards this. But anyway, recently, one of the shoots was Sensodyne sensitivity gum and enamel.
Helen:So they finally combine the products in a sense. So this one addresses the enamel loss as well as the sensitivity. I sound like an ad. This is crazy. But this is what I've learned from being on these shoots.
Helen:I've spoken to dentists. I've learned so much. I know exactly what the foods are, how it happens, and I even know how this works. It goes deep inside the tooth and it forms a barrier because the nerve what's happening is the cold water hits the nerve deep inside the tubule of the tooth, and this creates a block from that tubule so that when you drink the cold water, it doesn't trigger the nerve. Listen, I know how it works.
Helen:I probably should be in the commercials. Anyway, I just need my dental license to to do that, and I have to go back to school. But anyway, that's the story. And so if you don't know about Sensodyne, you should. And if you have any type of tooth sensitivity, there's so many options.
Helen:You've got the the quick the one that's rapid relief. There's so many skews, but I lean towards the ones with the toward the ones with sensitivity gum and enamel because occasionally, I'll get my gums will get sensitive. Alright. So I'm gonna stop talking about it. I'm also gonna tell you I floss like a religion, like it's a religion.
Helen:I floss every single night. And my teeth have my dental appointments are amazing. I never have to I very rarely have to have a deep cleaning because I'm a flosser. I didn't bring my floss here, but I like Glide. Flossing is where it's at.
Helen:So if you're not a flosser, you're gonna you're setting yourself up for failure and for not great gum health. So even with all of those things, I still add on to the party with my Sensodyne toothpaste. And that's what I have to say about that. But my next item goes hand in hand, and it's completely different, sort of, not really, my toothbrushes. I'm sharing, and I'm pulling them up here.
Helen:I'm adding it to the party because if you are using a hard bristled toothbrush, you're brushing the enamel right off your teeth. And I've never felt a toothbrush quite so much like this. It's like butter on the gums is what it's called. Guru Nanda. I happened upon this brand when I when I got into trying oil pulling for a short time where oil pulling was a thing on TikTok, and I'm like, I'll try that.
Helen:And these toothbrushes came with it. Actually, the ones that came with it I've already used, so I had to order another pack of them. I love these. Soft, not anything like any soft toothbrushes that I've bought in a drugstore. I am a huge fan of this.
Helen:The brush of choice by the oil pulling people is the brush brush of choice by the mothership. So if you don't want to do oil pulling, skip it. Get the toothbrushes though. You won't be sorry. There's one for every color in in the family, and they are so soft.
Helen:They are literally like what it says, butter on the gums. It's so gentle, and so this way, you're not brushing the enamel off your damn teeth. Okay? Okay. Enough about teeth.
Helen:Let's get to the topic at hand. Can you tell I'm well versed in in, everything related to to, dental health, oral care? I've I'm so well versed in it. I think I should be grandfather claused into dentistry. So what are we gonna do when social media is making you spiral?
Helen:And you might think, oh, Helen, you never spiral. You're always creating. You're always upbeat. You're always ready to go. You're always camera ready, da da da da.
Helen:And you might be kind of right about that because I am pretty much always camera ready. I always, like, always like to think, even when I look crappy, I'm like, if I have to film myself now, it wouldn't be terrible. So I think that I started living my life that way when I became a content creator. I'm trying to think if I was like that before. And if I'm really being honest with myself, probably not.
Helen:I didn't dress for the camera. We're gonna talk about that next episode. I wasn't ever thinking about, like, the colors I was wearing or how I presented on camera ever. It would be like if I was going side or in public, maybe I'd make sure I looked good, I guess. I don't know.
Helen:But now, I'm always pretty much prepared that if I have to pick up a camera and record something, I'm good to go. But that doesn't always mean I'm in a really good mood to record content. It's a very different thing. And I also have times where I'm like, ugh, I'm not even in the mood. I can't think of any ideas.
Helen:I don't even know what to make a video about, and I'm looking at what tutorials next. And I will tell you, there's strategies that you need to use to reset your energy when that happens. And I find myself using the strategies when I was reading them. I didn't even realize it. These are Julie wrote this newsletter, and she comes up with the strategies all the time because she is the queen of logistics and strategy.
Helen:And when she shared the ideas with me, was like, oh my god, yes. These are the things that I do all the time. So let's take it from the top, shall we? First, take a break. Take a break.
Helen:No one's gonna miss you for a day or two. You know what I mean? You could take a break for a month. I mean, depending on your following and how much your viewers are watching you every day and looking forward to the ritual of you posting every day, which happened to me. I was posting every day, posting every day, and then, oh gosh, June 2022, I went blind and I couldn't post.
Helen:There were were people saying, you okay? Is everything okay? So there will be that if you have an audience that is waiting for you and looks to you every day. But if not, you can take a whole month off. No one's gonna it's not gonna tank your account.
Helen:It's not gonna wreck your thing. You have to start over. Whatever. It's not gonna do that. People can sing you whatever song and dance.
Helen:When I take even the littlest break because I'm busy with the shoot and I don't have time to post as often, as soon as I get back, it's like things light right back up. So if you're doing it constantly, of course, you're showing the algorithm inconsistently. I'm talking about you post, post, post consistently, and all of a sudden after a few months, you're really just fried out and you need a break. You just take a month off. You know?
Helen:You don't have to feel bad about it. It can be a lot. It's just a lot. So feel free to do it. It's just that the issue we have when we're a small business or we know being consistent is important for our personal brand, for if we have been monetizing from it, you have to you have to keep going.
Helen:So there's a difference between doing it for fun and then just like, I'm off the trail for a little bit, and building a brand because you wanna be taken seriously. And so because you have to find that balance, I'm not taking a month off. Even if I'm in the crappiest damn mood, I'm not taking a month off. I'm just gonna think of something different to do. I'm gonna change it up for a minute or two.
Helen:I'm gonna say, okay. I'm gonna change my content. I'm gonna hello. I'm gonna read out of a journal one day. I just did that.
Helen:I just read a journal entry, and it was, like, seven minutes long, and people watched it because it was something different. So I'm gonna that's a big one for me that I'm starting with before I even take you through the newsletter points is sometimes the reset can happen from going completely off the rails onto something different and making yourself feel like, this is new because new things tend to excite us more. When we're in a routine, a lot of times you don't get excited. Maybe go to a new exercise class, you have a new book you're reading, and you get excited about something new. So the newness can help you jump start.
Helen:Alright. Now let's get to the points in the newsletter that we covered. The first one is to focus on your content. Like, take a step back, look at your videos, and assess them a little bit. Just look at which ones did well.
Helen:Why did that do well? Did it start off a certain way? Did you look a certain way? Did you have a vibe that you were portray you were your aura was a certain way? What really made that fun?
Helen:What made it engaging that people stuck with it? And and then also be critical. What could be better? How could I like, take notes. Audit yourself and take notes.
Helen:Because this way, if you're gonna take get new renewed and refreshed, you kind of come into it with, alright. I'm gonna fix that. I'm not gonna pause so long before I start talking. Oh, I noticed on all my videos, I always, I do a lot of this. I don't know why.
Helen:So now when I focus on my videos, I'm trying hard to lose the jersey that I do. So that's something that gives me something else to focus on. Now you're going to hear it. I should probably have not called it out, but here we are and we are all friends here. But I do.
Helen:I don't know what it is, if it's a jersey thing or what, I have the little in between. I got to clean it up. I cleaned up my ums. I tried to clean up my likes, but those are harder. The next thing is to focus on accounts that you love.
Helen:So when you are starting to spiral and you're getting like, oh, I can't even be on social media anymore and I don't even feel like looking at it. If you get to that point, that's when you wanna go, wait. Let me really pay attention to and curate my feed better. And so please have some discipline. If you see something and you go, I don't wanna see more of this, scroll quickly.
Helen:Quickly, quickly. Don't sit on it even for two seconds. I get in it sometimes with an airport drama, and I'm like, why am I watching this? And of course, I'm gonna get five more airport dramas. I don't wanna watch airport dramas.
Helen:But sometimes it sucks me in and I'm like, what is this lady doing? I haven't I've have I ever seen her at the airport? Because I travel a lot. So I get in it. But the thing is you have to you have to just like engage in some discipline.
Helen:What I tend to do when that happens is I'll go to a creator's page. I'll go even to Julie's page and I'll start watching a bunch of her videos and say, oh, maybe I'll get comedy or something. I try hard to curate it back to where it should be, where it's more fun. But on TikTok, you can just go to your friends following feed and follow the and watch the people that you know you wanna see, and that helps keep things in the right place. And then make sure you skip the ones if those people are doing something out of the norm or they're not it's not the energy you wanna feel.
Helen:Scroll past it. On Instagram, you're gonna stick to the same thing. Do the following or the close friends. Follow accounts and pay attention to accounts that aren't draining you of your energy even more. It's so tough.
Helen:It's just tough. I every time something happens in the news, we're in it. And we're in it, and it's like, my god. Our our social media's wrecked again. Yet again, we're in a horrible downward spiral of current events.
Helen:And it's so hard. I I'm sitting here telling you that, you know, when those things happen, I actually have to take a break because I'm like, just I can't even I feel thankful that I can focus on other things. And I'm like, you know what? Today, I'm not even gonna post anything. I'm gonna go for a run instead.
Helen:Today, I'm gonna go see if I can visit the baby and get some some cuddles in. We all need mental health check ins for ourselves. And so I know this is going a little bit down that place, but you gotta take a break. And sometimes you gotta unfollow people that make you feel bad. If you feel bad unfollowing on Instagram, use the mute button.
Helen:It's a little easier on TikTok to ignore people, just pass their videos so that you don't get more of them. But on Instagram, you can use the mute feature. They don't even know that you're muting them if you don't wanna hurt their feelings or whatever. It is so important so important to rise up when things are going down, you know? I don't know.
Helen:This is when I so this is similar to what I just said about like taking a break or go for a run or whatever. Try a habit swap. So if you think you're reaching for your phone and you're gonna start scrolling, go, you know what? This time, I'm gonna go to my book app or I'm gonna do a puzzle game. I'm gonna scroll on something else on my I'm gonna find something else that's more interesting.
Helen:And whatever that might be for you, I mean, to me, it might be even something as funny as going back to Snapchat, which where I use just for my family. So that is very much more personal. So I can just share Snapchats today to make myself feel better because it's just more family content. And you can do you can really break the cycle by replacing that habit with something else for real. It's just worth it.
Helen:Now if we wanna stay in the social media zone, and you don't wanna go like, oh, I don't want my engagement to go down, and it's too important to me. I have a business to run. I need to keep sales going, etcetera, etcetera, Then maybe consider going live instead of scrolling and instead of creating. Go live. Spend more time going live.
Helen:By the way, I went live a couple of times in a row last week because I was practicing, things. I wanted to learn things about live to talk about in the studio, and I was digging a little deeper in the lives. My videos got a lot more engagement in general that week when I went live a lot. So I do think there's something to be said that going live does help your gives you a boost in the algorithm, I think, because it happened to me. I even said to Julie, I think my account's lit up really well, and I it might be because I went live, like, three days in a row.
Helen:So try going live. Try that and see if that helps you. And then the, the other thing oh my gosh. I won't say the last thing, but I'll say one more thing is that you can set the time limit on your phone so that you're not spending too much time in those in those apps. And do I do it?
Helen:Absolutely not. I don't. But I also can be very disciplined at times, and I can say, alright, when the I set a timer on my phone, just like when the timer goes, I wanna be on to my next task, something like that. I'm trying to do that more in my work day, so I so I set times up where I know, okay, that's gonna be my social media time, and other than that, I'm not picking up I'm not going to those apps on my phone. I really try and do it.
Helen:It's obviously a little harder when so much of my business involves social media, so it's not gonna be me putting my phone away for a week and not going on the apps. It's not gonna happen. I'm just telling you right now, it's not gonna happen. I also don't find that they drain me as much. I very I am controlled about what I watch, so it doesn't take me down.
Helen:But if I have moments where I'm just in a lull, I don't feel like it today, then sometimes I'll scroll and I'll look for a fun trend to make myself smile, do something silly, do a funny effect, do one of those cap cut templates where you get taken away by aliens. By the way, wanna do that one so bad, but it's saying my cap cut has to be updated. And when I go to update, it's telling me that the app was purchased with a different Apple ID, and I can't get the damn app to update, which makes no sense, but that's my technical problem to solve. Anyway, I can't do the aliens taking taking me away one because it's mostly animals, aliens taking the animals away. I wanted the aliens to take the mothership, you know?
Helen:Thought that would be cool. So that would be a fun one. But that's what I tend to do is I tend to look for something fun and silly, like melting. That was a funny one. And I did the audio from the Wicked Witch of the West, like, I'm melting.
Helen:So I thought that was funny. But I get my kicks out of taking myself out of what I have to do, the chores or the tutorials or the constant information that I have to put out there, and I go, I'm gonna do something so silly, and I don't care. And that's then I usually get people that go, this is what I love about your page. It's always so quirky, and you never know what you're gonna do next. And I'm like, you're welcome because I can't I don't even know what I'm gonna do next.
Helen:I just try to have fun. That's it. I even say that at work. People are like, oh, the shoot's gonna be so stressful. I said, we're gonna have fun.
Helen:Don't you worry. Oh, I did the thing. Did you hear it? We're gonna have fun. I'm gonna call out all my quirks now.
Helen:Anyway, final thoughts. If you want to channel that energy into something positive, if you want to feel better about making content, and you wanna come to the studio and come to a meeting, you will always leave the meetings feeling good. I promise you that. And I leave the meetings feeling good every time because I get energized from the studio members, and you will get energized from each other and from me being happy because I love to be there, and I like to share and help and all the things. Okay.
Helen:That's it for today. That is a wrap. I have a big shoot coming up this week, so here we go, by the way. It's a new product coming from Sensodyne. Not this one, but a new one.
Helen:And I will be filming, so you will probably not even I don't know when I'm gonna get to go live or whatever, but I wanna be able to go live and do some get some do some more of that because I think that really does help, and I wanna keep my account lit up. So that's my goal. Join me on the ride, come to the studio, and hang out. We have our first Saturday meeting because I had to move the Friday meeting to Saturday. So if you've been hesitant because you're like, oh, the meetings are during the week.
Helen:I can't ever make it. Try it out this week, and you could see us on a Saturday, and it's 11AM eastern time. We'll be hanging out on a Saturday to just kind of get together and talk about community building, more engagement. We're gonna review Instagram live because I just posted that lesson in the studio. They I did post lessons for TikTok Live and Instagram Live, a behind the scenes look at what it looks like to be live from the creator's perspective.
Helen:These are not tutorials that I have shared on my page. These are tutorials that are only available in the studio. Okay. That's it. That's a wrap.
Helen:Have a wonderful week have a wonderful weekend because it's Friday by the time you listen to this, and I'll see you next week. Or else maybe I'll see you tomorrow at the meeting.
