Increasing Your Social Media Engagement (without the overwhelm) with Andréa Jones

Jaclyn Mellone  

Welcome to Go-To Gal episode number 170. As always,I’m your host, Jaclyn Mellone. And today I have with us an amazing guest who I’m so excited to share with you. If you are like me, and you have found social media to just be heavy and stressful and overwhelming. Maybe this past year, maybe longer.For me, it’s been a little bit longer than that. Then this episode is for you.  So confession time. I have two Instagram accounts. You may have heard me talk about this before, but I have two Instagram accounts. One that is Jaclyn Mellone, that’s jaclyn_mellone. The other one, which is the alaccount, which is @go.to.gal. And I’ve pivoted both a couple of times, neither one of them started out as that name. I’ve changed my business quite a bit over the last almost six years now. Yeah, I started both of them the summer of 2015. And pretty crazy.  

So that said, in the last six or seven months, we haven’t posted anything on the Go-To Gal account. And the past couple months, I’ve been meeting with my team and really thinking like, okay, where are we going? What are we focusing on? And it really keeps coming back to building Go-To Gal. And my vision of building Go-To Gal into more of a media company. And I say more of a media company because technically we’re already a media company, but into more of a media company, which I will elaborate on in another episode. Now’s not the time to replace.  But I really want to focus on building that community and connecting you with other Go-To Gals, because there’s so much amazingness in our community and I see that in our private communities. And I want to help bring more of that into our not paid or private communities. I think we can really be tapping into some of that magic on Instagram and more of an easily accessible way. So we’re gonna start having some fun over there on that Go-To Gal account.  

Oh, if you’re listening to this the day or so it goes live, we haven’t started yet. But I’m letting you know that this is like my accountability. Come over to Go-To Gal and send me a message and be like, hey, I saw you talking about this. Because we have not started yet this week. Actually had a call about this morning which would be the day before this episode goes live. So that’s my accountability. If we’re not already connected over on the Go-To Gal account, come on over there. Send me a DM and let’s connect.  

So our guest today is an expert with social media. But what I really love about her approach is that one, yes, she is brilliantly strategic, and so creative with the solutions she comes up with. But she also has this emphasis on keeping it mindful. She also told me she has an AI already gone and subscribed and reviewed and obsessed with. So she has a podcast, but she has a separate podcast that is entirely dedicated to meditations revolving around social media. So yes, I am obsessed with Andrea and her approach to this. And super excited. I knew I needed to have this conversation with her but I’m super excited to get to bring you in on it too. You’ve probably heard me kind of be whiny about social media this past year. I started off my business and like everything was social. And the last 18 months, just maybe longer, I haven’t been tracking it. 

But I just kind of fell out of love. Maybe it’s longer, the more I think about it, the more I’m like, yeah, it’s been a while that I fell out of love with social media. And I haven’t been as social on it. So I’ve been really, this year, this past few months, trying to get re engaged myself and really thinking about how I want to do this. And not just like, oh, what’s the best strategy these days and tactics, but actually, what’s gonna feel fun? Because I think if I am having fun, you can sense that energy and you want to connect with me there. But if it’s completely automated and feels missing that little extra something and it doesn’t have to be fun. But if it’s missing that energy, and it just feels flat. I feel like we can sense that.  

So how do we put together a plan to really engage our followers, but also engage ourselves on how do we stay mindful of our own attitude towards it and that is exactly what our guest today is going to tackle. Our focus in this conversation is not just on social media overwhelmed, but really how to one engage your followers. In such a way that converts to sales because you just having a bunch of followers is probably not your goal and it shouldn’t be your goal. You want to be engaging those people who you can help, who you can take that next step with whatever that is in your business. So that’s what we’re gonna jam on. Can’t wait to get to it. 

But before we get started, let me officially introduce you to Andrea.  Andrea Jones is fiercely committed to helping businesses and podcasters build profitable online communities through simple social media solutions. She’s the host of the Savvy Social Podcast, creator of the Savvy Social school, a digital platform designed to teach its 100 plus members, predominantly small business owners how to implement organic social media strategies and named one of social reports top marketers to follow. Alright, let’s get to it. Here’s my conversation with Andrea.  Andrea, I’m so excited to have you here today.

Andrea Jones  

I’m so excited to be here.

Jaclyn Mellone  

Yes, so much to dive into. But before we get started, take us back to when you were growing up. What were you the Go-To Gal for back then?

Andrea Jones  

I was a huge reader. And I still am to this day, especially fantasy fiction books. Like obviously, Harry Potter is like my favorite of all time. And so that’s what I was known for. Growing up is like always having a book in my hand. If someone needed a book recommendation, they just come to me and I’d be like, read this next.

Jaclyn Mellone  

Oh, I love it. Okay, I feel like I have to confess to you that I have not read Harry Potter. I know, I know. But I don’t want to start this off with a lie. I feel like I need to be upfront about this. But I did buy the first book with the pictures, the children’s, kind of it’s beautiful. It’s like this big, beautiful book. And I’m trying to get my daughter into it. So we can read it together. Because now I feel like I would really like it. Yeah, it just didn’t happen for me when I was younger. So we’re gonna try this now.

Andrea Jones  

Okay, there’s still time. There’s still time.

Jaclyn Mellone  

There’s hope for me. Okay. So fast forward to today. Tell us what you do? And who do you help? 

Andrea Jones  

Yes, I’m a social media strategist. I help coaches, leaders and really just passion led business owners learn how to use social media as a tool to grow their business. So I do that through done-for-you services for those people who are, I want to think about this, I want someone else to think about it. And then I also teach it in our coaching program for those people who want to learn how to do it for themselves.

Jaclyn Mellone  

So good. Okay, well, when it comes to social media, I could probably keep you here all day jamming on all of the things. But let’s just start off with how we should be thinking about social media and in 2021, as business owners with personal brands, growing our businesses online, what is social media like these days? How’s it changed? How should we be thinking about this?

Andrea Jones  

Yeah, and I think the challenge with social media is that it is so public that we can see what everyone else is doing. And especially, as business owners, we start comparing ourselves to other people like oh, I should be on TikTok now or I should start a clubhouse room or I should create a YouTube series and do a lot of shitting on ourselves. Like we should do all of these things.  And as business owners, one of the things I recommend thinking about first is what exactly do you want social media to do for you and your business. Because it’s going to be different. Some of us use social media as a portfolio piece to showcase our work. Some of us use social media as a way to build partnerships like strategic partners with people who would refer business to us. Some of us use it as a way to market to the end user or end consumer and encourage them to make a buying or purchasing decision. 

So once you understand what social media can do for you and your business, and where it fits in with everything else you’re doing, then I find that it’s easier to make decisions on where should you be, how frequently should you show up? What are you saying when you show up and all of those things. And that hopefully will take us through past 2021 as well, because the landscape shifts so much. So for example, for me, I love talking. I’m a talking processing kind of person. If you asked me to sit down and write a social media post, it’s gonna take me a long time. It just takes longer. And so for me, I’d much rather do a video or I love doing podcasts. So knowing that about myself and then knowing how I want to show up, I can take that skill and apply it to any platform, apply it to any strategy, even as things change like new features on Instagram reels. I know how I want to show up there because I know what works for me. If turning on the video and doing a face to camera video makes you like die a little bit inside, then you don’t have to do it. You can find other ways to show up on the platform and just know that when new features come up, it’s not for you. And that’s okay. 

Jaclyn Mellone  

Oh, that’s so good. This is such a timely conversation for me too. And I did not know that you also are verbal processors. So like podcasters, we’re typically verbal processors. It does make sense. This has been at the beginning of my business, I was all over social media and so much of my business growth came from that. At the last, I could blame it on the pandemic, but this was so before the pandemic, but I could totally be like, oh, the pandemic, and I just lost my way. But it’s totally what’s happening before the pandemic, the pandemic just probably made it worse, where I just wasn’t as consistent.  I didn’t need to rely on it as much. 

But I probably could have been, but I didn’t have tools in place that would help me keep up with it while keeping up with other things. And so now I’m kind of really going back to the drawing board. And it’s interesting to hear you talk about the different ways because that’s what I’ve been reassessing is what do I want to be using social for? And what accounts am I going to focus on? And trying to give myself that fresh start, if you will. 

Even though I have pretty established accounts, I haven’t been consistent on them. I used to do more with Facebook, now I’m over Facebook. And so it’s trying to figure out, okay, where am I focusing my attention? Instagram is so needy. It’s like five platforms in one, but I feel like Instagram is gonna be where it makes sense for me to focus. But it’s not really one platform, because there’s all these different things going on with it.

Andrea Jones  

Yes, my perspective on social media, but Instagram, specifically, it’s almost like that situation ship like a slightly toxic partnership where they just keep asking for “revenue”. Yeah. Our relationship with it is healthy sometimes. We love it and we like we get the dopamine hit. We posted something and people like it. And then the next day, we’re like, I want to delete this from my phone. I never want to log in again. And then the next day, we’re like, someone signed up for my program. And they said that they found me through Instagram, this is the best thing ever. Yeah, it’s like a little bit of a toxic partnership, where it’s you know this person’s toxic, but they just got a new car. And they said, they pay to get my nails done, but also they’re emotionally manipulative. So I think it’s just I think if we go into it, understanding that maybe we can navigate it a little bit better.

Jaclyn Mellone  

Oh, that’s so true. Yes, Instagram is definitely emotional. So I think it’s about those healthy boundaries. So what is your philosophy on how many platforms should we be on? I know this is going to be different for everyone but do you have strong opinions about this? What should we do?

Andrea Jones  

Yes, I do. I think one platform as your main go to platform is the way to go. Especially if you are the one controlling it and managing it, we can only save space in our brains for so many things. And even social media is my job, I still have a platform that I spend most of my time on, like 80% of my time. And so I think as business owners, if we can just be okay with not being everywhere, that is the best solution. Those people who appear everywhere have teams of people helping them implement all of that. And a lot of us aren’t teams of people. It’s like maybe a virtual assistant.  So if we think about it from that perspective, we can give ourselves a little bit of grace, pick that one, stick with it. I suggest three to six months. And then if you feel super comfy on that platform, you can start layering and others. 

One of my suggestions as well as in the meantime, if you still want to repurpose your content to the other platforms, you can absolutely do that. There’s a lot of tools that will help you cross publish content. It’s the exact same post. Our favorite brands do it as well like Starbucks and Peloton, they’re all posting the same thing on all of their platforms as well. So you can do that in the meantime. But when we talk about engaging and growing and showing up and being present, just pick one platform and just be happy there.

Jaclyn Mellone  

Okay, simple enough. Thank you for that permission. So one of the things that I know you talk a lot about that I think is really one of the most important things we should focus on. With these platforms is really how we get that engagement up with our followers and eventually build those engaged, loyal followers that eventually turn into clients or customers. Where do we begin with starting to do this?

Andrea Jones  

So there’s two pieces to this process. There’s the actual content that you create and then there’s facilitating the engagement of that content. So the easiest way for me to kind of understand the types of content that’s working on social media is the type of content people will share. And I think as business owners and marketers really, we kind of move away from that a little bit because we’re like, let’s blast them with our ads and hopefully they’ll buy something. But at the end of the day, the content that goes viral or the content that does the best is the content where people go, oh, I got to share this with my bestie. I got to share this with somebody and it’s not necessarily a promotional style content piece. And so if we approach the content from that perspective, it can help build engagement. 

So an example would be one of my clients who’s an OB-GYN works with women, people who are trying to conceive or who are pregnant. She walks them through the pregnancy process and postpartum. One of her posts I did the best was just identifying this question. She said, how many other people out there wear their postpartum underwear for way longer than they should. And it was kind of one of those posts where people were like I thought I was the only one and said that “I feel seen” type of content or people will DM it to their girlfriend and they’re like, you’ve got to check this out. 

This is so relatable. That really helps bolster social media engagement. So it does start from the content perspective first, and creating content like that as a practice. And so for me, it’s really related to consistent habits. And you’re not going to be great at it at first. So I like to relate this to yoga, for instance. I love practicing yoga. I’m pretty bad at it still. I do not look anything like my instructor, but I do the poses. But it’s the practice of it. And I can feel myself getting better. It’s the same for social media, it’s like the practice of getting better.  On the flip side of that is facilitating the engagement. 

So we’ve got the content, and we actually have encouraging engagement. And this typically comes from being engaged with first or being engaging first. And oftentimes, this means networking and building a community around the work that you’re doing. And it has to come from a really genuine place. It can’t be formatted or formulaic. And it really comes down to it’s a lot like dating or networking. You don’t just run up to someone and go, let’s get married tomorrow. Typically, I like your shoes, or something like that. And so a lot of our initial social media reactions are on that level of l like your shoes, and you’ve got to build up to let’s go out of date, or let’s grab coffee, or whatever the case may be like. It’s got to build. And the same thing with dating, not every single person you talk to is going to become the one for you or become a partner. Most of the people actually aren’t probably. 

So it’s a lot of networking in that capacity that really can help build amazing relationships in social media. And those people who commit to those strategies have the best engagement on their posts.

Jaclyn Mellone  

Okay, I love how you broke this down. It’s so true and these two parts, like break it apart, ever creating the content and then actually engaging. So when it comes to creating the content, you mentioned these habits, and we’re not going to be great at them at first. But is there anything that you do or that you recommend your clients to build these habits to create that type of content that is going to be shareable or the most engaging to our audience?

Andrea Jones  

Yeah, so I recommend setting a time limit for this. And I know a lot of people recommend giving yourself like a post limit. Every week, you should post three to five times a week. But it almost feels similar to that yoga analogy where your pose should look like this. Well, we’re not there yet. And so giving yourself that time to create the first couple of times you do it, like the first dozen times you do it. Whatever comes out is not going to be great, probably, but you got to stick with it.  

And then the second piece of that is using social media as a mirror. So it really should just reflect what’s happening internally in your business, like the postpartum underwear example is a question that she probably got from one of her members or from a client. And it’s one of those things that we talk about internally in our business, social media to just amplify those kinds of hidden conversations. And it takes practice to kind of dig deep and understand what that is. And typically a brainstorming session works for me. 

So give yourself like a VIP day. Give yourself some time to sit down and think about the concepts that you want to share, that you want to talk about. And this works for any of your marketing, not just social media. So everything from your website, to your podcast, to your emails, think about the concepts that you want to talk about. And then you can start breaking them down when you kind of do sit down for that hour to pull all of those content pieces together.  Where we get stuck sometimes as business owners is when we sit down, and that’s when we try to develop the content. And again, I think this comes from a place of looking at someone else’s Instagram or their Facebook or whatever and going. 

Okay, I’m going to try to make something as good as that. It’s not supposed to be as good as that. What are you doing today that you can reflect back in your marketing and you’ll be able to produce way more content, and you’ll be able to actually produce things that resonate with people because you’re not trying to be something else. You’re just reflecting the conversations and things that are already working for you and your business.

Jaclyn Mellone  

That’s such a good reminder. So when thinking about this type of content, it does matter if it’s a picture with a caption, if it’s a quote, if it’s real, if it’s a IGTV, if it’s a story, video, all these different carousel poses. All the different things that we could be doing on Instagram. It feels a little overwhelming. Well, what type of content should I even be creating in the brainstorm phase? Should we be thinking about these different types? And I’m talking about Instagram, specifically. Clearly, there’s all these other platforms that someone might be focused on. So yeah, what does that brainstorm phase look like? Is it just the ideas? And then we figure out where this really implements? What do you recommend for that?

Andrea Jones  

Yeah. I mean, even if you just said, you like talking. 

Jaclyn Mellone  

I do. 

Andrea Jones  

So I think sharing those concepts through some sort of spoken way could work for you. So have you tried Instagram reels yet?

Jaclyn Mellone  

Okay. In theory, I would be amazing at reels. In reality, I don’t know. So I love the concept of it. I love the idea of having fun with it. I’ve tried to do the lip sync thing, I just can’t. I don’t know, there’s missing that part of my brain. Where I can’t lie with that. That’s too complicated for me.  Now, I did have some fun doing, I’m gonna use air quotes here, like reel style videos. I may have gotten like a little too all out. Sometimes it’s all or nothing for me. 

So there were two different looks and I was like two different people. I had a lot of fun with it. And we ran it as an Ad. And I got really good feedback on it. But I didn’t know, I think it was maybe 90 seconds. And with reels, how long are these, 30 seconds or a minute. 30 seconds. So I think we like to get it down to a minute. And then it was like, oh, yeah, there’s no way we can get those to 30 seconds. So it wasn’t technically a reel, but it was reel’s style. It took me way too long to do, not even gonna admit how long it took to do with the video editing and all of that.  So the simple answer is probably no, I have not done reels, but I have had attempts. And I’d like to put it kind of like this is interesting. But also, how do I have the time for this. 

But I am also sharing as long as it’s like Jaclyn social media confessions. So I am like you where writing is so hard for me. I can write really well when I can get into that zone. But it’s so hard for me to get into that zone, and I can’t get into that zone at three o’clock on Thursday. I can’t time it. It just has to kind of happen.  So I have to get that inspiration from you. And then I try to hire other people to write for me, and I’m never happy with it. I’m very picky. So it’s not a good combination. And what I’ve decided is I need to lean more into video. You would think, oh, easy, but where it gets more complicated for me, and I’m sure I’m not the only one, but I’m sure most people are different from me because it feels like people are different from me since everyone else figures this out. But just talking to myself is not exciting. Like getting on live and just talking to myself or I don’t really have that personal accountability be like I’m gonna sit down and record like hours of video content today by myself. 

So what I found is when there’s someone else there, it keeps me accountable. And it’s more fun and then I get that energy.  So one, we’re now recording these zoom podcast interviews, so we can use clips of video for social. But I’m also leaning more into having team members interview me whether we air it as a podcast episode, which we did last month, but also just to pull stuff out of me that we can use video for because that is fun for me. That’s easy for me. And the end result is the same as me on video.

Andrea Jones  

Yes. I love every piece of this. And I actually feel like you’re doing a great job. And I kind of get the sense that you feel you’re not doing enough. Maybe. 

Jaclyn Mellone  

I feel like I’m not doing enough. Legitimately, I’m not doing enough with posting consistently on social media now the last month or so we’ve done a lot we went from like very little to a lot. But I want to get back to that community building content. And we’re really been focused on content around the launches.But this isn’t like the direction of where we want to go with things. Sure. We’re going to have things that we’re going to promote on social, of course, but that’s not the real point of it. And we have audiences but I pivoted my businesses over the years.  

So I have two accounts, but those audiences are definitely not as engaged as they could be or there is that you should be. So it’s going to take that time to re-engage the community and probably grow with more of the right people too, because some of those people are probably from a past account name where our focus was a little different and all of that. So yes, I’m trying to lean into more like I can create, that’s going to be the easiest. And it sounds like that’s really what you encourage people to do, too. And you were saying, well, this is what’s easy for me. So I think that’s important. We just own that and right and lean into it because going against the grain is so heavy. 

Andrea Jones  

Yes. Okay.There’s so many opportunities to just keep doing what you’re doing without having to point or dance on Instagram reels, for example.

Jaclyn Mellone  

Mike Adams is pointing too. I don’t know where to point. Yeah, not good at that.

Andrea Jones  

And I will say to Instagram, their app editing is awful. So if you can’t sync things up or if you can’t get the text to pop up at the same time, I almost promise you, it’s not you. It’s Instagram. Again, that toxic partnership and showing up again. They’re making you feel bad for doing something. But I think there’s opportunity to repurpose content. Instead of Instagram reels, what if part of this podcast interview is in IGTV video instead. If you have a video editor, you just give them the different dimensions and they can create a five minute segment for igtv. That’s a way to repurpose content. Or even post a couple of 32 clips into your stories or even on reel so you could try posting that content there.  

Even for reels, as well, I have found just talking to the camera can be a great way to produce content. Take a post that did really well, maybe like a year ago or even recently, and say the same things. Just on reels instead of in a post. You’re going to reach more people, reach different people. You’re not recreating the wheel because you already said it. And it could be a potential to test out a new feature without having to commit to the outfit changes, which I never did. I just can’t imagine having the time. But I’m always amazed when I say that people like oh, that looks nice.

Jaclyn Mellone  

See, that surprises me about you though because you do you. You’re like outfits together but it’s like you have the one outfit you’re committed you don’t want to have to. This is even off topic, but I have kind of a personal question for you. How many headbands do you have?

Andrea Jones  

I have a surprising collection that’s ever growing. I probably have about 20 now.

Jaclyn Mellone  

Okay, I don’t want to brag, but I think I’m getting close to 50. I don’t wear them all. But sometimes you get those like Amazon packs, 12. It’s a bit extreme. But yes, but I feel like the headbands change up could be easy. That’s what I do. That’s one of my tricks.

Andrea Jones  

I think this also comes down to knowing your audience as well. Because I talk about simplicity in social media, I want that reflected in my content as well. So I don’t really over produce. I just feel like it’ll actually alienate the right people for me. For my coaching program, my favorite clients are the people who are like, hey, Andrea, I felt a little bit embarrassed but how do I even post an Instagram story? And I’m like, oh, I got you, because I can really break it down in a way that feels like they can accomplish this or they can actually do something with Instagram stories.  So an example would be talking about this podcast turning into IGTV. You can keep sharing that to stories over time as well. It’s an evergreen piece of content now. So when you think about your stories, it doesn’t have to be, for instance, this morning, I posted a little video of me meditating with my dogs. It doesn’t have to be that. That’s my way of showing up. It doesn’t have to be that for you. It can be scrolling back to your feed and posting something that’s relevant to your audience today. Just hitting that little airplane button and sharing it to your stories. It doesn’t have to be super complicated. It doesn’t have to be you showing your food or anything like that.

Jaclyn Mellone  

It’s such a good reminder and just encouragement because when you say that it reminds me of just things I’ve been hearing from friends and clients, but sometimes that overly polished brand actually loses trust in today’s social media online landscape. That if it’s like to produce, it feels like there’s a distance or is that person being real. I think what in the past that level of production was trust, like, oh, they’re legit. It’s now the opposite is like, oh, wow, this looks too packaged and polished and like distant. It doesn’t feel like this is real. That’s an interesting change that we’re seeing.

Andrea Jones  

Yeah, and it totally. So even you can probably hear my dogs in the background. That’s part of my life. And I think that a lot of online business owners, especially the people who I’m trying to connect with, have their four year old running into the room while they’re on a meeting. Whatever the case may be. Life is happening around us. And so the more I can reflect that, the better. And that’s why I’m a really strong believer in social media and a great example of this too is I get a lot of questions from people thinking about political issues. Do I say something, do I not? How do I show up for my audience members? Should I post a black square? And those questions can be answered by talking about it with your clients and with your team and with internally in your business. If you’re not, then maybe you can start there. And then think about social media later.  Social media isn’t the place where you start. And I think that’s why a lot of people feel stuck sometimes when they go to post on social media and they’re like, what do I say about this topic? That resistance we feel is probably because we haven’t said anything yet about it. And so if you do the internal work first, that’s the hard part. That’s where you may feel the resistance, you may feel that discomfort and then social media can just reflect. Whatever those internal conversations, discussions, even if it’s just you like the internal thoughts about a certain situation, and thinking about how you can reflect that back on social media to your audience.

Jaclyn Mellone  

Oh, I love how you broke that down. And it’s true as verbal processors, those of us too have having those verbal conversations that do help us clarify. What it is we’re thinking and kind of disjointed thoughts together and process these situations better to then be able to go to social media to talk about it. One thing I’ve wondered: is there a frequency with talking about stuff that maybe isn’t the normal purpose of the brand, but that is timely with current events, and are on topics that, as the founder, we really care about. And our audience likely cares about too but we want our audience to hear about those things. But where’s that line between like, okay, but this isn’t the total mission of the brand. Have you found a balance with that, that feels like, okay, we’re showing up for the things that really do matter to us in our community but we’re not moving the direction of the mission, either.

Andrea Jones  

Yeah, and this is such an internal process as well. And I do think it depends on how much it shows up in your business. So is there like a dedicated page on your website, then you probably would talk about it more so than someone who is a P.S. on the about page, for instance. So I think it really should, the frequency of it probably reflects how deeply it’s embedded into your brand and into your missions. And it is tough. I see this call out culture happening on social media that it just doesn’t sit right with me. And I think that there is a difference between saying, hey, this is something that’s important to me as a member of your community. And I’d like to bring it to you to consider versus you should say this, or you shouldn’t say that, or that sort of thing.  So it is a really tough decision to make as business owners. But honestly, we are leaders.

As a business owner, you’re automatically a leader, and part of leading someone is sitting with that discomfort. It just comes with the title. And so you’ve got to be able to sit down with the discomfort of going to my community saying something or I feel like I should change the way that I’m approaching this or I feel like I should double down on a concept that I really believe in. Gotta sit with that as a leader and then also be okay with messing up saying the wrong thing, not saying the right thing. Taking too long to make a statement. Not making a statement at all. Those are all the things as leaders that we have to be able to make a decision about, take action on and live with the consequences of those actions.  And it’s really tough, especially now. I can feel the landscape on social media is heating up to a surprising level that it makes people feel like they’re tiptoeing around certain topics. 

They don’t want to talk about it. They don’t want to rock the boat. And understandably so just because of the blowback and reactions that we see from a lot of these things. So you have to decide as a business owner, what that comfort level is for you and make sure that if it’s a part of your brand, it’s not just something that shows up on social media. It’s something that you’re talking about internally, with your team, with your clients. It’s on your website somewhere. It’s in your business and then social media is just kind of reflecting pieces of those things.  So one example I’ll give is one of my clients is a coach for, she’s like a feminist life coach. And so a lot of her content, like it’s embedded in her content to talk about not only the workings of your brain and how you approach the world, but also the disparity is of women in North America and especially women of color or people of color specifically. And so for her, it’s a daily conversation. 

For some of my other clients. I have another client who works with actors and really helps them to show up right for their auditions and things like that. They do have a strong mindset component to what they do. They probably talk about these topics once a month, and that’s a good frequency for them. They donate to certain organizations. And so for them, it’s easy to say this is the organization we’re donating to this month. Here’s why this is important to us. And it’s something that’s consistent for them and that’s part of their habit. So you kind of have to decide what that is for you and your business, and just make sure it’s a reflection of what’s happening internally.

Jaclyn Mellone  

I so appreciate your one, just your opinion perspective and just the deep level of insight with this. I really appreciate you sharing all that. And I think this is a really empowering perspective too that we need to go deeper with it and really think about, how we are infusing our values into our whole business. Like, okay, now, how do we show that up on social media? But it’s like, just starting with social sometimes that might be why things are feeling hard. And this really needs to be. It’s a bigger, deeper conversation. So yes, thank you for breaking that down. And I think that is a really empowering way to look at it too. But yeah, we’re leaders. We need to show up and leave, and it’s not gonna be perfect, and it doesn’t need to be perfect. And that’s part of the process and showing up messy but we’re leaders. 

Oh, okay. I feel like this ties into, maybe it does, maybe it doesn’t, but I know you talk about mindfulness in social media. And there’s a lot going on with social media in terms of okay, here we are talking about. What are we promoting and we’re growing audiences? And also, how are we showing up on these topics? And there’s a lot at play here. So how are we contributing to social media, having this be a big driver in our businesses, but also being mindful about it?

Andrea Jones  

Yeah, and then shut up in a very real way for me and my business, because I’m actually doing this all day, 24/7. Feels like sometimes I had a moment where I was feeling incredibly anxious, I was feeling overwhelmed and panicked at the thought of another notification coming in. And I was like, I don’t know if I can do this. And so what helped for me is to really give myself strong boundaries with social media. And it again, starts with understanding the role that it plays, not just in my business, but like showing up for my clients as well and what I want that to look like. And so the first thing I realized was these notifications have to go like. I don’t get any notifications. I don’t even get text messages now because…

Jaclyn Mellone  

There was an option.

Andrea Jones  

In your iPhone settings, you can turn notifications off for every single app. And you do have to turn them off, they start on which I do not like. So anytime I download an app, the certifications go off. I don’t get a pop up. No sound happens. So what I have in how I set up is like my favorites list. So my husband, my mom, my sister, they come through. No one else can, there’s not an emergency big enough that they can interrupt anything. And it was like immediate relief. Now, in the beginning, I missed some things. Like I forgot to check my Instagram DMs for two days and so there was something sitting there and I was like, oh, shoot, I should respond to that. So it does happen, you will miss things. But how I have it set up is I have reminders in Asana. And I just leave Asana open on my computer when I’m working. And I go through my checklist. And every day when I check off stuff like check Instagram, check Facebook, check LinkedIn, is like moving it to the next day and I’ll do the same list the next day.  But I also like social media. So after I got over the anxiety and overwhelm, and I was like, I just need a break, I find myself I just use it naturally. So I naturally check Instagram in between my calls, because I love being there. But if I’m on a call, nothing’s gonna pop up. I’m not gonna start thinking about it. It’s not lighting up my screen. And so I really have separated that. 

Even email, for me, it was the weekends, clients would email me on the weekends. And they’re very nice. They’ll say, hey, no worries. Don’t think about this till Monday. It doesn’t matter. I saw it. And now I’m thinking about it. So on the weekends, it’s off completely.  And so when you’re a business owner, you’ve got to think about the boundaries you want to set for yourself. How you want to show up on social media, how it plays a role in your business. And that can start you developing your own mindfulness practices and habits. And my favorite way to kind of jumpstart this for myself is through mindfulness meditation. And I even created some meditations specifically around social media. Understanding your relationship, feeling terrible after getting a bad comment, gaining confidence before you hit live, go live on Facebook or whatever the case may be. It’s called Social Media Unwind. It’s basically put it in a podcast feed, available anywhere.

Jaclyn Mellone  

This is so brilliant, by the way. I am obsessed with this. Okay, definitely going to check that as soon as we get off. Love it.

Andrea Jones  

I’ve got about 10 of them up now. I’ve worked on it for a year now. And it’s one of those things where, again, we feel like we shouldn’t feel these feelings about social media, but social media is that toxic partner that we need to create boundaries with, otherwise they will make us feel bad and then we’ll start doubting ourselves. Like man, I feel like I should be excited to get an Instagram DM and instead I’m feeling resentful because there’s yet another person asking me yet another thing. And so it is that like, no, that’s not me. It’s totally Instagram, because that’s the point of it. And as long as I’m okay with that, I can then create boundaries that make me feel safe to participate on this platform.

Jaclyn Mellone  

Yes, okay. No, I think that’s one, all the guests have the boundaries. But having specific meditations for this, I think is really powerful and just a way to really embrace it more. And if we’re thinking of it as that toxic relationship, which I love this analogy, and maybe this is taking it too far. But it’s like, okay, well, we need to have the boundaries with it and we need to be able to take care of ourselves with that relationship, and having these specific meditations I think that plays into that so beautifully.  I have another question for you but anything else you want to say about mindfulness and social media, before I go, like in a totally different direction?

Andrea Jones  

I think I’ll leave you with this, social media is meant to be social. So when you think about how you want to spend your time on the platform, we think about broadcasting out a lot. If we can give yourself grace on that, if you want to cut out anything, specifically timelines, I would say just maybe reduce the amount of content you’re producing, and figure out how you can be more social on the platform. Because I think that really is where a lot of these negative feelings come from, we feel just like a content generating machine that’s like there’s someone with a web to create more and more and more. And so if we can reduce that feeling a little bit, I think we can also maybe learn to like these platforms, maybe.

Jaclyn Mellone  

Maybe, hopefully, someday. Okay. This actually ties in perfectly with the question I didn’t get to ask you earlier, but wanted to follow up with before we end it. So we really dove deep into the content creation side of the creative process, but the second part of that was engaging, and he gave some good tips for that. But I just wanted to go a little bit deeper with okay, with these people that we’re building real, genuine relationships with and spending that time engaging, how do we decide who these people are? Or is there a process for doing this? Are we engaging with them on just our own stuff? Are we going to their feeds and engage with these hashtags? How should we think about this to kind of simplify what might feel a little bit overwhelming or just ambiguous with how to get started? 

Andrea Jones  

Yes, again, like a time limit here. So 15-20 minutes a day. Again, this is in my Asana as well. So whatever project management tool you use, some of my students put it like a block in their calendar. 15-20 minutes a day, you’re going in and engaging. And engaging, it can be a like, it could be a comment, it can be a direct message, you’re just going to be consistent with that and you want to balance that between your current followers and new people as well. So typically say about 50/50. Don’t be hard on yourself, though, if you log in, you have a bunch of comments, and you spend the whole 20 minutes responding, that means it’s working. That’s a good thing.  

So as far as who to engage with, for me, I love partnerships. And that’s really where I see the most bang for my buck, so to speak with my brand. Because my ideal client customer, not on social media, and they may not be spending a lot of time there. So I look for people like graphic designers, brand strategists, podcast editors, people who work with buying clients, and I start building relationships with them. I use hashtags. I will use other people’s posts. I will use locations as well, specifically, when we could have in person events. If there was an in person event that I didn’t go to, I would still go like who’s checking in here, who’s like using the event hashtag because they’re super active and participating. And I will check out their profile. Maybe I’ll follow them. Maybe I’ll like a few of their posts, but it has to be genuine. I don’t just follow people hoping that they’ll follow me back. That’s like a really bad energy that goes into that and you’re not going to get the right people.  So it has to be genuine. And I just spend time building that up each day. I do it very organically. I have some of my students who actually create lists for themselves and spreadsheets of people. 

You can do whatever works for you. The consistent part is the habitual way you’ll see progress. And one of my favorite ways is just to go to someone who is maybe not a direct competitor, but well known in the space. Look at their latest Instagram post, see who’s commenting, then start looking at those people. They’re engaged, they’re participating, they’re showing up, they’re hot. So how can you also engage them. You can either respond to their comment in the same post, or you can go to their profile and start engaging with them as well. And so I think it has to come from a natural, very natural place.  So a very specific example is I have been really enjoying Pat Flynn’s content lately. He’s really strong about community and just seems like a really genuine person and so I’ve been trying to connect with his community as well, because I think there’s a lot of overlap in the way that I teach content and he doesn’t teach the same things I do. And that’s an example of someone who I will go to his latest posts, I’ll see who’s leaving comments and I’ll check out their profiles and see what they’re all about and see if it’s someone I want to connect with.

Jaclyn Mellone  

Such a smart and simple strategy. And yes, and then you’re putting your energy into people who are already engaged on the platform, too. So they’re more likely to engage. So brilliant. Okay, well, we’re out of time. And I can ask you a million more questions. But okay, this is incredible. How can we stay in touch with you?

Andrea Jones  

Yeah, so Instagram’s my favorite platform, if you’re listening to this podcast and you DM, let me know what you like about it. I’d love to connect with you there. And then if you want to go deeper into building out a strategy that works for you, I have a free course. It’s at onlinedrea.com/free, the meditations included as well, if you want to check that out. As well as like a framework for building a strategy that really can work for you and help you kind of break the chains of your toxic social media relationships. So you can find that at onlinedrea.com/free.

Jaclyn Mellone  

Amazing. It’s such a generous freebie too. So we’ll definitely be checking that out.  Okay, how amazing is Andrea. I’m obsessed and so inspired by our conversation. So I am going to be pouring some new life into our Go-To Gala account soon, and I would love to connect with you over there. So if we’re not already connected, come on over to @go.to.gal and send me a DM just say hey, and I’m looking forward to connecting with you over there. 

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