Crafting Your Brand Story with the Dream Team (Part 1)

Lyric Kinard (00:01.769) Hello friends and welcome to what I think is going to be one of my very favorite ever episodes of Creatives on Camera because we are here with a dream team. These lovely people were at the Handcrafts and Hobbies Conference in, what was it, May of 25 and we were on a panel together discussing crafting your brand story on social media and I would like each of you to introduce yourself. You're all kind of rock stars in my mind. Such amazing people, such amazing business people. Let's start with Hollyann. Tell us who you are and what you do. HollyAnne Knight (she/ Her) (00:35.526) Okay. HollyAnne Knight (she/ Her) (00:43.708) Hey y'all, name is Talia Knight of String and Story and it is my job to guide quilters all over the world to quilt with confidence. We've been a quilting education company online for about nine years now. We've had a brick and mortar shop for three years. Lyric Kinard (00:56.911) Excellent. Sarah, say hi. Sarah Rivero Khandjian (01:00.907) Hello, my name is Sarah Rivera-Kanjan and I own the brand Sarah Hearts where we create notions and labels for makers of all experiences levels through beautiful use of color. My background is actually in graphic design and I spent over a decade as a DIY blogger and created content for brands like Martha Stewart, Clorox, Sherwin-Williams over the years and in 2020 I launched my product-based business and that's my focus right now. Lyric Kinard (01:29.979) some Cory say hello Corey Pearson (01:32.302) Hey everyone, my name is Cory Pearson. I represent the brand Lindas, also known as Lindas Electric Quilters, depending on how you follow us on social media. And my job is from the front-facing side of things, I handle all of our social media brand marketing and assets. On the back end, I handle all of our website integrations, our data management, and I am so excited to be here with everybody. Lyric Kinard (01:55.594) It is so much fun to see your wonderful faces again. We had a lot of fun when we got together in person. If I could have a party every day with people in my industry, life would be so good, wouldn't it? We swim in the best ocean, in the best pond that there is. Today, we are going to talk a little bit about crafting your brand, about your presence on HollyAnne Knight (she/ Her) (02:13.071) Thank Lyric Kinard (02:25.037) wherever you appear online as presenting your brand to your customer in a way that will help them see themselves in the picture and in a way that's effective. And each of you have really interesting specialties and really interesting knowledge in this arena. Let's start, let's go the other way this time. Corey, tell us a little bit about how you take a brand that is, I mean, we all have something to sell, right? We all need to make a living. all, the idea is to make a profit, right? But what is behind this and how we connect with customers and where do you concentrate on doing that? Corey Pearson (03:15.054) Yeah, so I do majority of our content really lives its life on YouTube. We had our start with YouTube. Oh gosh, in 2013, a little before that. And it was really one of those things, and you're going to hear a lot of us talk about it today. It really was building that authentic relationship with the person on the other side of the camera glass. Even though we are trying to make a profit, you want to immerse yourself in that product and give whoever is watching that video that same feeling of, oh my gosh, I can do that too, because Corey's doing it, because Hollyann's doing it, because Sarah's doing it, or because Lyric's doing it. It's not that they're trying to sell me something. It's a they're trying to teach me something and YouTube was really our way to get into that by showcasing all those different things and Then you really get to have fun with it when you get into the analytics side of it is like what are people really watching or what are the keywords that they want to search or how is this going to show up better or why does my thumbnail need to look a certain way and I just I love YouTube for all of those aspects because you can connect with people across the world instantly Lyric Kinard (04:20.847) Why did you go with YouTube instead of Facebook or Instagram? Sure. Let's be honest first and then we can build on that. Corey Pearson (04:26.86) You want me to be honest? So my little brother, Ryan, when he was eight... Sarah Rivero Khandjian (04:29.226) you Corey Pearson (04:37.366) No, Ten. I don't know. He's the one that suggested he was always kind of ahead of his time with what was going on online. And he said, brother, because he doesn't use my real name, because I guess he doesn't like it. So he said, brother, you need to be on YouTube because that's where people are at. And I said, OK, what do you think I should do? He's like, I don't care what you do. Just show people quilting. I don't know nothing about it. But I know that that's where you need to be. I had no idea what video editing was. I had no idea how to record. I had no idea what proper mics were. HollyAnne Knight (she/ Her) (05:00.731) Thanks. Corey Pearson (05:07.28) but I did have a phone and so I used my phone which I still use today. We have very expensive cameras in our pockets and I put it up and I spent hours editing that first video but it was so worth it and it has launched me into so many incredible things and YouTube was just where it was at and it still is for me because my little brother told me to do it. Yep. Lyric Kinard (05:29.405) because your brother told you so. And I feel like you were probably 12 when you started with Linda. You said you've been here for so long. HollyAnne Knight (she/ Her) (05:35.367) Cory and I were in middle school. Corey Pearson (05:36.62) Yeah, I gosh Yeah, no I was yeah, I've been with Linda's forever. Yeah Lyric Kinard (05:44.681) It's been awesome. Sarah, where are you and why? HollyAnne Knight (she/ Her) (05:45.276) you Sarah Rivero Khandjian (05:51.838) Well, I think my background being a blogger led me to Pinterest very early. I actually had access before it was like launched to everyone. had beta access. So I jumped in there really early. So I've probably been on Pinterest well over a decade now. And I love it because it's visual, but I also love spending time there because that's where my potential customers also search for inspiration. So I love Pinterest because I use it. as for searching as a search engine. And that's kind of its primary purpose and primary goal when it was created is using it like a search engine. So I like to think about it how my customers would, and I'm just meeting my customers where they're already spending a lot of time. Our products are helping our little tiny puzzle piece in their creative journey. And they're looking there for project inspiration. for these big goals and aspirations and our products fit that puzzle so perfectly in that piece of the Pinterest puzzle. So we like spending a lot of time there. We also are on other platforms as well, a lot on Instagram, which Hollyann will touch on too. But Pinterest has been long, kind of a special, I personally love using it as a user. So I think it aligns so well with our brand. Lyric Kinard (07:12.945) Excellent, Hollyann. HollyAnne Knight (she/ Her) (07:15.099) Yeah, I love what you said, Sarah, about you love Pinterest because you love it as a user because that's how I feel about Instagram because similarly like I, you know, use all of the platforms, but but Instagram feels like home. There's something lovely to it about me about the way that we can share photos and share videos. And I really felt captured by Instagram when they first launched that one minute video feature back like 1 million years ago. And it felt right in the middle of Instagram Quilt Fest. And it felt like such a fun challenge to see, can I teach a whole? thing in a minute, like what can I capture and share with my audience? What problem can I solve in one minute? And now we get a little bit more time than that, but something about that, just meeting people with a quick win, if you will, that they could be scrolling through a feed and walk away with something useful that they can take back to their sewing room, makes it really fun to show up and meet my audience there. Lyric Kinard (07:46.324) Thank Lyric Kinard (08:08.562) I find it interesting that all of us gravitate to the platform that feels most comfortable for us as well. And I'm sure we're kind of in all the places. so the way and I want each of you to tell me if you see this in a in a different way. I see Instagram is a social right. It's about interaction. It's about visuals. It's about building that community. Pinterest is a HollyAnne Knight (she/ Her) (08:31.163) Mm-hmm. Lyric Kinard (08:38.1) visual feast, I get sucked down the rabbit hole every time I go there. And the way it does the search engine where it brings, the algorithm brings up things that are similar to what you're already looking for, know, helping you find so many amazing things. Just like I said, I go down the rabbit hole every time I go there because it is a beautiful visual feast and also an amazing shopping. I hear so many people who have so many sales that come directly from printers and YouTube is where people go when they specifically want to learn how to do a thing. Right? They have a problem they want to solve. I have a leaky faucet. I go to YouTube and say, how do I? And up it comes and then I can do it. Right? So how do you bring your business into each of those platforms? How do you make that connection in these different ways because across the board, no matter what we do, when we are building a brand and connecting with our customers, it is about that. It's about creating an authentic connection where we can help them be better, happier, more creative, make something easier for their lives. How do we approach our platforms in a way that makes that connection authentic, putting them at the center of the story. Hollyann, why don't you talk to us about how you do that on Instagram? HollyAnne Knight (she/ Her) (10:16.027) Yeah, so I specialize in teaching free motion quilting, which is one of those skills that I think gets a bit of an intimidating rap in the quilting world. It's something that folks often think, well, if I don't have a long arm or if I'm not a professional or if I don't consider myself an artist, then this isn't a skill for me. And I think that's one of the things that I find attractive about Instagram is that because of the short lived nature of the content in a way, it's less serious. And that's a huge part of what I need to. capture in order to connect with the quilting rock stars is taking some of the fear element out of this idea of free motion quilting and of finishing your own quilts. And so being able to be on a platform where I can be a little goofy, I can be a little silly, but it has that visual element too of I can make a clear demonstration of my skills as a quilter. I can demonstrate my skills as a teacher, but then add that little bit of levity, the goofy audio, a funny dance, you know, once in a while to make. that ambition of being able to confidently finish your own quilt a little more approachable, a little more like, she's just in her sewing room too, like maybe I can figure this out. Lyric Kinard (11:24.01) I like that. So it's kind of more, I'm thinking I'm sitting at the snack table or just walking by and grabbing the candy out of the bowl on the counter, right? And it's approachable and it makes the viewer, it helps the viewer connect with you on a really casual kind of intimate scale. What do you feel about, you said something at the beginning, you said it's, HollyAnne Knight (she/ Her) (11:34.321) Mm-hmm. Right. HollyAnne Knight (she/ Her) (11:46.951) Mm-hmm. Yeah. Lyric Kinard (11:54.17) ephemeral, it disappears, it doesn't stay around. HollyAnne Knight (she/ Her) (11:56.198) Yeah. I think one of the interesting things about like truly social social medias, right? So both Pinterest and YouTube have a very strong search element factor. And so when you put a piece of content up, it's going to last. It's much more like posting on a blog. There's a longevity there. There's an evergreen element. Instagram isn't really like that. Like things come and go very quickly on Instagram. which can be a challenge as a business owner, right? Like I show up and I'm posting every day. That means every day I'm thinking about what am I either promoting, sharing, teaching, showing off, what's the thing that's gonna happen on this feed today? Cause it's gonna be here today and gone tomorrow. But like I said, I think that's also the thing that when someone's wanting to learn how to finish their own quilts and maybe they haven't gotten over that anxiety piece of it yet. going all the way to YouTube or Pinterest and searching can sometimes feel a little scary. That feels like too much commitment. So I try to meet them a little higher up than that and they guide them to those more long tail things. Once we've maybe made that connection of you can do this and you can even be a bit of a goober while you do it and it's gonna turn out fine. Lyric Kinard (13:08.701) It's like the gateway drug to learning machine quality. HollyAnne Knight (she/ Her) (13:10.297) It's like, absolutely. Yes. I use Instagram as a gateway drug for quilters. Yes. Like, doesn't it look fun? Like, I'm just over here being a goofball. It's just fabric. You know, trick them into trusting their own abilities. What? Lyric Kinard (13:16.746) Yeah. Lyric Kinard (13:21.201) It does look like fun. Lyric Kinard (13:25.87) Nice, nice. Sarah, how do you feel like you approached the same idea on Pinterest? Sarah Rivero Khandjian (13:33.994) Well, as Hollyann touched on, Pinterest has always been about search and discovery. So I think about, I use it as a place to meet new customers. It's not where I'm nurturing customers. I focus that on my email list, for instance, or maybe on my blog post, but it's all about search and discovery. So that's where, that's kind of what I have in mind when I meet customers. So what I find that makes the most successful content on Pinterest, thinking about meeting those new potential customers. is providing content and a content strategy that's helpful and something valuable for the customer. So I'm always thinking about what can I share that aligns with that? So what makes my product unique or maybe you're offering a service, what makes your service unique? And then I also like kind of think about it as a Q &A, like here's my product, what questions does it answer? That's something I can help frame the content that I make. And then also one thing that I love also is how to get the most out of your product. So sometimes, you know, maybe your product has one use, but often it has a lot of different uses, especially for our products. We're in the sewing industry, but we're not just limited to sewists. We make crocheters and knitters and people that refashion and thrift. So how can we show all the different uses of our product? And Pinterest is just such a great platform for that. Lyric Kinard (14:58.377) I think it has something in common with Instagram in that it's also short little bits of information, right? Both of them need to provide our audience, the people we serve, with something that is useful, that is something helpful. And that usefulness might be on Instagram. It might be just, I had a smile and a laugh when I looked at this thing and made this connection, right? So, so they both have, it's really interesting picturing in my mind this building on each of the each of the developments of the relationship, the brand new customers coming out of Pinterest because it's a search engine, the building your customer base and actually deepening that connection on Instagram. Corey, tell us about how YouTube fits into that and how it's a I see it as a little different, so I am looking forward to hearing what you say. Corey Pearson (16:02.988) So just kind of like the way Hollyann and Sarah mentioned, you Hollyann touched on that she is hanging out with her customer more or less on Instagram. Sarah mentioned she's meeting new customers on Pinterest. I think YouTube is a great blend of both of those things because I find a lot of the time I am meeting new people on YouTube because they're going to YouTube with that how to. They're used to going there, like you mentioned, how to look for their leaky faucet. Now they're looking at how to learn more about why this batting is better over this batting. I do a lot of product reviews on YouTube and it's where you're seeing people kind of connect that way. And then you're also getting those same people that then want to come back, you know, coming back, customer to hang out with you for like, do live shopping events on YouTube. I do live walkthroughs of our store studio on YouTube. So you're kind of building that community because when YouTube really started out, it was that original how to platform. I was I'm going to go there and figure out how it's done. They have since evolved into bringing in a community section where you can post on your channel and it'll alert your subscribers. You can do shorts and reels now, which everyone calls it something different. YouTube calls it shorts. Instagram calls it reels. We've all got different names. It's the vertical video thing. And you can you can kind of tie all those things together to meet in that one platform. And so that's why I I love it so much. But then also listening to how Hollyann uses Instagram and how Sarah uses Pinterest. We listened to it back at H &H and I'm still getting more tidbits now today when we're recording this on different ways that it can be done. You know, we're starting to use Pinterest more because Sarah gave us some of these amazing tips and we're getting good conversion rates off of that. So thank you, Sarah. Appreciate that. And it's just it's really cool to see how everyone uses these different platforms to fit for their business model and then to tie it into how you use your business. It's just absolutely incredible. so but YouTube is just Sarah Rivero Khandjian (17:45.295) Thank Corey Pearson (17:59.218) It's always been my safe haven. It's always worked for me. It's how I found myself. And just using that to then meet my customer, meet new customers, create product content for our website that can stay, keep the customer on that product page instead of sending them off somewhere else. And then they might not make it back to the website. It's just what's worked well for me. And I just love it. Lyric Kinard (18:19.915) Right, YouTube is like the living room where you come and sit down and hang out for a bit, right? Pinterest, feel like is you're walking around downtown and looking in the storefronts and finding the new amazing things and Instagram might be, again, the person out front and you take a piece of candy out of the bowl and YouTube is where you come in and sit down and check it out for a minute and hang out for little while. You can do much longer. Corey Pearson (18:26.147) Yeah. Lyric Kinard (18:49.291) It feels a little bit deeper, but all of them still serve your audience in an authentic way. I want to know how each of you use these social media platforms. I mean, they're fantastic for finding people or making those connections, but So many, so many of our listeners will feel like, all of this is just too much. I just want to sit in my business and do my thing. And it feels like it sucks my soul out to have to think about putting all this content out there. Do I have to show up every day and do a dance? Do I have to make highly produced YouTube videos? Do I have to build a whole thing on Pinterest? How do you use it? Why is it worth it? HollyAnne Knight (she/ Her) (19:17.543) you Lyric Kinard (19:41.035) How do you actually take the content you put out and how does it bring conversions? How does it bring people into your ecosystem with your business? Sarah. Sarah Rivero Khandjian (19:56.21) So framing how we're going to present our content on Pinterest helpful and valuable for our new potential customers that we're trying to meet, that's going to structure how we do everything. There are some, like, I like to think about, like, actionable steps. Like, what does this look like for me? If someone's like, I've, you know, searched for my living room on Pinterest, you know, I inspiration, but I don't know how that fits on my brand. There are some little tips that I would love to share to make it actually, actually, Lyric Kinard (20:24.799) Yes, please. Sarah Rivero Khandjian (20:24.877) of valuable and actionable. So Pinterest is visual, but you can actually share photos and videos on there. And I always recommend trying both. So you want to do a little bit of mix of both on sharing, maybe just a product photo, but then also thinking about what makes your product unique. Maybe that's a photo that gives a context, visual context of how to use your product when it's not just the product on like a white background. Thinking about your ideal customer and how they can get the most out of their product. But that can also be shared in a video too, much like YouTube shorts or Instagram reels. Just keep a short video in Pinterest and you know, just a few seconds you can kind of as a teaser, inspire people with your product and what makes it unique. But I would recommend trying a mix of both photo and video on Pinterest and Pinterest since it is visual. And I think it's over like almost 90 % of Pinterest users now. use the mobile app versus the desktop. and much like maybe on Instagram, obviously is a mobile app primarily and same with YouTube. But we want to think about the customer experience with that too. So there are some like technical specs that we want to keep in mind when we are creating on Pinterest, like keeping things vertical in a two, three aspect ratio. So thinking things are tall instead of square or wide format. That is something to absolutely keep in mind with that. And I can jump into descriptions and titles and stuff like that. But really my biggest thing, which the biggest hurdle to kind of jump over is I always say, just start where you're at. We always think we have to get things. Even I think Pinterest perfect was a term, you know, used when Pinterest launched and everyone thought, it has to be beautiful and styled. But no, you're going to just meet your customer where they are already and just start with the content and the photos and the videos that you already have. HollyAnne Knight (she/ Her) (22:09.191) Okay. Lyric Kinard (22:22.572) Okay, how do people actually come to your business and buy your products from Pinterest? Sarah Rivero Khandjian (22:29.114) That's a great question. So with Pinterest, when you upload a pin, whether it be a photo or a video, it lets you put in a link and that link that people will then click out to can be anything. So I like to use it in a very specific product link, but maybe you want to link to a product collection that's relevant. Maybe you're just trying to get newsletter subscribers and you want to reach to a landing page for that. It's completely open-ended, which I absolutely love. So you can make it as targeted as you want, but you do want to keep in mind what your end goal is and how you're going to serve your potential customer. So you don't want to send them through a rabbit hole of a bunch of links. You want to make it as direct and relevant to whatever you're sharing on there. Also Pinterest, if for those users that are using Shopify has a great plugin that syncs with your whole entire Shopify catalog. They also have one for WooCommerce as well. that uploads all of your product listings right to Pinterest, you can actually tag your product. It's been a priority of the last couple of years for Pinterest kind of switching to just search engine to actually shopping experience. And then they're prioritizing actually shopping, which is great for those of us that have product-based businesses. But even if you have services as well, then we can link our catalogs. It's really easy. You don't have to do anything technical to it. You just download the app. and upload your catalog and then you're able to tag your products in videos and in photos and the algorithm works that it will show your products in relevant things. So even if you're not tag, you know, your product catalog is on there, but maybe someone's searching for something relevant to your industry, but your products will still show up in their Pinterest experience, which is really wonderful for us. Lyric Kinard (24:15.208) so many things and wishing I had 10 clones because I'm like, I didn't know I could, I could do that. I do. We all need so much more time. We all need so many more of us to be able to implement all of these things. Corey, tell us how when people come to YouTube and watch your videos, how does that actually translate into business, traffic, conversions, sales? HollyAnne Knight (she/ Her) (24:18.343) Thanks. Lyric Kinard (24:41.942) for your business, they're on one place. do you bring them from there into your sales funnel? Corey Pearson (24:50.19) So when I started with YouTube, was very primarily, you know, linking things in the description and you had to get people to scroll down to the description, start clicking through and hopefully they would land onto your website. Well, YouTube has evolved heavily and now we can attach like Sarah mentioned having Shopify plugins. I can attach to my Google listings, which has then attached to my Shopify listings and right in my video I can displace this is what the product Lyric Kinard (24:57.26) Mm-hmm. Corey Pearson (25:20.144) that I'm going to talk about and it'll pop up at the time that I'm talking about it. So when someone wants to easily hop over or like I'm talking about the ultimate marking pencil, they can click on that product and it will bring up my Google store and they can click on it and move to Shopify and go from there. It's all in one experience though, but it's all working in the background, which is really nice. Yeah, they're probably on YouTube. Yeah. Lyric Kinard (25:38.72) We need whole tutorials on this. And I'm sure they're out there. There's just... HollyAnne Knight (she/ Her) (25:40.839) They're probably on YouTube, Leric. Corey Pearson (25:47.33) But it's just, it's that incredible way of showcasing your products right there. It has the current sales price if you're running a sale and it'll change throughout. Cause one of my biggest complaints with YouTube complaints with YouTube is I hate to say it, but it stays there forever. So when I'm talking about things that are on sale, a customer might see that two years from now, and then that's a call to customer service. And then summer gets onto me because I made a video two years ago and it's a whole set of meetings after that. like having those plugins now where they update automatically with whatever the current sales price is, is one of my biggest things. My biggest tip, and this might be a little controversial, is I don't... say what the physical price of an item is, I want to send them to the website or click the link in the description below because I know that's going to be there forever. I spend a lot of time in my analytics section of YouTube seeing what people are searching for the most. What are my subscribers looking for that's outside of my channel? YouTube is very powerful to help you out with that. But I know people listening to me talking about all this say, well, you have a very established YouTube channel. You have that stuff that's there and literally HollyAnne Knight (she/ Her) (26:32.327) Mm-hmm. Corey Pearson (26:59.864) you mentioned this earlier, how do... that just sounds exhausting. How do... how am I going to get to have all that information right away? Because if I create a new YouTube channel, I don't have any subscribers, I don't have any analytics that's going to help me. What am I going to do? And Lyric, I might take your thunder, so feel free to stop me. But Lyric created an incredible tool, you guys, that uses ChatGPT. And when you were trying to start out and trying to figure out exactly where you want to do, I highly recommend using... I use the tool... every day to help and it's putting in and she can give you a whole synopsis of how it works but I'm gonna I'll just bring it down is I put in the product that I'm looking for I give it all the little things that it's asking and it spits out all of these long form short form photo things so looking at Instagram for short form YouTube for long form Photos for Pinterest all the three things the tools that we're talking about the most you're gaining from using lyrics tool It takes all of the guesswork out of where where am I gonna start with what I'm doing? And then once you start building those videos that that Pinterest platform that Instagram platform You start to then get those analytics back to start figuring out. Where is your audience at to work with your store? And kind of go from there and near another thing that you mentioned lyric was am I do I have to be? HollyAnne Knight (she/ Her) (28:17.223) Great. Corey Pearson (28:18.434) there all the time and is it kind of a one and done. When you're creating that long form video content, guys, use that to your advantage. Take that hour and a half filming session that you did the polished filming section, because we know that was probably about six hours of filming, let's be honest. Take that, take that finished video and use different tools. Like I use a tool called Opus Pro that I can put in a long form video and just a link from my YouTube channel, put a link in and it'll break it down into 20 short form reels. And it gives me the titles, the descriptions, everything that I need. And that's posted on into the future. So I don't have to worry about coming up with new content every single day. It reuses that. And you find people when they look at that short form content, then they end up landing back to your long form video, learning so much more about you. And then they end up on your website. And then they're converting through that. I know that was a lot of information. I kind of went longer than I probably should have. But it's so exciting to talk about. Like, it's so cool how it all works together. Lyric Kinard (29:12.14) Yeah. Lyric Kinard (29:17.164) It is, I'm learning so much. What was the tool that you use, Ovis? Opus. Corey Pearson (29:21.23) Opus, Opus Pro is what I use for breaking all that down and it puts the captions on, comes up with the titles, all the things. Lyric Kinard (29:26.806) breaking it down. Lyric Kinard (29:30.583) We'll put all of the links for all of these things in the show notes. And I use CapCut for the same thing. Easy video editing will automatically create shorts from your long videos so that you're leveraging your time. And you said never put pricing. I also never say dates out loud in any of your videos because then it's definitely a one and done. But if you keep a library, an organized library of your content and you have a video advertising a thing and you do it every year, but on different dates, you know, that's just a new title or caption over the top of it. You don't have to say the date. If you said the date, you have to make a whole new video, right? These, so much really, really cool stuff. Holly, tell us how you use interest Pinterest, how Pinterest this, you're not. HollyAnne Knight (she/ Her) (30:24.391) Instagram? I got you. Lyric Kinard (30:31.64) There's so much going on. Tell us how you use Instagram to actually, mean, because you can put all kinds of information out there and I see people doing it, but how does it come back to benefiting your business? How do you bring those people into actual customers instead of just taking the candy out of the bowl? HollyAnne Knight (she/ Her) (30:40.614) Mm-hmm. HollyAnne Knight (she/ Her) (30:48.167) again. HollyAnne Knight (she/ Her) (30:52.923) Good job. Absolutely, and I think it's I'm we've all said this and I'm gonna keep saying it because I think it's worth noting that all of these things feed each other so the content that I create for Instagram is gonna also land on Pinterest and things that are being done for Pinterest are gonna come to Instagram YouTube is gonna get split to all of it so I think when we as We're going through this. It's easy if you're listening to go my gosh, the content hamster wheel is going to be never-ending and there are elements of content that are a hamster wheel. has to stay current. We have to stay on top of it. But also there are ways to, you know, reduce our time investment, reuse content, recycle content and make it go multiple places. So I always want to add that caveat. What I think is special about Instagram content is that in addition to showing products in the way that I might also show them on Pinterest or teaching, you know, little tidbits of information the way I might also teach on YouTube. Instagram is a unique opportunity to allow my customers to kind of see the world through my eyes a little bit, to step behind the scenes into what I do. And I love living by the mantra that everything is content. Like if I am in my shop and I am working on anything, there is probably a camera on a tripod capturing a time-lapse peeking over my shoulder. Sometimes it's literally right in front of me so that the video that goes up looks like how I'm going to see the thing. Cause there's something really intimate about that almost that breaks through that glass camera, you know that we were talking about earlier. So from there that builds trust and I think trust is the most important element of converting any customer. Folks are going to shop with and continue to do business with and continue engaging with folks that they trust. So that level of intimacy can build a lot of trust. But then there are three easy tools that I love to use to actually get people from Instagram back over kind of HollyAnne Knight (she/ Her) (32:48.195) officially into the land that I own on the internet, right? I think it's also important to remember that all social media is rented territory, right? We are borrowing someone else's space. So we've already made what, you know, references to our website. We've made references to our shops. We've made references to blogs and to email lists. Those are assets that we can own. And it's important to guide people from a social media platform or a search engine back over to our own space. So for Instagram, I do that in a few ways. Sarah Rivero Khandjian (32:52.009) Thank you. HollyAnne Knight (she/ Her) (33:16.037) The first is the classic link in bio, always making sure that you're making full use of the five links that are available in your bio if you have a professional account. And making sure they're ranked that they have images so that if nothing else, that's I think folks still default to that when they're on Instagram of someone said something interesting, I'm curious about taking a next step. Even if there was a different call to action in the video or in the post itself. We all still think of that classic link in bio. So always making sure that your bio is updated, always making sure that your most important things are linked to your blog, your newsletter, your shop, whatever your current promo is. Those are always my top like four. And then I've got a fifth, it's like a freebie of whatever other thing is on, right? The second thing that I think we often all think about is that link in our stories. And I do this often because I know that the people who are my followers are most likely to see my content in their stories. they're not actually going to see it in their feed. Like 10 % of my followers are going to catch it in feed. A much higher percentage are going to see it in stories. And most of the content that I produce, I would say at least 50%, I have some kind of direct call to action. It might be go read a blog. It might be go check out the long form on video. might be join my email list, but there's some part to, to the thing, right? And so anytime I create content on Instagram, that content goes up to my stories and I make sure there's a link there. So folks who are already a part of my audience, they're, They're not the newbie who just took the candy out of the bowl for the first time, right? They know that they can use those stories as a constant update of what's going on, what has Hollyann produced, what do I get to join in on a string and story right now. The final piece that I started using in the last year or so that has been a game changer is a product called MiniChat. And this is the little bots that we all see. let me, the MiniChat bot is my bestie. And like, I tend to be a little bit... sluggish on using AI and other technology, but Minishad has been a really easy game changer because it's a quick way to make sure that people get a link back to a free resource that I have on my website or back to a blog post or over to a YouTube video. And it's that little bot where in your video or in your caption, you can say, comment this keyword and I'm going to send you a DM. And we recently had a video absolutely pop off on Instagram and from making HollyAnne Knight (she/ Her) (35:39.456) It was a time lapse. I had to baste a big old quilt and I took a time lapse of me crawling. You saw this, didn't you, Corey? Yeah, the entire internet has watched me crawl around on the floor, which is ridiculous to me. And it was a 90 second video, so it was a little longer than I usually post. That made me a little nervous, but I was like, you know what? I haven't mentioned this particular resource in a while. Let's give this a whack. We added 600 people to our email list over the period of a few days. Sarah Rivero Khandjian (35:48.836) Thank HollyAnne Knight (she/ Her) (36:09.115) because folks commented for that little bot and it took them to a resource on my website and they took those next steps with me. being able to even do something simple like that, sometimes it works really well, sometimes zero people comment and it just depends. Sometimes I get the analytics right, sometimes I don't. But making sure that I always have those three things in place, right? That my bio is updated, that basically every piece of content I create has something that I can link to in my stories. Sarah Rivero Khandjian (36:30.34) Thanks for HollyAnne Knight (she/ Her) (36:36.613) And then about 50 % of the time I'm making use of a Handybot to point people over to my website and to a longer form resource. Lyric Kinard (36:44.787) It's such a good reminder that social media, you don't own it. And I've seen people built entire businesses just on one social media platform and then it disappears overnight because the algorithm changes. So even though we're all talking about one specific specialty that you all use so beautifully and so well, we still are all over the place. But using those things to lead people into HollyAnne Knight (she/ Her) (36:50.267) Don't own it. Lyric Kinard (37:14.305) the most valuable parts of your marketing that you have, which is your email list, right? Using those to bring people into your own ecosystem is the real purpose of what we do or the real way we get people into our, invite them into our living room so we can serve them a full meal. HollyAnne Knight (she/ Her) (37:27.495) Thank Lyric Kinard (37:43.788) Right? These are the ways we pull them in and when people are on your email list, that means they've chosen you. They have invited you into their inbox. Those are the best places to actually convert sales. But first, you have to show them that your place is a good place to come over and hang out at, right? Let's go through, why don't we talk about a couple of the mistakes or the, you know, when somebody is new to this part of their marketing, and when we say marketing, we're often thinking, I hate salesy stuff. This is, I just don't wanna do this. I wanna just make my pretty things. HollyAnne Knight (she/ Her) (38:12.135) you Lyric Kinard (38:36.384) And I want people to love making the pretty things along with me. But marketing is that connection that we make. When you come from a place of love and service towards the people that you are working with, the people you're serving, then marketing is more about that authentic connection. HollyAnne Knight (she/ Her) (38:46.481) Mm-hmm. Lyric Kinard (39:00.054) What are some of the fears that people have when they come onto your social media platform? And what is one or two things that you can help alleviate or make easier for them as they come? Like, what are they doing wrong? What could they do better? What do they not have to worry about that they're worrying about now? Let's start with you, Corey. Corey Pearson (39:21.678) Um, so this is a really good question. And I think we're all probably going to have close to the same answer on this one because we all think quite alike. And I think that's why we're such an incredible team is you, a lot of people when they're starting out, I get this question from many new long armors that are starting out wanting to create a social presence is I don't want to post every day because I'm afraid I'm going to overwhelm or overload people. I are overload or overwhelm yourself even. Yeah. Over. Lyric Kinard (39:45.376) Or overloam ourselves? Overloam? Overwhelm? Corey Pearson (39:50.03) We knew where you were headed with it. We were picking up what you were putting down. I had to get over that fear myself because when I originally started social media I was like, eh, I'll post once or twice a week. I don't really want to upset people or ruffle feathers. They don't want to see my face all the time even though I'm my favorite topic. I might not be theirs. um, sorry about that. And I had to get over that fear on that and I realized quickly that even though I'm posting every single day. My followers and people that even don't follow me aren't seeing what I'm posting every single day. They might see something I'm posting literally maybe once a week because I'm not the only person they're following. So once I got over that and I started posting consistently and being on, I'm thinking, I'm thinking YouTube right now where I'm posting shorts every day, but this could apply for Facebook as well, is they're not being able to see every single thing all the time. So don't be afraid to put out there what you want to put out there. Put something out every single day, put something out every other. day. Follow whatever posting schedule you want and don't be afraid to be you. A lot of people like Sarah mentioned, a lot of people back in the day wanted to be Pinterest perfect. And Hollyann said this perfectly, those days are long gone, okay? Be you, be authentic, have fun with it. That is why someone is trying to connect with you. They saw a little tidbit and they're like, okay, I wanna see more of this person. Be crazy, don't do anything illegal, but be like, have fun, be you, show like what is the best part about your business and why they should trust you to get their product review from YouTube or to learn more about your product on Pinterest or HollyAnne Knight (she/ Her) (41:07.175) So long gone. Corey Pearson (41:33.944) see being a goober crawling around on the floor basting your quilt on Instagram, doing all the things. It works. I'm not mad at it. I watched. But I know, I know. But I think it's just getting over that fear of not, you're going to overwhelm people because you're not. I promise you, you won't. HollyAnne Knight (she/ Her) (41:38.311) It works. See? You knew. Lyric Kinard (41:53.391) Okay. All right. So what I heard you say is people aren't going to see everything you post. So don't worry about overwhelming them. Number two, be authentic, be yourself. think especially after COVID, especially in this age of AI where we're like, AI is such an interesting thing because it's creepy, it's fake, it's everything, but you don't know if it's real or not. So actual real, actual real you. is so much more able to connect with your people than anything you tried to make perfect. AI is also a fantastic tool. Again, that tool I made is, and I'll talk about for two seconds right now. You use your own ChachiBTE account. The thing about it is it guides you through what your customer needs. what your customer wants and how what you have to provide will help them get that. And then it doesn't come out with like scripts. It only comes out with bullet points if you're going to do a video and it'll come out with a caption and encourage you to change the words to make it your own because it does need to be your own words. It needs to be you, but it's customer centric all the time. The other thing I heard was be there all the time. So this is where I get and a lot of people get crazy. It's like, I don't have time to do things all the time. I'm already doing everything. I'm the chief officer of everything in my company. I don't have all these other people doing all the other things. So Sarah, why don't you talk to us a little bit again about how to make it easier on ourselves to approach people on Pinterest and then maybe touch on that as well. Sarah Rivero Khandjian (43:46.177) So like we said earlier, Gone are the Days of Pinterest Perfect, but it is still a visual platform. So we do want to think about serving our potential customers in content that would be visually engaging based around the framework that we want to answer questions that they may have or show them how to get the most out of our product. All that to say is you don't need to be a photo stylist. Lyric Kinard (43:51.971) Mm-hmm. Sarah Rivero Khandjian (44:09.922) and an amazing video editor. You don't need to use Lightroom, even like I used to do all that stuff. We can use our phones. But also, I mean, my background's in graphic design. I used to make these elaborate templates and all that stuff. You don't even need to do that anymore. Touching on AI, I love it as just another tool in my social media toolkit. So how I like to use it in approaching Pinterest in particular is upload a photo. and then tell it what title text you want. It will generate the text in your pin in the right size. You can even say that you're making this, make this photo into a pin for Pinterest with this title, boom, and then you can upload it. So you don't even need, you can do that in chat GPT. It can generate the image because you can upload your photo. can be a video still from, know, it can be a screenshot from a video. doesn't have to be super elaborate, but there is something to keep in mind. So Vint, Lyric Kinard (44:49.474) Where are you doing that? Sarah Rivero Khandjian (45:06.124) since Pinterest, as I keep saying, it's search and discovery and it's using a search engine. So often I like to do a mix of photos and videos, but on those photos, I like to have texts of clearly titling what the content is about. And you'll see that like maybe you're looking for a recipe and you see like it says, like, I don't know, enchiladas three ways. So you can kind of see whatever it says there. Those titles are actually really helpful in getting people to then click on your pin. So it is something to keep in mind, but I don't want that to be a roadblock in creating the content. So use some of those AI tools to create the templates or the text overlays for you. So just keeping in mind. Lyric Kinard (45:45.942) Right. And so many people use Canva and it's so easy and it can do so many of the same things. Sarah Rivero Khandjian (45:55.361) Yes, Canva can do that. If you're an Adobe user, they have Adobe Express, which is just like Canva. So there's so many templates, but even to simplify the barriers entry and you're like that, that alone overwhelms me. Use chat GPT to upload your photo and just tell it to add the text, tell it you want it to be a pin and it will export that for you. Lyric Kinard (46:18.479) Very cool. So what I heard you say in your best tip is put titles in there that are very clear. And this is really important on YouTube and Pinterest anything search engine, because first of all, you have to have good search engine optimization. You have to have the right words that people are searching for. Your words have to solve their problem. know, I, English major, right? I love. I love clever language, but that doesn't work for search engines. You have to have the words in there that are the answer to what people are typing in or looking for when they're how to, and they have to be legible. Once the search comes up in YouTube or Pinterest, then it's that image. It's that visual and maybe those words that will tell people, this is the one out of all the choices I have that I want to click. You know, so legible is one, y'all are babies. And these old eyes of mine, think people are looking at these things on their phone. So if I'm looking at three YouTube thumbnails plus their descriptions on my phone, those things are tiny. So if I've got flowing script or something gorgeous that looks great up on my computer, I can't read it at all on my phone. So legibility is really important. but also, you know, and this is clarity in your ideas, clarity in your words and clarity in your image and what it is that you want to present the way you're solving a person's problem for both of these platforms. Right, Hollyann, so Instagram's a little bit different than this, but still kind of the same, the same ideas apply. HollyAnne Knight (she/ Her) (48:04.719) Yes. Lyric Kinard (48:14.031) How do people be more effective? What are people making mistakes on with Instagram? HollyAnne Knight (she/ Her) (48:20.101) Yeah, I think there's two disservices that people can do, like that they'll do to themselves and their customer when they're getting started on Instagram. I think Instagram is definitely a platform of momentum. So continuing to show up matters. We've said that over and over and over again, but the two crimes that get committed, if you will. is the first is that if you are not showing up for your customer on Instagram, on Pinterest, on YouTube, on whatever blend of platforms you choose, then you are failing to serve them. You are doing them a disservice by depriving them of the answers that you have. They have problems, you have solutions, and we have to remember, just like Corey was saying, that showing up faithfully and regularly is actually a helpful thing. And it can feel... like we're screaming into the void, could feel like we're talking someone's ear off, it can feel like we're making the whole thing about us. But if we're showing up to solve a problem, then we're actually serving and it's very important to keep doing that. The other important thing to remember is that your sales are going to be a lag measure of your marketing efforts. So you have to do the marketing first in order to see the sales at the other end. And I think folks quit too soon on all of these platforms. And so you have to continue to show up and make the content and build the rapport and look at your analytics over and over and over again in order to see those measures come through. So as far as making that approachable on Instagram, because we've talked a little bit about that concept of like a content hamster wheel, don't overcomplicate the types of videos that you're posting. Now, because I love Instagram, there certainly are days where I'm going to sit there and I'm going to do the perfect goofy transition. One of my favorites was, you know, we were in Quilt Folk Magazine last year and the cover quilt was made with a bundle from our shop. And so I, you know, I threw the bundle up and when it landed in my hand, it was the magazine. And I spent 45 minutes getting that throw in that edit, correct? But that's because I geek out on it, right? But I think, and it's not every day that I'm doing that. Exactly. There are times when it's like, I saw this and this is gonna be fun. we're doing, I spent three hours on like a, Lyric Kinard (50:20.887) And it's not every day that you make a video like that. That's a special occasion. HollyAnne Knight (she/ Her) (50:31.971) a stop motion with or a fill thread one day. Like they did a dance on my Instagram. I went down a rabbit hole. But that's not the kind of content that we all need to be making day in and day out. That's actually going to end up being more of a distraction for our customer than a problem solver. They need to see a time lapse with you doing a voiceover explaining your steps. They want to see and hear you tapping your fingers on the cardboard box and pulling the tape as you pack bundles. or tags or anything else into their order. So simply capturing your process and then either putting a cute song or just your own voice explaining what it is they're watching over it takes very little time. These are the things, I call them my bus stop challenges. From the time I arrive at the bus stop to when my children get there, can I post on Instagram? And I've taken the time lapse already and all I have to do is pick a song, do a quick voiceover, write a couple sentences, caption. and it really can be that simple of, hey, I've got a minute at the bus stop, let me meet you and share a quick tip with you. Even though my customer may not know the backstory of here I am sitting at the bus stop, that's the mindset I'm trying to have because they're going to see that video while they're waiting at the bus stop. If I can solve a problem for them, then that's made their time valuable and it's a little in the trust bucket. Lyric Kinard (51:53.232) This has been really, really amazing to hear all of the kind of strategy and all of the sessions around. And we have so much more to talk about.