This blog is a transcript from our Facebook live recording on Thursday 28th April.
If you never know what to say on social media posts, then this is for you. You procrastinate and prevaricate and end up posting nothing at all or very little. In this week's podcast, I talk about this 'staring at a blank page' feeling and give you a framework to help you know what to post.
Oh , hello there . My fellow wedding florist friend , and welcome to the wedding florist social podcast. This is the podcast for wedding florist to learn all about acing their online presence . I'm your host Vicky Laffey , and as a wedding florist of over 10 years now, and a certified by digital marketer want to help you get the right clients, get more followers and never be stuck for content ideas. Again, click the link in my description to get your free wedding Flo guide to social media content creation today. So who here can relate. Okay, I'm gonna , I'm gonna reel off a list of things here, and I want to know if you can relate to this. Um, we're talking today about the whole topic of not knowing what to post on social media. You know, you go to write a post and you just can't think of what to say. So , um, who you can relate to this, you know, you want to post on socials, but you just can't think of what to say. Uh , or maybe you , you have all the intentions of posting, you know, you even set time aside , um, you know, you get a cup of tea ready, crank off on your computer or your laptop and then blank , uh , or perhaps, you know, this has happened a lot in the past and , and that sort of frustration of , um, not being able to think of anything to write and, you know, just totally puts you off posting on your socials at all. Um , do, let me know if any of that resonates with you, you know, if any of those feel familiar, you're not on your own. Uh , so many of you tell me that you, you know, you never know what to say on socials. Um, you know, you never know what to say or what to post about. So you end , um , procrastinating and provocating, and you know, you eventually end up just posting nothing at all. Uh , which is no good, cuz it's , it's such a shame. Um, because quite often you are people who are willing and really, really want to post, but you just can't think of the words to say it puts you off. Um, so you've got the motivation there <laugh> which some people don't have, but you can't actually think of anything. So how do we get over this, this, right , this block, this, you know, fear of not being able to write an amazing post or, you know, that , that kind of real staring at a bank page kind of feeling well, firstly, I don't want you to put yourself into too much pressure. Um, you know, we , we're not trying to write the next Jane Austin classic or, you know, the next puer prize winning novel here. Um, we're just, we're just small business owners, just florist trying to put some effort into our social media in and tell the world what we do basically. Um, so don't put too much pressure on yourself with that. Um, you know, you , you will have posts that are, you know, that do really well. You will have posts that don't do so well. You know, that's just the nature of it. That's just gonna happen. Um, secondly, I want to give you a little framework, which, you know, may help you think of what to post and , um, ensure that you don't end up being too salesy , um, which is the trap that a lot of people fall into. You may have heard me talk about that. Um , a lot of people just post salesy posts , this is my product, buy it. You know, this is a wedding I did, isn't it lovely. And it doesn't involve any , um , interaction from the, you know, evoke any interaction from the, the , the people who are following you or any emotions or anything like that. Um , so here's a little kind of four step framework here. Um, you may have heard these referred to as content pillars before , um, these particular four things are something I learned from , uh , Hootsuite , which is a , a fantastic program for scheduling and planning out your social media posts. Uh , um , and there are four things. So split your posts into the following four categories, pillars, whatever you would like to call them , educate, entertain, inspire, and promote. Those are the four things which are, which really help me certainly , um, create lovely posts that are, you know, create a great presence across my social media and , and sure I'm creating posts that aren't always one thing or another, you know, they're not always salesy , uh , or you know , promotional , uh , which puts people off let's face it. Um, and , and they , they end up evoking as some , some emotions and resonating with the people who are following me, basically. So educate and entertain , inspire and promote. You may choose to use different content pillars or, you know, call these things something else, but whatever they are , uh , whatever you do, you know , split these into different posts across the , the week or two weeks or , or over the course of the month and , and really mix them up , um , you know, and , and engage and interact with the followers as opposed to just selling. So what do we mean by educate and entertain , inspire and promote? So educational posts, maybe something such as , um, you know, for wedding flu that could be perhaps showing people doing a, on showing people how to , uh, you know, tie up , put on a button hole or a booter if you're watching in America , um, it, it could be showing them what your process is for, for booking you. It could be , um, flower care tips. It could be so , so many things , um, just, you know, letting people, giving some people, some sort of education, give like actually giving them something as opposed to trying to get something from them. Do you see the shift there ? You know, whereas a selling post a promotional post is, is very much trying to get something from them. It it's saying, hi, I want you to book me. I want you to , I want your money. I want you to book me as your Flut . Um, and that's a huge shift from giving them something, giving them something useful. Um, because if you, if you think about it, you , you know, if you've ever been sold to before, we we've all seen this either online and off , uh , whether it be somebody in the , in the streets , in , in your local shopping mall or wherever you are, and somebody comes up to you and tries to sell you something, or get you to sign up to something, and you're immediately turned off, you don't even listen to what they have to say. You just walk on. And , uh , the online equivalent to that is just scrolling on, you know, you scroll past it and you think, Ugh , there's nothing there for me. I don't wanna even hear it. Now, if you are giving them something , um, you know, a little bit of education or, or something useful, or , um, something inspirational , um, entertaining, then that's very different that that's, that gives your followers something to latch onto and, you know, engage with and the algorithms on Facebook and Instagram, et cetera , really, really favor that. So educational posts, I give you a few examples there , um, uh , and entertaining, you know, so this could be anything from , uh , you know, I find , I find Instagram stories particularly useful for this sort of thing, actually. So , um, entertaining, you know, maybe it's a silly behind the scenes picture of you in a couple of other suppliers setting up at a wedding or , um, know something along those lines, or maybe you , you know, you're making a , a wedding and , um, you know, a dog wanders into your shop, a cute dog or something wanders into your shop, and you post a picture on your stories about that. Um, or , you know, so something along those lines , um, it doesn't have to be hilarious, you know, just, it just has to be , um, light how , I guess, inspirational, you know, you could be telling people your story, or, you know, the pandemic was particularly good for this, you know, but there was a lot of , uh , uh , couples who had been through lots of postponements and heartbreak and struggle and , um, but they pulled through and, you know, you finally got to do their wedding for them. They finally got married and, you know, everybody's happy and , um, regards to so , so many other other things, but you know, something to inspire them , something to make them feel, oh , wow, brilliant. Um, isn't she amazing or he amazing , um, or they, if we are using new chill pronouns , uh , which we should , um, so, and then, then you're allowed to show off now. And again, with salesy posts with , with , with these promotional posts, educate and entertain , inspire and promote , um, there's nothing wrong with promoting yourself, but if you're doing it all the time, your followers, your potential customers, those, those potential bookings who are lurking in the background , uh , are put off by that, you know, they don't wanna be sold to . So yeah , basically only do this sparingly only promote or be salesy. Uh , occasionally , um, I see a lot of wedding suppliers in particular and all they post is, Hey, last weekend's wedding is up on the blog right now. Or , um , here's some beautiful pictures of today, his weddings, some , some snapshots , uh , you know, previews or whatever. Um, and , and that's all they're doing, and there's nothing wrong with that, but not all the time, just do that occasionally. Um, you know, I mean , I mean, if you blog great, but you know, if you're just posting pictures, that's great, but all you need to do is just do that sparingly. Um , you , you know, don't make all of your posts, promotional posts, because what is there to engage with, you know, if you are , if you put yourself in the shoes of a potential client who is, you know, maybe scoping you out on Instagram or something , um, they're gonna be , be kind of put off if , if , if all you need to, if all you're doing is, is being salesy. Um, so, you know, just, <laugh> just to sort of recap, educate, entertain, inspire, and promote. And , and if, if you are ever stuck of what to post, you know, if maybe if you're really good and , and you're planning out your content even , uh , maybe you have a , a spreadsheet like, like I do, of course , um, or you have a system, or maybe you're just like a good old fashioned pen and paper, whatever it is you're doing , um, split these post that , so maybe if you post like twice a week, you know, you could do , uh , you could rotate both of these things. So make that one educational, the next one, entertaining , uh, the next one inspiring. And then every couple of weeks you could do a promotional post and really show off a lovely wedding that you did recently. Um, and that way you are mixing it up a little , um, the algorithms will thank, you will reward you for that. Um , and your followers will thank you as well. Uh , there's a lot to , and there for them to, you know, think, ah , okay, this is really useful. And they'll , we'll remember you more , you know, if you are giving them an , an educational , uh, you know, post or something , you know , something useful , um, that they could perhaps use in their wedding planning or something that really kind of helps them in , in resonates with them. They're gonna remember you more . And that means when they are ready to book, they are gonna get in touch with you. So I hope that's helped you today. Um , do join me next week, where I'm gonna be talking about imposter syndrome as well, cuz this is a huge issue for , um, us creative types, us wedding, flutists and creative types in general, I suppose. Um, but do join me next week. I hope this week has been , uh, very useful for you. Um, thank you to everybody. Who's listened to this live as well, and , uh , we shall see you next week. All right . So take care and , uh , flower on. 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