Jarred’s website: https://jarredandrews.com/
Transcript:
Megan Brame: Hey guys, it’s Megan here. Um, I hope that my voice isn’t too crazy right now. I’m just coming into a cold, so yay for that. Um. Over the next couple of weeks. I was supposed to record episodes, but I am feeling just really poopy. So we are going to replace some of my all time favorites until I’m able to get back on my feet and until we are done with the move.
[00:00:27] Oh my God, you guys, this is happening right now. So over the next couple of weeks, enjoy some of my favorite stop sucking at business episodes. I’ll talk to you again soon.
[00:00:46] it’s time to grow your business, stop spinning their wheels and build the life you deserve. And I’m here to help. My name is Megan Brame. This is stop sucking at business.
[00:00:58] Hey guys, so glad to be here. Can I tell you that? It has been a while since I have recorded a podcast. I did them all in bulk because I knew that June was just going to be banana town for me with the launches that I had, the mentor series, and also with a beauty biz pro.
[00:01:20] And dude’s, I am beat. I am beatbox betty’s so beat, and this is just the ramp up right now because now we’re in July and I can’t even believe it. I can’t believe it because we are going to go buy our first house this month. This month I’m going to be, ah, is this just. Aye. Aye. You know, you’re watching community and Donald Glover’s character had this scene where he goes, my emotions, emotions.
[00:02:00] That’s what I’m feeling. I got a whole bunch of things going on in my brain and in my feelings, and it’s just a crazy time right now. So. I’m really glad that I can spend this crazy time with the people that I really love. And one of them you’re going to hear from today, his name is Jarred Andrews. I have known Jared 1112 years maybe.
[00:02:28] We met in college at Pittsburgh. Well, actually we met at Nolan. We were in college in Pittsburgh and working for an environmental group where we would call. Lapsed members pretty much just beg them for money. And consequently, that’s why I hate talking on the phone now, but the best part that I got out of it was meeting Jared and knowing him all these years.
[00:02:51] And it’s so funny that you know, we started in Pittsburgh and yet we both ended up in New York city and he’s just killing it. He’s killing it as a social media consultant. He knows so much about. Like stats and analytics and all of these things that even after the call that you’ll hear, we were talking and he’s just like, he knows so much stuff and it’s just mind boggling at how talented and how amazing he is.
[00:03:24] He. Not only, this is little fun fact for you. He not only is a social media guru, he was the one that was just like, you need to get your company on LinkedIn just to have a presence there. And I was always like, man, I don’t want another platform and gun too much to do. But he was definitely the pioneer for me for making sure that I was, you know, just having presences anywhere.
[00:03:51] I could. A little fun fact for you. He was also my, I guess I want to call him my booth designer. He was, when I had my soap company, like my trade show booths, my craft show booths. Displays. Jared was the man. He and I would sit, he has a really big passion for architecture, and so he would sit down with me and like map things out and do grids and things like actually figure out space and dimensions, which I did.
[00:04:28] I was like, this will all fit right. It’ll be fine. And he just like, he killed it all the time. And so I am so thrilled to introduce you to him because I love him very much and I’ve loved him for many years and I’m really excited that he is here to share his expertise with you guys all about creating effective social media campaigns, the tools you should use, what you should look out for.
[00:04:54] We talk about best practices for even starting. Like if you’re just starting on social media, like the best things for you to do, and it’s just incredible. He’s amazing. So I hope you love this interview, and I hope you get a lot out of it. You should definitely tweet him at @jarredjandrews. Now his name is actually with two R’S, so Jarred J Andrews,
[00:05:20] But reach out to him, say hi, tell him he’s amazing because he is. And I love him and I hope you love him too. Here’s my interview with Jarred Andrews.
[00:05:30] All right. Jarred, thank you so much for joining me today.
[00:05:33] Jarred Andrews: Thank you for having me.
[00:05:34]Megan Brame: Can we just do a quick background on, um, your experience and what made you start looking into social media?
[00:05:41] Jarred Andrews: Yes. Well, it’s over a long periods of time, but I’ve been using social media, um. Just at a personal level for a long time and it’s evolved from, um, my, I come from higher education and I was a community manager and I did a bunch of social media and all sorts of different things to help manage the student body.
[00:06:05] And at first we were only using platforms like a Blackboard, and then as new social media channels kept. Evolving and being creative, and I saw the benefit on, you know, using Twitter and of course, Facebook for the different groups and everything like that. And that just turned into a consultancy is what it’s coming down to you.
[00:06:30] Megan Brame: You know, just hearing your background is so funny to me because. When I had my own product based business. You were the one that was like, are you on LinkedIn? You should have a LinkedIn page. Why aren’t you using LinkedIn? Like you always just had such a keen eye for like how to make these things work for your business.
[00:06:51] Jarred Andrews: Definitely and it’s really, they’re specific to a per which platform do you want to use? I remember when we were trying to get some new leads for our hiring and everything. Uh, referring back to LinkedIn, um, that’s definitely like a, a small business boost or whenever you’re searching or, uh, positions to fill.
[00:07:12] Megan Brame: Well, why do you think so many small business owners are intimidated by LinkedIn? Uh,
[00:07:17] Jarred Andrews: it’s expensive or all the advertisements and everything. Um, but creating a profile page, it’s free. So it’ll also, it keeps the presence, at least on, on that channel. They don’t really have too much of a sales aspect on that sense.
[00:07:35] It’s more of a networking website, but it definitely helps being present on there.
[00:07:40] Megan Brame: I just don’t see a lot of them on LinkedIn, and I wonder if they’re intimidated by it if they think that their crowd isn’t there, or do you think that it’s there? Do you think they’re missing opportunities there? I don’t think that they’re missing out on, uh, opportunities for sales.
[00:07:58]Jarred Andrews: Um, having a presence is always good. But the one thing though is it’s not user friendly. Um, when it comes to trying to utilize LinkedIn to create new job leads, there are ways to do that. Mmm. You know, making connections with those business owners and those sorts of things. That’s a good networking site for that.
[00:08:23] But, um, I would focus more on Facebook, Twitter, depending on the business. Mmm. Since everything’s going more visual too instagram is a huge one. Uh, Pinterest. That’s another one. Their search features on Pinterest for different products and everything are amazing. And, um, Google plus, you always want to make sure that you have a Google plus page for your business.
[00:08:50] Megan Brame: Why’s that?
[00:08:51]Jarred Andrews: Uh, one of the, well, one of the big reasons is whenever you search a business on Google, uh, the information, the location information, the contact information, it’s populated through your Google account, so make sure that you have a Google business account and make sure that the information on there is up to date because if you don’t edit it user generated information will, and it’s not always accurate, such as, you know, the time, your business hours and those sorts of things.
[00:09:22] Megan Brame: Do you think that Google plus is also important for just online businesses?
[00:09:27] Jarred Andrews: I do, yeah. There’s definitely a bunch of different networking opportunities on there. Not only for, uh, showcasing your products and letting everybody know more about your business, but the networking aspect is really great and a 60% a little bit more than 60% maybe 63% of businesses or people who are searching for products are searching through the Google platform. Really the other, uh, business, uh, search engines, uh, like Bing for example, there’s only about 30% of users better searching through that now. So it’s mostly through Google anyway.
[00:10:11]Megan Brame: That’s, so I make, I guess that makes sense. You know, we’re so used to Google and just having Google be, have the answers for us that, yeah, I guess that probably makes sense to actually maximize that.
[00:10:23]Um, When, so say, say we’re starting metropolis soap all over again and we’re starting it today, what would you suggest are the first things that I need to do for social media? Like what are the first, uh, platforms that I should go on?
[00:10:39]Jarred Andrews: Definitely Facebook. Okay. Almost everyone who has internet access uses Facebook and has a profile.
[00:10:48]Mmm. Pinterest is definit
[00:10:49] ely an up and coming platform. Um, Instagram. Everybody loves Instagram. It’s easy to interact with and you can also, uh, showcase your, your products in various ways because they have the, the video options in there now along with photo options. And then you can also, of course, create your own content and share it through there.
[00:11:13] Megan Brame: So going actually this perfect segue. So going to content, I think that a lot of people, myself included, you know, it’s so difficult to keep thinking of new content all the time, every day, like something new, something exciting and have it not feel like, I dunno, having it not feel like I’m just trying to post something.
[00:11:35] Do you know what I mean? Yeah, I definitely understand that. So how do you, what are your tips for sourcing content and, um, do you, well, I’ll, I’ll get to the second question after that, but, so what do you think is, are the best ways to think of new content? Um,
[00:11:51]Jarred Andrews: inspirational quotes. That’s always a good one.
[00:11:55]Uh, so you could take a photo of one of your products, make sure to leave a little bit of spacing for text. And, and insert it there, then share with your followers. Uh, I always suggest that if you don’t have analytics already started, you want to get, Oh yeah. All of those different accounts and everything created and also connected to WordPress or making sure that they’re at least tracking the different analytics.
[00:12:23] If you don’t have WordPress, um, all right. If you don’t have analytics through, through the word press. Um, there’s also, once you have the analytics, ultimately it’s going to give you a much clearer picture on what your audience is searching for, along with their demographics and all of that kind of stuff too.
[00:12:41] So you want to make sure that you know that, um, beforehand, if possible, at first, you always kind of want to make posts to get an idea of when the best time to post will be. But on top of that, combining that with the analytics and knowing exactly what they’re looking for, what resonates most with them.
[00:13:02]Um, it, it starts giving me a better idea of if inspirational quotes work best with your followers or if they prefer, uh, how to articles over the inspirational quotes. Um, if you have a blog and you’re sharing that
[00:13:19] Megan Brame: which, you totally should have a blog, by the way.
[00:13:21]Jarred Andrews: You should definitely have a blog. Um, and also the, everything gets tracked through the Google analytics, so you can make adjustments accordingly.
[00:13:29] But I think one of the biggest things that small business owners, if they’re not familiar with social media, um, there’s a, there’s a general, an understanding I feel that everybody knows how to. Uh, utilize social media. And that’s unfortunately not always the case because each of the different platforms you have to communicate differently on there.
[00:13:51] You’re not going to communicate the same way on Facebook that you would on Twitter, um, or on Pinterest like you would Instagram, but they’re different. So, yeah. Well, you want to do is you just want to make sure that, um, you’re open to testing. And trial and error and sort of seeing what resonates most is that you’re not going to have a really clear picture until about three to six months in as you’re going through and trying to generate content.
[00:14:23] So it’s, it’s experimental at first because you’re getting to know your audience, but then after that you can really cater what you need to do to give them the content that they want.
[00:14:35]Megan Brame: I love that. And. When I guess what I’m trying to get to is like, what’s a good ratio for say, my product as a piece of content and then inspirational quotes or content curation or things like that.
[00:14:54] Like what is, what’s a good, um, way to think about, you know, like with Gary V, he had the jab, jab, jab, right hook. So. What do you, do you subscribe to the jab, jab, jab, right hook, or do you think that there’s kind of a, like a formula?
[00:15:12]Jarred Andrews: You can over time. What I usually do is I sign up for a bunch of different newsletters at first to help with, uh, generating information for everybody.
[00:15:25] And I kind of do that by, uh, once I have the analytics. It’s shows you pretty quick what the keywords are that everybody is searching for, which is ultimately leading to you. So I try to find, um, different bloggers and different websites. And I usually start with, um, five or 10 of them. And I read through it’s social media.
[00:15:47] When you’re posting and creating the content, everything, it’s a lot of research that you have to do. You don’t want to, um, just retweet anything about, you want to make sure that you’re actually reading through, uh. All the different articles and everything and sort of going off of things that you might have posted before, or if it’s brand new and you’re creating a social media calendar, for example.
[00:16:11]Uh, it just makes it a lot easier if you are able to experiment to see what, what the best, uh, types of posts will be. And sometimes you also have to keep in mind too, uh. The content that you’re posting isn’t always what you think you would like. You really have to think a different way and try to imagine what your customers are looking for, and sometimes that conflicts with what you like versus what they like.
[00:16:40] So it’s a big, it’s a definitely a shift in how you think about creating content, it takes a little bit of time to get that.
[00:16:51] Megan Brame: That’s such a good point. Like I’ve, I’ve, I think I made so many mistakes early on just thinking like, Oh, I like this and I like this and I’m not my customer. Right. And it looks like, who am I?
[00:17:06] Who am I doing this for?
[00:17:09]Jarred Andrews: And when, when small businesses are starting. Uh, reaching out on when they’re utilizing, when they begin utilizing social media. I feel like a majority of them, from what I’ve experienced, at least, um, think that way. And a lot of the times, uh, you know, they, they post and they keep making posts and it’s just not getting the response that they’re, that they’re looking for.
[00:17:33] And it keeps getting, uh, more of a burden. And that’s why they end up hiring somebody for social media. And somebody who is trained in social media knows this. And it’s also having a social media manager is a good way to sort of give yourself a sounding board. Totally. And that’s it. It helps. And that’s exactly what most companies need.
[00:18:00] It’s just, um, I think sometimes companies are expecting instant gratification, uh, with ROI and response times. And you have to keep in mind too, that if you were posting a bunch of content before and say you haven’t posted anything consistently for three or four months, and then you hire a social media person and they’re making a bunch of different posts on your various various sites and you’re not getting the response, you kind of have to give a little bit of time because they also have to get used to seeing information from you.
[00:18:36] Because right now they’re not expecting it. But once you start posting things consistently and say that you have a a weekly blog series that you do and you start posting every Monday, they’re going to start noticing a trend and will start, you know, paying attention for that and getting used to seeing it.
[00:18:57] At first, they’re, they’re just simply not. So you’re not able to get a large response. And I think that also discourages a lot of small businesses because you know, time is money.
[00:19:10] Megan Brame: Sure. Well, what do you think that you mentioned before that sometimes you’re, you know, these people just aren’t connecting with you or you’re putting the wrong info. How would you, uh huh. Too much coffee. I guess trying to say is how, like what’s a good benchmark to say, okay, this isn’t working. I need to change my strategy or I need to get a professional in here, or I need to start rethinking my content. Um
[00:19:37] Jarred Andrews: , if you have WordPress and you have your analytics set up through that, one of the things that you want to pay attention to is the bounce rate on your website. That can give you a lot of insights into, um, different social media platforms.
[00:19:56] Megan Brame: And Google does that for Shopify and Etsy, by the way, is it’s not just WordPress, but yeah, I, sorry, go ahead.
[00:20:02] Jarred Andrews: No, it’s okay. Um, I just, uh, I usually refer to, well, the bounce rate and then also, um, engagements go up and down.
[00:20:12] They’re not gonna constantly keep going up. They do rise over time because your followers are increasing over time, and the more consistent you are, the more responses you’re going to get over time as well. So, and there’s all sorts of different avenues that you take with that.
[00:20:33] Megan Brame: That makes sense. That makes, yeah, and I think that, like I said in the beginning, you know, you’re just posting like, Oh, this is pretty or I would like this, and then all of a sudden your Pinterest accounts a mess and you’re not bringing anybody. So what do you think is the time that somebody should begin to hire out and bring in the social media team or a manager
[00:20:59]Jarred Andrews: as soon as possible.
[00:21:01] Megan Brame: Yeah.
[00:21:02] Jarred Andrews: Getting a presence online is imperative for all businesses now. Everybody is searching for exactly what they’re looking for. They’re able to find it, and more than not over 80%. And say, if there is, um, a follower that you have on Facebook. And if they refer somebody to you through one of your social channels chances are though that there’s going to be a, an 80 more than 80% chance that they’re going to end up purchasing something from your company.
[00:21:36] Whatever it is you’re selling. So referrals are huge. Mmm. And if you don’t have a social media presence, a consistent one. If somebody goes to your site and you haven’t posted something for three or four months, what’s that going to tell someone it’s going to look like your company’s not really open anymore.
[00:21:57]Megan Brame: I’ve, I’ve had that so many times where I’ve gone to a website and I’m like, is, is this, is this company still active? Like nothing’s happened here. I might, I’m not comfortable giving them my info.
[00:22:09] Jarred Andrews: And that’s one of the reasons why it’s so, consistency is so important. Even if it’s once a week. Um, it depends on the, the social platform and your social media manager would know that on how many, you know, times the, they should be posting on the different channels because you don’t want to get too spammy.
[00:22:24] People don’t want to be sold to anymore.
[00:22:26] Megan Brame: Right.
[00:22:26] Jarred Andrews: They want to be the decision makers. So they’re looking for what their friends and their family are purchasing and what sort of brands they support, and that’s gonna, you know, eventually determine, you know, if there’ll be supporting your company or not. Um, and then also, I mean, it just gives you credibility when you have a website.
[00:22:47] People usually take your company more seriously. If you’re creating your own content and you have a weekly blog post or monthly blog posts. Something showing that you are an expert in your field and that you can trust that they can trust your products.
[00:23:04] Megan Brame: Well, you say that people don’t want to be sold to anywhere, and I think that’s totally true.
[00:23:08] How do you, how do you still sell to them
[00:23:15] Jarred Andrews: if it ends up being more of like a partnership selling relationship. When you’re online, I mean, that’s what it comes down to. You want to resonate with your audience and let them know about your products because they want to make an informed decision. Mmm. They’re not gonna take cold calls anymore.
[00:23:37]Mmm. They’re not. The email campaigns do work if they’re familiar with your company, but if you’re spamming people who aren’t familiar with your products and everything like that, it will not work.
[00:23:47]Megan Brame: That makes sense. So I guess, I guess it’s sort of like you’re not actively selling, you’re just staying top of mind. Would you, do you think that’s kind of right?
[00:23:58] Jarred Andrews: Yeah. Yeah. With the consistency and then also with your own information that you’re sharing with them, they get to know you and they ended up trusting your brand.
[00:24:07] And especially if they’re referring family and friends to you or you know, vice versa.
[00:24:16] Megan Brame: Now you, you’re talking about consistency and schedules. So I guess a good question would be, what kind of schedule should I make or have my social media manager make? And is there like, is there a sweet spot for all the platforms or are there different sweet spots per platform?
[00:24:37]Jarred Andrews: Uh, there’s different ones for each platform. They all kind of work differently, but they all ultimately, you know, have the same goal. Um, what you want to do, chances are, if you’re thinking about hiring a social media manager, you already have some of your social platforms already created and what you want to make sure, like I said earlier, you want to make sure that you have the analytics and everything set up if you don’t already.
[00:25:01]Um, but from there, you definitely want to focus on making those pages consistent with each other. You don’t want to go from Twitter to Facebook to Pinterest and have different logos on each page and the, you know, different background, um, information. And what you can do is you can start by, uh. There’s different limitations on how much you can post on most social media websites anyway.
[00:25:28] So you want to do the research on that, and the times of day. If you already have your analytics set up, there’s, there’s ways to be able to tell the best time to post information on each platform so you’re getting, you know, the best reach. Um, so you would just start, uh, start with your first week, your first seven days, start with Monday, and write down each of the platforms that you have and start with making them look, uh, cohesive and then also start with, um, you can pose a, a, a shared article.
[00:26:12] You can make an inspirational quote with one of the photographs that you have of your product. And then you can also, uh, share your blog, your most recent blog post and right there, that would be three different, uh, types of content that you can share, uh, on each social media platform throughout the day, which will be at different times.
[00:26:36] And you kind of want to mix them up a little bit too, because if you’re posting a different, if you’re posting a blog, if you’re posting a shared article, and then you’re also posting a photograph with an inspirational quote on it, um, on all of your platforms the same day, make sure that not all of them the same articles are being posted in the same order.
[00:26:59] You kind of want to mix and match a little bit.
[00:27:02] Megan Brame: Oh, I see. Oh, like kind of remix it for. Do you think that it’s a good strategy to share across the same platforms, or do you think that it’s better to do like Pinterest content, the Pinterest specific content and Facebook specific content and so on?
[00:27:22] Jarred Andrews: Yeah, you can do it that way. It really depends on, on your products and what you’re selling and how you’re selling and your social media manager would be able to help you more with the specifics of that because it has to, there’s a bunch of different things that you want to make sure you’re looking into.
[00:27:41]Um, most importantly, the which platforms you’re already on and making sure that you have the analytics and you know what your audience is looking for.
[00:27:51] Megan Brame: That’s a good point. And I guess also with like tone, do you think that that’s, cause I’m thinking specifically of LinkedIn versus Facebook and I feel like if I’m a person that’s looking to network and I want to do LinkedIn, but I also want my company to have a good presence on Facebook, I feel like maybe the tone would have to be different.
[00:28:12] Do you think that’s true or do you, is that just kind of overthinking it.
[00:28:16] Jarred Andrews: No, the tone definitely has an impact on it.
[00:28:18] Megan Brame: Okay.
[00:28:19]Jarred Andrews: Um, if you’re posting something on Facebook, um, I would say that’s a more, not necessarily like informal platform, but you can be yourself,
[00:28:30]Megan Brame: like conversational.
[00:28:31] Jarred Andrews: You can be conversational.
[00:28:32] Now with, um, Twitter since you’re, you’re limited to 140 characters in a post, uh, depending on what you’re sharing on Twitter, since some of the information on there has recently changed, um, you wouldn’t, you can’t be as conversational on Twitter as you can on Facebook and comparing, um, Facebook to Instagram, for example.
[00:29:00] Instagram is very, very hashtag friendly, uh, Facebook isn’t. And I see a lot of companies still using hashtags in Facebook and it really doesn’t have a large benefit to do that. Um, the sites that do have, uh, that you want to utilize hashtags in without overdoing it is Instagram and Twitter. So there’s just different ways of communicating on each platform.
[00:29:24] Megan Brame: So when it comes to hashtags, what do you think are good ways to find appropriate ones? I feel like the ones that are like #instagood and follow for follow like, those just seem link like spammy or something like you’re just getting lost in a sea. You know what I mean?
[00:29:41] Jarred Andrews: I would suggest with your analytics, once they’re all set up, you’re going to be able to see the different keywords that people are searching in Google that bring them to your different websites and just start
[00:29:53] using those. Okay. And hashtagging those. And then also, um, create a hashtag for your company’s name too, and start adding that to all of your Instagram posts and all of your, all of your Twitter posts as well. So that starts creating a precedence.
[00:30:11] Megan Brame: What, what’s the benefit of having a
[00:30:13] custom hashtag? Like I understand the custom hashtag for Instagram because then, you know, you can kind of feature customers if they’re using your hashtag, but what, what’s the
[00:30:23] the benefit of a hashtag on Twitter.
[00:30:26] Jarred Andrews: If somebody types in your business name, it’s going to show up first.
[00:30:31] Megan Brame: Oh, interesting.
[00:30:33] Jarred Andrews: Yes.
[00:30:34] Megan Brame: It shows up before your profile, or is that just one in the same?
[00:30:38]Jarred Andrews: They’re usually mixed. Sometimes their profile shows up first. Um, sometimes it’s a few posts down underneath, and it just depends on the interactions and engagements that you’ve gotten on each of those posts.
[00:30:50] Megan Brame: That’s so interesting. Do you think that Facebook, I know that Facebook kind of dabbles in hashtags, do you think that it’s worth having hashtags in your Facebook posts too, or is that just sort of a overkill?
[00:31:03] Jarred Andrews: I think it is an overkill. Yeah. You want to be conversational. Hashtags aren’t conversational and you want to be careful on the different sites.
[00:31:14]Um, a lot of people don’t understand what hashtags are. That’s one of the problems. But it also makes a conversational post choppy, distracting. I definitely use emojis. Everybody likes those. Your Facebook, uh, your Facebook posts and Instagram in Twitter, emojis are very, very friendly when it comes to the conversations and hashtags aren’t.
[00:31:44] Megan Brame: I see what you mean. Where it’s just like the emojis are kind of making it, um, like have a voice, maybe like have a specific tone, I guess.
[00:31:52]Jarred Andrews: Yeah. They definitely set a tone, especially if it’s going back to our, the canvassing days. Yeah. It definitely, when you’re, um, things can be misinterpreted very easy through texts.
[00:32:08] Mm. So when you do add an emoji, it helps to definitely set the tone versus not having it.
[00:32:18] Megan Brame: Sorry. Now I’m just, I’m just reliving reliving our staff skills that shove, I’ll, I’ll explain that in the intro for people. They’re like, what are you talking about? Uh, Vietnam flashbacks. Um, if we’re starting a small business and we’re starting a small candle business and we want to get our, we want to hit the ground running and we want to make sure that all of our social media is, you know, just the best it can be right off the bat.
[00:32:47] And then we’ll kind of tweak as we go. What kind of apps or things do you suggest people get started with?
[00:32:54]Jarred Andrews: Um, the best apps I would suggest. Mmm. You want to, whenever you’re trying to, um, figure out five to 10 different blogs or websites, a lot of, um, news, uh, news pages, they usually have an app on a, make sure that you, you get those
[00:34:18] Megan Brame: Well that, does that cut down on your character? Do or do or hashtags just a separate part of the character count? Um
[00:33:16] if they have one, that makes it a lot easier to, um. get to where you need to go if you’re trying to save some time and, and share some articles with your audience. That’s one suggestion. Um, a lot of, uh, people use, there’s, um, if you go into the Google play store and just search hashtag that helps to, um, generate some of the
[00:33:41] the more popular hashtags, uh, based off of subject.
[00:33:46] Megan Brame: Okay.
[00:33:47] Jarred Andrews: For Instagram, um, there is, there’s a bunch of different ones that I’m top tags. I know that’s one of them. And you can pretty much just type in, uh, soap or, or nature. And what it will do is it’ll pull up different lists that, um, you can just copy and paste into your posts for the hashtags because you can use up to 30 hashtags in a post on Instagram, but on Twitter, you don’t want to use more than, than one or two in a post
[00:34:26] Jarred Andrews: , for Instagram?
[00:34:28]Megan Brame: Oh no for, for Twitter.
[00:34:30] Jarred Andrews: For Twitter, it does. It takes away the characters.
[00:34:32] Megan Brame: Oh, that’s crazy.
[00:34:35] Jarred Andrews: And it looks spammy because you’re only working with 140 characters on Twitter anyway. So all of it is, are a bunch of hashtags.
[00:34:42] It doesn’t look like anything. It just looks like a jumbled mess. But if you, um. Use 30 different hashtags on Instagram. You want to make sure that you’re setting little notes and, you know, talking with your customers and everything and letting them know what the photograph is about before putting in the hashtags.
[00:35:05]Um, and then what else? Let’s see here.
[00:35:07] Megan Brame: What about like, scheduling apps or, um, like filters? Anything in particular that you use.
[00:35:14] Jarred Andrews: For, uh, photographs. Uh, whenever we’re resizing those, because there, there are different size, uh, requirements for different profile pictures on the different social media sites, uh, certain sizes for the background photos on the different sites.
[00:35:32] And you want to make sure that you’re sizing things properly. So it shows up on a different. Um, devices. But what I usually use is, um, for Instagram, uh, there is an app called Insta size, I, N, S, T, A, S, I,Z , E and there’s different filters and everything in there. And I don’t really use the filters too often, but there is a crop feature in there that gives you a bunch of different options.
[00:35:58] Okay. And you can kind of adjust them accordingly and then just, um, save it to your device. And it makes everything look very, uh, tailored. I really liked that out for resizing photographs.
[00:36:13] Megan Brame: What about the buffer verse HootSuite battle? What did, do you have a preference?
[00:36:18] Jarred Andrews: They both have their good points. They are a lot different though. Um, obviously it can help with being more consistent in your post and everything, but, um, Instagram is still not something that you can, uh, post directly through either buffer or HootSuite.
[00:36:37]Um, HootSuite does send you reminders on when the best time to post something on Instagram is if you end up connecting that account through there, but it won’t go directly through. Um, I think that for larger businesses, um, HootSuite might be a better option because there’s. It’s more specific when it comes to the, the analytics in there.
[00:37:01] And, um, there’s also a bunch of other things that you can do with it where as buffer is a lot more user friendly and still has analytics and everything. And, uh, their customer service for buffer is out of this world. It’s all live. You can actually watch their customer service, uh, on Twitter. They, they answer all the questions and everything directly on there, which, which I really like.
[00:37:30]Um, for smaller businesses though, I would suggest Buffer.
[00:37:34]Megan Brame: Okay. I, I started
[00:37:38] with HootSuite and I think,
[00:37:41] that you know, this is the first year that I ever upgraded to HootSuite pro, and I . Like I liked it, but now I just feel like there’s more that I can do with buffer, like just the different apps that I’ve come across.
[00:37:56] And I don’t know, like you said, that it’s more user friendly and I think that that’s true. I think that, you know, Hootsuite’s cool. It has the Instagram reminders, but I don’t know, I feel like buffer just has better, um, like it’s just easier with buffer, but I don’t know.
[00:38:14]Jarred Andrews: I think it’s definitely easier to use. I mean, they both have similar, similar qualities, but for smaller businesses, buffer is more user friendly and it gives you exactly what you need. Not only with the great customer service, but the different platforms that have majority of small businesses use anyway for social media. Um. And then Hootsuite, uh, is good for scaling large businesses because it gives you, um, the analytics are a little bit more, um, specific and you can, yeah, align, what’s the word I’m looking for?
[00:38:56]I like both of them, but I think just for, for our conversation, uh, buffer is the better bet for. For smaller businesses, it’s also more affordable. and there’s, um, a couple of different options. There’s a, there’s a free version that they have, and they also have, um, I believe it’s $10 a month for, um,
[00:39:18] Megan Brame: their awesome.
[00:39:20] Jarred Andrews: Their awesome plan. And then $30 for the business plan that they have, that’s $30 per month. So then you had 24 hour a day, seven day a week customer service. So
[00:39:32]
[00:39:32] Megan Brame: do you think that, have you done anything with the Pinterest thing that they have?
[00:39:37] For
[00:39:38] Jarred Andrews: Buffer? Uh huh. Yeah. Um, when you’re posting on, um, through a mobile device and you have a bunch of different boards and say you’re, you’re sharing something on one of your boards, are you, um, let me back up a second.
[00:39:53] I have used it. And I had some trouble right when I first started using it. Um, because it wouldn’t save, I cant just share in articles like the board and then save at be a mobile without adding a photograph.
[00:40:07] Megan Brame: Oh, like you have to, it won’t pull from the article.
[00:40:10] Jarred Andrews: Yeah. It won’t
[00:40:11] pull direct from it. So it’s a little bit easier to add the Pinterest via desktop.
[00:40:20]Mmm. You can still add it via mobile. It’s just you want to make sure that you save a photograph before you go to post it to a board. But it works fantastic.
[00:40:32] Megan Brame: That’s cool. I wonder if they’ll ever, you know, up that technology that would be really cool to just kind of automate it as much as possible.
[00:40:40] What are you gonna do? Right.
[00:40:42] Jarred Andrews: Yeah.
[00:40:44] Megan Brame: Well, we are reaching the end. So what is the best way that people can reach you out in the internets?
[00:40:50]Jarred Andrews: Um, you can find me on Twitter. Uh, my, my handle is Jarred. It’s J. A R R E. D. J. Andrews. So add @jarredjandrews on Twitter. I’m same for LinkedIn. I’m on there under Jarred J Andrews.
[00:41:07]Um. Those are the ones that I usually use. I also have an Instagram account where it’s, um, not really business related. It’s just more of the, some of my hobbies that I do.
[00:41:18] Megan Brame: More shots of New York
[00:41:20]Jarred Andrews: lots of shots of New York. Lots of shots of, uh, traveling in different places. Um, good stuff. Yeah, you can, you can follow me on there.
[00:41:28] And then also my email address is Jarred J. Andrews at gmail.com
[00:41:34]Megan Brame: and I will link to all of those in the show notes so that people can just click and find you easily.
[00:41:40] Jarred Andrews: Excellent. I’m creating a website too, but it’s, um, it’s down at the moment. I have one, but I mean there’s, it’s in beta. Yeah, it’s all right there.
[00:41:52] Megan Brame: Thank you so much.
[00:41:53] Jarred Andrews: Thank you.
