PepTalkHer Founder & CEO Meggie Palmer chatted with Karina May from the Plann That app crew and shared all things social media, automating analytics, and how to build your social brand.
I think it's a really important time to get your online presence just right when lots of businesses out there aren't able to resume their normal business activities. A lot of businesses pivoting also means plenty of time. So, I guess, really finesse your social brand online which is where Plann can come in and help.
We're seeing lots of businesses bunkering down and just using the opportunity to tweak their online presence. A lot of times, I think that means getting back to the basics of why you started your business. We've had a lot of people saying, I don't know what to post on on my Instagram. This is usually at the moment and that's where we're encouraging people to get back to the basics of why you started your business.
For example, if you're a fitness trainer and you can't work out at the gym at the moment, remembering that you started that business because you were focused on self-care and helping people. That helps you pivot your content and what you might be able to share at this time. So, that's a great thing.
Also, in terms of analytics, Plann has really powerful analytics at the moment. We're all online at crazy times like I was this morning posting. And getting back to having a look at those analytics to see when the best times to post are, where you're going to get the highest engagement, working out what posts are your most engaged posts because again, it's unprecedented times. What used to work might not work now and that's where powerful analytics can really help you uncover that. So you are creating content that better speaks to your audience during this time.
Meggie: Can you talk a little bit about how important analytics is because I think a lot of people don't know that you actually can get analytics on the success of both your Instagram and other social media platforms. Can you talk us through how important that is and how people can access those analytics?
How important is analytics and how can people access that?
Karina: On a platform like Instagram, analytics are available. But sometimes, it's hard to access, often calculating in spreadsheets, and that sort of thing. An app like Plann pulls together all of your analytics, so you can work out things like even your best color palette. We've got some intelligent AI that pulls through what your best color palette is. That way you know what people are responding to.
We've actually got a blogger that uses the platform and she has actually gotten so granular with her analytics that she can tell when a post with a cup of tea with milk versus a post with a cup of tea without milk, which one actually gets the highest engagement. So of course, when she's promoting books, which we're reading right now, her account is going off. She knows that that's a better image to pop up something with a cup of tea with the milk.
It's just something simple like that, that you can tweak. You're already going through the process of posting content daily, you might as well maximize it to make sure that you’re putting out the very best content. There are colors and there are best times to post, which I touched on. So that changes regularly. Previously, it might have been that 5pm - 6pm period when people are commuting. But there is no commute right now. So it's important to know when people if you post content, will engage straight away. That helps with Instagram’s algorithm so that more people will see your content. It's more visible.
Using analytics to be clever about the time of posting, basically helps visibility, helps with engagement, which in turn helps build your influence. I'm guessing that’s what you're trying to do on Instagram if you're business-minded
For people who've got an Instagram account and they're growing at a decent rate, how can they be more successful? What are some tangible steps people can do today that will really help move the needle for them?
Karina: Look at stuff like your analytics. That will help you in terms of what you're actually going to post. And look at your strategy. Plann actually has some strategy functionality. We look at the top themes and give you suggestions. Seven top themes and you can also add your own. We also encourage you to look at your most engaged posts to work out your strategy.
We've got a Plann superstar Jenna Kutcher. She's an influencer and she is all about the top five things to post on your Instagram post. She calls it a JK five. And she'll cycle through posts around weddings, dogs, family, quotes, and a training post as well. That makes sure that her content is always consistent.
When people are expecting a certain thing from a brand, and it's going to be a very cohesive look online. Obviously, online, to people you're unknown to them. So you're trying to build that authority, and people are going to come back to you if they know what to expect from your account.
Meggie: It's so interesting that you mentioned that. We at PepTalkher find Instagram as an amazing channel. We have women globally reaching out to us but it can take up a lot of time. And so for us downloading the Plann That app has saved us so much time. We actually batch out content. We'll upload all of our content to the Plann app, and then drip feed the posting of it.
I would encourage anyone who's posting on the fly, that really using an app like Plann can be a massive game-changer to saving you time, and also saving your hashtags and getting those analytics as well. I think that that's very, very useful. You mentioned Jenna Kutcher, who is amazing. I follow her as well.
Are there any other brands that are doing the best practice? What are these practices to build your social brand?
Karina: What you guys are doing right now. So, you're jumping on the fact that everyone's online. What offer, what value can we add to them? And these Power PepTalk sessions are amazing. Flowing that through as well. Looking at your strategy, holistically, it's not just about Instagram.
Creating your content
So, right now, obviously, we're going live on Instagram. You're adding that content and lots of other channels as well. That's making your content really work in terms of distribution. Back to the batching session, we have a social media cheat sheet at the moment, which is downloadable. It actually takes you through how you can create a week's worth of content in 20 minutes.
One of those things includes a new Canva integration. We're calling it a social match made in heaven because it literally is. But the joy of that for all of Plann is that it really streamlines that content creation even further. You can import your Canva assets directly into Plann without having to download and then re-upload. It definitely helps with that batching and scheduling process, which is what makes Plann so special. And the fact that you can spend your time getting really granular with your analytics and strategy. You don't have to be wasting that time on the actual content creation. You can get straight down to the strategy aspect of things.
Meggie: That's what I love about Plann. Because I think, I just assume, as a small business, that I'm too small for strategy, I don't need to have analytics, and I can't afford to pay a big ad agency. But what's good about the app is it puts all of it in the one place. There's a great free trial that you can use with the app. We will send through a discount code for anyone who wants to subscribe to Plann. We actually have the premium version of Plann, we pay for it because we find it so useful.
You can use PlannxPepTalk20 for a discount if you want to get that annual subscription. It's those baby steps for people who are just starting out and are finding it overwhelming. That's why I love this idea of the cabin fever reliever challenge. We might get on board that as well actually to just try and make some changes given we've got more time on our hands.
Tweaking your bio and highlights
Karina: It can be overwhelming if you're doing everything at once. Especially in analytics, it can be a bit scary. But you can get your nerd on and really deep dive into things. So, the cabin fever reliever just drip-feeds things to look at each day. Often overlooked is literally just tweaking your bio and your highlights.
Highlights are often overlooked. It's part of your bio. It sits right underneath your bio. Batching your content videos like this as “a helpful Q&A”, it's really easy for people to see what you're offering is straightaway. And again, we've actually got a really popular post on Plann about how to make your highlight covers, which seems super simple, but it can be difficult and it contributes to the overall aesthetic. And again, it's utilizing that Canva feature now where you can pull the highlight image that you've created in Canva like directly into Plann so everything is so simple and seamless.
Meggie: I actually have to admit that we don't have very good highlights on our Instagram so that might be a challenge later for my team to work on. When highlights first came out we did it as like “oh, let's test it” and we just haven't changed it. That's a bit of a battle now. I didn't realize that was so important.
Karina: Yeah, it's overall contributing to your bios. You get those 50 words in your bio but then if you think about it, it's got top real estate. They're like why you would do a live as well because it's great. Real estate is right at the top, it's highlighted. The same thing with your highlights especially that's this one or two highlights. It's a great place to highlight your USP. What's so special about your business?
I don't know about you, but I'm just watching videos constantly right now. It's obviously somewhere where you can highlight the most important or most successful video content that you have produced.
Meggie: Some people say the grid and the aesthetic is so important. And then other people say no, it's more about the just getting up in the algorithm and that people don't look at the grid.
How important is the grid these days?
Karina: At Plann, we are definitely favoring stories now. With Plann, that's what's amazing as well, because you can schedule stories. Are stories more important? In terms of engagement, that's what we're seeing. And again, that's another great thing that you can look at analytics to see. And then it's a no brainer, that's just gonna put this in the wind and see actually what definitely has more engagement.
We get more visibility in our stories and our grid these days. But in terms of transparency and conversions, I think a huge part of the grid still, it's not just about the one thing that you've posted. It's about a continual conversation of someone commenting and commenting back and that sort of thing. So, it's a great place to see those conversations take place in the real world and not with stories. It's a lot of DMs and it's not then visible to your whole community, especially if you're offering advice, that sort of thing.
Meggie: What about engagement? Typically with Instagram, it was all about the likes and the comments and then hide the number of likes to try and make it less narcissistic and people want to feel less pressure.
What are you noticing from the analytics at the Plann app that is the best way to engage?
Karina: I think definitely polls on stories on Instagram and the likes. Facebook actually bought likes back. So that Plann will always be on top of the latest tech news, especially like with platforms that we're dealing with every day. Instagram released as well some interactive stickers for small businesses that offer different services right now. For restaurants and that sort of thing where people can actually just tap a sticker and order food through directly from the website. That's showing us, it is all about stories. And yet the engagement is literally on stories with one tap now making it as easy as possible. That's so awesome.
Meggie: We're so grateful for all of these amazing tips. If people want to do the 10-day challenge with one small task today, to get a kick-off social media profile, what is the best way for them to find out?
Karina: Head to plannthat.com and then head to the blog, and it should come up as a pop-up. We're giving a 20% discount code for anyone that would like to try it. But we also have a seven-day free trial. So, that's also a good way to test it out and see what value it offers you and how much time it saves you.
I recommend that if you are doing the 10-day reliever challenge, you can sign up for the seven-day plan trial as well. And then you can maximize what you're getting out of that as well.
It's on Apple and Android app store and we also have a desktop version. That's the most exciting desktop as well. We have camera integration and we're starting to release more features on desktop knowing that it's businesses that are using the desktop version and can share it with a team.
“We’ve had a lot of people saying, I don’t know what to post on on my Instagram. We’re encouraging people to get back to the basics of why you started your business. ”
You can use the code PLANNXPEPTALK20 for 20% off to the annual subscription of plans. Check out Karina’s amazing work on Instagram and website.
Previously, we wrote something about Sending Handwritten Cards in the Digital Age and Productivity Hacks. You might want to go ahead and check it out.
If you have a story to share or a PepTalk to give, we'd love to profile you on our blog here.