When Life Interrupts Your Marketing Plan

Andréa Jones [00:00:00]:
So two weeks ago, I missed a podcast episode and an email newsletter and social media posts, all for family emergency and life. Life. You know, sometimes things don't go as planned. And so in this episode, I want to talk about normalizing that a little bit, but also, what do you do when life makes it hard to be consistent with your marketing and just like, the humanness of it all, you know? So we'll get into that and more in this week's episode. But first, a word from our sponsor. Riverside is the all in one podcast recording and editing tool that I use for this right here show. I use it to edit not only the audio in the video, it is like Chef's kiss magical, making the entire process so, so easy. Plus, I love their magic AI clips.

Andréa Jones [00:00:53]:
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Andréa Jones [00:01:28]:
I. I'm going to be honest. When I missed that week, I felt awful about it. I felt like a lot of guilt. Like, that's internal feelings. Like, man, I should have done that. I broke that promise with myself. I haven't done that in years, by the way.

Andréa Jones [00:01:47]:
Years and years. Even through both pregnancies, I never missed an podcast episode. And so there was, like, a little bit of guilt of that pride piece and then also shame because I've externalized it so much. I talk a lot about how I never miss a podcast. Y' all know I never miss a podcast. It's like my main content. It's my signature content piece, my ride or die. I don't miss it.

Andréa Jones [00:02:08]:
If I miss it, something's happening. And I kind of spiraled a little bit, and I had to message Jemmy because to be honest with y', all, it wasn't just the one episode. I saw the warning signs leading up to that episode because this whole basically all of January was very challenging for me, and I started recording podcast episodes. It was like a couple days before, two days before, then it was on the same day. Then was like, hours before it needed to be released. I'm sending it to Jimmy to edit and publish the podcast, which is not enough time. So I knew that that was coming. And so I felt that guilt and shame around missing that podcast episode.

Andréa Jones [00:02:51]:
And that inner. I call this your doubt gremlin. Your inner doubt gremlin is like, hahahaha, you missed it. You're a terrible person and everyone hates you. Right? It's always like the most dramatic thing ever. You've ruined everything, your business is going to fail. And so I just want to normalize that. Like we all have those moments and I'm here on the other side of it and I'm actually batch recording podcast episodes right now so that I can get in front of it because I life is going to be life.

Andréa Jones [00:03:19]:
And again. And so I want to talk about how this is part of it. Like falling off the rhythm is part of it. There. There's actually a pro. Like, this can be good thing for you to go quiet sometimes. It could be good to take a step back. It could be good to have a moment to like regroup and gather yourself.

Andréa Jones [00:03:40]:
The difference is we're going to get back on that wagon or on the horse or however it goes. You know, we're going to be loud again. We're not going quiet forever, just for a moment. And I think it's absolutely ridiculous, actually, that we expect so much from the people around us. I was talking with someone about this recently about text messages. It is absolutely ridiculous that there's an expectation, like a societal expectation, a cultural expectation that if someone texts you and you don't respond within hours, it's rude a day, really rude. And in my mind I'm like, but we have stuff going on. Like we have stuff happening.

Andréa Jones [00:04:21]:
Like if I don't respond to you for hours, I'm busy, I'm busy. You know what I mean? Sometimes I go days before I respond to someone and some people think that's rude. And I'm like, listen, I have children, I run a business, I have a very vibrant personal life. I have a lot of stuff happening. And I'm the kind of person where I'd much rather get in person than have like text conversations or even call me. Let's talk on the phone rather than texting back and forth. And so I feel the same way about social media sometimes. Sometimes it kind of activates that feeling.

Andréa Jones [00:04:53]:
And so I just want to remind you that you, even if you're posting on social media, that doesn't mean that people have unequivocal access to you. Like you get to set a boundary and say, I'm here for this amount of time or I'm not here. Okay? Like, you get to decide that. And so I want to talk about, like, how we can reboot back into that content again gently. Like, how do we reemerge? How do we enter? How do we come back from having. Maybe it's a day, maybe it's a week, maybe it's a. A quarter, a month, a year even. How do we come back when we've taken some time off? But before we get into that, I just had to be like, girl, it's fine.

Andréa Jones [00:05:32]:
Normalize, you know, normalize taking time off and rest and respite and then come back to it. Okay? So you can do what I'm doing here, and you can just be honest. This is one way that you can reboot that content marketing system. I released an episode last week about LinkedIn because I had the LinkedIn challenge this week. Okay. And you can still join us onlinedrea.com LinkedIn. We're on day two at the time of this episode being recorded, released, but you can definitely still join in. Watch yesterday's and then the rest of this week's content.

Andréa Jones [00:06:07]:
Right? But I had to post that one last week before I posted this one because I missed the week before. I was supposed to post that LinkedIn one the week before, but life. Life is lifing. And so I come on here because I'm pretty transparent, honest with y'. All. To be like, hey, I'm going through it right now. My personal life I can't even talk about on the podcast yet. It's just a lot.

Andréa Jones [00:06:26]:
It's a mess. A lot is happening. Um, good and bad. It's not bad. All bad. Just. It's a lot. And so, hey, I missed a week of the podcast.

Andréa Jones [00:06:35]:
Did you miss me? Yay. And to me, this is content for y' all to be like, hey, I talk all the time about how you don't miss a week of podcast unless something is happening. And there you go. Posting Unpolished is better than waiting for polished perfection. You're not going to get perfection where none of us are perfect. And in fact, a lot of y' all have come to me and said, andrea, I appreciate the honesty. So you can do that, too with your people. You can say, hey, I missed this day.

Andréa Jones [00:07:04]:
I missed a week. I missed a month. I miss posting all of the beginning of 2026. But I'm here now. Hi. Hello. Go for it. The other thing you can do, which I had to do twice last year is repurpose content.

Andréa Jones [00:07:19]:
So there are two times last year where I repurposed old podcast episodes into my podcast feed. But y', all, my social media, a lot of it is repurposed. 95% of my social media content is repurposed content. Because I do not have time to create fresh content all the time, right? Like, I just literally don't have the capacity to do that. So I go through my archives, I look at my podcast episodes, I look at my email newsletters, I look at my voice notes, I leave a lot of memos for myself in my Google notes, Apple, and I repost it. I've been talking about this for going on 12 years now. I have a lot of content to pull from. So we're going to repurpose and y' all don't even have to know that stuff's happening behind the scenes, because I can just reuse some of that past content, maybe freshen it up a little bit, but reuse it.

Andréa Jones [00:08:09]:
The third thing you can do is instead of creating content, you can create conversation. I'm going to say that again. Instead of creating content, you can create conversation. Okay, this is actually a really easy hack to creating more content. You can ask your community questions. You don't have to let it be some sort of educational, deep, meaningful post. You can just say, hey, let's give an example. Let's say you have a dog grooming business and you groom pets locally.

Andréa Jones [00:08:41]:
And you, you don't actually have any clients, so you usually just post your client's photos. But maybe this week was a slow week or maybe you're on vacation so you don't have any fresh photos to post. You can actually say, hey, what's your favorite dog park in this town? Okay, now you're activating your clients into sharing and collaborating on a conversation. You're just co hosting or creating that space for that conversation. They then get to have the conversation in the comments. Oh, I like this dog park, that dog park. I like to walk my dog on this trail, that trail. You know, you can even expand it to like, what are dog friendly beaches? What are dog friendly patios? Or you could start sourcing that information.

Andréa Jones [00:09:23]:
Here's a list of dog friendly patios you can take them to. You know, you don't have to create content from scratch. You can use your community and your conversations to create that content for you. Okay, so that's another way, like if you're trying to reboost or revitalize your social media, start with conversation. All Right. Another way you can do this is give yourself permission to just be on one platform. Okay? So this is something that I talk a lot about with my clients, because when I'm auditing and they go, man, I'm trying, I'm trying. It's not working.

Andréa Jones [00:09:58]:
I look at it and I'm like, you're doing too much. That's why it's not working. You actually don't even have time for this. Like, based on what you told me, you don't have time for this. So we edit down to one platform. Now, I'm going to tell you right now, there's a lot of big feelings that come up when we do this because you feel that fomo, that fear of missing out. You feel like, because I told you that, you know, hey, let's focus on Instagram right now. You're like, oh, man.

Andréa Jones [00:10:21]:
But, like, if I stop posting on LinkedIn, those people are going to miss me. But you can give yourself permission to only give what you have capacity for, and you'll actually get better results from it. Okay? Give what you have capacity for, and you will get better results from it. When you're giving it. When you're over capacity, you're actually not able to deliver on what you actually need to deliver on within your business because you're putting all your energy into marketing. Okay? So actually, when your business starts doing better, I had a console call years ago with someone who said, andrea, I watch your. I watch your challenge. It was the Instagram bootcamp at the time.

Andréa Jones [00:11:00]:
Watch your Instagram bootcamp and you say, respond to every comment. Respond every direct message. But I am overwhelmed with comments and direct messages. So much so that I don't want to post anymore because every time I post, I know I'm going to get a flood of comments and direct messages. And I actually can't take any clients anymore. I said, great. This is the problem we all want to have. Stop posting, stop responding to comments, because you don't have capacity for that right now.

Andréa Jones [00:11:24]:
And she was like, I can do that. Yes, you can. Yes, you can. You can create a marketing plan for what you have capacity for right now. So she completely removed Instagram and y', all. She still is not on Instagram. I keep checking it on her. She does her podcast.

Andréa Jones [00:11:39]:
She writes blog posts. That's all she has capacity for. Because her client roster is actually quite full. Her email list is beautiful. She doesn't need social media. She leans into her community that she already has. She has a vibrant business from that. Okay, you get to choose your capacity.

Andréa Jones [00:11:57]:
Okay. The last thing I'll say to this is if you feel like you're struggling to like, re. Emerge from a break. And I see this happen the most when it's a really long break. Let's say you took like three months, six months, a year off. Sometimes we don't know what to say. We actually have a lot to say and we're like, I have a lot to say, but it's a lot of nothing. I want you to still create that content as if you're telling one person, as if you're like, DMing your bestie.

Andréa Jones [00:12:27]:
Okay. Or not. Don't think about it as creating content. Don't think about it as like broadcasting. Just think about as a conversation. And this is actually something that's trending right now is the FaceTime style videos where it feels like someone just FaceTimed you information, do that. Okay. Take the pressure off of trying to perform and instead connect with one person.

Andréa Jones [00:12:49]:
The one person who you imagine is on the other side of the camera, on the other side of the screen. Okay. I think that that relieves a lot of pressure from you. And also you just jumpstart your content creation skill set again. That, that habit, that momentum. You're. You're starting it again with something completely low pressure and then you can go from there. Here's some things that I don't want you to do, though, as you're jump starting, jumping back in.

Andréa Jones [00:13:18]:
Don't go and delete your whole profile. I've seen people do this before where they're like, I haven't posted in a year and I completely change what I'm doing. Should I delete my old posts? 9 times out of 10, it's no. Unless you're like super embarrassed by it most of the time. We think there's a disconnect. That's fine. We, we as humans love the evolution of a human experience. Okay? So when an artist released a new album, that's different.

Andréa Jones [00:13:42]:
They don't go back and delete the old album. Right. Like when Beyonce said, I'm doing country music, she didn't go back and delete Renaissance. We don't need to delete past albums, past content. We like to see that evolution in that history. So for the most part, don't delete the old post. Okay? The exception is if you're super embarrassed by it. There are some people who are like, this is so bad that I want to remove it.

Andréa Jones [00:14:08]:
Then go ahead and delete it. That's fine. You're making more work for yourself. Nobody cares that much. The other thing I'll say, too, is a lot of times when we're reemerging, we put a lot of pressure on ourselves to, like, also rebrand at the same time. You don't have to do that. You don't have to be like, I'm coming back and here's my new plan. You don't have to make a big deal out of it unless you want to.

Andréa Jones [00:14:30]:
You. You can just say, I'm back and thank you, and I'm excited to be here. Right? We don't have to apologize. We don't have to say, I'm sorry for not posting last week. We don't have to say, I missed posting for a year and I need to apologize. We don't expect that, okay? As. As your community. In fact, we want to celebrate you.

Andréa Jones [00:14:56]:
So show up with the expectation that we're going to celebrate you, okay? So if this is you and you're reemerging from some time off, whether it was a day, a week, a month, a quarter, a year, I want you to give yourself the one win of creating that one post, okay? You could be like me and just say, this is content now. You can repurpose something and just keep going as if nothing changed. You can announce it or not. You can start a conversation. You can be educational if you want, but I want you to put yourself out there. That's it. Just one. One post.

Andréa Jones [00:15:31]:
And we're not measuring ourselves against this one post. This post is purely to get back into the habit of it, okay? And if you did it, you did the dang thing, and I'm so proud of you, and send me the post so that I can celebrate you. All right? If you want to stay connected with me, come on in. Join our LinkedIn challenge. It's still happening this week, February 16th through the 20th. This is day two of the challenge today. I would love to see you there. And even if you're coming in late, you're listening to this a little bit later.

Andréa Jones [00:16:02]:
Still sign up for the challenge because you'll still be able to watch the replays. And that's all for today. Make sure you rate and review us on Spotify and Apple podcasts. It helps spread the word about shows like this and helps us reach the right people. I'll be back next week with another episode, but that's all for today. Bye for now.