My Posts Aren’t Getting Engagement. Help!

Andréa Jones [00:00:00]:
If posting on social media is feeling a little bit of shouting into the void energy, then this episode is for you. I'm recording it especially for a lot of you because you voted on this topic in my Instagram polls. If you don't know what the heck I'm talking about, make sure you follow me on Instagram at online Drea so you can choose the next episode too. But today we're talking about what's working on social media in 2025. Let's get into it, 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.

Andréa Jones [00:00:43]:
Plus, I love their Magic AI clips. Their little AI robot in the background pulls out the most impactful moments of the episodes without me having to comb through into it myself. Resizes them for social media. So those vertical videos you see on TIKT and Reels, those all come from Magic AI inside of Riverside. It's literally one click. It spits out 10 clips. I picked the best one and away I go. Saves me so much time.

Andréa Jones [00:01:10]:
If you want to get on the Riverside train, check it out today. The links in the show notes and make sure to use my code DREA D R E A at checkout to get 15 off your membership. Welcome to the Mindful Marketing Podcast. I'm your host, Andrea Jones and I'm all about simpler, smarter marketing solutions for busy ass people like you and me. And I gotta say, my preamble today is I have been taking care of my skin and y', all, I'm not wearing any foundation today and I feel glowing. That's just my little like personal update I sell my lipstick on. Duh. But I have been playing around with like different skin care options, drinking more water and I have to say I'm loving it.

Andréa Jones [00:01:53]:
I may have to try the like no foundation makeup strategy more in the future. If you're watching this on YouTube, give me some love. Give me some love in the chat because I need some external validation today apparently. Okay, let's talk about social media content because I got this question specifically from a couple people, actually one person in my membership, one person in threads who is like, listen, I feel like I'm posting, I feel like I'm checking off the box. I feel like I'm doing what exactly what I'm supposed to be doing and ain't nobody seeing my posts. And I was like Girl, same. So if that's you, let's talk about it. The changes that I've made in my marketing this year.

Andréa Jones [00:02:32]:
Year. The changes that I'm recommending you make in your marketing this year so we can finish out 2025 with a bang. But before I get into the suggestions, I do have to set the stage for everything. And I don't mean this as like an excuse. I'm just trying to give you all the facts, right? Because the reality of the situation is we're in a post peak attention economy, okay? So what I mean BY that is 2020 happens. The. The pandemic happens. Two weeks to crush the curb turns into two years across the curve, okay? We're still struggling with COVID to this day.

Andréa Jones [00:03:05]:
At least we don't have massive shutdowns that we were having back then. Because of that, though, we had a lot of attention on digital during that time. Social media, podcasts, YouTube. We were connecting in digital ways that we literally had never done to that extreme ever before in the history of time. This is the Same time where TikTok blew up, y'. All. People were going absolutely viral on TikTok again and again and again because we all were watching it, especially for those of you, like me, who are in Canada, and we were shut down for damn near two years.

Andréa Jones [00:03:42]:
Okay?

Andréa Jones [00:03:43]:
It was tough. It was tough. So that attention economy led to more content that has been produced than ever. And even now, more content is being produced than it ever has been. More people are posting than they ever have.

Andréa Jones [00:04:00]:
Okay?

Andréa Jones [00:04:00]:
So what that means is there's less attention to go around because at the same time, right now, we're experiencing a tiny little collective burnout. You may be feeling it too, where you're not spending as much time on social media as you used to. You're choosing to, like, I don't know, go outside and touch grass. I know I have been, especially since it was like, pandemic then. I had two kids in three years. And so now that I'm on the other side of that, My oldest is 3 years old. I'm like, okay, okay. I'm.

Andréa Jones [00:04:32]:
I'm in my outside era. I was in my homebody era for a while, and I love that journey. For me, now she's outside girl. So spending less time on the Internet, just as it were. And a lot of us are. We're overloaded with content, which equals to content fatigue. So we're all feeling that more content's being produced, but we're actually consuming a little bit less. And I don't want this to to sound like nobody's consuming content because we are.

Andréa Jones [00:05:04]:
Like I said back in my day, okay, this is tmi. Those of you who've heard this on the podcast before, pretend this is the first time I'm sharing this. But back in my day, there used to be little books next to the toilet with like jokes or like a magazine. And if you didn't have that book, you were staring at nothing, my friend. This was back in my day. Now we all take our phones to the bathroom and pretend that this is not kind of gross, that we're literally poop scrolling. We all do it. Don't act like you don't do it.

Andréa Jones [00:05:36]:
We all do it. We don't sit in silence and stare at nothing anymore. Okay? So that means we're all consuming a lot of content. We're just more selective about the content we're consuming because frankly, there's a lot of it. So we have way more choice. And two, we scroll, scroll, and then we move on with our day.

Andréa Jones [00:05:53]:
Okay?

Andréa Jones [00:05:53]:
So you've got to keep that context in mind when you're creating your content. How are people consuming it? They may be poop scrolling too. Should I brand it? Hashtag poop scrolling? Let me stop before I get myself in trouble. Okay, so that's where we are right now. I now have to talk about the shifts that are happening marketing wise as well. Because of that stage setting moment, social media is back at the top of the funnel. During the pandemic years, we were all buying on Temu like it was going out of style. Wish.com, amazon package delivery, set it, forget it.

Andréa Jones [00:06:32]:
We would see an ad and we'd go, sure, why not? People are getting a little bit more discerning about their purchases. We're also in an economic downturn, which definitely affects a lot of industries. It impacts us and our buying decisions. So the golden age of I post on Instagram, I make a sale instantly is kind of slowing down, could be over, maybe it could make a resurgence. But here, now and today, it's not a credit card machine, a slot machine, if you will, it is more of a billboard. And this is not old news, okay? I think we've got a little bit spoiled by the economic booms of the pandemic and all that PPP money that kind of flooded the economy and gave us that boost. Okay, we're not there anymore. Sorry, girls.

Andréa Jones [00:07:25]:
Sorry, babe. We're not there anymore. So what we have to do is be aware that our social content is more of a billboard, less of a vending machine slot machine moment. Okay, so it's not, you know, press B5 and you spit something out. It's more of you pass by the sign four times before you go, oh, yeah, I meant to buy that. Okay, so think more awareness. First impressions. Know, like, and trust the role of your content marketing and your social media marketing is for someone to go, huh, that's interesting.

Andréa Jones [00:08:00]:
Or, huh, I want to learn more. It's less of like, I want to give you my money immediately here now and today. And. And that varies person to person. Okay, it varies. It varies a lot. But we're trending more towards the huh, that's interesting side of things when it comes to how we all interact with media. So smart business owners are treating social media like the top of their awareness funnel.

Andréa Jones [00:08:26]:
That means people find you, they watch your video, they look at your carousel posts, they. They see your posts on threads, and they follow you to go, maybe I'll see more about this person. Then you post some more. You. You share about your offers, how you work with your people, and then they go, huh, maybe I will visit their website. They sign up for a lead magnet or freebie, 10% off coupon, whatever the case may be they're getting for a while, and then they go, huh, maybe I'll buy. Okay, so you see how it goes from huh, I interested into, huh, maybe I'll buy. These are all very technical terms, of course, and it takes longer that buying process.

Andréa Jones [00:09:06]:
The timeline from I don't know you to I want to give you my money just is taking a little bit longer. Okay, so I want you to treat your social media posts almost like an invitation to a party. It's like, hey, do you want to get to know me better? Come on in the water. Fun. It's not a, hey, I just met you. Would you like to be best friends? That feels a little aggressive, right? I always like to use my dating analogy here. I've been using this analogy for 11 years, y'.

Andréa Jones [00:09:35]:
All.

Andréa Jones [00:09:36]:
The dating timeline got a little bit shorter during that pandemic, and we got used to it. But it always remains that you meet someone, you see if there's a spark or connection. There's an indefinite time period where they get to know you. Then you take things to a deeper relationship. This indefinite time period is the thing that people struggle with the most, because for a while there, we met someone, we went on one date, and we were like, yep, this is our one. Boom, bada bing, we're done. That indefinite time period was a lot shorter now it's okay, I need five dates, and then maybe. And so it just takes a little bit of wooing.

Andréa Jones [00:10:15]:
Okay. It takes a little bit of taking care of yourself, being the best person you can be so you can track your right mate. Wow. I love what I did with that. Okay, so that's the first thing is social media is top of the funnel. Second thing is, we don't like to be sold to. Ain't nobody likes ads. Okay, this is another.

Andréa Jones [00:10:34]:
Back in my day, Moga. Back in my day, I remember when TiVo came around and y' all youngins don't even know what this is. Oh, I feel so old. Internet granny moment here. Come Gather round, children. TiVo was when we used to record our TV shows. Because we only can watch them live. We record the TV shows.

Andréa Jones [00:10:52]:
And one of the benefits of recording was, yes, we could watch later whenever we wanted to, because otherwise you missed your show.

Andréa Jones [00:10:58]:
Okay.

Andréa Jones [00:10:59]:
I remember rushing home to watch TV shows. It's so silly now when I think about it. You record your show, so you watch later. But the benefit of TiVo, the other one is you could fast forward through those commercials. Girl, listen. The way we loved fast forwarding through commercials was slightly unhinged. Like, we got so excited to, like, fast forward to commercials because up until that point, you had to either watch the commercial or the commercial was when you went to the bathroom, you got yourself a new drink, a snack, whatever, right? But the same is happening now. It's just in a different format.

Andréa Jones [00:11:35]:
So what happens is we go to YouTube, we watch a video, and we're like, watching the 5, 4, 3, 2, 1, countdown, so we can hit skip and skip on over to the video we wanted to watch in the first place. We're not going. Oh, exciting, a commercial. I wonder what this is about. Same thing with ad blockers. Literally putting them in our browser so that we don't see any ads. When we see an ad on Facebook or Instagram or whatever, we're scrolling right past it. Once we notice that it's an ad, we either see the sponsored or, like, subliminal messages.

Andréa Jones [00:12:03]:
Go, it's an ad, and we just keep scrolling, right? Then there's you and your small business trying to post, and people are thinking it's an ad. And what do we do with ads? We've already decided we're skipping them. Okay, so your takeaway. I know this is a little emotional, but people don't want to be convinced of something they don't want. Okay, I mentioned this last week with my labubu episode. The reason why Labubu is doing so well is because people want it, so they bought it.

Andréa Jones [00:12:31]:
Okay?

Andréa Jones [00:12:32]:
How can you be that? You need to figure out why people want your thing and just show up reminding them that it exists and making them feel seen in that process. You don't necessarily need to orchestrate desire, but you definitely need to connect with them on a human level and go, if this is your problem, we've all been there. This is the solution, okay? They want to feel seen and understood. And I think that this is why certain things like there's this de influencer trend happening, de influencing trend happening, where we've all been convinced to buy something because some influencer somewhere said it was amazing. Then we bought it and we were like, why do we waste our money on that? So now there's people literally de influencing you, which is also still influencing you. But they're literally saying, I bought this things, here's why I didn't like it, or here's why you don't need it. But low key, a lot of them are saying, buy this other thing instead. Just from marketing standpoint, got to say it.

Andréa Jones [00:13:32]:
I got to say it. It's not that they're convincing you, it's that they, they're showing up thinking the same thing you're thinking and you feel like, I'm not the only one thinking this. Thank goodness. Okay? You feel seen. People want to feel related to and they want honesty way more than they want like perfect framing and lighting and all of that stuff. They want an honest interaction with someone, especially with how AI is on the rise. Right? And yes, can be a powerful tool. But at the end of the day, I don't want to speak to the robot.

Andréa Jones [00:14:08]:
Press 0 to speak to customer service human, please. Like, that's just me. And I think that's a lot of people too. Okay? So yes, yes, social media is crowded. Yes, social media is at the top of the funnel. But we don't also we don't want to be sold to as like social conventions are shifting. Okay, this is another one y' all aren't going to like. Entertainment is the new engagement.

Andréa Jones [00:14:34]:
Okay?

Andréa Jones [00:14:36]:
Entertainment is a new engagement. So when I teach social media, when I taught it for a long time and to this day there are some of my pre recorded stuff still says that I used to keep the five pillars of content. I still teach it to some extent. But one of the pillars is educational content. And this pillar right here, educational content is shifting. I'm not saying people don't want to be Educated. I'm just saying they won't. Don't want to be like, eat your vegetables.

Andréa Jones [00:15:03]:
Okay.

Andréa Jones [00:15:03]:
They don't want to be shamed into doing something. It's more of infotainment. Okay, so share the infotainment or edutainment. Can we go edutainment or infotainment? It's like, share the info, but, like, make it cute. Share the info but, like, give me a funny story or do it with a trending meme or give me, like a cute vlog style moment. Okay. You don't have to be a comedian. I'm not saying you have to, like, do scenes and stuff.

Andréa Jones [00:15:30]:
I'm not the type of person who's like, gonna do multiple characters. I've tried it. It just takes me way too long and I don't have time for that. I don't have time for it. The people who can do it go off. You're doing amazing. Me, not for me. I am much better at just turning on the camera and talking.

Andréa Jones [00:15:51]:
And I've learned to layer in a level of this new infotainment edutainment angle. So what I mean by that. Give us the behind the scenes. Give us the reality TV show version of our business. Reality TV shows are very popular for a reason. Why? We're nosy. We're nosy. We want other people's drama.

Andréa Jones [00:16:13]:
Okay.

Andréa Jones [00:16:14]:
We want to see the mess. We want to see the process. Show me how that sausage is made.

Andréa Jones [00:16:19]:
Okay?

Andréa Jones [00:16:19]:
And so I think that with social media specifically, there's so much content we can consume. If I see a video where someone's like, here's how you can. I'm already like, I don't want. I have too much stuff I need to fix already. Don't tell me to fix something else that I'm doing wrong that I don't know yet.

Andréa Jones [00:16:37]:
Okay.

Andréa Jones [00:16:38]:
I skipped past it. But if someone had a video that said, okay, listen, I'm trying to convince my toddler to eat carrots. And this is how I convince my toddler to eat carrots. I'd be like, oh, tell me more. How did you convince your daughter to eat carrots? This is something that I would be interested in because I want to see how other people are actually doing it. I don't want something theoretical. Here's how one can convince one's toddler to eat carrots already. I feel like I'm behind.

Andréa Jones [00:17:07]:
But if someone said, okay, I tried everything, this is the thing that works for me, I'd go, I want to see what works for you. So I can determine if I want to try it or not. This is infotainment, edutainment, content versus just straight up educational content. Now I'll put a huge asterisk on this because I still think educational content has a role in this. But the simple shift that I predicted last year that has come true this year is we're shifting away from how to content towards how I content. That simple shift can really make a connection with your ideal customer or client because now they don't feel ashamed into making a change. They're just along for their nosy little journey. And you get to be the one that helps them see a different way to do things without putting them at the center of it necessarily.

Andréa Jones [00:18:04]:
You're actually showing you're, you're actually just being a freaking human. This is how we exchanged information in my ancestors day. We weren't writing things down. We, we didn't have, you know, libraries and libraries of books available to every single person. We didn't have Google at our fingertip. We would just have to go to our neighbor and be like, howdy, neighbor, what you up to today? Oh, here's what I tried in my yard. Oh, I'm gonna try it too. You know, and that's, that's kind of where we are.

Andréa Jones [00:18:32]:
It's like a human thing, you know. Okay, so last thing I want to talk about before I get into the down and dirty of what you can post today is this concept I've been thinking about for a long time that I haven't talked about before, which is the content middle class. So there is a weird sweet spot right now where there's like high class content, which I'm talking, I'm talking like a studio quality film production, scripts. It still works. Okay, it takes a lot of time and money, but we all still like to see it. We like to see high production, highly produced content. I mean, come on, we still watch Netflix for that reason, right? We like it. But then on the low, I hate low class.

Andréa Jones [00:19:18]:
Maybe I need to come up with a different way to say this, but on the other end of that highly produced content is like low production quality content. Think face time with the bestie. Think. I just woke up like this and I rolled out of bed and I posted it. It's messy, it's spontaneous, it's rots. I just had a thought that works extraordinarily well and that's where I tend to hang out is in that low class, low brow, low quality content. Okay, there is this mid tier that's like semi Polished, that's not doing as well. And my YouTube videos are here.

Andréa Jones [00:19:55]:
They do fine on YouTube. I'm talking short form, like TikTok, like Instagram, you know, the. The talking head style videos where I kind of have my setup, but, you know, it's not. It doesn't have the aesthetic that other people have. That stuff isn't working as well.

Andréa Jones [00:20:18]:
Okay.

Andréa Jones [00:20:19]:
This mid tier level of content is disappearing. Semi polished, semi planned. It looks like you're trying too hard and you didn't quite hit the mark.

Andréa Jones [00:20:29]:
Okay.

Andréa Jones [00:20:31]:
And not saying there's anything bad about this content. I love it. I still create it. Something about y' all consuming it, we don't want to see it. So I think it's better to deliberately go on the lower end of the content production value than try to go on the high end, because that takes so much time, energy and effort. And at the end of that, you could still get the same results potentially. So this is what I'm calling this middle tier of content. I said middle class.

Andréa Jones [00:20:58]:
I don't like that middle tier. This middle tier of content is like disappearing. So what do we do? What do we do about all of this information? First, because of the low production value, you actually can create content quicker. But I do need it to be more thoughtful. Okay, More thoughtful content. We're calling this high concept, low production content.

Andréa Jones [00:21:26]:
Okay.

Andréa Jones [00:21:26]:
High concept, meaning you've considered the target audience, their language, what they want, their desires, what they don't want, the result that they're looking for, where they are now, you, you understand their attention span. You know them so intimately that when they consume your content, they're like, this is me, this is me, and we are the same.

Andréa Jones [00:21:50]:
Okay.

Andréa Jones [00:21:52]:
Lots of thought goes into it, but it's a low production content. I'm talking. It looks like you took a screenshot of your notes app. I'm talking you FaceTime video videos. I'm talking, you know, off the cuff threads, posts that feel like a stream of consciousness. Those types of content pieces are working extraordinarily well right now. And the more specific you can be, the better.

Andréa Jones [00:22:17]:
Okay.

Andréa Jones [00:22:19]:
It's still. It's still high thought, but it's low production value.

Andréa Jones [00:22:24]:
Okay.

Andréa Jones [00:22:25]:
Working so well right now also. What's working well right now? Post less, post less. Whatever you're posting, drop it in half. I went from five posts a week down to two posts a week. And my posts are getting more engagement. And they look, if you go to my Instagram right now, they look like they have less production value intentionally, because that's what's working better right now? Okay, so I'm posting two times a week over on Instagram, two on LinkedIn, sometimes. One, my thread strategy is still the same, to be honest. I may even be posting more over there, but it's more like stream of consciousness.

Andréa Jones [00:23:01]:
I'm just spraying, praying, throwing everything at the wall. It's like my messy drafts folder meets my podcast, like voice chats with my besties. And I actually have more stuff in my drafts right now than I have posted for probably the first time ever. Because there are some content pieces that I spent way too much time on. And I look back at it and I go, this isn't going to work well. Or it's not the time to post this. Or I have one right now where I just feel like I was, like, complaining. And I feel like there's a time and a place where, like, complaining works on social media.

Andréa Jones [00:23:35]:
It's just I'm not feeling that vibe right now. Either way, I'm taking more time to think through my content, Read the room a little bit, be a little bit more reactionary, but post way, way, way less. Okay, so more thoughtful, less production, less quantity, more quality. Okay, now the other thing that I mentioned that I want to linger on for a little bit is being more reactionary. This is, I think, one of the biggest missing pieces right now because marketers, myself included, used to teach these content calendars. And again, nothing wrong with a content calendar. I love a good content calendar moment. However, some of us are planning a little bit too far into the future, and it kind of comes across that way.

Andréa Jones [00:24:26]:
And this is where that mid tier content is coming from. Because it looks like you tried really hard and it looks like you tried really hard, and we kind of go, oh, that's nice. How cute of you. You know, I'm talking like I used to love, and I still do. I love a good styled canva graphic. Just, I just want to eat it up. I love it. And y' all don't love it anymore.

Andréa Jones [00:24:49]:
You look at it and you go, this is an ad from a small business scroll. And so it's not working. And that's me reading the room. You also have to read the room. You know, major events happening in the world, read the room. Maybe don't post that day. If there are trending topics happening in your industry, read the room, react to the trending topic. If there is some sort of meme that's circling, read the room, react.

Andréa Jones [00:25:20]:
So recently we had this whole scenario with the CEO of Astronomy, who astronomer who was seen with an executive at a Coldplay concert. Y' all know the one all the memes came from that. People loved it. I was sharing memes with my husband too. We, we had a good time. But. And any content that wasn't like, along that vein kind of seemed like you weren't in the same conversation.

Andréa Jones [00:25:48]:
Right?

Andréa Jones [00:25:49]:
And I'm not saying you have to join every conversation. You just need to read the room on what's happening. So it kind of feels like everyone's having a conversation and then you're changing the topic to something so unrelated that people are like, okay. And then the conversation just dies a little bit. Okay, so read the room with that. I will also say join more conversations. This is a con. This is a suggestion.

Andréa Jones [00:26:16]:
I have time and time again with my small business owner friends.

Andréa Jones [00:26:21]:
Okay.

Andréa Jones [00:26:22]:
We love a good. Like, I posted it and then sit and watch and wait and going. I hope someone like, leaves me a comment and likes my post and I go, are you leaving comments? Are you liking posts? It feels very much like you're at a networking event and you want to hand out all your business cards and don't want to take nobody else's business card. It's not reciprocal.

Andréa Jones [00:26:43]:
Okay?

Andréa Jones [00:26:43]:
So we need to have a reciprocal emotional relationship here with social media. And a lot of times that is actually giving more than you get.

Andréa Jones [00:26:51]:
Okay?

Andréa Jones [00:26:52]:
So for me, for instance, I spend way, way, way, way, way, way, way more time in my DMS than I ever do creating content. Y' all don't see that because it's dark social media. Dark social media is the hidden social media interactions that you don't see on a day to day basis. Not just DMs, but I'm talking sharing, saving posts, those sorts of things that you can't see publicly. You can see when someone likes it. You can see when someone comments. We all can see that you can't see the DM conversation behind the scenes. Now, there's a few, like, technical reasons why this behind the scenes participatory content works.

Andréa Jones [00:27:32]:
One, you're spending more time on the app. And I don't care what anyone says, you get rewarded for how much time you spend on the app.

Andréa Jones [00:27:38]:
Okay?

Andréa Jones [00:27:39]:
If you spend a lot of time on Instagram, Instagram's going to show your post to more people. It's why sometimes people say post X, Y, Z number of times a day. Because it's just because you're spending so much time on the app. Like you're on there every day, night and day, and you get rewarded for how much time you spend on there. That's just how it is, especially frequent time. So day over day over day two, you. When you start interacting with someone on the app, you both start seeing each other's posts more. So if I interact with you, you interact with me.

Andréa Jones [00:28:10]:
Now we're seeing each other's posts more frequently. So the more people you interact with, especially if you vary that interaction, the more chance they have of seeing your post. So there's a lot of reasons why this works, but I think at the end of the day, what it is is just natural humanness. Again, at play for the win is we just like people. And when we like people, we interact with their posts more. It's not like, groundbreaking, I know, but it's just one of those things that we kind of discredit a little bit. We. We want to, especially as business owners who have so much to do, we would just love post our little posts on Instagram and just say, come buy my stuff.

Andréa Jones [00:28:55]:
And then people see it and they come buy our stuff. Like, that's what. Ultimately, that's what we want to do. We just want people to buy our stuff. If it were that easy, we'd all be millionaires. Just takes a little bit more time.

Andréa Jones [00:29:05]:
Okay?

Andréa Jones [00:29:06]:
Give it that time to do so and be social in your communities. Last thing I'll say before I get to like my quick Hot Takes moment. These are just the thoughts that didn't make it into the notes. Like, into my outline. Carousel posts, voiceovers, videos, audio. People keep asking me, like, what's the best thing to post? And my answer is that to that is to post a variety of things. Y' all hate this answer. Post a variety of things.

Andréa Jones [00:29:36]:
Like, from a technical standpoint, different styles of posts work better at different given moments. So right now I'm recording this on July 31, 2025. If you're on Instagram, you better be posting carousel posts. For most accounts, those carousel posts are doing slightly better than reels, though reels are still high up there in terms of consumption and engagement. Okay, so I'm not saying don't post reels. I'm just saying a good mix, carousel and reels tend to work best. If you're posting all different types of content, all different styles, you get rewarded more. So if you're posting carousels and reels, a static post and stories, you will get rewarded more by the platform.

Andréa Jones [00:30:17]:
The delivery, though, reflects how people consume it. So depending on the information that's available, you may want to present it in a different way. One of the tests that I love doing is taking the same content and putting it in different formats to see how it perform. So I'll take a topic and write it as a carousel post. Then I'll do it as a reel, then I'll do it as a story, and I'll see which performs the best. And then whatever performs the best, I'll do a little bit more of that than the other formats. I keep telling people this, too. I'm on my soapbox today, y'.

Andréa Jones [00:30:48]:
All.

Andréa Jones [00:30:49]:
It varies by account, by niche, by industry, even within the same industry, I've observed the same strategies working completely different on different accounts. Everyone's experience is different. So, yes, I can give you kind of trending advice, like, here's what's generally happening. But it's all a spectrum, right? Some of us are on this side, some of us are that side, some of us are in the middle. So all the advice works for us. So whenever I. Whatever I'm saying today, I want you to take it, try it, look at the data, see if it works for you, and then adjust. All right, I've got some quick, hot takes for you.

Andréa Jones [00:31:24]:
These didn't, like, quite fit into my outline, but it's like a rapid fire. Okay. People keep saying AI generated content is the problem. It's not the problem. Lazy AI generated content is a problem. Okay, I can tell you right now, half of my threads posts come from these podcasts. So this podcast right here, I'm going to put it into AI and say, give me, like, 40 different ideas that I can post to threads and then I'll tweak them and post them. That's AI content, y'.

Andréa Jones [00:31:53]:
All. It A robot helped me put this together. Now, the thoughts came from me because it came from my notes and my outline, but I don't have time to re listen to this and then individually type up all of the thoughts that I think could possibly make a threads post. I don't have time. So I put it into my Cast Magic tool. It gives me a bunch of things back. I use, like, half of them, I schedule them out, and away we go. Okay, so it's not AI that's a problem.

Andréa Jones [00:32:20]:
It's lazy AI that's a problem. To me, it's like Botox. I used to work at a spa, a day spa that offered injectables. The people who came in and got Botox, 99% of them looked amazing. You can't even tell if I said that person has Botox, you'd go, really? Yes. Y' all just notice the 1% of people who either got a bad Botox job or did it way too much. And it just looks a little like Uncanny Valley, right? Y' all are looking at these AI posts and going, oh, that's definitely AI. I can tell you right now a lot of it is produced by AI.

Andréa Jones [00:32:56]:
Doesn't necessarily mean it's a bad thing. It's just like the lazy generic AI content that y' all like. Okay, hot take two hashtags. They're not as important anymore. We spend too much time on hashtags. We spend too much time on time of day. What time of day should I post? What hashtag should I post? They're not that important. The algorithms, another robot behind the scenes, are so much smarter than they were two years ago, they're smarter than they were five years ago, and they're actively trying to match your content with your people.

Andréa Jones [00:33:26]:
Looking at the content itself, if you're recording a video video, it's looking at the words in your video. If you have a carousel post with text in the post, it's looking at that, it's looking at your captions. So what you need to do is make sure all of that is clear first and foremost.

Andréa Jones [00:33:40]:
Okay.

Andréa Jones [00:33:41]:
Hashtag can be a seasoning. It's great. It's just not as important as it used to be. It is not the main dish. So make sure that the content in your post accurately represents what you do or what you want to be about. And then the AI algorithm will try to match you with the person who would maybe like that post. Okay? Three text based platforms are making a comeback. I know everyone loves a good video moment.

Andréa Jones [00:34:07]:
I'm a video galley, I love it. However, threads and LinkedIn are having a moment.

Andréa Jones [00:34:11]:
Okay.

Andréa Jones [00:34:12]:
Threads, short form, stream of consciousness. I'm just chit chatting. It's having its moment. LinkedIn, y' all are discounting LinkedIn. There's a lot of money to be have over in LinkedIn, a lot of buying decisions. You definitely don't have to post as much, but you've got to be a part of the community and you have to find your people because again, there are some lazy AI generated content out there that just looks, I don't know, clickbaity. And it's not for me, and it's not for you probably too. So you got to find your people and be in community with them.

Andréa Jones [00:34:41]:
Long form content is still having a day in the sun. In fact, I'm seeing more of my clients shift to more long form content and less shorter form Content. I know for me, for instance, I produce about equal amount. So I have two newsletters, I produce a week, I have this podcast. And then when I'm really going, I have a YouTube video as well. That's more long form content than short form content.

Andréa Jones [00:35:07]:
Okay?

Andréa Jones [00:35:07]:
And so for me, long form, like bingeable content, is working really well for me. I know I said attention spans are shifting, but when your people find something they love, we want the whole series. We want multiple series.

Andréa Jones [00:35:20]:
Okay?

Andréa Jones [00:35:21]:
If you're like me, you're like, and I see like one or two episodes of something, I'm like, I'll wait, I'll wait till the whole series is done, that I'll go watch it. The same thing is for your people when they find your podcast, your YouTube channel, your substack, whatever it is. We're going through the archives, babe. So when you think about your long form content, I want you to think about it as bingeable. People are loving that right now, especially for blog posts. Okay, so those are my hot takes. But I don't want you to feel discouraged at the end of this thinking like, oh, woe is me. It's not as important.

Andréa Jones [00:35:55]:
The main takeaway for me, for you, that I want you to have is that social media one is just a part of your marketing ecosystem. It's a part, it's a. It's an important piece, but it's not the biggest piece of your marketing. It plays a significant role, but it's more of like a supporting actress role, less main character. Okay, you need to decide what the main character of your marketing is. Where do you spend the most time, who's going to win the awards, and then the supporting character helps them get there. Okay, that'll be very helpful for you. Two, it's not that your content isn't working.

Andréa Jones [00:36:31]:
It's not that you're bad at it. It's just that the rules have changed and you haven't changed with it. I used to teach make sure you post three to five times a week on Instagram. That is no longer necessary, nor do I advise it for a lot of my business owners that I work with. If you have less than 10k followers, especially not post that much, you're spending too much time creating content.

Andréa Jones [00:36:53]:
Okay.

Andréa Jones [00:36:54]:
Three, take a look at your data. Y' all hate data, insights, metrics, whatever you want to call. Feels like stepping on a scale. I know, I don't like that scale number either, but sometimes gotta do a little check in just to see where you're actually at and not where you feel like you're at. So check in with your data. Look long term, don't look at just one post. Look at a collection of posts and see what the trends are in your own data. Okay, what surprises you? What did it? What can you do more of what didn't? And even look at the emotional data points that are really hard to look at when you're looking at the metric.

Andréa Jones [00:37:35]:
So for me, for instance, whenever I post about my kids, those posts go off. Emotionally though, I don't like it, so I don't do it. So, like, yeah, the data could say, Andrea, post a kit, a photo of your kids. Everyone's gonna love it. I don't love it, so I'm not going to do it. So you've got to also check in with yourself too. All right, my friends, I hope that you're excited that you don't have to post as much on social media. I hope that your, your wheels are turning about how you can really create an experience that works really well for you on social media media.

Andréa Jones [00:38:09]:
And I hope that you're ready to figure out who the main character of your marketing is so that social media can play the supporting role that it's meant to be. If you want to learn more about this, I'm definitely talking about this next week, so stay tuned. In the meantime, can you leave a five star review on Apple podcasts or Spotify keeps us in the top 100 marketing podcasts. And that's all because of your support, my friends. I'll see you next week. Bye for now.