💁♀ 7 Pillars To Attract More Likes, Followers And Engagement 👍
Social media is the nucleus of how your business grows. When utilized correctly, social media can attract more consumers to your content. But how can you magnetize these consumers into your business through social media marketing? In this episode, Blair Kaplan Venables, a social media marketing expert, describes the seven pillars to attract more likes, followers, and engagement. She also shares a stress-free checklist that you can use for your daily method of operations on your social media. Tune in to this episode and magnetize those potential customers now!
#impactfulentrepreneurshow #guestinterview #socialmediapillars
The lead magnet, which includes Stress-Free Social Media Checklists, guides you on what to do on social media daily. It guides you on what to do on social media every week. It guides you on what to do on social media every month.
https://blairkaplan.ca/get-in-touch/
https://www.socialsalesmachine.com/hyperdrive
https://www.facebook.com/groups/6.figure.strategy
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💁♀ 7 Pillars To Attract More Likes, Followers And Engagement 👍
Have you ever thought to yourself, "If I just had a step-by-step plan and a day-by-day checklist of what to do on social media, I'd do it. I would do anything, just give me the list. Break it down. Make it simple. I just need a daily method of operation. I need a way to wrap my head around all this social media stuff," then you're in the perfect place.
In this episode, I am going to be talking with an amazing human who is a social media expert. She's going to walk you through how to wrap your head around how you should be thinking about social media, and how to show up in a super magnetic way. She's even going to give you a stress-free checklist that you can use so that you do have that daily method of operations. You know exactly what to do to make the absolute most of the time that you spend feeding your social media. Let's do this.
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I'm here with Blair Kaplan Venables. She's an expert in social media marketing, and the President of Blair Kaplan Communications, which is a British Columbia-based PR agency. She brings fifteen years of experience to her clients as a pioneer in the industry. She has helped her customers grow their followers into tens of thousands in just one month, win integrative marketing awards, launch their businesses and more.
Yahoo has listed Blair as a top 10 social media expert to watch in 2021. We are super blessed to have her here with us. I can't wait to dig into her topic. She's going to talk to us about all things related to social media empowerment, and showing up in the most impactful way that you can. We couldn't have had this event without her. Blair, I'm so excited you're here. Welcome.
Thank you so much for having me. What an honor.
What a fun group we have. I love your topic of empowerment because there are so many people that know social media is important to build a business. That's where the people are hanging out, but they don't feel like they found their voice yet. They don't feel empowered to show up as their real self. They don't know what to say or how to say it, and they feel like, "Someone tell me what to do."
At the essence of what you teach, what is social media empowerment, and how can we all feel empowered to show up as our best selves? That's what I'd love to dig into. Before we do, in case anyone in the audience has not met you yet, I'd find that hard to believe, but just in case. Could you tell us a little bit about you and your entrepreneurial journey, and how you became this expert in this space?
I have a pretty big story, but thinking about when it all began, I believe I was born to be an entrepreneur. I have lots of entrepreneurs on both sides of my family. I remember when I was twelve years old, I got my mom to sign up for Avon to be an Avon lady. I went door-to-door selling makeup so I can afford my own lipstick.
I've always been very entrepreneurial. When I've had jobs, I've been entrepreneurial. I like to say that if I was on The Real Housewives, my tagline would be, "I don't make the rules. I just break the rules." I can't be put in a box. No one puts a baby in a corner. I've been surrounded by entrepreneurs my entire life. I have it in my DNA. It's been a cool journey.
At the age of 23, at the beginning of the recession, I was a new resident of Vancouver, British Columbia, and I was working for Lululemon Athletica. After three and a half years, I decided that I want to start my own PR company, which is what I went to school for. They wanted me to move up in management, but I had had enough of folding stretchy pants.
I decided that I'm going to start my own company, and I did. That was many years ago. That was at the beginning of the rise of social media marketing. It wasn't even a profession yet. I am self-taught. Anything to do with social media, I've taken what I know from public relations and marketing and have applied it to social media. That's where I am now.
I'm a social media marketing expert and mentor who empowers you to uplevel your social media skills. I do other things too. I speak, coach, mentor, write and create. I'm also the founder of the I Am Resilient project, which is a community where we gather stories of resilience. I like to take cool projects on. I like to be in that uncomfortable and exciting space of innovation.
If something doesn't exist and I want it to exist, I create it. Sometimes I create things that people need that I didn't even know I knew how to do. That is where I am now. I'm still located in British Columbia. I'm not in Vancouver anymore. I'm in Kamloops, British Columbia. I just moved here to a new home in a semi-desert mountain environment which I absolutely love. I find a lot of inspiration from being out in nature on the trails, the river and the lakes. It's super cool. I love to disconnect so I'm reinvigorated when I am connected.
There are so many entrepreneurs who when they first step into it, they're like, "Now that I'm an entrepreneur, I have to be this totally different person." They say that they don't feel authentic. No wonder. They think they have to be someone they're not. I love that in your story, you took your PR background and you said, "How am I going to take this zone of genius that I have and adapt it to this new space of social media that's emerging?" You embraced who you were already and layered it on top of filling this gap and learning this new skill. I love that about your story. It’s super fascinating. Let's talk about being resilient and feeling empowered on social media.
I got to tell you a little side story first. There's something missing from the story, and we have a limited amount of time. It’s about being resilient and innovative and whatnot. It's funny, Lululemon gives their staff complimentary yoga. I lived my life a certain way, and then when I quit I was like, "Yoga is so expensive." I looked for a way to still maintain my lifestyle for less of a cost, and I couldn't find a way to do so.
While starting my PR company, I actually had another company that I started. It was a coupon company for health and wellness. It started off as a coupon book called Living Free, Vancouver. It was a printed coupon book. I went to all the fitness and fun travel places that I wanted to try. I said, "Do you want to be in my coupon book to inspire a healthy lifestyle?" Everyone said yes. It morphed into being an online health and wellness community like a digital coupon book, and then a group by models similar to Groupon. It was around the same time Groupon was coming out.
It's super interesting because that's what put me on the map. That's what got me out networking. It wasn't to grow my PR company. It was, "I created a coupon company and it was growing." What I realized was I didn't want to own a coupon company. I just wanted free yoga so I just pay for the damn class. I wanted to throw that in there to show you that while building my business in the emergence of social media, I was building a digital company.
What I love about that. You saw a gap that needed to be filled and you filled it. You didn't wait for someone to come and give the solution to you. You created it.
It's a blessing and a curse, and resilience. That part of that is resilience. I've had to be resilient since I was little. I believe that we have this thing called a resilience muscle woven through our being. There are things you can do to strengthen your resilience muscle so when you need to activate it, you're able to move through a challenging time with a bit more ease.
We have a resilience muscle woven through our being. There are things you can do to strengthen your resilience muscle. So when you need to activate it, you can move through a challenging time more easily.
Over the last few years, my life has been pretty difficult. Personally, I've had a lot of challenges. It's been cool because I didn't know I was strengthening my resilience muscle for all these years. I've implemented new techniques. How can you pour from an empty cup? You need to take care of yourself. Over the last year, I've had probably one of the hardest and worst years of my life, but my business has been the most successful it's ever been.
It's because you've learned how to build that resilience muscle. Let’s unpack that a little because I love this topic. I see time and time again the entrepreneurs that stand the test of time. The business owners out there who thrive are the ones who have grit and perseverance, and they're resilient. Let's unpack that a little bit as it relates to social media. What role does resilience play in social media and how can we leverage that? What should the audience know about that?
I used to define resilience as the ability to bounce back after a difficult time, but then I started thinking, “Bouncing back to what? What am I bouncing back to?” It's about bouncing forward. It's about taking that lesson that you've learned in hindsight and moving forward in life as a new version of yourself. What's important with social media for brands, whether it's a huge organization or not, is to have a personality, to be a real person, and to show up. It’s not just putting out content to feed an algorithm.
I led a workshop called, "F the algo." I hate the algorithm. I don't create content for the algorithm. I create content for the hero, the persona or the customer. I create content that I want to create, and not based on any sort of algorithm. I tell stories. They're not always sunshine and rainbows, but sometimes it's about the sudden loss of my mother and now, I have a senior cat that was hers that actually was mine when I was a teenager. I'm moving my cat across the country. While being on webinars, the cat shows up. People follow along on my journey. They know this cat, Zena, was in my life when I was nineteen.
We lived in Winnipeg. My mom suddenly got sick and passed away, and now I have her cat. She came from Winnipeg to Pemberton to Kamloops. They're following me on social media and following these journeys, and then they maybe are seeing me on a workshop or a webinar, and the cat walks across the screen. I tell stories. I believe that businesses don't exist without the person behind social media. The person behind social media is a real person. If it's a large organization, what are the stories of the people of the organization?
Businesses don't exist without the person behind social media. And the person behind social media is a real person.
We buy products from people. Let's build that like, know and trust. I never want someone to feel uncomfortable. Only share what you want to share, and maybe share a lesson learned from a personal experience. I'm very open. I share everything, but it's who I am. My experiences are what I bring to my clients. It's how I show up. The I Am Resilient project was like the coupon company. I created something that I thought needed to exist because I got some bad news. My dad isn't well and he lives with an addiction. We had a bumpy life together. In my twenties, I forgave him and we developed a beautiful relationship. At the end of 2018, we learned he was terminally ill. I felt like I was being robbed. How is that fair?
We started telling our story about forgiveness, resilience and addiction. It was helping people and I was like, "Someone heard my story and they went and got a therapist. Someone heard my story and went to fix things with their dad." I said, "Dad, maybe we should create a legacy piece out of this story. Why don't we gather stories of resilience from around the world? We'll publish a coffee table-style book to inspire people to move through their challenges.”
Part of strengthening your resilience muscle is sharing your story, whether it's in a diary, to a therapist, or in a public platform or community like ours, and not keeping everything bottled in. You can't keep everything in. I was like, "I guess we need to create a website," so I built a website. "I guess we need social media," so I created social media.
We've been gathering stories for two and a half years. My dad, to this day, is actually still with us. The book's coming out in October. That all came because we created this thing that was helping people. Social media plays a huge role in that. That's how we found a lot of the stories that are going to come into our book and that is going to be in our community. This is not a co-author situation where I'm charging people. If they wanted to be in the book, they were in the book. I believe every story should be told. A portion of each printed book that's sold is going to get donated back to supporting mental health and addiction.
I have goosebumps thinking about this. We need to have a conversation on the side.
I know. This is not what we plan to talk about. Social media is the nucleus or the center of how this is all growing. Social media is how we're going to become bestsellers. It's how authors from around the world are going to get the message out. It's how we're going to empower more people. Empowerment is so important.
The common thread throughout this whole story is people pay attention to stories. Stories are what captivates our hearts and our minds. It's what makes us pay attention. Stories are powerful, in general, but they're especially powerful on social media. People are so done. They're so over with the perfectly curated feed where everything is perfect and their life is perfect. That's crap. Nothing is perfect. I'm sorry. Throw that out the window.
Sometimes I'm like, "I want to try this." As I said earlier, I can't follow rules. I don't make the rules, I just break the rules. Life isn't curated. There are ways to let people in. It can still look great on social media.
There is a spot for being vulnerable on social. Part of resilience is making it through that. The beginning stage is being vulnerable, then making it through whatever the thing is, and then the outcome is that you're resilient. Vulnerability plays a huge role in social media. In that resilience story, I can totally see that.
This is fascinating. Stories and vulnerability matter. It's not just about selling my thing. It's the person underneath the business. Who are you? What makes you resilient? What story do you have to tell? I love that. I almost want to connect on the side right away. It’s like I have all these ideas but I got to focus.
I want to say that one of my biggest tips is to tell, don't sell. Tell your story. Don't sell your product. Things connect on the side.
You'll naturally attract people. Let's unpack social media a little bit more. People have heard that storytelling matters before. Hearing it from this perspective brings it home of why storytelling matters. This is a perfect example of how storytelling grows an audience and a grassroots effort, and all those things. What else should our audience be doing to truly feel empowered, to become more resilient and effective on social media? There's some heart involved, but there's also the day-to-day. You have to be organized. What else should our audience know about being effective on social media?
I created something called the social media empowerment pillars. These are seven pillars that I believe if you build them out in your strategy, will allow you to be a recognized thought leader in your industry. A thought leader is an expert who has an idea. They act on it. They innovate, stand out, and build up a reputation where they are mentioned in the media, and their expertise is featured in the media. Instead of them going to look for clients, the clients look for them and find them. These seven pillars that I built out are important pillars. Under each pillar, there are strategies. We don't have time to go into that. Why don't I share the seven pillars?
Let's do that. Let's click through them quickly to make sure people have that framework.
Educate And Entertain
It spells out EMPOWER. Don't think of it that they have to be done in order. You're building them all at the same time like pillars. You can't put one pillar up, and then the roof. E is for Edutain. That's educate and entertain. All things related to content. Under that is your content strategy. M is for Money. What is your marketing budget, but also what are your money goals? We were never taught in school to set money goals. What are your goals? "I desire to make $1 million. I desire to make $100,000." You need to know how much you want to make in order to build out an effective strategy.
Money
Otherwise, you're just wandering around aimlessly. You have no idea when it's time to celebrate because you don't even know what you were aiming for.
Personas
That's a huge part, celebrating when you hit those milestones. I used to be like, "I know how to make five figures a month." I restructured and I actually set money goals and I had multiple five-figure days. I was like, "That's amazing." Having an ad budget is important, too. You have to figure out your money. P is for Personas. Those are the heroes. Who are you creating content for?
Who's your audience? Who are the people listening, tuning in, and ready to see what you have next? That's what you're calling personas.
Other Players
O is Other Players. If someone is not spending money with you, who are they spending money with? If someone is not following you on social media, who are they following? I believe in collaboration over competition. I have multiple coaches for different things, some are in the same industry because we all have something different to offer. I don't like to call it competition. I like to say Other Players.
My favorite is lurking. I love to see who are the other social media coaches. What kind of content are they making? What are they teaching? How many followers do they have? What do they do well? What don't they do well? It shows opportunities for you. It gives you inspiration, but also potentially opens a door for collaboration in the future.
The wide world of social media is so full of people. There's plenty of abundance for everybody. There's no reason to treat your competition as competition. Collaboration is where it's at. I love that you call them Other Players. That's a cool term.
Share Your Wins
W is for Wins. One, we are humble human beings. You got to brag about it. I call it peacocking. Share your wins. You landed a client. You got the paycheck, the speaking engagement, or whatever it might be. First of all, share your wins. This has to do with publicity. This isn't just wins, but this is the thought leadership piece or the publicity piece where you build out a media plan to be recognized as an expert in your industry in the media.
Share your wins. It is the thought leadership piece, the publicity piece where you build out a media plan to be a recognized expert in your industry in the media.
It's providing social proof like, "I'm not just here squawking to myself. I'm doing these things for a reason, and here are all the people who are noticing.”
Engagement
Publicity is an important part of a social media strategy. E is for Engagement. You need to have an engagement strategy, social media engagement or in-person engagement when that becomes a thing again. Schedule engagement time and then build a strategy around it. That is so important. We're not just pumping out communication. We're not a one-way broadcasting tool. We're real people having conversations with real people. That's how you're going to grow. You're not hacking an algorithm. Connecting and making real connections. That's how you're going to grow.
I hope you guys are noticing a trend. How many of the speakers now, at this point, have all said it's about connection? It's about real relationships and real connections. Here it is again. It couldn't be more true. We're not just trying to hack an algorithm or check ten boxes every day. We're trying to be real people connecting with real people.
Realistic Goals
The last one is my favorite. This is something I learned when I started at Lululemon in 2005. Realistic Goals. What are your personal goals? What are your health goals? What are your professional goals? They all work together. It's important to know those things because when you share them on social media, people root you on and they cheer you on. They maybe will help you get closer to your goals.
When you share your goals on social media, people root you on and cheer you on. They may help you get closer to your goals.
I'm going to share an example. I set a goal at the beginning of 2021. I was like, "I want to be featured in Forbes and Fast Company." I was starting to work towards all that because media wins. You start with your low-hanging fruit, and media breeds more media. I was working towards it. I have signed up for something called Help A Reporter Out, HARO. There's that little nugget for you. You get emails every day from journalists writing articles and looking to speak to experts.
I always answer requests. Sometimes the article comes out right away. Sometimes it doesn't. Sometimes a journalist will say, "I'm including you." Sometimes they don't. Anyways, in January, one of my goals is to be featured in Fast Company and Forbes. I'm very public about it. I talk about it on lives, in social media, this and that, and networking. I believe it was March 2021, I reset my Google alerts. I check every so often. I'm like, "Did I miss something?" I actually go to the publications and type my name in just to see if someone wrote about me. In October 2021, my expertise was featured in Forbes, but they spelt my name wrong. They added an E at the end of Blair. I had no idea.
You had already hit your goal and you didn't even know it.
Exactly. I'm so public about it. Another goal I'm public about is I desire to empower eight million people by the time I'm 40, so in four years. That could be people who've watched our videos and read articles. I want to empower people through resilience and social media. I have a TV interview coming out in November. I was looking at it to do some prep for marketing. They're like, "Our viewership is fourteen million people." I was like, "I just hit my goal. I should have made it higher." I share my goals. The thing is when you do that, people see the power in you knowing what you're doing.
Number one, you have an audience now that's cheering you on and they're watching your journey and they're like, "Is she going to get there?" It’s like binge-watching their favorite episode. They want to see what's going to happen on your journey, but it also holds you accountable. You can't shrink away from your goals once you've made them public. People know. They're not going to forget. You have to keep going. Don't give up. I love that for both of those reasons of how fun. Did you share it with your audience like, "I actually hit this goal six months ago?"
Yeah. I was like, "If a tree falls in the woods and no one hears it, did it really fall? If you're mentioned in Forbes and you don't know about it, did it really happen?" I put out a newsletter and social media posts. It was exciting. I love what I do. In February is when I lost my mom suddenly. My mom was my biggest fan. She would've been so excited for me.
I found out right after she passed away that this happened. I was so sad that she couldn't have experienced it, and knowing that if I would've known in October, she would've seen that. Having that huge win of a goal that I didn't know I achieved, but finding out I achieved it. It came at a dark time in my life. It was awesome.
I shared it because people were following along. They knew I lost my mom. They knew everything I was going through. They knew my goals. Being able to show up in whatever way I'm able to show up if I'm able to show up, I do. There are some days that were extremely fulfilling for me. It was a very full day but didn't make a post that I probably should have made. I posted a lot in my story. I always say, "If you don't feel like posting, don't post. Show up when you want to show up." If you have a business and you never feel like posting, then hire someone.
If you don't feel like posting, don't post. Show up when you want to show up. If you have a business and never feel like posting, hire someone.
I love that. You can't create a fan base who's there cheering for you if they don't know what they're cheering for. You have to share enough of yourself, what you're doing, and what you're involved in. Everyone loves the reality TV show view of peeking into someone else's life for a hot minute. Give them something to look at.
It's like you have your own reality show. My Instagram is BlairFromBlairLand, and that's what it is. I let you into Blair Land. Although that's not the intention of the username. That came from a high school party way back when. I introduced myself to a bunch of the older boys as Blair from Blair Land. That nickname got stuck. Look at your Instagram or your social media, even the stories feature. As your reality show, let people in. People want to know.
A lot of people hear that advice and think, "My life is boring. I'm not featured in Forbes. I'm not a big deal yet. I have the same routine every day." What advice would you give to those people who are feeling like they're not super interesting? Do you have any advice for them?
Everyone is interesting. What you might not think is interesting, a bunch of people will. There are people who will have the same routine. Share it. What if you shared the exact same routine every day, but you probably have a different outfit on? If you don't, that's also okay. You document your life and maybe you ask for people's input like, "How can I spice things up? What do you want to know about my routine?" What you think may be normal and boring might be fascinating.
Maybe you eat your Cheerios with chocolate milk. Maybe you struggle with getting your kids dressed in the morning. Maybe you've been getting a lot of funny spam emails. Right now, my power went out and literally came on three minutes before this interview. I was panicking and reconnecting the Wi-Fi. I looked at all the other networks and I just moved to this home. The networks that are around me are so funny. I didn't have time to post it, but I took a picture of the funny internet network passwords. It's such a small thing, but it's a piece of content.
People might just be overthinking it. What you think is boring, someone else might find fascinating. Your regular routine that's the same every day. Someone might be craving routine and being like, "For the first time ever, I'm going to set up a routine in my life." Maybe you inspire them. You don't know.
You'll never know. Look at what's on social media. People make videos of them opening packages or eating food. I'm not saying you should do that. I sometimes put food photos but never of me eating because I'm a sloppy eater. There is something for everyone. I guess there are some jobs that are quite monotonous, but our lives aren't. Life is so unpredictable.
Some jobs are quite monotonous, but our lives aren't. Life is so unpredictable.
I loved the seven pillars. I thought that was so helpful. My gut tells me that there's someone in the audience that's like, "Can you repeat them one more time because I didn't write them all down.? Can we go through really quickly what each of those letters is again?
E is for edutain, M for money, P for persona, O for other players, W for wins, E for engagement, and R for realistic goals.
Even if you feel like you have nothing to post about. Even if you just focus on those seven pillars, and you started integrating them into your business and just post about how you're integrating them into your business, and boom, there's a topic.
There you go. You tag me. Be like, "I'm learning from BlairFromBlairLand or Blair Kaplan Venables the EMPOWER pillars. I'm going to try something out. Here's one of my goals."
I love that. It’s super simple and super actionable. It can allow people to feel empowered to show up. Even if prior to this interview they maybe weren't sure what to talk about. I love it. Another important part of social media is being consistent and showing up. To do that, you have to be organized a little bit. You can't be a hot mess throwing spaghetti all over. How can people stay organized and stay on task and show up as their best selves? Do you have any tips there?
I love lists. I have a notebook of lists, and then I have a Post-it Note. My notebook is divided into five days, Monday to Friday. There are lists for each day. I have a Post-it Note for the most important things. What I created was actually a social media checklist package for stress-free social media management. That's what you should do every month, every week, and every day on social media. It's just a guide to remind you to engage, post, follow, and do all the things you should do.
I'm with you. I like lists and I love checking off the boxes. There's something so fulfilling about that. If you've ever been wondering, "What should I do on social media? Please, someone tell me what to do every day, every week and every month," you have your list. You can check it off. Feels super organized, and then go through those seven pillars and nail it. I love it.
Those EMPOWER pillars aren't on the social media checklist. That's a whole other thing. If you connect with me on social media or even go to my website, BlairKaplan.ca. You can connect with me and follow me. I do a lot of free workshops. I do free master classes. I do group coaching and private coaching. I love to edutain.
Thank you so much for your time and expertise. I love the seven pillars. I love the checklist. It takes something that can feel otherwise overwhelming and simplify it and streamline it. People are craving that so they're going to love it.
Important Links
BlairFromBlairLand - Instagram
Blair Kaplan Venables - Twitter
About Blair Kaplan
Blair Kaplan Venables is an expert in social media marketing and the president of Blair Kaplan Communications, a British Columbia-based PR agency. She brings fifteen years of experience to her clients which include global wellness, entertainment and lifestyle brands. As a pioneer in the industry, she has helped her customers grow their followers into the tens of thousands in just one month, win integrative marketing awards, launch their businesses and more. Yahoo! listed Blair as a top ten social media expert to watch in 2021. She has spoken on national stages and her expertise has been featured in media outlets including Forbes, CBC Radio, Entrepreneur and Thrive Global. Blair is also the #1 bestselling author of Pulsing Through My Veins: Raw and Real Stories from an Entrepreneur and co-host of the Dissecting Success podcast. When she’s not working on the board for her local chamber of commerce, you can find Blair growing the “I Am Resilient Project,” an online community where users share their stories of overcoming life’s most difficult moments.