How to Plan, Post & Grow on Social Media Without the Overwhelm

One of the biggest to dos and challenges any small business owner has is just mastering the art of social media. Just knowing who's your ideal customer, where are they hanging out, where do you start really engaging and building community and how do you do it effectively? There are so many ins and outs from every single platform and certainly there's a lot of struggles that we all have in common with social. So that's why today on the podcast, I'm excited to dive deep into this topic and have this conversation with my friend, Peg Fitzpatrick. Peg just wrote a really great book, the Art of Small Business Business Social Media A Blueprint for Marketing Success. Peg is going to dive today into what it means to really be successful on social media. What are the challenges that we're seeing right now and how to overcome them? And how do you start to plan and batch your content in effective strategies to actually build community around your brand? I know you're going to love this one and you're going to love Peg's book. So I've got that linked up for you in the show. Notes. But get ready to take some notes and start learning. Meet my friend, Peggy. Foreign. Business can be a lonely game, but it doesn't have to be. Welcome to Boutique Chat where we explore community over competition and how to scale your company with the balance and the happiness that we all seek. We'll hear from product based businesses of all types, retailers, e commerce and wholesale brands, along with industry experts shaping the future of our industry. I'm your host, Ashley Alderson from the Boutique Hub and I can't wait to chat. Hey guys, welcome back to the podcast. This week we are going to be talking about, you know, one of my absolute favorite topics. Peg, I'm going to nerd out as you get to get started speaking today. So just prepare yourself and everyone who's listening today. Make sure to take tons of notes. I know there's going to be lots of opportunity for that. So Peg, welcome to the podcast.

Thank you so much for having me. Ashley, I am so excited to talk to you. Doing podcast interviews, it's so fun because you get to meet a lot of new people and people listening. You know, you guys all know Ashley and you love her because you listen to her show every week. But I feel like it's such a gift to meet new people all the time.

I feel the same way and I have been so excited. I can't wait to fully finish digging through your book and all of your content because it is amazing what you're creating for small business. Owners. So let's just, like, back up. For those who have not met you yet, Peggy, how did you first get started teaching small business owners the art of social media and marketing and all the things that you do today? Where did that all come from?

Well, you know, if you go way, way, way back when I was in college, my second time going to college, I was an adult student. So, like, in my 30s, I went to college and I went for English, and then I ended up majoring in education, English with a minor in geography. So those were all the things that I love. So I really wanted to be a classroom teacher. And my mom was a te. And it just, like, did not happen. Like a weird thing. Glitch happened at college, and they were like, okay, here's your bill for the semester. And it was like, for the whole year. I had to pay right then or I couldn't go. And I had three little kids, so, no, I did not have that money saved up. And it was. It was the college that made an error, not me, because I did all the paperwork. But they lost it. It was before the. Before everything was done on the computer. That's how old I am. So. So anyway, so I immediately went into the classroom, started teaching. You know, I did a pivot. I had one day of super sadness, and then I was like, fine, I'll just, you know. And the principal found out, and he was like, hey, come and. Come and teach at our school. So I was like, cool. So teaching is something that I love. And. And then, you know, working at other jobs. I worked at other small businesses, and I worked at a company where I did traditional marketing, where I was doing email marketing and flyers and connecting with people online and all of that kind of things. But this is pre Internet, so I was working at a very. A job that I loved, but it was very hard working as a property manager. And so it was like social work, really, because it was social work kind of things. So I switched from social work to social media because all of that job was basically. I mean, it was social work. But then also you were doing, like, really serious paperwork every month that was like doing taxes for every single property. Like, it was like doing 30 or 40 versions of taxes. So it was. It's not my happy place. I was like, I can do it. And I did a good job at it, but it really didn't, like, fulfill me at all. I need to do, like, creative things. And. And I've. I've always been. I was like a theater girl. There's lots of People in marketing that were in theater or dance or voice or something like that. Were you in any of those?

Yeah, well, speech. So not necessarily we didn't have it. But like speech.

Speech team. Yes, yes. So but again, you were like up in front of people. You were preparing. There's similar things. I'm sure you found a lot of things in speech that helped you be great at what you do now. Because a lot of people speaking is their greatest fear. Like being on speech team, most people would be like, heck no. Like, that's not my jam. So then fast forward, I started working. So I was doing that job and I really wanted to do something else. And this opportunity came up to work for a company and do their marketing. And I had all these ideas to use this brand new thing called Facebook, which pages were just coming out. So when I started, there was no guidelines for anything. So anything that I've ever wanted to do, I've had to figure it out. This is before there was lots of blogs on it. There was like a couple books on marketing, but not. And I read everything and I would take workshops, but there just was never the thing that I wanted to learn. So I started teaching, teaching myself how to do everything. And I did it all on my own account before I would work on the company's stuff. So I say I accidentally built myself a social platform because I was testing things and using things and figuring things out and then I would use it on the company stuff. So that kind of evolved. And that was like a part time thing. So in moving forward, I had my own blog. And then I worked for a little Australian startup that you may have heard of called Kitchen Canva. Do you use Canva?

I love Canva. Yes.

Yeah. So I always say it that way because at the time I started, nobody knew who Canva was. Nobody knew who it was. And my job was head of social strategy. My job was to help people learn who they were. They had a really cool product already. It was like in this little baby infancy. I was like employee 24, 25 with Guy Kawasaki. I know who started like, now they think they have 2,000 people. So this was in their tiny first original office. And I worked in the United States. It was before really remote workers were even a thing. And I helped bring Canva to the US market and really kind of launch it using the things that I was. And I just figured out like how, you know, the main thing was like how to build a community. So I basically just figured out things as I went along and I've really been so lucky to be like in a bunch of different spaces. I've spoken at a bunch of conferences, like big conferences, marketing conferences, but also like for small businesses. And I worked with like behind the scenes with Pinterest and Instagram, like all the big Google, YouTube, like all of them behind the scenes. And my heart though really lies with small businesses because the big companies have all the money and they have the marketing teams and they have the ad budgets and all those things. So they're all set at this point, right? They all, they're all covered. There's millions of marketers. They all have. Now you can learn all this in college and come out and with, you know, degrees in all of these things. But I, during the pandemic especially, I like my heart was breaking over and over again for small businesses who just could not succeed because they had nothing for marketing. Like they weren't online, they didn't have a website. Like that's how it is for small businesses. They just don't have the time and the money to invest in things and then they don't know what to do. So I wrote this book because I really wanted to help all the people who really needed it but couldn't afford the big things. So my book is not how to use ads and it's really all organic marketing, but it shows you from the beginning to the end how to do all the things. So it was kind of like a brain dump of all the things that I've learned really with a filter of small businesses. And I know you also serve that same market. So you get it. Small businesses are literally the heart of all of our communities. There are neighbors, there are family members that have this dream to do something, whether it's just to make enough money to help with groceries or pay for, you know, camp for your kids. Like there's, it's expensive. Yeah, everything has gone crazy price wise for, for families. It's just, you know. No, I don't really know anybody who can do it on one income if you have kids. Yeah, I don't think it's that possible anymore, do you?

No, I don't. I think it's, I think everybody is looking for a side hustle or a new way to make a new opportunity. And when I think about like what's really the power of social media? It is the power to build a brand, really like a lifestyle brand so that no matter where or how you pivot, like let's say you're selling one product and all of a sudden you decide this small Business isn't for me. As long as you've built a brand and a community and had a really strong social presence, you can pivot and sell anything instantly, and you can test your market out instantly, which is just such a huge opportunity as well.

Yeah. Which is why I've always used my name for everything. All my social handles are my name, and My website is pegfitzpatrick.com. you know, at the time I was starting, most people were like, you have to have a cute name for your blog. And I get that. And I. And I appreciate people that do that. And there's a lot of people who are very successful, but for me, I was like, I want it to be me. So if I write a book, it's under me, like, and people are like, are you going to do a book website? I'm like, no, I want people to come to my website and there's a tab for the book. You know, all of those things. There's a. I mean, it works if you do a name for it, but you're asking people to remember more things.

Yeah.

If they just remember Ashley, you're like, if they can remember your name. Like, that is a very big start at all. Because people see a lot of stuff when they come online.

Yeah, for sure. So there's definitely. I mean, I think as I'm thinking about the retailers who are listening, like, most of them have a boutique name, and we have social media. We've got to build the brand of the boutique name. But simultaneously, you're building a personal brand in your name as well, and leveraging two different social media channels to drive traffic to the same place, essentially. Right.

And if you're. If you're in that situation, like, just take Instagram, for example, you can have both of those names there. You can have your URL, but you always want to have your name too, because you don't want to give all of your mojo to something else. Right.

Your.

Your mojo should stay with you.

Well, Peg, let's. Let's take a step back and talk about the small business owners that you've been so blessed to. To work with and that I've been so blessed to work with. I would love to hear from your perspective, when you think about, like, social media marketing, organic strategy, what would you say are really the top three struggles or roadblocks that you see small businesses running into that you're like, we've got a solution for that.

Yeah. I think the, the biggest problem these days is that all the algorithms have made it really hard for sure. And back earlier when they had started out, you could have a Facebook page and grow your Facebook page. And everybody who followed your Facebook page saw everything you posted.

The golden age of social media right there.

Yes, 100% the golden age. And you just can't count on that anym. So to combat that, I think it's real. So this will be number two. I think building a community of people and connecting with them on a. On a deeper level is really important so that people are excited to come and see what you're sharing. You know, they love your message, they're interested in you, and they're, like, committed to seeing your stuff. Because people have to make the. Really make the choice to come. Sometimes they're not going to see you. You got to go find them and go. Hey, is Ashley posted lately? I haven't seen her stuff. Like, I'm, like, working on my book launch. I've posted a lot. I've posted a lot everywhere. And one of my friends was like, well, I haven't seen that much, so I think you're fine. And I was like, that isn't good because you should be seeing a lot. So even if you're posting consistency, like the consistent level that we talked about forever, that was the most important thing, is posting consistently. That doesn't even push past the algorithms anymore. So building that community and really offering something unique and special, I think is really important now.

Yeah, so true. You know, I think about even our own social media strategy or what we talk about in the boutique hub. And I always tell people, assume nobody sees anything, because I commonly will hear people say, well, I don't want to annoy anyone. I don't want to annoy others with how much I'm posting. Am I posting too much? And I'm like, you can never post too much. You just can't.

I don't think you can anymore. No. Because no one's going to see everything unless they go to your profile and scroll through it all. And even then, they're not going to. I think the only place that you can post too much now is Instagram stories. They used to push that. You do tons of stories. But now I feel like if there's just so many dots up there that you can't even see them, that people won't take the that much time. So I think, like, really curating your Instagram stories to, like, have five to seven at the very, very most per day, and just keeping up on those, I think is more important, because if you have too many, I feel like people don't want to see all of your stuff, but I feel like in your feed, I don't even think it is possible I accidentally posted like two reels a day. Nobody cared. It just got, you know.

Yeah, absolutely. So let me talk about the community piece of this because I agree wholeheartedly. And the boutique hub was built on a sense of, you know, we've lived community over competition for 11 years. That's our motto for that long. And everything we do is about building community. So I'm curious if someone's listening and they're like, how do I build a sense of community in my small business? What does that look like?

Well, I think, you know, there's different ways of going about it. You can create like experience exclusive things for people. So say we'll say let's pick a, let's pick a thing. Like say you're doing hair care products, right? And you're like, you're a haircut, you have a specific brand that you're selling. So you're doing hair care products. So create something that's like unique for them. Do like something special that's only going to go to the people in your community. Like create a little video series that only they can see on how to do a blowout. Like do, do an at home blowout, which is not that easy. It's not that easy. Even if you have products, even if you have the stuff, it's still hard. So you're the expert and you're going to share like these ways to do it and then do it exclusive for your community. So if they want to get it, they can sign up for your email list and this is going to exclusively go to them. You could also have, you know, do it on your Instagram. Do like the private thing that's only going to go to the members that see it. There's, there's a lot of different ways to like get that group of people, but you want to just create something that's just for those people and then make it special for them. So it's not just selling things, but also that is where they can get specials and deals. You know, you don't want it to only be specials and deals. But let's be honest, people like coupons. Even when I'm like annoyed with my email, I'm like, I don't want any coupons. And then if I really like the brand, I'm like, wait, I do want that. So I 100% if something, if I like it, I will open it and use the coupon. And I think if people are interested in the products, they're going to do the same. So creating that like, special thing, like educating people on how to use the products, showing them, you know, different hair, things that you do every day. Like I have really curly hair, which you can't really tell because I straightened it yesterday. But then it's like in the past I never was able to do that, but now I'm able to do that. You know, it's just about like really creating that like experience for them. And then like other ways that you can do it are like doing challenges or, you know, like a 30 day challenge for something, you know, like just. Just ways that you can bring the people together. You could hold like giveaways that people are interested in. Just things that like get people commenting and using it. I. I use ManyChat. Have you talked about ManyChat?

Yeah.

Yeah. So ManyChat is a cool way that you can make sure that you're reaching people. So, like, if you have a podcast, for example, you know, you can just share it and then tell people, you know, comment this word, podcast, you know, like episode number or something. And then you can send that to them, right to their DMs. Because if you're posting a static post on Instagram or a reel, people can't click on anything obviously to do that. So doing something like that where you can like send them a direct message and then make sure that you're really just up on your messages and not only being on your page, but going to other people's pages and being complimentary, like really just. It can't be all about you either. It has to be like connecting with them as well. So, you know, depending on how big your community gets, just, you know, doing the best you can to like respond to people and really, like, you need to be interested in the people and know who they are. You know, I have people that I've been doing this for a long time and I have had different social channels, obviously, and you have different people on each one. But, you know, I posted something and somebody that I hadn't talked to in a really long time was excited about my book signing event and she was like, oh, I'm gonna come to that one. And I had talked to her forever, but she happens to be like semi local to me. So you never know who's watching and seeing things. A lot of people still, it's probably even a higher number. It's probably like 85% of people are just lurking. There's A really high level of people who never comment and see things, but they don't comment and they're not responding. So something like the manychat thing where you're sending something and you can even do it for. If you're doing stories, you can have. If people respond, respond to a story that you can send them something. So there's ways that you can kind of automate, which obviously you're talking about it in your hub. So people are like totally on it. But you can automate some of those pieces. But it's still personal because you're going to make your messages very user friendly. Because one of the biggest disconnects is if you set things up and they're not right, then it's bad. It's worse than if you hadn't contacted. And I'll use the example of my dentist, who I'm assuming is never going to listen to this. My dentist has automated texts and automated emails and things that sound like they are very helpful but they miss it on every message they send too many things. They send you a text message to call and confirm your appointment. I don't want to call to confirm my appointment. I just want to like say, yes, I got your confirmation. I'm an adult. I can come from that, from that confirmation. I don't want to call you after a text. Right, Yep. So. So just checking, check through your automations. If you set them up, go from a different account or have someone check them for you because things can go haywire sometimes. Sometimes things change. But they for some reason just set up all their stuff and it's just, it's not right. Like their messages aren't right. Like they canceled an appointment on me and then started sending me these messages. You've missed your appointment. You need to reschedule. It's like, like it was like too much to the point where my husband's like, I don't want to go to this dentist anymore. Like, you can really turn people off with automating poorly. Yeah.

Oh, that's so true. Attention to detail. Okay, you've got to know about this if you have thought about being a member of the Boutique Hub or if you're already a member of the Boutique Hub. This year we added something that I just can't wait to get into your hands. Okay, so if you're a monthly member of the Hub, awesome. Glad to have you. It's a great experience. But we were like people who are really serious about their business and growing it into the future. They don't just join The Hub monthly, they join for the whole year because it takes more than a month to impact and make real lasting change in your business. So this year we have updated our annual offer. For those of you who are our members are thinking about becoming a member and joining for the entire year. You want to hear about it? All right. If you're an annual member of the Hub, not only do you get access to everything the Hub has to offer, but from all of the education, live training every single week, all of our exclusive discounts, resources, wholesale brands, all the things. But now, as an annual member of the Hub, you also have access to some of our very bestselling masterclasses and handbooks. That's right. I'm throwing all of these crazy things in for free. If you are an annual member of the Boutique Hub, this includes our best selling small business marketing handbook, which is over 100 pages of content, calendars, live sale ideas, TikTok ideas, real ideas, social media ideas for literally every day of the month, engagement questions for literally every month of the year, collections, event ideas to run in your brick and mortar, and so much more. The Small Business Marketing Handbook is a must have for every type of retailer, no matter what you sell. I guarantee it. We're also throwing in our small Business hiring handbook, which is all the things you know to hire, train, onboard job descriptions, everything you need to know to grow a team. Plus our holiday marketing masterclass, our content sanity masterclass, Best of our Boutique Summit videos, and so much more. There's over thirteen hundred dollars added in courses, master classes and handbooks just for you. Plus, when you're an annual member of the Boutique Hub, you get access to join one on one coaching calls with myself and several members of our team. We don't give out an opportunity to do one on one coaching anywhere other than for our VIP students in Retail Bootcamp or those who are members of Boutique Hub Black. So this is a real opportunity for those of you who are a member of the Hub and you're like, hey, I just need to pick Ashley's brain for an hour. I need to pick Sarah's brain for an hour. What does that look like? You can book an annual coaching call if you are an annual member of the Hub. Did I say annual coaching call? I meant anytime you can book a coaching call. Only if you're an annual member of the Hub.

So that's it.

I'm excited. I'm rambling. I just want you to know if you're going to join the Hub and this is the best opportunity to get the most out of your membership. If you're already a member, reach out to Our team at HappyPeople, the boutiquehub.com we can get you upgraded to Annual. If you're not yet a member, scroll all the way down to the Join page at the boutiquehub.com and click annual to join us now. I can't wait to see you inside and get you all of these extras. We're going to do a lot together to grow, scale, optimize and secure your business together in the next year. Let's get started. Something that you said a minute ago really sparked me. And you were talking about building a community and how important it is to be interested in making the content about someone else and not about yourself. And I reminded of this quote, I just said this to my teenage daughter the other day in terms of like meeting people, making new friends on a new basketball team, stuff like that. And I said, you know, Hadley, I said, in order to be interesting, you have to be first interested. So don't talk about yourself. Go and ask questions, get to know them. The more that you show you're interested in them, the more interesting you become. And I think that's really the key to community building, and ironically that's the key to breaking the algorithm and staying top of mind, is it's not necessarily posting content about the thing that you're selling. But a favorite example, I use this in our program called Retail Bootcamp, but I'll go to social media and I'll just simply ask this question, Brussels sprouts, question mark. And like, you can watch people's heads explode because everyone has an opinion on Brussels sprouts. And so you're just like, it's funny, it's engaging, it's light, it has nothing to do with whatever it is you're selling. Unless you're a grocer, right? Which you like. But just to be interested in other people creates interesting content for you, builds community, keeps you top of mind, and breaks the algorithm. So I think it all goes hand in hand. But in order to get there, though, it takes a lot of planning. And I think this is one of the biggest struggles that I hear from small businesses is they're just overwhelmed with creating all this content. Like, I have a small business to run and maybe it's just me, and maybe I have one employee, two if I'm lucky. So what would your advice be in terms of planning and strategizing around what content to post?

When?

How do you get it all done?

Well, now that we're in 2024 at the very end. We all have AI now. So I have worked really hard in chat GPT and then I also have another tool called Magi M A G a I which is like, that's kind of an aggravator. And they have. Aggravator, yes, right. Not aggravated, but they have a lot of, they have a lot of different tools in there. So it lets you use a lot of different AI models in there. But I've worked really hard in my chat GPT to just, it knows my personality, it knows how I talk, it knows what I do. So I can go to it and ask questions and get very personalized responses. It doesn't always work. Sometimes you'll get like a haywire response. I don't know if this happens to you. Probably happens to everybody, but it's going great. And then you'll start a new one and then it throws back stuff and you're like, that's not what I meant. No, no. And then when it gets to like the third one, I stop that chat and I just go back and I'm like, we're talking about my brand and this is who I am. Just to give it a little refresh and then you get back in there. So that is a very great thing. Specifically, I've been using it even for little teeny things like that little note on Instagram where you can put the little note on there. Sometimes I just want to have one, but I'm like, I don't have an idea at the moment, specifically after the election, just like, so I, I ask it, like, can you come up with some like three or four word little messages that I could use for an Instagram note? So even just little small things like that, you can just have it. You could have it create a bunch of them and then when you see that you have one that reaches people. Because if you have a good one, like, even if you did your note and did like Brussels sprouts, like, you know, like, or even if you're like, hot take I love Brussels sprouts, people would respond, you know, so just if you have one that hits, then you can use that. Say, this one was really popular. Help me create some more like this. You don't want it to replace, obviously you. And you don't want it to replace. Like you can't use it for everything. You do have to, but you can use it for a lot and that kind of thing. Like, you can have it help, like say you want to do a carousel post, right? Those are very popular on Instagram, and you can save it as a PDF and post them on LinkedIn, and they're actually really popular there, too. So. So if you have an idea, you could go to AI and ask it. Like, I want to create a carousel post. I don't want it to be about me, but I want it to speak to my voice and just say, like, you know, we'll go back to our hair products, you know, like, five. Five ideas for using sparkly brats in your holiday hair designs. Like, just for example. And that mean, obviously Pinterest would be a great search for that too. But so you could just have it like, I, you know, and say, like, I want to have seven carousel posts. One at the beginning to say this, one at the end to say this. And then it could come up with, like, things. And then you could use, you know, you could just do a little photo shoot of using it different ways or like, whatever. Like, whatever things that you want to do. People love seeing the process of something, even from beginning to end. Like, I am so obsessed with, like, hair videos or makeup videos where people are showing, like, before and after stuff. I am there to watch it from the beginning to the end because, number one, I would never go on camera without makeup on because I would just. I could not do it. But I have a friend, Sandra Salon, who is amazing. She just turned 84 yesterday, and she's a beauty blogger. And she is so awesome. She's so great on camera and so engaging, but she's hysterical because she'll do, like, no makeup and she'll be talking and she does, like, get readies with me. And she's so, so fun and interesting and great that I love watching her. I love watching her. And my daughter also watches her. She's like, so she's just fun. She's like a perfect example of somebody who. She's not selling the thing. She's just, like, doing it and talking. And I don't know, I feel like that is so big in a part of it, like the storytelling piece to building your community too. Like, people just love her. People love her, like, telling stories and, you know, sharing things. And that's where you really hit it. You know, it isn't just about you. It's about talking to the people in your community. And I did a live stream with her a couple weeks ago, and we were talking about that specifically. And she says whenever she's filming, she just always is like, I'm talking to one person, you know, and it's probably even the same when you're recording a podcast, like, you're thinking of a specific, like, person. It's a small business owner. She's a florist, she has a little shop. It's her. She has one part time employee. You know, like, you have all these things in your head. And that's really important to creating great content too, I think, is to really know who your audience is. Because your audience is not everyone. There is nothing where the audience is every single person in the world. So really honing into who you're speaking to helps get the right message, helps reach the right people. And, you know, you get there when people are commenting saying, I really needed this today and this is perfect for me. And then you really start to feel that, and you're like, okay, I'm. Because it is hard when you're putting stuff out and you're not getting responses. That can be. It's hard. Like, that is a very hard thing about social media is that sometimes you feel like you're talking into the echo chamber.

Well, especially when you get started. And I think for most people, like, they quit before they really get any traction because they feel like that, like they're so alone. But it's the consistency. And I think to your point, it's like the raw authenticity of showing up and, and being comfortable in your skin no matter what. Like, it's not the. The olden days of, like, being fake on social media, I think, are so far gone. And the idea that perfection has to be, you know, front and center. Perfection doesn't sell. I think everyone wants to know that whoever I'm following has a little bit of shit show in their life, just like I do.

Yeah. You know, speaking of that, I don't even know the last time I've seen people, like, use filters. Remember, everything was just filters.

Oh, my gosh. I go back to the beginning of my Instagram channel and I'm like, what was I doing?

I know.

I was really experimenting with all of them.

The filters were so bad and we were all using them. I know. Yeah, but I mean, that just goes to show you that people would rather see, especially people who are doing beauty stuff I don't want to see. Although I will say, the one thing that I will do is the eyelash. I am obsessed sometimes with the eyelash. I can't put fake eyelashes on. I have a lot of mascara on. This is good. Like, if I can do, like, eyelashes, I'm good with it. I feel like that's not too bad.

No, I'm Just I keep paying for these damn lash extensions. That's what.

There you go. I know. I did that for a long time too.

Yeah, well.

Okay.

Another question I think a lot of small business owners have to tackle is what social media channels should I even be on? And you mentioned just a minute ago the importance of. I think step number one is identifying who is my customer. Because when I target everyone, I reach no 1. So honing in on who I'm really talking to. But then where do I decide to put the most of my social media efforts? What channel?

Right. That is the. One of the most important things to do right at the beginning. You gotta figure that out. So figure out, you know, if you're making jewelry, like who your audience is, whatever your thing is. Yeah. Instagram is still a really great place to do a lot of this stuff. It's so, so, so time consuming. I'm not saying to ditch it, but I am saying that people are under using Pinterest, which the best thing about Pinterest is every single thing that you do gets a link that people can click and go to short form videos. You could make a short form video and you could vertical video and it can go as a reel, it can go as a YouTube short. It can be a Pinterest pin. It can be. I forgot something else and there's a TikTok. I forgot TikTok. So there's a lot of different things. So I know people like to go on TikTok and they think that's the greatest place. And a lot of small businesses, honestly are doing great there. Like, it is a place where a lot of people have been successful. But the whole thing is that everybody talks about there is going viral, which is impossible to say. My plan is I'm going to go viral on TikTok and then my product will sell out. Yeah, that is not going to happen. Like, you cannot plan that. It could happen to you once and it will never happen again. It could happen and you might get a little bit of followers, but then they unfollow you two weeks later. So going viral is not. Sorry to burst anyone's bubble, but that is not a strategy. I'm sure you must talk about that as well. Right?

Yes, yes.

Yeah. So, yeah, Pinterest is very, very underused. Every vertical video, anything that you're selling can sell on Pinterest. Every single thing leads to a clickable link, whether it's a video or a graphic. And then the great thing is you could make four videos for the same thing. You could make five graphic pins for the same thing. And it doesn't matter that you have multiples, they can all be different. So it's a place where you can create multiple things without a lot of time. By the way, if you have one product, we'll say it's the hair product. So you have this one really great hair product. You can put the benefits of it in ChatGPT. Say this is by Persona. These are the things that I want to talk about. Please write me eight Pinterest pin descriptions and titles with SEO. This is the blah, blah, blah and it can help you create those. And then you can go in Canva and you can create some graphics really easily. You can use templates that you can reuse for every product and remix them with different photos. So Pinterest is just amazing. And I still see it being very, very underused in my opinion.

Yeah, especially I mean specifically to the boutique and retail industry. I think that people look often at Pinterest as like another social media channel. It's not social media, it's a search engine. And for many retailers, I mean, it's like Facebook, I think still is the number one converting platform for a product based business, but Pinterest is often number two because let's say a Facebook post or an Instagram post organically last an hour, maybe two hours in the feed.

Right.

Where you're talking about an average pin lasting up to four months. So the longevity of longer than four.

Months, that's just the little. It can go years. If you have holiday stuff, it can come up every single Christmas. I mean, the fact that it's still so underused and I get Facebook, like is really for people who have a great Facebook page. I get it. It's hard to like leave that. And you don't have to.

You have to leave it.

No, but the thing is those Facebook posts disappear. And even if you were like, I wonder what they've been posting lately and you're scrolling through, you just can't even see stuff. And Facebook groups even have the algorithm hit now. So if Facebook is your main thing, like you go and you do that awesome thing on Facebook but make Pinterest pins too. It's so much less work to just you do it. You don't have to be there entertaining people, you don't have to respond to, to comments. You just create great boards. And I just feel like it's, it's crazy that people aren't doing it.

I agree. I so agree, Peg. Our time is absolutely flying by, which is shocking. And I don't want to miss out on this part of the conversation. You've poured all of your expertise into your book, and I would love it if you would take a minute and just tell us about your book. And what are people going to find and learn and discover once they read your book?

Well, thank you. Thank you for asking. So my book, as I mentioned at the beginning, I wrote it for small business owners. So it goes through everything from the beginning to the end of how to use social media. So if you're already using it, you may already have some pieces of this, but it just tells you the things that you need to know along the way. Like how do you choose which platform to go on? How do you choose who your target audience is, which we already talked about, but why that's so important and why you really need to have that step if you're not doing it already. So it just goes through everything that you need. Like the beginning talks about the whys and then the middle has, you know, it just talks about, you know, the basics of stuff. Like. But it's not the things that you can Google. It's really like the expertise pieces of putting it all together. So if you can Google, like, it's not how to do a Facebook cover and where to click, and it's not those kind of steps to do things. It's the bigger things. And then there's little points at the end of each chapter that are like, okay, this is your little homework assignments for the end of this chapter. Then you go to the next one. So you can pick and choose things if you already feel like you have a lot of expertise in it. But I also included things with like how to do email marketing, which maybe people aren't doing that as much because they focused on Facebook. But if you're. If you don't have your own website and your own email list, you are missing out because everything else can disappear in a snap. I. I was on Google. I don't know. Were you on Google?

I remember Google. Yes.

Okay. I had a million and a half followers on Google. Wow. Which was really hard to get to. And it was so great because I'm a blogger and Google Search loved my blog. Cause I was sharing stuff on Google all the time and that is gone. And I lost all those people. Yes. I'm still connected with some of them on other social channels, but people dispersed and sat scattered. And then I have my email list and my website. So those things are the same. And even if people are like, hey, I miss Peg, I Wonder what she's up to. They can go to my website, hopefully, and find and find, like, oh, she still has block cut and she's still doing things. So it's really like those kind of things, like, just from my learning experiences, just all those kind of things. And then to the, you know, then it's like putting things together, like how to create a content calendar. Why that helps you what to put on your content, what kind of content should you share? Like, all those kinds of things. So it really goes from the beginning of the end. And it is different than if anybody read my first book, the Art of Social Media, which was power tips for power users. That was not the beginning to end. That was literally power tips for different things. Like, this is how you can, you know, that was like the quick tip kind of deal. This one is like digging into your small business and just creating the blueprint for yourself to make your business sustainable without a lot of money, just your time. And I feel like small business owners really are the superpower of their business because the passion that they have for the thing they're doing makes it all unique. So taking all of that and then you just are rolling it into this blueprint that you can create for yourself. So that's what it is.

Well, I love it. I know that you and I are just so aligned in having a big heart for small business. And. And we know that when we change a small business owner's life, that changes generations, it changes the families that they, and it changes the community around them. So it certainly has a huge ripple effect. So I love that we're on the same path, same mission, because it's hugely impactful.

So it is.

Peg, I have one last question for you. Just as you think about that, right, like, the whole reason you're here and these books you've written and all the people that you've served along the way. I'm just curious, as you fast forward, you know, 20 years from now and you're looking back, you're on your front porch with friends, family, and you're, you know, having a drink, cocktail or iced tea, whatever, whatever it is, and you're looking back at this life that you lived in the books and all of the content. Really, what's the thing you really want people to remember most about you, how you lived and what you created?

I think that I helped people. That's kind of my goal, is to help. Like, if somebody says, you know, you helped me learn this, and now I have, you know, my business was able to do whatever Like I, I really just feel like it's helping people learn, you know, Like I can't consult or work with every small business everywhere. So this book is kind of like a brain dump of like this is how you do it. So if it really, really helps people, if it helps small. To be honest, I don't even care if I make money from it. I feel my mission for it is like to help all the underserved people. Like if this book is just like in libraries and one person's checking it out a week and, and helping, like that's my goal. Like I just want to help people and have them learn how to do it in one place and then always my goal is to just have people go and do it like themselves. You know what I mean? To make them self sufficient. You don't have to also buy this from me or do this other thing. It's just here's the book and do all the things and then I probably will still post on my blog stuff because I like my blog. I know podcasts are more popular, but I still like writing stuff. So yeah, I just hope that people remember that I was helpful and maybe friendly and hopefully nice. Those are my goals. I'm a small town girl. I totally should. Like I'm a small town person.

Like yes, I love it. Well, we won't tell everyone, but Midwest is the best. We're just going to.

It's true.

Peg, this has been so much fun. Thanks for joining me on the podcast today. We'll link up your information in the book, everything in today's show notes, but it's been a real pleasure to get to know you today.

Thank you so much for having me. I enjoyed this.

Thanks for listening guys. I hope you took away all kinds of nuggets and new ideas from this week's episode. Don't forget to subscribe and leave a rating and review. We love to hear your feedback and give you a chance to be featured on the show each and every week. For more information on our spirit of community over competition and to access guest downloads and bonuses and all the resources we talked about on the show show, head on over to the boutiquehub.com and join the community. We'll see you next week.