Pillars for Creating Content That Converts with Jera "Bean" Foster-Fell

Can you share a little bit about your content strategy that you teach people?

There's three types of content pillars that I teach. First, we have the expertise pillars. This is where you are providing value. You're teaching what you know, you are sharing insight, resources, solving your ideal person's pain points. Then we have the secret sauce. This is all about showing up authentically. Lastly, we have the business pillars and I split this up into hard selling and soft selling. Hard selling is where we're being clear and direct and obvious about a particular promotion. Soft selling, my personal favorite, is where a lot more nuance comes in. That's where we are creatively featuring our business or showing the value of our business. And what we do. And what I love about soft selling, we can do it pretty much all the time, every day, versus hard selling. We're probably saving much more for a time specific moment like a launch.

Dara, I am so excited to have you on. Earn your happy in person.

I'm so stoked. Thanks for having me here.

I just thought this was so fitting to have you on right now because so many people and so much of what I'm focused on is really building a personal brand to also help build whatever we want.

Absolutely.

And it's such a topic of conversation right now and people are asking, how do you pivot? How do you build what you want? The most important thing is building your audience.

Yeah.

Like having that presence on social so that when you do launch something, there's people there.

Heck yeah. I'm 100% on board with that.

Let's talk about getting the people there. And I have, Gosh, when did we even meet? I know we were at a. I wouldn't. I think it was 2020, something like that. I was like, who's the girl in that outfit over there?

Who's that lady?

The lovely lady. And I, I just needed to meet you because of your presence and you're so funny and you're outgoing and I had seen you online and I was like, she's even better in person. So you guys, hot tip, she's better in person.

Oh my gosh. Thanks, Lori. That's so sweet.

But you truly are the perfect personality to do what you're doing right now. So I followed you on Instagram. Soul cycle instructor before that, which I. Soul cycle junkie life. Oh my God.

An important chapter of my life.

Also prob. Taught you so much about what we're going to talk about.

So much. I. It's. You think of fitness and social media as two completely different niches but there's so many parallels between the two that have really carried over into the present day for me.

So you are essentially social media teacher, a coach?

Yes, I describe myself as a social media coach, educator and speaker. And then within that, there's lots of different things that I do, whether it's serving my students through my group coaching programs, working with service based businesses, content creators, personal brands, one on one. I speak at conferences, doing keynotes and.

Presentations on a bunch of stages. Lately I'm like, that you're the perfect like teacher because you're so entertaining as well.

Thank you. And then I also work with brands like Estee Lauder, Mac, Adobe, and usually with those big clients, I'm working more so to work with their ambassadors and do these big virtual presentations as well as one on one feedback sessions so that these artists can cultivate their own personal brands on TikTok, on Instagram, while also supporting these big brands and creating kind of sponsored and branded content for them.

Great. I'm going to hire you to come in and work with my future ambassadors.

Let's do it.

It's going to be great. Seriously, I'm like, mentally noted. That's why podcasting is so great, guys. You just make all your contacts. Okay, so tell me about. We're going to go. We're going to go way back. But first I just want to go there because SoulCycle was such a big part of my life and I watched so many people evolve. I watch Lindsay Sim Sik. Yeah, she was my Soul cycle teacher forever and then watched her go on to almost 30. Like, I always think about the lessons that these different points of our lives teach us. So tell me a little bit about your soul cycle journey and what it even brought in for you to this arena that you're in now.

So many things. One of the first things that comes to mind, which is one of the strongest, is this mantra that I adopted during my Soul cycle days, which is feel the fear and do it anyway. And I love this mantra because it was so descriptive of my time during Soul Cycle. Here I was a fitness influencer before that word even existed. People weren't using the word influencer, but I had pivoted from graphic design into fitness on a whim by downloading Kayla at Cenis's program. One day in 2015, fitness changed my life. I created an Instagram account to hold myself accountable, But I wasn't a fitness instructor. I had no experience speaking in front of people. My first and second audition, my voice was shaking. I blacked out My hands were shaking. I'd never spoken in front of a group like that, let alone on a bike trying to.

If you're a thing, I don't know how you guys do it. Yeah.

Rubbing your head and patting your belly at the same time while also trying to sprint. It's wild. And I failed that first audition I got accepted into.

Oh, I love that. Okay, were you super disappointed or were you fine or what was that like?

Disappointed. And very much publicly with my tail between my legs.

Did you think you were going to get it or were you not sure?

I wasn't super confident, but I was hopeful. And at the time, I had about 70,000 followers and I had to. I was sharing the journey very publicly, and I had to very publicly say I didn't make it. And in addition to this, the real sort of heart wrencher is that I auditioned a second time, got in, and then went through the 12 week training program and failed.

Oh, my God.

Three out of 28 people did not move on to become instructors, and I was one of them. So that was even worse than not making that first audition. And I decided to go through training again. So by the time I graduated and became a Soul Cycle Instructor, I had 20, 24 weeks of training under my belt before I taught my first official class in New York City.

Okay, that gives me chills because people look at you and they're like, oh, my God, is she naturally like that? Look at her. She's so outgoing and she's able to do these things. You did 24 weeks of like, essentially bringing your personality out, being able to multitask, do all these different things in front of people, fail publicly. So you are like, so well equipped for all of this.

Yes.

How do you teach all that to people?

How do you teach what you just encapsulated to people in terms of showing up online? Well, I think the biggest thing if I was to sort of approach it from a high level view, is that none of this is inherent. And I think that's where a lot of people go wrong. They scroll on their reels tab, they're scrolling through TikTok, and we see people with great editing skills and confidence speaking to camera. And not just. Not just confidence, but charisma as well. And it looks like they're gaining tons of followers and selling all their things. And this doesn't.

They're always selling out.

I know, and maybe there are a few people who this does come naturally to, but I would say the vast majority, we have to push through this feeling of discomfort. Comfort and the fear of judgment as well as actual judgment that comes down upon you and really push through the mediocrity of it. Like something I tell my students and my clients is make mediocre content. We put this pressure on ourselves to have the flashiest and the coolest and the, and the most edited in the, and the lighting. And sure, maybe at some point you can get to that. Like we don't even need perfection anymore. But like if you want to create something high produce, maybe you can work towards that, but you have to work through, through creating kind of crappy content or showing up in a very beginner way. It might not be crappy, but you might just be a beginner. So I think that's the sort of high level thought to encompass to get to the point where you have the confidence, the charisma and the content that you're feeling good about.

That is the best advice. Because even now, even as you're growing, as I'm growing, it's like if you wanna be consistent, you gotta be consistently okay with being mediocre and good things are gonna come out. You never know. Some of the stuff that you probably think is your most mediocre stuff hits. It's the weirdest thing.

And sort of running parallel to that as well is is oftentimes content that doesn't perform well. And I'm going to put that in quotes because it's so subjective. But sometimes our least viral, our least viewed content or sort of in the middle there can actually be our most impactful content. My most viewed real. And I just talked about this recently in a, in an email newsletter. So it's top of mind is a silly little Trend from like two years ago, I think it has like 5 million views and it's like on my way. It's just sort of tongue in cheek and you're sort of pretending to be frustrated. It's like on my way to go make content and I'm like making faces in front of a ring light now that's funny, it's entertaining, it gives people a quick laugh. But is that something that really draws people into my circle? Is that something that speaks to, to my expertise, my passion, how I'm able to help you? Not necessarily, probably actually full out. No. However, I can think of something I posted recently was how to do a content audit to retroactively take into account how you're showing up. And it can be really impactful to see how often you're using your voice, how often have you shared about your business that's one of my least performing posts. Not many views, but it's really good content. So we can think of, you know, sometimes we just have to put mediocre content out there. And then when we also think of the views, sometimes our least performing content can indeed be our most impactful for the people who do indeed see it.

Totally. Oh my God. I'm trying to think of mine. I think it was. I did a Pamela pumpkin dance.

Oh my God.

And it just, it went off and I was like, hey, I brought in really no one of value for my other content. But it was fun. It's fun to watch those numbers go up and, you know, but other than that, I was like, okay, this actually isn't where I need to spend my time whatsoever finding that necessarily. So let's talk about your journey. Cause I found. So I found you on Instagram, but now you are really niching down in TikTok. Like that's really what you're teaching a lot on. Tell me about that journey from one platform to another and why TikTok for business.

So TikTok began for me in late 2019. I can remember so specifically why I decided to join. There was a gal who I knew on Instagram and I saw her on TikTok before. People were really flocking to that platform and she was doing so well on TikTok. And I'm like, this is so fascinating. Like, I haven't considered it, but seeing someone I quote, unquote, know through social media thriving, that really pulled my interest in. So I joined TikTok and within that first month of December, I made really silly videos. Like I did not understand the platform at all. I was just trying to take part in some of the fun trending sounds. There was like a Grinch sound where I put different outfits and I mouthed things to the words and I did something. There's like an egg challenge where you bring up an egg to your dog and you see what they do with it. It was like totally all over the place and chaotic. So I did that for a month. Didn't really see much traction. And then about a month later, after a couple weeks off, I decided, wait a second, here I am in this new phase of my life and career. And what I mean by that, I was in this very pivotal time of pivoting from full time influencer to more of social social media coach and educator. I was launching my group program for the very first time. It was a very, I look back on it now, it's very kind of tender and important. Like chapter. And I saw TikTok as a way to start fresh because on Instagram, it felt challenging and vulnerable to all of a sudden shift my content from full lifestyle to then teaching social media. It's hard to pivot to, from anything. So. So for me, it was a feeling of, oh, gosh, like a little apologetic in a way. TikTok was a fresh start. So in 2019, 2020, I was like, let's go. Full social media strategy conversation. I started to talk about ways to show up on your insta stories, different ways to pose in front of the camera, how to write captions, and then I'll never forget, I did my first tutorial for a TikTok trend and that blew up.

Wow.

Yeah. And from that moment on, I really changed my focus to not just talking about all of social media on my TikTok account, but focusing narrowly on trends, culture, and different ways to show up strategically, specifically on TikTok.

So you tried a different, like a bunch of different things to find what worked for you.

Oh, yeah. That feel good?

When that works, were you like, okay, I understand how to do this?

Yes. But because it was also very aligned with what I was doing in my business as well, I felt all over the place in that first month. And then it clicked. Wait a second, I'm pivoting. I need my content on TikTok to support this pivot. So it was sort of a couple things at once aligning. That felt good.

So what comes first for people? Is it like coming up with a strategy around the things that they're selling right now and going on TikTok, or is it just trying to figure out TikTok and how it works and then going back and figuring out kind of your strategy to align with what you're selling.

If I had to just pick one route for someone, there's always flexibility here, there's always nuance. But if I was to like, say, okay, we're going to do this in Jara's way, I always recommend with TikTok, because it's quite different than Instagram to become a consumer of content first. That's not to say that you can't just go out and start posting videos and figuring out your flow. You absolutely can do that. But I think the more understanding you have of TikTok and the culture of TikTok and the differences of how short form video lives and breathes on that platform versus reels, the more confident of a creator you will become on TikTok, because there are things like duets and stitches and Inside jokes and different delivery of content that thrives on TikTok, that doesn't thrive on other platforms. So even just having a very high level understanding of that will just give you more confidence to begin showing up on TikTok.

So right now I'm very Instagram heavy just because I'm trying to keep my focus there for a little bit. But I also need to start going on TikTok more. I did it for a while, but you really do have to go on with an observer's eyes.

Yes.

So like trying to stay in that and go, why did I like this? Why does this work? Why do these people like this? What are the comments? And it's also why you can't just take your Instagram stuff and post it on TikTok. It's a very different land.

It is, it is. And people ask me that all the time. They go, jara, can I take my content and can I repurpose it on both platforms? And my thought around that is you can do whatever you want to do, and if so, if you want to do that, by all means, I will support it.

But your numbers.

And it also comes back to this idea that we are strapped for time, Right. We not all of us have a content team or someone to support us with social media, so there's only so much we can do. And so if your only option right now is to create one piece of content a day or a couple times a week and post it on both platforms, I am happy with that because you are going to be exposed to a different audience. So the more we can cast that net out and sort of generate awareness, even if it's not the most optimized for that platform, I'm okay with that. However, it's exactly what you said. TikTok is a different culture and experience. And I recommend to people, if you start posting the same piece of content on both platforms, I want you to start to become aware and kind of keep this radar up for, ooh, wait a sec. This idea or this piece of content I think is actually really good for TikTok, but I'd actually don't see it performing well or making sense for my account on Instagram or vice versa. Once you start to tune into that a little bit more, that's when you can start to differentiate and be a little bit more selective or a little bit more creative and strategic with how you're creating content for each platform.

Okay, I love this. So this is kind of first step. It's like, go on, consume, start understanding it Start looking at it, start seeing where you could fit. What is something that you did when you were trying to figure out where you fit? Did you go follow those particular people or like, what is that level of K I've consumed? Now I'm kind of ready to start creating content. What's our next step?

Next step would be to start to tune into what type of content makes sense for you. Now, lots of layers beneath that. What type of content makes sense for you? Well, what kind of business do you have? What are you promoting? A service based business is going to show up differently than a product based business. A content creator who doesn't have anything necessarily to sell in terms of their own services or products might show up a little differently as well. So that's one component of what makes sense for you. Another component of that is what makes sense for your personality. Yes, TikTok is a funny and an entertaining place, but that doesn't mean you have to be funny and entertaining if that isn't you or that isn't your business. I can think of so many accounts that are delivering just valuable information and talking to the camera and being very substantive. Substantive with what they say and provide. But there's no humor and that's okay. So what's the delivery as well as how? What's the vehicle for delivering that message? Are you going to be talking to camera? Are you going to be creating B roll videos with voiceover underneath? Are you going to lean into trends or more so evergreen and original content? These are a lot of questions and you don't have to have them all figured out at once, but the more you can kind of try a little bit. Okay, let me talk to camera. Ooh, this trend is kind of funny. Can I test it out? Ooh, I want to do a day in the life video that shows the behind the scenes of my business and add in voiceover. And then the last step is what makes sense for your time and energy. If you see a beautiful video with transitions and high quality edits, but you've never edited a video in your life. Well, we're not quite there yet. Yeah, we gotta start simple with maybe one single shot of you talking to camera or one single shot with a text overlay on top, we have to ask what makes sense for our time, energy and skill level as well.

So would that work for people? Have you seen it work for people where they just find one of those and they just run with it?

Definitely, definitely. But I think usually it's with a decent amount of trial and error. Now One thing that's interesting with TikTok is that I will admit it kind of has this way of pigeonholing you into a certain topic or into a certain type of delivery. Got it. So my pigeonhole is tutorials. Like my tutorials, not always, but tend to do well versus other types of content. Higher chance of it not doing as well. Interesting as a tutorial.

So it's kind of like what do you think that is? Is it just what is that?

I think it's the algorithm understanding what you do best and like wanting to then deliver it to the right people. Because the TikTok algorithm's really amazing. As a consumer, it gets to know your preferences about consuming content to keep you on the app longer. And as a creator of content, it wants to understand you and what you deliver so that it can show and deliver your content to the fyp, the for you page of people who are interested in those subjects, genres and niches. So I'm assuming that TikTok kind of latches on to what you do best and then wants to promote that. Now that's just my guess. That's not really with. With fully understanding how it all works. So it's just a bit of a word of caution that I. I want people to experiment a bit in terms of the subject matter within their niche. So you have the umbrella of your personal brand, umbrella of your business or niche. But how can we experiment with the subjects beneath that or the delivery as well so that you're not necessarily pigeonholed right from the start?

Oh, interesting. That's really good to know. So that brings me into content strategy for it. Can you share a little bit about your content strategy that you teach people?

So I have a formula. I call it the video ice cream formula.

Delicious.

Yeah. It's so tasty. It's so great and so super high level. I can definitely go deeper into any of these if you want me to. But the beginning is step one, which is the cone. So that's the base. We have to have something to hold the ice cream. And that equates to my content pillar trifecta. There's three types of content pillars that I teach. First, we have the expertise pillars. This is where you are providing value. You're teaching what you know, you are sharing insights, resources, solving your ideal person's pain points. Then we have the secret sauce pillars. This is all about showing up authentically. And I divide this up into four quadrants. We have foundational secret sauce, which focuses on your past. We have personal secret sauce, focusing more so on your present, who you are as a human, right here, right now, we have light hearted secret sauce, which is kind of more funny, silly, goofy. And then we have professional secret sauce which is what sets you apart as a professional, as an entrepreneur, as a business. Lastly, we have the business pillars. And I split this up into hard selling and soft selling. Hard selling is where we're being clear and direct and obvious about a particular promotion. Soft selling, my personal favorite, is where a lot more nuance comes in. That's where we are creatively featuring our business or showing the value of our business. And what we do. And what I love about soft selling, we can do it pretty much all the time, every day versus hard selling. We're probably saving much more for a time specific moment like a launch. So I'm just going to pause there. Those are my content pillars for ideation to really ground you in a strategic way so that you can come up with really intentional content ideas.

First of all, where do you have that so we can go and grab it for anybody who's like, please tell me all of this.

Great question. Just right here, right now, rewind.

Go write that down. Go look in the show notes. That's where it's at. Show notes everybody. So I want to go back to the beginning if I was sitting down right now, because this is me. Like I am your ideal customer.

Yes.

Who is like, okay, you just told me all the things, but now how should I be posting? Is this like a once a day thing? And what pillar do I look at first or what should I start with amongst all of those things?

Yeah. So that kind of nicely brings us ties into our next step which is the scoops of ice cream, any flavor you want. So this equates to what I call the format. Okay, so a content idea is just a content idea. It's not a finalized social media post. It's not a video yet. It's just an idea sort of floating in the ether. And so we actually have to create something. Formats are as follows. And this is very obvious once you hear it. We have talking to camera. We have B roll with voiceover. We have text overlay which just think of adding text to a real.

That one.

Easy, easy, easiest one.

Walking around with text over it.

Exactly. That's how simple it can truly be. We have trends, which is a whole world. So that's a really broad category. And then if we bring TikTok into the mix, we have duets, we have stitches, we have reply with video. So we have to take a content idea and then ask ourselves, well, okay, I want to talk about how to build community. It can come to life in seven plus different ways. So we want to sort of solidify things a little bit more by not just having the idea, but also asking ourselves the format. And then what you asked about, well, how many times do I show up? How do I choose what it is that I want to say? I mean, great questions, but big questions. And I think it's very individualized to each person and their goals. So if you are gearing up for a launch, you're probably going to want to lean a little bit heavier into most likely soft selling within that business pillar prior to the launch where you're hard selling. If you do a retroactive audit, which I was talking about earlier, which is one of my least best performing posts, and you scroll through all of your reels and you realize that you've posted 30 reels, but not one single one is using your voice, either talking to camera or as voiceover. And you want to be on more podcasts and you want to speak on stages. Whoa, wait a second here. We got to use one of the formats with your voice. And perhaps we are sharing value from our expertise pillar, perhaps we're sharing about ourselves from that secret sauce. But the vehicle is your voice. So I think it's very dependent on your business, your goals, current and future, as well as really taking that retroactive audit approach to understand, well, how have I been showing up for the last month, the last year, and what do I need to change now that I have more perspective on what the last 30, 50, 100 posts have been?

Okay, so we chatted about soft selling. I love that. Essentially what you're saying is we can take every single post and just be highlighting kind of a business or teaching around what we want to be selling in the future. But let's talk about hard selling. I'm trying to think of times when I'm like, oh, that's just like a straightforward hard sell. What does that look like? How have you done it?

So hard selling is one of the easiest categories when it comes to content. I feel like it's pretty black and white because you are very clearly, obviously directly explaining how to work with you, explaining how to hire you, explaining how to buy from you, and it's coupled with a cta. So the CTA is really the hard sell. Buy now purchase here, click the link, sign up for the wait list, apply now to the program. And most often we're seeing those during a launch period. So it is mostly time specific. However, it doesn't have to be time specific. So let's say you don't have an open and close cart period for a course you're launching, but you take one on one clients and one contract just ended and now you have a spot. Well, you can just clearly say like, hey, I, I'm taking in a new one on one client for the month of xyz. So it can be just as simple as that. And once again, there's different ways to use our formats to explain that. It could be a story, it could be a reel, you could have that come through via a trend. So that's kind of a high level. But here's a really specific example that I would love everyone to have in some shape or form. With pinned posts now on Instagram and on TikTok as well, you are able to take a piece of content and pin it right to the top of your page so that anyone who comes to your profile, they're seeing your profile photo, they're seeing your bio, they're seeing your highlights, and they're seeing those pin posts, which I personally think are way more important than highlights these days. So if you have specific ways to work with you or specific ways to purchase from you, have something that says how to work with me, or here's how to hire me or here's all the ways you can purchase from me, it depends on your business. And you can either create a carousel or it can also be a video format, making it very, very clear. And that's pinned to your profile. It's front and center. And to me that is a beautiful example of a hard sell.

Okay, so why do, why do you think TikTok is really powerful for businesses? Can we talk from like, you know, a business standpoint of people who are maybe coaches and courses, but also products? Can we talk about that?

Yes. So TikTok is a generating awareness machine because you are not limited to the amount of followers you have. So before you know, we can, oh yes, yes, we can compare TikTok to, let's say pre reels days on Instagram. The only way to get discovered is someone sharing about you to their stories. There's the Explore page. Maybe they found you outside of social media via a podcast, but you're really limited in terms of discovery. Now TikTok comes along and their algorithm and their way of having you use the platform is totally different than what we're used to from our Instagram days because of a little something, not so little something called the for you page, the FYI fyp. When you are scrolling the fyp, you are consuming content for the most part from people who you don't yet follow totally versus Instagram. What we were used to for so long, you're, you're scrolling through the content of the people you've chosen to hit the follow button on. So the potential for reach has just completely shifted. And I love now seeing businesses pop up on my FYP that are thriving in terms of their content performance that I don't think ever would have thrived in early Instagram days and pre short form video days. Like I can think of this one guy who, he cleans this like the sidewalks and the overgrown grass in front of people's houses to like clear out their sidewalks. And I watch this video and he does it so good and it's like mesmerizing to see the transformations. Like something like that thrives in the world of video. Something like a product based business who can really show the behind the scenes of their packaging and what it's like to be a founder of this company that never would have come through in just a photo and caption alone. So the awareness play as well as the ability to showcase your business and have people be interested in it in a way that was not possible before via photo and caption and is really what makes TikTok thrive.

So what is some of your favorite things that you are doing on TikTok right now for your business?

I see TikTok as a way to bring people into my circle. So I see it as like casting that wide net and that's how it's been going for a while now. But something that I realized this year in terms of like a more specific thing that I can pull people into is that video is a huge part of social media. There's no denying it. That's just the world we're living in. That's the landscape we're living in. And so many people struggle with the creation aspect. Yes, we can talk about the ideas.

Hands up.

Yes, we can talk about the, the ideas of our videos. Kind of that cone aspect. Yeah. But then when it comes to the format of how to actually create a video and edit them together, this, this is not an inherent skill. Just like confidence is not an inherent, inherent trait when it comes to showing up. So I have been creating these tutorials for a long time now of how to create certain trends, how to create certain effects, how to create even just vlogs and talking to camera videos and simple edits. And so this year it dawned on me Wait a second. Like I need to create a course where it's just video editing. Like, we're not talking about the strategy, we're not talking about creating the perfect hook. It is a down and dirty nitty gritty. Here are all the tools and technical aspects you need to create a really wide range of videos. But I'm excited to tap into TikTok where I think I focus on that editing aspect a lot more than I do on Instagram in order to really bring people into this new course. Okay.

What is it called?

The Video Editing Rodeo.

Oh my God, I love this.

Thank you.

I needed the first time I've ever.

Said that out loud, besides to my husband. So I'm excited.

It felt good for me. I hope it felt good for you. Okay, so on this video editing rodeo, who is your ideal client? Like, what would I learn if I go and buy your program?

The Video Editing Rodeo is more so geared towards a beginner, slash beginner intermediate person who needs video for their social media.

It's me. Great. Tell me more.

What do. I agree. So it can be someone who's creating their own social media content as a service, product based business as a content creator or personal brand. I'm also thinking of people who are wanting to perhaps add on a service as for instance a social media manager. Maybe you need to create videos for not yourself, but for your clients. It's great for anyone who needs video editing skills. And the beauty of it is this is relevant right now, but it's also relevant for years to come. I have been editing since I was a wee child. My mom is a Jane of all trades in the film world, so she edits, she produces, she writes. So I've been creating videos for like all my school projects ever since I was in elementary school and middle school. And those skills have transformed, transferred over to almost every job and then of course social media as well. So learning the fundamental tools of editing is something that's going to be beneficial to you right here, right now, but also for years to come, especially with the way that social media is continuing to evolve.

So that's so huge because I'll tell you where my literally this is like where my hang ups have been with TikTok is I go on and I start to think I understand it, but small things will throw you off. So you can like get the momentum, you can have ideas for it and if you get stuck going, I cannot get this like stupid transition to work. I don't know how to overlay this. Like it can. I feel like that old person who's like, I just don't understand this yet. And so I don't have the time for it. Meaning, yes, But I could make time for a course if I knew once and for all it was going to solve this really irritating problem of going on and having that. We all know that you won't stick with something if there's a barrier of entry. And I think that's where people fall off with TikTok all the time is going, well, I don't know how to do that.

And I will say that most people, especially those who maybe identify more as a beginner in the video editing and content creation space, are mostly sticking to creating within TikTok or creating within reels because the. The editors have. The editing parts of the platforms have evolved, but there's so many glitches. You have way less flexibility. You have to deal with the watermark once you post it. So my whole ethos when it comes to video editing is to take it off the platforms and into an app like Cap Cut on your phone. You're going to have so much more control. You're going to have way more flexibility with the options for creating your video and to make it more. Not perfect, but a little bit more polished, a little bit more optimized. And going back to our repurposing, if you do indeed want to take that one video and put it on Instagram and TikTok, you're going to have that original asset to then put to both platforms without the water.

So smart.

So I. Well, this course specifically focuses on not editing within Instagram or TikTok, but really being able to edit within an app like capco.

Okay, we're putting that info in the show notes. You can go check out everything about the course in your show notes. So that's really exciting. Why did you do that? What were people coming to you? What's the main problem that you're seeing?

I think it's exactly what you described. It's okay. I. I maybe am understanding the platform. I have the cone, I have the content idea, but then I try to bring it to life and I don't know how I shoot the video. And then I'm getting frustrated because I don't know how to put the shots together and voiceover. How do I even do that in a transition? Forget about it. That is like so advanced. I would never even attempt to do that. So it is this barrier to creating. And if there's a barrier to creating, that means there's a. There's A barrier to generating awareness. As we talking about, there's a barrier to supporting your business, to getting your personal brand out there. So yes, it is video editing, but it leads to this beautiful goal of being able to get out there and get the word about, out about who you are and connect with others and grow your brand and business. It's a huge tool for making that happen.

Thank you for taking the pain point out. I literally am just like, okay, can I, can I, how soon can I get this? Okay, so one last thing I just want to touch on because you know, TikTok is a really, it's such a cool, unique place. And the thing that I have learned about it just by watching some friends is they can go from zero to like millions of views in one day. And that is really overwhelming and a little bit scary when I think about it. So let's talk about that because I think for some people right now they might be seeing that among their other friends. I literally had my sister in law posted herself on a treadmill, walking while doing work and talking about this treadmill. And she went from zero to like, I don't know, 3 million views. And it was like very overwhelming because she has a really small, she had a very small following. It was like not that person at all.

Yeah.

And I kind of watched like what happened and what this can do to a person. Can we talk about how to handle what happens if and when your video goes viral?

And I'm assuming you're taking this from more the negative aspect, as in people are.

It was exciting, but there was. It opened you up to everyone.

Yes.

When a video goes viral, good or bad, like even if the video, even if 90% of the comments are great, you are open to everyone and 10% are horrendous.

I know, I know, it's. It's funny as someone who's been showing up on the platform for years now and someone you know, I have a good amount of followers on TikTok. My stomach still clenches a little bit when I see a video start to pick up steam. And I have other creator friends who feel the same. So I think first things first is knowing that whatever experience level you're at, whatever amount of followers you have, I think it is a common feeling and experience to go, oh my gosh, this is a lot to take in. And this, this is a weird, it's sort of a weird feeling. You're exposed. Yeah, you're exposed. And then I think just sort of protecting your, your mental health. There's a few things you can do. I've gotten to a point sometimes where I just won't check the comments. I just won't look like I'm done. I'm done at people yelling at me and telling me like, you don't need a response. Yeah, yeah, I did see the comments when people told me I looked like Steven Tyler so that, that at least I can make an inside.

Steven Tyler's hot and if he was a woman, he'd be even hotter. So he's.

You actually. Compliments. Exactly.

I'm like, that's a huge compliment.

Compliment. Yeah. But a few other thoughts around that is you can also turn the comments off. And I think if it gets to a point where it's severely impacting you and you're people are saying awful things, turn the comments off. I don't think there's anything wrong with that. And then lastly, I think it comes back to this really great point. Or, or I'm not sure if we've covered this yet, but it's something very prominent when we talk about social media. People are always like, how to go viral? I want to go viral. I want to get all these views, I want to get all these followers. When that's not actually always beneficial.

Right.

In a variety of ways. One, mental health wise, it opens you expose you to people who are maybe not saying the nicest thing. So there's one thing there. Going viral also means that you're being exposed to people who aren't necessarily your ideal client. So are those views actually doing anything for you? Is that influx of followers actually so supporting you in a positive way? So I think it opens up the conversation a little bit wider to the goal shouldn't be to go viral. The goal shouldn't be to have all of these thousands and millions of followers unless they are the right people. So I think that's an important perspective to keep in mind.

That's so powerful because you can be really overwhelmed, like hearing different things about just, you know, it's trying to get as many views on, on your content. That's just like a huge convert. The more views the better. Right. But not necessarily because you do, especially in the beginning or even when you're. You're growing your business and scaling your business. You want your ideal customer and you want them to hear you and you want to respond back to them and you want to have a conversation in the comments. And like having all of those views can actually really impact that.

Yes.

And hinder it.

And that's why I think growing slower and growing Steadier.

It feels nice sometimes. Yeah.

And yeah, you might have a video. You can't control what goes viral and what doesn't. So I'm not saying, oh, you. It's bad if that happens. Totally. There's a lesson in it, I think. And it just comes back to like slower, steadier and having a smaller pool of the right people versus a huge pool with the not right people. Like I rather have the former.

Okay, so this has been such a great conversation. I think for anyone who is not started on TikTok, we will be.

Yes, now.

And now we're going to have to hear video editing rodeo. Giddy up skills. I'm going to be roping a lot.

Lots of put your hat on.

Lots of followers on TikTok. I'm super grateful for you. Is there anything you want to share with our audience about TikTok if they are, you know, either getting started or wanting to scale that you haven't shared?

Oh, hardest question you you've asked.

Why did I ask that at the end? That was so rude.

No, I like it though. I like it though. I want to make it a juicy one. I think it, it comes down to this, this idea of taking messy action, starting and creating before you're totally ready. Yes, I do want to recommend that you are a consumer of content and understand but the more that you sit around and think about it and you don't actually show up on TikTok versus posting through the mess, kind of trudging through the sludge of not knowing, not creating the best content. The more you do that, the more you're going to hone in on your content creation skills, your delivery, the best way to use TikTok to support your business versus not doing it all. You're not doing yourself any favors by just sitting there kind of pondering and not taking any action. So I much rather someone take that messy action, make mediocre content and post before they're truly ready in order to get to that point where they can really support their business through short form video content via TikTok as well as reels.

So good. All right, so where can we find you, follow you and we already know we have all of your info on your program below. Yes, but where can we find you? Follow you.

I'm Jera Bean, that's Jara Bean on Instagram, on TikTok and Jerrahbean.com for my website.

Okay, everyone and Jara, you and I, we did not go, we did not put the sprinkles on top of this ice cream cone yet.

We are lacking some rainbow sprinkles.

We're lacking sprinkles right now, but we're not going to give it to you in this episode. So if you want to get the sprinkles, you have to go to the link in the show Notes notes to get the bonus content where Jarrett is going to share three tips all about the sprinkles to finish this off. And I just don't even know if you're going to be able to create your content without it. So with that said, you guys, we're so grateful for you. Go follow Jara. One of the biggest things that we can do is follow her and let her know what your biggest takeaway was. Give her a shout out on a story. We love to know who's listening. And until next time, earn your happy. Bye, everyone.