I'm Engaged!

~ On My Instagram (and other reasons you probably don’t need to spend thousands on an Insta coach)

Not a real engagement ring, in any sense. Thank you to my friend Lynsey for snapping this issue’s cover image!

Perhaps this is bold of me to say, but the amount of folks who market themselves as Instagram or TikTok coaches is insane. I cannot tell you how many times while scrolling that I see Reels purporting that if you just buy this, that, or the other marketing course or join this community, you’ll get the secret sauce to going viral with millions of Reel plays, tripling followers, or whatever other desired result that is sure to bring you a WILD amount of digital clout. It is nuttier than a cashew tree.

Hold please: This is not me saying that these creators and self-styled “coaches” don’t offer any usable ideas or strategies. Let me be clear on that. I’m just saying you don’t need to sell your soul, your favorite cat, and your grandma’s wedding china to get the secret sauce.

In transparency, I’ve never bought one of these courses. I did work with Jourdan Gandy for her insight into a specific marketing space. I also, in transparency, do social media marketing for small businesses in the Athens, Georgia, area — but both my work and Jourdan’s are markedly different than these run-of-the-mill coaches I want to bring up today.

One of my social media clients did buy into an Instagram coach for a period of time, and that’s how I gained insight into this … coaching industry, if you will. It was validating to hear that this coach told my client to do things I was already doing for her. The coach also told my client to do things that I asked her to provide me in order for her social media strategy to go the way we hoped it to. But I suppose this information resonated more for my client when she heard it from this coach she paid so much to, than it did when she initially heard it from me!

Suffice to say I have some thoughts, especially since I gained the walk to back up the talk. I’ve been offering social media marketing services independently since 2017 and prior to that, as part of my jobs in journalism and marketing starting in 2010. Y’all, I wrote the first Georgia Career, Technical, and Agricultural Education curriculum on using social media for business. I’m not kidding. So, though I may not have an advertising- or marketing-specific degree (my communications background is jointly through UGA’s colleges of agriculture and journalism), I say all this to say I know what I’m doing, and constantly teaching myself and my clients how to do it better.

Even though this is a paid Substack issue, I decided to put the ~goods~, if you will, above the paywall.

So! In my 14 years’ experience in social media marketing and storytelling, these are the three things that consistently, across platforms, help your content perform better:

1. Know and engage with your audience.

2. Be true to yourself.

3. Post regularly, being cognizant of numbers one and two.

(If you want to read my full rambling thoughts and expertise regarding this list, you’re welcome to become a financially supportive subscriber!)