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Welcome to the Muthership Creator Strategy episode 200. I can't believe I've been at it for this long and I've enjoyed it, believe me, or otherwise I probably wouldn't have kept at it. I have a surprise in store today as I have promised in the Substack newsletter and on my posts. Very sweet thing that I've decided to do for those of you who have come over here to listen or who have been avid listeners. What I'm planning to do, if you didn't know, I have a studio where I teach creators every week.
Helen:I host live meetings. We have a community chat. There are recorded lessons. And depending on what you're trying to achieve on your social media goal, the whole purpose of the studio is having the support to make that happen. Whether it's a transition you're going through, whether it's a transformation, whether it's a business you're starting or just on a journey of being a creator, an affiliate, a salesperson, a coach, the goal of the studio is really to help you achieve your goal.
Helen:With all of that said, in this episode, I'm going to release a code. I'm going to hide the code. I'm going to sneak it in a few times. It's going be a little game. It's going to be a challenge for me too.
Helen:But I'm going to give you a code that will give you thirty days free in the studio. So if you've been a listener of the podcast and you haven't jumped into the studio, if you read the newsletter and you think, oh, one day maybe I'll try it, this is your chance because you're gonna get to try it for thirty days for free. And for my current studio members, if there is someone that you have been trying to convince to come into the studio and you have that affiliate link, but people are not clicking on it, this is your gift. You can gift them. Here's a whole month free.
Helen:And when it kicks in to payment time on the following months, because of course they're gonna fall in love and wanna stay, then you're gonna get your affiliate fee. And this is gonna eliminate that barrier to entry. So you can give them your affiliate link, give them the code, and then they will be able to try it for thirty. And thirty days later, when it kicks into payment time, you will be earning your affiliate fee. Okay?
Helen:So it's twofold. It's for new members who wanna try the studio, and they've just been hesitant, and they don't know why they've been hesitant because why are you being hesitant? But it's for new members who want to try it and also for affiliates who have been trying to convince friends to come in, and they just can't seem to crack the code. Now it's like, here you go. Just try it for thirty days.
Helen:You're gonna be happy. I'm gonna add one more thing to this. Okay? In August, I've said this before, because the app is launching, the studio price is gonna go up. If you come in now with the free try it for 30, you're essentially locking in the current rate and yours will not go up.
Helen:So when the app changes the price in August, your rate is locked at the current $36 a month. With okay. I hope that's clear, and I'm gonna just dive into the topic for today. I'm gonna share my five takeaways from being on social media and growing a following of 1,200,000 on TikTok, a monetizable YouTube channel, an Instagram that's growing consistently, actually. So all of those things, I'm going to share my top five takeaways on what I would recommend.
Helen:And I'm also going to say at the end what I would do differently. All right? Buckle up. Here we go. I'm going to start with, for those of you who don't know, a quick and I say a sixty second recap on how I got here.
Helen:So the journey from zero to a million happened for me in a very unusual way. There were chapters. I'm going to call it chapter one, the baking household dancing chapter. This is where I was in the pandemic, bored out of my head, didn't have any work. So I decided I was going to get on social media and just try my hand at it.
Helen:And I began doing baking videos, household tips, dancing, whatever I felt like doing, and just really enjoying that time during the pandemic. Grew a following, and then the awakening came. So chapter two, the awakening of an untapped skill. I've labeled my chapters. The untapped skill was I know that I knew how to edit videos but I didn't realize my ability to teach others how to edit videos was so strong and also a marketable skill that was very needed.
Helen:So chapter two, the awakening of the skill. Chapter three, let's go. The cancer chapter. Threw me a curveball. Went blind.
Helen:Had to go through chemo. What am I going to do with my social media while this is happening? Guess what? Took my audience with me. What did I learn?
Helen:Audience loyalty is one of the biggest things you should focus on over and above all else. Okay. Chapter four. The comeback and reinvention. And this is when you well, I had to come back from that cancer experience.
Helen:I had to find myself again. When I look back at those videos during that time period, it is a very specific time period. And it was growing my hair back, finding my happy again, because I was such a happy person all the time, and I didn't know where that person went. So it was really that re finding of myself. And then chapter five, launching a paid community and actually monetizing my social media.
Helen:Why did it take me so long? I'm gonna talk about that. But I also think it was meant to take that long. It needed for me to go through those chapters of the book in order to get to the point of the story. I didn't even plan to say that.
Helen:Oh, I love when it works out. Alright, so let's start with the top five tips that I would say are my takeaways from having this experience. And I'm going to try and give you examples and tips within each one. Okay? And by the way, when you try it for 30, the things that I'm telling you now, you're going be able to look back and go, yes.
Helen:It's just like new parents, new mothers, new dads. I related to this. Every three months you're looking back and thinking, oh man, that was easy. Why did I think that was so hard? And then the next three months and then you're looking back on that.
Helen:So it always looks better in the rearview. It looks maybe easier in the rearview, clearer in the rearview. I mean, sometimes it's better when you look at it back there and it's behind you. Okay, so the first one is exposure therapy. Doing the posting, seeing yourself on your videos, hearing your voice, I hate my voice.
Helen:Hearing your, seeing your face, I hate my face. Going through that exercise is the only way to get on the other side of it. So exposure therapy was such a big thing that I learned. I learned how not to judge myself so much. If you're still scared when you post, you're not far enough into your journey.
Helen:It's going to happen. The second thing that I learned is that relentlessness wins over massive talent. I used to watch these creative people and think, oh my god, they're so good at that, and oh, they're so funny, and oh, they're so smart, and they have so much intelligent stuff to say. If I think about it now, I just thought I wasn't good enough to do this, and I was not funny enough to do that, and not smart enough to say this, and not confident enough to do that. So the not enough thing was such a lesson for me to embrace and learn.
Helen:It's also not about necessarily working harder, being better or learning more. It's more about keeping going. If you don't give up, you have so much better of a chance of success than the person who is constantly judging themselves or trying to be better. That will take you down if you can just let it go and say I'm just going to keep going no matter what. You have so much better of a chance of success than the person who won't do that.
Helen:There was a thing I saw, oh I've to find it and post it, but it was that only 3% of people are monetizing on social media. 3%. Now think about it because you're probably, if you're listening to this, you probably are monetizing in some way or maybe you're going to be soon. Even in a small way, just think that you, aka we, are in the 3%. It seems daunting because when you're watching social media you feel like you're in the minority because everybody seems to be making so much more money than you.
Helen:But in fact, that is a warped perspective. Okay? So exposure therapy, being relentless, not listening to gurus is number three. This is a huge one because everything happens in social media the way it happens in fashion. You know, low rises in, high rises in, big bell bottom oh, sorry.
Helen:Flares at bell bottoms. I didn't really dated myself on that one. But flared jean flared cut boot cut. Think about jeans. Think about fashion.
Helen:It changes all the time. It's the same thing on social media. The gurus are selling a package, and at that and the at the when I first got on the package, was stay in your lane, post every only stay in your niche. And I was like, oh gosh, that's kind of boring. So I didn't follow that.
Helen:I just felt like, what well, I don't need to stay in my lane because I'm not looking to make money. That's what I thought. Was I like, I'm just looking to have fun, so I'm not gonna stay in my lane. So I would teach a lesson one day, do a dance another day, show the city the next I would just do my thing the way I wanted to do it. Unbeknownst to me, I was building loyalty, community, more friends in the app that were gonna be more loyal friends versus stay in my lane.
Helen:Okay. Everybody's just gonna come to me to learn the tricks. Because the fact is people were coming to me to learn the tricks, but then they were more invested in what else I had to say, what else I had to offer, what else I was doing in my life. So I don't think so my point here is that there was a trend to stay in your lane. And then I think it was Gary Vee started posting about like, don't stay in your lane.
Helen:Just post anything that comes to your head. So then that kind of came up, and it's like people aren't staying in their lane. So now you think about, I spent all that time staying in my lane, and now the trend is not to stay in your lane. So the point of this is you don't even have to follow what the gurus are saying is the trend in the moment. You can just step outside the norm and do what you want to do and not listen to them and feel more true to yourself.
Helen:And number four is get a little strategic. And And this this is is one of the mistakes I will admit to having made. A lot of people now are doing the opposite. They're making the plan and they're so strategic that they're not even having fun posting or making the content. So I had the opposite problem.
Helen:I was like, well, whatever. I don't need you know, I'm not gonna monetize on social media. I have a day job. I'm busy. I have production and all of that.
Helen:And I'm sure that I missed an opportunity at that time. There were people who were asking me, can I book you for private lessons? I didn't even have a plan. You know, I probably could have at the time had booked one on one sessions. But I was like, I will say it's not that I wasn't interested potentially.
Helen:I didn't have the confidence to think I could help someone back then. Maybe I needed to go through this five year period to get to a point of clarity with seeing, because now I can see someone's account, immediately see what they're doing wrong, immediately see how they can improve. Potentially, I can never go back, right? So potentially, have to think, why didn't I do that then? And it's am I because I was a dumb dumb?
Helen:Maybe? Head in the sand? I don't want to do that right now. Maybe it was just like not right now. I wasn't ready for it.
Helen:And maybe I didn't trust myself. I don't know what the things were. But I think if I could go back, maybe I would get strategic a little sooner. Perhaps. I do think I had to go through what I went through to get here.
Helen:But most people now are doing the opposite. They're making their strategic plan. They're trying to make a digital product, sell a thing, do a course, whatever. And they're so focused on that, they're not having any kind of fun in their content. So they're not enjoying the journey of building.
Helen:And so they're almost like sabotaging themselves because they're too much they have too much of a plan. So get a little strategic so you're prepared, but don't think the whole thing has to be about that. You can loosen it up. I would say that that's something I learned for sure. Loosen it up.
Helen:So for me, my learning is I probably could have got more strategic because I was super loose. But super loose got me to really good place with a really good solid community of trusted, of people who trust me because they knew I wasn't trying to sell them something upfront. So there's a balance that you need to find as a creator who's trying to monetize. And number five, number five comes before what would I do differently. Okay?
Helen:Because it's number five and then what would I do differently. So number five is play the long game and follow your heart. Because if you're judging your account every day, you're looking at analytics and oh my god, people are my viewers are dropping off after after three seconds. If I looked at my analytics every day back then, I probably would have I don't know. I think I would have I won't say I would have given up because I'm not a give up person, but I think it would have taken more of a toll on me.
Helen:I never really even considered worrying about analytics. I didn't look at when people drop off my videos. And more recently, when I have started to look at analytics to teach people what the analytics mean, I was like laughing at my analytics thing. Oh my god, after three seconds everybody stops watching my video. Meanwhile, it's viral.
Helen:So those analytics aren't even real. So I don't think I think we put so much stock in the analytics and we forget to go with instinct. And I'm the opposite. I'm not a, because I'm not an analytics person, I do go with instinct more. So I would say for you, for you as a listener, know who you are.
Helen:If you are so into the analytics, don't judge it in every day. Maybe look at it every quarter. Okay now, what would I do differently if I could do it all over? Here it is. I would have started an email list.
Helen:Day one. Day F and one. I would have started an email list. I can't emphasize it enough. And by the way, I didn't wait too long to start an email list.
Helen:I did it probably in year two maybe or one and a half. I didn't wait that long. I just didn't start it soon enough. It's not soon enough if you're not doing it right now. I don't care if you have 100 followers.
Helen:Start an email list. 50 followers. Start an email list. Those are your 50 people. You've got to get an email list going.
Helen:Oh my God, the things I've learned from social media personally, I can make a whole separate episode about that, about how confidence about, being less of a people pleaser and being okay with people not liking me and not liking my content. Those are other things that, that's like a byproduct of social media that I love. But that's not as, I guess I would say technically relevant to to you necessarily, so I wanna make sure these are relevant things. So starting in Nameless big time, big time, big time. And potentially finding a monetization option sooner to just have it in my profile.
Helen:I should have had something linked in my profile that was even if people didn't book me for a one on one, I should have had it there. Alright. We're gonna bring it back to wrap this up and give you the code to get into the studio, which I've said, I think I've said it at least five times in this episode. The code is all caps, TRYIT43030. Try it for 30.
Helen:All caps. Try it for 30. Try it for 30. And you can get a month for free. And by the way, I'm not talking about this on social media.
Helen:I'm not posting it in the newsletter. I'm not sharing it. This is yours. It's like your secret. It's the Easter egg.
Helen:It's the secret that you can share with people who have been thinking about it. I would almost say don't make videos about it if you're my studio members and you want to make videos. Do it in a DM. Just say, hey, I have you can do those voice chats in the DM. Hey, I know you were thinking about the studio.
Helen:I know you're trying to level up your content. I have a code. No one else knows the code. You can have it for thirty days because I don't offer a free trial. You as my studio members are able to now benefit from getting somebody in and being able to cap monetize on your affiliate links.
Helen:Because once they come in and they love it, they're gonna stay and you'll be making your affiliate money on their on their, fees every month. Okay. So thank you for making it to the end. Yay. And I can't leave without saying, in my two hundredth episode, please leave a review if you are enjoying the podcast.
Helen:It's something I should be saying after every episode, and I'm saying it today. Alright. See you next week.