Subscribe
Share
Share
Embed
Free newsletter for social media content creators!
Social media updates, trend alerts, original content ideas, music/audio suggestions, tutorials and more!
Welcome to the socialized strategy. Happy Friday. I am back, and I will have to say that I feel very basic because my background I have this crazy plant that I've had forever and it's just I need to change. I don't have my background set yet which is so frustrating when I look in my videos and I just see a blank wall. And I was literally just in a plain black shirt.
Helen:So if you're watching this, I added this sweater because I felt that the the visual was so basic. I couldn't even handle it. I'm such a visual person. I have to get it right. And I'm gonna tell you a couple of things.
Helen:So the wall behind me, I it is a blue color, but for some reason, on my videos, it's looking very green and I'm not happy with it. So that's why I haven't hung anything because I'm picking another color and I'm gonna make it bluer before I start putting any decor up. So, we're in a little bit of a holding pattern. I I like to do things and I like to go fast and get it done, so this is so difficult for me when it's like I have to wait, I have to wait till the paint's done before I can hang, before I can replace the plant, la la la la la, whatever. You didn't This is information you didn't need, but if you're watching, I just feel that I need to say it.
Helen:Okay. Let's get on with before I dive into the topic for today, I do wanna talk about a funny trend that since it was really not hitting that hard on, Tuesday when the trends went out and also I think it's now picking up traction, so I'm guessing we'll probably put it in next Tuesday's newsletter. By then, it's really gonna be going, and I wanna explain it a little bit because it's so funny and it's can be done in lots of different ways. So right now, it's called the women in male dominated fields or the women in male fields, and I think a lot of at first, a lot of guys didn't get it because it's their women are putting a text on the screen of something men typically say to them and how absurd it reads when you read it and then it says hashtag women in male fields. So that's the thing.
Helen:So the tongue in cheek thing is that the woman isn't saying it, she's putting up on screen what men have said to her. Okay. So now take it to another level. There's I'm seeing other ones come up and that's when I know the trend is gonna really light up because I'm seeing people use it in different ways. So, for example, children in parent fields.
Helen:So now you might be in, a kind of an odd mother daughter or parent child relationship, and so you're putting up on the screen something that your mom typically says to you that you think is absurd and just wrong. And so you put that absurd thing on the screen and then you'd have child hashtag child in parent fields. Alright. So I'm explaining the trend because I think a lot of people don't understand it and once you click in on what it is, you have to realize that the text on the screen is the person is not you saying it. It's what you've been what has been said to you by another person in your life that that's in another, role in your life.
Helen:So that's a trend. If you haven't seen it, type it in. You'll be on a journey that I cannot explain and some of them are so good and some of them are a little, they hit a nerve a lot of times. So be be aware and be ready if you're gonna go down that rabbit hole. And there's a lot of other things that happened this week on social media that's, like, I'm trying to think of we got the pajama thing.
Helen:We got the pink tote. There was, like, a whole bunch of things about this pink tote thing. We got this Kraft Mac and Cheese thing where this girl wrote to Kraft Mac and Cheese because she kept buying the gluten free mac and cheese and it wasn't coming with the the cheese packet inside. So she kept contacting the company and they were sending her coupons and she's like, no. I'm trying to let you know that you have a problem in in your production line.
Helen:And when she she finally made a video about it saying what happened, like, she had 4 boxes from different stores and they all were missing this packet of cheese, and Kraft was not smart in their response. And they said, we're sorry you're experiencing difficulty. We don't have any problem with our production line. Like, basically, a little bit gaslit her, like, saying apologizing, but basically saying it's you, it's not us, which is a really weird thing for a company to do. It was handled very wrongly.
Helen:I'm just saying. And, so that has been all over my for you page. So a lot of different kind of I'm not gonna say dramas, but a lot of different, viral things that have happened that are controversial, but in a an interesting way, in a small a small way that actually may makes a big impact. So I'll just leave you with that, and if you can you can easily find those things by hitting search and going, like, pajama gate or whatever, you'll find that one. Whatever.
Helen:But I I will say don't spend the whole a whole lot of time on it because there's a lot of it gets into a negative spiral in my opinion and that's when I was like, wait. Now am I getting more of these things because I watched one of them and am I gonna wreck my for you page and that's all I'm gonna get now? So I quickly try to find other things I enjoy more, like watching outfit transitions and, you know, fun fashion videos and, funny things and I try and get out of it. That's just how I roll. Okay.
Helen:Let's go on to the topic for today and I have a lot to say about it beyond the newsletter. So, unfortunately, we can't fit everything that I wanna spew out here. I cannot fit in a newsletter. It would end being a novel every week. So thank you for listening here for my bonus tips because I just have to be organized.
Helen:It has to be bullet points in the newsletter and then I can wax poetic if you feel like listening. So I wanna talk about social media burnout from my perspective because I also feel it sometimes, and I'm trying to say that I'm someone that loves making content. Like, every day, when I have a day that I haven't filmed something, it's almost like I get annoyed at myself that I didn't give myself time for my joy. That sounds maybe a little crazy, but my things that I like to do outside of the work things that I do that I have to do, but I really enjoy exercising or maybe going for a run or something. I know I'm one of those crazy people that enjoys it.
Helen:It's something I look forward to doing and I feel good after it, so I know it's always gonna benefit me because I'm always gonna feel good after. When I'm making content, I have the same little endorphin, rush or whatever it is. Yeah. Endorphin rush because I enjoy it. And it's like, oh, I captured that.
Helen:That was so cool. Me capturing content is how I live my moments, crazy as that may sound. And I'll go back to when my son got married, one of his friends said, well, I hope you're gonna be in the moment and not worry about videoing it. And I was he didn't mean it in a bad way, but I was a little offended because I said, actually, how I enjoy myself is by making content about the thing that I'm enjoying. And that's maybe not for everyone and maybe you might argue with that point, but I see things I have always seen things, like, through a camera lens.
Helen:I used to ride the subway in my twenties to go to NYU, and I used to think the whole thing was a music video. So when I was with headphones on watching people on the subway, I was seeing it through a camera lens. I didn't even realize that at the time. I realize that now as a content creator because that comes back to me often. So I do think that the best of us that love the content creation can still feel like it's a hamster wheel that you can't keep up with, and for me I get more frustrated that other things got in the way of me doing my fun thing versus I'm lost and I can't think of anything.
Helen:So there's 2 different types of burnout. There's the kind where you are just out of ideas and you're, like, blah, I can't figure it out, and the kind where you're, like, I didn't have time to do it because so many other things got in the way, so I didn't have time to be creative. And I tend to experience the second one way more than the first one. But on occasion, when I come back from if I'm on vacation and then I'm back from vacation and recently when I went to Tahiti on the sailboat, it took me almost 3 weeks to get back in the swing of it when I got back. And mainly because I was making only fun content when I was away.
Helen:And then I had to come back and think back to my strategy, I wanna make tutorials, and I was blanking out on what tutorials to make. But then my life wasn't as fun on the sailboat, so I couldn't think of fun things to post and I I experienced it. I was like, I think I'm maybe for the first time in my life having not writer's block, but, like, creative block burnout where I was like, what am I doing? What am I gonna post? And so, in the newsletter today and on this podcast, I'm gonna take you through some bullet points of how you can overcome, but before I before I even go into those bullet points, I wanna give you my extra things that are not included in the newsletter that I find helpful for me personally.
Helen:So, these are not apply to everyone types of of notes. These are just my personal things and maybe if you relate to this, it'll help you too. So I always say the group exercise thing gives me, like, a jump start on my exercise and then I go to a group class 1 or 2 and then I'm, like, now I'm back in my game and I could do my video exercise classes again and I feel like I'm in the mojo. And then if I start to feel like, I'm not doing I'm not doing the video all the way through because I'm getting, like, there's nobody here to pressure me into finishing it, then I go back to an exercise class in a group session and then I get rejuvenated. So lately, I'm I'm relating a lot of things to my exercise classes, but this is this is important.
Helen:So when I feel social media burnout and I start to feel like, I'm not really as inspired, I like to talk to people about it. I like to meet with a friend and then a friend that gets social media, by the way, not some of my friends who don't, but I do meet I like to get together with people who are in that social media space and then we inspire each other, and then we talk about, like, our frustrations, but then also we start to get creative. I'm like, you know, we should do a video together, la la la la la. And the next thing you know, my wheels are spinning and my mojo comes back. So finding a friend, phone a friend as they say in that game show, whatever, try and connect with someone who you can inspire each other, get connected with and start to feel that creative juices flowing again and the next thing you know, you're back.
Helen:That is such a good one and that's what I find a really, really helpful one for me. So that's the first. And the second thing that I'll tell you, and this is just related to things that are happening studio wise for me, but when I go to group things, I always think when I'm in those group exercise classes, I'm like, man, those fitness instructors are always the fittest people and they're always in the best space because they are in it because they have to be. So they're that's how they're making their living. They're exercising and they're teaching exercise, and so, of course, they're gonna be the fittest people and of course they're always gonna be able to stay fit.
Helen:So in the same way, as a creative person who is teaching people and now starting a studio, I think that I've just given myself a much more fun type of hamster wheel to be on because I'm not just thinking for myself now. I am thinking for a group. I'm thinking for a community of people. I'm thinking for the studio, like, how are we all gonna stay creative? How are we all gonna inspire each other?
Helen:And then I'm looking at the people that are in my studio's content and I'm like, oh, my God. She did that in such a great way. That was such a fun video. Oh, wow. He took that to a grocery store instead.
Helen:How much fun was that? So I think that weirdly, I have somewhat solved my my burnout potential by putting myself in a position where I'm always gonna be inspired to even if it's not for myself, now I'm inspired to help other people, which will then help me back again. So it's like I'm the fitness instructor. Only it's not fitness. Maybe I should learn how to teach a fitness class too while I'm at it.
Helen:Just kidding. Alright. So those are my little two tips, on how I overcome my roadblocks and a couple of times it's been I haven't had the chance. Let's say I can't get together with someone or let's say and this was before the studio where I was doing it for, because now with the studio, if you don't know, where it's really I'm helping people that are paying to be helped. They have a membership and they want my guidance daily and that's what I'm providing in the studio.
Helen:But if I think back to before this, so you're just a creator, you don't have the opportunity to teach people, and maybe you don't have someone near you that can be your your friend, your buddy. What I what Some of the suggestions in the newsletter are gonna be really help you help helpful, but for my own thing, I start to just say, I'm not gonna create today. Today, I'm just gonna scroll. Now, in the newsletter, we also suggest taking a break from the scroll, but personally for me, if I'm in a slump of creating, it's better for me to say, I'm not gonna post a video today. I'm just gonna look at videos today.
Helen:And when I look at videos, then I tend to save things that are, like, inspirational. I might wanna try something like that or I should use that sound when I'm in a mood again. And so it's scrolling is not a bad thing. Like, just scroll and have fun and that will help you a little bit. That's how I solve mine.
Helen:Okay. Let's get into the bullet points on specific things that you can do and maybe try some of these to see if it helps your content block so that you don't get burnout, especially over the holidays when it's like pressure, million directions, presents, holiday frenzy, all the things, the stores get more like anxious you're in them and you feel everybody's tension. So that's really hard. So and it's sort of it's hard to quiet that down. So here's some here's some tips to help you stay in the game without burning out.
Helen:First is the opposite of what I just said, set aside scroll free time. So get yourself out of the zone. Stay Okay. You can either decide to go in the zone and do that for a day or take yourself totally out of the zone. Put yourself into a position where you're walking or you're out and you're getting together with friends.
Helen:You're doing something in real life. Go IRL for a day or 2 and take yourself out of the scroll. Take yourself out of it completely. And Julie does this often. She's been doing puzzles now.
Helen:Like, I don't get it because I could never focus on a puzzle. That's just me. I probably could because I do Legos with Jonathan. But I I do that with him because he wants to do that, not because I have any interest in doing that. I just get once I start doing it, in the zone and then we have to finish it.
Helen:So that's another reason I can't do a puzzle. I wouldn't be able to sit down and do part of it. I'd have to finish the whole damn thing in one sitting. Like when I read a book, I have to finish the whole book so I can't read. That was just a squirrel moment.
Helen:Thank you if you know what I'm talking about. Thanks for staying. Alright. So, you got your squirrel free time. You got your break.
Helen:You can't take yourself away from it and then when you come back, you're refreshed. The second is to create more and scroll less. So, that's another strategy where instead of, like, looking and looking and looking and seeing what other people are doing, put it aside, go to the newsletter, and get some of the original content ideas and say, I'm just gonna make some content today. I'm not gonna look at what other people are doing. So this isn't a These are all different ways but And no one way is the right way for everyone.
Helen:So what I'm hoping to provide is options like see what works for you because what's good for the goose ain't always good for the gander as my mom would say. It's one of the expressions that she says it doesn't necessarily annoy me. It annoys me a little but not a lot. Alright. So what's good for you is not good for someone else, etcetera.
Helen:So think about if this helps you to create more and not watch more. The other thing is maybe changing up your content and really being so much less perfect. So if you do videos that you always script and I'm thinking of one of my studio people who is, like, scripts her content, thinks about it, she uses a teleprompter, she gets the content out there, boom, boom, boom. And now that she's in the studio, every week we're providing ideas, and so she's trying things that aren't necessarily that type of, vibe where she has to script it. And so she's powering out some different content and it's good.
Helen:It's really good because it's just like a change from the norm. Alright? So switch it up. Switch up how you, you know, basically keeping it yourself, be yourself, but maybe add a little fun and add a little something different. That's gonna help you a lot.
Helen:I love the whole switch it up thing because as soon as somebody steps outside their normal comfort zone, it's like exercising a new muscle and it's like, I can lift that weight. I can do that. And then maybe you wanna do it a little more and then maybe one of them gets traction and can feed feed you some followers. Okay? So that's it.
Helen:And the next one is to not post just for the algorithm. So if you think, oh my gosh, I know this video is not gonna do well because it's not this type of content and the algorithm is not gonna like it. Get over it. For real. I have lots of videos that have very few views but I like them and so they stay on my feed.
Helen:And I notice a lot of big creators. I scroll their feed and all the videos have a significant amount of views and I'm, like, they're privating videos when they don't do well because there's nobody's feed is that consistently good video after good video with thousands of views. It's not. Even on the biggest creators, if you scroll, you see this, some with a 1000 views or 2 1000 views and normally they maybe get 20, 30, 40, 50,000 views, but I think people are deleting them and so so you're having your idea of, like, it's a little FOMO. You think, oh, that person's never having a bad video.
Helen:Why am I having a bad video? And, you know, the reality is they're doing it for the 'gram, as we like to say. Right? They're just possibly deleting things so that their feed looks good and that's the reality. I know it for a fact and I will just leave you with that.
Helen:Don't worry about the algorithm. If it didn't like a video, the non liked video tends to push out your better performing videos. When I post a video and it gets some traction, if I post the next day, the previous day video gets more traction again. If I post again and the following 2 videos don't do well, the one that was doing well keeps doing well. So it's like it keeps you, it keeps your hamster wheel moving in the algorithm and it keeps you getting traction on other videos.
Helen:And then the last tip of the week is you come first. Okay? Social media is supposed to be fun and inspiring. It's not supposed to exhaust you. It's not supposed to drain you, it's supposed to add to your life, not take away from it.
Helen:So if it's doing that, reassess and say hold up. How can I change this? Make a conscious decision on how you're gonna change one thing this week to see if that makes it better. You can go through the bullet points and say, k. This week, I'm gonna try no scrolling for 2 days.
Helen:This this week, I'm gonna try scrolling for 1 whole day and not worrying about creating. This week, I'm gonna try not posting my usual content, doing something a little different and you can do that. And if you need help doing that and now comes like a minor little sales pitch but that's not really a sales pitch because you don't have to be in the studio because you're getting lots of ideas here in the newsletter and here on the podcast. But every week in the studio, I'm providing a challenge and everybody's hopping on it and we're having fun critiquing each other. It's so great to see the different ways people are doing the one challenge that I put out.
Helen:I'm giving a tip of the week. So here's a way to improve your speaking videos this week. Think about doing this, this, and this. So each week and then another day, I'm giving out extra trends. So if you don't like what's in the newsletter, here's a couple of extra trends.
Helen:And then the next day, if you don't know how to use this trend for your niche, drop a comment and we will give you some ideas. So that's what's happening in the studio along with the weekly lives. We did one last night. It was so much fun, and I can't explain it. I am inspired by the people who are in there.
Helen:I feel like it is a good group of supportive, wonderful people, and we're really connecting because the camera's on, so I'm getting to meet the people that I have a lot of them I have seen in my feed and now I'm getting to meet them in person and have back and forth. So it's not a one way street. It's a two way street and I'm finding that I am learning from some of the creators who have more expertise. I'll mention I'm gonna shout out one who is Lilybeth, and I like to call her Lily. Her name is Lee.
Helen:She is a capcut creator. She creates templates and she makes money creating CapCut templates, like, what? First, I didn't even know this was a thing, so now I'm learning from her. She needs to figure out how to promote, so now I'm helping her with her content that's gonna be more, soft promotional so that she can get more views on her CapCut templates. So, I think that we are the group is greater than the individual.
Helen:Right? The whole is greater than its parts. So, even though it was a struggle for me to figure out how I was gonna be able to serve a large group of people, I'm just happy that Julie and myself and our social studio manager, Maayan, have just put it together in a way that is so doable for me as a teacher and for you so that you get more personalized help instead of generic help. Like, I don't like when you join our program and you pay a monthly fee and all you're getting is, like, a PDF with some suggestions every week. I don't know.
Helen:That doesn't feel that doesn't feel productive, and I wanted, if I'm a producer by trade, director, and I'm creating a studio, I want it to be productive for the members and the crew in the studio. And enough said, have a wonderful weekend. I'm too inspired and I have to stop. I I promise you. I I keep saying I promise you I won't talk about it anymore, but I can't help it because I love it.
Helen:And this is what I'm talking about. So if you get to this point and you don't wanna listen, just turn me off. I will not be insulted at all. Love you. See you next week.
Helen:Have a great weekend.