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Social media updates, trend alerts, original content ideas, music/audio suggestions, tutorials and more!
Welcome to the socialized strategy, Tuesday, October 8th. Hello. Hope you had a great weekend. I have so many things on tap for today. I don't even know if I'm gonna get to the trends.
Helen:I'm just kidding because I will get to them. But let me start with a few things. There have been so many things unfolding that I'm glad I'm in this certain area of TikTok on the for you page for this stuff because it's not negative, and it's intriguing, and it's really fun. So let's talk about a couple of them. The one is the whole rug escapade.
Helen:And if you're not in on this, there's a woman who has found a rolled rug with blood stains on it or something buried in her backyard. It turned into a crime scene. This one went crazy viral because, I think, because of all the Crime Stoppers fans out there and, like, the peep and the people who like that sort of content on television, and now they're getting it in real life on social media in real life. Funny that that's social media, and I consider it in real life. But it's because it's a real story, and it's not something that TV producers have worked on.
Helen:It's definitely more authentic when you see something like that unfold on social media versus a curated show that has been, handled by producers. So, you know, there's been editors involved, and this is was much more organic. So Cady Sentry is the creator. We're we've tagged it in the newsletter today, but I definitely wanted to talk about it because I think it's so intriguing how something as simple as that has really gone crazy. It took her account from I don't even think she had followers to 2,200,000 followers.
Helen:So it was, like, jettisoned her into the platform. And I think what's gonna be curious for me to see is where she takes her account now, because she has the interest of people. But once the story is old news, what is her account going to be about? Because it seems to be very, very heavily leaning on that, at least for now it is. And her updates are continuously about that.
Helen:And her recent post as of this date of this newsletter and this podcast, her recent post is that they are no longer considering it a crime scene. So she doesn't think there's much more happening or maybe nothing at least crazy happening. So I'm curious to see where she's going to take her content now now that she has this base of followers who have clearly jumped on to make sure they stay in the story. But now that the story and when it gets to be old news, where does that leave her as a content creator? So I'm gonna be watching.
Helen:I'd love to see where that goes. Some other things I wanted to just touch on is and I in in a good way, in a heart felt warm place, I'm gonna share about how Frankie Valley TikTok has been entertaining me. And there's a little bit of a backstory to this because years ago, when there was a show on Broadway I don't know. My husband and I went to see a show about the 4 seasons or something way back when. And then there was a Frankie Valli performance of some kind at Radio City or somewhere.
Helen:Anyway, we took my father because my parents were big, big, obviously, Frankie Valli fans. And I thought, oh, my father's gonna love this. By the way, he's 93 now. So we did this. It had to be at least when he was mobile, so it's gotta be at least 7, 8 years ago, maybe even more.
Helen:And we went to see Frankie Valli. And back then, almost a decade ago, he was also lip synching the whole show. And my dad was so adorable because he was watching this, and I could see how much he was loving it. And he said something like, wow. His voice is really still pretty amazing.
Helen:And I did not have the heart to tell my dad that it was lip synced because my poor, at the time, 80 something year old dad literally thought he was performing and he was still singing with his own original voice. So it was kind of adorable. But what it tells me is that his fan base does not care if he is lip syncing, if he's even not lip syncing. They are there for him and for their memories of him and their love of him. So it's really kinda cute, like, that I have this personal attachment to it.
Helen:And then I started seeing these posts. And, I mean, the comment sections are well worth reading. So funny. People are funny. People on the Internet are funny.
Helen:Realized realize realizing how many funny people there are that have not been acknowledged as comedians in this world is pretty amazing. Because when you read a comment section of a video like that, it is unbelievable. There was people talking about how it's the rigor mortis tour. The comments are so funny. There's creators who have shared comments and talked about it.
Helen:And I think it's what makes the Internet such a fun and beautiful place that we can all be behind our screens and where there's a lot of clever senses of humor, and you realize how brilliant some of them are and that they can be so quick quick on their feet and clever. And it's probably one of my favorite things that I have gotten out of TikTok since the pandemic up until now. It's always been one of my favorite things. Creative comments get me. When people make really creative comments on my videos, funny or not, just sometimes beautiful or extremely creative, thoughtful, the way they articulate the words, whatever it is.
Helen:I will oftentimes follow someone with no followers. Even if, even if there's no content, I will give them a follow for their, I think, their cleverness and their mind. I love it. So there's a lot to be learned from the comment section. That's what I one of my favorite things about about social media in general.
Helen:What else do I wanna do I wanna talk about today? So many things. I wanna talk about learning from mistakes because there's a few things that I need to share. So first off, often, we are powering out these newsletters very quickly. And the we have Julie and I have a rhythm for how we get the newsletters out and then how I do the podcast.
Helen:We have a really nice rhythm. But sometimes the rhythm gets a little disrupted by our work my work schedule for production. All of a sudden, I don't have as much time to necessarily, like, pay attention to it or proofread or whatever. So she'll write the initial draft, and she does put the the trends in and all the ideas and everything. And then I tackle, what is that what I will call, like, the opening of what I wanna talk about the topic of the week, and then I tend to write that.
Helen:So when you see typos in the opening paragraph, you can point a finger right here at me because it's usually my mine. And last week when the newsletter went out and I was in such a rush because I had a shoot coming up and I was moving too quickly, and I read my own newsletter and I wanted to cry because I had so many typos in the first sentence. And I'm like, how did I type this and not even read it again? My god. I can't stand it.
Helen:One of my least favorite things that I do in in typos is when I type you instead of your. So y o u it mean, like, your time this is your time or whatever, and I type you time. I can't stand it. It's just for some reason I leave off the r just when I'm typing fast. It's not a spelling problem.
Helen:It's that my fingers are doing the typing. And we have learned to move so fast with our fingers that sometimes the connection between the brain and the fingers isn't even there. So it's crazy. But I was so upset when I read that newsletter, and I saw the typos in the first sentence. And I even said to Julie, I wanna cry right now because it just went out.
Helen:And I opened it up, and I see typos. And why didn't I see them last night when I was typing it? So, number 1, apologies if you see typos in the newsletter. We are moving quickly to get this content out, and it's so upsetting to me because as a grammar particular person, I'm always, like, so particular about typos and re proofreading. So when something comes out of my house, our company, I really hate it when it's got mistakes.
Helen:So apologies in advance for that, but understand that it's part of it is the speed at which we're moving and the other things that are happening at the time, and we're just trying to get the time the stuff out in a timely manner. What was most interesting to for me to learn from this, though, is that there are many adults living with dyslexia who have problems with spelling. And so I'm not saying that's me necessarily. Although, I do think when I say go left and I'm pointing to the right, I might have some moments of dyslexia. But I know that it's a thing and spelling is a problem for people who have adults with dyslexia.
Helen:And so I have good friends now who have it and who are who talk to me about it, and they're they're saying, you know, sometimes I I try to avoid the written word, and I don't. Even when I use Grammarly or I proof my captions or whatever, there's always mistakes. So I'd rather do speaking than typing. And I'm like, oh, okay. So that's curious.
Helen:So I think that my eyes are even open now to to be more forgiving of typos. Whereas before, I would immediately think, oh, this person didn't even proofread this. Like, what? Now I'm trying to be a little kind to myself because maybe I didn't proofread it even though I did probably proofread it and I just didn't notice. And other people just might have this dyslexic problem, so they can't even with proofreading, they're not even able to find their mistakes.
Helen:So let's all be more forgiving, and I'm gonna be more forgiving of myself. That's the lesson for today. Okay? The second thing is that we can have technical failures, and we can't blame ourselves and we can't beat ourselves up. But I'm gonna share another one.
Helen:Julie and I recorded our mother daughter podcast last week. Everything was great. We were talking about a recap on our trip. We had a fun it was a really a fun episode, and we record with this microphone. I record with this microphone.
Helen:She records with 1 too. And my when you tap on the side here and this little red light lights up, it's a mute button. So that if you're recording and you have to cough or something, you can tap mute, cough, and nobody would hear it, unmute. So unbeknownst to me, my mute button was on the entire recording. It must have been when I take when I took it out and I must have touched it.
Helen:In this particular podcast, I was holding the microphone. My finger probably touched it. So the whole podcast had no sound, and it was devastating. And I had to forgive myself. So there's 2 2 places where I'm learning to be kinder to myself, and one is with technical problems.
Helen:When things fail, sometimes shit happens. And we make mistakes and we make typos and we have to move on. And I have learned, thanks to social media, thanks to how the speed at which we are putting content out in the world, it's not always gonna be perfect. And even when I say you don't have to be perfect with your hair, makeup, and etcetera, clothing, it's the same I have to teach myself that I don't have to be perfect in my spelling and my grammar. And sometimes mistakes happen.
Helen:And so the theme for today is to be kind to yourself if you make a mistake. It's not a big deal. And most people aren't even noticing it. Quite frankly, we're probably more tough on ourselves than anything. Alright.
Helen:Lastly, before I get into the trends, I'm gonna say one more thing that is funny about social media. That there was a this is just a funny thing that happened that I happened to be in in deep on. But there was a guy who went to a Goodwill store and he found he saw trophies. And they were like a piano trophy and a whatever it was, tennis, and it was trophies, and it was had a girl's name on it. And he posted about it, and he's he basically made a joke post like, oh, to this girl whose name was on the trophy, your mom cleaned out your cleaned out your room and got rid of all your trophies.
Helen:And he made this post and it was so funny. And he was just like, you were really, really good at everything you did, you know, kind of thing. Well, it turns out that she was found eventually, of course. Because when things go viral on especially on TikTok, it goes why far and wide. So this young woman, I guess her mom went running to the Goodwill store to buy back all the trophies because they went viral.
Helen:And I just think that's funny. And that would be something that happens to me because I am known in my family when we moved from one house to another when my kids were younger, but they had all been participating. And if anybody knows Flamingo Golf in Long Beach Island, they used to when your ball went into the hole in 1 in the last hole, they would give a trophy or 5 free games. And my kids always took the trophy, and we had a bazillion of these trophies. And we had to move the house pretty quickly from one house to another.
Helen:It was during the pandemic. No. Sorry. It wasn't during the pandemic. It was during the sandy storm.
Helen:And so things were it was water. It was crazy. And I tossed the trophies. I said, we don't need these trophies anymore. And I somehow got rid of these trophies, and my kids will never forgive me for losing, for letting the trophies go.
Helen:They still talk about it to this day. Oops. So when I saw that TikTok, I was dying. Talk about being a relatable moment for me. And now you know it too, and I feel terrible about it, but I have to move on because I can't get the trophies back.
Helen:At least it didn't have their names on it. It was just like, all in one, first prize, whatever. Okay. I'm moving on. Maybe that just telling that story will let me absolve myself of it.
Helen:But, I'm sure I'll still continue to beat myself up about it. Let's talk about the trends for today. Let's start with TikTok. So in the clurb, we're all fam. This is a fun lip sync, and you can really be goofy and silly.
Helen:It's a audio where you're trying to talk about something and the person doesn't get it. Well, it's because you sound because the audio was garbled and ridiculous, kind of weird speak. So you can have some fun with this by doing the lip sync, and then you can put something on screen about how you're talking about something and when when when the people in your group don't get it. So that's a fun one, nice and easy. There's another cute one, and I love when a transition is involved.
Helen:Boom. So if you're doing this one called where will the wind take us? And it's when you put up your finger and you could be with yourself or with a friend and where will the wind take you and you kind of fall out of the frame. I'm not gonna do it because I'll go away from the microphone, but you fall to the side. And then in the next scene, you're falling into the next place.
Helen:And in this case, I think the ladies ended up in Target. But it's like, where will the wind take us tonight? And then they end up in Target. So you can take yourself wherever your wind takes you with that one. And you can use it to for your brand too.
Helen:If you have, a business, you can have people like where will the wind take us and it's gonna take you to buy new products for your business or whatever it is to support your business. That would be fun one. Next. Oops. I see a mistake here.
Helen:Okay. Next is an is Instagram trends, and it's they are both, of course, trends that have been trending on TikTok and have now they're now hitting hard on Instagram, which makes me sometimes think I should hold off posting some of my TikToks to Instagram. If I only had the patience and then remembered to post them later, it's frustrating because I tend to do it too soon. So I'm not in the trend when it's trending on Instagram. I'm ahead of it, which is fine, but it doesn't help me in the moment.
Helen:But one is one step at a time and it's, the sound of feet walking, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, and heels clicking. And people you you're showing where you're walking to with purpose. So whether you're walking to your to the bar at happy hour, whether you're walking to your morning class because it's a Monday and you're gonna kick off the week week on the right foot, or you're walking back on your on your Friday, you're walking out of work with purpose. Whatever it is, have fun with that one. And the last one is pat yourself on the back.
Helen:And this is a a nice lip sync where you're I mean, just play the lip play the sound and you'll know what I'm talking about. But you have to just show off something that you're doing good and you can do it. You can actually grab a friend to do it with you. Nice and easy one, and I'm not gonna even elaborate on it. You can go click on those in the newsletter.
Helen:Okay. Now let's talk about original content ideas because these are always more fun to talk about and elaborate on. The first one is to use some fun effects, And that means take advantage of this is how people go viral on these apps. They use something that's in app that's a fun feature like the do re mi thing on TikTok. And then all of a sudden, one person used it and started to hit a trend.
Helen:And do, re, me, the people that were singing and getting the ball, it was like a game. You had to hit the note to get the ball through the hole, and you've got all the way up to so lati do. You the, confetti would fly. And I I hit the notes, and I was so excited when the confetti started flying. So using the effects that are in an app tend to be a possibility for you to create a trend by accident.
Helen:If yours is funny, if yours if someone else picks up on it, or if you're just you're just waking people up to a trend that to a effect that you might have found and found fun. So look at go through. You can do the color game. There's plenty of effects to utilize on Instagram Reels and TikTok where you can help get that algorithm push by using something in app. The next one is, it says here ask your followers a question, but it's it's almost bigger than that.
Helen:It's like a lot of people have done this. And to me, I don't really care for it, but I'm sharing because it works. You can say something like, you know, who's your favorite creator? Tag them in the comments to show them love, and we'll all go follow or go see their content too. I don't really like it because in my opinion, I don't think people necessarily click on the ones that people recommend and then go see.
Helen:I don't think it it helps necessarily, but it does get people talking. It's like, who's your favorite creator? And then all of a sudden, I'll be tagged in it as the person's favorite creator. So if you can think of something where you're asking people to tag an account that does such and such. So it could be asking your followers, who what brand is what brand are you most loyal to?
Helen:Like, if you had to go sit on a desert island, you'd make sure this came with you. And so maybe then you're having people tag their favorite brands in there. Maybe you'll get the attention of a brand. You never know. You could do the same thing with the idea of, what creator would you bring if you only could keep 10 creators on on your social media app?
Helen:Something like that. That could be a fun one. I like that because it's more interactive. It's not just asking a question and someone has to think of an open ended answer, but it's you're asking them to tag someone. So tagging has good engagement value.
Helen:So think about that as a possibility. And then the last one is kind of creative, and this is for my creative people out there, which is recreate a fan recreating a trend but making it your own. For example, just how the woman who did the girl what's her name? Girl with I forgot her username, but she did Looking for a Man in Finance, Trust Fund. Okay.
Helen:So let's say you make up you find a song you like and you write different words to it and then you do a chant. Or you take one that was already a spoof and then you make new words to it. So if you're a creative person that likes to, like, maybe maybe you're frustrated jingle writer that wanted to just write music in some way, This one's for you. You can do it and you don't have to be a great singer. You could just do it like chant it.
Helen:Chant it. You know, you could just get on there and do your thing and, you know, looking for Julie wrote one here. Scratch that. I'm looking for a creator in my feed. Sick vibe.
Helen:Sick vibes, creative eyes, you know, something like that where you can change it. But now I'm not saying to do that song. That's just an example. You can pick any song trending or not and then make your own lyrics to it and then post it. Get as creative as you can and see if you can be the next girl with the finance.
Helen:Okay. I can't think of her name. Oh, well. Alright. Next up, the tutorials.
Helen:So what I've got this week is I really focused hard on formatting. Because once I get on a topic, then I start to think of different things that I wanna share about that topic. And since I was talking about formatting content, I decided to actually make a tutorial that shows you here's how you do it if you shoot horizontally and if you wanna crop it vertically. So I did oh, I did an example. It was Jonathan calling me.
Helen:Sorry about that. But that's what I did for this week is how to actually shoot a video. I showed it on screen, where to put your camera, how to push it back a little further, how to make the cutting down the center, what's good about doing it, what are tips that can help you do it better. That's what, this tutorial is for today. And on the Instagram tutorials, I've got how to post longer reels.
Helen:Because, again, I don't think people know, no matter how many times I say it, that if you wanna post a reel longer than 90 seconds, all you've gotta do is post it as a regular post. So that is the tutorial for today. I show that and it's the hidden gem, I'm telling you, of of Instagram because I've got so many people who are just thinking they have to edit their videos from 2 minutes to 90 seconds and you don't, unless you wanna add music. Because you can't add music to videos longer than 90 seconds. Alright.
Helen:So go check out the, the wonderful music suggestions for today. We've got lots of trending musics for you, lots of options. And see if you can find something there that works for you. I'm working on a lot of content right now for brands and different in my production job. So I've really been focused hard on music.
Helen:And sometimes when my work my day job leads me to need to find music that's trending, I really go deep. And then I have lots more options for you in the newsletter. So go check it out. And before I leave you, I wanna say, if you would like to have questions answered, I don't think a lot of people are noticing that at the bottom of the newsletter, there is a submit your question button. And I love to answer questions at the end of the podcast, and I'm I often wonder if the people who ask the questions are even listening to the podcast to hear the answers.
Helen:I hope so. But if you know someone that has a social media question, submit it to the newsletter. It's at the very bottom of the newsletter. It says submit your questions, and it's a blue square. Ask questions.
Helen:You could submit a question, and then I will tackle it in the Friday session most likely. Sometimes I get to questions on Tuesdays too, but not today. I'm out. I've got work to do, and I've gotta get get it I gotta get it going. Thank you so much for listening.
Helen:Have a have a very happy week, and I'll see you again on Friday. Have a good one.