My Instagram workshop at Harvard Ed Portal. We had a great audience and a very friendly atmosphere. Instagram Marketing is my favorite topic! #instagrammarketing #bostonbusinesswomen #smallbusiness #enterpreneurship

IS HAVING A MENTOR A GOOD IDEA? ⠀ Find a mentor, somebody who will give you good advice and help you to achieve your goals! I heard it so many times, and I’m sure you did too. ⠀ I was always looking for this kind of person since I’ve moved to the US. Every time I met someone who is slightly suitable for this purpose, I wondered if I should ask her/him to be my mentor. I felt a desperate need for someone who could guide me in my entrepreneurial journey because most of the times I feel like I’m wondering in complete darkness. I’ve spoken with many people with lots of experience in business who are mentoring others. ⠀ And you know what? I finally realized that having a mentor right now might actually hurt my business. I will tell you why. ⠀ ✔️First, it is hard to find someone who knows my industry well. Marketing business is a very specific one. I couldn't use cookie-cut approaches to find clients like running Ads and networking, because my business only works on referrals. ⠀ ✔️Also, most of my potential mentors didn’t understand my struggle of being an immigrant who works in the marketing industry, and who's not a native English speaker. What seems super easy for them, is not easy for me at all. That's why most of their recommendations are quite useless for me. ⠀ ✔️They don’t have enough experience with online marketing. This person has to understand a difference between SEO, paid traffic, content marketing, lead generation to understand what kind of services I offer, and how it all works. ⠀ When people whom I respect give me an advice, I always listen to them. But I'm afraid that if this advice wouldn't be a good one, I could wast a lot of time. And I just can't afford it right now. ⠀ The good news is that I finally realized who could be my best mentor at this point. THIS IS ME! I’m the one who knows my business, my industry, and my situation very well. I just have to trust myself more, and stop on dreaming that somebody comes and gives me answers to all my questions. ⠀ ————————————————— ⠀ Do you have a mentor or trying to find one? ⠀ If you want to read more about my entrepreneurial journey, follow a hashtag #janesbusiness

My Instagram workshop is next week! ⠀ This time I will be talking about my favorite topic - Instagram for business. Dear business owners who live in the Boston area - you are very welcome to attend it on Tuesday, April 23, 2019, from 9:30 AM to 12:00 at Harvard Ed Portal in Allston. ⠀ Link for the registration in my bio. ⠀ Light breakfast and networking will take place 9:30 - 10 am. Presentation from 10 - noon. ⠀ What I will be talking about? This workshop called How to Market Your Products or Services on Instagram, and I 'll cover the following. ⠀ ✅Creating quality content for Instagram ✅Boosting Instagram engagement (Instagram giveaways, contests, challenges) ✅Setting up Shoppable Tags ✅Using Instagram Stories for business ✅Running Instagram Ads ⠀ I will be trying to record it, so if the quality of recording will be satisfactory, I’ll share it with you. ⠀ Instagram is such a great tool for every brand and (almost!) every business, especially the small one. I’m looking forward to sharing my experience with you and help you to generate sales on this amazing platform. ⠀ Also, I need your help. What questions about Instagram for business do you have? What would you like me to explain to you in details? Step by step? Please share your questions in comments even if you won’t be able to attend. I will answer them in my next posts. #instatips #bostonbusinesswomen #smallbusinesstips #bostonsmallbusiness Photo credit @susiemhl

Are you using the most efficient and less expensive way to grow your sales on Instagram? ⠀ Your existing customers are your best advocates and your best marketers. Encourage them to support you along the way by offering them some incentives like store credits or special discounts. ⠀ 1️⃣Make your program’s requirements clear. List the details about your program on your Instagram and your website: ⠀ ✔️How long does your Brand Advocate term last ✔️What is the incentive (store credit/discount) ✔️Application requirements (public IG account, the minimum number of followers, etc) ⠀ 2️⃣See if your applicants qualify See if your applicants qualify by asking for the additional info. ⠀ ✔️How often do they go on Instagram per day? Per week? ✔️Have they ever been an ambassador before for another company? ⠀ 3️⃣Offer an incentive ⠀ You can offer your customers either a store credit or a discount. Or you could offer to let them try your product for free if in exchange they would post on Instagram and “story” their experience with your product. ⠀ 4️⃣Choose your ambassadors wisely ⠀ ✔️They don’t need to have a big following on Instagram — you can even work with people who have 200 followers — but they do have to show up on the app frequently. ⠀ ✔️Choose people who share similar interests with you. For example, if you are a brand with a focus on sustainability and eco-friendliness, choose people who also care about these things. ⠀ 5️⃣Be clear on what content you expect your ambassadors to create for you ⠀ ✔️Let them know when and how often you want them to post ⠀ ✔️Send them examples of content you’d like to see (both Stories and feed posts). ✔️Tell them what content they could repost from your account. Explain how to repost your content and give their thoughts and opinions on it. Make the process of working with you as easy as possible ⠀ 6️⃣Communicate with your ambassadors often ⠀ Give them the tools they need: graphics, post examples, and scripts for communicating with followers in comments and DM, so they will sound authentic and not “pitchy”. ⠀ Do you run BAP for your brand on Instagram? #janeinstatips #ecommercebusiness #instamarketing

I did it! My presentation about Facebook Ads at @venturecafe went well. ⠀ Honestly, I had such a hard time creating the slides and preparing to this workshop. Why? Because I had too much to say. Facebook and Instagram Advertising is a complicated topic. I also wanted to show participants the examples of Ads that are very trendy right now, including quizzes ads, FB messenger quizzes, gamification trend for ads, and so on. I cover briefly Chat Bots and how they work just amazing for small businesses. And of course, I was talking about my favorite User Generated Content that could be turned into Ads, and also Instagram Stories Ads! ⠀ Can you feel my excitement about this topic when you read this? Imagine how I felt when I finally had a chance to share my ideas and knowledge with other people! Yes, I could go on and on...Providing one example after another. I’m such a Social media 🤓 ⠀ But time was limited, and I had to be brief and use only one example to illustrate each point. This was the hardest part. ⠀ Have you ever done a workshop or a presentation about topic you are very excited about? ⠀ Have you struggled with the same problem - how to cover many things in one session and don’t make people confused? Photo credit to @aisha_alwardi

INSTAGRAM UPDATES! ⠀ Instagram is introducing “Instagram Checkout” so people can shop without leaving a platform. For now only certain brands have access to this feature, like Zara, H&M, Nike, Gucci, etc. ⠀ This feature works perfectly! When you tap on a shoppable tag in the post, you’ll see a screen where you can choose a size and a color, read the product description, and see a button called “Instagram Checkout”. You will be asked to leave an address and your credit card info, and you can buy an item in a couple of taps. ⠀ ✅What does it mean for brands? ⠀ ✔️Less friction - more sales. This feature will increase your sales rate, for sure. Adding shoppable tags to Instagram posts has already increased the sales rate by 30% on average, and I’m sure that the Instagram Checkout feature could improve this result significantly. ⠀ ✔️Instagram is becoming officially a “shopping” social media; people have already gotten used to shopping on Instagram. Will it become less social and more commercial? Probably yes. But...shopping IS a social experience. We like going shopping with friends, communicating and having fun in the process. Instagram tries to offer us a similar experience. Let’s see how successful it could be. ⠀ ✅What does this update mean for you? ⠀ If you sell physical products and market them on Instagram, you should add shoppable tags to your account — asap! — so when Instagram gives access to Instagram Checkout to everyone, you will have started benefiting from this feature from the first. ⠀ ———————————— ⠀ What do you think about Instagram Checkout? Will it make Instagram a new Amazon, or will Instagram remain a social place where people connect with each other?

This is the Instagram Marketing mistake that 99% of entrepreneurs make. They don’t include their main selling points to their Instagram description and content. ⠀ Your main selling points are the reasons why people should buy from you, and how are your services or products different from what other people or brands offer. ⠀ How to include your product advantages to your Instagram content? ⠀ ✅List all your selling points on a piece of paper. ⠀ ✅Ask your existing customers why they chose your product or service. ⠀ ✅Include not only ones that make your product unique, but also what makes your brand unique, something about who you are. For example, you are a military spouse who started her own business because it is often hard for military spouses to find a job. You should definitely add this detail to your bio and content. Many people will be willing to buy from you because your story will resonate with them. ⠀ ✅Chose 3-4 most important selling points, and include them to your bio and content (posts, stories) ⠀ ✔️Bio. Use bullet points listing your most important product advantages in you bio. ⠀ ✔️Posts. Write posts explaining your product key advantages. Try to include one key selling point per post. Post about your product advantages periodically, at least several times a month for each selling point. Make it interesting - use your customer’s stories, or share your own experience to illustrate your point. ⠀ ✔️Stories. Create stories that highlight your product selling points every week. Add them to your Stories highlights. ⠀ ——————————— What are your product’s main selling points? List them in the comments, and I’ll tell you if you made them clear in your Instagram.

MY TOP THREE PODCASTS ABOUT ONLINE MARKETING ⠀ 1. Shopify Masters by Shopify @shopifymasters ⠀ Shopify is a great platform to build an ecommerce website. This podcast is a series of interviews with ecommerce business owners who already achieved impressive results selling products via their Shopify website. The real business owners share which tools and techniques worked for them, and which didn’t. ⠀ If you click on “Details” button (I post an example in Stories), and dig into episode notes, you’ll see a link to a blog post about this episode, and Show Notes which include information about the guest: website and social profiles, and guests’ recommendations: apps and online tools that they use for their business. And! You will also find a full transcript of the podcast. If you want to go back and check something that guest mentioned, you can find it in the transcript very quickly. I think this is genious! Thank you, Shopify! ⠀ 2. Perpetual Traffic by Digital Marketer @perpetualtraffic ⠀ This is a very good podcast about FB Advertising. ⠀ Facebook Ads experts Molly Pittman, andRalph Burns share their experience working with Facebook Ads. Ralph Burns run a marketing agency that focuses on FB marketing for ecommerce, and he shares his proven strategies for getting results for his clients. I like episodes where they provide practical examples, like the one I shared with you in Stories - about using Facebook bots to advertise a restaurant. ⠀ 3. My # 3 is The Art of Paid Traffic by @rickmulready - also about FB advertising. I’d say that this is a more beginners-friendly podcast than Perpetual Traffic. A lot of case-studies, and also as soon as Facebook releases an update - Rick immediately records a new episode about it. Highly recommend. ⠀ These are my top 3 podcasts, and honestly, I couldn’t say I enjoy listening to them😀 They make me think hard and absorb new info, and it is a lot of work. And after every episode I felt frustrated - so many things I have to try, where can I get so much time?!! ⠀ Do you feel the same while learning something?😁 What podcasts are your favorites? Please like my post if you find it helpful.❤️

WHY I STOPPED LISTENING TO TOO MANY PODCASTS ⠀ I was a big fan of educational podcasts. I’ve listened to them whenever I had a chance - in the gym, in the car, in the morning while making breakfast. ⠀ I’ve been mostly listening to marketing podcasts, but also to political shows and motivational speakers, like Tony Robbins, Gary Vaynerchuk, and more. ⠀ At some point, I realized that I’m receiving so much information that I don’t have time to absorb it. I decided to create a strategy for my “podcast education”. ⠀ ✅I set goals for my podcasts list. I want to learn about new marketing trends, and how business owners get results from online marketing. In other words, I only interested in real case studies. That’s why I focus only on podcasts where business owners share their experience running a business, or where marketing agency’ owners share what strategies they use while working with clients. ⠀ ✅I stopped listening to podcasts with general advice about social media marketing. This stuff like “New social media trends for 2019” is useless. Every social network has its own rules. Especially Instagram! There no one size fits all approach. ⠀ ✅For every podcast episode that I’ve listened to, I write a summary of what I’ve learned, what I can implement in my business or for my clients, and what ideas I should research further. No exceptions! ⠀ ✅I stopped listening to motivational podcasts like “How to change your mindset about money” for now. I got sick of them, honestly. ⠀ In the next post, I’ll share my two favorite podcasts I listen to regularly, and I learned a lot from them. ⠀ Do you listen to podcasts? What is your favorite, and why do you listen to them?

How to promote User Generated Content created by your fans? ✅PARTNER WITH INFLUENCERS TO RECREATE YOUR “MOMENTS” ⠀ A customer of the cosmetics brand Glossier made an organic video where her son brushes her brows with the brand’s brow palette. Glossier then took this organic content and turned it into a blended influencer campaign. They partnered with mom-bloggers from micro-influencers to bigger deals, had their sons do their brows, and posted it all on Instagram. Glossier’s CEO Emily Ferber said that it was one of the most successful marketing campaigns that was very aligned with their brand strategy. ⠀ ✅USE INSTAGRAM ADS TO PROMOTE YOUR BEST PERFORMING UGC You can repurpose your content for advertising, asking your users or influencers permission in advance. At Salted Papaya we implemented this strategy for one of our clients: we repurposed a video made by an influencer for a Stories Ad, and we got leads (messaging replies) with $1.5 cost per lead, running the ad for the cold audience. Read more about the results that we got. If you have an additional budget, you can recreate your best performing UGC video by hiring a model/influencer and a professional videographer, and use this video as an ad banner. Glossier did just that. ⠀ ✅MAKE YOUR UGC SHOPPABLE If your customer created beautiful content featuring your product, don’t miss that opportunity to squeeze all from it! Repost this content as a feed post or Story, and tag your product with shoppable tags. ⠀ Don’t forget asking your customer for permission first, and mention them in the captions. This is a very simple strategy, but robust and effective. ⠀ If you are still hesitant on leveraging UGC for your brand on Instagram, then you are ignoring the most effective and less expensive way to get results from this platform. UGC really works, so if you have it - make the most from it. ⠀ Are you using any of these strategies to promote your UGC content? Don’t forget to like and save my post if you find it useful.

Why did you choose to start your own business? Here is my story. ⠀ In my case, I didn’t choose to start a business. When I moved to the US, I didn’t even consider starting my own thing. I really enjoyed doing social media marketing and advertising and I wanted to work in that field. I was so passionate about online marketing, that I was ready to work for free, which I did (don’t repeat my mistakes!)🙊 ⠀ I started a blog about marketing in the fashion industry, got a Google AdWords certification, learned how to use MailChimp and Hubspot, and began working for small businesses and getting results. ⠀ But my goal was to find a job at the marketing agency or get a marketing position at a company. ⠀ I couldn’t tell you how many interviews I went to...Nobody wanted to hire me. I’ve tried and tried again. That was tough because I was blaming it on me - that I’m not good enough. ⠀ Now I know that I’m good enough. I just didn't fit a profile. I am not an average Boston-based marketing person. 😀 I'm not 25 years old. My background is from a different industry and from a different country. I speak English with a heavy accent, and I didn’t go to an American high school. I dress differently. I believe in the system, but I don’t like cookie cut approaches. And I have my own opinion about everything, which I never hesitate to share.😄 ⠀ At some point, I got so sick from that never-ending job search process, that one day after an interview I’ve decided that it was the last one. ⠀ And I started doing my own thing. I didn’t happen overnight. Working side jobs, and having no connections from Boston marketing scene, it took me 5 years to be where I am now. ⠀ Was it worth it? Yes, yes and yes! I still don’t fit a profile. But it doesn't matter for my clients because they value the results over anything else. ⠀ What were your reasons for starting your own business?

HOW TO GENERATE SALES ON INSTAGRAM FOR FREE USING USER GENERATED CONTENT Please like my post if you’ll find the info useful. ⠀ hi UGC consists of any form of content that's created by users about a brand or product. UGC isn't paid for, that’s why the majority of people trust content shared by “average” person more than by brands. ⠀ HOW TO ENCOURAGE YOUR USERS TO CREATE UGC? - CHALLENGE YOUR GANG ⠀ Christina Pardy, founder of a Boston-based knitwear company @shitthatiknit posted a video of herself jumping into fresh snow wearing a bathing suit and her brand’s hat. Creating the hashtag #binkinisandbeanies, she challenged and encouraged her followers to do the same and share their content. ⠀ Her #binkinisandbeanies challenge rules: ⠀ 1. Go outside in you STIK hat and your fave bathing suit 2. Post it and tag #binkinisandbeanies 3. I will be picking the top 10 winners for free hats 4. I’ll be live updating the submissions. ⠀ The outcome? Over 40 people have participated in the #bikinisandbeanies challenge. Christina reposted all posts and Stories on her Instagram. See pictures from #bikinisandbeanies challenge in the gallery, and more examples of UGC in my Stories. ⠀ Were these people posing wearing bikini’s in 20 degrees Boston weather because they desperately wanted a free hat? Of course, many of them wanted to win and get the prize. Competing is fun! But most of them participated because they liked the idea of challenging themselves to do something really brave, like doing a “snow angel” while wearing a swimming suit. ⠀ Creating challenges like this will boost engagement for your Instagram account, generate lots of interest for your product and help you build a community around your brand. Instagram algorithm will reward you for your efforts, I promise. And it is free! ⠀ Stay tuned, in one of my next posts I will explain how you could scale your UGC campaigns and squeeze all from it! Follow the hashtag #JaneInstaTips if you don’t want to miss a new post. ⠀ Would you consider running UGC campaigns like #bikinisandbeanies for your brand?