Instagram is an important part of a healthy online presence, but I miiiight have a few pet peeves when it comes to people posting Reels—only because it makes it really difficult for your audience to consume your message.
Today, we’re talking about Instagram with Monica Monfre—specifically Instagram Reels. Monica is a business coach and social media strategist who teaches female entrepreneurs how to launch their businesses while gaining visibility on social media.
Monica explains how to create Reels with your audience in mind and how to make your content pop. We’re also taking a deeper look at using your Clubhouse presence to grow your Instagram following.
So if you love Reels or want to get started growing your Instagram following, this one’s for you!
Listen in!
Mentioned in This Episode
- Free 3 Day Instagram Story Challenge
- Episode 97: How to Deliver Powerful Presentations with Mike Ganino
- Episode 127: Using Clubhouse in Your Business with Annabelle Bayhan
- Client Journey Ebook
- The Content Mastery Lab
About Monica Monfre
Monica Monfre is a business coach and social media strategist who teaches female entrepreneurs how to launch their businesses while gaining visibility on social media. She’s helped hundreds of women, including teachers, business coaches, social media strategists, and mompreneurs launch their businesses and grow their followings on social media. Her work has been featured by Luminary (NYC), The Financial Gym and Girlboss as well as on numerous podcasts.
To learn more about Monica check out her website, Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter.
Transcription
Abby Herman 0:08
Hey there and welcome to Episode 128 of The Content Experiment podcast, a podcast that supports the idea that content and marketing are ever moving targets in any business. And it’s okay if you don’t feel like you’re doing it. All right all of the time, you have permission to experiment with little tweaks and changes in your content, to find out what works for you, what increases value for your audience, and what grows, your business and most importantly, what feels good for you. I’m Abby Herman, content strategist and coach for online business owners who are ready to make a bigger impact online. I firmly believe that success isn’t about what big marketing brands and so called gurus think is the right thing. It’s about you and your business, your lifestyle, and frankly, your values and belief systems. You get to do business in a way that works for you. Last week in Episode 127, we talked about using clubhouse in your business, how to get started and how to make it work for you.
Abby Herman 1:09
Well, today we’re talking about Instagram with Monica mon free, but part of the conversation toward the end of the interview is all about how to leverage clubhouse to grow your Instagram following because while clubhouse may be a great addition to your marketing strategy. As of this recording, there’s really no way to capture followers there and to get them to subscribe or have a you know any kind of back and forth communication. Now, as an aside, clubhouse is a great way to build brand awareness and educate and inform your audience the first two steps in your client journey. If you want to learn more about how to take your audience on a journey with your brand head to the content experiment comm slash journey to grab your updated copy of the client journey ebook. So in addition to that conversation about clubhouse a lot of the conversation today is around reels and how to create them with your audience in mind, we might talk about a few of our pet peeves when it comes to posting reels also things that make them really difficult to consume. I know I love to talk about my pet peeves and what I see that’s driving me crazy on social media. If you love reels or you want to get started using them, keep listening.
Abby Herman 2:26
And of course if you like what you hear today, be sure to leave a rating and review ratings and reviews are what helped tell Apple Spotify, Stitcher and all the other platforms and to me that you like what you’re hearing and it helps to get the podcast and more earbuds so others can benefit from the information I’m sharing on a regular basis. Okay, let’s get on with the interview. Monica mon free is our guest. She is a business coach and social media strategist who teaches female entrepreneurs how to launch their businesses while gaining visibility on social media. She’s helped hundreds of women including teachers, business coaches, social media strategists and mompreneurs, launch their businesses and grow their followings on social media. Her work has been featured by luminary, NYC, the financial gym, and girlboss as well as on numerous podcasts. I graduate of Teachers College, Columbia University and the George Washington University. Monica holds two master’s degrees in education. She currently teaches High School in Brooklyn, New York while running her six figure side hustle and advocating for breast health awareness. And here is our conversation.
Abby Herman 3:38
Hi, Monica, thank you so much for joining me here today.
Monica Monfre 3:42
Hey, Abby, I’m so excited to be here. I can’t wait to get dive into our topic today.
Abby Herman 3:48
Yes. Before we get started, can you share with all of the listeners what you do and who you do it for?
Monica Monfre 3:55
Sure. Well, before I even start, I always like to say I have a side hustle and a real hustle. You might be surprised because you know who I am. I am an Instagram strategist and a business coach for women. Predominantly, I work a lot with teachers, because in my you get to decide if it’s my side hustle, my real, real hustle. I teach Brooklyn, I teach high school here in Brooklyn, New York. So I always like to say part of me says my side hustle is teaching because I just had a six figure year in my coaching business.
Abby Herman 4:28
That is fantastic as doing it not not as a full time job,
Monica Monfre 4:33
though not as regulations. So I always whenever people say what do you do? I always say well, let’s have a little play out here. So generally what I would say is, I coach women around social media and launching their offers.
Abby Herman 4:45
Awesome. Well, so I have to say as a former teacher, when I was doing my freelance writing gig, quote, unquote, on the side of teaching full time, my head was always in the side gig. It was always in the writing. And it was not probably as much in the teaching as should have been the last few years.
Monica Monfre 5:09
I definitely feel that and I think, you know, one thing people always ask us, like, who I work with, and when I do work with teachers, and they asked, like, how do I do it, I said, there is that like mind shift, of thinking about, like, whatever I put my energy in is what will grow. So just trying to find that balance, not that I can walk away from my teaching responsibilities, but how can I find the balance? or How can I work in more time with regards to my side hustle or my coaching business?
Abby Herman 5:39
Yeah, yeah. So can you share a little bit about how the way that you work with clients in your coaching business helps you to live the lifestyle that you want? How are you able to kind of balance that all?
Monica Monfre 5:53
Yeah, well, because I work a lot with social media. And because I feel like that is the area that I first started to grow. I’m also a previous or current, depending on what day of the week it is yoga instructor, social media, and being specifically on Instagram has allowed me to really find more space and more freedom. And I know people don’t think about that with regard to social media, but being able to be present, and then also to recognize, like when something can become good content, has really allowed for me to step more into that business space. And because of being a teacher, and I teach high school literature, so content is everywhere. And it’s very easy for me to see something like oh, that would make a good Instagram post, or Oh, that would be a good video, or that would be a great thing to talk about on a clubhouse room. And so that has really allowed me to always be inside of my business while also just being really present. And I have to say that this past year, having this business has really allowed me to get some of the things that I’ve always dreamed about, like having a rooftop, or really having a place to put my car and that wanted them possible previous to, to start in this business.
Abby Herman 7:03
Because of the extra revenue, you mean?
Monica Monfre 7:06
I think part of it was the extra revenue. And the other part of it was when I was simply teaching, I think I knew what my salary was. And I kind of just thought, well, like that’s not enough money, I didn’t actually think about what that money could do for me. And so once I stepped into coaching and had my own coach who said, Let’s run some numbers, I realized what my take home pay actually look like. And where I was spending money on. So one of the best parts about being in a business is you kind of have to look at what’s coming in what’s going out. And I was actually surprised to see that more was coming in than what I had thought because I was just living on, quote unquote, just a teacher salary.
Abby Herman 7:44
Yeah, that’s interesting. It’s true. I mean, I feel like as a business owner, by necessity, I’ve had to be a little more aware of my numbers and what’s in my bank account, versus when I was a teacher. So I can totally see how that happens. And when you’re doing both of them at the same time. I think that’s, that’s great. I mean, that’s such a great way to be really comfortable financially, which is something that I don’t think a lot of teachers can claim.
Monica Monfre 8:14
No. And I think it’s also another thing I really appreciated. And this has come out in some of the work I do around social media is kind of how do you describe yourself, even you ask me Like, who do I work with? Right? That idea of Dude, I used to work, say just work with teachers. And now I really work with anyone who is ready to think outside the box. Because as teachers, as part of what we do with students is, if they don’t get it the first time, how can we help them to understand it the second time, so that’s a lot of I think, living the life that I wanted to live has been because of the ability of being a teacher, but then also saying, like, I just don’t have to be a teacher, I can really do what feels great. And do what excites me and do what helps me just really see all the different colors in the rainbow.
Abby Herman 8:59
Yeah, yeah. Love it. Well, so we are going to be talking about social media. Specifically, we have we have a couple of specific areas where we’re going to talk about and you and I were talking about before we hit record. And so I’m going to put out the disclaimer now. And then feel free to add the disclaimer in anytime you feel it’s necessary throughout this conversation, but we’re recording this may 17 2021. And we know the nature of social media is it changes all of the time algorithms change, new new social media platforms come out. And, and so I just want to mention that for everyone. So because of how much things change and how there may be some change on the horizon with some of the things that we’re going to talk about. We want to just mention that that it could be that by the time you’re listening to this, whenever it is the day it comes out or six months later. But things are different. And maybe don’t look exactly how Monica and I are talking about them. And so I’m putting that disclaimer out there for everyone. And then Monica, you can, you can repeat it as many times as you need to.
Monica Monfre 10:13
Yeah, it’s always interesting, especially since we’re talking about reels, which there are people are always asking me about that. So when we talk about that, I’ll share what I have heard what I see and what I anticipate to happen.
Abby Herman 10:26
Yeah, awesome. And they think that too, this goes back to so social media is great. It’s such a good way to connect with audience members and to get in front of them. However, it also just social the nature of social media in general, and how much it changes really spotlights, I think, for me how important it is to have other types of content out there, too. Because you never know when, you know, the way that you’ve been doing things for months and months a month is going to drastically change and then leave you in a panic or like, Instagram goes down for a day or two, which has happened or you get kicked off of Facebook. Like you’ve got to have other places to create content as well.
Monica Monfre 11:07
Absolutely. I remember that day when Instagram went down for 24 hours, it was a fairy. It was a very angsty day for many people.
Abby Herman 11:16
Yes, yes. And we shouldn’t have to feel that way. If we have our ducks in a row. If we have content in multiple places, and we’re collecting our email, email addresses from our followers, then we used to be just fine. So well, let’s dig into social media. And I want to start with video. And how important is video video in general, we know that it’s really important. It’s such a great way to connect with our audience and to see them you know, quote, quote, unquote, face to face. However, I know that people get uncomfortable with being on video. We’re not going to talk about that necessarily today, because we’ve covered that in the podcast before. But I want to talk about like how easy it is to actually create video on social media Instagram, specifically, can you share just the ease of creating video and what people should be thinking about before they hit record on their phone?
Monica Monfre 12:12
Yeah, I have. First of all, I remember when I thought that video was so hard. And I remember being in different programs and watching the person run the program thinking oh my gosh, I need to get my makeup done and get all of the lighting. And the reality is our cameras on whatever if you’re an iOS or an Android, those cameras are really powerful. And I always tell people, if you’re feeling like, Oh, I don’t have the right makeup, or I don’t have my skin doesn’t look great, or I look tired, like the filters are your best friends. There are filters now for makeup. I mean, we’re in a zoom call. And we could be putting on lipstick if we wanted to like the reality is, is that I think one of the things that people will talk about is I don’t look right. But you can just put a filter on and have eyelashes, it’s amazing. So that’s one way that it’s like super easy to record. And then the other part about it is we oftentimes think that people need, we have to have such a long message or such a profound message to say and the reality is in social media, kind of like really quick bite sized pieces of information are going to help your audience connect with you.
Monica Monfre 13:19
I always like to think about this I am I was a dancer for a while and we talked about the fourth wall when you go to the theater. And the reason why so many people enjoy going to places like Broadway is not only does it transport you to a different place, but sometimes in particular shows the fourth wall will be broken where the audience will be brought into the experience. And that’s what social media can allow have to happen with your own audience. When you’re on an Instagram Live or a Facebook Live, you get this chance to connect in that moment with your audience breaking down the fourth wall. And that’s where we see this high conversion video. And that can happen simply by reversing the camera putting in a tripod and hitting that go button simply saying like, it’s time to get on video, what are your questions and immediately you are going to step into the expert role gain credibility. And it doesn’t have to be very long. The other thing is we don’t have to show up for a 45 minute live it can be five or 10 minutes. In fact, I encourage you know the maximum time of being on something is about five to seven minutes audiences. We’ve learned that in the pandemic, our ability to stay in touch. And even as a teacher, it’s been about 20 minutes is like the attention span. So now we know it’s even shorter.
Monica Monfre 14:34
So we don’t have to have these long, drawn out lives we can simply pop on and give somebody a quick tip and we never know how that is going to impact someone’s business or their life. Absolutely. And actually I had Mike Gambino on the podcast back in Episode 97. And he was he talked about the fourth wall also and making that connection like using the camera as a way to connect with your audience and Really like, you know, speak to them, instead of speaking to the camera or speaking to the person on the other side of the camera who’s actually watching. So I love that you brought that up. And I want to offer a tip, I’ve mentioned it before a few times. So you were on zoom, and I can see you on the camera and I can tell that you are sitting next to a window, there’s natural light coming through in my office I have, My office is really warm, so I have to block my window off. But I have daylight light bulbs above it on my ceiling fan above me so and that I got to tell you, it takes like 10 years off.
Abby Herman 15:37
I even love them so much. I installed daylight light bulbs in my overhead lights in my kitchen, because I love it, like 10 years younger with my daylight light bulb. So those helps so much. And then I think you mentioned a ring light or I have umbrella lights. Also sometimes if I’m recording a video for a course or for webinars or something, I will put up my I’ll put up my my umbrella lights that have daylight light bulbs in them as well. So that’s a great way I think it kind of washes me out a little bit, but it also takes the wrinkles away and the age thoughts and all of that. So you don’t have to look perfect because I mean, that’s the you know, reality you guys like what is the reality you don’t look perfect in real life. Sorry to say nobody does and that’s okay. It’s, you know, perfection, I feel like puts up a barrier between you and your audience. So it’s okay to be imperfect, it’s okay to flub up as you’re talking, as, you know, stumble over your words, I do it all the time here. So yeah, I love that. Such a good way to connect is using video. So one aspect of video or one type of video you can create is a reel. And reels are as of this recording, incredibly popular, very engaging. I find them like I could sit and watch them forever. I’m in awe of the people who can create really fun, interactive, maybe not necessarily interactive, but they’re like bouncing around and the screens changing. And it’s a little bit intimidating. I gotta say, I want to create them, but it’s like, kinda it’s kind of take hours to do. Can you give us a little walkthrough about how to get started with reels, and it’s makes it really easy to do.
Monica Monfre 17:31
Yeah, so first off, little hints here, if you do want to do some of those more fun ones is to do them in tik tok, it has a little bit of a bit of a better video editor than Instagram does. The reality is sometimes we, you know, reels came about as kind of the competitor to tik tok with lots of like dancing, and there’s remixes. There’s all these added things. But if we scale back and say we don’t need to dance, you can add movement by pointing at things are snapping, snapping sort of my favorite ones to do. But the reality is, is that whatever is an Instagram story can become an Instagram reel. And I always like to say that a reel is like a story at a post had a baby because you’re going to get that same view that you would show up on an edgy story. And you would talk to your audience for 15 or 30 seconds. And you might not think anything of it because you’re not snapping your point. And you’re having to worry about the stickers. And then the beauty of a real is you get to write a caption, and have a little bit more visual there. So the easiest way to to really dive into Rails is think about what would you talk about in a 32nd Instagram story, you might say to someone like, Hey, here’s the number one way to start your reel, simply turn the camera around, hit your timer for three seconds, and then stay still to get a really nice picture. And then just start to talk.
Monica Monfre 18:54
And that’s gonna be your Instagram real. I always like to say to I just, I like to do like threes. So it’s really cool when you do a real to do tips and odd number. So like three or five, I think five tips can be a lot, even if it’s a 32nd rule. And I actually prefer I think you’ll get better, you’re gonna get better analytics, which is part of the astrak done here is we think that Instagram is going to be releasing, how to use Instagram reels how to use the analytics, but you’re going to get better analytics on a 15 second reel than you are in a 32nd reel. Mostly because people are going to watch 15 seconds is a little bit more digestible. So I would say if you’re like nervous about starting out, start with a 15 second reel. It’s nice to do like three really quick tips there. And sometimes I’ll go on film in my bathroom, or I’ll just turn the camera on and I’ll just point to three different locations. And I’ll save the video because you don’t have to do it all at one time. The other thing that we can sometimes get caught up in is I have to know what my real is going to be when I post And I actually say sometimes you just start in the right light. And you can just turn that camera on and record yourself. And that can become your real and that is probably the that was the easiest way for me to start with reels was just to record in 15 seconds or 17 seconds, so that I had some video to play with.
Monica Monfre 20:18
The other thing is I hear from a lot of people Monique, I don’t like I don’t my face to be on camera. So here’s a quick real idea if you are ready to start, but you don’t know how to do it. I just shared this with a client yesterday, do your lunches throughout the week, and every time the lunch comes out, take a screenshot of it or recorded for two seconds. And at the end of it, you’re going to have a nice chunk of reels that you can then put up on Friday. So every day, you’ll have a picture of your lunch. And this is great if you’re a health coach, or you do diets. And that’s a really easy way to just get started. Because you can actually use Canva to create your video. So you don’t even have to worry about creating it inside of the app. But those are ways. You know, if you’re ready to be on camera, just record yourself playing around. If you’re not ready to be on camera, take two second videos of your lunches that you’re making or of your shapes that you’re making, and then string them together for that longer 15. Second reel.
Abby Herman 21:14
I love it. And so if you’re a business coach, you could do like you could do screen shots of you maybe on a zoom call or another day, it’s like a picture of your calendar. Or maybe it’s each day you take a picture of your calendar and what you’re doing. If you’re a designer, a website designer, you could do like the stages of the website development if you don’t want to be on camera. So there’s a lot yeah, I can see how there’s lots of different ways that you can do it without being on camera yourself.
Monica Monfre 21:43
There’s so many ways. And I think the other thing we can see is you can even do for example, if you have client testimonials, you could do those via a Canva. I have a client who she may, she does a lot with like house music. And so she as a business coach will create like her different graphics using the house music. And so she does all of that through her video app, we’ve been told, or we’ve told herself, perhaps we’ve told herself, that in order for real to really be powerful, it has to be you pointing and dancing. And well that there’s some truth to that those are some of the ones that are going viral, your audience might not need that you know exactly what your audience needs. And so delivering the content via reels is just another way for your audience to absorb the content that you’ve already put out there. And this is where I think being a teacher has helped me, not every single student learns in the same way that every single client is going to purchase from you in the same way. So you could put out a really powerful piece of text on your Instagram grid. But you could repurpose that same idea into a real with you three tips or showing like the top three apps that help you run your business. And then you have Canva float up for three seconds. And then you have in shot fill it up for three seconds. And then you have stripe pop up for three seconds. And then you talk about how those apps help you run your business. And so there’s just a lot of different ways to easily get started on rails that don’t require you to learn a new dance, or figure out how to mouth to you know how to like present new one right now as we’re talking. It’s very popular. Like, don’t you hate it when girls like you don’t have to learn how to lip sync if you don’t want to? Yeah, and of course you can if you want to, but you don’t have to.
Abby Herman 23:25
Yeah, they’re they’re fun to watch. But yeah, like there’s no way I’m doing that. I say that right now. I’ll do it next week. I don’t know. And so I have to mention something that drives me insane about reels that maybe this is just me being super picky. But so you you create a reel, you share it in your Instagram feed. When you create your reel, it’s vertical. So it’s tall. And when you share it in your feet, it’s going to be square. And so I’ll like watch. I’ll scroll through my feed, and I can see some of the reels. And there’s people who are pointing and they’re pointing above them. You can’t see the words in the feed. So you have to click on it to go to the rail. But I do you recommend that people consider that as they’re creating it, like make sure that it’s going to fit within the feed itself so that people can see the words or is it better for people to click on the reel and actually go to the real do they get better engagement that way?
Monica Monfre 24:27
Absolutely not, I actually would say you want to remember if you’re not going to use the cover which a way to get around that is to use a car. You want to remember that if you are going to put this on your feet and the recommendation is always to put the rail on your feet first because once you take the reel off of your feet, you can’t put it on the feed later. Okay, so if you want to get that immediate kind of like engagement to your feed you’re gonna want to put down there first. So you do want to remember that everything it’s sort of like in the middle and this is also true for like an igtv as well if you’re going to put it on your bead, that it is going to show up as a square. So you don’t want to point too high up. And you don’t want to point too low down. And you don’t want to, you want to be careful where you float your words. And so some people will say like, recommend, you know the size. I feel like as I’ve done this enough, I started to learn kind of on my screen, like where is the center section of this to put the words, one way around.
Monica Monfre 25:22
That is, of course, to use a cover, you could use a cover, this is also important if you have like a very specific aesthetic to your grid. So you can put a cover on a reel, you can put a cover on igtv. There is like some people say that that that might lower your play. Some people say it might not. So it’s really up to you. But if you are putting it on the grid, you can also go through and pick the first screen that you want to pop up. So that is a way to get around. But as long as somebody is watching it through your feed, you are going to want to think about where you’re where you’re placing the words. And then of course, you can take it off of your grid and simply have it live on the real feed. And on the real feed, it won’t matter where you’re pointing. So that is there’s two ways to access your reels. But I’m always a fan of putting it on the grid, it’s going to help your it’s going to help your the post before and after. And it’s just going to help your engagement. We don’t know though, like that’s where it gets dicey right now, because we have heard that there’s about to be some more analytics. And if you use Facebook Creator Studio, you can start to see that they’re starting to drip out more of the analytics about reels. So that’s a time if at this time that you’re listening to this test and see which works for you. Does it work better if it’s on your feet? Or does it work better for you? If it’s just playing on Instagram reels? Personally, I don’t really go to be. I don’t discover people via reels. So I like it when I can watch somebody real right from their feet.
Abby Herman 26:49
Yeah, absolutely. great tips. So I have to mention one other thing that drives me crazy. And you can maybe debunk it or whatever. Or share that Yeah, like this is something we need to consider the posts that have or the realest that have tips on them, where somebody is pointing and the tips are popping up and disappearing and popping up and disappearing. A lot of times, they’re popping up and disappearing so fast. I can’t read the words like we don’t have time to read the words, how do you get around that? So that I mean, is it just a timing issue where you have to? You need to time it out? Or how does that work?
Monica Monfre 27:26
So there’s two reasons why people do that. Number one is so that you have to rewatch it, so they get more place, of course, because I ended up having to watch it like three or four times.
Abby Herman 27:33
And sometimes I’m like, forget it, I still can’t read it.
Monica Monfre 27:38
That’s why we can’t tell like with analytics, like some people, like I haven’t 1000 watches but only like 50 likes, well, it might be that somebody had to watch it like five times. So there’s that
Abby Herman 27:48
I have to watch something five times I’m not gonna like it.
Monica Monfre 27:53
Definitely for sure. And so I would say it really is about a timing thing. That’s why I think it’s important, like if you’re doing a 15 second reel, three points is probably enough. If you’re doing a 32nd reel, maybe you can do five points. But you do want to consider your timing when you’re putting in your stickers. And also remembering that the words you can have disappear. But if you use an emoji sticker, those are going to stay you can’t Well, I haven’t when I first started, you couldn’t change those. So you do want to think about like kind of what you’re flying in. And that’s also what’s really key to if you’re using a tick tock Some people like to repurpose their tic tocs over sometimes tic tocs will go just slightly faster and people are used to that on Tick Tock so you want to really think about your audience on Instagram. What are they putting out there and then is it just too much the other thing is a good reel will have like really clear like smaller word stickers and then have us read your caption because that’s the other benefit of an Instagram reel is that you’re gonna get engagement not only from people watching your stickers but also we hope that they’ll go over and read your caption and don’t forget at the end to have a call to action so many people this is a bothers me on reels is you forget to tell people to do something at the end of the reel. So if you’re a business coach, don’t forget, don’t get so close to the end of your 15 seconds that you forget in that last like second 13.5 to throw up one more sticker that says Like, DM me to join or Lincoln bio. Like Don’t forget to have a call to action at the end of your reel because some people won’t read your caption. Yeah. Okay.
Abby Herman 29:32
Great tips. Yes, yes, always have a call to action. So I want to switch gears a little bit and talk about Instagram growth and growing your Instagram following and you have what I found to be a really unique way to do that. And I want to talk a little bit about that and how to because I mean really run Instagram you want to get people to Instagram so that they can be on your feed and See your reels? Can you share your secret to growing your Instagram following?
Monica Monfre 30:05
Yeah, in December, I grew my Instagram following with 1000 followers simply by showing up on clubhouse. And one of the most powerful ways to do that is because currently on clubhouse there is no way to communicate directly with anyone after a room has ended, or during a room unless you message them. And so Instagram is one of the two ways Currently, we think there’ll be a third way. But Instagram is one of the ways to communicate with people. And so really showing up on clubhouse and messaging people through your Instagram, DMS. And you know, when you’re on a stage like inviting people say, hey, come check out my latest Instagram real, you can, you know, look at my club hairstyle, but it is the best way that I have found to grow your Instagram with people who actually are going to engage with you. Because, again, sometimes you can join follow trains, I don’t recommend them. But I’ve done them before I every once in a while we still do them. We all you know, they just aren’t going to draw your ideal clients or the people who are going to engage with you. But if people are on clubhouse, we know that they’re already inside of one social media. And if you’re active on one social media, and clubhouse is a place where people are actively trying to grow their businesses or to get feedback, then it’s more likely for you to grow that way. So 1000 followers in December just from simply using clubhouse, you do want to remember to always have a call to action, though to let people know like do you want them to dm you? Do you want them to follow you? But that and then you want to make sure you have good content too, because that’s the other thing you’ll get the followers. But if you’re not staying active on Instagram, you might not see that conversion happen.
Abby Herman 31:47
Yeah. So walk us through how you did that, though. So you were speaking in a clubhouse room? And you told people to go follow you? Or can you do it as a someone in the room? Is someone in the audience? Can you connect with other audience members? How does that work?
Monica Monfre 32:06
It works both ways. So I did both. So obviously, when you’re on a stage, it’s much easier to say like, here’s my Instagram. But my tip sometimes when I don’t have a lot of time, or I can’t tune in is I’ll just sit in a room and either write down the names of people who are talking or while people are talking, go to their Instagram and send them a message that says like, Hey, I really love the question that you just asked on clubhouse, or I agree with you. This has happened since we last talked. I was in a room with Dane Cook. And Wendy exactly what I’m saying here message Dane Cook. And he had we had a whole conversation. You know Dane Cook is he’s like a famous comedian. Same thing happen with DJ corrupt. And so we have to not be afraid of the DMS. And so that is a great way to grow your audience. And you’re not necessarily going to say like, follow me back. But it could be like I really love your content. And I hit the Follow button. I’m looking forward to engaging with you in the platform. And then I would leave those conversations inside of the gen box in your Instagram dm. So if at some point you do this a lot, I’m not a fan of follow for follow. But if you have followed someone back and they’re not giving you that engagement, that’s a great way to track number one to kind of use Instagram as a CRM. And number two to just kind of notice, like, what’s converting for you, maybe you’re trying something on clubhouse, and it’s not converting so you switch your method or you switch your like dm conversations. But that’s what I would do is I would sit in the audience and I would just message people or like, be like, Hey, I think you can help I can help you like I would love to know more about what you were asking about inside of that space.
Abby Herman 33:35
So do you recommend that the handle that you use in Instagram is the same as the handle that you use in clubhouse then as often as you can?
Monica Monfre 33:44
Yes, I like to have the same handles and I like to have the same profile pictures. I don’t think my matchup right now. Because sometimes I’m doing like pgrs in clubhouse, I’m constantly changing it. But you do want to have it so that it’s obvious to people that it’s the same person on both way on both apps. I would also say that this is a great way if you’re seeing somebody on clubhouse who’s new to clubhouse that you say welcome to clubhouse. How long have you been on the app? How are you finding it? Do you have any questions? And you know, we talked about borrowing audiences on Instagram, but you can borrow someone’s audience inside of a clubhouse room, especially if there’s like 50 people on the stage and then hang out with them on Instagram, go get to know them go reach out to them have that connection, that collaboration. And the other thing that’s really helpful is if you have the answer to somebody question on clubhouse, and it’s on your Instagram, you’ve done a real about it. We’ve done it, it’s an igtv about it, this is the chance to say like hey, I actually did an Instagram real about it would love to have you check it out. You know, I’m happy to share it with you. And then you’re you’re going to be pushing people to that content that you want to get in front of other people.
Abby Herman 34:49
Yeah. You mentioned borrowing an audience. Can you explain what you mean by that?
Monica Monfre 34:55
Yeah. So what we mean by borrowing an audience on Instagram is like a for example. have, you know that I work on Instagram strategy and you yourself are also inside of the social media, you might come to my audience and see who’s engaging with the post that I have. And then you wouldn’t want to engage with them on my page. But you would go to their page and like their pictures or engage with them or feel like, Hey, I saw you asked this question on Monica’s page. And so you’re basically looking at the audience that I’ve created, and then finding inside of my audience, people that you might want to connect with. And this can be really helpful if you’re starting to feel like my Instagram is getting stagnated, or you’re a very specific business type of coach. So I have a client who worked with women going through menopause. So I said, Why don’t you go to clubhouse type in the word menopause, you’re going to see all the rooms where your clients are hanging out, you’re going to go hang out in that, and then just make sure that you have content on your Instagram, this is a great time to think about I just did a real, that’s all about you know how to create a funnel. So then you’re you’re gonna want to go to a business room where people are talking about funnels. And then as you’re engaging with people, don’t be afraid to say, Hey, I just did a real on this. I would love if you checked it out. And most people are going to say like, cool, they’re not going to feel you know, you’re not asking them to join your program. On the first dm.
Abby Herman 36:11
Yeah, you’re just connecting and establishing that relationship. Yeah, that’s a great tip. And I know, it’s something that I’ve heard talked about a lot in just instinct, just straight up Instagram where, you know, find the people who have similar audiences, as you, you know, comment on their posts that you can get noticed by their audience and said, this is just crossing over between two different platforms, which is so smart. I love it. I love it. You have something to help us grow our Instagram following Is that correct?
Monica Monfre 36:47
I do. So I just recently ran a five day Instagram story challenge. And so what I’ll be able to offer to anyone is five prompts. And here’s what I love about them. A prompt for nije story is the same prompt that can be used for your Instagram reel that can be used for your Instagram caption that can be used for an igtv. So when we think about content, it’s all about how to repurpose it. And these prompts are really meant to not only grow your audience, but to convert into clients. And so it’s five Instagram story prompts, but just said the word reels in there. And now you have five Instagram real prompts ready for your next real, you’re ready to introduce yourself to your audience get ready to tell them about a problem. And your solution. Just they’re really great. And I just want to say if you if you grab these one person use them. And she messaged me, she was like, I just booked two VIP clients by using I was like, awesome, like testimonial time. So there they are, I don’t want to pat myself on the back. But then again, we are we’re in the business. So these are really great prompts, they will definitely help you get more engagement. Connect with your ideal audience members, and hopefully convert and when they do definitely let me know because I want to hear I want to hear all about you winning.
Abby Herman 38:01
Yes. Where can people go to? To find those?
Monica Monfre 38:06
Sure. They’ll be the landing page, but you can grab them on it’s gonna be Monique bond free.com forward slash ID story prompt.
Abby Herman 38:16
Okay, perfect. Before we go, would you think back to our conversation? And if people were to only take away two things, two actionable things from our conversation, what would you like for them to take away,
Monica Monfre 38:32
Turn the camera on and say, three tips to and then do a real tip one, tip two. Tip three, doesn’t have to be hectic at all. And then I would love to see you film something about a your week and then do a, you know a recap of your week whether that is your business coach, the five apps that you use this week, if you’re a health coach, what you’ve eaten this week, you don’t have to be on camera. But both of those are going to help you start to connect with your audience members. Love it.
Abby Herman 39:07
Monica, where can people find you online?
Monica Monfre 39:10
Sure. So this is another tip. All of my social handles are the same. I’m at mana C’mon free on every single social platform, from clubhouse to Instagram, to I’m on tik tok from I think Twitter, all of them LinkedIn, it’s all the same. So I would love you can find me there and then my website is MonicaMonfre.com.
Abby Herman 39:29
Fabulous. Thank you so much, Monica for being here. I really appreciate your time and all of your expertise.
Monica Monfre 39:36
Thanks so much Abby for having me. I’m excited to connect more with anyone who’s listening and I can’t wait to see you get real unreal.
Abby Herman 39:45
So many great tips here. I hope you were taking notes. I love how Monica is using clubhouse to grow her Instagram following such a great way to pair the two platforms. If you’re wondering how clubhouse or reals fit into Your client journey. Be sure to grab my client journey ebook you can get that at thecontentexperiment.com/journey. If you found value in what you learned here today, be sure to share it on social media. Take a screenshot of the episode on your phone and share it over on Instagram stories. You can tag me @thecontentexperiment and tag Monica @MonicaMonfre. You’ll find all the links mentioned in today’s episode in the show notes. And just remember that the more you share, the more that we can get the podcast into the hands of more business owners just like you who need to hear the message that they are not alone. Until next time, take care.
Transcribed by https://otter.ai
