Social Media: How To Make It Work

🎙️ Social Strategy Simplified: Building a Social Media Plan That Works | Brand of Brothers

Welcome to another episode of Brand of Brothers with Doug Berger and Johnny Diggz, where we’re diving deep into the world of social media—what it takes to actually make it work and how to turn likes, shares, and posts into real results for your brand.

🔥 In this episode:

• Why clear goals and objectives are the backbone of every social media strategy
 • How to define your Ideal Customer Profile (ICP)… yes, including the Insane Clown Posse reference
 • The role of personas and understanding audience demographics, psychographics, and behaviors
 • Why it’s not just about posting content, but posting where your audience actually lives online
 • Tools and platforms for syndicating content (and why you shouldn’t just copy/paste across channels)
 • Creating a content calendar that keeps you consistent, coherent, and cohesive
 • The three content types every plan needs: promotional, educational, and engagement-driven
 • How to diversify with videos, images, polls, quizzes, and user-generated content
 • Measuring success with KPIs, analyzing performance, and adjusting your plan accordingly

💡 Whether you’re a startup experimenting with TikTok, a brand manager optimizing Instagram, or a CMO trying to align social with broader marketing goals, this episode offers practical advice and a few laughs along the way.

🎧 Listen now to learn how to:

• Set goals that align with your brand and business strategy
 • Find and connect with the right audiences
 • Develop a calendar-driven content plan that actually gets results
 • Measure what matters and adjust for growth

Presented by Remixed, the full-service branding agency that helps companies craft, launch, and grow brands that convert.

🎶 Music by PRO.
 📍 Find us at BrandShowLive.com
 📱 Follow us: @BrandShowLive on all socials
 👍 Like, share, and subscribe so you never miss an episode packed with insights.

Episode Transcript

Doug Berger (00:00):
Welcome to the latest installment of Brand of

(00:01):
Brothers.
I'm Doug.

Johnny Diggz (00:02):
And I'm Johnny.
Today we're talking about socialmedia and how to make it work.

Doug Berger (00:05):
All right, let's get to it.

Johnny Diggz (00:17):
So today we're talking about, uh, social media,
social media content, how todevelop a plan for your
Instagram, your, your TikTok.

Doug Berger (00:28):
We're talking about all of it.
We're talking about how to reachyour audiences most effect.
And most efficiently.
So there are basically five keyideas that go along with an
effective plan.

Johnny Diggz (00:47):
Um, so I imagine that starts with some sort of,
uh, goal

Doug Berger (00:53):
goals.
Goals and defining clear goalsand objectives are, are
definitely the most importantpieces of this process.
Is

Johnny Diggz (01:00):
this, um, like an, an area I know.
Uh, when you're dealing withwebsites, we talk about
personas.
Do you deal with that in, insocial media?

Doug Berger (01:09):
To a limited extent, because you need to know
who your ideal customer profileis or your ICP.
If you're a fan of, uh, ofacronyms, which I know you are
Insane, clown Posse, love them.
Them two.
Them two.
So in this Juggalo for Life.
So, so in this process, so inthis process, we need to define,
uh, why we're doing what we'redoing, right?

(01:31):
So is it to generate brandawareness?
Is it to, uh, drive traffic to awebsite?
Is it to create conversions?
Is it about generating leads?
What, what is the, the ultimategoal and why is it that you're
doing this?
And, and of course, it's alsoimportant to make sure that it's
aligned with your businessobjectives as well.

Johnny Diggz (01:54):
So, and how do you do that?
How do you figure out what yourbusiness is?
Oh gosh, I have no idea.

Doug Berger (01:59):
Uh, so ordinarily when we're doing that kind of
thing, we put together what werefer to as a messaging brand
scape.
And that messaging brand scapedoes everything from either
reaffirming or re.
Finding your mission, vision,position tone, core values, the
list goes on.
But more importantly, it's aboutunderstanding what your

(02:20):
marketing objectives are, uh, ina short term, near term, long
term perspective, as well as.
Making sure that you understandwho your audiences are and not
how to bring them to you, butgoing to where they are.
So when it comes tounderstanding your target
audiences, you've gotta researchthe demographics, you've gotta

(02:43):
research the psychographics,right?
What are their interests?
What are their behaviors?
What are their preferences?
In addition to that?
Um, those personas that I wasmentioning, you've gotta put
together content that's tailormade for those respective
audience members.
And then lastly, remember how Ijust said about going where they

(03:04):
are?
That's.
Where you have to choose theright social media platforms
that reach them.
So some of them might be onTwitter, some of them might be
on Facebook.
Yeah, go ahead.
Say it.
What's,

Johnny Diggz (03:14):
what's Twitter?

Doug Berger (03:15):
Yeah, so, uh, Twitter is this, uh, marginally,
defunct, it's like threads.
Okay.
Uh, it, it's like blue sky.
Okay.
I got, um, it's a pre, it's aprecursor to those Mastodon.
Is it like Mastodon?
So it, it's a little bit, uh,like Mastodon.
Okay.
Um, it, you know how there was,uh, the like Google wave there?
There was, there was MySpace.

(03:35):
Yeah.
Right.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.
It, it's a, it's a precursor to,to threads friends.
Ster.
Well, that, that's what Facebookis now, right?
Sure.
Um.
Or, or something along thoselines.
Well, there's a

Johnny Diggz (03:46):
tumblers still exists.
I found out recently, huh?
That they're actually growingTumblr.
It's, I mean, it what?
What?

Doug Berger (03:53):
Of course it's growing, right?
Yeah.
If it's nothing, all it can dois grow.
I mean, you know, Reddit.
It it is.
It's like what Tumblr was.
Reddit.
Reddit,

Johnny Diggz (04:04):
uh, has, yeah.
I don't know if that, if you is,is Reddit in the social media's
realm?
I guess I would

Doug Berger (04:11):
say it definitely is.
Yeah.
But for the sake oftransparency, I have to say that
I am a shareholder and, uh, andthis is not an advertisement for
Reddit.
Okay.

Johnny Diggz (04:20):
Um, but I'm not so, um, so I use it a lot
though.
I find myself using it more.
Then I used to, um, and, and I,I think, wait, have you

Doug Berger (04:30):
given up on Quora?

Johnny Diggz (04:33):
Well, I'm trying to figure out why it is, why I
gravitated towards Reddit all ofa sudden.
I don't think it changed.
The content changed.
Um, but, um, maybe I, maybe I, Ifound that maybe I was using
Twitter less for stuff that Ican now get on Twitter.

Doug Berger (04:52):
What's this?
Twitter?
Sorry.

Johnny Diggz (04:55):
Uh, XX is what I'm talking about.
Um, the, uh, no, I, I, I justfind that, that it's
interesting.
I also know Reddit, uh, also hasbeen, uh, signing deals to sell
their, their data to, uh, tothe, the big AI engines so they
that are hungry for data.

Doug Berger (05:15):
Well, I mean, it's interesting to see how things
are, are progressing in thesocial media realm, right?
So social media.
It is definitely affecting, ithas affected SEO in the past.
They're trying to reign that in.
But here, like you're mentioningwith Reddit, it, it, we're
moving into a different spherefrom SEO to a IOI feel like
we're going off on a little bitof a tangent here.

(05:35):
Yeah.
Um, because, but I think it'srelevant.
It, it.
All of it's relevant, right?
We're talking about contentdistribution and, and where that
goes and how that gets to yourau your respective audiences.
So we talked about defininggoals and objectives, right?
We talked about understandingwho your target audience is.
So the next thing is contentdevelopment and putting it out
there.

(05:55):
So what do you do first?
For me, I like to identify whoour audiences are and then
establish a list of titles thatmight resonate with them.
You

Johnny Diggz (06:07):
say like titles, like, uh, subject

Doug Berger (06:11):
subjects.
So in, in this instance, I wouldactually refer to them as
article titles.
Okay.
Right.
So what, what this all is withinis a content marketing strategy.
Right?
And so this content, so thatgoes beyond social media.
It does go beyond social media,but the content plan has to work

(06:31):
within the social platforms aswell as, you know, the, the blog
spaces and, uh, in any, uh,content syndication platforms.
So the list goes on.
I can see, uh, that you wannasay something?

Johnny Diggz (06:45):
Yeah, no, I had a question.
I, because I've always dreamedof sort of a, a way to post
once.
And it go, it goes out to all ofyour, all of your platforms so
it can, you know, you have onething that goes onto your blog,
then it goes on the same contentgoes onto Facebook, same content
goes onto Instagram.

(07:05):
Um, but I've always hadchallenges because each of those
platforms has its own.
Format.
They, they, they, you know, it'seither Yeah, definitely.
Yeah.
Like vertical or, or, orInstagram has a weird size.
Now is there a way to to, touniversalize that today?

Doug Berger (07:22):
Uh, of course there's a way to syndicate
content, but that doesn't meanthat you should, just because
you can doesn't mean you should.
Right?
So there are our platforms, uh,like, uh, buffer and I Zoho
Social Metrical.
Metrical is a great one as well.
Again.
We're not sponsored by any ofthis, so we can just talk about

(07:43):
that freely.
Yeah.
But, uh, as far as thesyndication platforms are, are
concerned, yes, you can phone itin and do one post and hope that
one post fits all.
But we also know that that's nottrue because one way that you
deliver the message, forexample, on on Twitter.
You only have a couple words toget someone's attention.

(08:05):
Um, I'm sorry, X mm-hmm.
Uh, but then when, when you areon, uh, on TikTok, for example,
it's not about a text post atall.
It's about a video and it's aformat that has to be vertical.
And these individuals also havea, a relatively short attention
span.
So can you do a two minutevideo?
Sure.

(08:25):
Is it advisable?
Absolutely not.
Unless you're on YouTube where.
On YouTube, you have a bit of alonger, uh, attention span.
So when it comes to thiscontent, it should definitely be
customized per platform.
And not only should it becustomized per platform, it
should also be scheduledaccordingly.
So.

(08:46):
Yes, you can make it where itall goes out on a Tuesday at
eight 30 in the morning.

Johnny Diggz (08:51):
Right?
They like, they, they say thatthere's an optimal window, but
if everybody posts at thatoptimal window, it doesn't
become as optimal, does it?
It it does not.

Doug Berger (09:02):
Um, but.
However, not everybody isposting at 8 39 on a Tuesday.
Right, right.
Um, and, and some of thesesyndication platforms actually
have these amazing tools whereyou just click a button and it
auto automatically, uh,optimizes optimize Yeah.
The, the delivery time.
Um, and so that, thatholistically leads to the bigger

(09:24):
picture, which is having acontent calendar.
So when you're posting on.
On X, when you're posting onFacebook, when you're posting
on, uh, on, on Mastodon, um, it,it should be consistent, right?
The goal here is that everythingis cohesive, coherent, and
consistent.
It's the three Cs that Iconstantly harp on, and so at,

(09:47):
at the end of the day, what youshould have is an outline of
what gets posted.
Where it gets posted and when itgets posted, and that whole
component, the why has alreadybeen answered in the previous
section with regard to, toaudiences.
And then lastly, we want to, tomake sure that, that we've

(10:09):
organized it accordingly.
So if, for example, you'reputting out video content.
That video content should becomplimented by the text and
vice versa.

Johnny Diggz (10:20):
Is there.
Now, speaking of video content,I mean the, the, the type of
content that you put out.
So, you know, there's texts,there's, there's images, there's
uh, now there's like reels,there are stories.
Um, there are, uh, what do theycall them?
Uh uh, this little slideshow,the slide shows slideshow.

(10:41):
Yeah, sure.
Um, w do you, do you pick oneand go with it, or do you kind
of do a hodgepodge?

Doug Berger (10:47):
So there's a time and a place for everything, and
you should absolutely diversifyyour content.
And the, the diversificationisn't just whether it's video
and whether it's a slideshow andwhether it's text.
In fact, what you wanna makesure is that the diversification
is more, uh, around the ideas ofpromotion and education and

(11:07):
engagement, right?
So.
It's okay to do aself-promotional post every once
in a while.
It's more important to doeducational content.
That is something that ismutually beneficial, right?
You are passively promotingyourself while also
demonstrating an expertise in acertain, uh, content area.

(11:29):
And then there's the other sideof things, which is the
engagement, right?
So.
Taking user generated contentthat maybe it's using a hashtag
that you've branded or maybeit's, uh, you inviting people
for, uh, uh, talking about yourproduct or your service and
reposting that so that there aremutual benefits here in that not

(11:53):
only are you taking content thatis, is positive.
Toward you as a brand, but it'salso something that positively,
positively, that's, it's, it'seasier than it sounds.
Um, and, and so, uh, thatpositively reflects the
individuals or other companiesor brands that are, are helping

(12:15):
to promote you.
And then there's a, a fourthoption for diversification of
content and it gets a little bittrickier here, and that's what
things like polls and quizzes,um.
It, it's really complicated tosee these have a positive Im
impact.
It requires a relatively sizableaudience in order for you to

(12:36):
actually see, um, a, a, apositive reach and reaction.
What,

Johnny Diggz (12:41):
what do you, what do you do when a client comes to
you and says, I wanna make.
I think that we just need tomake something go viral.
Like what does that mean to you?

Doug Berger (12:51):
Well, it it, that's when you start, uh, going into
the realm of, uh, of KPIs.
Okay.
Um, so you've got keyperformance indicators, and so
the definition of of viral canbe different from, from one
person to another, from onecompany to another, right.
From one

Johnny Diggz (13:09):
platform to another.
Yeah, that's true.

Doug Berger (13:10):
Right?
So, but if your audience.
Let's say that you'veorganically grown your audience
and you only have 5,000 uh,viewers.
If there are 5,000 views andreactions, as far as I'm
concerned, you've reached thelevel of being viral, right?
But when it comes to what peoplethink of viral, that's.

(13:33):
You know, 1.5 million views.
Sure, sure.
Two, 2 million views.
Right.
We're talking about things thatgenerate revenue at that point.
Right?
Right.
Um, so when a customer comes tous and says, I want to generate
viral content, my internalthought is, that's awesome.
Me too.
Um, my external thought is,okay, well first what do you

(13:56):
define as viral?
Right.
So we need to end up on, at, ata realistic metric as to what
qualifies as viral.
Sure.

Johnny Diggz (14:04):
I know, like I, I make a lot of memes.
I especially Seinfeld memes.
Mm-hmm.
And, uh, they're fantastic.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Um, Chad, GPT thinks that too.
Um, so the, uh, but.
For me, like my, my key K, PI,if I get 50 likes in like the
Facebook group that I post memesto and how, and how many

Doug Berger (14:24):
people are members of these groups?
Like a hundred thousand, right?
Yeah.

Johnny Diggz (14:28):
So, and I, if I get 50 likes, I'm like, that's,
that's a successful one.
If I get seven, then I kind ofwasted my time.

Doug Berger (14:37):
But the goal, the, the question is what, what is
the goal?
Right.
What is the objective?
Just making people happy, but,but, but you know, if a, if a
customer says, I want a viralpost, right?
Right.
Well, why?
Right.
Sure.
It you, to what end are you, isit for brand awareness?
Right.
Is it for lead generation?
Because if, if that's thepurpose, then perhaps social

(14:58):
media isn't really the rightoutlet.

Johnny Diggz (15:01):
Right, right.
Well, so you mentioned KPIs.
Um, so what, how do you, how doyou track.
Uh, your success when, whenyou're, when you're building a
campaign and, and, uh, designingthese for clients.

Doug Berger (15:16):
So it it, I thank you for, for getting there.
'cause that's, that's keynumber, that's point number
five, right?
So, so far we've talked aboutgoals and objectives.
That's number one.
Number two is defining who youraudiences are, right?
So what's your ideal, idealcustomer profile?
Who are those personas?
Establishing that and puttingthat forward.
And then number three is, uh, isgenerating content and, and

(15:37):
having it organized andpreferably a content calendar.
And then what we were justdiscussing was a, a mix of
media, right?
So, uh, is it.
Is it text?
Is it video?
Is it user engagement?
Is it, uh, is it polls andquizzes?
Educational?
Is it educational orpromotional?
Right, exactly.

(15:57):
So then, uh, you're, you'retaking us to that, that, that
final stage, which is analyzeand adjust, right?
So before you can analyze andadjust, it's imperative to
create a set of KPIs and me andrespective metrics, right?
So what matters.
Uh, engagements, likes, uh, justreactions, right?

(16:20):
It depends on the platform.
Uh, Instagram, you get a thumbsup.
Mm-hmm.
Facebook, you can get a wow.
Um, and, uh, and, and you canget a cry, but, you know, and,
and do you wanna parse out thosereactions or do you just wanna
look at it uniformly?
And then there's the as

Johnny Diggz (16:35):
engagement, like you don't really care about
whether.
I mean, I guess it'd be creatinga lot of Ries then.
You probably don't want that,but Yeah.
Right.
It, it, well, it, it depe

Doug Berger (16:45):
It depends on your goals and objectives.
Sure.
It takes us back to point numberone.
Right.
So then, uh, you, you also havemetrics like, uh, people
reposting, uh, you havecomments, you have other, uh,
metrics like, uh, views, right?
Mm-hmm.
So what matters ultimately, andthen are there adjustments that,
that make sense?

(17:05):
And, and what, what?
Tweaks, uh, are gonna make itwork.
So AB testing, the types of, ofinformation that you're putting
out there is, is valuable,right?
So look at what the, the resultsare for, um, for promotional
content.
If people love your promotionalcontent and they're not

(17:26):
responding to polls and quizzes,well, it's pretty clear that you
should probably stop wastingyour time with polls and
quizzes.
It's not getting that level ofuser engagement.

Johnny Diggz (17:36):
Um, while we're here, talk to me a little bit
about the algorithms, becausethe, my understanding is that
certain types of content, theplatform itself has.
Algorithmic decisions on whetheror not that content gets seen by
more people or, you know, what,how, what factors do you take

(17:59):
into account there?

Doug Berger (18:00):
So it, again, it comes down to what your goals
and objectives are and who youraudiences are.
So if, if your goals are to playthe algorithm game, you're gonna
have to focus on negativity.
I, it, it, I hate to say it, butwhen you put things up that are
controversial and that havepolarity like politics for

(18:23):
example, um, anything that couldbe considered politically
divisive, you are likely.
To get more engagement becausepeople are going to argue.
And the more comments you get,the more reactions you get, the
more visible it's going to be.
Because what that does is itcreates sticky content on that
platform that then means thatyou're gonna be on that platform

(18:45):
longer, which is great for tworeasons.
Um, and both have to do withadvertising, right?
Because then.
Uh, meta, for example, will beable to say that they have x
amount of hours of average usageper user, and that also means,
excuse me, that also means thatthey're gonna be able to sell

(19:07):
more ads and put those ads infront of more people.

Johnny Diggz (19:09):
Speaking of ads, um, how do, how does, uh, your,
your content strategy.
Kind of dovetail if you're doinglike social ads or digital,
digital marketing.
Like is there, is there some,uh, strategy for making them
work together?

Doug Berger (19:28):
The only time that I ever really recommend that,
uh, that they, they work, uh.
Uh, interdependently is when youboost posts.
Um, otherwise we try to keepthem separate because it becomes
really convoluted to evaluatethe efficacy of a program.

Johnny Diggz (19:48):
Yep.
That's an excellent point.
That's excellent point.
Any last thoughts on the, onthe, what people should be
focused on when, when thinkingabout this?
I think it's just the big five,

Doug Berger (19:57):
right?
Establish your goals andobjectives.
Make sure that they align withwhat your business and brand
goals and objectives are.
Establish who your, your socialmedia audience.
Remember, your social mediaaudience isn't necessarily
one-to-one in parity with yourbusiness audience.
They should be close, butthey're not necessarily gonna be
one-to-one.
Then it's about content creationand scheduling.

(20:19):
Right.
Make sure that, and I can't, Ican't hammer this home hard
enough because it, it's reallyeasy to generate content, post
it, and then forget to postregularly.
Right?
That calendar makes it soyou're.
Consistently putting outcontent, and that then yields
engagement because individualsknow when to expect you.

(20:44):
Do they consciously know when toexpect you?
Hopefully not.
But they at least know thatyou're a reliable source of
content.
And then, uh, the last twopoints are to diversify your
content.
So don't just have promotionalcontent.
Don't just have articles, don'tjust have, uh, polls and
quizzes.
Don't just, uh, you know,repost, do all of it.

(21:08):
And then lastly, analyzeconstantly.
And when I say constantly, Imean, you know, periodically.
So do things.
I, I would suggest, uh, when itcomes to, to smaller brands.
Do things on at least aquarterly basis, um, just
because of bandwidth reasons,right?

(21:28):
Um, but when it comes to largerbrands, you've gotta be at least
monthly, if not weekly.

Johnny Diggz (21:36):
Well, I think that, uh, that about wraps it up
for today and, uh, appreciateyour insights into how to build
a successful social mediacontent plan.

Doug Berger (21:49):
And thanks for all the questions.
Yeah,

Johnny Diggz (21:51):
I'm parched

Doug Berger (21:52):
Thank you for tuning in to Brand of Brothers.
Big thank you to our presentingsponsor, Remixed, the branding
agency, along with productionassistance from Johnny Diggz,
Simon Jacobsohn, and me, DougBerger.
We can't forget music by PRO.
Speaking of not forgetting,remember to do that like and
subscribe thing and find us atBrandShowLive.
com and follow us on the socialsat BrandShowLive.