February 1, 2025 • 38 mins
Struggling with social media for your pet business or animal rescue? This week, we’re joined by Skarlet Rockwood of Fur Social, a marketing expert dedicated to helping pet professionals grow their brands online. As a key member of the Pet Industry Network, Skarlet shares invaluable insights on PR, video marketing, and best practices for social media success. Whether you’re a pet entrepreneur or running a rescue, you’ll learn which platforms work best, how to create engaging content, and free resources to boost your visibility. Don’t miss this episode packed with expert tips to take your pet brand to the next level!
EPISODE NOTES: Mastering Social Media for Pet Businesses & Rescues with Skarlet Rockwood
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EPISODE NOTES: Mastering Social Media for Pet Businesses & Rescues with Skarlet Rockwood
Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/whisker-report-pet-pr-publicity-pet-life-radio-original--6669416/support.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Hey, this is Pet Life Radio. Let's talk pets.
Speaker 2 (00:14):
Welcome to the Whiskard Report. We're a new podcast dedicated
to helping anyone in the pet industry, whether you're an
animal welfare or a for profit pet company, get some
pr and buzz for your organization. I'm Mary Chan, one
of the hosts of the show, along with alexand Ricard.
Speaker 3 (00:31):
Who hails from France but is.
Speaker 2 (00:33):
Currently in Canada. Out in Vancouver. Bongeur, Alex Doron.
Speaker 4 (00:39):
We're so excited about this show today. Do you need
help with social media? Well, today we've got an expert
for you. But first let me introduce you to our producer.
Speaker 5 (00:48):
Mark Winter of Pet Life Radio, who is the man
who gets us to you each and every week.
Speaker 6 (00:53):
Hello Mark, Hi, how's everyone doing.
Speaker 4 (00:56):
We're good, You're good.
Speaker 6 (00:58):
I need to know about social media? We need help?
Speaker 2 (01:04):
Hey, Mark, what are you working on with your podcasts?
Speaker 6 (01:08):
Well, let's see this week. Actually, right after this we
are recording with a Broadway producer, Daryl, who's a Tony
Award winning producer and she also did a documentary about
dogs and she's on next. So wow, that's on Rapaport
to the Rescue.
Speaker 3 (01:28):
That's so awesome. And Jill Rappaport is amazing.
Speaker 2 (01:32):
She's like, I think she is the first pet journalist.
She's on the Today Show, Like I want to say,
she started probably in the eighties, right Mark.
Speaker 6 (01:41):
Yeah, probably, I mean she was on the Today Show,
she did entertainment, she did other stuff, and then she
switched over to pets, and so she's the pet reporter.
So she's the one.
Speaker 2 (01:51):
Yeah, I mean, who doesn't want to do all pet right. Well,
we're honored to be part of Pet Life Radio, a
network of many many awesome podcast.
Speaker 3 (02:01):
That you should also check out.
Speaker 2 (02:03):
And we want to remind everyone this podcast has a mission.
You can do pr for yourself.
Speaker 3 (02:09):
And Alex Mark and I are going.
Speaker 2 (02:11):
To show you how to do it each and every week.
Speaker 4 (02:15):
Nay and you know, as animal rescuers or any pet
business owners.
Speaker 5 (02:21):
We all need to do something with social media. That's
why we're so thrilled to have Scarlet Realcude of First
Social It's an amazing part of the Pet Industry Network,
which is a group of marketing creatives dedicated to helping
those in the pet industry. Welcome Scarlet, thank you for
being on the show.
Speaker 7 (02:40):
Thank you so much for having me.
Speaker 4 (02:42):
Yay can you give us a little introduction of yourself
and a first social.
Speaker 7 (02:47):
Yeah, So I'm Scarlet Rockwood. I am the owner and
founder of for Social and our mission is to help
pet businesses impact to lives of pets and their people
more by making sure they can reach more pet parents
using content marketing and creating a content marketing ecosystem which
not just social media, but bring them onto your email list,
(03:09):
to your website. But that almost always that customer journey
almost always starts on social media.
Speaker 3 (03:15):
You know.
Speaker 2 (03:16):
I find that like we like people like you are amazing,
like Alex and I are pr people, and you know
our expertise.
Speaker 3 (03:25):
Is not marketing, but like.
Speaker 2 (03:27):
You haven't figured it out. You told me such amazing
stuff the other day, and we really really.
Speaker 3 (03:32):
Want to get into it, and of course we have
to pay for the show.
Speaker 2 (03:36):
So we're just going to take a really quick break
and then we're going to be right back with the
car lit.
Speaker 6 (03:45):
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(04:08):
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give them ten dot org.
Speaker 8 (04:21):
Let's talk pets on Petlife Radio dot.
Speaker 9 (04:24):
Com and we're back with Scarlet from for Social Scarlet.
Speaker 10 (04:38):
Just a quick question to start on how important a
social media for small pet businesses and rescue for all
the people who you know, they might be a bit.
Speaker 4 (04:50):
Older, might not be gen z. So how important is
social media? Can you give us a little Yeah?
Speaker 7 (04:56):
Absolutely so to me, the smaller your business is, the
more important social media becomes because it is the organic
you know, it's more and more commercialized now, but it
started out as almost the grassroots way to get to
your customers. When you're looking at online marketing everything else,
it's very difficult to get the same amount of reach
(05:18):
and engagement without paying for ads. So social media is
a very good way to get yourself in front of
people and more importantly, to show them who you are
and what your business is about, to raise that no
like and trust factor that we talk about a lot
in marketing. So if you are on social media, it's
a lot easier for someone even if they've heard of
(05:39):
you through a referral or a flyer you left at
your local pet store, or they found your website by
searching Google first. A lot of people still go to
social media to actually find out about you and try
to get to know you before they actually reach out
and either sign up for your services or by your part.
Speaker 4 (06:00):
And when we talk social media, we talk about Facebook, Instagram,
which are you know, the most common ones. But now
TikTok has been introduced, right, So do you recommend to
people that they try to be on every single network
or to focus more on one or a couple.
Speaker 7 (06:17):
I think that the power of repurposing is really strong,
and it allows you to be in a lot of
places without necessarily needing to make unique content for each
individual place. You can just tweak it to fit the
native language of that platform, so you can be on
as many platforms as you want to be. I would
just recommend that you do pick something that feels sustainable
(06:39):
for you. It's always better to be consistent where you
are rather than to spread yourself too thin. And I
would also say to only focus on growing one place
at a time. So whether if you're growing your Facebook group,
don't try to do that and grow your Instagram account
at the same time and split your focus. I recommend
growing one channel at a time. So right now, for me,
(07:00):
my focus is a Facebook group and my Instagram account
is staying pretty level. My Facebook page is staying level
or even losing followers because I'm not focused on growing yet.
I'm not running any ads. I'm not sending people to that.
Anytime somebody wants to join my audience right now, I'm
sending them to my Facebook group because that's what I'm
focusing on growing right now.
Speaker 2 (07:22):
Question, So everybody thinks, oh, you know, I just put
something on social media, but it's not as simple as that, right,
I mean, growing your page is hard.
Speaker 3 (07:32):
And so if you only had what would you.
Speaker 2 (07:35):
Suggest to pet for pet rescues and small pet businesses.
Is it best to be on Instagram or Facebook or TikTok? Like,
if you had to pick one, what do you think
would be best for the pet industry?
Speaker 7 (07:49):
I personally find that the best results from me and
my clients usually come from Instagram. On Facebook pages, it
can be a little bit challenging just because of the
way they've set up their algorithm to work. Really want
it to be very pay to play in terms of
reaching your people and getting the same level of engagement
you can get in other places. Facebook pages are difficult,
but Facebook groups are also very good, especially if you
(08:11):
want to build a collaborative community where other people feel
as much of the conversation as you versus just all
the other channels where you're posting and all they can
do is comment. TikTok can be a good place if
you are not a local business, but they do not.
It's much harder to target a local audience on TikTok
versus on Instagram or other places like that. And then
(08:34):
they are also you know, depending on your cybersecurity awareness.
There are some concerns there with TikTok that are there
with any online platform, but they're a little bit, you know,
a little bit less with things like Facebook and Instagram
because at least they're owned in the US.
Speaker 2 (08:51):
If you have somebody you know that is opening a business,
has never and now has to do social media, like
are there, I'm kind of leading because you offer such
great programs. What are some like self help resources that
people can can use to do social media themselves and
learn the ins and outs of it, just the basics
(09:12):
to get them through.
Speaker 7 (09:13):
Absolutely. So obviously there's good old Google and YouTube. I
think a lot of people kind of get the YouTube degree.
They search and they watch all the videos. And the
problem with that, even though it's very valuable for learning,
is that you can get conflicting information from people who
have grown their businesses or created their systems in different ways,
(09:34):
and it's very tempting to take one tip from this
person and one tip from that person, and one tip
from this other person, and what you end up with
is not the same system that any of them have,
and you wonder why you're not getting results. So I
do recommend that if you do join in any program
or follow any particular recommendations or system from anyone, that
(09:56):
you try to stick to the whole system from that
person without mixing in too much from other people who
that may be conflicting with the way that that system works.
I have my own Facebook group that you're welcome to
join right now. It's called Profitable Pet Businesses. You can
just search it and if anyone who is a rescue
or five O, one C three is listening. I actually
(10:17):
have a scholarship for my membership program that is basically
an all access pass to all of my paid trainings
and courses, and any five oh one c three that
is animal related can get access to that for free.
So if they want to just reach out to me,
they can, They can definitely get that.
Speaker 6 (10:33):
There's lots of other.
Speaker 7 (10:34):
Really great resources. There are people like you know, cand
just on Yolo with pet boss Nation has a wonderful program.
It's not specifically marketing focused. It's all around leadership and
business growth with a few marketing courses inside of it.
But I would just encourage you to start by finding
the people who are in the pet industry. Go to
(10:56):
Pet Industry Network dot com, look for the network that
you want to build around yourself, and then those are
also the people that you can learn from, whether they
have a course or you hire them for consulting. The
best thing to do is to look for the person
that's going to align with you, with your values and
understand the pet industry. That's what's very important.
Speaker 4 (11:16):
Yeah, completely right, Thank you so much, Carter. And it's
amazing that you're offering a free scholarship for rescues. That's
really nice to hear that's amazing. We have rescuers listening,
so I'm sure some of them will should and will
want to take advantage of it.
Speaker 2 (11:33):
So this is a PR podcast. Can you talk a
little bit about how do you think PR intersects with
social media?
Speaker 7 (11:40):
So PR is like, in my opinion, social media before
social media existed. It is the organic way to get
your message in front of as many people as possible,
to get them talking about it. And the difference between
PR and social media is that you're trying to get
yourself on other people's channels, whereas with social media you're
trying to build your own channel. And kind of the
(12:02):
mix between the two, I feel like the little hybrid
is influencer marketing, which is, you know, getting yourself on
someone else's channel that they have built as a social
media influencer or content creator rather than a news organization
or magazine or something like that. But the end goal
of all of it is to get yourself in front
of as many of your ideal clients as possible.
Speaker 2 (12:24):
How do you find your target audience on social media?
Speaker 7 (12:29):
A lot of it starts with understanding who that target
audience actually is. I think that's something that a lot
of people don't quite dig deep enough on they say, oh, well,
anyone with a dog can use my product, But in reality,
your product is really built for the single dog mom
in the city who needs xyz solution, and you know,
(12:49):
it's not really the same attraction as someone who is
out in the country and maybe doesn't have the same
problems or doesn't care about the same things. Not every
pet owner is a pet parent, and therefore not every
problem we can solve is one that every pet owner
wants to solve or understands that they need to solve.
So the first thing is dialing down into who your
(13:11):
idol client is and who is it that's going to
understand that they need and want your product or your service,
So that's a big step to it. Then you know,
doesn't matter where they live. Are you a local business?
If you ship anywhere in the US, then you're less
limited in terms of finding your audience versus if you're
(13:31):
a pet sitter and you only work in a thirty
mile radius of where you live. So that's another step
to identify. And then I just go on to hashtags
that are related to that are being used by people
who are in that Niche specifically on Instagram. I also
look up you know, other businesses who are having success
in those niches, who have the audience we want to have,
(13:54):
even things that are not a direct business, especially if
you're local, Like if I'm a pet sitter, I might
go look at petsticks and veterinarians in my area and
see what their audience looks like, what kind of things
their audience are posting, what hashtags they're using. That sort
of research is very helpful to find out where your
target audience is hanging out. Outside of Instagram, you can
do the same thing with Facebook groups. Do you have
(14:17):
a local, you know, pet owner group that's specific to
your city that you can join, or if you're not,
someone who is limited by the local area, very specific
to the types of problems you solve, Like there are
lots of find a dog trainer or dog behavioral support groups.
If you're a trainer that you can join and that
(14:37):
is your audience, they're right there. All you have to
do is build a relationship with them.
Speaker 1 (14:41):
Wow.
Speaker 4 (14:42):
Go, it's other really great tips. Thank you so much
for this. We have to take another break, but we'll
be right back.
Speaker 3 (14:50):
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Speaker 10 (15:56):
And we're back with Scarlet and all of our tips
on social media.
Speaker 4 (16:00):
Scarlett question, is there a general rule of social media?
So I've heard you know you should post three times
a week or like two times a week, but you
can also post every day because then you're overwhelming your audience.
So is there a general rule? And how important is
like the amount of time you're posting compared to the engagement.
Speaker 7 (16:21):
So the most important thing in that front is consistency.
You want to pick a time that you yourself are
going to be able to keep up with. So if
you choose to post ten times a day on all
the platforms, it sounds outrageous, but there are people who
do it. You're probably, as a small business, gonna burn
out and not being able to keep up and feel,
(16:43):
you know, like you are not You're just gonna give
up on social media. I've had so many people say
that to me, I can't keep up, and I just
decided not to bother. I recommend picking something that you
can sustainably keep up with, whether that's once a week,
three times a week, once a day. The best results
I find are usually when you're doing about once a day,
(17:04):
but you can even go two, three, four, or five
times a day. There's not really such a thing as
too much because no one in your audience sees every
piece of content that you put out, and that's a
lot of things people are worried about as well. As
I don't want to spam people. I don't want people
to see the same thing over and over. But the
algorithms decide what people see. So what matters more is
(17:26):
finding the content, those golden nuggets that your audience is
really going to love that are going to take off
and become what I call viral for you, which is
it doesn't have to get a million views, but if
you normally get one hundred views and it gets two
thousand views, that post is viral for you, which means
that post performed better and it is now kind of
(17:46):
put it in your little vaults as an example of
what performs well with your audience. The more content you
put out, the quicker you can find those golden nuggets,
and then the more you can refine your content to
be better and better and closer and closer to what
you're are audience wants. So more is going to get
you where you need to go faster, it's going to
get you in front of more people. But you also
(18:07):
want to focus on your own well being and not
getting burned out, because if you're going to put out
a post every day for a month but then run
out of steam and not do it for six months,
that's not going to be as helpful to you as
you If you focus on you know, two or three
posts a week and you do that consistently over time.
Speaker 2 (18:27):
Wow, I have a question. What about the use of video.
Speaker 7 (18:31):
Video is almost non negotiable at this point. You know,
with the invention of TikTok, people's brains just decided that
that short form video is exactly what you know, what
they resonate with, and the algorithms and the companies that
control social media have listened to that and they build
everything around short form content quite a lot, to where
(18:55):
now there's not really even a big platform that most
people use in the pet industry that hasn't copied TikTok.
Instagram has reels, SODA's Facebook YouTube has shorts. Even pinterests
Now has you know, video pins. So it's definitely something
that's taking over and you are definitely holding yourself back
(19:17):
if you're shying away from video. Video is very important.
It's not to say that if you don't want to
do video or don't have the capacity to do video
right now, that you shouldn't bother. You should still be
out there do what you can do. Something is always
better than nothing. But I have found that the exact
same post, with the same caption, same message, even the
(19:38):
same text overlay, if I put it out as a
video versus an image post. Almost every time it's going
to reach more people.
Speaker 4 (19:45):
Yeah, and now, like if you go on Instagram, I've
seen that in the last couple of weeks. If you
go on somebody's profile, you don't even see their picture
anymore because you're already on their real feed on their profile,
So you have to like change the tab to actually
see their pictures. But if it's just sure, you don't
actually even see them anymore.
Speaker 7 (20:02):
Yeah, it depends a lot on how you got to
their profile. For example, I ended up on people's profile
a lot because I find a post and then I
click into their profile from that post. If you are
on an image post and you click into the profile,
it will take you to the normal feed. If you
are on a real and you click into the profile,
it will take you directly to the reels feed.
Speaker 3 (20:22):
I didn't know that.
Speaker 4 (20:24):
That's so interesting. Wow, I really know how to work
their magic.
Speaker 3 (20:29):
They do.
Speaker 2 (20:29):
I have a question about Pinterest, like, should business is
an animal welfare use Pinterest? You know, I associate it
with recipes and you know interior design.
Speaker 7 (20:40):
Well, I think that's actually a perfect example of why
you should you associate it with where you go when
you want to learn something. So if you are a
pet business, especially if you have a blog, if you
have a podcast, if you have anything where you want
them to leave the social media account and go to
your website to consume something, Interest is the best place
(21:01):
to be. It is not quite the same for community building.
So I almost don't even consider Pinterest a social media
network so much as it is a search engine. It
is they they're the only network that has designed themselves
to where they want people to click away and leave
their platform. Everyone else has designed themselves to keep people
on the platform as long as possible. But Pinterest wants
(21:24):
people to leave. They want them to go read your recipe,
read your blog, you know, go look at your interior
design photos. So they are a great place to share
if you have a link that you want people to follow.
I don't typically post a Pinterest if I don't have
somewhere to send them because that's really like if you're
on Pinterest and you're looking for recipes and there's nothing
to click to go read the recipe, that's probably pretty annoying.
(21:47):
Whereas if you have a blog, if you have you know,
a news channel where you released something, if you have
pr that you want to put out into your audience.
Anything that you have a link to send somebody to
go look at something, you should put it on Pinterest.
Speaker 4 (22:02):
So interesting, And do you know what the target audiences
on Pinterest? Is it more like millennials, gen z X?
Speaker 7 (22:10):
I think it depends a lot. It's definitely at least,
you know, millennials, I think, yeah, some gen Z use it.
I think gen X and millennials definitely use it almost
more than others because it is more of a search platform.
You know, when we go to look at you know,
design ideas for our weddings, we go to Pinterest. Yeah,
(22:31):
I think a lot of gen z is now going
to Instagram and TikTok for that sort of thing.
Speaker 4 (22:36):
That's true.
Speaker 2 (22:37):
Have another question about TikTok and you know, politically there's
all this talk and everything of you know, not allowing
us users to use it anymore. What do you think
about that? And what should people do? I mean, should
they still be on TikTok? Should they be careful about
what they put on?
Speaker 7 (22:55):
So I will start by leaving it and sufficing it
to say that I do not have TikTok on my phone,
so you'll know where I land in that camp. My
husband cybersecurity engineer. So that says enough about that. But
I have, you know, my networks and my third party
posting platforms connected to TikTok. If I have a client
(23:16):
who wants to be on TikTok, I use those to
post and to interact with comments. Personally, I think that
TikTok the reason it became so popular partially is because
it invented this mega short form video platform that we
now see, I mean invented a strong word vine existed
long before, but they're the ones who really popularized it,
(23:37):
and they're also the place where people feel like they
can get the most viewsed and grow the fastest. The
reason for that, though, is because they designed their algorithm
to just show everything to everybody all the time. Now, okay,
the more you interact with it will pair your feed
down to where you're seeing more things you're more likely
to be interested in. But they basically don't restrict their
(24:01):
feet as much in terms of, you know, wanting to
show you content that they believe is quality and that
other people have engaged with and that they think you're
going to be interested in. They just show your content
to more people, so more people like it and watch
it and follow you. But those followers I have found
are not as valuable as the ones that you get
(24:23):
on Instagram or and a Facebook group in terms of
how many you know followers you have versus how many
dollars you can make off of them. Now, this is
different equation. If you're a pet influencer by all means,
that's not what I'm talking about here. But in terms
of the likelihood that your follower is targeted, is interested
in what you actually offer, and it's likely to buy
(24:45):
something from you, is not as high on TikTok. Now,
there's a lot of places where people have made thousands
and millions of dollars a month because they are on
TikTok getting millions of use. It is possible, but I
personally feel like one thousand views on Instagram is going
to bring more money into your pocket than a thousand
(25:07):
views on TikTok. And the reality is it's a lot
of work to build a platform. This is a platform where,
especially if you're in America, it could get ripped out
from under you any second. So it's a lot of
effort that you may end up We always say social
media is a platform that you borrow and you want
to move people to something like an email list, which
(25:27):
is a platform that you own. TikTok is the most
borrowed platform in my opinion. So even though all of
them are somewhat volatile, it's kind of the one that
has the shakiest foundation in terms of it could be
gone tomorrow.
Speaker 2 (25:40):
That's amazing. And you know, Whisker Media has some Chinese clients,
and what they see on TikTok in China is vastly
different than what is seen here in the US, and
so this is kind of this might be more conspiracy,
But do you think that the Chinese government is flooding,
(26:00):
you know, misinformation on TikTok.
Speaker 7 (26:03):
I wouldn't at all be surprised, because the American government
is flooding misinformation on our social media. I mean, that's
just something we have to be aware of as informed adults,
you know, and outside of the government, the human beings
and users who are completely outside the platform control are
also flooding misinformation because everyone leaves different things and some
(26:25):
of us don't do our research very well. So always
be aware that that's something that you know you could
be dealing with. Always do research for something that's important,
something that you know you're actually making life decisions about,
you know, don't just watch a TikTok or an Instagram
reel and make a decision. Always, always, you know, dig
(26:46):
a little deeper. But I would be very surprised if
if there wasn't, you know, involvement with the Chinese government
and what kind of content is being put out. We
do know that they're heavily restricting the types of content
based on the location, and we know that people have
literally gone to jail because of what they posted on TikTok,
So if they're restricting that much, I'm not at all
(27:06):
surprised if they're also controlling and putting some stuff out
there as well.
Speaker 2 (27:10):
So be careful when it comes to TikTok, everyone.
Speaker 7 (27:15):
Be careful everywhere because you never know. I mean, even
Mark Zuckerberg just recently came out and apologized for letting
himself be threatened into influencing politics and hiding certain posts
and letting more people see certain posts based on political leanings.
So just always, you know, be mindful of that when
(27:36):
you're on social media and when you're watching the news
and when you're really consuming anything.
Speaker 3 (27:41):
I have a quick question.
Speaker 2 (27:42):
What social media programs that help you you know, post
multiple you know, helped you repurpose your content?
Speaker 3 (27:51):
Any suggestions? Which ones you like?
Speaker 2 (27:54):
You know, I know there's like like some of these
are really expensive, but like sprout.
Speaker 4 (27:58):
Social we use, we use social.
Speaker 3 (28:02):
Yeah, which ones do you like?
Speaker 2 (28:04):
And you know what would be worth somebody's time and
resources to put into to do social media quickly.
Speaker 7 (28:13):
I'm a really big fan of one specific platform, which
is what I now use after trying a doesen't and
this one really hit all the things I needed. It's
called Metricool, and for most people who only have one
brand to promote, you can get everything you need on
the free version.
Speaker 3 (28:30):
Oh oh, upgrade then, you.
Speaker 7 (28:33):
Know, I think the next level up is only like
eighteen dollars a month. It's really affordable compared to other platforms,
and it also does a lot more so you can minimize.
Like there's some people who pay for a scheduling platform
and they pay a separate analytical platform to look at
their stats and compile reports. And they pay a separate
(28:53):
platform to have their multi link tool that you know
gives them that button on Instagram where you the list
of all the buttons and everything is kind of a
different platform for everything, so that really adds up metric cool. Especially.
I know I am on a paid level because I
have like ten or twelve brands that I manage on there,
(29:14):
but it has all of that in it, so I'm
only paying I pay less for Metrical now than I
paid seven or eight years ago just from my analytical
and reporting software. So it's definitely a very very useful tool.
Like I said, a lot of businesses can use the
free version and get everything that they need. And the
other reason I switched to it is it's got really
(29:35):
good analytics and it will connect basically every platform, so
I don't need Metabusiness Suite for Facebook and Instagram and
who's Sweet for LinkedIn and you know other platforms that
connect to other things. Metrical will connect basically everything you
needed to and then you can just put up a post.
I can put up, let's say, a real post on
(29:55):
someone's Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, and YouTube shorts all at all
at the same time, and I can also edit the
captions to be different for each one, so that I
can remove the Instagram hashtags from the Facebook post and
put the link in the ones that allow links and
take it off of Instagram so that you're still posting
in what I call native language for the platform. So
(30:19):
you can edit the post where they all fit the
platform they're going to, but then put them all in.
Speaker 3 (30:24):
There at once.
Speaker 7 (30:26):
Just upload the video one time, and then if you
want to move them all around to where they don't
necessarily go out at the same time.
Speaker 2 (30:32):
That's awesome. Hey, we should bring Mark in here. Mark, Mark,
you're a huge fan of social media.
Speaker 6 (30:41):
I'm a huge fan of it. It's just that our
social media is pitiful. I mean, we're a worldwide media company,
and our social media is terrible because we don't really
have a lot of time to do this. But now
that I just saw this metricol, this really is useful.
Speaker 7 (30:59):
It's very helpful scheduler.
Speaker 6 (31:00):
Yeah, now that I know to do reels more than
just photos, I think that that'll be helpful too. So
I'm learning a lot.
Speaker 4 (31:09):
Here and Mark, you can promote your own music when
you do your reels.
Speaker 6 (31:13):
I could.
Speaker 4 (31:14):
Yeah, you could put it in the background and then
that can become like a sound.
Speaker 6 (31:18):
The only problem is every time I do that, they
take it down because they say it's copyrighted. Of course,
it's copyrighted by me and the companies that distribute it,
but they don't distinguish that that it's mine and they
just take it down.
Speaker 3 (31:30):
Oh that's a bummer.
Speaker 7 (31:33):
Yeah, you do have the opportunity, I think, to appeal
those and basically say, yes, it's copyrighted, I own the copyright.
Speaker 8 (31:41):
Yeah, I do that.
Speaker 6 (31:42):
But it's a pain to do that a lot.
Speaker 7 (31:44):
Yeah, that's one of the things that is a challenge.
I see a lot of especially bigger content creators deal
with that. They'll even pick music that's in the Instagram
or Facebook music library and then later get the real
taken down or de monetized because of of copyright. So
it's a little bit of a mess. They're they're trying
to be very cautious and not get themselves sued, and
(32:07):
that unfortunately makes it kind of hard on the creators.
Speaker 2 (32:10):
It's just social media is just constantly evolving. I can
tell you I can't keep up. I mean, Alex does
most of ours. And you'll know this scarlet. You might
you'll tag me and I'm like, I'll like find out
that you tagged me, like three weeks later. I apologize
to everybody in our network and so it's just hard
(32:31):
to keep up, you know, and your wisdom is just amazing.
And I did want to ask one quick question about today.
I got an email and it said your Instagram could
have more followers, and you know, they were basically soliciting
me to buy followers. Can you talk about that really quick?
Speaker 3 (32:54):
You shouldn't do that correct.
Speaker 7 (32:56):
Yeah, I was about to say. The quickest I can
say that is don't. The thing about any cold email
that you get is almost always going to be someone
who wants you to buy followers. Sometimes it will be
someone who's offering a service to help you grow followers,
which looks a little bit more up and up. But
the problem is that that type of service I offer
(33:16):
it myself is very ambiguous and very easy for people
to tell you they're doing something different than what they are.
So they could be buying followers, they could be using
bots to follow your account, they could be even doing
the work that is the same thing I might do,
but they're not targeting people correctly, so they're just getting
(33:36):
anybody and everybody to interact with your content. But I
have found, you know, because I do some behind the
scenes testing for all that kind of stuff. I sometimes
respond to those emails and say, okay, tell me what
you would do with the account, and a lot of
them what they'll do is they will send you, you know, hundreds,
if not thousands of new followers a month. But if
(33:57):
you go and look at who those followers are, they
are a face that doesn't match a name that has
two posts and fifty followers and probably got it. Might
have been created yesterday or a year ago, but it's
not a real person. These companies they make these accounts
just to use them to then sell you accounts, so
(34:19):
you're not actually gonna make any money off of them
because they're not real people, much less real people who
are actually your ideal clients. So it can be very
difficult and I personally, the best way to grow your
account using the same type of methods that these people
are trying to tell you to use, not buying followers,
but actually growth methods, is what I call outbound engagement.
(34:41):
There are a few different methods for this. One of
them is called dollar eighty. You can just google that
and it'll probably be the first result there with an
article on all the information on how to do it.
Another one I call the notification bomb, which you basically
just go to a page, maybe comment on a post
like nine or ten foot photos, follow them. When they
(35:02):
get on their phone and look at their notifications, they're
going to see your name takes up their whole notification page,
and they're most likely at least going to go look
at your profile and see why and see what you're
all about, and that increases the likelihod they're going to
follow you and engage with your content. The dollar eighty
method is one that is what I use for the
(35:22):
service that I offer, and what we do is we
reach out to people who are using the hashtags that
identify them as your ideal clients. We comment on the post,
we like it, We follow them, We build a connection,
and ideally we want to start a conversation and build
a relationship, because that's really what social media is all about.
It's about feeling like you can get to know a person.
(35:45):
And the most successful you're going to be on social
media is if you look like it like a networking
event or a party, even if you've got great content.
That's like going to a party and standing in the
corner and waiting for someone to come talk to you.
And how successful. Is that going to be or working event?
How many people are you going to meet if you
do that versus if you go and you talk to people,
(36:05):
and you approach people and you introduce yourself and you
join whatever conversation it is not necessarily about your business.
It could be about how cute their dog is in
there out in that outfit that day. The more you
do that, that's where you're going to start seeing results
from your social media. You're going to see more engagement,
You're going to see more followers, and more importantly, every
single one of those followers is going to be a
(36:28):
closer connection, and that pulls them one step closer through
your customer journey to actually buying from you. I find
accounts that have one hundred followers that do this and
get you know, don't go a single day without making
a sale, versus accounts with ten twenty thousand followers that
are dead and don't actually make any money because they're
(36:50):
not building connections.
Speaker 2 (36:52):
Wow, well this has been really helpful. Can you tell
us how people get a hold of you and tell
us your podcast and you know how how they can
connect with you?
Speaker 3 (37:03):
Basically?
Speaker 7 (37:04):
Yeah, absolutely so. My name is Scarlet Rockwood. With a
K SO s K A R L e T. Scarletrockwood
dot com is my website and Scarlet Rockwood is my
user name on basically every platform I'm on. You can
also join my Facebook group Profitable Pet Businesses that should
be pretty easy to find. And there's a picture of
me with my bright red hair, so should be should
(37:25):
be hard to miss. And the podcast is the Pet
Marketing Podcast, so if you just search pet marketing podcasts,
that should pop up for you as well. And again
the bright red everything shouldn't be hard to find.
Speaker 3 (37:40):
That is so awesome.
Speaker 2 (37:41):
Thank you so much Scarlet for joining us. You have
been just a wealth of information. And Mark's gonna go
check out metricool as soon as he's done with this.
Speaker 6 (37:55):
This is really really helpful.
Speaker 2 (37:57):
Yes, yeah, well that's a for this show for this week.
We are so excited to be doing this for all
of you out there who are making nice better for animals.
So you got a question you want us to answer
to reach out to us on Instagram or Facebook under
their Whisper Reports and we'll try to answer it in
a future podcast episode.
Speaker 3 (38:17):
And as we always say.
Speaker 9 (38:20):
Ourk loud and her smart see you later.
Speaker 8 (38:24):
Everybody, let's Talk Best every week on demand only on
petlifradios dot com
Hey, this is Pet Life Radio. Let's talk pets.
Speaker 2 (00:14):
Welcome to the Whiskard Report. We're a new podcast dedicated
to helping anyone in the pet industry, whether you're an
animal welfare or a for profit pet company, get some
pr and buzz for your organization. I'm Mary Chan, one
of the hosts of the show, along with alexand Ricard.
Speaker 3 (00:31):
Who hails from France but is.
Speaker 2 (00:33):
Currently in Canada. Out in Vancouver. Bongeur, Alex Doron.
Speaker 4 (00:39):
We're so excited about this show today. Do you need
help with social media? Well, today we've got an expert
for you. But first let me introduce you to our producer.
Speaker 5 (00:48):
Mark Winter of Pet Life Radio, who is the man
who gets us to you each and every week.
Speaker 6 (00:53):
Hello Mark, Hi, how's everyone doing.
Speaker 4 (00:56):
We're good, You're good.
Speaker 6 (00:58):
I need to know about social media? We need help?
Speaker 2 (01:04):
Hey, Mark, what are you working on with your podcasts?
Speaker 6 (01:08):
Well, let's see this week. Actually, right after this we
are recording with a Broadway producer, Daryl, who's a Tony
Award winning producer and she also did a documentary about
dogs and she's on next. So wow, that's on Rapaport
to the Rescue.
Speaker 3 (01:28):
That's so awesome. And Jill Rappaport is amazing.
Speaker 2 (01:32):
She's like, I think she is the first pet journalist.
She's on the Today Show, Like I want to say,
she started probably in the eighties, right Mark.
Speaker 6 (01:41):
Yeah, probably, I mean she was on the Today Show,
she did entertainment, she did other stuff, and then she
switched over to pets, and so she's the pet reporter.
So she's the one.
Speaker 2 (01:51):
Yeah, I mean, who doesn't want to do all pet right. Well,
we're honored to be part of Pet Life Radio, a
network of many many awesome podcast.
Speaker 3 (02:01):
That you should also check out.
Speaker 2 (02:03):
And we want to remind everyone this podcast has a mission.
You can do pr for yourself.
Speaker 3 (02:09):
And Alex Mark and I are going.
Speaker 2 (02:11):
To show you how to do it each and every week.
Speaker 4 (02:15):
Nay and you know, as animal rescuers or any pet
business owners.
Speaker 5 (02:21):
We all need to do something with social media. That's
why we're so thrilled to have Scarlet Realcude of First
Social It's an amazing part of the Pet Industry Network,
which is a group of marketing creatives dedicated to helping
those in the pet industry. Welcome Scarlet, thank you for
being on the show.
Speaker 7 (02:40):
Thank you so much for having me.
Speaker 4 (02:42):
Yay can you give us a little introduction of yourself
and a first social.
Speaker 7 (02:47):
Yeah, So I'm Scarlet Rockwood. I am the owner and
founder of for Social and our mission is to help
pet businesses impact to lives of pets and their people
more by making sure they can reach more pet parents
using content marketing and creating a content marketing ecosystem which
not just social media, but bring them onto your email list,
(03:09):
to your website. But that almost always that customer journey
almost always starts on social media.
Speaker 3 (03:15):
You know.
Speaker 2 (03:16):
I find that like we like people like you are amazing,
like Alex and I are pr people, and you know
our expertise.
Speaker 3 (03:25):
Is not marketing, but like.
Speaker 2 (03:27):
You haven't figured it out. You told me such amazing
stuff the other day, and we really really.
Speaker 3 (03:32):
Want to get into it, and of course we have
to pay for the show.
Speaker 2 (03:36):
So we're just going to take a really quick break
and then we're going to be right back with the
car lit.
Speaker 6 (03:45):
You know the expression cats have nine lives? Well, what
if you can give them one more? But give them ten?
Movement is on a mission to help give kats an
extra life. How with spay and neoter spay or new
ding your cat helps them live a longer, healthier life,
and it helps control free roaming cat populations too. Learn
(04:08):
more about the benefits of spee and neoter and meet Scooter,
the newter cat at give them ten dot org. That's
give them ten dot org.
Speaker 8 (04:21):
Let's talk pets on Petlife Radio dot.
Speaker 9 (04:24):
Com and we're back with Scarlet from for Social Scarlet.
Speaker 10 (04:38):
Just a quick question to start on how important a
social media for small pet businesses and rescue for all
the people who you know, they might be a bit.
Speaker 4 (04:50):
Older, might not be gen z. So how important is
social media? Can you give us a little Yeah?
Speaker 7 (04:56):
Absolutely so to me, the smaller your business is, the
more important social media becomes because it is the organic
you know, it's more and more commercialized now, but it
started out as almost the grassroots way to get to
your customers. When you're looking at online marketing everything else,
it's very difficult to get the same amount of reach
(05:18):
and engagement without paying for ads. So social media is
a very good way to get yourself in front of
people and more importantly, to show them who you are
and what your business is about, to raise that no
like and trust factor that we talk about a lot
in marketing. So if you are on social media, it's
a lot easier for someone even if they've heard of
(05:39):
you through a referral or a flyer you left at
your local pet store, or they found your website by
searching Google first. A lot of people still go to
social media to actually find out about you and try
to get to know you before they actually reach out
and either sign up for your services or by your part.
Speaker 4 (06:00):
And when we talk social media, we talk about Facebook, Instagram,
which are you know, the most common ones. But now
TikTok has been introduced, right, So do you recommend to
people that they try to be on every single network
or to focus more on one or a couple.
Speaker 7 (06:17):
I think that the power of repurposing is really strong,
and it allows you to be in a lot of
places without necessarily needing to make unique content for each
individual place. You can just tweak it to fit the
native language of that platform, so you can be on
as many platforms as you want to be. I would
just recommend that you do pick something that feels sustainable
(06:39):
for you. It's always better to be consistent where you
are rather than to spread yourself too thin. And I
would also say to only focus on growing one place
at a time. So whether if you're growing your Facebook group,
don't try to do that and grow your Instagram account
at the same time and split your focus. I recommend
growing one channel at a time. So right now, for me,
(07:00):
my focus is a Facebook group and my Instagram account
is staying pretty level. My Facebook page is staying level
or even losing followers because I'm not focused on growing yet.
I'm not running any ads. I'm not sending people to that.
Anytime somebody wants to join my audience right now, I'm
sending them to my Facebook group because that's what I'm
focusing on growing right now.
Speaker 2 (07:22):
Question, So everybody thinks, oh, you know, I just put
something on social media, but it's not as simple as that, right,
I mean, growing your page is hard.
Speaker 3 (07:32):
And so if you only had what would you.
Speaker 2 (07:35):
Suggest to pet for pet rescues and small pet businesses.
Is it best to be on Instagram or Facebook or TikTok? Like,
if you had to pick one, what do you think
would be best for the pet industry?
Speaker 7 (07:49):
I personally find that the best results from me and
my clients usually come from Instagram. On Facebook pages, it
can be a little bit challenging just because of the
way they've set up their algorithm to work. Really want
it to be very pay to play in terms of
reaching your people and getting the same level of engagement
you can get in other places. Facebook pages are difficult,
but Facebook groups are also very good, especially if you
(08:11):
want to build a collaborative community where other people feel
as much of the conversation as you versus just all
the other channels where you're posting and all they can
do is comment. TikTok can be a good place if
you are not a local business, but they do not.
It's much harder to target a local audience on TikTok
versus on Instagram or other places like that. And then
(08:34):
they are also you know, depending on your cybersecurity awareness.
There are some concerns there with TikTok that are there
with any online platform, but they're a little bit, you know,
a little bit less with things like Facebook and Instagram
because at least they're owned in the US.
Speaker 2 (08:51):
If you have somebody you know that is opening a business,
has never and now has to do social media, like
are there, I'm kind of leading because you offer such
great programs. What are some like self help resources that
people can can use to do social media themselves and
learn the ins and outs of it, just the basics
(09:12):
to get them through.
Speaker 7 (09:13):
Absolutely. So obviously there's good old Google and YouTube. I
think a lot of people kind of get the YouTube degree.
They search and they watch all the videos. And the
problem with that, even though it's very valuable for learning,
is that you can get conflicting information from people who
have grown their businesses or created their systems in different ways,
(09:34):
and it's very tempting to take one tip from this
person and one tip from that person, and one tip
from this other person, and what you end up with
is not the same system that any of them have,
and you wonder why you're not getting results. So I
do recommend that if you do join in any program
or follow any particular recommendations or system from anyone, that
(09:56):
you try to stick to the whole system from that
person without mixing in too much from other people who
that may be conflicting with the way that that system works.
I have my own Facebook group that you're welcome to
join right now. It's called Profitable Pet Businesses. You can
just search it and if anyone who is a rescue
or five O, one C three is listening. I actually
(10:17):
have a scholarship for my membership program that is basically
an all access pass to all of my paid trainings
and courses, and any five oh one c three that
is animal related can get access to that for free.
So if they want to just reach out to me,
they can, They can definitely get that.
Speaker 6 (10:33):
There's lots of other.
Speaker 7 (10:34):
Really great resources. There are people like you know, cand
just on Yolo with pet boss Nation has a wonderful program.
It's not specifically marketing focused. It's all around leadership and
business growth with a few marketing courses inside of it.
But I would just encourage you to start by finding
the people who are in the pet industry. Go to
(10:56):
Pet Industry Network dot com, look for the network that
you want to build around yourself, and then those are
also the people that you can learn from, whether they
have a course or you hire them for consulting. The
best thing to do is to look for the person
that's going to align with you, with your values and
understand the pet industry. That's what's very important.
Speaker 4 (11:16):
Yeah, completely right, Thank you so much, Carter. And it's
amazing that you're offering a free scholarship for rescues. That's
really nice to hear that's amazing. We have rescuers listening,
so I'm sure some of them will should and will
want to take advantage of it.
Speaker 2 (11:33):
So this is a PR podcast. Can you talk a
little bit about how do you think PR intersects with
social media?
Speaker 7 (11:40):
So PR is like, in my opinion, social media before
social media existed. It is the organic way to get
your message in front of as many people as possible,
to get them talking about it. And the difference between
PR and social media is that you're trying to get
yourself on other people's channels, whereas with social media you're
trying to build your own channel. And kind of the
(12:02):
mix between the two, I feel like the little hybrid
is influencer marketing, which is, you know, getting yourself on
someone else's channel that they have built as a social
media influencer or content creator rather than a news organization
or magazine or something like that. But the end goal
of all of it is to get yourself in front
of as many of your ideal clients as possible.
Speaker 2 (12:24):
How do you find your target audience on social media?
Speaker 7 (12:29):
A lot of it starts with understanding who that target
audience actually is. I think that's something that a lot
of people don't quite dig deep enough on they say, oh, well,
anyone with a dog can use my product, But in reality,
your product is really built for the single dog mom
in the city who needs xyz solution, and you know,
(12:49):
it's not really the same attraction as someone who is
out in the country and maybe doesn't have the same
problems or doesn't care about the same things. Not every
pet owner is a pet parent, and therefore not every
problem we can solve is one that every pet owner
wants to solve or understands that they need to solve.
So the first thing is dialing down into who your
(13:11):
idol client is and who is it that's going to
understand that they need and want your product or your service,
So that's a big step to it. Then you know,
doesn't matter where they live. Are you a local business?
If you ship anywhere in the US, then you're less
limited in terms of finding your audience versus if you're
(13:31):
a pet sitter and you only work in a thirty
mile radius of where you live. So that's another step
to identify. And then I just go on to hashtags
that are related to that are being used by people
who are in that Niche specifically on Instagram. I also
look up you know, other businesses who are having success
in those niches, who have the audience we want to have,
(13:54):
even things that are not a direct business, especially if
you're local, Like if I'm a pet sitter, I might
go look at petsticks and veterinarians in my area and
see what their audience looks like, what kind of things
their audience are posting, what hashtags they're using. That sort
of research is very helpful to find out where your
target audience is hanging out. Outside of Instagram, you can
do the same thing with Facebook groups. Do you have
(14:17):
a local, you know, pet owner group that's specific to
your city that you can join, or if you're not,
someone who is limited by the local area, very specific
to the types of problems you solve, Like there are
lots of find a dog trainer or dog behavioral support groups.
If you're a trainer that you can join and that
(14:37):
is your audience, they're right there. All you have to
do is build a relationship with them.
Speaker 1 (14:41):
Wow.
Speaker 4 (14:42):
Go, it's other really great tips. Thank you so much
for this. We have to take another break, but we'll
be right back.
Speaker 3 (14:50):
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A y dot com.
Speaker 3 (15:40):
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Speaker 8 (15:44):
Radio Catlight Radio dot com.
Speaker 10 (15:56):
And we're back with Scarlet and all of our tips
on social media.
Speaker 4 (16:00):
Scarlett question, is there a general rule of social media?
So I've heard you know you should post three times
a week or like two times a week, but you
can also post every day because then you're overwhelming your audience.
So is there a general rule? And how important is
like the amount of time you're posting compared to the engagement.
Speaker 7 (16:21):
So the most important thing in that front is consistency.
You want to pick a time that you yourself are
going to be able to keep up with. So if
you choose to post ten times a day on all
the platforms, it sounds outrageous, but there are people who
do it. You're probably, as a small business, gonna burn
out and not being able to keep up and feel,
(16:43):
you know, like you are not You're just gonna give
up on social media. I've had so many people say
that to me, I can't keep up, and I just
decided not to bother. I recommend picking something that you
can sustainably keep up with, whether that's once a week,
three times a week, once a day. The best results
I find are usually when you're doing about once a day,
(17:04):
but you can even go two, three, four, or five
times a day. There's not really such a thing as
too much because no one in your audience sees every
piece of content that you put out, and that's a
lot of things people are worried about as well. As
I don't want to spam people. I don't want people
to see the same thing over and over. But the
algorithms decide what people see. So what matters more is
(17:26):
finding the content, those golden nuggets that your audience is
really going to love that are going to take off
and become what I call viral for you, which is
it doesn't have to get a million views, but if
you normally get one hundred views and it gets two
thousand views, that post is viral for you, which means
that post performed better and it is now kind of
(17:46):
put it in your little vaults as an example of
what performs well with your audience. The more content you
put out, the quicker you can find those golden nuggets,
and then the more you can refine your content to
be better and better and closer and closer to what
you're are audience wants. So more is going to get
you where you need to go faster, it's going to
get you in front of more people. But you also
(18:07):
want to focus on your own well being and not
getting burned out, because if you're going to put out
a post every day for a month but then run
out of steam and not do it for six months,
that's not going to be as helpful to you as
you If you focus on you know, two or three
posts a week and you do that consistently over time.
Speaker 2 (18:27):
Wow, I have a question. What about the use of video.
Speaker 7 (18:31):
Video is almost non negotiable at this point. You know,
with the invention of TikTok, people's brains just decided that
that short form video is exactly what you know, what
they resonate with, and the algorithms and the companies that
control social media have listened to that and they build
everything around short form content quite a lot, to where
(18:55):
now there's not really even a big platform that most
people use in the pet industry that hasn't copied TikTok.
Instagram has reels, SODA's Facebook YouTube has shorts. Even pinterests
Now has you know, video pins. So it's definitely something
that's taking over and you are definitely holding yourself back
(19:17):
if you're shying away from video. Video is very important.
It's not to say that if you don't want to
do video or don't have the capacity to do video
right now, that you shouldn't bother. You should still be
out there do what you can do. Something is always
better than nothing. But I have found that the exact
same post, with the same caption, same message, even the
(19:38):
same text overlay, if I put it out as a
video versus an image post. Almost every time it's going
to reach more people.
Speaker 4 (19:45):
Yeah, and now, like if you go on Instagram, I've
seen that in the last couple of weeks. If you
go on somebody's profile, you don't even see their picture
anymore because you're already on their real feed on their profile,
So you have to like change the tab to actually
see their pictures. But if it's just sure, you don't
actually even see them anymore.
Speaker 7 (20:02):
Yeah, it depends a lot on how you got to
their profile. For example, I ended up on people's profile
a lot because I find a post and then I
click into their profile from that post. If you are
on an image post and you click into the profile,
it will take you to the normal feed. If you
are on a real and you click into the profile,
it will take you directly to the reels feed.
Speaker 3 (20:22):
I didn't know that.
Speaker 4 (20:24):
That's so interesting. Wow, I really know how to work
their magic.
Speaker 3 (20:29):
They do.
Speaker 2 (20:29):
I have a question about Pinterest, like, should business is
an animal welfare use Pinterest? You know, I associate it
with recipes and you know interior design.
Speaker 7 (20:40):
Well, I think that's actually a perfect example of why
you should you associate it with where you go when
you want to learn something. So if you are a
pet business, especially if you have a blog, if you
have a podcast, if you have anything where you want
them to leave the social media account and go to
your website to consume something, Interest is the best place
(21:01):
to be. It is not quite the same for community building.
So I almost don't even consider Pinterest a social media
network so much as it is a search engine. It
is they they're the only network that has designed themselves
to where they want people to click away and leave
their platform. Everyone else has designed themselves to keep people
on the platform as long as possible. But Pinterest wants
(21:24):
people to leave. They want them to go read your recipe,
read your blog, you know, go look at your interior
design photos. So they are a great place to share
if you have a link that you want people to follow.
I don't typically post a Pinterest if I don't have
somewhere to send them because that's really like if you're
on Pinterest and you're looking for recipes and there's nothing
to click to go read the recipe, that's probably pretty annoying.
(21:47):
Whereas if you have a blog, if you have you know,
a news channel where you released something, if you have
pr that you want to put out into your audience.
Anything that you have a link to send somebody to
go look at something, you should put it on Pinterest.
Speaker 4 (22:02):
So interesting, And do you know what the target audiences
on Pinterest? Is it more like millennials, gen z X?
Speaker 7 (22:10):
I think it depends a lot. It's definitely at least,
you know, millennials, I think, yeah, some gen Z use it.
I think gen X and millennials definitely use it almost
more than others because it is more of a search platform.
You know, when we go to look at you know,
design ideas for our weddings, we go to Pinterest. Yeah,
(22:31):
I think a lot of gen z is now going
to Instagram and TikTok for that sort of thing.
Speaker 4 (22:36):
That's true.
Speaker 2 (22:37):
Have another question about TikTok and you know, politically there's
all this talk and everything of you know, not allowing
us users to use it anymore. What do you think
about that? And what should people do? I mean, should
they still be on TikTok? Should they be careful about
what they put on?
Speaker 7 (22:55):
So I will start by leaving it and sufficing it
to say that I do not have TikTok on my phone,
so you'll know where I land in that camp. My
husband cybersecurity engineer. So that says enough about that. But
I have, you know, my networks and my third party
posting platforms connected to TikTok. If I have a client
(23:16):
who wants to be on TikTok, I use those to
post and to interact with comments. Personally, I think that
TikTok the reason it became so popular partially is because
it invented this mega short form video platform that we
now see, I mean invented a strong word vine existed
long before, but they're the ones who really popularized it,
(23:37):
and they're also the place where people feel like they
can get the most viewsed and grow the fastest. The
reason for that, though, is because they designed their algorithm
to just show everything to everybody all the time. Now, okay,
the more you interact with it will pair your feed
down to where you're seeing more things you're more likely
to be interested in. But they basically don't restrict their
(24:01):
feet as much in terms of, you know, wanting to
show you content that they believe is quality and that
other people have engaged with and that they think you're
going to be interested in. They just show your content
to more people, so more people like it and watch
it and follow you. But those followers I have found
are not as valuable as the ones that you get
(24:23):
on Instagram or and a Facebook group in terms of
how many you know followers you have versus how many
dollars you can make off of them. Now, this is
different equation. If you're a pet influencer by all means,
that's not what I'm talking about here. But in terms
of the likelihood that your follower is targeted, is interested
in what you actually offer, and it's likely to buy
(24:45):
something from you, is not as high on TikTok. Now,
there's a lot of places where people have made thousands
and millions of dollars a month because they are on
TikTok getting millions of use. It is possible, but I
personally feel like one thousand views on Instagram is going
to bring more money into your pocket than a thousand
(25:07):
views on TikTok. And the reality is it's a lot
of work to build a platform. This is a platform where,
especially if you're in America, it could get ripped out
from under you any second. So it's a lot of
effort that you may end up We always say social
media is a platform that you borrow and you want
to move people to something like an email list, which
(25:27):
is a platform that you own. TikTok is the most
borrowed platform in my opinion. So even though all of
them are somewhat volatile, it's kind of the one that
has the shakiest foundation in terms of it could be
gone tomorrow.
Speaker 2 (25:40):
That's amazing. And you know, Whisker Media has some Chinese clients,
and what they see on TikTok in China is vastly
different than what is seen here in the US, and
so this is kind of this might be more conspiracy,
But do you think that the Chinese government is flooding,
(26:00):
you know, misinformation on TikTok.
Speaker 7 (26:03):
I wouldn't at all be surprised, because the American government
is flooding misinformation on our social media. I mean, that's
just something we have to be aware of as informed adults,
you know, and outside of the government, the human beings
and users who are completely outside the platform control are
also flooding misinformation because everyone leaves different things and some
(26:25):
of us don't do our research very well. So always
be aware that that's something that you know you could
be dealing with. Always do research for something that's important,
something that you know you're actually making life decisions about,
you know, don't just watch a TikTok or an Instagram
reel and make a decision. Always, always, you know, dig
(26:46):
a little deeper. But I would be very surprised if
if there wasn't, you know, involvement with the Chinese government
and what kind of content is being put out. We
do know that they're heavily restricting the types of content
based on the location, and we know that people have
literally gone to jail because of what they posted on TikTok,
So if they're restricting that much, I'm not at all
(27:06):
surprised if they're also controlling and putting some stuff out
there as well.
Speaker 2 (27:10):
So be careful when it comes to TikTok, everyone.
Speaker 7 (27:15):
Be careful everywhere because you never know. I mean, even
Mark Zuckerberg just recently came out and apologized for letting
himself be threatened into influencing politics and hiding certain posts
and letting more people see certain posts based on political leanings.
So just always, you know, be mindful of that when
(27:36):
you're on social media and when you're watching the news
and when you're really consuming anything.
Speaker 3 (27:41):
I have a quick question.
Speaker 2 (27:42):
What social media programs that help you you know, post
multiple you know, helped you repurpose your content?
Speaker 3 (27:51):
Any suggestions? Which ones you like?
Speaker 2 (27:54):
You know, I know there's like like some of these
are really expensive, but like sprout.
Speaker 4 (27:58):
Social we use, we use social.
Speaker 3 (28:02):
Yeah, which ones do you like?
Speaker 2 (28:04):
And you know what would be worth somebody's time and
resources to put into to do social media quickly.
Speaker 7 (28:13):
I'm a really big fan of one specific platform, which
is what I now use after trying a doesen't and
this one really hit all the things I needed. It's
called Metricool, and for most people who only have one
brand to promote, you can get everything you need on
the free version.
Speaker 3 (28:30):
Oh oh, upgrade then, you.
Speaker 7 (28:33):
Know, I think the next level up is only like
eighteen dollars a month. It's really affordable compared to other platforms,
and it also does a lot more so you can minimize.
Like there's some people who pay for a scheduling platform
and they pay a separate analytical platform to look at
their stats and compile reports. And they pay a separate
(28:53):
platform to have their multi link tool that you know
gives them that button on Instagram where you the list
of all the buttons and everything is kind of a
different platform for everything, so that really adds up metric cool. Especially.
I know I am on a paid level because I
have like ten or twelve brands that I manage on there,
(29:14):
but it has all of that in it, so I'm
only paying I pay less for Metrical now than I
paid seven or eight years ago just from my analytical
and reporting software. So it's definitely a very very useful tool.
Like I said, a lot of businesses can use the
free version and get everything that they need. And the
other reason I switched to it is it's got really
(29:35):
good analytics and it will connect basically every platform, so
I don't need Metabusiness Suite for Facebook and Instagram and
who's Sweet for LinkedIn and you know other platforms that
connect to other things. Metrical will connect basically everything you
needed to and then you can just put up a post.
I can put up, let's say, a real post on
(29:55):
someone's Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, and YouTube shorts all at all
at the same time, and I can also edit the
captions to be different for each one, so that I
can remove the Instagram hashtags from the Facebook post and
put the link in the ones that allow links and
take it off of Instagram so that you're still posting
in what I call native language for the platform. So
(30:19):
you can edit the post where they all fit the
platform they're going to, but then put them all in.
Speaker 3 (30:24):
There at once.
Speaker 7 (30:26):
Just upload the video one time, and then if you
want to move them all around to where they don't
necessarily go out at the same time.
Speaker 2 (30:32):
That's awesome. Hey, we should bring Mark in here. Mark, Mark,
you're a huge fan of social media.
Speaker 6 (30:41):
I'm a huge fan of it. It's just that our
social media is pitiful. I mean, we're a worldwide media company,
and our social media is terrible because we don't really
have a lot of time to do this. But now
that I just saw this metricol, this really is useful.
Speaker 7 (30:59):
It's very helpful scheduler.
Speaker 6 (31:00):
Yeah, now that I know to do reels more than
just photos, I think that that'll be helpful too. So
I'm learning a lot.
Speaker 4 (31:09):
Here and Mark, you can promote your own music when
you do your reels.
Speaker 6 (31:13):
I could.
Speaker 4 (31:14):
Yeah, you could put it in the background and then
that can become like a sound.
Speaker 6 (31:18):
The only problem is every time I do that, they
take it down because they say it's copyrighted. Of course,
it's copyrighted by me and the companies that distribute it,
but they don't distinguish that that it's mine and they
just take it down.
Speaker 3 (31:30):
Oh that's a bummer.
Speaker 7 (31:33):
Yeah, you do have the opportunity, I think, to appeal
those and basically say, yes, it's copyrighted, I own the copyright.
Speaker 8 (31:41):
Yeah, I do that.
Speaker 6 (31:42):
But it's a pain to do that a lot.
Speaker 7 (31:44):
Yeah, that's one of the things that is a challenge.
I see a lot of especially bigger content creators deal
with that. They'll even pick music that's in the Instagram
or Facebook music library and then later get the real
taken down or de monetized because of of copyright. So
it's a little bit of a mess. They're they're trying
to be very cautious and not get themselves sued, and
(32:07):
that unfortunately makes it kind of hard on the creators.
Speaker 2 (32:10):
It's just social media is just constantly evolving. I can
tell you I can't keep up. I mean, Alex does
most of ours. And you'll know this scarlet. You might
you'll tag me and I'm like, I'll like find out
that you tagged me, like three weeks later. I apologize
to everybody in our network and so it's just hard
(32:31):
to keep up, you know, and your wisdom is just amazing.
And I did want to ask one quick question about today.
I got an email and it said your Instagram could
have more followers, and you know, they were basically soliciting
me to buy followers. Can you talk about that really quick?
Speaker 3 (32:54):
You shouldn't do that correct.
Speaker 7 (32:56):
Yeah, I was about to say. The quickest I can
say that is don't. The thing about any cold email
that you get is almost always going to be someone
who wants you to buy followers. Sometimes it will be
someone who's offering a service to help you grow followers,
which looks a little bit more up and up. But
the problem is that that type of service I offer
(33:16):
it myself is very ambiguous and very easy for people
to tell you they're doing something different than what they are.
So they could be buying followers, they could be using
bots to follow your account, they could be even doing
the work that is the same thing I might do,
but they're not targeting people correctly, so they're just getting
(33:36):
anybody and everybody to interact with your content. But I
have found, you know, because I do some behind the
scenes testing for all that kind of stuff. I sometimes
respond to those emails and say, okay, tell me what
you would do with the account, and a lot of
them what they'll do is they will send you, you know, hundreds,
if not thousands of new followers a month. But if
(33:57):
you go and look at who those followers are, they
are a face that doesn't match a name that has
two posts and fifty followers and probably got it. Might
have been created yesterday or a year ago, but it's
not a real person. These companies they make these accounts
just to use them to then sell you accounts, so
(34:19):
you're not actually gonna make any money off of them
because they're not real people, much less real people who
are actually your ideal clients. So it can be very
difficult and I personally, the best way to grow your
account using the same type of methods that these people
are trying to tell you to use, not buying followers,
but actually growth methods, is what I call outbound engagement.
(34:41):
There are a few different methods for this. One of
them is called dollar eighty. You can just google that
and it'll probably be the first result there with an
article on all the information on how to do it.
Another one I call the notification bomb, which you basically
just go to a page, maybe comment on a post
like nine or ten foot photos, follow them. When they
(35:02):
get on their phone and look at their notifications, they're
going to see your name takes up their whole notification page,
and they're most likely at least going to go look
at your profile and see why and see what you're
all about, and that increases the likelihod they're going to
follow you and engage with your content. The dollar eighty
method is one that is what I use for the
(35:22):
service that I offer, and what we do is we
reach out to people who are using the hashtags that
identify them as your ideal clients. We comment on the post,
we like it, We follow them, We build a connection,
and ideally we want to start a conversation and build
a relationship, because that's really what social media is all about.
It's about feeling like you can get to know a person.
(35:45):
And the most successful you're going to be on social
media is if you look like it like a networking
event or a party, even if you've got great content.
That's like going to a party and standing in the
corner and waiting for someone to come talk to you.
And how successful. Is that going to be or working event?
How many people are you going to meet if you
do that versus if you go and you talk to people,
(36:05):
and you approach people and you introduce yourself and you
join whatever conversation it is not necessarily about your business.
It could be about how cute their dog is in
there out in that outfit that day. The more you
do that, that's where you're going to start seeing results
from your social media. You're going to see more engagement,
You're going to see more followers, and more importantly, every
single one of those followers is going to be a
(36:28):
closer connection, and that pulls them one step closer through
your customer journey to actually buying from you. I find
accounts that have one hundred followers that do this and
get you know, don't go a single day without making
a sale, versus accounts with ten twenty thousand followers that
are dead and don't actually make any money because they're
(36:50):
not building connections.
Speaker 2 (36:52):
Wow, well this has been really helpful. Can you tell
us how people get a hold of you and tell
us your podcast and you know how how they can
connect with you?
Speaker 3 (37:03):
Basically?
Speaker 7 (37:04):
Yeah, absolutely so. My name is Scarlet Rockwood. With a
K SO s K A R L e T. Scarletrockwood
dot com is my website and Scarlet Rockwood is my
user name on basically every platform I'm on. You can
also join my Facebook group Profitable Pet Businesses that should
be pretty easy to find. And there's a picture of
me with my bright red hair, so should be should
(37:25):
be hard to miss. And the podcast is the Pet
Marketing Podcast, so if you just search pet marketing podcasts,
that should pop up for you as well. And again
the bright red everything shouldn't be hard to find.
Speaker 3 (37:40):
That is so awesome.
Speaker 2 (37:41):
Thank you so much Scarlet for joining us. You have
been just a wealth of information. And Mark's gonna go
check out metricool as soon as he's done with this.
Speaker 6 (37:55):
This is really really helpful.
Speaker 2 (37:57):
Yes, yeah, well that's a for this show for this week.
We are so excited to be doing this for all
of you out there who are making nice better for animals.
So you got a question you want us to answer
to reach out to us on Instagram or Facebook under
their Whisper Reports and we'll try to answer it in
a future podcast episode.
Speaker 3 (38:17):
And as we always say.
Speaker 9 (38:20):
Ourk loud and her smart see you later.
Speaker 8 (38:24):
Everybody, let's Talk Best every week on demand only on
petlifradios dot com
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