The Wedding Pro CEO Podcast

Short 33 Transcript

Hey, they’re CEOs. I’m your host, Brandee Gaar, and my mission is to help you the wedding industry, entrepreneur, to build a profitable wedding business that you love. Welcome to the wedding pro CEO podcast.

Welcome back to today’s Thursday short today, we are talking about Reels and I know some of you are like, girl, you talk about Reels all the time and you are absolutely correct.

If you’re new here, I talk about Reels literally all the time. And it’s one of my favorite things to talk about.

Why? Because I love to talk about things that work, things that have a high, high ROI and things that I can understand how to use strategically and Reels check all of those boxes for me. And so I wanna teach as many wedding and event professionals as I possibly can, how to use Reels and how to harness their power.

So today I wanna tell you three reasons that I’m so passionate about Instagram Reels and why you should be too.

Okay. So this isn’t like how to make Reels or you know, how to post them or what to do with them. I’m gonna tell you three reasons you just absolutely should be making them and why you should really not have any excuses as to why you’re not doing it because I will help you. I have courses on it. You can jump into my community and talk about it. You can tell me why you’re afraid and. Still get you on the bandwagon because they are amazing. There’s so much power in them.

Okay. So the first one is that engaged couples just are on Instagram. They, they are on Instagram. And what’s really interesting about this I know when you hear me say it, you’re like, okay, but how do you know that?

Well, let’s talk about this for a second. I was talking to someone at the Florida Governor’s Conference a couple of weeks ago. I was there as a speaker talking about Reels and he asked me if I used a LinkedIn and I. Honestly, I don’t.

And really the answer to that is because each social media platform kind of has its own personality, right? Like every social media platform has a, a, a reason that it’s used. And so I’m not gonna tell you that there aren’t engaged couples on LinkedIn. I’m positive that there are, but the way we’re using each social media platform is different.

So just because there’s an engaged. Let’s just say a bride is on LinkedIn and she’s engaged, but she’s likely not there searching for her wedding vendors. She’s probably there either searching for a job or she’s a job seeker herself to be hiring someone, or she’s just trying to make connections and build her network.

But very rarely is she gonna be there searching for her wedding pros right? Now, she might be searching for her wedding pros on Pinterest, but more likely she’s creating a vision board. And while she may love a picture and say, oh, that’s really cool. I’d love to know who, who created this image. I’d like to contact them. It’s less likely that that’s gonna be the case.

Most of the time, she’s gonna be there to be able to get inspiration and to create a vision board.

Facebook! Facebook is where you go for groups. I honestly think at some point in the near future, Facebook is just gonna just be like, listen, we’re the groups platform. Like that’s who we are. So come slay your groups here, but otherwise we don’t have much purpose.

Like I just, that’s my opinion. I don’t know if it’s gonna come true or not, whatever.

Okay. TikTok. Yes, there are tons and tons and tons of engaged couples over on TikTok and you can absolutely go viral very, very quickly.

However, On TikTok. You’re not gonna find the same level of engagement because there’s no DMing platform over there. And on TikTok most people are more worried about views and followers, but not necessarily “relationship building” or “business doing” over there.

And what’s been interesting to me is the more I’ve learned about TikTok, a lot of the TikTok influencers will say they link their Instagram and their profile because where people actually do business is on Instagram.

So how they get found is on TikTok, but then they link them to their Instagram to have the conversation and to build the relationship and close the business. So that’s really something to think about.

Instagram is a visual platform. Couples are there because they can see your work. They can be educated. It’s it’s beautiful. It also has a very warm interface because of the accessibility to DMs. People are in their DMs honestly, as much as they talk on the phone or more or text. And so this is a really easy way to create a relationship and to close a piece of business right there in the DMs.

So honestly, the reason I’m so passionate about Reels versus YouTube shorts or TikToks or Facebook Reels or Pinterest video pins though, I think all of those are amazing. The reason I’m so passionate about Reels and I teach on Reels is because I think for a business owner. Instagram is where you go to close business and to create relationships. And that’s why Reels are the most important.

Okay. So that’s number one number two. (I’m gonna prove why Instagram is better than TikTok for business owners.) Okay. So I was listening to the Build Your Tribe Podcast with Brock and Chalene Johnson a couple weeks ago, and they were quoting a study about how valuable your followers are on each platform, each social media platform.

Now, the reason I think this is important is because we are business owners. So I don’t really care if you have 1000 followers or you have 20,000 followers. What I care about is how you’re converting those followers to dollars in your bank, because otherwise it doesn’t really matter.

So a lot of times people will say, oh, well, I went viral on TikTok. It’s so much easier to go viral. I have a hundred thousand followers on TikTok, but I only have 10,000 on Instagram.

And that’s super frustrating, but what’s interesting to me, again, going back to point number one is that Instagram is the platform where people do business. Most often they’ve made it easy to shop there. The DM platform we’ve talked about this.

Okay. So this study that Brock Johnson actually talked about on his podcast Build Your Tribe. Is that in this study, To followers are worth approximately 7 cents per follower to a business owner. And Instagram followers are worth approximately 77 cents per follower, 11 times the amount, the, of value that a TikTok follower is worth.

Now, does that mean that you’re gonna make 77 cents from every follower? No, not necessarily, but what it means is that people are more likely to buy on Instagram versus buying from TikTok.

And so it’s really, really important that when you’re, if you can only focus on one social media platform for video content, because honestly now every single, every single social media platform has short form video on it.

So the it’s very, very powerful, but if you can only focus on one of them, Listen, the, the allure of TikTok is real, but I’m telling you guys as business owners focus and grow your Instagram through Reels before you ever start one of the other platforms on short form video.

Okay? All right.

So point number three is that if you are strategic about your content, you can use Reels as a funnel to get your followers to really follow your sales to obviously booking you.

When you think about a sales funnel, you know, the widest end is at the top and the narrowest end is at the bottom. And so you wanna think about Reels as the top of your funnel.

Reels are being shown to people who don’t necessarily follow you, but who the algorithm thinks is gonna engage with you.

And what’s really, really cool about our industry, especially is that the second someone gets engaged, what is the very first thing they do? Usually they call a friend or two, and then they immediately go on Facebook and they change their status to engaged, or they share their engaged photos.

Facebook owns Instagram, Instagram knows who’s engaged.

So when you make content for engaged couples to educate engaged couples, Instagram knows who to show it to. And that’s really, really cool because you don’t even have to think about it. You don’t even have to add hashtags anymore. If you don’t want to. The Reels algorithm already knows who wants to see your content and its job is to make sure that as many people engage with that content as possible.

So it’s gonna go seek out those engaged followers. So if you think about using your Reels as a top of funnel, then what I would do is I would write a blog. And then I would make a social media post about it, like a carousel post or just a, a regular feed post.

I would then make a Reel about it. And I would, if you have three tips in that blog, I would just say the three tips in the Reel and then I would say, go read our blog link and bio to be able to read more.

Because what you’re doing there is you’re leading them from the Reel to your profile. They’re gonna check out your grid. They’re gonna click the link on bio. They’re gonna get to your website to read that blog. And at the bottom of, of the blog, if you’re smart, you can say, find out how to work with us and click right to your contact us page or to your scheduler, to book a consult.

You wanna make sure that you’re constantly telling people what that next step is. You’re leading them to that next step in your funnel, because you don’t want at any point for them to break, and for them not to know where to go, you don’t want them to just like your Reel you want them to engage with it and then become a follower.

Then continue to read your content, click on the link in your bio and ultimately get to your website. Your website is like your front door. It’s like someone made it all the way to your front door. And now all you have to do is invite them in.

So that’s what you wanna do right there on your blogs. You wanna always give them that call to action, to work with you or to book a consult right there on your blogs. And you wanna use those Reels as top of funnel.

So, okay. Really quick to recap, engaged couples are on Instagram. That’s where they’re shopping, that’s where they’re building relationships, that’s where they’re viewing your work.

Number two is that an Instagram follower is worth 11 times more value than a TikTok follower.

And number three is to use your Reel and your content strategically to create a sales funnel from the Instagram world, right to your front door, to your website.

So hopefully you guys found this helpful. I would absolutely love it. If you have questions or if you’re like, Hey Brandee, would you, would you mind kind of assessing my funnel.

I love doing funnel audits.

So if you’re interested in, in having me go through your, your funnel to see how people are making it from your Reels or just from your content, if you’re not making Reels yet to your website, I would absolutely love to do that.

I’ll be doing it in my community. So you can just pop over into the Wedding Pro CEO community. The link is down in the show notes below and just tag me and say, Hey, Brandee, I’d love an audit! And I will absolutely check out your funnel, tell you where there’s some breaks and shoot your loom video back so that you can know exactly how to fix it before engagement season, because it’s coming you guys.

So join the Wedding Pro CEO community tag me, tell me you want an audit and I will absolutely do that. And you guys thank you so much for being. Every single week. I’ll see you next time.

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