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have you been wanting to start a podcast? You've been thinking about it. It feels right. You just know this is the next thing that my business needs. Well, I encourage you to sign it for my five day podcast Boot camp. This is a thing that you've been looking for. It is a five day video. Siri's where I walk you through exactly how to start, launch and market your podcasts and I throw in some or information about planing strategies and being consistent and how you can make the most out of your podcast from day one. So sign up for a five day, create your podcast boot camp at crystal profit dot com slash podcast boot camp and do it already. You know that you've been wanting to so just bite the bullet and join us. I am so excited about the end of the year. I know that sounds silly to say, but I'm excited because I feel like so many amazing things have happened this year, and I'm starting to plan for the New year and really just kind of reflect on everything that has changed for me in 2019. And today I wanted to talk about something that I didn't spend enough time doing this year, but is going to be a much bigger focus for me in 2020. And that is the Prophet podcast online community, Facebook group. Because I've had many people asking about Facebook groups. And do I need one for my podcast? Or should I just have a Facebook page? Like all the things? So that is what we're gonna cover today. I'm going to give you some strategy, things to think about when it comes to a Facebook group and how you can get started. So let's get right to it. Welcome to the Prophet Podcast, where we teach entrepreneurs how to start launch a market, their podcast. I'm your host, crystal profit. And I'm so excited that you're here. Thanks for hanging out with me today because if you've been thinking about creating a podcast for awhile well, I'm so glad you found this show. Think of this as the shortcut slash timesaving version of searching Google and YouTube for hours and hours trying to figure out the world of podcasting. Trust me as a busy mama of three. I get it. You don't have a lot of time to be spent or wasted, I should say, searching the Web, trying to find all the bright ideas and all the amazing things that are out there. And you descended, overwhelmed. Trust me, I've been there, done that to calm the souvenir. But this podcast is gonna help you in practical ways, because twice a week will be delivering episodes that are going to give you steps to help you create a podcast your audience can't wait to listen to. So let's get right to it, shall we? So, like I said in the beginning, we're gonna talk about Facebook groups. So I don't have a Facebook group that has thousands of people and everybody is interacting. And there's all kinds of magic happening in that group. The reason why is because I have not paid as much attention to the group itself as I feel like I should be doing. So I'm just putting it out there like I am not the shining example of someone who has a thriving Facebook group, and you're all I am a part of a lot of Facebook groups, and I tell my students to be part of a lot of Facebook groups so they can get content ideas and interact with potential listeners. And there's just so many amazing things that can come from being a part of a bunch of podcast groups. Sorry, Facebook groups. See, I got podcasting on the brain always. But you know what I'm saying? Like there's just so much good that can come from Facebook groups. And I've realized that I have done a huge disservice to my community by not being more active in there and showing up in ways that can add value. So how can a Facebook group add value to your podcast? Right. That's the obvious question. We're going to dive into some of these questions real fast, and then I'm gonna give you some tactical things that you can actually do and you can implement in your Facebook group to make it more strategic and more to your advantage as you continue to grow your own online communities. But when it comes to Facebook groups versus a Facebook page, this is what I get asked a lot. So when it comes to the algorithm and how Facebook is functioning as of right now, groups get more preferences over pages. So what does that mean? So I have a Facebook page that is crystal profit. T x u. Go to facebook dot com slash crystal profit t X, and you will see my bright shining face. That is not my personal profile. That is a business page on Facebook. It is what I run my ads through. It is where I post most of my stuff and most of the time on Lee, I think What did I see? Like a 4% 4 to 6% of your audience actually sees what you post on your business page. That's kind of sad, right? Because so many of us stress out about the content before we even put it out online. And then to know that you could have thousands of followers. But only 4 to 6% is actually seeing what you're posting. So it's really sad what wall, You know, like, uh, but you know what? It's okay. We're gonna move past it because you can utilize a group to reach your audience in an authentic way and in an organic way, because I know a lot of you are like crystal. I don't understand ads I don't want to run ads. I don't even know how it's gonna function in my business. Therefore, I do not want to waste any money like I don't I don't have any money to throw. It adds right, because a lot of ads and I will tell you this I'm going to do some ads training in 2020 for those of you that are brand new to Facebook ads and you just kind of want to get the very high level how it can work for you. How, like all those things were gonna talk about that in 2020. But I want to say that I was in your house in your shoes. I was gonna say I was in your boat. I can't like metaphors are really I'm struggling with metaphors today, but I have been in your shoes where you're just like I don't have a single penny to throw it. Something that I don't know is a for sure thing. So instead of throwing money at ads, I would encourage you to start a Facebook group. Start from there because whenever you post within your group, Facebook likes it, and Facebook will share that community out to your audience. So for me, perfect example. I'm a part of Facebook groups, and I get notified when people put brain new post into these Facebook groups. Whereas if I'm following a Facebook page, I don't get a notification every time. All the pages I follow post something sometimes l see it sometimes I don't, but I almost always get notifications when there's new post in the groups than I'm a part of. And now I think that according to the algorithm, it probably depends on how active you are in those groups. I'm sure there's a bunch of back in stuff that I will never understand, nor do I care, too. But I can tell you that Facebook groups are given a preference in people's news feeds. I'm not saying it's never gonna change, but that is how it is working right now. So that is the reason why we're talking about Facebook groups today and not pages. I think that you should have both, but a Facebook group is what we're specifically talking about for your podcast today. So how can you utilize Facebook groups to help you with your podcast? So I have four takeaways that I want to talk about today for very specific things. I could probably talk about 50 but I want to talk about four very specific things that I feel have been very into role Thio the success of the interaction of people within my group and how I have used my group to help me create content and create very, very strategic things in my business because of my group. So again, we have the prophet podcast online community, Facebook group. So if you have not joined us, I encourage you to. It is 100% free. And all you ever do go to Facebook, type in the profit podcasting online community, and you will find it. But OK, so we're going to talk about questions. That is number one. The first thing I'm gonna talk about today for Facebook groups is questions. So if you have joined Facebook groups, then you know sometimes you're prompted with questions. This doesn't happen in every single group. Some groups have them. Some groups don't. I encourage you to fill out these questions and ask your audience something. The three questions that I ask people are like y'all. This is marketing gold like I salivate over the information that I'm given from people who are already excited to join my community. So not only are these people that are potential listeners and possibly even potential customers in the future, but they are literally telling me where they came from and what they want to know For me. I mean, I'm gonna repeat that again. These people are telling me exactly where they came from and what they want to know For me, like you can't even pay for this kind of information. So my questions, if you want to jot these down or if you want to go join the group, you will see exactly what I'm talking about. It says, How did you learn about this group? And I know on the surface you're like, Well, that crystal, that's such a simple question. But what I do is I copy all of these answers, and I put them into a spreadsheet because I'm super dorky like that, and I love spreadsheets and data. It's just nothing, and I will copy these answers and put them into a Google spreadsheet. And what I do with that it's so strategic and I cannot wait. I'm gonna teach this in a workshop too, because I think that this is gold. But I will take the answers when I say, Where did you find this group? And those are the things that I strategically focus on to grow my podcast and grow my audience. You all. I'm not just kind of throwing, you know, fishing lines out into the sea and hoping like, Oh, you know, we'll see if I'm gonna buy it somewhere. No, These people are telling me where they found me, and now I can look at him. And, of course, once you get like two people in your group, you're gonna be like, Okay, this isn't enough information. But I've been doing this over several months now, just collecting data collecting data, and that might be what you have to do is well, maybe you just have to be in a season of patients and just No, I'm just learning. I really want to understand my audience. I will understand, want, understand where they're finding me And, like, just know that going in this isn't nothing in this industry is an overnight success. First fall like exclamation point. Okay, we're in this for the long haul. We're not in this for I'm gonna snap my fingers and have everything figured out in a hot minute because that has not been my journey. It's probably not gonna be your journey either, but collecting the data, I have been able to see that so many of my listeners and people in this community have come to me either from an email that I sent from another group or organization that I've been involved with in the past six months or from a specific program, like another digital course or something where I'm also a community member. They're telling me, literally, they put the people's names. If someone refers them, they just say, I got it from your email or you told me to do this on the podcast like it is so specific. And I'm so grateful. So if you filled out one of these forms, then I am so grateful that you told me all of this because it helps me reach more people just like you, with this important message of creating and launching and marketing podcast. So thank you and shout out to you. Okay, so that is question number one. And like I said, I'm gonna show, like, do a training all about how you can extract this information and put it into a spreadsheet and geek out on all the things. But the first question is, how do you find this group? The second question is, what is the number one thing you want to learn about? Podcasting. Now that is specific to me, because it's what I teach. It's what I know, and it's what I'm interested in. If you had another business or you were wanting to create another business, you could keep it more general. Or you could keep it super, super specific. I could go in at any time and change my question to say, What is the number one event you're looking forward to in 2020? Or what is the number one book that you read in the last six months? I could change it up to whatever I felt like, you know, it being as like a new influx of people coming to my group. But what I wanted to know from my audience was, what are their biggest pain points? Are they in the starting phase of their podcast. Do they just want to know howto launch? Are they looking for marketing tips? Because now, when I sit down to plan my content, I go back to those Facebook group answers, and I'm like, Oh, I had four different people say they're about to launch and they want to know specific strategies on how to launch. And then I can say, Oh, this person is confused about equipment They don't know which one to buy. And this person doesn't know if they're using the right kind of audio editing software. Do you see what I'm saying? You'll like? This is a hold. This is like, ah, content marketer's dream. Ah, marketing manager's dream. Like just all kinds of things. This is It's just it's so good, and I want you to take advantage of using Facebook Group questions. And then the last question that I have within my Facebook group questions is what is your email address? I can't remember. Have it phrases like if you want to receive weekly emails or updates than put your email address below, people do not have to do this, okay? It's not like I'm saying you have to give me your email address or you are banned from this group. Okay, so I want to make that very clear. I am not some like holding someone hostage, telling them they have to give me their email address. The people that give me their email are excited to learn more, and they want to hear more for me. So I had them to my email list. If you aren't on my weekly newsletter, then go join the Facebook group and put your email in there, and I can definitely send you bi weekly news later. I send it out every Friday morning. I write it every Friday morning. It's so much fun for me. I love sending this out because it's how I connect with you and just on a different way. I It's almost like a pin pal to me. Like I tell stories in my e mails that I don't tell anywhere else, and I love connecting with you in this way. So go to the Facebook group. You can join me. You can P m me your email address. If you have not doing yet or I can send you 1000 other free resource is to give to you in order for you to get on our mailing list. But y'all this is how I've been able to grow my email list exponentially over the last few months. When people join the Facebook group, they're able to get on my email list. So take advantage of this opportunity. Don't take advantage of people if they don't want to give you their email list. Are their email address? That's fine. Okay, Don't get all but her if someone doesn't want to give you their email address. I've seen people actually like freak out that Ah whole bunch of people joined their Facebook group, but they didn't give him the E mail. Told them. People probably don't want to get an email from you. Sorry, your emails aren't good enough. Oh, that's tough love. I shouldn't feel a little feisty today. I shouldn't say that that was me and Crystal. I take it back, I take it back, but do you know what I'm saying? Like it's okay. It's not the end of the world. If you cannot get someone's email address from a Facebook group question, it's totally fine. You need to write better emails in order for people to get excited about getting on your email list. You see, I'm saying, OK, we're gonna go down a rabbit hole. I don't want to go down today, so that is number one. So for Facebook, groups were talking about questions. That was number one. Utilize your questions. Number two is interactions. So this is where I want to get better in 2020. Because I see this done well and so many groups and I'm a part of and I see it and I'm just like, Oh, man, I want to have a group where everybody is exchanging Jeffs and Emojis and everyone's excited and everyone's giving all this feedback And they just know like, Oh, I can share my podcast episode on this day and I can talk about this thing on this day and I can come in here and talk about my business and no one's gonna kick me out of the group or no one's gonna threaten to, you know, block me or whatever All the, you know, throw you and Facebook jail. I don't even know the terminology, but I want that for the profit podcast online community. So that is what I'm gonna work on going into 2020. There was actually a great podcast episode and all linked to it in the show notes. But it was Amy Porter Filled and Dana. I think it's Dana Dana Dana mouth staff of Boss Mom and they talk about because her group is actually when I'm a part of, and they have, like 50,000 people in there, which is kind of crazy, like it is a huge Facebook group, yet it is so well managed. People interact in there, people have their voices heard and they dug. It doesn't feel spammy. I'm also part of a lot of groups that are super super spammy, and it's almost like you walk into a room like you're walking into a party and you feel uncomfortable. But you're like I just got a got a kind of peek in here and see like, Are these my people? And then you look around you look Oh, there's like three people that I recognized and then you're like, Oh, wait, this chick just walked up to me and is like telling me about her business. She she's like throwing her business card in my face, and she's like by this by this by this, and I'm like, I gotta go. I gots To get out of this party is not for me anymore. So I have been on both ends of it. There are amazing Facebook groups out there. And then there's ones that you kind of just, you know, Do you do the Irish exit? You just you don't even say anything onto, like, okay, about a year, but yes. Oh, interactions is something I want to get better at in 2020. Interact with your people, talk to them, get them to talking to each other other. I'm part of groups where the moderators don't even have to step it like there's just open conversations happening all the time. And that is what I want. So much for my group in 2020. So you're going to see a lot more of that? I'm gonna be focusing on that going into the new year. Okay, The third thing I want to talk about So we talked about questions. We talked about interactions. And then the third thing I want to talk about is welcoming. So I love to do something super, super simple, and I just put up the exact same image, the exact same picture every single time. New members joined the group. The reason why I d'oh this brand new picture and it just says Welcome. Look new member alert. Welcome. And it's just very plain is because I want other people to recognize Hey, there are newbies here. I need to welcome them. And there's always there's always like three or four people, the exact same ones every time. They're like, Hey, I'm glad you're here. Hey, welcome. Yea, Glad you made it. Hey, and then it's really cool to watch, like, you know, from a 1000 foot view of everything I see. Oh, you finally made it. I'm so glad you're here. So it's like we're having this party and people are inviting their friends like it's so much fun to see. One people are like, Oh, I told you, you're gonna love this group. I'm so glad that you're here like that is a group creators Dream is to see that kind of interaction happening. It's almost like you're a good party host and people are having fun. So I encourage you to welcome people when you have new members in your group. I'm going to do a training on all of this in the future. But there is a button on the side of your desktop computer when someone so I don't know how it looks on the mobile cause I always wait and do this when I'm on my desktop cause a lot easier. But on your desktop, if you're looking at Facebook, you're in your group. It'll show you all of your members. But right above all of your current members, it'll say, Oh, you have one new member this week or 20 new members or however many it ISS and it'll say, Write a post. So if you click right post, what that will do is take all the people who have recently joined that you have not already welcomed, and it will put all of their names in this one post. So I'm not going in and manually like going back and forth like Wait, who joined last time and how do I add this person? Wait, wait. I repeated that one. I don't want to do like hang on. Uh, I'm confused. I did that for a while, so yeah, that was a real life reenactment of what that looked like. But you don't want to do that. You want to utilize all the tools that are at your disposal. So what I d'oh is, I go in, I click right New post It grabs all the names of the brain, new members. And then I add this same image every single time. I actually use this image in all of my groups that I moderate because I want people to feel that familiarity and see that and be like, Oh, there's new people. I remember what it was like when I was brain new to this group. So I'm gonna go say hi and I really think that that's what's happening is people get used to seeing the welcome, you know, image. And they're like, Oh, I want to go say hi. I want to go see what's up. I want to tell them that they are in the right place. They have found us like, Welcome home. That's what I wanted to feel like. So make sure that you're welcoming new members into your group, at least on a weekly basis. OK, I'm not saying you have to do this. Every single day if you have a huge influx of people. But I do want you to do it at least once a week. Welcome your new members. Tell him you're excited that you're here and make sure that they know that they can ask questions or they can interact with you or what they can expect for what's happening within the group. So that's the third thing. So we've talked about questions we've talked about interactions. We talked about welcoming. And the last thing the fourth thing. That's probably gonna make some people feel a little uncomfortable, but we're not here for comfort. We're here to learn. We're here to learn from each other, and this is the one that I feel like I've gotten so much better at, and you're gonna roll your eyes and say, Crystal, I don't want to do that. I don't want to. Okay, I'm I'm podcasting for a reason, and I do not want to do video, but I'm going to tell you if you can d'oh at least one weekly Facebook live within your group, you will see people starting to interact with you more so like I said, I have multiple groups. I have the Prophet podcasting group. So if you're a current student and you just enrolled, shut out. I'm so excited for you because I d'oh weekly live Q and A's within our student only Facebook group and what I love to do in there as I hold my office hours. So every single week, BriAnderson every single week. I am in there answering questions from past students from current students from people that are just joining us. I am answering questions that they have because that is part of the course experience. I want them to know they have access to me. So I get in, I hop on there, and if there aren't any direct questions like right then live whenever I'm chatting, then I will pull from what we were recently talking about in our last Facebook live. Or if there is something new and exciting in the podcasting world to talk about, then I start talking about those. I've covered a few case studies of podcast that I saw that we're launching. I have talked about a question that I saw pop up regularly in the group, or if I saw it in someone else's groups and I addressed it. They're like we always have something to talk about when it comes to podcasting. So I'm going to challenge you to go live in your Facebook group at least once a week. Now, people freak out. When they start thinking about live video and I get it, I totally get it. I'm not saying Well, you just need to suck it up and do it, okay? Cause I get it. I totally I I understand because I've been in your shoes. I have been shaking, nervous, like, almost to the point where I'm like, I'm going to throw up here on live camera because this is so nerve racking. So I get it. I 100% get it. I was not born doing live video, and it's been like, just the easiest thing in the world for me. But I kind of did a baptism by fire, if you will. And earlier in 2019 you can actually go to my Facebook page and look, I did live video every single day of the week. It was Monday. His money through Friday is what I did. So five days a week I would go live and I did that for probably two months, two months straight. So it's probably about 40 Facebook lives that I did and it was talking about different various things. I did, ah, book Club for a while, where I talk about my favorite books that I'd read. And then I did podcast episodes that I want to talk about and then another time. I think I just talked about what I was working on and behind the scenes and time management and being a mom and being an entrepreneur, like I've talked about so many different things. But that's what helped me become the Facebook live person that I am today because I am natural on Facebook live now because I've done so many of them and I've done a lot of video. I started to YouTube channel like I have feel more comfortable on video, but it's only because I started doing it. Guys, I don't have a secret formula I don't have. Ah Oh, If you do this this and that, then you won't feel like you're gonna throw up whenever you hit live. No, you'll still probably feel that That's a real thing. I'm not gonna pretend like that. doesn't exist. But I do want you to know you can get better at it. I promise. If I could do this, you can do this. It's just like podcasting. All you gotta do is say take a deep breath. Second up and hit. Go Just hit. Go Life. Even if your 1st 1 is only one minute long and you're just like, Hey, guys, I don't really know what's going to go on in this Facebook group, but I'm here. I'm showing up. Put your questions in the post and I'll see you later. Okay, Bye. What? That might have been 15 seconds. I don't care. I don't care how long it is. I want you to go live at least once a week in your Facebook group because when people start to see you, they feel like they know you. And I know you're doing a podcast because maybe you didn't want to dio YouTube. Or maybe you didn't want to be on camera. And I get that I really d'oh. But I think that there's so much more of a human connection when you conduce those Facebook lives and get out of your comfort zone and show up. Even if it's just for a minute. One minute a week. I'm gonna challenge you. If you have a Facebook group and you have a place he already interacted with your people. I want you to go live this week. If you've never done a Facebook live, I want you to go live for one minute, 60 seconds and I promise you you will not die. You will not die on a Facebook live. Why? We're going live. It will not kill you. You can survive this. You can do this. And I know you're probably gonna be nervous. You're gonna feel like you're gonna throw up. You might even be sweating. I can't even tell you how many How many times I've sweat through my shirt while I'm live on camera doing a workshop, doing a seminar. It's happened. Okay, I'm not going to say it doesn't have. I can hear all the other details of, like, things that have gone wrong. I did a webinar the other day and my kid was banging on the door saying he had to go potty. Okay, Like I get all the real life snafus. But you do it anyway. You keep showing up, you try new things because that is the only way that you are going to grow. So that's all I have for you today about Facebook groups. I'm gonna do a quick recap. So we talked about why you need a Facebook group, first of all, and then I went into the four ways to utilize a Facebook group to your advantage. The 1st 1 is your questions. Make sure they're good. Make sure the relevant put some thought into him like, How can I use the questions to benefit me and my podcast the most to interactions. Make sure that you're interacting with people in your group. What? People aren't just there, and there's like nothing going on. There's nothing going on at your party. You want to make sure that people are coming there for a very specific reason. Number three welcoming people. Be a gracious host. Make sure that everyone has their drinks field and they know where the snacks are. And they know where they can go to the bathroom. Do you know what I mean? Come on, you get my hopefully get that metaphor, right? At least I got that one right just make sure people feel welcome. Make sure they know that they're not alone. And they're not the only ones in there. And then they're like, Oh, I'm on Dodge out of this place. Make sure people feel welcome and that they're gonna have fun in your environment. On the fourth thing is weekly live videos. I really don't have anything else to add other than just do it this week. One Facebook live one minute. Just one minute. It's not going to kill you. You could do it. If I can do this, you can do it too. So that is my challenge to you. Go start your Facebook group and get it going. Let me know if you have any questions. But that is all I have for you today. So if this is your first time tuning in, what a doozy. Thio here for the very first time. But I'm so happy that you're here. Make sure to subscribe. That what? You don't miss any future episodes? I would love it if you would leave us a rating in a review. Tell me what you thought about this episode. Did you love it? They hate it. Did you say? Oh, my gosh, There's a lady is crazy. Let me know. Okay, because I promise you won't even hurt my feeling things. But I would love to know what you think. You can comment with your favorite episode What you specifically thought about this episode or about what future content you want to hear. I challenge you to take a screenshot wherever you're listening to this podcast and posted on social media. Put it into the stories and tag me. I'm at Crystal Profit T X on instagram and on Facebook. And I would love to see you sharing this podcast episode and let me know what your biggest takeaway waas Make sure to check out the show notes at crystal profit dot com slash Episode 108 Go grab that Amy Porterfield episode about Facebook groups because they have even more detail in that episode. And it was so helpful for me. So I know it will be helpful for you, but that's it. That's all I have for you today. So remember, keep it up. We all have to start somewhere