Here's What I Learned: Ditching Biz-as-Usual for Values, Freedom, and Doing It Your Way

Intentional Engagement Experiment: The Halfway Mark

• Jacki Hayes • Season 10 • Episode 6

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Six weeks into the 90 day Intentional Engagement Experiment, I have a surprising update: Instagram is the hardest platform for me to consistently have real conversations on right now. Between ads, suggested content, and the “either I only see my favorites or I see Unstable Unicorns ads” problem, it is tougher to stay focused on the people I actually want to build relationships with.

In this halfway mark check-in, I share what is working better (hi, LinkedIn and Threads), how I am defining a meaningful conversation for this experiment, and the simple tracking system I built in Airtable to keep the whole thing grounded in reality.


Topics:

  • What “intentional engagement” means in this experiment (and what doesn't count)
  • Why Instagram has been the most difficult place to engage consistently
  • Why LinkedIn and Threads have been easier for actual conversation
  • How seasonality and real life impacted the experiment (and why that still counts)
  • The Airtable Conversation Tracker system I am using to log interactions and follow ups
  • The next piece I am building: a weekly rhythm for engagement that does not rely on scrolling

 

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Welcome to season 10 of Here's What I Learned. I'm Jacki Hayes, a systems and ops strategist, romantasyt reader, and D&D nerd who's endlessly curious about what makes a business actually work. This season is about experiments.


Big, small, accidental, and transformative. Because every business is built on trial and error, noticing, and iteration. If you're growing a business that changes with you and you're tired of one-size-fits-all advice, you'll feel right at home.


So let's get into it. It's been about six weeks since I kicked off the engagement experiment assigned to me by Jayci Trujillo of Happy Girl Marketing. If you go back and listen to that episode, you'll know that I am tasked with spending 90 days intentionally engaging with folks across social media platforms.


Intentionally being, not just dropping comments like, or saying, but consciously thinking about who I want to interact with, how I want to interact with them, and the kind of relationship I would like to build with them. And then tracking that information as I go, those conversations, so that we could have a true experiment, which means results to look at at the very, very end. What I have found so far is that I'm struggling with interacting on Instagram more than any of the other quote unquote social platforms.


I found that the barrage of ads keeps me from wanting to be on the platform, but also really hinders my ability to find the people that I want to speak to. If I scroll my feed without using the favorites, I'm seeing nothing but suggested posts that, quite honestly, let's just be real, here has a lot to do with cute dogs and pandas, or books, and not a lot to do with folks in my sphere. The same is true if I scroll through with the stories, and the stories are people I actually follow, but I'm getting suggested stories, I'm getting sponsored stories, I'm getting ads, some of which have caused a lot of clicking, because Instagram knows exactly the kind of things that I want to see.


But that means I'm not seeing real people. And if I use favorites, then I'm just seeing the people that I already know. I'm not meeting new people.


I'm not able to engage in new conversations. I'm finding it much, easier to interact with folks on LinkedIn and threads more than any other platform. One of the things that Jayci and I discussed before setting this experiment was the timing, because we knew that I would be running into the holiday season, with the U.S. Thanksgiving, and then the winter holidays.


Interactions and engagement in general on the social platforms were going to go down, and my life was going to get lifey. I had to wrap up some client work before the holidays kicked in, and I took two weeks off. And to be completely honest, those two weeks, the last thing I want to do is be on Instagram, scrolling through, trying to have conversations with people who may not even be there anyways.


So we knew that that could be a bit of a hindrance to the results that I might see. And at the same time, it's the reality of running your business. There are slow seasons, and there are busy seasons.


There are times when people are away, July being one of those, as we all know, as well as the holiday season, and you still have to keep running your business. But also, you can also take those down times, which I went ahead and decided to do. At first, I thought I would just push through and every day have a conversation with somebody, but they're not there.


So I'm still having conversations on threads, because in other places, I don't feel the need to be there having those conversations right now. And while that might skew the results I could have gotten at other times of the year, and it means that I'm not exactly sticking to the experiment, that's also the reality of life. I knew from the very beginning that I needed to define what a meaningful conversation meant to me, what engagement meant to me.


Again, saying Me Too or Same wasn't something that I wanted to track. It's not that I don't occasionally respond to people that way. Quite often, in stories, they might get a Me Too or a Same or a 100%, clapping, those kind of things.


And while I still do those things, because they're encouragements, or a way to reach out to folks, I didn't want to track all of those. I wanted to track meaningful conversation. And to me, that meant opening up the door for an exchange that goes back and forth.


And that didn't mean it had to be about business. It could be about books that we're both reading, or movies that we both watched. But it meant I was posing a question or observation that would invite them to respond in a way that would continue the back and forth.


I decided those were going to be the types of things I counted as interactions or meaningful conversations. And the way I decided to start doing that, tracking those, was to use Airtable. I created a form that I called my Conversation Tracker.


And it allows me to put the data in, select if they are an existing contact that is already in my database. If not, I can put their name in. I can mark down where that interaction happens, and it's a drop-down menu.


And then I can type in a quick summary of that, so I can remember. That is linked to my database, which has an automation that basically says, hey, it's been a couple of weeks since you've checked in with so-and-so. And then that is the push I need to say, okay, do I want to check in with them again and see how things are going? Or do I wait? It gives me an opportunity to realize the span of time that may have gone by since I interacted with somebody.


Because I think we can all get lost in thinking, oh, you know what? I talked to so-and-so the other day. And in reality, it's been a month or two. I know that happens with friends and family.


Why wouldn't it happen with people in our business world? One of the things that I am still working out is matching engagement to my own daily, weekly rhythms. Finding ways in which I am present to those conversations. I think it's really easy for us to be scrolling and doing those quick comments that can be seen as meaningful, but we're not really present.


And I want to be present for those conversations. Even if I'm typing something to them that they may not see for another 24, 48, 72 hours, however long it is, I want to really be thoughtful in what I am saying to people, how I'm saying it to them, letting them know I've been thinking of them as I am typing out those words. And that means I need to set aside time where I am focusing on that action, not on scrolling.


And I know that having joined Jessica Lackey's Deeper Foundations program, she has something that happens each week, each Monday, where you are doing a secret ritual of connecting with others. And of course, I'm brand new to the program, so I completely forgot her actual term, and I'll put it in the show notes and link to any resources she has about it. But those Monday time frames, I'm going to set aside an hour of my Mondays to plan the connections I want to make in the week, whether that is on social media, via emails, wherever I happen to want to speak to somebody, do I want to invite somebody to a coffee chat, etc.


I want to be more intentional about that. And I want to make it a ritual action. And I want to figure out what time of day I want that to occur.


Do I want that to be Monday through Friday? Or do I work better by doing most of my interactions one or two days out of the week? And then just respond as things come back to me. Thanks again for spending time with me on Here's What I Learned. If this episode gave you something useful to try, rethink, or explore, the best way to support the show is to follow and lead a review.


That helps more curious business owners find their way here. And if you want more real talk about the experiments that shape our businesses, plus practical doable system ideas, join my email list. I send one to two emails each week with stories, insights, and strategies that help you build a business that supports your life, not the other way around.


You'll also get updates on workshops, new offerings, and the things I'm learning as I experiment alongside you. Until next time, keep experimenting, keep paying attention to what those experiments tell you, and keep building a business that fits you.