Talk Skin Academy Podcast

3 No No's I See On Instagram

• Katie Howell

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Imagine elevating your social media game as a beauty therapist and creating authentic connections that drive your business forward. In this episode, Kate, the founder and director of Talk Skin Academy, shares invaluable insights to help you avoid the three biggest blunders on Instagram. Discover why it's crucial to put a face to your brand and how to strike the perfect balance between personal and professional content. Kate also reveals why using friends and family in your promotional material might be doing more harm than good and provides tips on targeting your ideal audience effectively.

But that's not all! Tune in to learn how to build unwavering brand loyalty among women aged 40 to 50, who often face hormonal changes impacting their skin and sleep. Kate discusses the benefits of educating clients about the skin-repairing power of rest and the magic of deeply relaxing facials. By focusing on engaging content that resonates with these clients, you can enhance their experience and reinforce your professional brand. This episode is brimming with practical tips to align your social media strategy with your business goals, making it a must-listen for any beauty therapist eager to thrive.

Speaker 1:

Hey everyone and welcome back to the Talk Skin Academy podcast with me, kate, director, founder and tutor at the Academy here in Essex. So today we are going to go straight into talking about. What are the questions I got asked on one of my Q&As which I wasn't able to get around to answering, and that was what are your three big no-no's that you see on Instagram for a facial therapist business? Okay, so number one, the number one thing that I see time and time again is you are a business and I appreciate that you need to showcase your services. But remember, it is called social media for a reason it's about being social and your business is you. You are your business. Even if you have a team, you still are the face of your business as well as your team members. So showcase your face.

Speaker 1:

So as soon as I go on to an individual beauty therapist building their own business, I want to see them. I want to see who is the face behind the business so I can connect with that person. So if you don't have either your face in your profile picture or on the first post that should have a bit of about you, then please go and do that ASAP. People buy into people. People buy from people. They don't buy from a business. At the end of the day if you didn't know me for those of you who are following me and it was just the TalkSkin Academy, that would mean nothing to you. But you connect to me and to what my beliefs are, and what you want from your customers is to connect with you and what your beliefs are and what you offer to them from a pain point solution. So make sure that you've got your face on there. The other part of the number one thing I see is your name Again. So many of you get lost within your business so you might have I don't know face, face faces. I don't know. It could be your business's name, but that's not what your name is. So when people go to contact you or maybe ask you a question or they come to see you, it's really difficult to connect with someone when they don't actually know your name. So please make sure that in your bio of Instagram, social media, facebook, wherever you're at on social media, make sure that you've got your name present so people know who you are and what you believe in and what type of therapist you are. So that's my biggest first no-no that I see day in, day out is make sure you're present within your business, because it's all about you and it's not about the products, it's not about the machines. It truly is about you, because people will buy into you first, and then whatever you then sell. Number two, okay. So number two is trying to have business and personal going on all at the same time.

Speaker 1:

So I was actually speaking to a wonderful therapist. Many, many years in the industry. Phenomenal what she does, but social media has been one of her pain points. Now she wants to get better because she wants to attract a higher type of clientele, and when I jumped onto her Instagram account, the first four posts were of her children and they have the most beautiful children in the world. And so I thought I'd stumbled upon a modeling agency rather than a beauty therapy business, because the first four posts were of her children, because she wanted to bring that type of kind of like you know, get to know me better scenario, which I totally get.

Speaker 1:

But the reality is is that as soon as somebody jumps onto your page, they either will stay on it or they will leave it within five seconds. And, let's be honest, if you've got loads of beautiful, smiling children. You think you've hit a modeling page or a children's page, not a beauty business page. So just make sure that the first three posts are catching. They are all about what you offer and who you are as a person, as a business, so that people then can automatically either go, yes, this is my person, or actually no, she's not my vibe, and they'll move on. You can't be everybody's vibe, remember that you can.

Speaker 1:

Just all you're trying to do is attract your type of client because, like I say, all the time, burnout happens when you attract the wrong type of client, the client. When you wake up in the morning you look at your books and you go, fuck, I've got her in today. You know it happens because you know, maybe when you first started out you just wanted everybody, because you just needed that, you needed them to come in, you needed, needed the reviews, you needed the clients. But maybe now you're trying to be a little bit more particular with who you try to attract. And so those first three posts that are on your actual page, they need to be alluring, they need to basically just call out to that person that you want to say, hey, I've got a menu. That's going to be the biggest solution to your biggest pain point and that's what you want to do. Menu, that's going to be the biggest solution to your biggest pain point and that's what you want to do, and make sure that it is all about you and your business.

Speaker 1:

If you want to introduce family members, do it through your stories, do it through your highlights, but try and keep your posts all about you and the education and keeping it engaging about what it is as a business you offer your ideal customer, which brings me on to number three. Now you want to attract, like I said, an ideal customer, and what I see again, time and time again from therapists is they are utilising people within their crowd, like their mums, their dads, potentially their sisters, in their videos, in their reels, but maybe it's not the ideal customer that they're trying to attract. So maybe you I know your mum obviously loves to have a facial, obviously she's going to be okay for you taking videos because she's your mum and she wants to support you. But your mum may be 50 or 60 years of age and she might have a certain look about her, which is the opposite to what you want to attract, which is maybe the younger generation between 20 and 30. If your type of client sees that reel, they're not going to engage with it because they don't associate themselves with someone in their 50s and 60s. They might recommend their mum to follow you if their mum's the same age, but they're not going to recommend their friends or themselves to recommend to follow you because it doesn't quite agree with what they believe and what they see themselves as.

Speaker 1:

So just make sure, when you're going to use your marketing techniques, marketing types of reels, when you're trying to sell something, to basically make sure that the people in your videos, whatever you're trying to do, is portraying you the way that you want to be portrayed, so you are attracting your ideal market. Because, again, there's no point in trying to attract everyone because it fails every time. It has been proven time and time again If you try and attract everyone, you attract no one. And if you attract anyone, it's going to be people that you're not going to want to Instagram about, you're not going to want to market, you're not going to want to showcase on your profile, because they just aren't the type of people that you want to be associated with, which is nothing wrong with that If you want a certain look and a certain vibe, you want to attract a certain kind of gal, then you need to make sure that that full-on marketing aspect of your social page is going to be down that route of your social page is going to be down that route.

Speaker 1:

One thing I will say, which is one of my biggest notes, is try to avoid always selling. Okay, people don't like being sold to and nor do you. Try and keep your page educational. Go and check out my page. There's very little sales promotions. I use a lot of my stories to sell because I can get links in with the stories, but a lot of what is on the page, on my actual TalkSkin Academy page, is purely education. It's useful information that can help build your beliefs in what I offer, which is basically all about the customer experience. So try not to sell.

Speaker 1:

Try to create useful reels, useful posts that can be the cure or be a solution or be an idea of how your ideal client's pain points can be solved through maybe something recommended like not using hot water, because why does hot water cause the skin to break down? How does it affect the oil levels? What does that mean to them? If you're suffering with dry skin after cleansing and you don't like the sensation of it. What's causing that? Could it be a certain cleanser you're using? Or could it be they're using hot water? Or could it be because they're not rebalancing their pH, because they're using more foaming type of cleanser, which is not great because of xyz?

Speaker 1:

So you want to make sure that your educational posts are educating your ideal customer.

Speaker 1:

So maybe, if you've got to say a 40 to 50 year old, and the reason is, you know, maybe one of her biggest pain points is she's going through change and maybe her sleeping habits are now starting to change because her hormones are fluctuating like crazy, maybe educate them on how sleep impacts the skin, because the skin goes into repair mode at night and if the skin's not getting repaired at night, then it's not going to look its best.

Speaker 1:

So why would they come to you? Because maybe your facial allows that client to have a 90-minute deep, deep relaxing experience where the body can repair itself because it goes into REM sleep, for instance. This is what you want to be utilizing your social media platform for to create that engaging content, to allow your customers to really connect with who you are as a therapist and to basically build your own little cult of clients that you love seeing every single day, every single week. So you enjoy going to work and they enjoy coming to see you, and that's how you build your brand using social media. So hopefully those three no-no's can also help you now start to figure out where you need to go with your socials if you're in a bit stuck in a bit of a rut. So there we go, guys. See you on the next um podcast. Bye.