Connection Is the New Currency with Jordanna Cheifetz

If you've ever felt overwhelmed by social media, unsure what to post, or wondered whether building an audience actually leads to business growth, this episode is for you.

In this episode, I sit down with Jordanna Cheifetz, founder of JAC Digital Media, a social media agency she's grown over the past nine years by helping brands build meaningful connections online.

We talk about how social media has evolved, why personal branding matters more than ever, and why Jordanna believes that connection is the new currency in business.

From content strategy and audience growth to entrepreneurship, and wealth-building, this conversation is packed with practical insights for business owners, creators, and anyone looking to build a stronger brand.

Key takeaways:

• Why connection—not follower count—is what drives business growth
• The importance of building a personal brand alongside your business
• How to identify your content pillars and create a sustainable content strategy
• Why consistency matters more than posting every day
• The role of hooks, engagement, and audience retention in social media growth
• How creators and business owners can generate income through social platforms
• What nine years in business taught Jordanna about resilience and growth
• Why reinvesting in yourself and your business can create long-term wealth
• The mindset shifts that helped her go from startup founder to business owner

This episode is a reminder that while platforms, algorithms, and technology will continue to change, people still buy from people.

Because at the end of the day, the strongest businesses aren't built on trends—they're built on trust.

Thanks for listening!!

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Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:07

Welcome to The Inner Capital, the podcast where money, mindset, and mastery meet. Because your greatest asset is within. I'm Kate, your host, and together we'll explore the stories and strategies of founders, visionaries, and leaders who are redefining wealth from the inside out. Thanks for tuning in. Welcome back to the Inner Capital. Today I'm joined by Jordana Chafetz, the founder of Jack Digital Media, a social media and marketing agency that she's been building for nearly a decade. What started as just helping brands navigate the early days of influencer marketing has now evolved into a thriving business centered around one core belief. Connection is the new currency. In this episode, Jordana shares how social media has changed over the last nine years, why personal branding matters now more than ever, and the strategies that she uses to help businesses create content that actually drives results. We talk about everything from content pillars, consistency, hooks, and audience engagement to the role that AI is playing in marketing today. But beyond social media strategy, this conversation is really about entrepreneurship, resilience, and wealth building. Jordana opens up about building her business without taking a salary for the first several years, learning to reinvest in growth, developing a stronger relationship with money, and how creating financial systems has changed the way she thinks about building wealth. Whether you're a business owner, a content creator, or simply somebody looking to grow your impact and income, this episode offers a powerful reminder that in a world increasingly driven by technology, human connection remains one of our most valuable assets. Now let's get into the episode. Welcome, Jordana, to the Inner Capital. Thank you. I'm so excited to be here. I'm excited to talk about how connection is the new currency. Me too.

SPEAKER_00 2:05

Honestly, that's I really am so happy I coined that term. Um that's six months ago.

SPEAKER_01 2:09

So I'd love to start with your story and what kind of initially drew you into building Jack Digital Media.

SPEAKER_00 2:17

Alright, so I started Jack Digital when I was 24, and I really knew that brands really needed help with social media, but they really didn't know how to do it and they didn't know what was gonna push the needle. So I kind of started fig helping brands figure out what was gonna be next and what their next steps were. And like I started with a lot of influencer marketing. I started helping influencers get brand deals as well as also working with brands, getting them influencers. So that kind of went really close into social media and it kind of ballooned from there in my business.

SPEAKER_01 2:48

Congrats, that's awesome. Um I'm sure it's been quite the journey because like I feel like social media, the in like industry in general is constantly changing and evolving and growing, and trends are coming and going. So I'm sure you've seen lots of trends in the past nine years of running this business.

SPEAKER_00 3:06

Absolutely. I mean, I remember when you had to have a perfectly manicured feed, and I remember sitting there on a Thursday night color coding my clients' content for the week later.

SPEAKER_01 3:15

Now it's like all reels, wouldn't you would you say?

SPEAKER_00 3:17

It's a lot of reels, but also like carousels, they do have their moment as well.

SPEAKER_01 3:22

Yeah, but it's not as much just like one still photo. Like I don't remember the last time I actually saw somebody post just one single photo, which is like pretty much all Instagram used to be, right? It's just like one you post one photo at a time. Now it's like carousels or reels.

SPEAKER_00 3:38

If you post like one photo, now it's like people think about you and you're like, Do you not know how to use social media?

SPEAKER_01 3:44

So social media, there's like a lot. Um, there's a lot to unpack there. Businesses and brands have social media and like social media strategy, but also there's an aspect of building a personal brand on social media. What do you think people misunderstand about building a personal brand?

SPEAKER_00 4:00

You know what, to be honest, in a lot in a lot of businesses, you need to build a personal brand. I always tell my clients, like people I'm consulting with, that listen, you are your brand. Jordana is the Jack Digital brand. Like, people want to work with me. I am my personal brand. It's like that emotional connection. People need to connect with you. So I always believe you need to build your personal brand inside of your big business brand.

SPEAKER_01 4:24

That definitely has been become a more popular thing. People want to know the founder, right? It's like the founder story. People want to know exactly who's building this, why they're building it, because that it's more of an emotional connection to what you're buying instead of just like, oh, something, something's trending or came up on my timeline. Who is the person behind this brand and what are they representing?

SPEAKER_00 4:46

Exactly. People want to connect with you, they want to have that emotional connection of hey, um, this person can give me that result.

SPEAKER_01 4:54

When you kind of started the business, I I know you mentioned it was more like influencer marketing. What was the biggest thing you were working with people on at that time?

SPEAKER_00 5:02

I'd say really being able to figure out your pillar in social media. Like, what are the six to nine things you need to constantly be posting? Because social media really, it's like you have eight to ten pillars categories of what you're posting, and you post what those on and on. Maybe it's a real, maybe it's a carousel, maybe it's a story.

SPEAKER_01 5:21

So if I'm a business or like a personal brand, how would I identify what my pillars are? Like, what how do I go through that process?

SPEAKER_00 5:29

So for you, for inner capital, I would say for you, you have big pillars. So you have like finance, you have education, you have experts in their field, and then under that you have post ideas. So you'd have like um, how do you like maybe it's a wealthy quiz, or it's or how are you wealthy? Is it not just like how you feel about money, or if you have money, it's about how you feel in your daily life. So it's kind of like you want to break it down like that.

SPEAKER_01 5:54

Nice. Okay, and then so what's your take actually on content calendars?

SPEAKER_00 5:59

So honestly, they're super important. Like my team and I go back and forth. Now we use Canva. I used to use later, I use metrical, a bunch of different stuff, but it's so important to be able to batch your content and know what you're filming. So I always tell people you when you're planning your content calendar, you want to have a pattern. So say if you have six pillars, you have eight pillars, you want to have a flow. Pillar one, pillar two, pillar three, like how does it all go together so you can get the same result in the end?

SPEAKER_01 6:26

Question about the consistency: is there a general rule of thumb that you say, like you know, is it multiple times a day? Is it once a day? Is it a few times a week? Like, what do you would you advise people to do?

SPEAKER_00 6:40

So, to be honest, it's all about what your desires and what your goals are. If your goal is awareness, if your goal is to get sales, that's really gonna tell you. I have some clients who post five days a week, but they have that value, they have that content. I have some clients who post three days a week because they're like, listen, like I don't have the value, I don't have the content, but I can post this and it still resonates with people. As long as you're still on Instagram, Facebook, TikTok the other days of week, you only have a certain amount of value and you don't really want to burden your followers by posting too much. I think that as I said, like it really depends who you are, and I know it's not a great answer, but it's really depends what is your niche and what is your goal.

SPEAKER_01 7:23

No, I think that's totally fair. Probably too like, like, is is your goal to make sales with you know posting? I'm sure that there's a slightly different strategy there than just somebody who maybe their sales path is is kind of separate from social media and they're doing this more to just build brand awareness. Let's talk a little bit about income streams and how social media can create some of that. So, what are some of the most effective ways, ways you've seen individuals turn their online content into actual income streams?

SPEAKER_00 7:54

Okay, so let's take it about this two ways. So if you're like an influencer and you have a large following, you can have affiliate commissions. You can also get paid um for real bonuses, Facebook bonuses, it's a little bit of money. There's also like then there's brand deals. If you're like uh some of my clients are larger, um, and they get paid by brands to post for them. Then I'd say if you're a small business, like you can still get into the reels where you have like you post a certain amount, you get a certain amount of money. But at the end of the day, it's really all about um so somebody sees your social media, somebody meets you at an event, and somebody looks at your website, so everything flows together. So that's really how you kind of grow that income stream. So it doesn't mean necessarily you're not getting somebody directly from social media, but if they meet you in person and then they kind of go to your social media, that's I would call that an income stream.

SPEAKER_01 8:48

Okay, so like more so the flow of like where does your social media point you to you know close a deal.

SPEAKER_00 8:54

Exactly. You literally have 30 seconds to really impress somebody, and if not, they're scrolling away.

SPEAKER_01 8:59

Right. I mean, I think 30 seconds is even generous. I it's a lot. I was gonna say, I feel like um even sometimes I find myself like if I'm scrolling on TikTok, like you got about, I don't know, even maybe less than three seconds to like fair engage me, or I'm probably gonna like just scroll to the next one.

SPEAKER_00 9:19

Exactly. It's like all about that really strong hook.

SPEAKER_01 9:22

So let's talk about hooks for for anybody who doesn't know what a hook is. What what is the hook? How do you use it? What is the purpose of it?

SPEAKER_00 9:28

So a social media hook is something, it's two things. It's very visual. You have like maybe you're like you're putting your hand in front of the camera and you're like, here I am. And it's also the way you're speaking, you want to grab them right away because the algorithm has changed now, so now it's all about skip rate. So you want to grab somebody first before they scroll away. And that I would say that's a really good hook. I love to say like people can have something that's shocking.

SPEAKER_01 9:51

The longer somebody stays on the reel, the it Instagram then pushes it out to other people, right?

SPEAKER_00 9:57

Like exactly, because yeah, if they don't if they don't skip it, then exactly it's gonna be pushed out to other people. But if they skip it right away, I believe the rate now for skip rate is like it has to be under 35%, or you're not gonna be pushed out to other people.

SPEAKER_01 10:11

Okay, interesting. Let's talk about connection is the new currency. So, what does that look like?

SPEAKER_00 10:18

So, really, connection is the new currency, it's really all about creating a relationship online, in person, and that's gonna help you sell your brand or your business. Also goes into emotional connection. Like, how do you connect with somebody on a really deep personal level? And that's gonna help you um get them as a service-based business, etc.

SPEAKER_01 10:40

How has your view of money and wealth changed since the beginning of when you started Jack till now?

SPEAKER_00 10:48

Well, it's been nine years, and at the beginning, I didn't take a salary, um, I want to say for three years, and then I thought to myself, oh my goodness, I have a little bit of money, I'm making money. And now, nine years later, I think and I'm like, Whoa, I'm doing way better than I was nine years ago, but now also I think about differently because I have a house, a husband, I have a dog, I have two full-time employees, I have a part-time employee, so it's like I kind of think about, hey, yes, like I'm still trying to generate wealth, but I have a lot more expenses now than I did before.

SPEAKER_01 11:20

Yeah, what kept kind of kept you going in the I think you said the first two or three years you didn't take a salary? What what kept you like with the business? Because a lot of people don't have the stamina to stay in a business for for three years and not take a salary. Some people can barely do that for a year. So what kind of drove you to continue to push and grow this business?

SPEAKER_00 11:41

Well, honestly, it's resilience. And thankfully when I started this business, I had my parents' support, so I live with them, so I was able to. So I did make money the first three years. I just put it back into the company. Like I never took a salary. Um, but really resilience to really be able to say, no, I can do this, and really I didn't want to work for anybody else. And I would say at the beginning, I would take anybody who wanted to pay me even $500 a month. I laugh now because I'm like, there's no way that would fly anymore. But I would take anybody because I just wanted to get my hands and everything and really learn and grow and have the experience to show like other clients, hey, this is what I did for somebody else. And also I'd say somebody gave me advice where they were like, listen, if you don't understand something, just say, hey, I don't know that I can do this, but I'm gonna research it and I'm gonna get back to you. So it's like at the beginning, I was like, I'm never gonna say no, I'm just gonna figure it out. Now I'm like, certain things I'm like, yeah, I'll refer you out.

SPEAKER_01 12:37

I think that's totally fair. I mean, when you're doing when you're starting anything from scratch or doing anything that's like new to you, like you're not gonna know everything. You have to, you have to figure things out. So, like, and there's there should be never an expectation for you to know everything, you know? It's always, I have leaned into that statement so much throughout my career and throughout my life. Like, I don't know the answer to that right now, but I will figure it out. Sometimes it's that thought that we need to know everything at all times that holds people back from doing anything because they're like scared to not have enough information or to look dumb or to not know. But it when it's really like it's a simple, it's a simple phrase of like, hey, I don't know that right now, but I will figure it out, and then going and figuring it out. Like, that's that's my favorite phrase.

SPEAKER_00 13:24

100%. It's super important.

SPEAKER_01 13:26

Yeah. When you did decide to take a salary, was it because you hit a certain like revenue, or was it just kind of like you were like, okay, it's it's time in this business?

SPEAKER_00 13:36

Well, I was like, I was like, it's time in this business. I did hurt I did hit like I don't even know how much I hit. Maybe it was like I hit a hundred, and I'm like, well, I probably did take a salary, but it was a really small salary at the beginning because everything I made went back into the business. Cause even no, I was not taking a salary the first three years, I did have an employee. Okay. So like I really wanted to grow this in a smart way, and I was very fortunate that I could.

SPEAKER_01 14:00

Okay, yeah, that was gonna be my other question. And when you said you put it all back into the business, like what what type of like how were you investing in the business at the time that that you think helped you scale? So was it primarily getting that employee?

SPEAKER_00 14:12

I would say getting my employee, also like having technology, like I paid for platforms, I played like for like later and things like that. I played for um other marketing platforms, planally, like a bunch of stuff. And I also paid for education. I'd have like courses and stuff like that, and also like that employee really helped me definitely um at least start to skip a little bit.

SPEAKER_01 14:34

How has this business impacted the way you think about wealth?

SPEAKER_00 14:39

Well, I always think about this. So for me, it's like I'm the sole shareholder of my company, so I always think about wealth. I'm like technically I have two pockets, but I really try to keep my money separate. So like I have a personal account and I have a business account. So it's like I really think about wealth. I look at my accounts and I look at my PL and I'm like, okay, how am I doing this month? Like it kind of wealth and money kind of helps me make my decisions. Can I afford to do this or can we invest in this course? Of course, like I want to splurge once in a while, but I always think you need to invest for the future. So I'm really big in investing and really saving for the future and not spending everything you make now.

SPEAKER_01 15:14

Like it's probably what has helped, you know, grow your business this way because I think it's it can be really easy to want to spend the money that you make right now. And it's not it's not always easy to put that money into something else, even though you know it's going to benefit you in the long run. A lot of people don't have that discipline. So it's it's great that you have that discipline, especially in your business.

SPEAKER_00 15:38

Like I'm honestly amorous topaholic. If you would have talked to me, you know, um 15 years ago, I'd be like, oh yeah, I just like bought that yesterday. Now I'm like, nope, like I only I have like a budget, and this is what I can buy.

SPEAKER_01 15:51

What do you what do you think has helped your mindset around that? Do you think it's like creating a budget, or like was there some mindset-related money work that you've done?

SPEAKER_00 16:00

I think you know what, creating a budget was very key for me of figuring out where I can actually spend like a budget. It's not to hold you back. It's like somebody told me this a long time ago. A budget really is to kind of show you where your money's going.

SPEAKER_01 16:12

Well, this is this has been great to have you on. At the end of each episode, we do an end-of-episode ritual, which I'm gonna fire off three questions to you. The first one being one daily habit you do to feel wealthy. This could be internally or externally.

SPEAKER_00 16:25

To be honest, it's like I would say externally. I look at my dog and I'm like, man, my I can afford I can afford you my little my little golden doodle. I guess like it may be funny, but it's the truth because I'm like, he's very expensive, and I'm like, okay, you're having a good life.

SPEAKER_01 16:40

Yes, yes. If you can spoil your dog, you've got wealth. Um, okay, next one is your go-to coffee order or morning drink.

SPEAKER_00 16:48

I'm really into matcha. I really like banana matcha foster or like an iced banana matcha latte. Oh, do you make um or buy them? I make it. Um, I had a really good one at Commonwealth the other day. It was so good. Yum.

SPEAKER_01 17:01

The last question is your most used emoji lately?

SPEAKER_00 17:05

Um, probably the laughing emoji.

SPEAKER_01 17:07

Life is funny. Life is good. I mean it's funny. Exactly.

SPEAKER_00 17:10

Or like, even if it's not funny, you're even like you're setting your friend and you're like, oh, I'm having a hard day.

SPEAKER_01 17:14

And then the laughing emoji comes out. It's better. I mean, it's better than the crying emoji. So thank you so much for for joining the episode today. Um, and thank you everyone for tuning in. And I will catch you all on the next episode.

SPEAKER_00 17:26

Thank you for having me.