Friends. Thank you for tuning in today for another episode of the Jasmine star show. You are truly in for a treat. Have you ever had an experience that you are just so shocked it's actually happening that you can't even truly process how amazing it was until afterward. That's how I felt being a guest on the EAD . My let show ad is an American entrepreneur and a peak performance expert in his podcast has been one of my favorites for years. Like I listened to his inspiring interviews and his raw conversations every week because his interview style is the best combination of laid back yet he's so interested. I could rave about ad all day, but I don't want to make you wait any longer. Here is my interview on the ed [inaudible] show.
Speaker 2[inaudible]
Speaker 3to my left. This wonderful woman here is a social media strategist. She's an expert when it comes to social media and helping you grow your following and your platform. So Jasmine, this is Jasmine star everybody. I'm excited too, so fired up. And I was telling Jasmine that if our on-camera stuff is even half as good as what we've been talking about off camera, this is gonna change your life. It's going to be bringing that [inaudible] . Let's go. Let's go. All right, let's, let's do that then . Let's start, let's talk a little bit about you first because I think they have to have a context for this amazing following that you've already built. And I want them to know why you can help them so much. So I want to go all the way to kind of your adult life almost, right? Because like a lot of people watching this, Jasmine was kind of living a script and was chasing a dream and that dream sort of ended and she had the courage to make a transition to really chase her real passion, her real gift. And so you were in law school, right? You were. And so you're chasing that there . Was that like your goal or was it like a family goal? I'm curious
Speaker 4and I come first generation Latina. My father is Mexican, my mother is Puerto Rican. And my father is an immigrant and so he was basically trying to pursue the American dream and education and they never once asked us to pursue education because they themselves never pursued education. My father barely, my dad didn't learn how to read until I was 23 years old. So I mean this just, they valued education because they looked at it as like a key, like a passport out of where we were in the hood, in the body, all like it was who we were. I'm still in love with how I was raised and the history that comes with it, but in my mind, the way that I made my family proud or the way that I was able to pursue my dreams would be through higher education. Yeah . And I think looking back it was me trying to take the safe path. Typical immigrant child is like hard worker , top of the class, be there on time above the rest. And I finally had this moment of reckoning of like is the thing I want to do really well . Yes. When I was in law school in 2005 unfortunately, during my first year of law school, my mom got the news that she had relapsed to brain cancer. It was an eight year battle and it was so long. It was so hard in the doctors had decided that her time had come, they were going to stop chemotherapy, they're going to stop the brain surgeries. And I received this phone call. They're in law school in such a difficult, hard time in my life. I wasn't happy in school. I wasn't happy with where I was and the decisions that I was making. And I walked in and I was on full scholarship at UCLA and I walked in and I said, you know, I think I need to be at home with my mom. I'm going to come back to school. Like I'm gonna come back. I just need to be with my family. So in 2005 I dropped it a law school in 2005 I moved home in 2005 I watched my mom lay listlessly on the couch for months at a time. And it was at that time that my boyfriend, my high school sweetheart , said, we need your mom to see us get married. That's the thing that she wants. So we planned them wedding in three months and in 2005 I remember sitting on a table very similar to this circular table across from my newly-minted husband. And he says, what do you want to do with your life? Like where will you find happiness? Yes. And I looked across from him and I said, I want to be a photographer. And
Speaker 3that's pretty artsy from going to this very committed law path. Right. Because his response was, well, don't you need a camera even have a camera. I did have a care ideas where it didn't have a camera. I said, a camera, that's off. I had a camera. I really think I could do this thing. If I had a camera, I think I'd be a good photographer.
Speaker 42005 in rap I camera. But I didn't open the camera because I felt like 2005 was such a hard year in my life. On January 1st, 2006, I inboxed my camera. And at that scene here, against all odds, the doctor said, your mom's not going to walk. She's not going to talk. She's gonna slowly go back if she's going to retreat. And against those odds, my mother walking in the aisle, she began to walk. She began to talk, she began to drive. She'd be out again to cook, even though she's a terrible cook, mean my mom's mom, if you're watching, I'm sorry, she's just her . It was like burnt offerings, you know, it was like, Oh well mom made it with eat it. Um, and I think that she had a second chance at light . Wow. That's wonderful. And I think that I had a second truck that life , like I made a decision. I'm not going back to law school. I'm going to do this wild, crazy thing that I'm wildly unqualified to do. The camera JD ,
Speaker 3J D D yes. Yeah . J D is here by the way. Everybody. And so I kind of figured it was him and I just wanted to make sure that [inaudible] so he was instrumental in getting you to even think about your dream. By the way, that takes huge courage because that's a very traditional path. And it is true that most of my friends whose are first generation here, education is emphasized so heavily. Were you concerned at all you were letting your family down? Did ever enter your mind? Or, I distinctly
Speaker 4remember sitting at an Italian restaurant in West Los Angeles. I'd called my father. My father is one of like my dearest, sweetest, most powerful friends. He's a beacon. He shows me how to be strong. He shows me how to be humble. And I called him and I asked to meet and we're sitting at the small table for two. And I sat across from him and I said, I think I want to make a really hard decision. I'm so wildly unhappy. I don't want to let you down. And he said, how could you possibly let me down you Farsi , Pete suit superseded anything you could have imagined. So to have your father's blessing. Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. And it was such great advice because I'm happy, I'm successful. I'm living life on my own terms. And as a dad, I think he would want that for anything. Yeah .
Speaker 3Yeah . And that's, by the way, a great lesson for parents who are watching this by the way, is that it's their path. It's their script. It's their life. It's not the script you give them. And for, I want to acknowledge one thing because you become this unbelievably successful person in that space, kind of. Because you've used that background in an increased it even to the social media space. But, but I've got to tell you that it takes, I want those of you that are listening, as many of you that are watching this, you right now know you're living someone else's script. You're not chasing your dream, right? And you're the leading character of your life. You're the author, you and God are the author of the story. Your life. At any time you can step into your dream, you can have the courage to step out and start pursuing that. So I want to acknowledge that because you're not sitting here with me. You haven't changed all the lives you've already changed and the millions more you're about to change. If you didn't make that decision and if J D didn't have the vision to ask you that. So I want to challenge you all to have the courage to chase the real you, the authentic you, your real dream. And so in doing that, you started really out in the photography business, really getting into the space of it ended up being where you became one of the most sought after photographers in the wedding space. Isn't that true? Kind of everywhere. So that started, talk about that for a second and then how did that end up taking me through that? And then how did you end up in the social media space in the first place? How'd that happen?
Speaker 4I interrupt the camera in 2006 and by 2009 I was voted one of the top 10 photographers in the world. In 2010 voted top most influential photographer. And in 2012 we did top most socially influential photographer. So we kind of just started off in as niche of a market and then expanded into this creative space and I started teaching people how to run better businesses and leveraging just what you have. I didn't have money, I didn't have resources, I had nothing. I mean I barely got a camera, you know, it's just like so living on the dream like we had no money. My husband was , this is a startup at the time. Our big date nights was taco bell in front of the fireplace. Like we were living the high life and he was great and it was beautiful because you understand the grind and you understand the hustle but you're so thankful for it today. So special. Right? Absolutely. Absolutely. I don't pass by talk about without [inaudible] cross. I'm like, yeah , gone are those days. Thank you. Thank you God . Thank you God .
Speaker 3I have a lot to talk about too because my first office was on the roof of a taco bell was in the second row and I lived on this horrible, I lived on those breeders , but I literally had the same refill mountain Dew cup for like two years cause I was so broken . So taco bell, we're not advertising , it's like instrumental in both of our lives. It's kind of crazier . So you become this, that's crazy. You unwrap a camera and within three or four years you're one of the most recognized photographers on earth. That's amazing. Right. So how did you, I want to now segue into like, this lady is unbelievable about, we're about to talk about. So if you're in the where you think I want to learn to really grow my social media following, where do I begin? Because she said to me, I was the queen of having no resources, no money, no background, no anything. And she's turned this into, if you go to our Instagram page, which you should, and we'll talk about that as we go. You're going to see this following. She's built. But the first thing I noticed on your social media stuff, can we get into this stuff cause she wants, she wants to teach and I were saying we're going to slay this for you today. So this is now if you're driving, you're starting to take note somehow by pulling over, right? Because here we go. Your page. The first thing I noticed about your page and your website, but we'll stay on the social media websites. The first is it looks like you, in other words, it's a reflection of you. Um , you know, you , it's a beautiful page. And like when I see it, I see you just the colors, the layout of it, et cetera. Did you do that on purpose and what advice would you give to somebody about just starting out on social media with the look of their page or what they should post? Anything like that? Is that done on purpose?
Speaker 4Absolutely. There was a point in time, like if anybody's interested and wants to verify, yeah , maybe I need somebody to testify. Somebody can go back into my Instagram feed in 2014 by 2014 I was always already an internationally recognized photographer. I had built a brand. I was sought after. I was working with magazines, so basically at the top of this photography game, yeah, but my Instagram looked like a five-year-old's was running . It really was a hot mess. It had no vision. And in 2015 I saw other people using it for their business. I saw other people making money and I thought to myself, I'm in the position to , and I have no idea how to get started. So I just took a step back and I understood. I started looking at other accounts that I found admirable and I noticed that number one, they showed up consistently. Okay. What do you mean what they post consistently? Yes, they're on like anytime you want to grow a platform, any social platform, you must make the commitment to say, this is how often I'm going to show up. I recommend at minimum once a day.
Speaker 3Okay. Is that different? Let's get granular here. Is that different based on the platform? In other words, if you're on Facebook or Instagram, is that the same apply to you
Speaker 4at minimum once a day? Minimum on either one. Once a day. I would say on both of them. Okay. I'm on every day . I'm on sweater, Instagram and Facebook. I am most active on Facebook. Even though my audiences most engaging on Instagram, trying to figure out like with every algorithm change, you have to treat the platform as if you're going on a new date with somebody, like how you doing? Let me see, how is this changing for us? And so I think it's really important for me to create content on a consistent basis. And with Instagram, engagement matters the most, right ? So it's like by you showing up every day, you're basically creating a little template for yourself. When your audience responds, you say, Oh, let me double down on these types of posts. When they don't respond, this is very clear indication that they don't want it . They want to see less of that from you. So instead of us being so tethered to this ideas , like I'm a real estate agent, I'm a show houses. I'm a real estate agent. I show keys opening a door. It's like, but when you post photos of you walking to the house or you delivering champagne to new homeowners and that gets a ton of interaction, show the champagne to the homeowner .
Speaker 3Careful of that. You just taught me something because I seem to even, I'm like thank, I hope everybody
Speaker 4caught that because I make that mistake myself. It's like I kind of have these posts that I know everybody should like. Yes. And they don't. And I keep creating the same one thinking at every single time. It's the same genre, the same look, the same thing . The market has smoke and homey . But it's so true though. Like I'm glad you're saying that . Like the market will speak to you. This is huge. Right? So, so you're watching what the market indicates. That's powerful. Is your content the same on each platform? That's a great question. Right now the answer used to be no. I was trying to create content independent of each platform trying to show up and I realized that I just didn't have enough time in the day. Yeah. So what I decided to do is to create a content on each platform, but I wasn't sharing it on the same date or the same time. Oh wow. Because oftentimes studies have shown that when somebody's , there's a high likelihood that if somebody's on Instagram, they likely have a Facebook account and if they're scrolling through Instagram, they might pop over to Facebook. They're on their social at the same time. And so if they like both my Facebook page and my Instagram account , there's a good chance that they're going to see the same content and I don't want to make it feel like I'm not paying attention and fostering unique conversations in each of those platforms. So hypothetically. Okay , good . Good. If I post like a post on Tuesday morning on Instagram, I might post that same post on Thursday night on Facebook. I might post it on Wednesday afternoon on Twitter. I'm just trying to regurgitate the content, but making sure that it's specific. Now as a , I'm just going to go off, I'm like jive, a little jive riff, like, and like , I'm not even cool. I don't even have to talk core on Instagram. What I see a lot of business owners doing is taking the same photo and automatically pushing it to Facebook, which is a big no, no. Okay . You can use the same photo, but what I want people to do is to independently upload to Facebook because the thing that happens is that at mentions on Instagram and hashtags on Instagram that are highly effective don't translate over to Facebook. And so what people say are they see broken app mentions, they see hashtags that don't work or don't lead anywhere and so what happens is subconsciously as you are watching this, they're saying, Oh, Bonnie, the real estate agent is having a conversation on Instagram, but she's just really depositing over here on Facebook and then people wonder why aren't people engaging with my content here on Facebook? Okay? It's because you're not having the conversation on Facebook. Same photo, bring it over here. No more app mentions are going to be tagging other pages that are like relevant to the conversation you're having. The conversations exist in both platforms but in a way that people are engaging on those platforms. This is huge what you're saying because that's another mistake I've made by another mistake I've made is I've sent it over there and you're exactly right. The hashtags are there and I can tell they kind of know I'm just dumping over to Facebook sometimes, but I did notice on Twitter you're, you're banging on Twitter, you're not pushing over your Instagram photos to Twitter. You're doing independent uploads. I watched , here's why I don't, by the way, so I was doing that. What she's referring to is I used to just send my Instagram post over to Twitter and I read your blog. Maybe if you look , I'm pretending like I'm here this for the first time, but the truth is I've made the mistake on Facebook, but on Twitter I learned from your blog. I'm like, wow, like she's exactly right. I'm just dumping on like my Twitter followers started to figure out like what's the of following him on
Speaker 3here? And so you're so this is, this is so good. So good. Okay. Talk about the hashtag thing for a second. Yes . How do I know if I'm on Instagram? Let's say, what hashtags could you do a blog on this? I thought it was just, by the way, let me step back. She has a blog that will absolutely change your planet. How did they get your blog? Just tell him that real quick start blog. Jasmine star blog. Just so you know guys, let me tell you something that I read this blog and it helps me and I have a pretty dadgum big social media following and I , I implement what she recommends on there very regularly. One of the things you wrote about on there, it's so good by the way. It's so good. One of things you recommended on there was about fighting out what hashtags your consumers or your clients are inclined to look for. Talk about that for a second. Okay, so first let's back up a tiny bit. Okay. We need to identify each of us as independent business owners who we are marketing to and we don't mean this loosely. Okay . I mean, I am a firm believer of sticking a claim in the ground and saying, my content is for this single person. And that rubs a lot of people the wrong way because people say, well, I'm , I'm to create content for whoever wants to buy what I'm selling. Yeah . And that's true in theory, but if we're trying to build a brand and have longterm sustainable growth, it's very good to niche a market. Now, just because you niche doesn't mean that you won't appeal to other people. I believe based on your content, you have a very large male , um , following, but it doesn't feel like, I don't feel like I can't follow what you're doing. I just know that you're creating content that appeals to a specific gender. And I think that that's great, right ? I think it's powerful. These are saying, this is my tribe, this is what I'm going for . Other people are welcomed. Yes . So it's important they do that too . You're already one great step in there . Good. Once you understand who you're marketing to, when you have that person in their mind, like that person's a real person. You know how old they are you, if they're married, do they have kids? Where do they live? How much money to make it ? What car do they drive? Where do they go on vacation? Was the most recent YouTube video that they watched ? What pages on Facebook do they like? Get in their mind. Okay, then you create content for them. Yeah. Not like this is a promotional piece for my business. This is how can my business help you? How can my business empower you or or how can my business diminish fear? We want to make sure that our social media endeavors really hone in on that because there's too many people in the fitness space. There's 20 photographers to be graphic designers. There's 20 bakers. There's too many people doing the same damn thing. How do we stick out? Our messaging comes, it's not about our business, it's what our business does for you. That's huge and so when we do this now, now that we're here, brought it up, we built it up. Let's get into hashtag . Okay. That is huge. What you just said though. Let's stay there. It's [inaudible] I'm giving it to you what your business does, right? Not so, Oh my gosh, that's big time. Big, big time . All of you. No matter what your platforms , cause I want to just say share something with you. I struggle with that just because I watched guys in my space, the men in my space, right? And I can tell like certain P , I won't name who they are, I could tell they're really get there . Guy is only a 25 year old below and male. Right? Or there's just a fitness person. And for me, I really do want to appeal to everybody that is with my content, whether it be a woman or a man or a guy my age, 47 or a 24 year old. And so it's, it's uh , I do try to think about that because the market is so big. And so I wanna acknowledge, I do what Jasmine said. When I'm creating content, I do think about, because my market is vast, how do I appeal to all these different people with the, with the content that I'm creating, knowing I can't reach everybody with every post. And so, so huge about what your business does or for me, right? So talk about the hashtag thing now.
Speaker 4So now that we know who we're talking to, now that we know that we're talking to the 25 year old who lives in Chicago, who's has a side hustle, but during the daytime he's driving Uber. Like I want you to get really granular. Who is this person? Because when this person becomes real to you, you create content that appeals to them and then you are really smart with your hashtags. So for instance, if you're creating entrepreneur content, okay, the knee jerk reaction would be to hashtag entrepreneur business startup business minded, right ? And then what happens is the other people in your industry and sphere are using entrepreneur business minded, right? Hustler, right? So then we wonder why our people only in my industry following me, because you're only using hashtags that industry peers are using. So now if we go back and we say, how does, how does Seth living in Chicago driving Uber who has a side hustle? He wants to become a videographer. How do I as in my shoes, if Seth was my ideal client, how do I create social media content for sets? I'm using masculine driven images. I'm making references that a 25 year old guy wouldn't , would like and know and understand. I'm making music references to who I think he's listening to hip hop references. What kind of car does he drive for Uber? Like I'm creating content that gets into his psyche because any time a consumer of social media is looking at a piece of content that feels like it's tailor made for them, they will follow, they will spend more, they will wait more. They will support more. They will evangelize more. Tailor made content of now allows you to build a tribe. Now I'm not about metrics. I mean it's great that we have all these numbers and that's fantastic. But really I firmly believe, I firmly believe God is my witness. A business will go farther with a thousand avid followers than 10,000 followers who are just passive. I'm going to scroll on by 100% so we build a tribe, but you build a tribe by creating content that people want to see and then insert yourself in social situations. Because then if I was creating content for Seth, I'm not hashtagging entrepreneur cause Seth doesn't identify yet with being an entrepreneur. What does he identify with the music that he's listening to the side hustle. If he listens to podcasts like ed, my leg , I might be hashtagging your podcasts so that when he's like, Oh well this podcast, how does Jasmine's information come here? Who is this person? Oh she's creating content for me.
Speaker 3Is that what you mean by inserting yourself in social situations? Okay . That is the conversation. Social social conversations. Okay. And so this is huge. How do you feel about this? This is the best stuff we've covered on here about this topic far and it's learning for me, like educating for me. How do you feel about thank you by the way, because these people are getting huge value out of this. How do you feel about no, once you're building that engagement, cause I agree. I'd rather have a thousand engaged followers than 10,000 and pastoral and scroll through my stuff. That's the other point I want to make to you is I see certain people in my space, they post too much stuff and it becomes this blur of nothingness that I don't want to see. W how do you feel about engaging with your followers? So are do you recommend people in gate reply to comments? Do you recommend they like comments? Do you recommend they engage on other people's pages whom are in a similar genre? How do you feel about that?
Speaker 4Ed, let's talk. We're going to get, we're going to get into tactical stuff. And what I'm going to say is I, as the audience is watching and listening, I want them to understand that I know and I feel, and I trust that I'm going to ruffle some feathers. I know that I'm gonna make people uncomfortable. Okay ? I know I'm going to piss some people off. Yeah . Avoid the shutdown right now. I want people to be open instead of poking holes at the things that I'm saying. I want you to avoid the ways to make reasons why you can't do it and find reasons that you will. Okay? Okay. So people say, I don't have enough time. Yeah , but you have to understand what is the role in your business. If you do not want to be the head of your company, if you do not want to be the visionary, if you don't want to be lead of, if you don't want to be the [inaudible] driver of lead acquisition, then bring somebody on the outside who is and let them drive those conversations. But if you want to build personal brand, if you want to be the driving force, then you must be the one navigating those conversations online. You can go through. And I'm really proud of this ad. I respond to the best of my darn ability to every DM to every card I know you do because we come from this thing , we understand the value of saying, I see you, the fact that you took 10 seconds to write this for me, I'm going to respond back to you. It's not scalable, but the unscalable builds a team of evangelists to become ride or die. And what you're
Speaker 310% agree with you, I love what you said about ICU, cause that's really what I feel like I'm doing. It isn't scalable to a point. I'm, I'm at a point now where we've been discussing like how many more can I do? And I get a couple thousand a day , right? But I, I'm, I'm blown away by people who only get 25 a day or 40 a day who don't engage with their groups. It's like, it's incredible. So one way to engage is that, and by the way, I want to also say this to you. This is why you want to get involved with from this is just eight. We're just scratching the surface here. One thing about content to a lot of you struggle with having enough of the photos to post. You can't, you can't post every picture, just a view. There's gotta be stuff that makes a statement. And Jasmine and I say is because I so believe it'll serve many of you. You have a business where they could get access to content that you help create. True. Yes. Can you tell them just I want, this isn't a commercial guy. She didn't want to talk about this. No pitches, that would keep me clean. And he's like, no, I want you to know that part of you growing your following may be for some of you accessing some of what she can offer you this way. So tell them a little bit about that. So the inception, it's called social curator show, social curator.
Speaker 4The inception of this idea was that I had my tribe and I would teach people, this is how you show up, this is what you say, this is how you engage. And I even brought a videography team into my house and say, this is how I created this, how you do it. Now go and do, and the three main things that I heard again and again from thousands of people, Jasmine, I don't have enough time. I don't know what to say and I don't have photos. Yes. And so I thought to myself, is there a way that I can create a service? So for $25 a month, okay, I have business owners and on the first of every month they get 30 stock photos. They get 15 caption templates. So that when those times that you're like, I don't know what to say, I don't know how to talk about my business. I can't find the right words. I have swipe copy, fill in the blanks, talk about your business. I guide you through that. And every single month we tackle one small piece of social media, how to use Instagram stories for your business, how to revive your Facebook page, how to run your first Instagram ad every single month. You're just getting a small piece of content. So you know, this is how I'm showing up. This is what I'm doing.
Speaker 3I love this. Like just so you know, that's such a nominal cost when you have someone who does that full time for you, you know the difference that they have somebody doing that for 25 bucks a month. It's pretty unbelievable. Right? So I think it's a value add for all of you that are listening to this too. So I wanted to make sure they got in the middle of the podcast, not towards the end where you might miss it. Okay. So stay with us. So a couple of other things I want to say that I noticed that you're an expert at and that is, so not only do people struggle with having the photo, they struggle with the caption. Yes. So Andy Frisella, who's one of my best friends and has built a monster following and is actually my partner in some group stuff we're doing together that you know, so mentoring and masterminding we're doing, but Andy has been teaching me over time. The reason one of my followers goes is how important the caption is, right? He believes the caption is actually more important than the actual photo in many cases. And so can you talk to them about how do they know what to caption? How do you, how do you caption when you make a post?
Speaker 4Well, I mean we go back, this is the inception of like marketing sales. Like we go back, this is like a hearkening like Madmen days , right? This is like, this is Madison Avenue in its rarest form is that we are all now copywriters. True. I mean this is your caption is your sales in print. And I don't disagree with Andy. I firmly believe now photos are important to stop somebody scrolling. Sure . That's the first thing that they see. And then they debate, can I, do I want to fight , do I find this interesting? And that's why it's so important to have an attention grabber at the beginning of every catastrophic . Most people know that on Instagram what you're now, they truncated it. You used to be able to see three lines of copy to get people interested in , and I believe, and this is speculation, but I believe that they made it only two lines because they want people to read the clipboard . They don't want an image boost . They don't want an appetizer. They want you to say, go to the meal, go to the ribeye . We want you to serve in it up. Which I think is actually a good thing, but those first two lines are now so important, right? It's an attention grabber. It's, can I ask you a question? I'm curious. I made a mistake. Can I , uh, do you have an opinion? Can I get a recommendation? Engaging, hooking them in the beginning and then guiding them through the conversation is imperative.
Speaker 3Massive, massive, massive, massive. As she has you to grow your following or those first two lines. I promise you, people ask me. I'm, I think I'm the fastest growing person in the history of social media, in the business space for in nine months. And one of the keys has been me mastering that. What you just said, the first two lines was three lines. First two lines , getting your attention. Can I ask you a question? I'm curious. I love what you just said right there. Couple more things and we'll talk about winning in life and just not through social media, right? Yeah . But I love this. So I want to , because I'm learning, so I'm gonna keep asking you . So what about your photo? What about your bio photo? Is there anything about that that someone should know? Because that's the first thing. So
Speaker 4you're just asking the right questions. I think that you're coming at this, you're serving an audience that is hungry and you're meeting them where they are. We and I had this conversation a lot of times. I see this like esoteric cloud life . Let's talk about the , the, the philosophy of social media. No, let's get down to the down and dirty. Absolutely. Your bio photo three main tips. Number one, a photo of a person looking at a camera is really engaging as human beings, we're hardwired to judge people if you're looking at their eyes. So the minute just stop. Somebody is going to be really about how do we know each other? We go back, no, we're good. So looking at somebody in their eyes is very powerful. So having a headshot that's from the collarbone chest bone area up is great. When you have a full body photo, what happens is you see less of the person's eyes. Okay? So you want end well lit, naturally lit photo. Okay ? You want to be looking directly at the camera, okay . And if at all possible, smile. Okay there . There are times for very cool photos, cool photos really do well. But as a standalone piece of building a brand, you want to be approachable. You want to be friendly and you want to start conversations. And we have to think about social media as a cocktail party on the internet. When somebody walks into a cocktail party and indoors it's a Friday night, they walk into the montage at the bar and they're wearing their sunglasses. They still have their hat on. They're just looking around waiting like, who's going to look at me? Take a drink. Yeah . It's the people who we want to talk with or the guys, the women who have their sunglasses off, everything's packed up. They look at you smile, casually order a drink. Wow. This is the stuff we need to have massive
Speaker 3stuff. Should you , you change it. Is there a, is there a shelf life to a photo where you should change that photo because your followers have seen it so long?
Speaker 4Well, there's a, there's a beauty. It's a beauty and the beast. You like when people become familiar with your photo because people look at the photos and another thing to say is I highly recommend against using a logo because a logo takes away the personality of a business or a brand. So there's that. So there is a beauty of somebody seeing those same regular photo because then they, if they engage with you in the past and they know that you deliver great content, which you do, you kind of liked that association. So I kind of need familiarity. I'll kind of like rest a photo for at least like four or five months before you decide to just switch it out . Switching it out too much confuses people, as simple as it is. Okay.
Speaker 3Okay. You're good . This is tons of stuff here. Tons of stuff. Anything else you would tell somebody who's getting into the social media space or is in it now and you'd say, listen, if you're gonna make this work, you need to doX or Y, would it be, you know, create content that I always tell people the content better reflect. You w rite i t better not be, y ou're n ot doing somebody else like it's g ot t o authentic. T hey h ave t o think it's a r eally, but is there something else you would tell them i s we t urn the page off of social. We'll go into life here in a minute, but anything else you would add to them about social media? The way t hey they oppose anything of that nature?
Speaker 4I would. I would talk about creating value driven content because let's say I sell shoes and you sell shoes and you sell shoes and you sell shoes and you associate , we're all selling shoes, right? What the marketing that I see on Instagram, the conversations I see on Instagram by nine out of 10 of us, I sell shoes. These are the sizes. The shoes come in when if I want it to stick out from the crowd of value driven piece of content would be I sell shoes. Here are the five reasons why you should be packing these shoes to go on vacation because of one, two, three, four, five. If I sell sunglasses and we also send glasses, it shouldn't be. These are the colors that the sunglasses come in. Yeah , it should be. These five tips will help you pick the best shape of sunglasses for your face. So we have value driven content that helps us position ourselves in a place of authority, but it builds trust.
Speaker 3This is huge. This is huge. Okay, I totally agree with that. By the way, like I, when I'm listening I'm thinking what are the things I've done wrong? You're right and when you say things I've done correctly, I have to acknowledge it too . I've done that. I've done that value add on the content like so you have obviously become this success not only because of the detailed knowledge you clearly have about how social media works, but also you have the courage to step into this space. You're super driven to improve you and chase the highest version of you. You're , you've spent money on yourself, you're in various different mastermind groups that you participate in. And so what is it that you think for entrepreneurs or just people in general that are out there that they want to be somebody they want to dream to happen. They want to live, oceanfront, they want to have a dream relationship, whatever it is. What do you think holds most people back? What do you think it is and what do they need to do and think differently? That's a broad question, but what would your answer be to that?
Speaker 4It's going to be two things. Okay. It's going to be, so a lot of people are so concerned of what other people will think about their decisions. It could be a parent, it could be a spouse, it could be people on the internet. Yeah , and the only person who's responsible for making those decisions and protecting your soul. You have been, we've all been commissioned. We have, as we serve a higher purpose and a calling, and when we stand in the light of our rightness and our voice, I would have been a successful lawyer. Mark my words. Yeah. I would've not had served the amount of people I can serve because now I'm standing in my purpose. Had I listened, if my father sat across to me and said, you know what? Me ha , no, I don't want you to do that. I would have said maybe, who knows? I don't know what I would've said, but the fact of the matter that I still at the end of the day made a very hard decision to walk away from a safe path and say I believe and I don't care. For all intents and purposes, people say that's the most ridiculous thing you could have done, right ? I don't care. When I decided to take a sabbatical from running one of the most profitable photography studios in the world, people said, you're crazy. And I said, I see something else on the horizon. I'm intended to be serving more people. I'm intended not just to be serving creatives, but entrepreneurs, people who want to live their best version by way of pursuing their dream business. That's my life calling. I don't care what all of you have to say, I'm doing my thing. Secondly is belief in self that they , they they, they have like this pinwheel above their head of failure. It list of all the things that didn't work in the past and I say reframe that it wasn't a failure. It's only a failure if you decide to stop right there and then wow.
Speaker 3Stand and purpose and reframe. Those are , you know , I think by the way, I totally agree with you and I think those two things are connected. I think a lot of times because there's a lack of maybe self belief , then we become more concerned with what other people think about or , right ? Because I think when you have a great reputation with yourself, you've kept promises, you make yourself, you trust yourself, right? You're far less concerned with the reputation with everybody else. But when you don't feel great about yourself or you haven't kept promises you've made to yourself, you don't have high self confidence. Now your reputation with everybody else's have huge value to you in importance. Right? So they're interconnected. One things I noticed about you immediately on camera when I watched you speaking and then now in person it's like really apparent. I believe in energy, right? I think energy almost overrides everything in life, right? Even even a poor decision made with the right energy, the right intentions . But I've almost like just willed my energy, my cause. I always give myself credit for my intent. I know my intent is good. I know I want to do the right thing. I don't always do the right thing, but I know my intentions are good . I know I'm a good man. I know I want to help people. I know I want to serve. I love that term of standing in your purpose, by the way. I may steal that from you, but so this energy you have, it's , it's magnetic, right? It's like I , I root for you. I want to help you. I believe you. Right? Like your certainty levels off the charts too, right? Where's that come from? Have you always had this or have you worked on that? Like what's it come from with this energy you have? Cause it's, it's, it's obvious like I'll guarantee even the people that are sitting around here watching this, they can feel your energy. I can feel it when I'm talking.
Speaker 4That means so much and it means so much to me because I know what it's like to have an energy that's completely polar opposite of the energy I possess. Now as the daughter of an immigrant, I grew up obese. I weighed 180 pounds. I wasn't even five foot tall. I was 11 years old. I weighed more than my dad. I was constantly ridiculed. I didn't learn how to read until I was 11 years old. I was poor. We had government issued food. People from our church would take donations for us, and yet through all of that, I felt like if I can pour myself into academics, so I studied, I remain quiet. I always like to be behind the scenes. I'm a watcher. I'm a Looker. I would see other people doing the things I wanted to do and I never gave myself the permission to do that. It wasn't until I was 25 years old in 2005 when we started this conversation where I thought, my God, I've robbed the world of this thing that I have because I was so concerned of being me . When I saw my mom, she was 50 years old and they said she was going to die, was 25 years old and I had a mid life crisis. I said, what if I look back and they say, what if? What if I could've done more, served more, been more up my voice quivered what could I, what could I have been and at that moment I said no more. I'm going to stand in this. I'm going to, I'm going to speak up when my voice shakes, I'm going to walk even though there's Hills and I'm going to continue to own up to mistakes because I've made plenty and if people want, if people know she's trying her best, her intention was to serve. We're still going to support her even when the chips are down. That's 100% right, Mike. That's a clip
Speaker 3by the way, that I'm going to watch over because I just love what you just said because I think there's, wow, you got me right there because I also went through a midlife crisis at that agent . I'm in . Well , I say this all the time. I'm going to midlife crisis constantly to get to the next version.
Speaker 4I saw an interview with you talking about your daughter said you're having a mother crisis , so the midlife price , you'd be a better man. I was like ,
Speaker 3what's more powerful is what you just said, because here's why. Because a lot of people watch it . They go, well, I haven't always been in a crisis to get better. Right? I've had a track record of not getting better, which is what you just said. I want you to hear what this beautiful soldiers told you. Right? I spent 25 years not being this person, so I think sometimes people look to me like, well, he's just got this track record of getting better, so it was like this momentum. You're like, no, I didn't have that 25 years. I sort of lived in the shadows and then you stepped out of it, right? And you gave them the formula of how to do it. And there's so many of you, I think men for sure, but even more with women. I think even more in the space with women, the world tries to tell you, you're not enough all the time. You're not enough this , be quiet, be a good girl. You don't look like this. You don't act like this. There's all these things, these messages we get as we're being raised and then the world does it to us too . So often I feel this women walk into a room and no one acknowledges them, and that happens over and over and over again. It's like reserved for these, just these few people in the world get that acknowledgement and you have to take it ladies. You have to step into it. You have to decide what Jasmine just told you, that you're going to take your power, right. You're going to step into that space. And I love what you said, step into your purpose. That is massive. So I love that. Now doing that, and I want all the women to hear this to a man . I know you're getting value on this, but the women need to hear this, that you can step in it . You are enough now. You can step into your purpose and your intentions are good. This is what could happen to you. This is what can happen. Millions of people are hearing this and so we don't have a whole lot more time, but I'm curious so I know where you've gone. I know what you've become. What do you want to do? Like what's your purpose now you said, I'm stepping into my purpose, right? So, and I think by, I want to tell you something, having met you, it's even bigger than you think. So I've watched your ability to communicate. I've watched you on camera, I've watched your, your energy level today, your intensity level, but man, your ability to communicate. Wow, right? Like you have a huge purpose, Jasmine. It's huge. But how, what do you want? Like what is your calling? Where are you going? Like what is, what are we going to see it from Jasmine star in five more years? What do you want?
Speaker 4I would love like my main goal is yes, I want to provide for my family. I want my parents to be proud of me. I want my friends and family to send behind me. That's my number one too . But I think that my purpose is to empower other people to live the life that they don't allow them to. To watch somebody and say, you were underqualified you wonder or to prepare . If you were underfunded, you were under connected and yet as an underdog you still continued to show up and show up and show up. And when people made fun of you and when they said the meanest things about you and they said as why anybody would hire you and you showed up and you showed up. It's just living proof that people can get and earn and pursue and push all the things that they want. And if I can look back five years from now and look at all the people who said this is me, I might not be making $1 million a year, but I'm taking my family on a Disney cruise. I might even making $1 million, but guess what? I bought myself a Toyota Prius. I might think all of those things are success parameters to them. If I am allowing you to live your version of success, not the yachts and the houses, those are beautiful. That's fine, that's wonderful, but if your version of success is to leave work everyday at 3:00 PM so that you can serve dinner and eat dinner with your family and pick up your son from soccer and you're living the life good for you. If I can look back, I will say I have lived in my purpose and I will find a way to monetize on the back end. I have food on my table and my dad, we were raised in a very spiritual house. My dad's a pastor and he said beans and rice and Jesus Christ, you have those things you're okay about. They daddy got a little bit more than pizza rifle . Thank you.
Speaker 3No, that is so awesome. It's cause that's a real perspective, right? Like that's actually true. And I think so often when you watch these shows, I love what you just said because it seems like we think everyone's dream is these huge material things, but often times it's just like, I'd like to, I'd like to have my Saturdays free or I'd like to coach my son's little league team or all these different things. And that's your calling. Now let's go get it. Let's have the courage to go get it. I want to help you help people. Cause I think you're amazing. I think you're amazing. A today's conversation. You can tell I'm fired up like this is, this was beautiful for me. And so you can tell from listening to her, there's no question in my mind that, you know, this is a soul who wants to help you. But not only does she want you to, she have the energy. Does she have the story? But she's got the strategies, man, she's got the track record. So how do they find you? Just before we go. Where do they go find you? At least on the internet somewhere. What's the best
Speaker 4on the internet? Jasmine? star.com in an all social Jasmine star.
Speaker 3Okay, Jasmine star. Y'all got that right? I want to tell you some, I really am grateful for today because unlike a lot of programs out there, I try to do it where people get real tangible things they can go use. There are several pages of notes. Someone who was listening to this took today thanks to you. And then on top of that you inspired them, right? Like because you're inspiring, not just the words you said, but you're inspiring your stories , inspiring your being is and so really grateful.
Speaker 4And I have to say like I met you today, I walked into your house and the new thing that I felt was that you were like a magnet. You were a magnet. And not only does that make you special, when you share your magnetism with other people, when you share your platforms and you invite people for the greater purpose. Thank you. Like this. It's not lost on me, homey . Like, I'm so happy to be here.
Speaker 3Thank you so much. It was wonderful. So everybody, I want to challenge you. If you do me just one favor. I bring you these unbelievable people in this unbelievable knowledge for nothing for free. I just asked you that. Whatever platform you're watching this on, if you'd review it so it moves up the rankings. I want more people around the globe to see this and if you're on all those other platforms, make a comment or something as well. So God bless your buddy Jasmine. Thank you, max out everyone .
Speaker 1I hope you all enjoyed that episode as much as I did. We really went deep and I think that's my favorite part of this interview at is such an amazing person to talk to and I feel so blessed to know him. If you want to listen to his podcast, you can find it anywhere you listened to your podcast under the ed , my lit show. Speaking of listening to podcasts . If you enjoy this one, can you do me eat tiny teeny favor and head over to the Apple podcast search icon? There you can find the Jasmine stars show and it would mean the world to me for you to write a review. Your reviews help this show get discovered by more amazing business owners just like you. I'm obsessed with the community of hustlers we are building and I can't grow it without you so y'all know that I don't ask without giving in return. After you go to iTunes and leave your review, you can head on over to Jasmine star.com forward slash podcast review to access an exclusive training I did with my mentor James Wedmore entitled how to raise your prices without losing customers. I am telling you, friend , if you enjoyed this interview with ed, you will love at James's class full of practical tips and mind blowing pricing strategies. So leave a review and then go to Jasmine star.com board slash podcast review and say goodbye to underpriced packages and the hello baby to products packed with value. Again, thank you for tuning in to the Jasmine star show. Have a great week, and I look forward to chatting with you again soon.
Speaker 2[inaudible] .