Journey into Social Media Part 4: To Avoid Getting Wet I Get Help Along the Way

As my social media journey continues, I thought it would be interesting to add perspective from my team of support on their thoughts and recommendations on social media marketing. Lori Kennedy is the first.

The full audio and text versions of the interview are below. Enjoy!

 Hi, everyone! Karin Naslund here with Naslund Consulting and the Great Supervision Training Series. Lori Kennedy is joining me today from the Wellness Business Academy to talk about the time she spent with me as a coach for setting up my online training course. Lori, in fact, is the founder of the Wellness Business Club, an online platform that delivers personal development and professional training for health practitioners who want to take their practice online. She’s also a mom, and lover of all thing related to coffee! Lori’s two foundational programs, The Wellness Business Academy and the Launch It Like A Boss Mastermind, are growing a powerful community of health leaders who are transforming the way healthcare is done all over the world today. And as I mentioned, I asked Lori to join me because she was actually at the forefront of helping me to go online. It has been a journey and I’m so grateful that she would join me to share her experience in what it is to go online, and also what it is to be a business coach. 

Karin (K): So, Lori, I want to thank you for joining us. Share a bit about yourself and about your business wellness academy.

Lori (L): Sure! So, I started off as a Registered Holistic Nutritionist and I did that full-time in my practice for about seven years, until I realized that I was really capping my ability to work with people. To help people. The Internet frees you from any geographic boundaries and it really allows you to scale your business in a way that’s never before been possible. (I started in a brick and mortar setting.) So now what I do is I help people who have established businesses, or they’re just new to the business world, or they have a course, or they have some type of training — I help them to create it and establish it on the Internet using various tech platforms in order for them to really leverage their time and scale their business.

K: Yeah, and, actually I’m so appreciative that you would accommodate the way that you have been doing things as you support the healthcare professionals — that you would take me on! Because I was really inspired by what you were doing and I think my first connection with you was actually through Facebook. Through a webinar! And it’s like, yeah, you know what — she’s the one that I want to help me to get going in what I’m doing. So, what would you consider the most important parts of building a business online?

L: I think there’s a couple of things. One: you have to know that it’s going to take time. It’s not an overnight thing. Although you might have an established business — maybe you’ve been doing it for five years or 10 years — I know you were very well established in what you were doing offline. You had processes and systems, and I completely overhauled them and changed the way that you were doing things because when you go to deliver something where you as a physical person is not there, the delivery mechanisms, the communication style, all of it has to be modified. So I think the important thing to remember is that it’s absolutely doable, you can take in-person programs — in-person lectures and courses — and put them into a video-style or webinar-style format. It’s just — you have to open your mind and understand that the delivery is very different. So, it does take time. You’re also — you and I have talked about all of the new platforms that you’re learning that maybe you’d rather not. It’s a new language. It’s a totally new way of running a business — even to a point where, if you’re used to having employees or contractors — trying to find them in the online world where they’re good — they might be overseas. They might not necessarily have English as their first language. So it’s like a whole new world when you want to take your business online.

K: Yeah, and, boy I can vouch for that! Two years into my journey and I’m still learning so much and there’s still lots of work to be done. I think another part that you just nailed was about the people that you have around you. The team. As you overhauled the face-to-face part of my business. it’s almost like that with being able to supervise people from a distance. So, moving online has actually helped me to appreciate those organizations that are already supervising people from a distance, and how they have to look at it a little bit differently when they’re actually doing that.

Now, many of the nonprofit organizations that I’m working with are using online and social media in terms of getting their message out there and building a community of people to support what they are doing. So, if you were to offer them one or two ideas, or suggestions, or focuses over the next six months to a year, what would they be?

L: I would create stories around the good work that they’re doing. I think a lot of the time, the goal, really, is to get donations. The goal is to get charitable partners — people who are consistently donating. And the best way to do that is to show the wonderful work that these organizations are doing. You know, I think about it like “front of house” and “back of house”. So, “front of house” is with their actual community programs, or whatever it is that they’re doing to really create moving stories that they can share on social media that aren’t just images of people celebrating. They’re really taking time to craft the story of why this is important, who this is important to and who it’s affecting. Then you have the “back of house” — the people who work at the nonprofit. I think that too many times, we’re not documenting what’s really going on. The hard work that they’re doing. The meetings that they’re having. The decisions that they’re making. People want to see that. They want to become familiar with the person that takes the donations. They want to know who the key players are and how they feel about the organization. I think that storytelling is such a beautiful way to get the message out. Especially with Facebook Live and Instagram stories. You don’t need professional videographers anymore. You can just walk into an office, flip on a camera, and just start talking. I recognize that nonprofits are already bogged down. I recognize that the salaries, perhaps, aren’t where they should be. But I think that the more stories that you can tell from the front of house and the back of house, the more people will feel about the organization and then want to give more donations too.

K: Okay. I really like that analogy — the “front of house” and the “back of house”. That’s perfect for this group of people, for sure. So, one of the things I really heard you say is — and I think this is something that took me a long time to realize — is we aren’t just talking about stagnant time. We’re talking about providing an ongoing story that happens at any point in time, anywhere. You grab your camera and spend that five minutes saying “Here’s what we’re doing!” or “Look at the great work!” or “Did you know this, that or the other?” I think the more you can do it live, at this point in time, the better. Am I right in that?

L: Absolutely. Video is very powerful regardless. I think the old model of promotion was to hire a videographer and have this really professional looking scripted promo/trailer-style video. While that’s still important for sure, I think now, if you’re having a team meeting or you’re doing a brainstorming session, turn on Facebook Live or start doing some Instagram Stories to show the process, so people can see their dollars at work. If you’re going around and picking up — for example, just off the top of my head — donations or you’re going and asking for sponsorships, film that. Show people. Behind-the-scenes. We all love reality tv and the people that feel connected to the cause — they want to see more of it. We know that it takes about 6 – 8 touchpoints for a sale to occur. I think of a donation as a sale. You have to sell the person on the reason why they would want to donate. So, what better way to create those 6 – 8 touchpoints than a live, ongoing story. Even trainings…whatever it is that you can offer to the people that will be your potential quote-on-quote customers — they’re giving your organization money. They’re donations, I understand, but essentially, the marketing mechanism is the exact same, it doesn’t matter.

K: You bet. So, another piece of this for me — and, it’s part that I struggle with now, looking from the outside-in to nonprofits — I actually hear the organizations restricting their staff in even mentioning that they’re part of an organization online. That they’re restricting their staff from making any mention of it, or stating anything on their Facebook Pages and things like that. I’m almost feeling that’s really old school and that there’s a bit of fear behind what might happen vs. the potential benefits of having your staff be your salespeople.

L: Right. To be honest, I don’t know why they would do that. In order for me to give a good answer, I’d have to understand a little more about the reasoning — they don’t want the staff to represent the organization. Especially on social media. I think that the more promotion you can get, the better. What I would offer is that it needs to be structured. So, perhaps part of the reasoning that they would restrict their employees from participating on social media is because they don’t want it to come across as being unprofessional. So what we teach people — what I’ve taught you — is to have a Content Calendar. Some type of editorial calendar where you know who is going on social media on what day and what they’re supposed to be talking about, so that it’s structured around themes. Around events that are happening in the company. That doesn’t take very long to put together. If you’re going to do this three times/week, you could basically schedule out an entire quarter based on the events happening within that organization. If you’re having a holiday party or there’s some type of birthday or you’re doing a massive donation drive…you can absolutely have assigned Rachel and Marie, each day, to jump on Facebook Live and talk about a different aspect of the company. I definitely think the nonprofits who are implementing social media — specifically live video — they’re the ones that are going to win. Most of the people that have the money are on social media; specifically, Instagram and Facebook.

K: So really, a nonprofit could have a team of staff who actually love the social media arena — which I’m thinking will lend more toward the Gen Y population — they do it more naturally. But they could have a team. It doesn’t necessarily need to be one person. It requires a lead in setting up that calendar and holding people accountable, but, really, from that there could be a lot of people behind-the-scenes, helping to promote the work of the organization.

L: Yeah, absolutely! I mean, look, social media can be very overwhelming. But if there’s a plan in place — and it should be part of the marketing and promotions strategies (it is entirely doable). I wouldn’t really understand why a nonprofit, specifically, with these free marketing tools, these free channels, that allow people to share and comment and like and create community, I don’t know why they wouldn’t be prioritizing that as a hard strategy that they’re using to grow their donation base.

K: So, if we were looking at the skill of that person who would need to lead it…a lot of times, organizations pull people from within to do this kind of stuff. Now, I have been somewhat discouraging that because I think they’re pulling people away from what their real aptitude is and where they’re most needed. However, there are people from within an organization that have a passion around the social media, around the marketing — those kinds of things. So is there any particular skill that you would say is needed in that role?

L: <Laughs> I’m laughing because as long as you can speak the language, you’re good. As long as you have access to Wi-Fi, you’re good. I don’t think that you need any particular type of skill. It’s helpful if you know graphic design. But there’s also these amazing free platforms like Canva or PicMonkey where you can upload an image and modify it and add your logo. You don’t need any technology training. You’re not going to break the computer if you try it. It’s someone who will take ownership over it. I believe this is a strategy specifically for nonprofits because they don’t have an abundance of manpower, an abundance of budget, for sales and marketing. Like I said, I don’t understand why it’s not a priority to have someone within the company trained on how to create these marketing stories and use social media to the fullest advantage because it’s free. And you can get really far-reaching with it.

K: And you know, it’s interesting — I’m smiling because I think my hesitancy around all of that is coming from my generational perspective. We tend to make it bigger than it really needs to be. The whole thing about the Internet. About social media. So, really, it’s giving it to those people who are most comfortable with it. Giving them a guideline around how they’re to operate within it, and then letting them do it for you.

L: Yeah, I’ll give you an example. Although he doesn’t work for a nonprofit, my Dad is in his 60s and he’s an engineer. So he already has that kind of mindset. So we have all of these old family videos and we decided that he was going to learn how to digitize them. So he’s now taken all of these old videos. He bought some software where he can — I don’t even know how he would upload them, but he did. And he learned how to edit video and make movies. So, my Dad is a nuclear engineer, right? He, now, is making these amazing movies from the 40s, the 50s, the 60s of my family, and using technology, namely Dropbox and Google Drive, to disseminate all of these amazing videos of people who are no longer with us to my entire family all across the globe.

K: Oh, wow. Wow.

L: I mean, he doesn’t have any… he’s a nuclear engineer. Like, okay, I’m sure he knows how to use a software platform, but to edit video… So, you don’t need any particular type of training. I think right now there’s no better time than to open it up to people in your organization to say, hey, who wants to learn these skills? Because taking video, being able to edit video at any of your community events — with free video editing software, you could save a lot of money. And you could disseminate these amazing videos to your community, to your top donors. You could film private videos for them, thanking them. There’s so much you can do with technology and the Internet and I think nonprofits should really invest in that because they have a tighter budget than most.

K: For sure, for sure. I want to shift gears briefly. I want to hear about your perspective on coaching, distance supervision, supporting those that aren’t immediately across the hallway or table from you. What are some of the important things for a coach to do and remember when they’re working with people that aren’t right there? How do you keep them motivated, on track, task-focused, all that kind of good stuff?

L: So I think the first thing is really understanding how they communicate and learn best. As a coach and leader, that’s my responsibility. So, for example, when you and I worked together, I figured out very quickly that you needed to-do lists and you needed action steps, and it needed to be very clear and very concise. Whereas, I don’t function like that. So, if I’d mandated that you function in a way that’s most comfortable and best for me, we likely wouldn’t be having this conversation right now. You would have moved on to someone else because it didn’t work for you. So I think anytime you’re in a leadership or coaching or mentoring position, it can’t be about you. You have to first and foremost understand how your client or your mentee or whoever it is that you’re coaching — how they absorb, how they learn and how they need the information to be disseminated to them, so they can actually take it in and then take action on it. That’s regardless of whether you’re sitting in front of the personally physically, or if we’re talking on the other side of the world. I think you’ll only be successful when you can pivot based on how your clients need you to teach them and to coach them.

The other thing too — and this I think is really important — is having a system and a structure that you’ve used before with great success. You’ve tested it with others, obviously over the years, that you can then break down and teach to other people. It’s repeatable, so that as a coach, you’re not having to continuously recreate the wheel for your clients. Then they can take what you’ve given them and implement it because it’s sequential — it’s step-by-step. They understand it and they’re able to then pour their own philosophy, trainings and personality into the structure that you are providing. Otherwise, what else are you teaching them? Some random tactics? (Well, some people do that I guess! That wouldn’t be my preference to coach anyone.)

The last thing is, as a coach, detaching. We all have expectations and how I function and move in the world is not necessarily how my clients move. So, I also have to remember that I’ve been doing this for a lot longer than my clients, so they have resistance that comes up. They have a lot of questions and they might not take action or implement as fast as I would like them to. So, my job is to just be the guide. It’s not to place judgement or have expectation. It’s really just to say, “I’m here. We’ll move to the next step when you let me know that you’re ready.” Otherwise, I’m forcing and there’s this tension and it’s just not a good situation. So, really being able to detach from the outcome of the client, but yet still taking ownership over them and coaching them and helping them and holding them accountable, but not taking it super personally when they don’t do exactly what I want them to do when exactly I want them to do it.

K: Yeah, it’s something that I’ve had to learn many times over. I’ve said, you really need to start where your client is at. Not where you would like them to be or where you can see them. Because we’ve been through all of that and we know all of the work that goes into it. But I think we lose some perspective on how hard it is to actually do when you’re first trying.

L: Yeah.

K: So, you have a team of staff all over the place, I’m guessing. So, as the supervisor of those people, how do you know they’re actually doing the job? How can you trust them when they’re not right there next to you?

L: Yeah, that’s a really good question. I have to be honest and forthcoming and say that I’ve never been in a corporate environment, and, up until the last couple of years, I’ve never really even been a boss or an employee, for that matter. So all of the supervision stuff has been very new to me and I’ve actually had to reach out to coaches and mentors and trainers to learn how to be a CEO. To learn how to actually supervise other people. I think I’ve been through enough people to know that you have to find the right people to fit into the culture. So, a lot of the skills that I need are very trainable. Like, they’re not skills you’d even learn in any school setting at this point. What I needed to do, first and foremost, was to find people that I liked — that we would be friends regardless. That had the same core values as me. That had the same beliefs in terms of how the world functions. The same type of behaviours, so that my culture was really set in the way that I wanted to run my company. I can tell very quickly when somebody’s not a good match for my culture because I can feel it. Then tension happens and stuff.

So, in terms of, how do I monitor what they’re doing? We use a project management software called Asana and all of the tasks that we need to do go into Asana. They basically just check them off as they’re done. I work with people who work very well autonomously. Part of the culture would be that I’m not hiring people that need to be handheld. That need to be checked in on, or being constantly told that they’re doing a good job. We have regular meetings, as any company does. We do meetings two times/week. We’re chatting all day. I’m available to them throughout the day. I think just like any responsible person, they know that if they don’t do their work, they’re going to get fired. So, you know, there’s always that!

Really, we use our project management platform. Each department has projects that they’re working on. They’re all tasked out with deadlines and they need to meet them. And if they don’t meet them, I’m right there — like, what happened? What’s going on? It’s just like any supervisor. If I see that things are slacking or they’re not holding up their end of the bargain, then we go through the exact same process that we would if we were in a physical office setting together. There would be an interview, feedback and supports. And at the end of the day, if it just doesn’t work, it just doesn’t work.

I think that we function the same that we would if we were working in offices. I think that perhaps they get more work done because they’re able to do it during times where they actually function best. So, if that time for them is super early in the morning, and they can work from 5am until 8 and bang out the majority of the tasks because no one is interrupting them, I don’t care. It doesn’t matter to me when they work. It just matters that they show up for the meetings, communicate and that the work actually gets done.

K: Perfect. Yeah, again, sort of a big transition for many people that have come from an office environment, right? To be looking at how to manage people through that distance. I absolutely agree — using Asana as well, I have really found that is an excellent way to stay on top of things with your team. It’s a great way to keep ongoing communication because it’s right here for you and you can communicate back and forth in it. And we can get assigned tasks too! Which I’m sure is something that they like to do!

L: Yup, absolutely!

K: Yeah, and I think that everything you have said around the coaching side is so important — how to be a great coach and how to be that mentor. I think we all struggle with that. And underlying that, I’m really hearing how critical the communication side of it is as well. So whatever that communication looks like and however you figure that out between the two of you — that ongoing communication is a must!

L: Absolutely. I think that when you’re distance, it’s so much more important because you don’t have the energetics of the person. So, if you’re communicating via text only, everybody has their own stuff going on. So they can perceive it in the wrong way. So that ongoing communication and clarification — having meetings using platforms like what we’re using right now — we use Zoom every day in my business because sometimes you need to have that quick conversation with someone. So we have a virtual meeting room where we can jump on Zoom, see each other, and have that quick conversation. So I think, enhancing your communication skills and really taking into consideration that it’s text and not to read into it too much, is really important.

K: Perfect. So, I think our time is wrapping up. Do you have any final thoughts for that community of nonprofit organizations that can help them to be successful in the whole world of online, and working with staff that are apart from them?

L: I think just really being open to the fact that this is the future. Over the last three years, social media and technology have changed the game for us. It’s opened up doors and pathways that would never be possible before. I think that there’s so much opportunity on the Internet. And I sort of ask that — don’t be afraid of it. There’s so many amazing courses and trainings. Pick a strategy and stick with it. But I definitely think that if you’re not taking advantage of the platforms that are available — even things like Kickstarter — those types of platforms, you’re really missing out and you’re doing everyone a disservice because there’s so many more people in the world who could know about you who would want to support you. Who would want to help you. By not utilizing these platforms that are global, you’re doing yourself a big disservice.

K: Nice. Well, I can’t tell you, actually, enough about how much I truly do appreciate that you would take time out and join me today. It is always so great to hear a different perspective on how things are going. You know that I wish you really well in your future endeavours and I stay in touch with you through the emails and all the events that you have going, and all of that great stuff. So thank you again Lori, take care, and what I say to my clients all the time is remember, success is yours!