Today’s podcast episode of The Hayley Osborne Show is all about more followers won’t make you more sales and what to do about it.
Having more followers on social media can be beneficial for increasing your brand awareness and engagement to a point, but it doesn’t necessarily guarantee more sales.
A large number of followers doesn’t mean they’re all genuinely interested in your business, which sucks, but it’s the truth.
So much so, a high follower count with low engagement (likes, comments, shares) shows me your audience might not be interacting with your content, which is crucial for driving sales.
OR WORSE…
accounts like this may have purchased followers which makes them not trustworthy.
It’s time to learn what to do about it and what can move your business forward instead.
While you’re here, I have a new key marketing tool for you over on my website which you can access here: www.hayleyosborne.com titled: 3 essential posts your biz needs to get more people through the door – with templates & swipe copy!
This is a must for you to implement into your business to optimise your social media and make the most of the platforms.
SUMMARY
0:00:01 Introduction and Hayley’s background
0:01:45 The misconception of more followers = more sales
0:05:15 Understanding Customer Lifetime Value (CLV)
0:07:45 Quality content and social media strategy
0:09:45 Building community and trust
0:13:15 The power of authenticity and trust
0:15:15 Leveraging social proof for success
0:18:15 The value of existing clients
0:18:48 Conclusion and call to action
Hayley Osborne
Hello and welcome to another episode of The Hayley Osborne show. I am so glad that you are here listening to this episode of me in your ears, whatever you are doing today now, today, I really wanted to come and talk to you about sales, okay, and the real fact that more followers won’t make you more sales, but there is something that will.
And before we get into it, I want to paint this beautiful picture for you. Okay, because it has to be said. So, let’s just say that you have a smaller Instagram following. And let’s be honest, it is very hard organically to build a social media presence these days, you do have to pay for it, right? So, you do have to put money behind advertising and all of that.
And it’s easy to go, it is easy to go, you know, kind of semi viral with a really good video or whatever it is, but it shouldn’t be your objective in your follow account, okay? And the reason that I’m going to say is because, could you imagine? So, let’s just say you have 100 Instagram followers.
Okay, let’s not worry about Facebook or LinkedIn or any other social media platform right now, but you have 100 Instagram followers, you would need to book the biggest room in the cinema to house that many people, okay? If they are all your ideal clients, okay, you would need to book the biggest room in the cinema complex to be able to house 100 people that are your ideal clients.
Okay? Because that is who we want to attract on our social media. If you have, say, three or 400 people following you on your social media, you’ll need to book out like a theater space to house that many people in real life. Now, if you have 1000 or 2000 followers on your social media, you probably need to book out like a small local football stadium.
All right, local football, local community football, to house that many people. Does that kind of help to put things into perspective for you that your followers just need to be more of your ideal clients, not just more people altogether, because that will not bring you, sorry, more followers will not make you more sales, and so the more people that you have on your social media that are your ideal clients, the better it is for your business.
We don’t need hundreds of 1000s of followers. We just need more of our ideal clients. And think of it in real life too. Are you booking out these spaces in real life? Could you do that? Okay? And is everyone that’s following you, your target audience? The chances are there’s probably a bit of spam in there. You just don’t know if you’ve got an open profile, but you don’t need more followers, okay, so that’s the first kind of I wanted to paint that beautiful picture.
So that way you kind of have that in your head as we get started. So, it’s such a massive misconception. The other thing is, you need to have a really good think about your customer lifetime value. So, a lot of the time that is used as an acronym, as CLV, customer lifetime value.
So that basically equals the average value of a purchase from your client, whether that’s product or service, plus the number of times they work with you or purchase from you per year, and that will equal the average lifetime customer relationship of yours and theirs in years.
But if that’s too confusing, basically what it means is the customer lifetime value. Is a lot higher to you, then it will cost you a lot more to bring in a new client, right? So, an existing client is always going to remain an existing client if you serve them well and will make you a lot more in return than what trying to source a new client will cost you, okay, so that is your customer lifetime value.
Your existing clients are more valuable to you than you trying to source new ones. Because not only does that cost you money, but it also costs you time to create content. And so that is why I often say, continue to build your database, okay, because that is your warm audience.
Your socials are your cold audience. However, if you have an ideal following of your ideal client within your social media, that is such a beautiful foundation to get started to continue to build that customer lifetime value and more of it.
So, you know, I know that gathering more followers is really irresistible, and that’s kind of a benchmark that people use, but it’s really easy to, I guess, equate a high follower count to success when it’s not really the case, right? Having more followers doesn’t actually lead to more sales.
And for business owners and entrepreneurs like you guys that are listening, it’s probably not the case. So, I really wanted to come to talk about more followers won’t make you more sales. Now, if you think about those two things that I’ve shared with you already, and now put this next thing into practice, this will make you more sales.
So, the next few things I want to talk about are important. So firstly, we need to have quality over quantity. Okay, we need to have quality content over the quantity of content. Okay, so if you can post seven days a week, really quality content, then that’s amazing.
But if you’re just posting for the sake of it, and you’re throwing spaghetti at the wall, then I encourage you to reassess what it is that you’re doing and come up with a better strategy. So, you know, a social media strategy can often help, and that is something that I can help you with, and it’s basically like a tailored Bible for you to refer back to of exactly what you need to be doing across your social media to tell a really beautiful story of your brand and your business to attract more of your ideal client.
Okay, and how to do that. So, I think a social media strategy is really important. And you know, having a highly engaged audience that is small is far more valuable than having a very, very large audience that is disengaged. And you know, you can just smell it when you look at other people’s Instagram or Facebook or LinkedIn accounts, and they have 10,000 followers and they have 30 people liking their posts and stories.
Now that is a disengaged audience, whereas if you have a couple of 100 followers, for example, and you know, you’ve got 100 people liking what it is that you are putting out there, and your database is building that is a highly engaged audience.
You do not need hundreds of thousands of people to make hundreds and thousands of dollars at all. You just need quality over quantity. And the next thing I want to talk about is building a community. So, if the number one reason that you have your social media is just to build your marketing, that’s not the only reason why you should have it.
Okay, the second and most powerful reason to have a social media following is to build a community and to build trust. So, I often say that you know your website is like the suit and tie version of your business. Okay, should articulate all the things about you, how people can work with you, how they can buy from you, and make it really easier in like, a bit of a linear path, it is not complicated.
If it is complicated, if you find it complicated, chances are most people are going to find the same thing and then, so that’s your suit and tie, and then your social media is like the shorts and T shirt version of you, okay, that gives people a little bit more of an in, into your world, your business, behind the scenes of your business, what makes you tick, why you built it, why you are doing what you’re doing, how you help people, how you can educate like whatever your product or service is.
That is the place that exists as your shorts and T Shirt Day to day, version of you with a little bit of formality added in. But what it is building a sense of community along the way.
Okay? So it is building that know, like and trust with yourself, but also with your community, so that they have somewhere as a go to, as a source of what it is that you do in your zone of genius and your thought leadership, okay, when your audience, your followers, feel like they’re part of a community, they’re more likely to, number one, engage with what it is you’re putting out there, your content, and, number two, make a purchase.
All right? And you know, this can be achieved so easily and frequently by interacting with the people that follow you, responding to their comments, making them feel valued, and just continuing the conversation.
So, by that, I mean responding to their comments in a really meaningful way that may ask a question that’s so genuine, and there are so many people I see doing this beautifully, and many more doing it poorly. Okay, so genuineness is where it is at and that is the key to being able to make more sales 100% and you know, trust is such a critical factor today, because humans buy from humans, and it is becoming more and more evident in marketing data and reports that are coming out.
And you know, people are more likely to buy from a brand that they trust, okay, not from a brand that they hardly interact with. So, if you think that you are operating in a competitive market, and trust me, we all are.
There are 100 coffee shops out there, and I say this a lot, but there’s room to coexist for everybody, whether that is location, whether that is community, whether that is good coffee quality, like whatever it is, you know, everyone is forging their own way in that space, therefore there is room to coexist.
And I’m going to say the same in your industry, even though there might be a few people doing what you do, there is room to coexist for everybody, if you can build trust, okay, and when you’re authentic to yourself.
So going back to your strategy and your content pillars and all of the rest of it, it is such a significant thing to be able to build trust. It plays a huge role in trust building. And you know, when you have those authentic, genuine connections across your social media, that is far more likely to build sales than what the opposite will be okay, if you think it is just a vessel for you to show up and not care those days are completely gone.
You have to work for it. And you know, I know that social media is one element of the marketing mix, except it is such a powerful element. So, you know, the data says that there are 2.35 billion monthly active users on LinkedIn. Sorry, on Instagram.
I know that there’s a lot on LinkedIn and YouTube and Twitter, and I Yeah, and Facebook, and I have all the stats for that, but that’s the one I remember from the top of my head, because I love to know these podcast episodes are what I know, and I speak from the heart, because this is my zone of genius, and I love it. And so, imagine if you could capture 1% of that 2.35 billion.
That’s like 230,000 people, all right? And you’ve done that in a really genuine, like way that you care about your audience. If 230,000 people came to you and said, we want to work with you. We want to buy from you, I guarantee you that you do not have the foundation set up for systems in the process to be able to support such a large number.
But this is the number that we’re dealing with, right? It is so powerful. So, another thing that will make you more sales, as opposed to having more followers, or trying to get more followers, is utilizing that social proof. Okay, and I’m sure that you’ve heard this 1000 times before, but nothing screams You’re amazing like someone else saying it, not you.
You can say things until the cows come home, but when you have somebody else saying how you have helped them, whether it be through a product or really through a service or a beautiful product, how you’ve changed their world, or it’s just, you know, they’re really proud when they go out all the time, whatever that looks like, that is social proof.
So, it comes in the form of testimony. Whether it be written or video. Video is my go-to. It is so powerful, as well as Facebook and Google reviews. So, if you can encourage your clients to leave you Facebook and Google reviews as well as you know, video or written testimonials, that is social proof and honestly as a marketing tool and as a psychological phenomenon, it’s where people can really understand the actions of others.
And momentum creates momentum, and when someone has something positive to say about your business, it must mean that you are a credible source and worthy to deliver the product or service that you are offering, and more people will trust that, as opposed to you just saying how amazing you are.
Okay, so when other people see other people working with you and loving what it is that you do, they’re more likely to do the same. And the barrier to entry is so much left, so much less. And you can really leverage social proof by, you know, customer testimonials, Google reviews. Another one that I haven’t said is user generated content.
So, you know, you use things that other users have created in your marketing. Okay, so you know those testimonials, they’re gold. They are pure gold. And if you haven’t started to nurture that as a strategy, I suggest that you start to do that and reach out and ask for reviews, Facebook, Google, your podcast reviews.
What other reviews can you get? Just written testimonials? One thing that I haven’t, haven’t done for a while, actually, but that I did, was when I reached out to certain clients to ask them for a testimonial. If this was over email and not for a video testimonial, I would pre write the testimonial for them and say, hey and laugh at this, but it works, hey, I would love you to provide me with a video, with a written testimonial. I know how busy you are.
I’ve written it for you below. Can you just proofread this and approve me to use this in any of my content, okay? Because whoever you’re asking is usually very busy, and for them to be taken out of their day to think about something nice to write about you is quite hard.
So, if you can put yourself in their shoes and how you’ve helped them, and come up with something for them, for them to approve, to say, Yep, all good. That is the quickest way to get testimonials in written format. Obviously, if you’re asking for a Facebook or a Google review, then that’s a different story.
They need to do that, but that is super powerful and video they need to do that too. So, more followers won’t make you sales guys, but those things will be okay and your client lifetime value is far greater. So, if you are, for example, releasing a new product, the first place that you need to go to showcase and sell that is your existing clients, because they love you and they want to work with you, and they want to buy from you for a reason.
You already have converted them as clients, and the chances are that they are more likely to buy from you the more things that you add in your repertoire. I hope this has been a little insightful for your ears. I hope you’ve loved listening.
That is the end of my knowledge in this podcast episode, and I hope to see you next week for another episode of The Hayley Osborne show. I hope you’ve enjoyed listening to this episode. If you have hit subscribe so you don’t miss any new episodes released every Tuesday, and while you’re there, leave me a review.
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