246: The Power of Canva with Jessica Bay
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Summary
Have you ever used Canva for your business? It's a software and app that gets recommended as a great way to create social media posts, but what exactly is it and how do we get the most out of it? Jessica Bay from Templates for Pet Pros joins the show to share simple workflows to use in Canva and how to make sure you don't spend hours making your posts. She gives us some of the power features everyone should be using and how it's more than just social media posts. We also discuss many facets of Instagram and why having a strong social media presence builds authority with your clients.
Topics:
What is Canva?
How do I make it work for my business?
How does Canva help me with my social media posts?
How to build authority through your posts
Main takeaway: You don't have to be a graphic designer to start creating posts that reflect the brand you want.
About our guest:
I’ve owned and operated an off-leash pack dog hiking company for nearly 15 years and launched Templates for Pet Pros, a Canva template membership for pet industry professionals when my pack hiking business has to close during the pandemic. I’ve worked in dog daycare, pet supply retail, training service dogs, as a dog walking business coach and owned and operated a dog collar and leash company. I’m also a professional pet photographer and dog mom to 2 beagles (@littlehounddog on Instagram).
Links:
Jess's website: https://www.templatesforpetpros.com
Jessica was on previously back on episode 81
A VERY ROUGH TRANSCRIPT OF THE EPISODE
Provided by otter.ai
SUMMARY KEYWORDS
post, canva, instagram, people, templates, pet, photos, add, reels, business, clients, dog, content, brand, social media, save, logo, gift, features, carousel
SPEAKERS
Meghan, Collin, Jess
00:10
Hello, I'm Meghan. I'm Collin and this is Pet Sitter confessional
Meghan 00:13
an open and honest discussion about life as a pet sitter
Collin 00:17
brought to you by time to pet and pet perennials. Well, hello, everybody and welcome back. Canva and social media are both powerful tools and tend to just be thrown out there as something that we're just quote unquote supposed to do. But we've never really done a deep dive into Canva, and how powerful it is for our business. So today, we are really excited to have Jessica Bay, former dog walker now turned Canva expert and social media guru on the show. She's back on episode on episode 81. Talking about her pack walking business, then today, we're really excited to have her on to talk about the power of Canva and everything that it can do with our business. So Jessica, it's a pleasure to have you back on the show. Again, for those who are new listeners, could you tell us a little bit about who you are in what you do?
Jess 01:03
Sure, of course, and thank you for having me again. I basically I right now I own a business called templates for pet pros. And I help dog brands and pet industry social media managers, stop the Instagram marketing overwhelm that they have with niche specific Canva templates so they can see results on social media without spending tons of time creating content. And I've worked in the pet industry for more than 20 years now. I started out working in a kennel when I was in high school, and then I moved on I did puppy raising service dogs. I taught obedience classes like like you said, I ran a pack hiking business. I did that for 15 years. Basically, if it involves dogs, I probably tried it. At one point, I have done pet photography. And I have two big goals that are my babies and I love them.
Collin 01:52
Yeah, definitely been in and around the industry for quite a long time. And specifically talking about Canva. When did you first when it first come on the scene for you? And when did you start using it?
Jess 02:03
Yeah, I started using it pretty soon after it came out. I can't remember when that was but it was when I was running my PAC hiking business. And I needed something to create like social media graphics. For Instagram, like you can use it for so many things. But that was the first thing I started using it for I just somehow found out about it. I don't I don't remember how it's been so long. But I found out and I started creating graphics for my own social media feed with it.
Collin 02:33
Yeah, it is that kind of word. It does get thrown out a lot and really recommended by people as a as something that we should be using in our business. But there's a there are a lot of components to it. I know. So for you, how do you how would you describe what Canva is, and really what it can do for us.
Jess 02:51
So basically, it is a drag and drop graphic design software that anybody can use, you don't need to be a graphic designer to use it. It's super simple. It's point and click and drag basically to use it. And it's pretty intuitive. You can use it to make so many things. It's great for Small Business Owners. You can make social media posts, which I mentioned videos, marketing materials, you could design T shirts with it flyers, posters, they even have a new feature rolling out where you can build a whole website with Canva. So it's a really amazing tool.
Collin 03:23
Walk us through a simple workflow. I'm wanting to make a social media post, walk me through some steps in Canva, that can take me from absolutely nothing to having something posted.
Jess 03:33
Okay, yeah, so there are a few options, you can make a post from scratch on Canva, which is what I do when I design my templates, but I wouldn't recommend that for most people. Because graphic design does take a lot of skill to make it look aesthetically pleasing. And there's rules to making things look how they should look. And as a pet sitter and a dog walker, like, you probably don't have those skills, you might have those skills. But not everybody can be a professional designer and have things look aesthetically pleasing. So I recommend that you start out using a template, there are tons of them within in Canva. So say you want to make an Instagram post, all you need to do is go to canva.com. And I do recommend using the desktop website version rather than the app. The app is great too. But just for making things, it's a lot easier to fine tune and like click on things and stuff on the actual desktop version. So like if from the search bar, you can actually just type in Instagram posts. And you can it'll pop up Instagram posts, you can pick that and then there will be all these different templates that you can choose from to design for your business. So the first thing you want to do is look for those templates. They're on there and find something that kind of has the vibe that your brand has. Because you don't want to use like a mishmash of templates so that that looks kind of not cohesive. And you want people to see your graphics and be like Oh, that's great. From this company, you know, be recognizable just like you would from any big company. Like if you see, you know, an ad for like Old Navy or GAAP, you're probably going to recognize that's what it's for, before you even see their logo or anything, just because there's like a certain style aesthetic. So that's something to keep in mind. And that's something that like a membership, like my supplies, templates, they all are cohesive and go together. But within template, within Canva, you can use that template and you can customize it to match your brand. So once you've picked the template that you want to use, it's really easy to change the colors, the fonts, to match your branding, you can easily even switch out like the elements in there and add your own elements, like if you do have some graphic design and work with a designer and have elements that you want to swap out for. You can do that. And you can add your logo as well.
Collin 05:45
Yeah, that search feature is really powerful. When you go to canva.com, you could click on Create design, and then you can figure out what size you want it, which is really important for social media posts to your meeting their requirements, and you know, it's showing up, right. And then you can just search with simple words like fun, or Thanksgiving or holiday or sunshine or things like that, that you want to have a certain aesthetic or theme that you bring forward. And then I do really like how you can basically click on everything that pulls up and you can change the color, you can add new elements, you can change font, you can really then, you know, tweak it and make it your own. So that is consistent with your branding.
Jess 06:27
Yeah, exactly. And it's very user friendly and searchable. Like you can search for different elements. You can search for photos, you can, like you mentioned, search for different types of templates, through keywords, and makes it really user friendly.
Collin 06:39
Well, and that's really powerful. Too many of us use photos in different ways. And different marketing in Canva has a built in feature where you can search for photos that they have licenses to that you can use already.
Jess 06:54
Yes, that's true. There are tons of photos on there, like there is both a free and a pro version of Canva. Yeah. So if you have the Pro version you have access to so many like elements and like excellent, like professional quality photos on there that you can use,
Collin 07:12
that's something that we're always searching for is ways to get a story across or get an understanding of what our you know, our brand or our themes are. And photos tend to be a pretty sticking point for us because we either have to find free for use ones that we can have access to and that license available. So we're not having copyright infringement over we're paying for each individual photo. And when you pay for that pro version of Canva, you get access to all of it, and it's all accessible to you. And you don't have to worry about copyright infringement or anything like that, you can still
Jess 07:43
use them, if you have a free account, you just have to pay $1 for each one. So I mean, that adds up really quick if you lose a lot of photos. So it's totally worth it. In my opinion to pay for the Pro. One, there's so many other features with the pro one that you can do as well like, remove the backgrounds from your photos, resize designs with one click so like say you have a post that you already made for Instagram, like an ad or something and you want to use it to your Instagram story or Facebook and you want to resize it well, you can just click resize on there and pick what you want to resize. And that's one of the great things about Canva. It knows what dimensions need to be. So you just say you want it to go to Facebook, and it'll resize it to fit and be optimized to go on Facebook.
Collin 08:27
Yeah, cuz we're worried about saving time. And we don't want to have to recreate these things from zero again, after putting all that investment to it. And having these preset sizes. And being able to kind of cookie cutter it from from one platform to another really does help you do a lot of these kinds of posts at one time. Yeah,
Jess 08:47
definitely. Like it's a huge time saver, you can kind of go in there and bulk edit, like members get a batch of new templates every month. So for them, all they have to do is download those, click a link, download them and then go in and change the colors that they want to change. Change the fonts. And I do recommend that people change the colors and fonts to match the brand, again for a brand recognition and keeping it consistent in your feed. But they can do that really quickly. And then put those you can even have folders in Canva and organize everything in folders. So if you wanted to make like so you have a folder for like January. And you can put all your posts for January into that folder. You can even schedule social media posts through Canva which I have tried that out. I like using later. That's what I like to use, but you can do it within Canva and Facebook Creator Studio. I like using that too.
Collin 09:41
Oh, well. You mentioned talking about changing our colors and logo. Just Canva have tools to help us stay consistent with that. Is there a way to store that information in Canva somewhere?
Jess 09:53
Yeah, so there is something called a brand kit within Canva. I'm not sure if I have that with the Free Account, you definitely can have it with the pro account. So and this is something that people don't know about. And I wish everyone knew about the brand kit. And then there's something called the Style Editor. If you see it on the sidebar, it's just a style and has like a little Artist Palette. So the brand kit, basically what it does is you can go in and you can add your logo or different variations of logos, you can add all your brand colors in there, you can add your brand fonts, then, when you go to customize a template, all that information is store for you. So instead of having to like enter the hex codes for your color, or like manually picking every time what font you want, you can just go to the bracket and choose from there and the style. So the style editor like pulls from your brand kit. So if you pick your template, you open that up, and then go to that style editor, you'll see that's on the left hand sidebar. And then they'll be you'll see like all your little colors there like color bar, once you've done your bracket, there's actually if you click it, there's like a little arrow twisty like an arrow thing in the middle. It'll shuffle, basically, it'll shuffle all those colors on the design. And you can hit it multiple times until you get it how you want it to look. But it'll shuffle through your brand colors. So that you don't even have to like go in and pick I want this color to be this, I want this to be this. And if you're doing like a multiple page document, so when my members get their templates, I give them a link that they can download, like all the static posts for the month, all the video posts per month, that way when they go in, and if you go in, and it's multiple pages, and you want to change, so you have something that's pink, and you want to change all the pink to blue, like you just click on that color. And down at the bottom, a little box will pop up and it'll say change all pink to blue. And you just click on that and everything that's that color and that whole document will change.
Collin 11:49
Wow. Yeah, I think I think it's the fact that it's you are able to Batch Edit, not just these colors, but you're able to go in and change all the fonts at once all the colors at once all of the arrangements like you really are able to take something that is looks pretty cookie cutter and standard and then really make it your own with just a few simple clicks of a button. I know one of the just I think we use this probably three or four times a day, it's just it's so simple, but it's so powerful is we post a lot of photos about us or the dogs out. Now with Canva, we're able to add our logo in the upper right hand corner or in a corner of the photo. And then we're kind of branding that photo really quick. So that as it gets shared, or that photo gets taken out of context of its original post, our name and brand, continue to follow that post along. And we're able to get our that out there.
Jess 12:42
Right exactly. And you do that like by adding your logo to the brand kit, then you just click and add that logo in there, you can drag the logo on or if you want to just do like a text at the bottom of every post or something, it's super easy to do that.
Collin 12:54
Yeah. And you don't have to you can upload as many like, logos or icons as you want. So if you find yourself inserting a lot of the logo of your insurance provider or if you're fear free certified, you can upload those logos so that you can add those two posts really quickly. And you're not having to go and find those every single time.
Jess 13:16
Yeah, I don't know if there's a limit on how many things you can add in there. But I I have a ton so I know there's a limit it's very high. So
Collin 13:27
have you heard of time to pet player from acting critter sitters has this to say
13:31
time to pet has honestly revolutionized how we do business. My sitters can work much more independently because they have ongoing access to customer and pet information without relying on me. I save hours upon hours of administrative time on billing, processing payments and generating paychecks
Collin 13:48
if you were looking for new petsitting software in the new year, give time to pet a try listeners of our show can save 50% off your first three months by visiting time to pet.com/confessions you know we've been talking about photos I know you alluded to website design in Canva. And maybe that's the second or third episode on Canva. But But what about I know video is really big Canva do anything with with video and help us edit those.
Jess 14:15
Yeah, absolutely, you can make videos in there from scratch, you can use templates, which I recommend starting with a template. One of the things I like to use it for is making reels for Instagram. You don't have to do every single reel being like you're talking to the camera or video like that, but you can edit it that way you can edit with just graphics I have real templates for my members that they don't have to jump behind the camera and get in them. They just have transitions you can add it has motion so it looks like a video. And then a lot of the time I'll use like animated GIFs in there can switch that out for like a picture of themselves again using like the background remover. They can animate that so that they're actually In that video, great for people who are camera shy, you can be in the video without being in the video. So there's so many things and then they have tons of video content in there that you can use. If you want to just use like a pretty background, that's a video to turn like a boring post into something more interesting with a video in the background, which the Instagram algorithm was gonna love that, that you're using videos. Yeah. But you it's so powerful. There's so many things you can do on there with videos, be it like video, just a regular video, post a promotional video, if you want to put something on your website, if you want to make a YouTube Cover video for YouTube and like edit it in there, you can do all of that.
Collin 15:42
Yeah, what I like about their video is that they're really short clips. So again, when you go to add something, use that search feature, and type in what you're looking for. And all the videos are like 30 seconds or less. And you can loop those and you can put together a story with text overlay. I think they've even recently added where you can animate individual features of the the posts that you're that you're making.
Jess 16:07
Yes, I believe you can that's that you can on regular posts, and I'm pretty sure you can do it on. Yeah, you can I've done it. Like you can you can I have done it, they have so many features coming out all the time that sometimes it's hard to keep track of all of them. So that's one of the great things about them as they listen to feedback. And they implement things like they added curved text is one of the things they didn't use to have your text always had to be straight. Now they have like a curved text effect, which is awesome.
Collin 16:37
Yeah. Yeah, I know, especially for us who had round logos where we wanted to have text going around it that was really frustrating for a really long time. And then when they finally added that it was a much rejoicing in the Yes.
Jess 16:50
Yes, that's a big one. I love it. Well, so that's,
Collin 16:53
you know, that's a lot of depth to what Canva can do. And you know, we've touched on templates, we've touched on being able to add videos in the pro versus free versions. What are some of your favorite Canva tips that you wish more people knew about and they're, they're not using them to their fullest?
Jess 17:12
Um, well, we already kind of touched on this, but like the brand kit and the Style Editor, a lot of people don't know about those, but it saves you so much time. Another thing you might not know is just the features on the like searching, it's kind of hard to describe just without being able to like go in there and look around, but I'll do my best. But like, you can save elements, if you like them by adding them to your favorites, which is something that lots people don't know. And other features. If you like mouse over an element that you like, there'll be three little dots at the top. And if you click on them, you can try and find more of the same thing. So say you find like a little cute dog illustration, and you want to find more like that, you can click on those three dots, and look for like more by the same artist. Sometimes they'll have more, sometimes they won't. But it's an awesome feature that most people don't know about. And then also, you can make mock ups in there as well. So if you want to mock up like a product, or even if you're trying to get people to get on your email list, and you are giving them like a free newsletter, and you want like a little mock up of like iPhone with a little newsletter in it, you could do that on Canva. There's just so many hidden little things like that. And I share a lot of those on my instagram with little videos that show you how it works and how to do it. Yeah,
Collin 18:35
I love those little I don't know what they're called their photo windows or something where it does look like the iPhone, and you can drag a picture in there. Or you can drag the screen of what your app looks like that you're using for booking. And so you can do a walkthrough of how to book a walk or a little bit of the back end work. And if you you're thinking, well, I've got a lot of stuff spread out everywhere, you can actually connect your Instagram, your Facebook, your Google Drive, to Canva. And you can pull photos and other elements that you have stored in these other places. So you're not having to constantly re upload or re add or redo something, you can pull it back in and use it as something new. Yeah, totally like
Jess 19:15
it makes it so easy. And you can upload your own content and keep them in folders as well on there. One
Collin 19:22
of Megan's and my favorite features of it is that you can add people to a team to work on it together. So if you have staff or you have a friend who you want to help help you, you can invite them to work on either specific projects, or just have that give them access to everything that you're working on. And that you can really collaborate and use elements in a group effort.
Jess 19:47
Yeah, it makes it really easy and you can leave little comments on it and stuff for each other as well. I don't know if you've seen that but there'll be like a little bubble in the corner where you can add comments and I think you have to have the Pro account I'm pretty sure to do that.
Collin 20:00
At what point should somebody decide the free accounts no longer working for me, I should probably go to that that Pro and maybe it's worth it for me at that point.
Jess 20:08
Yeah, I mean, like, it's pretty inexpensive. I think it's, it's like 1299 a month. And then it's like, it's like 120. If you do like the annual plans, that's my $10 a month. If you're using Canva, consistently, like you can go and you can try out, try out the free version, and see how you like it. But if you're using it consistently for your business, I would definitely invest in getting the pro version just because it unlocks so many features. Like that brand kit that I was talking about, using the Style Editor, having the ability to share with other people, if you have a team and you want them to be able to help edit or download things and posts for you on the fly, that type of thing. And then just you have access to all those photos that way without having to pay $1 All the photos, all the extra elements, being able to remove the background with one click being able to, you can upload your own fonts. So if you have brand fonts that are included within Canva, you can upload your own fonts with that as well.
Collin 21:07
And I know you recommend using the website version, but it does have the desktop app, as well as a phone app so that you don't have to, you can do a lot of this stuff while you're out on the go. If you're just needing to do something quick, and get it posted or resize something, you don't always have to be sitting down in front of your computer to do that.
Jess 21:27
Yeah, that's true, I do recommend using the website version when you can, it's just because I've had issues with the app on my computer, taking longer and not being as efficient. And then put the app on the phone, it can be difficult to select things. But if you're like out and about, you just need to download something that you already have done or just add your logo or something it works great for that.
Collin 21:47
We've been talking a lot about Canva. And the power behind it. What is its connection between the two, I guess, social media in Instagram and all those other platforms,
Jess 21:58
as well. So social media is really content heavy, their content, heavy platforms, right. So by that, I mean, you have to create a lot of content, and be consistent with your posts to see results. So that's really time consuming, right? Like as a small business owner, especially you have tons of other things that you are already doing. Like you can hire a social media manager if you have the budget for that, because like it really is another job right doing that. Or you can use tools to help you stream like streamline that for you and your staff. So Canva will help you save time on that content creation, but just having those templates to pull from because to go in and like be like, Okay, what what do I post, you know, I don't even know what to post about, right? Like, should I just be posting pictures of my client dogs all the time. You know, and like the Instagram algorithm, it wants you to post more than just that, like, they want you to post video, they want you to post all different kinds of things. And that's going to be more interesting to your followers too. It'll take you a little bit more time in Canva. But you can find other ideas in there too. Just search for like dog templates in there, you know. And see, you may not end up using the exact one you see, because Canva has a lot of users and you probably don't want to post the exact same thing that everybody else is posting. But it'll give you a great jumping off point to it'd be like, Okay, this is a great idea that I just got from looking at this,
Collin 23:23
I will say biggest pro tip for Canva is scroll down a couple times on the page to get access to those templates. So you're not always picking the top two or three search results because a lot of people do, just click the first one or two that help you stand out a little bit more.
Jess 23:39
Yeah, and like, try, you can also try using different keywords like instead of searching dog or cat like try do puppy sometimes or kitten or, you know, you can get different results that way. And you don't have to specifically use a pet template either, you can use any of them just swap out some of the elements to make them, you know, swap out a flower for a dog bone or a paw print or something like that. And you can make it work.
Collin 24:01
Well, I guess I should also add, the other thing that Canva does is it saves your entire document history of things that you've worked on over time. So you don't always have to go back in and refined that template or refined those elements or make something from scratch because it'll save what you've made in the past. So that way, once you start using it, you'll find that you kind of fall into this, oh, these are the four or five, maybe six ones that I use pretty consistently, and that it helps speed it up even more because you're not having to go in and search brand new keywords every single time to
Jess 24:34
Yeah, definitely. And if you use if you have a lot of templates, like I have hundreds and hundreds of them, make folders in there for yourself. So you're like you know have marketing templates, or whatever categories that you want to have that makes sense. Canva also has a new feature where you can search your own content, you can search your own templates, which I use all the time so like if I know I made a template for Christmas, I could just type in Christmas and search my own templates and As long as I have that word in there somewhere, it'll find it.
Collin 25:04
Yeah, that does mean you do have to work on labeling and not just have copy, copy, copy, copy, copy draft 123.
Jess 25:11
Yeah, give it a name. Give it a name. Just think about what would I search for if I can find this later name as?
Collin 25:19
Well. So you know, social media is what we use it as a marketing outlet. And I think sometimes we can get a little frustrated, because we get followers that that's one thing that we can do. But then we've got to convert them into a client and a customer. So walk us through an approach that we could take to to not only gain followers, because that's one thing. We've got follower accounts, but then what kind of posts or how do we then convert our follower accounts into actual clients and paying customers of ours?
Jess 25:52
Okay, yeah, so one of the most important things when you're posting, let's just use Instagram as an example, because that's the platform that I use the most. And I know the most about, so make sure that you post with intent. I mean, that's true with any social media platform, but why are you posting what is the purpose are you is your purpose to convert new clients, if you're a dog walker, or a pet sitter, that should definitely be one of your intentions, I would think some people only use their social media to communicate with current clients. But if you're not doing that, like you could have more than one purpose, but one of them should be to convert new clients. So the first thing is that people need to find you on there, right. So they don't know who you are, they've never heard of you, and they need to be able to find you. So right now on Instagram, specifically, the best way to get in front of new audiences, is doing things like reels because Instagram algorithm is pushing reels out right now. And they're pushing them out to people who are not your followers already. Regular static posts, kind of go more to your current audience. So you're trying to get new followers and getting in front of people who don't already know who you are, is really important. So using reels I've heard from other business owners, they've had a lot of success doing live rooms with other people in their niche. So maybe you are a pet sitter, and you want to jump on a live room with a veterinarian, and do a live together that you share a client base with because you get in front of both audiences. That way, you kind of help each other that way, get new clients and new followers, and then posting like shareable things that people are going to share with others. So another thing to keep in mind is for pet sitter and dog walkers is you want to focus on getting quality followers not quantity. Because if you get followers from all over the world, they're not gonna be able to hire you, right, they need to be in your service area. So make sure that the topics that you're using on these, like shareable posts and on your wheels are relevant to your local areas. So for example, you can do shareable posts about fun things to do with your dog in your city. You know, restaurants that take dogs, all kinds of things just do like a brainstorm list of things that people are going to be interested in that are also local. Because that's a great way to grow like quality followers. And then you just want to make sure once they start following you that you're putting out content that's relevant to them that they find valuable. So they want to continue following you and stay engaged with that content. So again, it's kind of the kind of need to sit down and be like, Okay, who, who is my ideal client? And what kind of content are they going to enjoy seeing on here? Now, the number one thing that people say they go on social media for his entertainment, they also love education. So those are two great things to focus on. You can answer frequently asked questions that people are wondering before they hire you. So what are a lot of questions that you could ask before people hire you answer those questions, like do a real answering those questions, do a carousel answering those questions. All those types of things will help you focus on the type of client that you want. And it'll help you establish yourself as an expert in your field and gain their trust. So we're pet sitters and dog walkers are dealing with people's pets. So trust is like such a huge thing when it comes to that. So just building that trust and video is such a great way to do that. And even just carousels with education. You know, you can answer basic dog care questions, questions that people might have in your local area, about you know, like seasonal things like in California foxtails are a huge thing. So talking about that, if you're in that area, you know, mushrooms that are toxic, things like that are all helpful. Just keep in mind what is going to be helpful to those people that you want to service and then don't be afraid to sell. You know, a lot of people are afraid to sell their services on there. Don't be afraid to do that. It's fine to be on there selling your services. Tell them what you offer. Tell them how you can help them and how they can hire you. And don't worry about people not following you. Because if they're going to unfollow you because you're trying to sell a service, like, that's one of the purposes of why you're there, so they're not gonna hire you anyway. Right? They're like all they're trying to sell me their petsitting I, you know, I'm offended, I'm gonna unfollow them, I'm fine, let them go, you know, don't get someone else who's like interested in and hiring you and get that person in instead?
Collin 30:24
Yeah, I we do tend to focus on that number of followers. And I love how you pointed out like you want quality, not quantity of followers, and just having a big number doesn't mean anything. If they're not engaging, if they're not actually able or going to use your services, you need to be using that as a way to, to feed them and gain that trust and build that authority with them. And so, I see this an awful lot. And I know there are different takes on it. So I want to get your take on this. Are our follow for follows on, you know, Facebook page, someone say, Hey, I, here's my Instagram posts, and everyone starts posting theirs. And they they go and follow each other. Does that do anything to hurt their healthy algorithm at all? Or is it really just trying to bump up follower counts at that point?
Jess 31:11
Yeah, I mean, it's a big pet peeve of mine, when I see people doing that, because I feel like it hurts them. I mean, I always say only follow accounts that you genuinely are interested in, following and connecting with, don't just follow someone to get a follow back. Because it's just basically going to inflate your numbers, right? So it looks like you have I mean, what's the purpose of it, you know, of someone following you who's not interested in your service. Not only that, the accounts that you engage with the most is what Instagram kind of is going to gloop you in but those accounts so like, if you mostly are following other pet sitters and dog walkers, and vice versa, Instagram thinks that that's what accounts are going to be most interested in you. But that's not what you want. You want people who are pet owners who want to hire you. You want the algorithm to show your posts to those people, right, not a bunch of other dog walkers and pet sitters. That doesn't mean you can't follow other dog walkers and pet sitters that you're friends with and that you admire and you want to his business, but just getting into the whole follow for follow just boost your numbers. I would really avoid that because it doesn't do anything to help you.
Collin 32:14
Yeah. And I think again, focusing on that, that why am I doing this? What's the purpose of me being here. And whatever reason you end up deciding on that's fine. Because that's how what how you want to use it what you want to do, if you just want to have a presence, or if you want to be engaging, if you want to be growing your followers, if you want to be gaining clients through that, and using that avenue, that's up to each and every business to decide. But then the the thing there is then be consistent with that and and do appropriate things that are going to match the desired outcome that you eventually want. Yeah,
Jess 32:45
absolutely. Like I have other Instagram accounts that I do just for fun. Like, I'm not trying to get clients. I'm not trying to make money. I just do it for fun, and I'm not most consistent. I don't follow all the rules that I know I should be doing. Because you know, my purpose is just for fun. So like, you know, it's fine. That's
Collin 33:02
right. Well, you mentioned a couple words, I think specific to Instagram that not everybody may be familiar with. I heard reels I heard carousel and I heard static posts. So what are the different ways I can post content to Instagram? And what should I be posting to each one? Sure. So
Jess 33:24
Instagram rails came out a while ago, and it's kind of like their response to tick tock, try and keep up with tick tock. So what they are is they're short videos, they show up in your feed. And you can use them in a variety of ways, which I kind of talked about a little bit. But just they're short little clips. So try and keep them short, like 15 to 30 seconds is great. Like, if you can get it done in 15 seconds, don't you know, don't do more work than you have to do, right. Just keep it short. So those are great for getting in front of people. Like I said, that don't already follow you because Instagram is really pushing those right now. A static post is what I call just a regular photo post, right? Be at the square or like a four by five, size vertical one on Instagram. So that's kind of what Instagram is known for. And those posts are still doing well. It's not like those posts are dead, you can still post those and do well. It's just you should vary it with other things too. And then a carousel is a multiple image posts. So if you've ever been on Instagram and seeing where you can kind of scroll through more than one image. thing I really like about those is if you're going to do even do a static post and you'll see I do this on my templates for Petros Instagram all the time. I'll post the same image on a graphic but I will post it in different colors. The reason I do that is because it'll show the the posts to people multiple times right so same thing if you post say instead of posting one picture of a client dog out on a walk or something, you post three different pictures all in the same post as a carousel, or you post an educational post, you know, something like that, as a carousel with multiple, multiple images, if the person is shown that first time and they don't interact with it, Instagram will show it to them again, they'll show them like the second photo from that, they'll show them the third one. So you get more opportunities to get eyes on that, therefore, better likelihood of getting better engagement on it.
Collin 35:29
And what I really like about the carousels is it allows you to have more information density per post, if you're trying to have one of those educational ones, you don't have to feel like you're cramming everything on to that little tiny picture, you can have three or four that kind of expand out in a story. And it makes it a little bit easier for people to engage read and not quite so overwhelming.
Jess 35:52
Yeah, and it's great for like, a lot of the time, you know, people aren't going to stop and read a long caption on Instagram, like they're scrolling through, you kind of have to catch their eye first. So if you put like, you know, an attention grabbing headline in that first, first slide there, and then break up the text. So it's just like a sentence or two per slide, it's much more likely they're actually going to read that information. And if you have a big paragraph down there in the comments, so works great for that, too.
Collin 36:18
You mentioned this a little bit earlier. But why don't you to give more explanation on the role that social media plays in building up my authority as a business or as a pet sitter and dog walker, when it comes to people interacting with my information in my account?
Jess 36:34
Sure, yeah. Like this is one of the great things about social media for specifically for dog walkers and pet sitters in the pet care industry. Is that like, trust is such a huge thing in this business. And it's such a great way to build trust, right? Because people don't know who you are. But especially through video, they feel like they they know you right just like you feel like maybe you know some celebrity right on TV better than some stranger off the street, because you've like seen them, right? Like in interviews, things like that talking, or you know, they're an expert about this or that and you trust their information that they're giving out. So you're like harnessing the power of social media to do that for your business is really powerful. So just, I know you guys have talked about this on the podcast before, I'm pretty sure but like the know, like and trust factor, right? So getting people to feel like they know you, they like you, they trust you. And then they're going to trust you with their pets. So one of the ways you can do that is posting things to social media to build those factors. So things like infographics carousels, like we just talked about, you can do videos, reels, they all work really well to you know, tell them a little bit about who you are, tell them what you do, and why they should hire you. And you if you have staff, you know, tell them about your staff? Who are they who's actually going to be like caring for their dog because you want them to trust those people as well. And then don't forget to tell them how to hire you. You know, if they're like, Well, how do we you know what, exactly? You know, I'll say a lot of the time people just post cute pictures of dogs and stuff on there, which is fun, you know, and we're in a great industry that like, you know, pictures that are cute, like they do well. But you don't want the person just happy to see the cute pictures, you want them to hire you. Right? If that's the purpose of your feed. So you've got to tell them like, what is the service that you offer? Make sure that they're clear. Why should they hire you? And how do they hire you and you need to be repetitive like don't? That's the thing is like you put you think, Oh, let me post this? Oh, I don't want to post that. Again, I just said something like that last week, you know, I don't want to, you know, the thing is, like, half the people aren't reading what you wrote. You know, more people, like look at your Instagram, if you look at your insights, it'll tell you like, how, what was your reach, you know, it's not reaching all your followers, right? Do you have to be repetitive, show them over and over and over, this is what I do. This is where I am, you know, you can make like little content creation buckets, right? Like, I'm gonna educate them about these things, or what I'm going to educate them about, I'm gonna make sure that they know who we are. I'm gonna build authority, you know, all these things. And like, kind of be like, these are the kinds of content that I want to pose. And then like, recycled, do them again and again. And one of the tricks to save time is like, go into your insides, look at what posts are performing best, right? And then make more posts that are like that. And then even repost those ones, like a couple months later, because again, people forget and like if if people are like, Oh my god, they keep saying this over and over. Okay, well, they can unfollow you. And, you know, again, that person wasn't gonna hire you anyway. So, you know, just say what you said in a different way, you know?
Collin 39:45
Well, then when you couple that with something, you know, thinking back to Canva, you've already made that post one time you can go in you can rejigger it. You can change the colors or move things around in a different way and post that exact same content a couple months later or a couple of weeks later, and it will fit right in with the rest of you. your feed, there's a saying, you know, everyday there's somebody born who hasn't seen the Flintstones, I don't know, by the Flintstones. But it basically saying like, there's always somebody brand new whether a they just got their pet for the first time be the way they used to care for their pet is no longer reliable to them and they're looking for something different. Or C, you know, they're they're just totally new. And they're just learning about all of this. And so there's always somebody new coming in and looking for help in the industry. And while to us, as you said, it can feel so repetitive, like I always post about this. Well, you know what, somebody's just now today looking at your feed for the first time, and the likelihood that they're going to scroll back through to see that post that you made a year ago about what you do? Very, very little. Yeah. So you got to, you know, keep it fresh, and keep posting that same stuff and not be self conscious about that knowing that you are still educating people and continue to remind them about you.
Jess 40:55
Yeah, and like, on that you can also like repurpose, if you have a carousel that you made that did really well, like an educational carousel, take that content, make it into a reel, you know, or vice versa. Like if you did a reel that didn't really make that into a carousel, you know, you can kind of repurpose that same content. So you're not having to reinvent the wheel on every post that you do.
Collin 41:15
Yeah, yeah. And back to that, that know, like trust factor. In pet care, a lot of pet care is done by friends, family, and acquaintances, those are people that that the client already has a relationship or unknown connection to. And if they're going to invite a stranger into their home, the only way they're going to grow that connection with you, is if they know about you, how do they know about you, you have to tell them about you, you have to post that content, build that relationship digitally, before they can start to understand who you are. So it's not uncommon for people to I know we get this where people will say, I started following you eight months ago, and I've been stalking you ever since. It's a little creepy, but we say thank you. I'm glad we can use your you can use our use our services now. But it took time for them to understand who we are and get get to know us before they could eventually trust us.
Jess 42:10
Yeah, and it's just about like building that comfort level. And some people are gonna be more comfortable right away. And some people it's gonna take them more time, you know, or maybe they don't need your services right now. But they're like, oh, this person's cool. I love what they're doing. I'm going to follow them and then later, when they do need someone, you know, since you've been consistent with your posts and had engaging things in your in their feed all the time, they're gonna remember you and be like, oh, yeah, there's that person I follow. Okay, I'm gonna contact them.
Collin 42:36
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Jess 43:57
How Yeah, so that was like, a lot of social media managers are freaking out business owners. But if you haven't heard about this, like, yeah, back in June, a huge announcement was made that Instagram is no longer photo sharing app anymore. I mean, technically, it hadn't been just a photo sharing app for a while. Like, we've had Instagram stories and the option to add video for like a few years now I think. So it's like, okay, don't freak out. Everybody will be able to do other things on here forever. But, you know, Instagram is trying to compete with tick tock you know, that's like the long and short of it they want to compete with tick tock better. So they're pushing more video content, so things like especially reels and videos. So something to keep in mind as a business owner is that the Instagram algorithm, it likes it when you post reels it likes it when you post videos and so you're likely to get better reach, you know, as a reward for using those types of features. So thinking about using those if you're not doing If you're just doing photos, you know, like, that's not the most effective thing right now, it's better to like, keep those posts varied. videos also work really well to stop people from scrolling, you just have to make sure the very beginning of your video, you have like a good hook that tells them you know, this is why you should watch this video, this is what this is about. And then it also helps build, like you said, like the know, like and trust and the authority, using those a lot better than it does just with static posts alone. And I'm not saying you can't have just a static post feed. You can some people like are lucky and they have a lot of followers already. And they're doing great with that. But like if you're trying to get more eyes on your content, and if you're trying to make the most of like this free platform that you have, and integrating a variety of posts, especially with like reels and videos is something I would definitely recommend. Just not to use just images, like add animations in there. And when you use an animated post, it shows up as a video, use videos use reels, just to make that Instagram algorithm happy so that you get more eyes on your stuff, because you're putting a lot of work into it, you know? So you want eyes on it?
Collin 46:13
Well, I was gonna say when when somebody says, Oh, I have to do a video or you need to do more video, I think of just being a huge time suck for me to shoot, edit to put together and post. How can we save time? Or what are some tips for working on Instagram or Facebook to post videos but not have them eat up my entire day? Yeah.
Jess 46:33
So I mean, it takes forever, right? It does. So especially like doing videos or making reels for Instagram or Tiktok. So, I mean, my first thing is just keep it simple, it does not have to be perfect. Some of my best performing reels are like, the silliest things that I did, like, last minute and took like no time at all. So, you know, don't feel like every thing has to be like fully planned out. This is what I what I'm going to do you know, and then batch your batch if you can, you know, decide to how many videos or I want to post a week and do something realistic, right? I mean, Instagram released like something saying how many times they want you to post and it's some insane thing I forget, I can't even I just like it wouldn't want everyone out the other for me, because I just like what I think it said like five to seven reels a week or something. I don't know, I was like, What are you insane. So you know, don't worry about that, do what you can, like, if you can do one every week, that's great. If you can do two every week, even better, you know, but like you have other things that you need to do, and like, your job is not to sit on Instagram all day. So don't be too worried about that stuff. It's just being consistent. You know, if you post one reel every week, that's great. That's consistent, you know. And then I mentioned this before, before, just keep them short, you know, answer A commonly asked question, you know, this can be a general pet related question that that people want to know about could be specific to your business specific to your area. You can just do like a face to camera, you know, 15 seconds or less. And you know, that should hardly take you any time use the auto caption feature and Instagram they have it in Tik Tok to, to add captions to that so that if someone's scrolling through and they don't have the sound on on the Instagram rails, it captions what you're saying automatically, and you don't have to type it all out. That saves time. But my members also get real templates, they can customize to save them time. And they just go in there and they can customize them to match their brand right in Canva. So they don't have to even create or come up with the idea from scratch.
Collin 48:37
Yeah, those auto captions really save a lot. And I love how they do draw people in. And it's thinking about the elements that we want to add to each photo and not overdoing it not over producing it not overthinking it, and getting that content out there. Again, remembering why we're on the platform and who we're talking to. And really ultimately, what we want them to do with what we've presented them. You know, speaking of time, let's talk a little bit more about batching content, and, and what content can be batched. And how I can prevent myself from being too too repetitive or sharing the exact same thing over and over.
Jess 49:14
Yeah, so like, if you can batch if you're like, I always recommend it. Like some people just aren't into batching they like to do one post at a time, which it can save time if you're batching but like if you're more likely to post if you do it one at a time, you know, do what works for you. Like I can't batch too many Instagram reels at a time for example, I get totally burnout. So like Yeah, some people will do two weeks worth I can do like two, maybe three and then I'm like nope, I'm done. So do so do what works for you but try to batch but as far as like customizing templates, like if you're a member of a membership like mine in Canva definitely recommend batching those because it's a lot different than doing a video you can just pull it into Canva and use that brand kit and sell it that we talked about, and have everything ready to go like all of those posts ready to go. You can keep them in a folder or you can schedule them, like at the beginning of the month or the end of the previous month for the whole upcoming month, if you want to using something like later or Facebook creator studio or even directly from Canva, you can do that as well. So yeah, like it's like whatever works best for you. But like, if you're doing templates, I definitely recommend like batch editing those, so that you save time, and then you just have like a library of ready to go content ready?
Collin 50:35
Yeah, I think it's about just setting aside 30 minutes or 45 minutes, maybe an hour a week to kind of think through at least what you want to post and then start working towards make actually creating those so that you're not always just every day starting it or ending it going, Ah, what do I what do I post? What do I what am I doing? What how do I write this stuff together. But take actual time to plan that out and set it aside doesn't have to be a lot, but at least it's something to get your mind in the game and get those creative juices flowing. So that you can kind of start just working through and once you start it, it does kind of tend to flow a little bit easier. So that you're not having to panic posts throughout the week.
Jess 51:15
Yeah, and just like having like, keeping that purpose in mind, like what is my purpose? What do I want to promote this month? Are we having like, special? Are we trying to get new Walking clients in? We have openings like what what are we trying to like push this month and creative ways to like do that. And just batching all that together, but also like coming up with ideas. So you're not like God, I don't know what to post about. And one of the things I do with my members get a monthly list of all the holidays observances, I also send them out to my email list and post them on my Instagram account. So like if you're really stuck on ideas, that is a great way to like go and get some ideas is look at the upcoming pet related holidays and observances and be like okay, this is coming up, we could do something fun for this, but like don't like be look at look at the lists and be like, Okay, I'm gonna post the thing for every one of these holidays just saying like, at a National Dog Biscuit day or something. No, no, no. Don't do that. Like, go in there and pick like a couple that are relevant and be like, you know, for National Dog Biscuit day, we are giving away you know, a free bag of treats, you know, tie it in with something that's going to be relevant to your audience and help you achieve the goal that you want to, to do with it.
Collin 52:28
Yeah, like if you I think recently was like National Monday or something like that, like if you if your dog is a mutt, or if you have a relationship with a rescue who you know, is not specific to a particular breed. That's a great tie in to do those call outs or posts particular photos that you can share along with that, that makes it a little bit more personal and have that tighter connection with people. So again, they're starting to understand who you are, what your values are in what you're actually trying to do.
Jess 52:56
Yeah, exactly. And like you can also do fun things like for Facebook and get people more involved in engaging like, national Monday, share a photo of your mat, you know, tell us the story of how you got your pet, you know, something like that to just get people engaged or even like, say, you know, do a fundraiser or something to support rescue dogs.
Collin 53:14
Right, right. Well, Jessica, I really appreciate all the amazing advice. And taking us a little bit deeper into what Canva can do for us. And the time it can save us in our business and helps us be consistent, build that authority and build that trust. And then how we can start leveraging social media to not be quite so overwhelming, and how to take those posts and reuse them time and time again. I know there's a lot here, in that it's an ever changing topic and industry as well. So if people want to learn more, find out more about what you're doing and get connected with you. How can they how can they do that?
Jess 53:49
Yeah, so my social media handle is at templates for pet pros. And you can find me on Instagram. That's where I am most active on Instagram. But I'm also on Facebook and Tik Tok at templates for pet pros. If you want to try 10 templates for free, you can go to my website templates for Petros calm. I also have tutorials there on the blog, and lots of tutorials on my Instagram feed as well. And if you have any questions about Canva or anything, you can always send me a DM on Instagram.
Collin 54:20
Just again, it was a pleasure having you back on and thank you so much. Thank you. How are you currently making your social media posts? Do you find that they are taking way too much time and that you end up getting frustrated ended up not posting anyway, I really do recommend that if you have not already you look into Canva if you have Canva start using some of the power features that Jessica and I talked about on the show today. They're really going to help you streamline your posting helps you stay consistent. It makes sure that you're not pulling your hair out every time you sit down to try and post something for the day. The big word that Jessica kept bringing up over and over again, was the importance of consistency. Not just consistency in your posting schedule, but also the consistency in your branding in how you have your posts structured. Using something like Canva can really help you be as consistent as possible so that your clients know what to expect. It's not weighing on your mind what you're going to post. And it starts to build that recognizable that no light trust factor that we talked about on the show, which is critical to our industry, and building those clients that you really want. We want to thank our sponsors, time to pet and pet perennials, for making today's show possible. And for you listening, we are so appreciative that you're here and we know that you have a lot going on in your days in your week. So we really appreciate you taking time to listen to our show today. Hope you have a wonderful rest of your week and we'll be back again soon.
