Content Queen Mariah

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234: Stop asking yourself what channel SHOULD I be on and ask this

Mariah MacInnes

I am going to argue and say, you could have success on any social media or content channel...

If you put energy into learning it, creating on it and enjoying it, that channel will give you results.

So rather than trying to work out what channel you SHOULD be on, work out which one you WANT to be on.

I have a few questions to help you in this podcast.

If you LOVED this episode, make sure you share this on your Instagram stories and tag us @contentqueenmariah. ⁠⁠⁠

✨⁠ ⁠⁠⁠⁠ ⁠⁠⁠Work out what channel is best for you - take our QUIZ⁠✨⁠

KEY EPISODE TAKEAWAYS 👇

  • 3 questions to ask yourself to work out what channel you want to be on

  • How to work out what channel is right for your business

  • Why you shouldn't always listen to outside noise

SHOW RESOURCES 👇 

If you like this episode, don't forget to share it to your Instagram stories and tag me⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ @contentqueenmariah⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠!

Other than that, enjoy - chat next week 💕

PODCAST TRANSCRIPTION

This is episode  234, and I'm going to tell you to stop asking yourself what channel should I be on and ask yourself this.  Welcome to the Content Queen podcast. I'm your host, Mariah. Entrepreneur, storyteller, digital nomad, creator of content bootcamp, and founder of Content Queen. I'm here to teach you how to share your unique story, create content, and market your business with strategy through the channels that work for you.

Each week, I'll deliver a story to help you connect to a powerful strategy around marketing, business, and marketing. And content creation. I'll also be joined by amazing souls and entrepreneurs who are here to share their own journey, along with actual steps to help you take your business to a whole new level through amazing storytelling, powerful and marketing content strategy.

Let's do it. Okay. Let's chitty chat about this question.  and how you can kind of find it out for yourself.  So  you're a business owner, you create your own content.  The number one question I get as a content marketer is always, what channel should I be on?  Where should I focus my energy?  The second one, my friend told me I should be on this, insert channel, what do you think?

This, the questions and the answers.  are very simple. I'm going to share them with you that will help you work out the channels that you quote unquote should be on.  Because basically what happens is everyone's going to tell us what channel we should be on. Oh, I saw such and such go viral here, or I've tried this channel and I've, you know, I'm getting leads all the time.

You should do it. Of course, should,  but I'm going to help you  understand what channel  You could be on  because should is of course with should should should should is a horrible word sometimes because  We hold ourselves to this pressure  But basically the core concept is when you understand the channels you enjoy  then that is the right channel for you.

Now you might be saying, Oh, but I hate them all.  We're business owners. We're entrepreneurs.  We're naturally creative. We, even if you say I'm not, I've got someone coming on the podcast soon to share that you in fact are,  but  we are all consumers in some way, shape or form.  So you will find the place that you enjoy.

Just takes a little bit of digging.  So the first question is,  What content do you like to consume and on what channel?  We all consume, as I just mentioned.  There will be a type of content that you enjoy over what I enjoy,  and there will be a channel that you love  that maybe I don't, or maybe we both love, equally the same.

But there will be specific types of content and a specific channel  that you enjoy the most as a consumer. I want you to explore what that is. If you say to me, it's like more TV and um, you go down towards more traditional paths. That's great, because that might hold the answer. Be curious.  What channels do you like to consume on?

When I first started my business, and this changes, right? When I first started, I loved podcasts. That's why I started this podcast. I loved listening to podcasts, loved, loved, loved it.  TikTok's a big one for me.  That sort of video style, really conversational, really storytelling. So it helps me to identify what type of content I like to consume, which would mean what I would.

Like to create myself.  So over the next week or so just analyze. Everything comes down to awareness, right? Self awareness. See what type of content you like to consume.  The second one, what channel do I actually enjoy being on from a social media perspective and what format of content makes me feel good or shows my genius?

So this is really the money shot. This is going to hold a lot. Now,  what you could do is list all the different channels out there.  It's like the values test, you know, when you write all the values down and you circle the values and then you like keep, you know, um,  like going down the list until you find your top three to five.

I'm going to post a list on socials,  if you can't be bothered making your own.  It's literally like the values thing. You just narrow it down.  You could also take my quiz.  Which I'm going to talk more about. But basically it is a quiz. I ask you some questions. Those questions help you identify what channel is best suited for you.

Based on you, right? Because if you are the business owner creating the content, it's got to be firstly about you. Then later down the track you could outsource a lot of it. You could outsource bits and pieces. But when you're first starting, you've got to be on the channels that you enjoy consuming, you enjoy creating on.

Because That is where you're going to have the most energy. Energy goes, energy flows. So, if you are showing up on a channel that you enjoy, you will see  the quote unquote results that you're looking for from that channel, because you enjoy it. And people will see your energy, people will see that you really want to be there, rather than, oh my god, I've got to create this video, so let's just chuck it up there and, for the sake of posting, and wonder why it gets crickets.

So, write a list of the channels.  See which ones you like. Take the quiz if you want the short track. It's in the show notes.  But basically this is the number one question that I will always ask people. What type of content? So you could go, okay, well I really love Instagram. Okay, great. There's multiple different types of content on Instagram.

I really, I like to  talk. So video. But I'm not really, I don't really like talking in front of the camera. So I could do voiceovers over b roll footage.  Right?  You could go live, because a lot of people, you know, you're just talking more than you're actually, like, needing it for it to be a visual thing.  So it's identifying the channels and then the format of content that you like.

Just because someone says, you know, um,  I had success by just showing up face to camera, being in front of the camera, and talking, doesn't mean you have to do that.  Sharing your voice, of course.  But it could have been a different way.  in a way that you like. And then, as you build more confidence,  you will start to go, oh maybe I could do this, or maybe I would enjoy that.

So, it doesn't mean that you'll never do a video with your face in it, if that's a goal of yours. It's just about understanding when you're first, not even first starting, but when you're finding yourself like, posting for the sake of it, creating, not really getting the quote unquote results that you want, wondering if you're on the right channels.

You just, sometimes you've got to go backwards and start from the start and understand the types of content that you enjoy. And then the last one is, where is my audience hanging out?  Because of course, that's the important part. I could argue that most of your audience is on a various range of channels, but there are always channels that are more optimal.

You know, for example, if you are in the more corporate space.  and you work with corporates, it might be best that you are on LinkedIn.  If you  are trying to market to a certain audience,  you know, a certain type of audience,  for example, have a client where we really want to dive into that sort of, um,  that space where people want to want adventure and they want to find new places and they want to explore a little bit more of their local area, TikTok seems like it makes a little bit more sense.

So that's why we're doing that.  What you can do if there is a channel that your audience is in and you're like, ugh, hate it, hate that channel.  I mean, there's a moral, there's a moral thing, right? There are a lot of people that don't want to go on TikTok because of their terms and conditions. There's, you know, but if it's just generally like it doesn't energize you, create content on the channel that does energize you and see how you can repurpose it onto that platform.

And then down the track, we can repurpose our content into other mediums, so that we can hit that people that watch, people that listen, and people that read, and where they prefer to consume their content. Because we all want to consume content in different ways as well.  So, there might not be a one set answer.

But really, out of all these questions, it really is going like, you know what, I really, I really enjoy being on that channel, and I really enjoy creating this type of content, because it makes me feel confident, it makes me,  And of course, if there's reasons why you don't want to show up a video and it's a fear thing or a mindset thing, then of course you've got to work at it.

But if it's holding you back from posting now and creating content now and, and starting to learn more about those channels, do what you're comfortable in or what makes you feel good for now. And then of course we want to shift, but really confidence grows with doing something. So you're not going to get confident in something without you doing it or doing, um, the thing.

So if it's like, Oh, well, I'm not confident in  showing my face on camera,  you know,  sharing on social media is something you're not doing because you feel like you have to show your voice on camera, your face on camera. Just start sharing your voice in some way, whether it's the voiceover on video, um, whether it's, you know, your written voice, writing, and then once you get that consistency, you start to see your energy going into something, people starting to resonate with it, then you can go, okay, I'm ready to do this.

go out of that comfort zone. But the problem that I see is we get so caught up in where we should be, what we should be doing, people telling us, if you're not doing this, you're not going to get success. And then it just paralyzes us from doing anything.  Or we show up on channels that we don't like, and then there's no energy in it.

Or we create the types of content that we don't like. You know, for example, we could be, um, Um, doing a lot of writing and we don't necessarily enjoy writing or we could be doing a lot of video with our face on it. And again, it's not something that we enjoy at this point in time because you can learn to enjoy and love something, but you've got to go back to the root and go, I just need to find a way that I can enjoy this content creation process that will help me build consistency and habit.

And then I can explore in other places. Basically what happened to me recently is a client said, you know, One of my friends is having success on YouTube, she's getting a lot of leads, do you think I should try YouTube? And the first thing was we had to start foundational, because this client hadn't been posting on Instagram before, just LinkedIn, doesn't have an email list, all these things.

So I'm like, this is our priority.  But,  you could have success on any content channel if you put energy into it and if you enjoy it.  So that person obviously enjoys video, enjoys YouTube. That's why they've seen success in it. If you don't see yourself being able to put work into that channel and enjoy it and put your energy into it, then you're probably not going to see the same results as that person.

So it's about identifying what type of content you like to create and what channel you see yourself on, because then you will see the results in success.  I see people that still see quote unquote success on Facebook, and people go, Oh, Facebook's gone, it's dead. Because it's not about that, it's, it's a combination of what I like to consume,  where I like to consume,  and the channels I like to create on and the types of content I like to create, and then where my audience is.

But as I said, I could argue that your audience is in multiple different channels.  And actually,  for example, if you're on LinkedIn and you're trying to target corporates,  That person also consumes on other channels in their off time. And you actually might catch them at a better moment in a channel like Instagram or Facebook, where they're using it for leisure, because they might be in a space to be inspired by their work, rather than being in work and scrolling LinkedIn as a bit of a break in between with a coffee in between meetings.

So just because it seems like it makes sense to go on to you to LinkedIn in that instance, doesn't mean you can't capture people in different spaces.  I want to inspire you to find where you can really see yourself and where you could see yourself putting energy in because that is the first step. And if you don't know what that looks like, check out the quiz because it will help you get started.

And then after that, we send you an email sequence that is very informative and educational on how to actually get started if you've never started on that platform, and how to really, you know, Yeah, shine in that space. And I know so many people like, oh, I really want to start this, but  such and such says it's saturated and it's not a good idea.

And this person told me, oh, I really should be over there. I should be there. And I just go, what do you want to do? If you're forced to go on a channel that you don't enjoy, you're not going to have the success that that person thinks you will.  If you follow your intuition and start the channel that you want to.

It'll light you up, you'll love doing it, you'll put energy into it, it'll inspire you, and you will see  the results from it because you've put energy into it. People will hear that.  And of course, we can't be energized every single day because sometimes it doesn't always happen.  But if, you know, 80 to 90 percent of the time you really enjoy being there,  It makes such a difference.

So I've seen this in many spaces.  Usually the channel that the person enjoys the most is also the one that I see in the analytics. I had a client that  was always on Instagram, feeling like they had to push on Instagram because everyone was getting results on Instagram, where in fact she really enjoyed video and YouTube.

And then when I looked at the stats, Most of her website traffic was coming from old YouTube videos. So she could go, Oh,  how good does it feel that I can actually go, you know, the analytics are telling me where to go. And it was a channel that she enjoyed and then we could cut up those pieces and put them on Instagram.

So she was still there. And then she could use Instagram as a way to connect with people rather than feeling like she had to be on all the time. She could connect in the DMs and things.  We interviewed a fitness coach, um,  who is now a user generated content creator and does bits and pieces when she shifted from Instagram to TikTok.

We have a whole podcast on it. I'll put it in the show notes and I'll talk about some of these people. I'm going to do a whole podcast on these examples, but Lizette really felt like TikTok was her space. So she tried it and she had massive success. She grew like 60, 000 followers in a really short period of time.

And so.  You know, following your intuition is sometimes a really great thing. And even me with blog and writing, I've always loved writing. And that's where most of my traffic comes from.  It's I feel I connect most with my writings, why my email marketing, my emails, um, have high open rates, things like that sell mostly in my, um, emails or I connect more with the people in the emails because I love writing.

So  it is a creative process, content creation. So find where you feel more creative. And as I mentioned, you can do the quiz to help you find out where that could be. It might not be the answer, but it could be a starting point to get you thinking. And I really want this  to help you. be the catalyst for maybe some change in how you create content, how you market your business, because  it is one of the first things that people do see when they connect with you.

If they've never known you before, obviously if someone's met you in person, they can go off face value and who you are, but  we're in this very online space. So a lot of people make their first impressions from our socials, our content. And if you're not energized, And you don't enjoy it, then that does show, right?

Unfortunately. So I want to inspire you to try and find your space. Now I'm going to be talking about this for the next three weeks. I have a guest coming on next week, Chloe, who is a content creator. Um, That, and she's also, but that's not her background, right? She found her love for like her industry and found a love for sharing it content wise on socials and channels and she's found her space.

She loves it. Obviously, her energy into it has seen her grow.  you know, in, uh, grow incredibly on, on her online channels. So I'm excited to share that story. And then another episode I'm going to do is sharing these people that have found their space and the results they've had from it. So I've just given you a sneak peek, but I'm going to, you know, break that down.

What does that mean in terms of business success as well? Not just,  I mean, there's a balance, right? You want to see the results, but you also want to enjoy the process because content marketing, marketing, it's something that's really going away. You never not market your business. Um, and even if you did, you are, um, maxed capacity in your business, things like that.

You still need to nurture the people, your existing clients, even, you know, I've got people that come to me that go, you know what? I just want to be on socials because I want to nurture my client base. Because I feel like they don't see me unless they're, you know, having a meeting with me.  So there's many ways why we would use content.

So it is really about learning to enjoy it, and I want to be part of that process and help you learn to enjoy it. So  Be a content queen or king and remember that developing your strategy and story develops your business as well as finding the right channel for you.  Thank you for joining me today and please don't forget to share this with all your business and entrepreneurial friends.

You can do this by adding it to your Instagram stories and tag us at contentqueenmariah.  Or just tell them about it. If you do enjoy podcast episodes like this and you love having new guests, I get guests through the charts on  Spotify, on Apple,  and basically,  I get through the chart on the charts because I have good ratings and reviews.

So if you want to continue to see great content, quality content,  um, please leave a review. And yeah,  or even if you have feedback, I, feedback is a gift. So please share your feedback, follow me on Instagram or TikTok, and let me know if there are any topics you would like me to cover in the future. I'm always generating new ideas and obviously we have a weekly episode.

So whilst the last next two episodes have already been defined, there is always episodes to come out. So let me know if there is a question that you might have. I always base a lot of my podcast episodes on things that are happening around me and questions I get. So don't be shy, ask me anything and I will give you the answer, but then also probably create a whole podcast on it.

So. I will talk to you next week where we will talk to Chloe. You'll be super inspired and ready to find the right channel for you. Bye. 

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