Not doing this one thing can seriously slow down your sales coming from
Instagram.
And it's the same mistake that Casey Neistat and Ramit Sethi have made as a
YouTuber and a blogger.
And this mistake has cost them over half a million dollars,
probably a full mill, if I were to guess.
Whether you're a new or seasoned entrepreneur,
it's so easy to fall into this tap, I mean trap.
So if you've got more money going out of your biz than in and you know you need
to figure out this whole sales thing on Instagram, this video is for you.
I'm gonna share with you the most important thing you need to do on Instagram.
But first, to truly put it into practice,
there's a few key things you need to understand. So let's go.
First when it comes to your Instagram.
We can't forget the power of what it's like to speak to a room full of a hundred
people. We sometimes think that having only a hundred followers is a failure,
but have you spoken to a room full of a hundred people? It's nerve wracking.
I remember when I was asked to speak on stage at Social Media Marketing World
and for months leading up to the event, I was nervous, like so nervous.
I would wake up in the middle of the night suddenly with a pit in my stomach
thinking, "Oh no! In six weeks I need to speak on stage and present,
and not fall on my face, and make sure I don't forget my lines,
and make sure that people think I'm an expert." I had so much anxiety for months
leading up to giving this presentation. Good evening.
It is February 27th and my slides for this Social Media
Marketing World event, they're due March 4th, so basically the end of this week.
So yeah, I'm kind of regretting or rethinking my topic.
I'm hoping that it's not gonna be too technical for the audience because I want
everything to just be like mind blowing. It is
The morning of my presentation.
It's funny how your brain can just think about the worst case scenario.
The reality is, is like I have not had one bad experience since I've been here.
They're just really nice, like genuine people, excited.
I'm gonna do a little bit of rehearsal right now,
just opening like the first 10 minutes of my presentation. What time is it?
7:10! We're doing good. We're doing good on time. I Literally couldn't speak.
My heart just like jumped up into my throat. I could barely squeak out words,
and this was live on radio across the country.
I am done my presentation. Luckily, when I got on stage,
I didn't feel like super nervous. I was able to talk okay. Yay! I
feel relieved.
I'm also trying to take in the moment because I know it's so easy when you
accomplish something to not really give it, uh, acknowledgement,
which I'm guilty of doing. So I'm just like, yay for this to be done.
And I did it, I spoke to an audience of about 400 people.
And the day I got there, the day I looked at this crowd of people,
the people who I'd been worried about for months, I had to laugh to myself.
Because I put in so much energy, effort,
and time to prepare for this presentation.
But the reality was for the months leading up to this event,
I had been speaking with hundreds of thousands of people through my email list
and my social platforms. Anytime I sent an email,
I was messaging 60 to 70,000 people. Anytime I posted to Instagram,
it had the potential to be seen by over a hundred thousand people.
Anytime I posted a video to YouTube,
it could have been seen by my 100,000 plus subscribers or anyone else on the
internet.
So keep this perspective in mind when you're worried that your growth is slow or
you don't yet have enough followers. If you have followers,
you have enough followers.
You just need to learn how to turn them into leads and sales to your business.
The second mistake that stops Instagram accounts from making money is thinking
of your Instagram account like a one-way broadcast channel,
as if you were NBC or ABC or Fox. When in reality,
Instagram is more like a two-way conversation with a friend at a coffee shop.
You sit down face-to-face with them, you talk, they listen, they talk,
you listen. This is the back and forth of a normal conversation.
And if you're not treating your Instagram followers in this same fashion,
you are literally turning away sales.
It's like you're that person at the coffee shop who's talking the entire time,
and the other person can't get a word in edgewise.
So they leave that meeting feeling defeated and like they never want to do
business with you. Luckily,
there are two key features that Instagram gives us for free that helps us
cultivate these conversations with our followers.
The first feature is Instagram Stories,
because Stories literally have a built-in call to action for your viewers to
reply and engage with your Story. The thing is,
most people make Stories all wrong.
They'll post a picture of their laptop and their coffee and they'll say,
"Drinking coffee today!" Or the story has no real value to the viewer or to them
or their business. Instead,
you still wanna share personal moments of your day through your Instagram
Stories because you have nothing to lose, the Stories disappear after 24 hours,
and let's face it, people do business with people.
So especially if you're a coach or a service provider and someone is hiring you
as their person, it's good for them to get to know you.
But you wanna think about infusing value into your Stories so that people, yeah,
get to know you,
but also get to see what you do through your business and how you help others
like them.
So here's an example of what you could post to your Stories during a business
day. In the morning, maybe you don't wanna be on camera yet.
You can just grab a clip or a photo from your camera roll and post your agenda
for the day.
This allows people to see what you're doing both personally and professionally
with clients, customers, all that great stuff. In the afternoon,
you can share a tip, a resource, or a takeaway,
something that you've learned that day by working with your customers or your
clients. And don't forget this part.
Include the poll sticker or the quiz sticker in your Story so that people can
tap and indicate that yes, they wanna learn more about this topic. Or yes,
they want you to follow up in the DMs for more on this topic.
This is the power of Stories.
It's using those stickers that allow people to easily,
easily engage so that you can follow up with them. In the evening,
you can share something personal, maybe your wind down routine, or your workout,
or what you're making for dinner. But in this Story,
don't forget to include a call to action asking your viewers to reply to your
Story with any questions they had about your earlier Story,
or your freebie or takeaway. The second feature is Instagram DMs,
because all Stories lead to the DMs,
and the DMs is equivalent to that intimate coffee setting where you're sitting
down face-to-face with your prospect or your customer and having a one-on-one
conversation with them. Most people though,
don't use DMs in the two most powerful ways. One is for customer support.
Yes, you can help your students, your clients, your customers,
through the DMs and give them that one-on-one attention, because guess what?
When they feel like they're getting that from you,
they're more likely to buy the next thing from you or continue working with you.
So don't ignore offering customer support through the DMs.
And the second thing is don't forget to follow up with people who are ready to
buy. The DMs are where sales happen.
This is where you're gonna close the sale. So don't drop those conversations.
Keep them going or revive them whenever it makes sense to do so.
Maybe you came across a resource or a blog post that makes you think, "Hey,
I should follow up with Susie because I was just talking to her about this topic
last week." Go ahead and reach back out to her in the DMS and share that
resource with her. You wanna keep these conversations warm,
you wanna keep the momentum going,
because when Susie is ready to buy your coaching package, guess what?
You've already done the hard part. You've helped Susie get to know, like,
and trust you. And now her decision, it's easy.
But the thing that stops most Instagram accounts from making sales,
and what I need you to stop doing today, is this:
growing your Instagram platform as a free information platform and not a
business. Take this tap water, for example.
Tap water is generally free in most major cities.
So your audience loves turning on the tap and getting free water anytime they
want. Now, the day that you offer a paid option,
like this lovely bottle of sparkling water sourced from the mountains of
Spain, you hear an outcry. "I've been getting this for free the whole time,
and now you want me to pay?" "No, you got it all wrong.
The free water is still there. This is just another option,
a better option that you pay for." "Sell out, boo,
you suck!" If you're doing this right now, don't feel bad.
It's the exact same mistake that Casey Neistat and Ramit Sethi made for years.
Why they didn't wanna be a sellout or compromise their artistic work.
But in the end,
they were only attracting an audience that wanted more of what they'd been
offering for years, free stuff. Don't do this with your Instagram.
You are not running a non-profit. You are a for profit business.
And I know some of us don't like to admit that, but that's the truth.
You don't need to hide it from your Instagram profile or your followers.
Because if you train them to only get free stuff,
how do you think they're gonna act when you release a paid offer?
The good news is there is a way to set up your business on Instagram from day
one that will set you up for sales and not just attract a freebie hungry
audience. And you don't even need a website. Watch this next.