, hi. My name is Ann Marie Christell. I'm a coach for hairstylist that wants to grow their business behind the chair without feeling overwhelmed or working longer hours behind the chair. I have over 20 years of experience working behind the chair, earning over six figures if you wish to make more money without working longer hours behind the chair and bring in spiritual and sustainable principles into your business and life when you are in the right place. In this podcast, I will mix business strategies, marketing tips, personal development, spiritual practices and sustainable ways of living and working. Welcome to the sustainable hairstylist podcast.
Welcome back to the podcast. Today, I am going
to talk to you about if social media feels like a struggle
for you. I want to be real with you. I have a love
and hate relationship with social media. I truly love the way that I can connect with people. I can learn new things. I can get inspired. I can have beautiful conversations with people that it can end up as friendships. I can have conversations with people that enjoy my work. They they can become clients. And for my salon account that I was running for many, many, many years, I became really, really good at showing off my work in a way that created demand for my work. But I've also have had a lot of hate. I've woken up to over 1000 hate comments over a night. I've had people writing really horrible things, and sometimes some threats going on, and that took quite a toll on me. That really hit hard on me. So
I want to be
real here on the podcasting and let you know my own relationship with this, so that you know where I'm coming from. And some days, I love creating content. I love using social media as a tool, and some days I just feel yuck. I don't like this Yuck, right? This feels icky. This feels overwhelming, etc, etc, and that is why I created this podcast episode that I'm giving to you today, because all of these things that I'm going to talk about today, I in some form, have had as a block or an issue or an idea in my Mind, and things that I have overcome, and I'm the first person to say that we should use social media as a tool. We should use social media as a way of building relationships with potential clients and move them into becoming a client that comes to you get their hair done and come over and over and over again, because those are the type of clients that we do want to have. I think, first of all, as a hair stylist, you use it as a marketing tool. Second, you can use it as inspiration to learn new things, but be mindful of getting stuck into the school. Be mindful of what happens with you and what kind of impact social media has on you and anytime you get stuck in comparison mode, anytime
you start to feel yucky around
certain accounts, my recommendation is to remove them from your feed, because if you using social media to find inspiration, to find ways of marketing yourself, and you're actually getting stuck in the scroll and not using it for marketing purposes, I. Then you're doing it in the wrong way. So today is going to be all about, if social media is a struggle for you, how can we move away from that? And first of all, I want to talk about there might be some blocks that you have. A block is a mindset, a way that you are thinking around something that is actually stopping you to move forward. So one block that you might have is it's too hard, and I've been there. I used to think that social media in general was so, so hard. I didn't understand how to use it. I didn't get it at all, and it felt like the photos that I was taking didn't work. I felt awkward when I was supposed to write a caption, etc, etc, etc. If you believe that something is too hard and you won't overcome it, first of all, what is it that you believe is hard? What is it that is actually preventing you from moving forward? Is it creating the content, taking photos, doing videos, etc, or is it the caption writing, or is it that maybe you just don't know what to post, the more you get an understanding of why do you believe it's hard? That's the first step. And then how can you move when you know why you believe it's hard? How can you get the knowledge that you need, and then create a small step by step system so that you know that, Okay, number one, I'm doing this. Number two, I'm doing that. Number three, I'm doing this. And then just follow the steps. And the more you do something over and over and over again, the easier it will become for you to do it, and all of a sudden you won't think it's hard anymore. A mindset block that I've had is I don't understand how it works, and I can say that I don't enjoy learning new things when it comes to tech,
but it is something that I
force myself to do over and over again, to keep up to date to things. You might feel that there is all of these tricks that you have to be up on date, on and, etc, etc, etc. My recommendation is ask yourself, Who is it that you want to help? Who is your dream client that you want to have in your chair? What does this person need to hear from you in order for them to connect with you and in what way should you show off the work that you're doing so that that person actually reacts and will respond to you? The more you focus on those three things, you don't have to do all of these fancy new things that is coming up, jumping on the next social media platform, etc,
etc, etc. Focus on,
where are your dream clients hanging out? What do they need to hear from you and create content for them. You don't have to jump on the next trend, and if it is some of the things like nowadays, using video is essential to reach new people.
If you don't understand how
to record videos, learn how to do it next month, inside of my membership, I'm creating a full blown class on content creation. I'm going to give you all the tips and tricks on how you can create amazing content from just one hair model, you can create a full month's worth of content, and you will also learn how to plan out everything, so that every day you know what to post and you know what to have in your captions. If you want to join in on that class, you can join. Ann in for the next 30 days for only one US dollars. So if you want to learn how to create video, if you want to learn how to create reels, and if you really want to find your unique voice, that my membership is really the right place for you to be, I will put the link in the show notes so that you will have it there if you want to join in and join in on the class, we have another book here.
It works for everyone else,
but it won't work for me. You are unique. And trust me, if you dare to show your uniqueness, your unique way of styling hair, and tap into that, then people will react and respond to the things that you're working on, but you need to find that unique voice and start to show up on social media. And trust me, the more you tap into that, the more it's going to work for you. But if you're just sitting doing nothing, or if you're looking at other salon sites and seeing what they're posting and just copying that, that's not your unique perspective of things. So the more you can tap into Who are you, what is your uniqueness, and what is your unique way of helping your dream clients tap into that, use that, and it will truly, truly help you another Mindset block that I know people say, and I hear this over and over again from people on social media, I cannot get hair clients from social media. Social media does not work. Yes, you can get hair clients from social media. I've had people flying from Australia to Sweden, from Canada to Sweden, from all over Europe to Sweden, from USA to Sweden just to get their hair done. Because they found me through social media, and they connected with me, and they came all the way to Sweden just to get their hair done by me. So yes, you can get clients through social media, as long as you hold on to that idea, as I was talking about before. Who is your dream client? What is your uniqueness? What is your unique way of helping these people will truly make you tap in to that core, the core of your marketing, and that can transform and make your social media accounts blow up. But we need to learn how to speak. Speak on video. Speak as in, what are you saying in the texts to get people to start to have conversations with you, as long as you are just posting a photo of someone's hair and writing balayage underneath, and think that that is going to translate into a paying client. It probably won't, because it's not showing anything of who you are. More and more people want to get to know you before they book with you. So we want to have every single caption to have a call to action, and that is to let people know what they should do. And in your fact, should be that they should DM you, to start a conversation with you, maybe book a video consultation, etc, etc. So it's up to you to tell people what to do, so we have all of those blocks. Maybe there is something else that you want to work through. If you need help working through anything like this, don't hesitate to reach out to me. You can contact me via my email or at Instagram, at serene flow underscore, because I love to hear from you, and I if you have something that is blocking you, I would love to help you up, because you deserve the very best and the very best clients. Now I'm going to start to talk about how we can actually shift our energy and our mindset around social media. If you believe that social media is a struggle, if you believe that it's hard, then that is what it is you're bringing into social media. That is what will manifest. Best. So I like to always focus on that. When I show up on social media, I get a chance to reach out to my dream clients, and I have this belief now in my business of helping new hairstylists grow your business with finding your unique voice and translating that into an amazing marketing funnel that will actually attract your green clients into your chair. So my every time that I record a podcast, when I show up on social media. I think about that, I have a chance to reach you and help you. You can get your own affirmation or own belief that you decide to hold on to. So I want you to find a positive affirmation that you can use every time that you are going on social media to actually create a post and get the word out there that you exist to reach your dream clients. Then we we need to remember that everything does not need to be perfect. We want to focus on progress instead of perfection. It's better to have something maybe 70% or 80% perfect and actually do something rather than not doing it at all. And every single social media platform that is out there rewards you of showing up daily or showing up consistently. So let's say, if you decide on posting three times a week, that's great, show up for those three days and do that because you're telling the platform that I'm doing this three times a week, doing it over and over again, and that creates engagement and your dream clients will want to hear from you, and if you're not posting at all, well, they probably won't find you because of the noise. How can you then move into making social media fun? What type of content do you want to create that makes it fun again for you? If you feel that social media is overwhelming, if you feel that it's stressing you out, if you have this idea that you have to show up
instantly responding to things directly, or maybe you're just stressed by all the notifications. My best recommendation for you, if notification stresses you out is remove that from your phone. You don't have to respond directly in an instant have time in the morning where you respond to things, and in the evening, I do that, and then with the rest of the day, you can let it go, because there is this idea that we have to respond immediately, directly, when Be on all the time. That's not really true. So how can you remove anything, maybe overwhelm, stress, whatever, and see. How can I feel more secure in my content creation? How can I make sure that it's fun to do these things create the content, etc. If you don't like doing it every day in the salon, maybe have a hair model coming in once a month. Create a bunch of content that you can then use for the rest of the month. But it's important if you believe that it's hard, stressful, irritating, how can you move from that into making it a fun, joyful thing and focusing on that? I'm actually creating this for my dream clients to find me. So I hear this over and over again, all of the different excuses people have around social media. I hear people saying, I don't know how to take photos and videos. So when it comes to this, the first thing we need to really think about is practice. And if you. Don't have a tripod yet. I want you to go on any shopping site or go to the mall and get a tripod to put your phone on. You can create amazing videos and photos by using your phone and using a tripod. You can record yourself while you're working. You can put a timer on your phone and take a bunch of photos when you are working. Nowadays, B roll is super thriving on social so you can record snippets of what it is that you're doing in the salon, put some educational texts over it, and that will put your content out in front of a lot of potential clients. Super easy. When it comes to taking photos of your clients, it is important to think about what is the background like, and what kind of light source Do you have? Sometimes it's maybe better to go outside and find a clean wall that you can take your before and after photos. There one thing that latter hair stylists do not think about is that the fact that the colors on your wall will reflect color on the client's hair. I'll say that again, the color on the wall will reflect color on the client's hair. So when you're taking your before and after photos, and you feel that they look strange when you're looking at the photo. That might be because of the reflection of all the colors that are around in the salon. If you do not have a clean wall, get some kind of backdrop that you can pull up or roll down. I even in my last salon, had my photo papers like backdrops over the door, so I put them over the door, I roll them down. I could take my before and after photos and roll them up again, so there is always space to do that, and trust me, by having clean white background on your photos will make a huge difference in what the color look like of the client's hair, because then You see the hair more clearly, a common excuse that hairstylists have it is too late to start. And I'm saying it's never too late. And I am actually making a test on this, because if some of you have been listening to the podcast for some time, you probably already know that I just moved from Sweden to Provence, and I've had a lot of questions if I do wedding hair, if I do hair styling for events, parties, etc. So because I am a creative person, and I truly, truly love helping you guys out with marketing, but I actually miss doing creative stuff with hair, so I've decided that I will start to offer wedding hair updos, etc. And I will actually create a whole new social media strategy to build that up. And I will document everything. I will make everything into easy systems that I will actually share inside of the membership, so all of you that are already inside of the membership, I will let you know what is working now, what is happening, so that I can actually show you that it's not Too late to build
a social media presence for something new. And if you're getting married approvals and you want to have someone to do your hair, don't hesitate to reach out. Another excuse I hear over and over again is you can't grow a clientele from social media. So I am the proof that I grew all of my clientele for my salon through the internet and through social media. There are loads and loads and other people doing this as well, and I will show it off with my hair up to work as. As well, really putting proof into the pudding here, but it is possible. The real question is, if you believe that you cannot build a clientele through social media, then the real question is, why do you believe that? And is it so that you're not willing to learn something new, maybe you don't have the skill set right now that is needed to do that. So let's move into some actionable tips to simplify your social media. I love patching my content. It's because it's a form of mindset, the more I actually have a checklist of I'm doing all of these shots, I'm doing all of these videos. I'm recording these talking heads. I'm doing this blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. I have it outlined, and I get my makeup on, I do my hair and I do record stuff, then I am in the right mindset of actually creating content. I know that it can be hard to create amazing content in the salon when you are stressing out because you have a client waiting for you, if that is the fact, my recommendation is to have a content creation day where you are taking one of your clients, you're taking the time, and you're actually creating lots of things around that client, and then you create all of those social media posts that you are going to use for like the week or for the month, if you have the energy to like batch that much, and have a fixed time every day, at 9am or 4pm or whatever time it is to show up and just post in that way, when you are in the mode of creating the content, or you're in mode of actually putting it together and editing, you are more likely to get more things done because you are Doing the same thing over and over again. That's one tip. And if you want to learn how to the full course is coming inside of the membership next month, and remember, you can join for only $1 for the next 30 days. So don't miss out on that. My second tip is to look at what is working and what is not working for you, and do that over and over again. If you struggle with captions and need a framework for that, I have a chat GPT prompt that you can use. We will put the link in the show notes for you. For that, first of all, look at what kind of content is actually working. You can look in the stats to see how many are interacting, or how many followers are you getting from a piece of content, or how many views are you getting. And always look at, okay, what have the highest of these, and how can you just copy that over and over and over again and create amazing captions using my chat GPT freebie, promise you it's going to save your life. And inside of the membership, I also have different Google Forms with different captions that I've written all over the years actually helps people moving from someone that's just looking at the content to reaching out and actually saying, like, Hey, you really get me. I want to get your the hair done by you so you can get that as well. And my third actionable tip is to show up authentically. Remember, I was talking about this earlier, who you are, the unique way that you are doing hair is what people want to hear from you. They want to see those quirky bits. They want to know more about you. But there's a fine line between sharing everything about yourself or sharing what your clients need to hear from you, and you don't have to show your whole life. You can share snippets of your life with the things that you know that people will connect with you. And if you don't know what people will connect with you, think about when you are in the salon and when you're talking to a client, what. Is it that makes them go, wow? About some stories that might be an indication of things that you can share. So let's talk about why it is worth to show up on social media. I see social media as a part of your digital storefront. Nowadays, your digital storefront is the thing that will drive people into your chair, most likely, the days are over when people are just going by a fancy salon and they will walk in and just because they see the salon on the street, people want to connect with you. They want to know who you are. They want to trust you before they get their hair done by you. And social media is part of that digital storefront, and I want to remind you that your marketing funnel and social media is a part of that is something that takes time to build. It takes time to put all the pieces together, and the more you have systems into place with all of these, the easier will be for you to show up and consistently move people from being followers into your chair, but we have to think about it as a long term investment. Building your digital storefront is a long term investment. It is nothing that we just do overnight. It is something that happens by showing up over and over and over and over and over again and having consistency in the work that you are doing. So let's recap. I hope that me talking about this in this way can help you out, and I want you to think about social media as a powerful tool and not your worst enemy. Remember to stay consistent, show up as who you are and show more of who you are on social media, and that will build trust. And we want to build trust in order for us to get all of those amazing clients into your chair. I hope that this will help you out. I hope that you can shift the struggle. And if you have any blogs or any thoughts and ideas, I would love to hear from you, and I would love to help you out. Please don't hesitate to reach out. You can send an email to me or send me a DM on Instagram at serendflow, underscore. I will put my email also in the show notes, if you feel that you want to work more together with me, join the membership. You will get coaching inside of our community. And we also have live calls, coaching calls, where I will help you out with where you're at this very moment. So it's not too late, and I will show you that it's not too late, and remember your dream client is waiting for you, so start to show up. I'm sending you lots and love. Bye for now.
