IAM1499 – Social Media Strategist Helps Business owners on Media Strategies, Framework and Foundation

Andréa Jones is the social media strategist who helps coaches and experts go from stuck to strategic, passion-led powerhouses and visionary thought leaders with her simple approach to social media: “Take one little step each day. Build your social media savvy over time.”

• CEO Story: Andrea’s parents were entrepreneurs, so it runs naturally in the blood. After graduating from college, she worked as part of the social media team in a hotel where she learned and applied how to manage a media page last 2012. Andrea's husband created YouTube videos, she started her own agency after she moved to Canada.
• Business Service: Social media services. Subscription-based membership social school – teaching social media strategies, framework, and the foundation they need for their business.
• Secret Sauce: Teaching social media is geared towards business owners.
• CEO Hack: Mindfulness meditation. App mention: Headspace – being intentional about having space.
• CEO Nugget: Leverage social media as a tool to connect more through strategic partnership. Building relationships.
• CEO Defined: Being a leader in the business and in the community. You are impacting the community around you.

Website: onlinedrea.com

TikTok: onlinedrea

Instagram: onlinedrea

Facebook: OnlineDrea

Twitter: onlinedrea

LinkedIn: onlinedrea

YouTube: onlinedrea

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Transcription

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00:25 – Intro

Do you want to learn effective ways to build relationships, generate sales, and grow your business from successful entrepreneurs, startups, and CEOs without listening to a long, long, long interview? If so, you've come to the right place. Gresham Harker values your time and is ready to share with you precisely the information you're in search of. This is the I AM CEO podcast.

00:53 – Gresham Harkless

Hello. Hello. Hello. This is Gresh from the I AM CEO podcast. I have a very special guest on the show. I have Andrea Jones of onlinejurea.com. Andrea, It's great to have you on the show.

01:03 – Andréa Jones

Thank you so much for having me.

01:05 – Gresham Harkless

Yes, super excited to have you on and talk about all the awesome things that you're doing to help people become internet famous. And before we jump to the end, if you all want to read a little bit more about Andrea you can hear some of those awesome things. Andrea is the social media strategist who helps coaches and experts go from step to strategic, passion-led powerhouses and visionary thought leaders with her simple approach to social media. Take one little step each day, and build your social media savvy over time. And you can find her online at onlinedrea.com and onlinedrea on Instagram as well. Super excited to have you on the show. Are you ready to speak to the I AM CEO community?

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01:43 – Andréa Jones

Yes, I am ready.

01:45 – Gresham Harkless

Awesome, Andrea. Well, let's make it happen. So to kind of kick everything off, I want to turn 01:00 here a little bit more on how you got started. What I call your CEO story.

01:52 – Andréa Jones

Yeah. So I have 2 parents who are very entrepreneurial. So I think part of it's in my blood. But I went to university for English literature. Can't really do much about that, but keep studying English literature. So when I graduated with my bachelor's degree, I actually got into hospitality and worked for Marriott Hotels, the marquee downtown, for those of you who are familiar with Atlanta, and was put on their social media team as one of the youngest folks working there. I was managing the Spa and Fitness Center and was on a team of people managing social media and that's how I got my lessons learned and all of the things that I applied were just by doing it back then in the day.

This was 2012 when Facebook and Twitter were a thing and that's about it. In 2013, I met my husband on YouTube. So I was creating YouTube videos. We collaborated just like we're doing today, Grash. And we kind of kick things off. And then that's important because that's when I started my business, was he lived in Toronto, Canada. I lived in Atlanta, Georgia. So I ended up quitting my job moving to live with him and started my social media business from there. And the rest is history, as they say.

03:06 – Gresham Harkless

Nice, I absolutely love that. As somebody who's a fellow English major, I understand that there's a lot that you could do everything, but you can do nothing at the same time all the opportunities. It's kind of like a skill more than like a steadfast kind of thing that you learn but I love how you kind of took that wasana sounds like you ran with it.

03:23 – Andréa Jones

Yes, yes you know there's a lot of research, analytics, there's a creative side with writing reports so I still feel like I'm using it today.

03:32 – Gresham Harkless

Yeah, absolutely. I'll say the same thing. So I'm always going to go to bat for any English major. So I love that you have a fellow one on the other side of the mic.

03:40 – Andréa Jones

Yeah, absolutely. I mean, it was a great time. I learned a lot. And I still like to read to this day. So yeah, it's a huge passion of mine.

03:49 – Gresham Harkless

Yeah, you and me both, but I love that you had the entrepreneurial blood kind of flowing through your veins. And, you know, as you said, I think, especially with, you know, social media, there's all these gurus and experts and, you know, all those things that you hear so often. But I love that you had, you know, that experience, you've been able to kind of have professional and personal great experiences that sound like with social media. So I love that you're able to kind of, you know, help clients out in so many different ways.

04:14 – Andréa Jones

Yeah. And you know, I, I was blogging since 2004, which at the time was very odd. None of my friends were doing it. They were like, you're doing what with the internet? I started my YouTube channel in 2007 and still very odd. I sat in my bedroom creating videos about life and, you know, questions. And, you know, I think, my propensity to discover new things and explore the internet just really makes me enjoy it.

And that definitely serves me today because you look at platforms like TikTok, where it's like a really budding, vibrant platform, where you look at platforms like Instagram, where there's so many changes. My job is literally to keep up with those changes and play on social media. And so I'm able to take that curiosity to my clients, to my students, because I actually like social media. I don't know, how do you feel about social media?

05:12 – Gresham Harkless

You know, I'm somewhat mixed. I'm a very somewhat private person, but I also understand that you can't deny the power of social media. So I'm not one of those like I'm sticking my head in the dirt like the ostrich. I'm very much so aware of those things that are going on. But I think that just like with everything, there's a gift and there's a curse of it, it's all kind of determined by the person that is with the phone or the microphone or the video in front of them.

05:38 – Andréa Jones

Yeah. And I think that my rose-colored glasses view of the world is that I know that there's a ton of bad to social media. It's one of the reasons why I don't post my daughter on social media. I just don't want her, she's 4 months old. She doesn't need to be stressed out about this yet. But I personally love it because of the power of connection. You know, you and I can have this conversation and live in completely different parts of the world.

And you can find your people, and your community and make those connections without actually having to physically be close to them. So for me, that's the part that I love about social media. So sometimes I know I put my blinders on and I go, I love the work that I do. I love social media. I'm going to focus on the good of it instead of the negative because it does live out there, unfortunately.

06:23 – Gresham Harkless

Yeah, absolutely. But it's so important to be the change that you wish to be in the world, as Gandhi said. And a lot of times you do that by having those rose-colored glasses on and being able to say, hey, I'm going to create the change and help my clients to create that change. And that is making the world as a whole a better place. Yeah. So I wanted to drill down a little bit more. I know we touched on a little bit about how you're working with your clients. Could you take us through a little bit more on what that looks like and how you're serving clients that you work with?

06:48 – Andréa Jones

Yeah, so I run an agency that does social media for you, social media services. That's most of our revenue. We have about 20 clients right now. A lot of them are coaches, experts, and thought leaders. They have really powerful movements behind them. A few that you may have heard of are Rachel Rogers from Hello7, the Life Coach School, and clients like that. She podcasts as a client. And so when we create these social media strategies, it's people who, you know, they have the podcast, they have the vision, they have the thoughts, and they just don't want to post that on Instagram. They want to, you know, they love doing the podcast, they're writing their newsletters, but like the technical side of Instagram is not, they're not a fan of.

So That's mostly what we do. And then I also have a program, we have about 260 members in our membership program called the SABI Social School, where we teach the exact strategies that I applied to my clients. A lot of the students in the school also don't like social media, but they wanna learn how to use it as a tool to build their business. And a lot of them are working towards eventually outsourcing it to someone else. And so we teach them the frameworks, the foundations that they need to build their business to a level where they don't have to do social media anymore. And so we teach all of the technical bits, the mindset bits, lots of done-for-you content to really streamline that process for them.

08:11 – Gresham Harkless

Absolutely, absolutely. So I wanted to drill down a little bit more and hear a little bit more on what I like to call your secret sauce. This could be for yourself, the business, or a combination of both, but what do you feel kind of sets you apart and makes you unique?

08:24 – Andréa Jones

Yeah, I think that the way that I teach social media is specifically geared toward business owners and not necessarily influencers or content creators. And I think that's what makes my business different from other social media educators out there is that they assume a lot of things about their audience, you know, like, oh, just create a reel, record, you know, these 3 clips and put it together. I take it a step back and my clients are like, I don't even know, like, well, how do I hit record? You know? Or like, how does this actually make me money? Am I wasting my time dancing on TikTok or retweeting this political news or do you know what I mean?

They really want it to be a business driver. And so the difference I think in the way that I teach it and the way we apply it to our clients is that all roads lead back to making money in the business. And so if you're building a community, we want it to be a community of folks that are interested in your offers. They're not just there to look at pretty pictures or a community that's profitable in the sense that, you know, it is bringing you revenue, whether they're referring you out to other people or they're the ones directly purchasing, we want to make sure that that's the community around it.

And I practice what I preach. I only have 8, 000 plus Instagram followers, and we're in the high 6 figures for our business. So it doesn't matter how many followers you have, it's the quality of those followers that matters the most.

09:54 – Gresham Harkless

Absolutely. So definitely appreciate that. And I wanted to switch gears a little bit. And I wanted to ask you for what I call a CEO hack. So this could be like an Apple Book or a habit that you have, but what's something that makes you more effective and efficient?

10:08 – Andréa Jones

I use a lot of mindfulness meditation, and I don't think it has to be super structured. I like to use headspace, 5 minutes a day or less, a little bit of like clearing my mind and being intentional about having space to understand myself, my thought processes, and my emotions. I think as business owners, it's really easy to get caught up in the day-to-day, to get caught up even in emotional experience. And I used to have these really bad, anxious feelings just at the thought of opening my email inbox at the beginning of the day. It was like, who's gonna be complaining now, or What else does someone need?

And so I think just taking a moment to breathe and be like, okay, it's okay. It always has been okay. I've been doing this for almost 10 years now at this point. It's okay to be like, I feel a little anxiousness and I'm not gonna let it ruin my day or ruin my, you know, experiences with my clients. So mindfulness meditation really helps, and I like to use Headspace, but it could be anything. It could be just a moment of your day.

11:12 – Gresham Harkless

Absolutely. I appreciate that. So now I wanted to ask you for what I call a CEO nugget. You might have already touched on this, but this is a little bit more word of wisdom or piece of advice. I like to say it might be something you would tell your favorite client, or if you hopped into a time machine, you might tell your younger business self.

11:30 – Andréa Jones

Yeah. I think that oftentimes with social media, we focus on the media piece and not the social piece. So if I were to tell my favorite client a piece of advice, it's to network and connect more, like Leverage social media as a tool to connect. And one of my favorite ways to do this is through strategic partnerships. So being on podcasts like this one, speaking, collaborating, finding… If you could speak to a group of your ideal clients, That's amazing. And that probably came from a relationship you have with somebody.

So how can you make more relationships? Yes, posting is important, and showing your expertise is important. But to me, the behind-the-scenes work of actually building a relationship with someone, That's not a comment. That's not one direct message. It's years and years of being a friend, a pal, a buddy. So that would be my piece of advice focus on that piece and it will produce dividends in your business.

12:30 – Gresham Harkless

I absolutely love that. And it kind of reminded me of the quote, the secret to overnight success is it takes 10 years. And I think so many times we're talking about relationships and things like that. You can look at it as we kind of talked about the snapshot of a person's life. You see them get in the ward, You don't see the time that they were building year after year after year relationship with the person that recommended them for the war that happened to be on the board or whatever might happen. You don't see those behind-the-scenes, you know, interworkings that happen.

And I think it's so important because I think a lot of people don't look at marketing, social media, especially as something that has to be and can be cultivated over time to build those relationships, not just something you post and then you go viral and then that's the end of everything.

13:12 – Andréa Jones

Yep, exactly. And honestly too, if you're not prepared for it, virality can damage your business more than it can help. I've seen it happen a lot. We actually just had 3 clients go viral last month, but we've been working with them, 1 for 8 months, 1 for a year, and 1 for 2 years. So when you think about even having an agency support you, there's a lot of groundwork that goes into those moments, even though it looks like, oh, nobody knew them to suddenly they're getting 2 million views on their video. That took months or years of work. And a lot of people aren't willing to put that in, but once you put in that work, I think it's so, so powerful to have something that's sustainable and not just a flash and a moment.

13:57 – Gresham Harkless

Absolutely. That's why one of my favorite books is the book, Malcolm Gladwell's Outliers. And a lot of it goes behind the scenes. So you can see that 8 months, that 1 year, you don't see all of that. You don't see the 10, 000 hours. You just see that, okay, that person went viral. That person reached success, but you don't see all the behind-the-scenes things that kind of built up into that.

14:18 – Andréa Jones

Yeah, exactly. I love that 10, 000 hours, y'all 10, 000 hours.

14:22 – Gresham Harkless

Yes, absolutely. And so now I wanted to ask you my absolute favorite question, which is the definition of what it means to be a CEO, and we're hoping to have different quote-unquote CEOs on the show. So Andrea, what does being a CEO mean to you?

14:34 – Andréa Jones

Yeah, to me, being a CEO is being a leader both within your business and in your community. And I think business leaders are community leaders. And So when you're thinking about that CEO status, whether you have one contractor or a team of 20, you are impacting your community around you. So remember that as you're going out and building your business.

14:57 – Gresham Harkless

Nice, absolutely appreciate that. And of course, I appreciate your time even more. So what I wanted to do now was pass you the mic, so to speak, just to see if there's anything additional that you can let our readers and listeners know. And of course, how best people can get out of you, find out about all the awesome things you're working on, and of course, listen to your podcast as well.

15:14 – Andréa Jones

Yeah, so I'll start with the podcast. It's a savvy social podcast. We have over 200 episodes, both me teaching and some really amazing interviews all about using social media. So if what we talked about today resonates with you, you'll really like the podcast. And then the best place to start is my free course. It's onlinedrea.com slash free. It takes the practicalness of social media and boils it down into easy-to-follow steps for business owners. We have things like swipe files and graphics as well to really jumpstart your social media journey. And of course, it's a sample like the Costco sample of our programming. So if you like that, then you'll want to definitely join our membership program. But onlinedrea.com slash free. Grab it. It's the best place to start.

16:00 – Gresham Harkless

Nice. I absolutely love that. We'll have the links and information. The show notes as well too. And I hope you have a phenomenal rest of the day.

16:06 – Andréa Jones

Yeah. Thank you so much for having me on the show.

16:07 – Outro

Thank you for listening to the I AM CEO Podcast powered by Blue 16 Media. Tune in next time and visit us at iamceo.co I AM CEO is not just a phrase, it's a community. Be sure to follow us on social media and subscribe to our podcast on iTunes Google Play and everywhere you listen to podcasts, SUBSCRIBE, and leave us a five-star rating grab CEO gear at www.ceogear.co. This has been the I AM CEO Podcast with Gresham Harkless. Thank you for listening.

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