Using Social Media to Effectively Market Your Studio

A HUGE thanks to Sara for coming to this interview and sharing her thoughts on social media! We had such a fantastic discussion about how social media can be a huge resource for studio owners. If you’re teaching music online then social media can be a game-changer for you!

Carly: Welcome to the podcast, Sarah, it is so fun to have you here!

Sara: I'm so excited that I got to join you. Thank you for asking me!

Carly: I'd love to start by hearing a little bit about your musical background. What instrument do you play? How is music a part of your life? How did you get into teaching?

Sara: Oh, I love this. Okay. So I've been singing ever since I was really little, and that's how I got into the music world initially. I just fell in love with singing. Then my mom started teaching me piano lessons when I was five. That lasted for all of, like, 30 seconds, and she realized she had to get a teacher for me. And so I took piano all throughout high school, and I was singing all throughout how high school as well. And then it was just a natural step to go on and study, so I have a degree in vocal performance from Westminster College. Then I continued my education and I have a Master’s in Musicology because I love to nerd out about music history.

Carly: Wow. That's amazing. Off-topic, but do you have recordings of any of your vocal performances online?

Sara: I actually do. At the beginning of COVID, one of my ways to relax was to sit in the studio afterwards, and I would record myself singing and playing, and I shared them on Facebook, and a lot of people really enjoyed them. So that was kind of cool.

Carly: So can we find those on Facebook? I would love to see that.

Sara: I'll have to send you a link.

Carly: Perfect. We'll link it in the show notes, too. I love seeing other teachers do their thing, performing and sharing what they're gifted with. And we don't always do that. As teachers, we forget to tap into that side of our passion, so that's great to hear.

Sara: It’s so true. And I was lucky enough that before all of this went down, I finally got back to the stage for the first time in 13 years. I was in Brigadoon, and it was super fabulous fun.

Carly: So teachers listening today, Sara and I are talking about social media and how important it is for your business. How can it help you grow? How can it help you share content? How can it help you connect with students? All of that. So, Sara, this is an obvious question for some teachers, but for others, can you tell us what is social media?

Sara: So social media provides us this beautiful opportunity to connect with real human beings. And I think sometimes we forget that. So when I think about what is social media, social media is a chance to be able to show up online with people and interact in a real way. Now, for those of us who grew up with social media--and I'll actually say I didn't grow up with social media--at the very end of my College career, Facebook came out. So I jumped onto those platforms like Facebook and Instagram, and then I realized I could use them to meet people who want to learn music. And so I started using social media as a way to connect with potential clients and my piano invoice studio. And it was just a really great way to share the journey. So that's how I view social media. When we're looking at those platforms where you can sign up with a personal profile like Facebook or Instagram, TikTok, Twitter, all of those places. It's a place where you can show up and share the human experience.

Carly: When did you start using social media to connect with clients and promote your studio? Has it been a couple of years, or when did you kind of jump into that?

Sara: So I would actually have to look back on my Facebook page, but I think I started it in 2009, the business account for my studio. It might have been even earlier than that, but that's when I started, and at first, it was just my way to say, ‘this is my place on the Internet’. It was my little business card out on the Facebook land. And then it started turning into a place where I could connect with teachers, too. And that was really fun.

Carly: So with social media, a lot of people think that it’s just a place to share photos. Showing what you’re doing with your husband or children, or showing that you’re studying music. A place where you can say, here’s me and my college friends partying. How can we shift social media into becoming a business thing, without it feeling stale? How do you share the business side of a teacher’s life, without making it feel like they're pushing and promoting all the time? How do you make it turn into this connection that you're referring to?

Sara: This is a fabulous question, and this is something I see a lot of teachers struggling with. They have a personal Facebook account. And like you said, this is where they share. This is what we're doing on the weekend. Here's a picture of my food. Here's a picture of my cat. Here's a picture of my kid. And then they look at this business account and they think, okay, well, all I can talk about on this account is the fact that I'm a piano teacher and I offer lessons. And then we fall into this trap of only sharing links from other people about music education, or maybe just posting saying ‘I have an opening in the studio’ and we miss that opportunity to create a human connection.

So if we think back to the personal page, the reason that people interact with us there is because they see what our life is like. They understand what we enjoy, what lights us up. And that's the benefit of using social media on the business side. It gives us a chance to really show people what the experience is like inside of our studios. And yet sometimes, there's something that stops us from doing that. We find ourselves going, ‘Oh, I can't share the behind-the-scenes.’ ‘I can't share the messy moments.’ ‘I can't share the sad stories or the happy stories’-- out of fear that people will see that and assume you're just using your students as marketing. But really, it's sharing this beautiful experience that we're creating inside of our studios, especially right now, in this moment where we don't have a lot of human connection. And yet, we're still able to create this beautiful connection online.

Carly: There are so many questions running through my mind that I can just imagine the teachers that are listening are asking. So I'll just start with some of them. One that I know a lot of teachers ask is, they don't know which place to put their information, and they often get overwhelmed knowing they have Twitter and Instagram and Facebook and others. Where do you recommend that they start? What's a good place for someone who has never done anything on social media, even in their personal lives?

Sara: The overwhelm is real. And I will say that sometimes I experience that, too. There's a lot of platforms out there that we can use. And we see other people like sharing things like, ‘hey, our studio’s on TikTok now’, ‘our Twitter feed is blowing up’ and you're thinking, ‘How can I possibly keep up with all these people and places?’ So my suggestion for teachers who are struggling with this is to start simple. Choose a platform that does two things. One, it makes you happy as a human being, because it's hard to interact with a platform that we don't enjoy. And two, make sure that your ideal clients are actually hanging out on that platform.

We all teach different types of clients. Maybe your studio specializes in young kids. Maybe you specialize with adults. You have to think about what platform the paying client--meaning either the adult student or the adult parent, depending on their age group--Where are they hanging out? And that's where you want to start. Thinking about the fact that Instagram is a slightly younger crowd. Facebook, I have been told by my students that Facebook is for old people, and I'm like, ‘Well, thank you, student. I'm going to keep Facebooking.’

Carly: And that's why we want Facebook.

Sara: Exactly. So you pick a platform that you enjoy using and just make sure that that platform is going to be a place where people are paying attention.

Carly: I also love referring to YouTube as being a place where everybody is. I find that on YouTube, your students are there, but you also have parents of students there. And when you share a tutorial video, or a demo video, or anything like that, you're really able to capture both the younger crowd and the older crowd. But yes, as you said, Facebook is a great place for attracting all of the friends of your students’ parents. It's so easy for a parent to share one of your videos with their friends when they're looking for a teacher because it's just there on Facebook.

Sara: Exactly. And I love that you mentioned YouTube because you're right, it is cross-generational. Everybody's on YouTube.

Carly: Can you explain a little bit about having a business account? Sometimes teachers are confused with a personal profile and a personal Instagram and the differences between running your personal and business accounts. What are the logistics of having a business account versus a personal account?

Sara: You know, I was just having conversations with teachers about this yesterday, and sometimes we're like, ‘I just don't want any more accounts to manage or to keep up with.’ But here's why I think it's really important to have a business account. First, it's going to set the right tone. When we are trying to run our business from a personal account, it does a couple of things. One, it's actually against the platform policies. They don't want us running businesses on a personal account--that's why they created business accounts. And two, when we do set up that business account, it's telling people we take ourselves seriously and we’re putting that professional foot forward. But it also enables you to do so many other things. On the business side of Facebook or Instagram, you have access to looking at post insights, so you can actually see what is resonating with people. How many clicks did I get on this? How many engagements, how many sets of eyes watched this video? And we don't get the ability to do that on a personal page.

So the business page has all the bells and whistles, which will allow us to do cool things like running ads and being able to hook up different integrations into the business page so people can schedule directly from there. So it's a really powerful tool.

Carly: It's great for teachers to realize that. I like that you mentioned that it sets the tone. For some teachers, there's this gray area or this blurred line with their friends and their students and their family, and it really does it for you when you set that business aside. Then you have your logo, and you have your brand name, and your studio name, and your website, all of it is cohesive. When you add those social media accounts, it even adds an extra level of validation for that teacher, it makes them even cooler, right?

Sara: Absolutely. I think that's the exact term--it makes you cooler. So you need a business account and join the Cool Kids table.

Carly: Can you talk about some content ideas? Let’s say a teacher just started an Instagram account. They're excited and ready. Now they don't know what to share or how to make it look nice. Do you have any thoughts on what type of content is great to share on Instagram?

Sara: Yes, and it all depends on the type of studio that you're running, right? When I talk to people and we are working on content plan we want to think about what kind of a studio you’re running. What kind of a business do I run? Who are the people that I serve? And then we want the content that you share to really connect to those people. So, for instance, if you have a school that focuses on preschool piano lessons, you're going to want to pick up some categories that you can speak to. Things like, ‘tips for busy parents who have kids who practice music’, ‘tips for engaging with your child when they're young and they're studying piano’. Or you want to have those photos out there that show these little kids having a blast at the keys. And that's going to be totally different from the person who maybe serves students who are doing RCM exams, and that might have a different tone. It might be more professional, a little classier. And so depending on the style of studio that you are, you just need to sit back and think, ‘okay, what does that person, what does that potential client on the other end, want to see from a studio like mine?’

Carly: Such great tips. I would like to invite those listening to check out a webinar I did recently called Clarifying Your Message and thinking about what is it that you want to convey in your brand. And then that ties over into all of your social media accounts, into all of the content that you're sharing, and all the way down to your bio and to how you format your website. All of that goes into this foundation of who you are and what your brand is. Even the colors, how do they convey your message? Like you mentioned earlier, there’s a difference between a fun, energetic young-student teacher versus someone who's preparing students for exams in college prep. And it goes down to those fundamentals, so if you're listening and you're in the membership, that's our branding and social media course. So if you're listening, make sure you check that out, because that's going to help you clarify your message and make sure everything is ready so that you are able to then share it on social media. I just don't want teachers to start backwards. Sometimes they start with social media, but they don't have their website or Facebook or anything else set up, and they just want to start posting. And that can be a lot harder. Can you speak to that at all, as far as creating that foundation or studio brand and then being able to have all of these ideas for what you can share?

Sara: Oh absolutely. This is something that I specialize in, talking about branding and really starting by building the foundation. Then we get out there and start sharing a bunch of stuff that we realize later on is really off-brand for us. When it comes to setting those foundations, we need to start with who we are as human beings. Starting with our passions, starting with what we love about music, what lights us up, and really connecting that to the people we want to serve. And when we start to understand that, then we can start to build out our idea of an ideal client. We can build out what that person looks like, and what they want. We can look at what their challenges are, and what their pain points are. What are those problems that they need solved? Then we start getting more ideas about what our brand looks like, and that's when we can step into figuring out the verbal branding, what words are going to resonate with that person. The words that resonate with the preschool group are going to be totally different than the exam group. And then we start thinking about the visual aspects of branding. And what's funny is that the visual seems to be the part that people jump into first. They're like, okay, I need a logo.

Carly: It's the fun part!

Sara: It is the fun part! I'm actually going through a rebrand right now, and I haven't done this in years, and it's super fun to go through and pick out the colors and to work with the logos. But we really need to start with who we are, who we serve, and then we can figure out what it looks like to communicate to that person.

Carly: What can teachers expect when they set this foundation and they're posting on social media? What results can teachers expect, or what results have you seen teachers receive when they're consistent with posting on their social media accounts?

Sara: You can expect two different types of results, depending on what kind of things you're sharing. If you are--and this is something that my audience understands--if you're putting on your #BravePants and you are showing up authentically in your business, you are posting about the experience and the journey of being in your studio. Whether it's this perfectly poised picture of you teaching at the piano or a screencap of you guys learning on Zoom together, or if you're sharing the messy behind-the-scenes stuff. When you're sharing those kinds of things and you're reaching out to people with helpful tutorials, you're going to see great engagement.

And that's the big thing, if you are consistent with it, you're going to see growth. One week of that might not be enough for the social media algorithms to start really chugging along. And eventually, if you're consistent with that, you're going to see more people showing up on your page, you're going to see more people liking them. You're going to connect with more human beings. And sometimes we can all fall into this trap because we might be tired. We're not sure of what to put on social media. If the only thing that you're doing is sharing what other people are doing or posting kind of generic posts, you're not going to see very much engagement, and I know that can be really disappointing. That's why I've seen a lot of teachers step away from curating their social media accounts because they hadn't gotten the engagement before.

Carly: As you're talking, the word that's coming to mind is ‘awareness.’ You want to raise the level of awareness for your studio and your specialty. You want to show what you do and what you're good at. If we're just promoting all the time, we're not really showing them anything. We're just asking for students. But why would they take from you if they know nothing about your personality or what you offer or your expertise when they know those things? It's almost like we don't even have to ask them to sign up because they are already aware of you.

Sara: Exactly. It comes back to the concept of marketing versus advertising. Marketing is when we're out there and we're sharing the experience, we're painting the picture of what it's like to be a part of your studio. Advertising is when you're trying to sell. And if we're always advertising, people tune us out.

Carly: So true, because that's what we do. When we see brands advertising to us all the time, we unsubscribe. We stop following them, we block them, whatever it is, because it's not connecting with us.

So, we're in the middle of a pandemic right now and the world is a little bit crazy. Why do you think social media is especially important and effective currently?

Sara: Right now, it's been hard. You know, we have been through the wringer since March and a lot of teachers have risen to the challenge, and I know we're all feeling a little bit tired and a little exhausted. But, we have this beautiful opportunity in front of us right now, especially those of you who are listening, now you have these students who are doing really well with online lessons, or even if they sometimes struggle with online lessons, it has been one of the only things that have been consistent in their lives right now.

I've had parents reach out to me with no prompting. They've reached out and said, ‘I just want to thank you, because this has been the only thing in our lives right now that has stayed consistent and constant. And it's been really great for our kids to have access to something like that.’ And as teachers, we are growing these amazing budding musicians. So we have to talk about that, because there are parents out there right now who don't have any kids enrolled in music, and they are actively searching for opportunities for their kids to do something. And we're here! If you've got those open spots in your studio, it's time! Step out on social media and share the journey, talk about what you're doing and how much students are enjoying it because there are other kids out there who are waiting for those opportunities to show up.

Carly: You mentioned something about getting feedback about online lessons and how it's helping and how it's become such a joy for people. Sharing reviews is so great for teachers, and they can even use those on social media. How would you go about gathering that feedback and repurposing it for sharing on social media?

Sara: Yeah, hard question, but it's a perfect question, because this is something that I teach about frequently. When we have those little reach-outs from people that say ‘This has been an amazing opportunity.’ Oftentimes, what we'll do is we'll just say, ‘Oh, thanks. That's so awesome.’ And you'll just, like, text back and thank them. But there's this little opportunity there that we miss, and we need to grab a hold of it instead of just saying thank you. Even if this was like, a few weeks ago, or a month ago, reach out to them and be like, ‘Hey, you know that thing that you said a couple of weeks ago, it really meant a lot to me. I was wondering if you would be willing to share that on my Facebook page as a review. Here's a link where you can do that.’ And nine times out of ten, they're going to do it. And most of the time, the reason they don't do it is just that they forgot.

Carly: If they don't know how, or lost the link.

Sara: They lost the link, they forgot, something like that. So it's important to reach out, you know, not just to the people who voluntarily give you that feedback. But it's important to reach out every month to a few families in your studio to ask for feedback. And you can ask right then. And when we make those asks, most of the time, they say, yes.

Carly: People are so willing to write reviews, I’ve found. Especially students, they know you and they've loved you, especially teachers who have been teaching some of these students for a few months or even a few years. They know you and they value you. That's why they continue paying you every month! I encourage teachers not to be hesitant to ask for those reviews. And remember that those reviews are so crucial to getting new students. These reviews totally validate you. The social proof of who you are and what you teach is so huge and often can be even more valuable than having an entire website. Just hearing from someone else that spending money on you and spending time with you every week has been worth it, often puts people over into joining a studio.

Sara: Exactly. I think that in many cases, you don't even need a website. If you've got an active social media account, and a Google business listing and you have reviews coming through there, people are going to know that you are somebody they should contact.

Carly: When your demand is high, you can raise your rates. You can do all kinds of things.

Sara: Exactly.

Carly: This has been such a fun conversation, Sara. I just want to ask one more question. You are clearly passionate about teaching, about helping teachers, about music. You've been recording yourself, singing or why do you do what you do? Why are you so passionate about your music, but also about helping other teachers?

Sara: You know, when I got into music, one of the things that drew me there was the fact that music gives us a platform where we can connect with other people. And I know I keep saying that, about the human connection. It's about that shared experience. Music is a very unique way to do that. And I'm so glad that this is where my life has led me. Through studying in college and then coming out on the other end, and opening a studio and then becoming a blogger. And that's how I started interacting with other teachers. And I just kept following that path. What I’ve found is that for me, it's really about connecting with human beings and being able to make a difference in their lives. Whether I'm sitting down at a piano with somebody, or singing with them, it's bringing joy to them and enriching their lives. Or if I'm on the other side of a computer with another piano teacher, and helping them set up their business, it's not only bringing joy to their lives, but it's giving them the capability to serve more students or to serve in better ways.

And so I see this both as a music teacher and a business coach. I see this as an opportunity to bring even more music into the world, because if we have businesses that run really well, then we're going to keep doing what we're doing. And then we're going to be able to serve more kids and more adults who want to bring music into their lives and the lives of others. So I just see it as this big old circle that comes around.

Carly: That’s so beautiful. Thank you for sharing that. For teachers listening, if you are feeling overwhelmed during this pandemic, or feeling down, or maybe a little bit of depression. First of all, it's expected, because we can't go anywhere. But I would just encourage you to--as Sara has just said--remember why you do what you do, remember that you do this because you want to touch the lives of your students. And if you don't have that in your mind, it becomes so much heavier and it becomes so much more of a burden, versus something that we can truly enjoy doing. And if transitioning online has added to that heaviness, remember your students and remember that they honestly don't know the difference. They could see you on a little phone screen and not know that you couldn't get your computer working, or not know that Zoom shut down on you and you had to jump over to FaceTime. They don't know the behind-the-scenes, which means they just get to appreciate you showing up every single week. And hopefully our discussion today about social media has just given you a little bit more of a boost to know how you can market and how you can build awareness around yourself, because that is going to help you find new students. Once you get your feet on the ground and you feel like you're good, you can find those students. And I hope Sara's comments were helpful for you. Sara, where can teachers find you and learn more about you?

Sara: Oh, okay. So you can find me in a couple of different places. First, you can find me on Facebook. I actually have a weekly live show every single Wednesday at 12PM Eastern and you can find that at Sarah Campbell - Savvy Music Studio, and that's where you can find me every Wednesday at noon, and you can find me over on my website at savvymusicstudio.com. And that should be launched by the time this podcast comes out, which is really exciting.

Carly: Awesome. Thank you, Sarah, for your time. I really appreciate it.

Sara: Thanks for having me.

Check out this Facebook video!

As a part of this episode, I also want to share with you a video directly from my course on how you can use a Facebook Business Page to share content and find new students. In this video, I give you 10 content ideas for different types of posts that you can create and share on Facebook.

Podcast Resources!

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