When you run your own business, finding time for social media can be tough.

But what if you sell social media management as a service?

You can’t really say you’re ‘too busy’ creating content for other people to post on your own accounts. 

Because surely that’s like trying to sell personal training when you don’t even work out. 

So how DO you find the time to create your own social media content?

In this live coaching interview I help social media manager Frances Barrett uncover the surprising reason she’s struggling to find time for her own content.

She also shares her feelings about being paid to do something for other people she’s finding it hard to do herself. 

Key moments

[2:05] How Frances ‘sells’ social media management to her clients

[2:55] What Frances says to people who say they can’t afford social media management

[4:05] Why Frances believes she’s struggling to publish her own social media content

[5:39] Why it’s important for content specialists to find time to create their own content

[7:19] Why I don’t think Frances has a problem with time management (and what’s really going on)

[10:08] What small business owners are looking for when they hire a social media manager (and what they don’t really care about)

[11:34] Why great testimonials can free up time in your business (and help you make more sales)

[16:26] Why pricing can be the key to freeing up time in your business 

[21:44] How undervaluing the audience you’ve built can leave you feeling ‘time poor’

[24:38] Why knowing your hourly rate is crucial to freeing up time for content

[25:36] Why you should focus on your own marketing - before you do any client work 

[26:05] Janet summarises what she feels Frances needs to do to find time to create her own content

Key Links

Janet Murray’s Courageous Content Planner

Janet Murray’s Courageous Podcasting Content Kit

Janet Murray’s Courageous Planner Launch Content Kit

Janet Murray's Courageous Blog Content Kit

Save £30 on my Courageous Email Lead Magnet Content Kit using the code MAGNET67.

Save £30 on my Business Basics Content Kit using the code PODCAST67.

Save £30 on my Courageous Launch Content Kit using the code PODCAST67.

Janet Murray’s Courators Kit

Janet Murray’s FREE Ultimate Course Launch Checklist

Frances Barrett website (Jelly Bean Social)

Frances Barrett’s socials: Instagram, Facebook & LinkedIn 

Janet Murray’s website

Janet Murray on Instagram

Janet Murray on Facebook

Janet Murray on LinkedIn

Janet Murray on Twitter

Janet Murray on TikTok

IMPORTANT: THIS TRANSCRIPT IS AUTOMATICALLY GENERATED. WE GIVE IT A QUICK CHECK THROUGH BUT WE DON’T CORRECT EVERYTHING AS IT’S INTENDED TO HELP YOU FIND PARTS YOU WANT TO LISTEN TO AGAIN - NOT AS AN EXACT TRANSCRIPT. SO THERE MIGHT BE A FEW QUIRKY WORDS/PHRASES HERE!

I think it's a little bit of my imposter syndrome. Again, everyone has one month old Hector and he sits on my shoulder and tells me I'm not very good. And any client is going to pull out at any minute that my business is going to fall flat on his face. When you run your own business, finding time to create social media content can be tough.

But what if you sell social media management as a service, you can't really say you're too busy creating content for your clients to post on your own accounts, because surely that's like trying to sell personal training when you don't even work out. So how do you find time to create more social media content? That's exactly what social media manager Francis Barrett is struggling with.

It's, it's definitely a timing issue for me. I just had a baby during the pandemic, and it's kind of balancing the time with the baby the time where it's my client's work. And then my work gets fished in the back In this coaching interview, I help Francis uncover the surprising reason she feels so time poor and has, she can free up more time to create social media content for her own business.

Comparisonitis is real. We're all comparing against each other all the time and, and feeding that imposter syndrome. But when you know the reason why, when you know your why, then it all becomes a bit fair. It doesn't, it You're listening to the courageous content podcast. I'm Janet Murray and I love helping coaches, creatives and entrepreneurs create super engaging content that generates leads and sales for their businesses.

No one starts a business and just knows how to create engaging content. It's a skill that has to be learned from practice, and there's always something new to learn, no matter how long you've been in business. And I know running an online business can feel messy, perfectionism, fear self-doubt and other mindset stuff can stop you showing up online in the way that's best for you.

So you'll get help with that too. Ready to get courageous with your content? Let's get started hiring a social media manager can cost you anything from a few hundred pounds a month to thousands of pounds a month. How do you sell it to prospective clients? To me, I think it's more about my personality, my passion, and I'm very passionate about speaking to those business owners who say,

I hate Facebook. I hate Instagram and give them something that they can turn into a passion either by teaching them how to do it themselves or taking it from them so they can see the results. They can see how many people have seen a particular piece of content. They have seen a particular piece of content convert into a sale. They can see that customer journey from somebody just seeing and paying attention to what they're putting out there to buying from the business themselves.

And when someone says it's too expensive, I can't afford a social media manager. What do you say to that person? That is a really difficult question. So generally I start from the highest price point, light my way down. I like to provide services that can cover every budget depending on if they are a startup and they don't necessarily have much of a budget.

Then I have a, a service where I can teach them a little bit more about social media and ways of I've got VR beans platform and I have our power hours, or I have the full-on is everything all singing, all dancing. And that's a price to per platform service that I can provide to them. If they say that that highest point is too expensive,

then I take out some things and try and judge it to reach a budget that's suitable for them. So tell me about the challenge that you're having with your own social media. Yeah, I think it's really common across the board and that social media managers are doing everybody else's and then they think of themselves last. And I'm definitely a victim of that. It's definitely a timing issue for me.

I just had a baby during the pandemic and it's kind of balancing at the time with the baby, the time where my clients work and then my work gets pushed to the back. And it's very much do, as I say, not as I do social media management way, because we always talk about content plans and making sure that everything works was a purpose,

but mine is very hit-or-miss in alignment just because of time, But your fully books. Why is it a problem? I think it's a little bit of my imposter syndrome. Again, if I'm completely honest, everyone has one month's called Hector and he sits on my shoulder and tells me I'm not very good. And any client is going to pull out at any minute that my business is going to fall flat on his face.

And I think it's still important as a social media manager to practice what you preach to have that reflected in your own social media content is just an easiest sell. But if, and when you need it, and especially because there are so many social media managers out there, there's still going to be somebody who is that's the new is back in most clients that perhaps you should be working with because she relates to them more or resonate with them more.

So, yeah, it's kind of practicing what you preach and showing that you can do the job. Okay. So I'm just going to go over some of that again, because I think that's really important. So you talked first of all, about practicing what you preach and being able to show, not tell so people can come to your Instagram account or your LinkedIn account,

and they can see that, you know what you're doing. I personally feel from an ethical point of view. I think it's important to keep up with what's going on. Sometimes I see social media managers who they don't seem to be up to speed with all the latest things that are happening, social media. I think it is important, I think from a kind of integrity point of view,

but you also said something else, which I thought was really important. And you said, I think it was something along the lines of being able to get the best clients, if you like having, having your pick of the clients, not having to take the people that come, but actually being a bit more choosy. Was that what you were getting at?

Yeah, absolutely. I think that's one of the best things about self being. Self-employed, isn't it, you get to choose who you work with. It's just about having your stamp and what really shows your business in the best light to therefore have it, have the opportunity to show up for, for those ideal clients that you're shooting for. Yeah. And I think sometimes there's this temptation to think that nobody knows what they're doing,

but actually there are plenty of discerning people out there who are too busy to do all of their own content. And I would include myself in that. But if I go and look at social media managers accounts and their content, isn't very good. And it isn't actually about it being pretty for me. It's like, do they have the understanding of how to create engaging content?

Do they understand how to get comments and shares? I'm not looking for big numbers at all. It's just, I want to pay somebody who knows more than there were plenty of descending. People who do know what a good account looks like and are looking for the best people. So that's another compelling reason from the first few minutes of my conversation with Francis,

I immediately sense her problem. Isn't time management, having her talk about tailoring her services to clients. Budgets makes me suspect she is competing on price rather than the value she can offer and that she is setting the features of my services rather than the benefits, both of which contribute to underpricing and over delivering. So I decided to dig a bit deeper. What I asked you earlier,

how do you sell your services to your clients? Can you remind me what you said? There were a couple of words that you use beginning with P I think rightly Passion and personality. Okay. So how important do you think passion and personality is to a small business owner who has a limited budget? I think it depends. I think if you have personalities that are aligned don't,

oh, that's a really tough, Let me, let me rephrase it. So passion and personality. So if I was looking for somebody to do my social media, obviously it's nice that you get along. And if you'd like the person that does make a difference, but actually I'm looking for something completely different. And I don't think I'm actually that different for most small business owners.

What do you think people are really looking for, But obviously looking for good value obviously, And say more about that. What is good value? That's a really tough question because it depends on how the social media manager looks at themselves. So when I first started social media managing as a freelancer, I was massively undercharging massively, and I was posting three times a day and I was researching and creating the content and everything else.

And it was, I was working with 37 clients just to try and make ends meet because I was undercharging myself so much. It depends on how you value your work and how you value your job. I remember going to see a business coach when I first started my business and saying, well, anyone could do social media. Why do they need me?

And it took a lot of work to really push myself to realize I am needed. Like you just said, really? You know, I, I know more than the regular Joe blocks business owner, so I am needed. I, there is value in what I do get there is conversion from content to sale. Okay. I'm going to, I'm going to say something to you now,

which might shop here, but say as a prospective client, I don't really care how much time you're spending. You could be spending 12 hours, 24 hours, 36 hours writing my case for me. Or you could be spending 20 minutes. What? Just small business owners, what do they actually really care about? Results? Yeah. Yeah. So I know we started off talking about time,

but I promise this is really, really relevant. So it's taken us about 20 minutes, I think, to get from passion and personality to actually really get to the heart of what your ideal customers, clients are looking for. And what they're looking for is reassurance that they're going to get results. Talk to me about what results, what does that mean for your ideal client or customer Money?

Yeah. So what do they ultimately want as a result of you doing their social media for That? I want return on investment. Yeah. But then as a social media manager, we can't always guarantee that. Yeah. I totally totally understand that. That's the hardest, I think that's the hardest way to justify somebody to work with you because we can't guarantee it.

You know, it's exactly like, can you get me $10,000 tomorrow? No, There is something you can guarantee them though. You can't go and see them squillions of sales. Because the part that you can't can't guarantee actually is the follow-up. You can't guarantee that they're going to convert those customers, but there is something that you can guarantee them. What can you guarantee them More eyes,

more eyes on their feeds, brand awareness, But more eyes on their feet and brand awareness is not, it's not really making a difference to my business or life, but there is something you can promise them, which regardless of whether they make any sales, it will make a difference to them. And it's really what we're here for There with me. I'm a bit slow.

So you can promise them. I totally understand with the sales because you can't guarantee it. It's like I say to my clients, I can give you all of the tips I can give you all a VFI is the bit I can't do is do it for you. So you could generate that engagement. You could generate the DMS, the comments, but you can't control what they do or what they don't do,

but you can control time so you can give them back time. So what do you think might happen if you don't give this attention? So six, 12 months down the line, if you're still struggling to put out content consistently, It's the top office nays. It's the not being on anybody's radar. Yeah. Yeah. It's just that being consistent, but just with bad content,

because I'm not planning. I think that's the underlying issue because I've not got the time. So I think that's ultimately the issue is that you, you don't get noticed from all the other social media managers who are putting out better content than you. I think you've been quite hard on yourself. I think your content is a lot better than a lot that I said.

So I think you are being quite, quite hard on yourself, but that shows that you've got high thunders back to the question I asked you, I said at the beginning, which was, how do you sell social media to your clients? And you talked about passion and personality and you talked about different packages. There's a few reasons why I brought this up.

So one of them is when we talked about the reasons why it's important for you to show up consistently into your content. Yes. It's about keeping your skills up, showing your expertise, walking the talk. It's also about your short windows of when people come and check you out, it's clear that you know what you're doing to those people who do know,

but also if you're saying to your clients, which I think you should be, you need to do this. You need to invest in this because if you don't six, nine months down the line, you may find that you're still struggling to attract leads and sales. I mean, I don't know what your clients are like, but I don't generally come across people who want to spend money on a social media manager,

just because it's generally because they want to generate more leads and sales. Is that the case? So I know we got on this call to talk about time. I think you could get yourself some time back by actually being much clearer with your clients about the return on investment that you can offer. Let's just talk for a moment about testimonials. So when somebody says,

oh, I think that this is a bit expensive, or they're trying to take something out of a package or questioning your prices. Then being able to send somebody a testimonial and say, well, we worked with this person last year or this company. And as a result of the work that we did, they made X amount more money, or they saved whatever time it was when you can demonstrate a real clear return on investment,

because you've got a strong testimonial that actually shows the transformation that you offer. That means you can, you can charge more because you've got the pre. So do you feel that you have that social proof? Yeah, I think that's, you know, I think they push you over that generally after power hour. I think I mentioned it twice and I could remember when I first started out,

when I was trying to get all the testimonials and everybody would get like a monthly email from me and gave me a testimonial. But yeah, I think that's something that I really need to put back onto my radar. What I should have said to Francis hair is that she shouldn't be sending automated emails to ask our clients for testimonials. If you want to get testimonials,

you need to make it as easy as possible for people to say, yes, it's easy to ignore an automated email. It's not so easy to ignore a personal text or phone call from someone you like. And Francis is certainly very likable, especially when you offer to send a template, to create the testimonial with your clients on the phone or on zoom in just a few minutes or even create the testimonial for them and just send it over for approval.

These are strategies are using my own business to get amazing video and written testimonials for my own clients. This is what I always say about pricing is like, you can charge what you like. You can charge 50,000 for your lowest social media package. If you can make me a hundred people adjust, looking for return on investment. And if you have proven results and you have proven stories and testimonials of people who have not only gained their investment back,

but actually generated more or it can be time. Like time is really powerful as well. And people will, will have different things that they want. So again, it may feel like this is irrelevant to this time thing, but actually one of the things I think that's keeping you stuck time-wise is having to have more clients on your books. And if you had less clients who were paying you more,

because you were able to prove the results that you've got, then you would have more time. But the other side of it is that as a social media manager, what are the things I think you'll, you probably are doing it, but maybe you're doing it more in direct ways. You're you're saying to people, content is important because content generates you leads and sales,

but you're not doing it yourself. So it's not even so much about the scale. It's more about if you're telling other people that they need to invest time in content to generate leads and sales for their business. Then why aren't you doing that too? I don't need you if you ever have this with clients, but I'm sure people pay you for social media and then they don't do what you ask them to do.

And they don't give you the collateral that you need, the pictures or the cocky, whatever you've asked them for the minimum, you need create your content. But if you're not prioritizing it in your own business and saying, well, actually this is the first thing that I do before I work with my clients. And it's the first thing that you should be doing then can you say,

how does that kind of disconnect there? I'm assuming that you, if a client asked you that you would say, actually it's important that you do your own marketing first and you, you look after your pipeline, your sales pipeline, and by showing up every day and investing in content, then you're ensuring that you've got leads and sales six, nine months down the line.

And seeming you say that to your clients. Of course. Okay. So this is also about you showing them and say, well, this is what I do too. I prioritize my content and my marketing first because I understand I need to keep my pipeline full. But also you may even also have said to them that they can be fussier about who they work with.

Like, if they've got lots of leads they can pick and choose. Whereas if they're scrambling around looking for their next client, then they're going to have to just take what they can get. I don't know if you've ever said that to them, Never, But it's true. If you've got a pipeline, if you've always got inquiries coming in, you can afford to be choosy and you can be afford not to not to have to work with everybody and to put your prices up.

What I'm hearing is that the issue is more around sales and it's not about you not selling it's about you getting clearer between the link or about, I should say the link between what you do and the transformation for the customer or client, because all the time that you're talking about passion and personality and we'll do this many posts, like they don't care, they don't care how many posts you do.

They don't care where you post them, particularly what they want is sales ultimately, or they want to be internet famous, whatever then, or they want you to save them time. You get the confidence to charge more. You get the confidence to turn people away when you have to prove. And I think you do have the proof, but being able to say to somebody,

well, the reason we charged this is because typically our customers or clients see this type of ROI. That's quite different than, than what we were talking about before we got on to this call. Are we okay to talk about that briefly you were talking about using about using contractors and how you, you outsourced to trusted social media managers and you're like the account manager,

but you were saying that you're taking quite a small percentage on top because you feel that's fair and you don't want to be not nice, grabby, whatever. That's what I'm guessing is probably going on. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. So I'm not a grumpy person. And so, and even like the fact that I'm talking about money is making you stutter and it's meant that I'm now not earning as much as I was before I was outsourcing.

I feel like my business has grown too quickly for me to really keep up and to really review what I'm doing myself, because I'm trying to be ethical my freelancers too. So, Okay. Let's dig into this. So what makes you feel it's grubby to do any more than just put a nominal percentage on top when you've got the work through the hard work that you've done and the content that you've created and the connection that you've got,

what makes it feel grabby for you to do any more than just pop a little? It sounds like you're just getting a little, a little percentage on top. What, what, what makes it feel crappy? I think it's because I hand out over accounts to these freelances, they're either June part of our engagement package or they're doing the content creation or they're doing the whole lot.

So they're doing the stuff that I'd be doing and I'd charge a certain amount for that particular service. And for me to say, oh yeah, I'll take, I'll take 50%. Obviously it wouldn't be 50%. But for me to take a larger amount just feels, I don't know. It does feel crappy. It feels like I'll have to charge the client more in order for me to get more.

And then the client might say no, because it's out of budget. And it just, I get is Hector, isn't it. As to the imposter and he kind of pops up, where would you even start when you come up with that figure? So the place to start is to look at how many hours you've got available to work. I don't know whether you have childcare across the week or whether you work in evenings or weekends,

but actually look at those hours and then track your hours for a couple of weeks and see what you're actually doing in those hours. You might find, and it's horrifying, but you might find it, your current prices that you're working for 10 pounds an hour or something like that. You can't get this 15 hours back a month or 20 hours a month to do your social media until you know what you're doing with the rest of your time.

And then, and that's the case to say, okay, well, I don't know, cute. You know, off the top of your head, how much time you have to work during the week at the moment? No, my head generally is between that times. So, you know, if you had, I dunno, 30 hours a week or something like that,

and you want to find five of those, you need to either put your prices up or drop a client. It's probably going to involve putting your prices up in order to free you up to do that. So can you see how it's not really a time problem? It's more of a organization of your business problem. Once you know that how many hours what's been working a week.

So what is my hourly rate at? How much am I actually putting in my pocket? You may be horrified by the way as many business ends are. That'll give you an idea of, okay, well, if I put my prices up by 10%, if I put my prices up by whatever, if I took a higher percentage for my freelancers, do you ever get clients?

And you think, oh, I think I can see trouble. I don't. I think I'd rather not work with, and you can say no to that client because you're bringing that income in somewhere else. The only invest bit of advice I can give you about getting your own social media content on first is to do it first. So I always do my marketing before I do my client work,

which might seem crazy because those kinds of paying you. But I know in particular, in what we do, I know that if I'm not prioritizing marketing, how can I turn around and say to one of my clients, oh, you need to do marketing first. If I'm doing it at 11 o'clock at night and not doing it properly. So I literally do direct first.

It's my worry for you is because you have these bigger questions and issues around, well, how many hours do I actually work? What is my hourly rate? How much would I need to put my prices at? It's probably not much. It's probably could be quite a small percentage increase, but that would give you back that time that you need in the week.

And it's just that simple. It's the first thing I do. When I sit down at my desk, if I do my own content and the client stuff, just eat, just go second. It's like a doctor telling somebody to lose weight. I can overweight doctors telling somebody they need to lose weight, but you're telling them they need to prioritize marketing.

They need to do their marketing first. Otherwise they may not have any clients or they may not be able to pick and choose it's about you doing the same. Does that make sense? Yeah, Absolutely. Yeah. It's so easy. Isn't it? When you think. Okay, so we've covered a lot and it's probably not going how you were were expecting it,

but I think we've uncovered the real issues that need to be solved. So what are the key takeaways for you? Learn how rubbish my hourly rate is and come up with a plan to revisit that marketing in the morning is a great, great tip. I'm definitely going to implement that, Put it on the calendar, block it out. Not let anything else get in the way of it.

It's your hour Day, that first key takeaways. I think you need to understand how many hours you're actually working, because you can't reduce them until you know how many you're working. So contract for a couple of weeks, you need to know what and how of your time is worth. And you need to put your prices up, but you won't know where to put them up.

And so, you know what you're actually doing. And that's how you get your first hour of the day back to do your, your content. I really don't think Francis has a problem with time management after all, she's managing multiple clients accounts and a team of freelances and doing a really good job of it. Her problem seems to be more around sales while she's clearly not afraid to promote her services.

She isn't able to articulate the transformation. Her service offers both to herself and crucially to prospective clients. This means she's almost certainly undercharging for her services and not attracting the clients. She deserves. Francis also undervalues her role as an account manager and to the value of the audience she has built, hence paying her freelances more than herself in order to free up the time she needs to work on her own content.

Francis needs to stop talking about the features of her services and talk about the benefits. This will allow her to raise her prices and attract clients with bigger budgets who will pay what her expertise is, where and freeing up time to work on her own content will be instrumental in helping her attract better paying clients because people only pay top rates for people who are at the top of their game.

I've included links to Francis's websites and her socials in the show notes of this episode. And do please take a look at her Instagram account. She's at jelly beans social. And if you enjoyed this episode tag, both myself and Francis M on Instagram, I'm at Jan Murray UK. Tell us what you enjoyed about this episode. Would you like to grow your audience on social media,

head over to Janet murray.co.uk/audience to take my 62nd audience growth quiz, find out the steps you need to take to build your online audience and your sales. You get a detailed report with actionable tips, tried and tested with hundreds of my clients from both products and service based businesses. So you can start creating super engaging content to attract your ideal clients today. Thanks for listening to the courageous content podcast.

If you enjoyed this episode, please leave a review on apple podcast or share the episode on social media. That way more people can benefit from the free tips and strategies I share and be sure to just hack me when you do I'm at Jan Murray on Instagram, Twitter, and TikTok.