Mike meets with Savannah Kell, Junior Designer at Punchmark, to talk about everything she's done to renovate the Punchmark Instagram account, what goes into managing an account sustainably, and the differences in approach for a B2B account versus a B2C account.
Send feedback or learn more about the podcast: punchmark.com/loupe
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Mike meets with Savannah Kell, Junior Designer at Punchmark, to talk about everything she's done to renovate the Punchmark Instagram account, what goes into managing an account sustainably, and the differences in approach for a B2B account versus a B2C account.
Send feedback or learn more about the podcast: punchmark.com/loupe
Learn about Punchmark's website platform: punchmark.com
Welcome back everybody to In the Loop. Our goals are with it. Since we're a B2B Instagram, it's kind of an interesting look at what the goals of a B2B Instagram is versus a B2C, which is much more common, and what your business would probably be doing. If you are a retailer, you're probably trying to attract customers and we're trying to attract other businesses, so the way that we're talking and approaching Instagram is slightly different. But Savannah also breaks down how she sets up a pipeline for the content and makes this content so that it looks great and is on brand but also doesn't consume all of her day-to-day. It's really fun talk and we kept this episode a little bit shorter so that you could digest it a little bit better, and we're gonna have a lot of client workshop content coming at you real soon, so stay on the lookout for that. But please enjoy as we talk about our Instagram and give us a follow at Punchmark websites on social media That'd really be appreciated.
Speaker 2:Thanks, Enjoy. This episode is brought to you by Punchmark, the jewelry industry's favorite website platform and digital growth agency. Our mission reaches way beyond technology. With decades of experience and long-lasting industry relationships, Punchmark enables jewelry businesses to flourish in any marketplace. We consider our clients our friends, as many of them have been friends way before becoming clients. Punchmark's own success comes from the fact that we have a much deeper need and obligation to help our friends succeed. Whether you're looking for better e-commerce performance, business growth or campaigns that drive traffic and sales, Punchmark's website and marketing services were made just for you. It's never too late to transform your business and stitch together your digital and physical worlds in a way that achieves tremendous growth and results. Schedule a guided demo today at punchmarkcom. Slash go.
Speaker 1:And now back to the show. Welcome back everybody. I'm joined by Savannah Kell, junior designer at Punchmark. How are you doing today, savannah? Good, how are you? I'm doing? All right, I'm super excited. We're going to talk about the Punchmark Instagram and also we're just basically going to kind of use this as a extended allegory for why our listeners and just retail jewelers in general should be kind of paying attention to their Instagram. It's never too late to get back into it. So you've been leading the Punchmark Instagram charge for the last. How long has it been? A couple months now.
Speaker 3:Yeah, since the beginning of the year, I would say now, so a few months.
Speaker 1:Nice and to give people an idea, we started the Punchmark Instagram back when I started here. I think I picked it up in 2018 and I posted on it. I took care of the first 200 posts, I think it was, and I just, you know, posted every single day. We had a content calendar Back then. We were doing like stuff on Adobe Illustrator and we would put the art boards right next to each other so that you could crop stuff and you'd be able to preview things. It was very, I want to say, low tech, but high tech at the same time, and it was just like required a lot of work to get involved in, and I think we posted and then I finally was like okay, I'm not going to do this anymore. If anybody wants to pick it up, they can. But it laid dormant for a couple years and now you're running it. What are your goals with this Instagram at this point?
Speaker 3:Yeah, I definitely noticed that it was sort of kind of left to kind of wither away a little bit, for lack of a better term, and I was thinking about it just seeing like other companies being very trendy with social media. So I was like, why don't we just start picking it up? I wanted to, you know, help build our audience. We kind of talked about having stuff like the vendor vault to talk about us and our accomplishments and upcoming things, and I was like, why don't we translate that over to the Instagram as well? So that's one big reason why I wanted to start posting on there again.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I think Instagram is just. It's just another medium for brands to have a personality and a voice and another touch point with clients, because pretty much all of our clients have an Instagram varying levels of utilization out of them. I think that the big difference with our clients versus our Instagram is that our clients are B2C business to customer or consumer I think it is and we are B2B business to business. So, as a result, inherently, the voice and the conversation is different. However, I think that Punchmark's branding is something that is supposed to be very tangible and identifiable and something that has a personality to it, and I think that you, picking this up, it's been very effective for you to, yeah, like, allow that brand to kind of come through a little bit more.
Speaker 3:Oh yeah, I like really had a lot of fun exploring the brand with working on Vendor Vault and that allowed me to kind of like nail down the processes and like the overall look and translate it over to Instagram, because we have such like bold fonts and really unique colors and it's really like attention grabbing. So it's definitely something I wanted to bring over to the Instagram.
Speaker 1:And it's just nice way to get a little bit more of a of like a timeline of what's going out. Because one thing I think about all the time is within the loop is that inherently so I look at the downloads all the time and inherently, every single download it's like 80% of that or 90% of that week's downloads are going to be on the most recent episode that came out on Tuesday and then probably 8% are going to go to the second episode. Usually from people listening to the first one, it goes into the second and then the rest of it. It's just sprinkled throughout the playlist. And I sometimes think about like we've made some awesome episodes but they're just kind of shelved away and they just get pushed farther and farther down. I mean, we have like 170 or 180 episodes at this point and they just kind of get pushed down.
Speaker 1:And with Instagram, I think it kind of has like a prettier. It's almost like a display case, like a showcase. You know, I don't know, it's just like. I guess that's like a whole conversation about like the inherent permanence level of social media. So I don't know, it's just kind of a really nice way for us to kind of display that a little bit more kind of put together.
Speaker 3:I think you saying display case is a really interesting way to put it, especially because now with, like, my kind of takeover, I've wanted to start showcasing client sites that we've designed. So it is kind of like a little art gallery in a way of showcasing, hey, this is what we can do and among a bunch of other things that we promote. But I really like that you mentioned that.
Speaker 1:Yeah, Kind of like a little like a trophy or something that kind of goes into there and pretties it up or like a China cabinet. But again, so we being us being B2B, are there any other B2B businesses that you have looked to that you've taken some inspiration from? Because I think very most often we are just consumers, so we are kind of the C of the B2C funnel. Are there any B2B businesses that you can think of that kind of are giving you inspiration or guidance for how they're running their Instagrams?
Speaker 3:Not necessarily at first, but when I started looking more into like the punch mark, like who follows us and who we follow, I really took a lot of inspiration from how KV runs their Instagram as well as like Alex with her Diamonds Diaries. Like Alex with her diamonds diaries, I really enjoyed like seeing them with their consistency, and that's something that plays in a lot with how I wanted to approach the Instagram, because being consistent with it and maintaining it will help us in the long run, gain a following and continue to build engagement, which is something I've been paying close attention to. So I would say I'd probably say KV Jewels was the big one for me.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I think it's. It's good to know that it's never too late for us to start and I just have it on open rate on my, on my, on my second screen and it's funny kind of scrolling down when you get to the break between you know when you were posting, versus like our old stuff. It's so interesting. It's a completely different tone, a completely different vibe and I think back in the day when I was running the Instagram, it was just so I was like so embarrassed about that, like I don't want to kind of show like the seam or like show that we didn't have like this plan all along.
Speaker 1:But then I think when you go and you look at the B2B Instagram that I look at the most is HubSpot, I think, does a really good job. They have a great brand voice. I think Slack does a really good job too. So Slack owned by Salesforce we use Slack at Punchmark to communicate across the teams and the way that they present themselves. Not to mention that their brand colors are really fun. They have like a purple and like a bright red, blue, yellow, green, I think it is and it's they just feel so tactile and fun with how they do it and but inherently they are, you know, approaching other businesses. So I think, so far, I think that you've done a really good job and it's kind of positioning ourselves to, to show that we are practicing what we preach.
Speaker 3:Thank you so much. That means a lot.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and I guess another thing is is, like, what is the actual, like goal? Is it to just create our, our brand, uh, extend our brand and make it so that we are kind of more in people's face, you know when they, when these business accounts are scrolling social media, or what is it that you think that like? How does this fit into the punchmark marketing strategy?
Speaker 3:I think getting our brand out there is a big one, but ultimately, what I've been reflecting on as of recently is kind of approaching a new generation of jewelers. I know there's been a lot of talks of trying to connect with, like millennial and Gen Z jewelers, since those are ultimately who's going to be taking on different businesses across the US and across the world. So I think reaching out via social media, it's such a strong platform that we can, you know, engage with literally anybody. It's very important for us to have that kind of platform and reach those kinds of audiences.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I guess it kind of also comes down to if your business, so your jewelry store, if you guys are trying to attract this next generation of shoppers, so, for example, gen Z increasingly going to be the ones that are getting engaged, proposing or just having expendable income that they can start spending elsewhere. And also I mean Gen A, gen Alpha, gen A, I think, is becoming quickly that market as well. I think that Gen A started only in like 2005-ish, 2007-ish, and they're going to be fast approaching that market and, as a result, we definitely you need to have that conversation, like if that's going to be a major part of your business. You can't be marketing to the next, that next generation on places where they won't be found. For example, they're not trusting Facebook as much, and so it's like man, if you're dumping all your money into having Facebook, you're just, as a result, not going to be catching any of this. You know, especially Gen Z, because they don't really use Facebook anymore. Is that right?
Speaker 3:I mean as our resident Zoomer over here, yes, I am the resident Gen Z at Punchmark, but I personally don't use it, not for any particular reason, it's just there are other social media platforms that are a little more interesting to me, but there is like that trend of not using Facebook. And I don't want to speak for Meta as a company, but I feel like that's one reason why they have Instagram under their belt, because they want to, you know, get a little trendier and reach a different audience. So I think that definitely helps them.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I totally agree. I think that the big blue app. They knew that it was going to kind of go away and it kind of has. I guess I don't really even know what Facebook is, its utility is for.
Speaker 1:I think the best thing about it is that it's a very accessible set of communities and you can find information on there pretty easily. We use it for our punchmark Facebook community and that has been very useful because our target demographic is typically older generations, so either the baby boomers or Gen X and millennials increasingly are the store owners. We can find them on Facebook very easily and they check it quite a bit because they're running businesses, business pages for their stores, and it makes it so that it's very natural fit for us. But I mean, give it 10 more years and maybe it'll go away. I originally wanted to have Reddit. Be you know, I wanted us to create a subreddit for Punchmark and, truthfully, it just never really made sense because then you'd have to convince all these people to make Reddit accounts. So that's how we ended up with the community.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I definitely don't see a lot of our like clients using Reddit. It would probably be a majority of us workers at Punchmark being the more engaging on the subreddit.
Speaker 1:Yeah, now we're going to take a quick break, we're going to come back and then I want to talk about how you're managing it and posting things, because it's really interesting. It's super easy how you've been running it, so maybe people will learn something, so stay with us everybody. Good news everybody. Punchmark just released new digital marketing programs starting at just $199. Many of our listeners are Punchmark website clients and they trust us to handle their online branding and their e-commerce, but they've had their PPC and SEM grandfathered in with a local agency or even their radio station or newspaper. This can cause headaches, as it increases the number of vendors you'll deal with, leaves a lot of question marks for what is actually getting done effectively and is a generic solution not tailored to the needs of a jewelry store. And not to mention, many of these local agencies also service their competitors, and if you're existing in a small market, that's no bueno.
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Speaker 1:And now back to the show. All right, everybody still talking with Savannah Kell, the junior designer at Punchmark. And Savannah, I want to ask you about how are you posting this? Because there's this quote from season one of In the Loop, where real time can waste time. How are you posting these? Is it in real time or do you have some type of automation?
Speaker 3:I do utilize automation. I try to schedule things out Ideally I would like to do at least a week in advance, but sometimes that's not the case but creating the actual assets, I go into Adobe Illustrator, similar to how you did, just because I'm familiar with those tools, but I go over to Adobe Express and schedule them that way. They have a whole calendar for each month and it's really easy to just click a day and you get to pick a channel that you want to go. I'm primarily focused on Instagram, but they allow you to post to Facebook, twitter, tiktok, all the other big apps, and you can write a caption there and then you select the assets you want to upload. Or you can make it in Express itself I haven't dabbled with that quite yet, but and then you just schedule it out with the time. You can select dates if you want to change the date and then the time and then schedule it out.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I think one of the things that Alex from KB Jewels had recommended that just like think one of the things that Alex from KB Jewels had recommended that just like a couple of housekeeping things that you can do for yourself to make it so that your Instagram is set up for success is one of the things is just sign up for a Linktree account, and Linktree is just a. It's your link in bio, but it allows you to have like multiple links in bio. We use it and I think it links to all of our various places, including Book links in bio. We use it and I think it links to all of our various places, including book a demo. I use it for myself, just on my own business account, because it allows me to link to my Etsy and my portfolio and to various other social medias.
Speaker 1:I definitely recommend that you do it. It's free, it takes two seconds Definitely the most bang for your buck. And also, I see that you're doing these three up posts, like, for example, you have this client workshop banner. Can you just talk about how you do that and what like the goal is with that?
Speaker 3:Sure, it's been very trendy as of like I want to say, the past two years to do more carousel specific posts. But with the client workshop banner I wanted to do three separate. I actually took inspiration from Lumin Dior. I saw that they had a sale going on and I really liked the way that was laid out and it had all the information in each caption. So I was like, well, since we're really big into promoting the client workshop right now, let me try to dabble with that. So I took the design that you did for the community banner and just translated that over into Adobe Illustrator, put three art boards right next to each other and made a seamless image and then just scheduled out like a minute or two difference and it was really pleasing to look at as a gridded format on our page and I just pinned it to the top so everybody would know if they're clicking on our profile that that's what we got going on recently, Do?
Speaker 1:you think that there's any any problem with keeping those after the event happens? Are you like planning on deleting them afterwards, or is it just okay for them to you know, cause they'll naturally break apart as they get pushed down the feed? Does that bother you or is that nothing?
Speaker 3:Didn't think about it that hard, but I don't see a problem with keeping it. I think it's a nice like reflection for when we do like say a few more of the workshops, we can say, oh, this is what we sort of did for this, what can we do to improve it next time? Or I think this had a really nice response, let's continue to do similar things. So I think it's nice to kind of just keep to reflect.
Speaker 1:Yeah. And one thing I've noticed, especially with working with you, because you were my help for the coffee thoughts, so we do this thing, a Coffee for your Thoughts. It's like our little start of the year campaign where we community activate. We just ask people, hey, what are you excited about for this year? And then if they comment, then we send them a coffee gift card in the mail as well as a card that just says hey, thanks for being involved.
Speaker 1:And one thing I've noticed this was our second time doing it. It's so much easier. The second time, like, we already had the template. I already had the entire run of, you know run of the event. We even had pretty accurate estimations on how many gift cards we were probably going to need. You know we were like within two and all those kinds of things. It just makes it so that as you get into the flow it gets easier. And I think for you know running the Instagram I'm hoping it's been, you know, about four months since you started it I'm hoping that when you get to like one full year, you'll kind of have like a flow and template for everything and then it's just about adapting it and refreshing it and making sure that you're kind of um, you know, following along and just make it a lot easier for yourself.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I definitely have already seen that Um. I created templates, um, just to begin the process and talked with our art director, sarah um, to see if it was a nice direction to move forward with and she really liked where I went with that. So it's nice to just be able to kind of plop in the different images for, say, trade show talks and different promotions that we're running. It's nice to be able to just kind of drag and drop and not have to spend hours making a whole new design that looks similar to everything else.
Speaker 1:Yeah, all those kinds of like little time-saving moments where you're taking inspiration from the year before.
Speaker 1:You don't have to reinvent the wheel every single time, and that's why I think sometimes our clients are stressing about when it comes to managing or starting to manage their own social media platform.
Speaker 1:So, like, take this information and go with it with, for example, on TikTok, and it's like, well, the first one is going to be hard and probably, like the first five are going to be difficult, especially if it comes to TikTok, like learning the tools and learning the editing, trending sounds and things like that.
Speaker 1:But after that it's a lot easier. And I think that doing setting a realistic goal or committing to it for a certain amount of time for example, like I'm going to make sure I get through 20 posts Then you're at least making good on the amount of ramp up and learning that you have to have in the beginning, and then you're applying them to the other trends, and then it kind of all comes out in the wash, and that's what happens within the loop. If I was to start a podcast today, I'm sure it'd be very arduous and take a lot of time, but then the second episode is going to be easier than the first, and so is the third and fourth, and yada, yada, and then eventually you have a process and it's like you know, it becomes second nature.
Speaker 3:For sure. It definitely is hard to get the ball rolling. I know I will have to experience that when I learn how to do reels for the client workshop. I'm going to do a bunch of different promotions and a bunch of content for the workshop with social media. So if you're in attendance, be on the lookout for me. I will be asking you questions, but after a certain bit I'm going to you know it'll the lookout for me. I will be asking you questions, but after a certain bit I'm going to you know it'll just become second nature. Just like with posting on Instagram. I had a goal for myself which was get us to at least 600 followers, and now we have, I want to say, 611. So I'm just slowly building up that audience and paying attention to the engagement just to continue to reach new goals.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's not everything is about the metrics, but a little bit of it can be and it can keep you motivated to keep moving forward and I think that punch mark is just appreciative to have another channel. And again, it's nothing's worse than like having someone maintaining you know, seven channels and being like, all right, you need to do an eighth and it just becomes like another task. But diversifying it and also just having you with you know, a very fresh perspective on the brand to come in and lead this, it's going to keep it fresh and that's kind of what we need right now. So, Savannah, any other things before we wrap this up, I kind of want to just to share about the process and about what your goals are and also just to kind of say like, hey, it's not too late for you to start doing this with your own business and to make this digestible.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I just I continue to learn more about Instagram. Each day that goes on, I learn new stuff about the kind of content creators we follow and engaging with them. It's all about just continuing to learn. With new age stuff like social media Not much else I have to say on it I just I really enjoy being able to add the design elements and then, as well, kind of use my other side of the brain with the metrics and kind of play around with it and let this be a new voice for Punchmark.
Speaker 1:Absolutely, savannah. I appreciate you doing it too, and if you want to give us a follow, we'd really appreciate it. I already mentioned this in the beginning of the episode, I'm sure, but you can follow us on Instagram, punchmark websites. At Punchmark websites we're you know, know, posting new stuff. I say we it's actually savannah savannah's posting new stuff uh, seemingly every day, or at least every week, and we'll have a lot of fresh content with the client workshop, which will be coming up, uh, very soon. So when this episode airs, I think it'll be um coming out that week. So very exciting, um, savannah, thanks for joining me. I think this is really cool and everybody will. We'll be back next week, tuesday, with another episode. Cheers, bye, bye, all right, everybody. That's the end of the show.
Speaker 1:Thanks so much for listening. A little bit of a shorter, snappier episode after a lot of longer ones. This episode was brought to you by Punchmark and produced and hosted by me, michael Burpo. My guest this week was Savannah Kell, junior designer at Punchmark, and this episode was edited by Paul Suarez with music by Ross Cockrum. Don't forget to rate the podcast on Apple Podcasts and Spotify and leave us feedback on punchmarkcom slash loop. That's L-O-U-P-E. It's the best way to help the podcast grow. Thanks, we'll be back next week, tuesday, with another episode. Bye.