As always, I loved the conversations in the Business Advice Clinics at Harrogate and meeting so many wonderful store owners. For those who couldn’t make it over this time, I wanted to recap some of the conversations we had that could be helpful for you:

Q: I’m overwhelmed with social media. I feel like whatever I do isn’t enough and it doesn’t get me any views or likes - so why should I even try?

A: First of all, no one needs to do anything. You don’t need to have a bridal store. You don’t need to sell a particular designer or offer a certain service. These are all choices.

Reframing your approach to what you have to do for a successful business helps you think differently about it. Remember when you first started and couldn’t wait to have your own store? All the daydreaming and ideas you had? Did you realise during that honeymoon phase that you would have to keep books and pay taxes? Yes. Did you realise you would have to hire an accountant to help you with them? Yes. Why? Because you realised that you bring certain ideas and gifts to owning a successful business - and doing your own accounting is not one of them. 

Reframing your approach to social media from “what is the bare minimum” to “what will bring me the maximum return” allows you to incorporate social media into your business just like you do for other aspects. You don’t have to be good at it or even do it yourself, but you can’t ignore it any more than you ignore your taxes or keeping books.

Q: I’ve heard about AI and don’t know where to begin. I tried it and it didn’t really do anything special like what I have heard it can do. Is it worth even trying?

AI (artificial intelligence) is a wonderful and powerful way to do more, automatically. The hype around it can make it seem scary, but it has actually been around for quite a long time. It is the way ads are shown to you that feature a product like you were looking at or purchased online. It is how Google auto-fills the search bar when you start typing. It is how autocorrect works on your computer or phone. Helpful? Yes. Perfect? No. (Don’t get me started on autocorrected texts that went wrong.)

AI and automation can be absolute lifesavers when you are wearing lots of hats in your business. Everything from sending emails to creating spreadsheets, drafting a social media strategy to creating content to use.

But like everything else, you need to know how to use it for it to be useful to you. Your television doesn’t do much good if it isn’t plugged in and set to the right channel. Your washing machine can ruin your clothes if on the wrong setting.

There are lots of online resources, classes and articles you can read about it as well as services and apps you can pay for that utilize AI to help your business. While it is an initial investment, in the long run, it can be much less expensive than hiring another employee to do it for you.

Q. I’m doing social media and seem to get a decent amount of views on my Reels/TikToks, but no one has requested an appointment from them. What am I doing wrong?

One of the most important things to remember when it comes to Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) and metrics is that using the wrong ones is like using a ruler to weigh an object. Views do not equal sales (nor appointments). You have no idea who those views are from. Are they 5 year-olds playing with their parent’s phone? Grandmothers scrolling through their feed? Teen boys looking for memes? Is anyone even there watching it - did someone set the phone down and walk away only to come back a few minutes later realising they had left it on (and playing Reels continuously)? 

You can have a million views and have them all be the wrong accounts/people or you can have 100 of the right ones who are interested and care about who you are and what you are selling.

The most important thing is to identify your ideal client avatar (ICA) - who is your ideal customer? The demographic, psychographic, and behavioural characteristics of your ideal client avatar are your guiding light to everything about your branding, marketing strategy, designers you carry, store interiors, CX journey map, and especially your social media content strategy.