Latest / The Racer on Demand Show / Episode 14 | Beat the Algorithm

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Episode 14 | Beat the Algorithm · The Racer on Demand Show

• Amanda Van Den Elzen: Hello and welcome again to the Racer On Demand show. I'm Amanda Van Den Elzen and I'm joined with Megan Meyer, my co-host. Hi. And as most of you know, I've been spending a lot of time looking at racers' social media profiles. I've been doing Instagram audits and from the viewpoint of a sponsor, I've been looking at what are people doing right? What are people doing wrong? And today, Megan and I are going to be talking all about Megan: Hello? Amanda Van Den Elzen: social media and how racers can leverage social media to drive more value through their programs, position themselves to be better advocates for their sponsors and attract better sponsorships based on what they've got going on there. So I know, Megan, you've got a ton of expertise in the social media side from the work that you've done in the past too. Megan: Yeah, just learning as I go, right? And so... For us, I started using social media early on, which thankfully at that time there wasn't a whole lot of noise or a whole lot of users. So it was pretty easy to grow and get seen. compared to now, like 15 years later, it's completely different. So I'm excited to talk about what's new, the changes that are happening. mean, sometimes it's daily that it happens with these platforms and you always just got to be ready for that next thing because you never know. One thing that might be working for the past couple days or weeks or months might not work anymore. And that's just the nature of the game. and I, but I love your series that you've been doing and it's like helped grow your following too, right? Cause what did you start at and where are you at now? Amanda Van Den Elzen: Yeah. Yes, ⁓ my gosh, okay. ⁓ my god, my whole mic just broke. It's just like... Megan: ⁓ my gosh. Can you fix it? Amanda Van Den Elzen: Oh my god. The like literally broke off. Okay. ⁓ Megan: You're just going to have to hold it. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Please hold. All right, we're back in action. I'm going to just reach around this to grab my phone now. Megan: We're good? Yeah. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Okay, so when I started doing my series, I was at 587 followers and that was 55 days ago and now I'm at 2326. So I've gotten, what, 1700 followers in 50 some odd days? So yeah, more than quadruple what I had before. So yeah, the goal is 10,000 followers, but. Megan: Okay. Wow. That's awesome. Yeah. Yeah. That's awesome. Yeah. Yeah, that's awesome. Amanda Van Den Elzen: You know, what I learned in that though is like I was providing value in my posts, but I wasn't tying it back to my audience well enough, right? Like it wasn't personal feeling enough. And as soon as I added in the personal touch, it was like, I'm still telling people the exact same things, but I'm telling them one by one, you know, this is exactly what you are doing wrong and how you can fix it. And people are coming along for the ride, even though I'm still telling them the exact same things as what I was before, so. Megan: Yeah. And have you seen them actually implement changes? Is that a loaded question? Amanda Van Den Elzen: ⁓ man, you know what, I feel like that's every learning and development, kind of, kind of, you know? I feel like every learning and development person, that's the struggle is like, ⁓ people love to consume the information, but are they actually applying it in what they do? And you know what, I have to put on my marketing brain and my business brain and say, some people are just not my customers and they're just not the ones who are going to finish the course like you've talked about before, right? Like they're not gonna finish the course, they're not gonna apply the advice. And I have seen some people though that have made changes and those people are immediately seeing results. ⁓ Did I tell you about the little kid with the F1 drivers and stuff? Megan: Good. No, I don't think I saw that one. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Okay. So on day 10, I reviewed this little kid. He had like a couple hundred followers and his name's Ilan and he ⁓ just started go-kart racing, like just started. He's like five or six years old. And ⁓ he told his parents that he wants to be an F1 driver and he's just obsessed with F1. ⁓ But his parents like don't know anything about racing. So they put him in a go-kart and they started this Instagram page for him. And I reviewed him and I said, you we want to hear his voice more, like have him tell us what he's excited about and whatnot. And they created a video of him asking his daddy runs up and he goes, Papa, how many likes do I need in order to go to an F1 race? And I think he told him like 10,000 likes or something. Well, that video is up to like nine million likes. Like it's it's gone completely viral. Megan: Yeah. you Wow. Yeah. Amanda Van Den Elzen: And he said, like, you have to have at least one F1 driver comment on your post. so he's had like a whole gamut of F1 drivers say, like, come out to the paddocks. He's had the races are like giving him tickets and like flying him out to these races and stuff. And his his grandma messaged me and she was like, you helped Ilan go viral. Like, I'm so excited. And it just like Megan: Aww. Wow. ⁓ my gosh, that's crazy. Amanda Van Den Elzen: That is not going to be the case for everybody, right? Like that is not going to happen to everybody. But to have that as just like them reaching out saying like, you helped make this happen by like bringing his voice out. And man, what a cool thing. Megan: Right? Aww. I love that. Yeah. Oh, yeah. I know that's like one of the reasons why, like, I really got into coaching and teaching because it's just, it, it's so like, feel good when you're able to help out someone else. And yeah, it's like completely different sports. So it has like literally nothing to do with you, like not going to help you out anyway, but it's just so cool to see them. Yeah. Like have it click in their head and have, you know, could be a life Amanda Van Den Elzen: Yes. Megan: life-changing thing that happens and it's just so cool and it feels so good. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Yes, yes. And you know what, like that video was clearly, you know, staged by his parents, right. But the next one where they got to tell him that he had over a million likes. ⁓ Yes, that one has almost as many views as the original video. And that's the one that I think really, like, hooked people into this little boy, you know, like that was his personality coming out and his passion for it coming out. And, you know. Megan: ⁓ yeah, and get his reaction. Aw, I love that. Yeah, okay, I'll have to go back and see. I'm sure I saw that. I'm sure I did. But yeah, I'll have to go back and see. Amanda Van Den Elzen: That's where it's exciting. Yeah, but he was just a couple hundred followers then. Now he's got tens of thousands. If not, he might've broken a hundred. I don't know. He's doing amazing though. And their follow-up content is good. So that's exciting. Megan: Yeah, that's cute. Wow. Yeah. Yeah, because that's where you need to have good follow-up content. can't just be a one-hit wonder. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Yeah, yeah, and I think people like they think, well, when I go viral, I'll create good content. But it's like, OK, but if you go viral, nobody's going to actually keep up with you if they look at your profile and they don't connect to something, you know. Megan: Yeah, exactly. Yeah, that's where like we talked about like, why building your brand is so important and being able to know like, what are your values? Like, what do you want people to think about you say about you? Like, what what do you want to be remembered as? And, like always, like, it's so important to do that work. And I know it takes time. And it might seem silly to some people, but it actually will make a difference. And if you like are very Amanda Van Den Elzen: Yeah. Megan: firm and rooted in your values, which they can change. You can evolve and lean towards one way more. That's okay. But just showing like, your humanity, being yourself, being vulnerable, being authentic online, that is like what you always say. That's what's gonna bring the people into want to follow you and learn more about you. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Mm-hmm. Yeah. Yes, yes, I love that so much. And, you know, one of the things that I've seen racers doing as I've been preaching to them, you know, you've got to find a differentiator. What's your brand is so many racers are saying, well, my brand is that I'm always chasing checkers or I'm trying to cut my lap times or, you know, like I want to be an F1 racer when I grow up. And it's like, you guys, like you're not standing out. Megan: Mm, yeah. It's really not that different. Yeah. I mean, we're all racers. We're all trying to get the better lap times. Amanda Van Den Elzen: No. Yes, exactly. And like if every other racer out there says the exact same thing as you, then that's not your brand. That's just you blending in. And that's why sponsors won't partner with you. know, like, think outside the track, what are you doing outside the track? Or why are you racing? And how is that different than why the person next to you is racing? you know, just yesterday, I reviewed one that said racing for women's rights. if every other racer out there says the exact same thing as you, then that's not your brand. That's just you blending in. And that's why sponsors won't partner with you. ⁓ know, ⁓ like, outside track, what are you doing outside Megan: Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Amanda Van Den Elzen: And I was like, cool, that's a really cool stance to take. How is she doing that? And I looked through her content and I saw nothing about it. And it's like, well, a brand or a differentiator has to be like so innate to you that every single piece of content you put out is pointing back to that in some way, you know? And if she's racing for women's rights, then I want to hear about that in every single piece of content she puts out, whether that's on the track or off. Megan: Yeah. Mm-hmm. Yeah. Yeah. Do you, do you know who it was? Don't, don't knock over your mic again. Cause I wonder if she is associated with the shift up now group or the women in motor sports North America group. Cause those would be two organizations that she could really help. ⁓ they could, yeah. Align with. Yeah. Amanda Van Den Elzen: you Mark see something. Yeah, my mic stand again. Yeah, a line with... Yes, her name is Moxie Azevedo. ⁓ 13 year old karting driver. Yeah, but she was my review yesterday, so she'll be easy to find. She's tagged there. Megan: Okay, I'll to look her up. ⁓ okay. Okay, cool. Yeah. Well, okay. And to go like what off what you were just saying to like, stand out and be a differentiator. Like I loved your video you did about the the trashy reality TV show, and how like, you know exactly who each person is. And that's how we need to say I mean, we don't need a trashy reality show. But I mean, I've honestly thought Amanda Van Den Elzen: Yes. Maybe we do. Megan: like when I was younger, so John Forrest's family did a reality TV show and I was like a teenager at the time and I thought, my God, it is so cool if we did one because like there's a lot of drama between me and my sister and our dad and it's like we would have a good reality TV show, I think, but nobody would want to do it. Yeah. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Yes. Everybody would just clam up. ⁓ my God. So our spotter Robert, he used to work with the LaDukes before Kyle passed and ⁓ he was with them forever. Like he basically just grew up on their race team. They were his family. He lived with Kyle and Amber for a while. Like they were He was ingrained in that family and he said that at one point they did film a reality TV show, but it never aired. But it was called La Dukes of Hazard. And he said that like 90 percent of the time it was just them like fucking with the camera people more than anything. But ⁓ yeah. Megan: Yeah. ⁓ my gosh. ⁓ Yeah. Yeah, that would be so awkward, but... Amanda Van Den Elzen: It would be, it would be so awkward. feel like once you got into the norm of it, once it became just normal to have them there, it would be a lot of fun and probably really help to define your brand. But ⁓ yeah, the very first parts of it would be like, I don't want to say this on TV. Megan: Mm-hmm. Right, yeah. Yeah. Well, will say, ⁓ So speaking of that first to the finish, which is on Amazon prime was amazing documentary. It followed three girls that are doing the road course racing, the Mazda series. And, ⁓ through shift up now, I know these three girls that were like the main characters that they had on there. So, so cool because I've never really watched the Mazda's race before. So it's cool to learn about that and see, ⁓ cause yeah, it went all behind the scenes. went home with them. Shay Holbrook, who's a good friend of mine, show her, you know, being a mom, which I really connect with. And she is just like this powerhouse, like entrepreneur. And so she was a speaker at last year's Women in Motorsports North America event, which happens on Tuesday, Wednesday before PRI show. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Yeah. Megan: And so they had a whole panel talking about the reality show and how, know, with the F1 drive to survive, how that's just blown up F1. like, I mean, we're like, we're people that had never watched F1 before until we saw that first season and then we were hooked. And so there's basically the panel was all about how we need to get more shows that cover motorsports and how it can help us reach new audiences and show the behind the scenes and show the personalities of the drivers. Cause usually, you you don't really learn much about the drivers on TV unless they're able to Amanda Van Den Elzen: Yeah. Megan: you know, get out and do their interviews and all that stuff. Otherwise you just see them racing on the track. You don't really know who that person is. And, ⁓ so that's where the show's like do a really good job, ⁓ to, to show, Hey, like, this is a real human being. This is their daily life outside of the car. ⁓ you know, all the tension and everything that happens at the track too. So that was really cool. So, ⁓ but I mean, yeah, exactly with that, you're able to see them building their own brands, how Amanda Van Den Elzen: Yes. Megan: their personalities differ from each other, their experiences, because they all have completely different backgrounds and all different ages. So it's cool to see how they're, you know, each of their stories are unique. And I think we can all do the same thing with social media because it's free. We have it. We don't need to have a TV crew there with us, but it's just Amanda Van Den Elzen: Yes. Yeah. Yeah. Megan: Being comfortable on camera, I think is the biggest struggle that I see with people. And I'm guilty of it too, but I just gotta force myself to do it. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Yes. Yeah, same. Yeah, no, I love that that parallel that you just drew of like, when these people are on these TV shows, they're a character, right? I'm gonna put that in quotes, right? Because the producers are saying like, hey, this person stands out from this and this person stands out from this and we're gonna highlight that and like hone in on it and say like, this is what's defining this character in the show and this is what's defining that character in the show. And this is how they all play together in this storyline that exists, right? Like these shows are not creating a story that doesn't exist. They're highlighting a story that's happening and they're basically glamorizing it by really like honing in on just that storyline and the characters ⁓ features, I guess, or their personalities and how they play into that story. so... I think as we're developing our own social media content, like you said, we can build our own storyline. We can define what our character looks like. And, you know, that's going to be way easier if it's truly authentically ourselves. ⁓ But, you know, we, we have to be able to think like a TV producer and a TV producer isn't thinking about what is that person. They're thinking about who is the audience and what are they going to relate to? And I think if we can just like, Megan: Yeah. Mm-hmm. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Take those pieces, put them in a jar, shake them up and say, who's my audience? What do they want out of this jar? And pick just those pieces out. Like all of our social media would be so much better. Megan: Yeah, well, that's like the first thing that someone can do is look at their insights. And I mean, it'll just give you the basics of gender, age, location, but you'll be able to kind of use that as a good starting ground. You know, like if you're a female like us, maybe you have a, maybe it's like a 50-50 split of men versus women. So you could do more feminine content. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Mm-hmm. Megan: with it versus, you know, if you are a guy, you're going to probably have 95 % of a male following. So you'll know, Hey, like, ⁓ depending on who that audience is, I can tweak just your perspective. I think around it, like you could do, you could take like the same, you know, like if you're in the shop working on your car, like you could do the same thing, but Amanda Van Den Elzen: Mm-hmm. Yeah. Megan: have a different perspective of how you say it and like the storyline. I love that you mentioned that because I so I've been putting a lot more effort into YouTube and I need to do a better job of thinking like a producer and how can I use this long form video as more of to tell a story versus just like, I kind of been treating it more just like documenting what we've been doing and I've been doing all the editing myself and so, they do okay, but I feel like, yeah, if I followed more of a story, then it could be. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Yeah. Megan: You know, just get better views. could be more entertaining to watch. So I'm actually working on one right now that I'm going to publish in two days. And it's just all about the drama that we've been having of doing this short course car. And then the day before we want to leave for a race, we find out there's a broken part. So then we have to miss the race and then we can't get a new part. And what we ordered was wrong. And then, then the drama of like. building an ultra four car, taking a side by side that's completely stock and trying to turn it into this, you know, monster truck of a race car. And I've been like, it's been about three months that I've just been like filming everything. And I was like, I want to put this like into a video, but I had no idea like how I was going to do it. So I had actually had used my AI friends at chat GPT of like, Amanda Van Den Elzen: Yeah. Megan: Okay. Here's like everything I have, like, how can I make this into a good video and like tell the story of like the struggles that we've had and everything we're learning. Cause this is all new to both of us. And you know, we know like, as we're going like, ⁓ we forgot to order this and we forgot this and we're still waiting on this and this. even today, like we still don't have all of, like I ordered some new safety gear. still don't have that yet. ⁓ Still don't have all of our stickers done for the cars and like we're supposed to be loading up tonight. And it's like, okay, like there's still some like stress and like nerves. So I'll be filming that too. But it's like, okay, I want to actually like, yeah, kind of think of this as like a show that would be entertaining to watch instead of just like kind of a typical YouTube video. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Yes. Yes, yes, yes, yes. And what I love about like you coming into this is you already kind of know vaguely like what the story looks like, right? And I think a lot of times we get caught up in like, but I don't know how this ends. And it's like, well, how do you want it to end? You know, like that's what story you should be telling is this is the goal that I have in place for the end of this story. And really. If we want people to follow along, we have to have a bunch of stories happening at the same time, right? We've got this overarching story of like our season, perhaps, or maybe the year, or this event that's coming up in six months, you know, like this is what I'm working towards. But then we kind of have to have episodes too, right? Like your long form content isn't just standalone, this is one piece. and this is something completely separate in the next like episode, so to speak. It's like we're working towards, you know, building this car into an ultra four machine, you know, and follow along through that long story. But each episode has to have its own story too, right? That has to have a beginning, a middle and an end, right? So if we're building this car and that's the big story, well then maybe the episode is like this weekend we're working on the suspension. and we need to get it to this point in order to be on track for that big story of having this car ready by, you know, X time. And it's like, we have to be really intentional about knowing what that looks like. And that means having clear goals, having clear timelines and understanding what content we need to capture in order to be able to tell that story. So I love the fact that you brought in ChatGPT to help you align that. But if you didn't already kind of have those vague ideas in your head, You wouldn't have even known what content to capture, too. Megan: Mm Yeah, yeah. Well, and like, I think the car builders do a really good job of this because a lot of them are YouTubers. And you know, they've got hundreds of thousands of views. And yeah, like they like their end goal, let's say it's a SEMA build that they're doing. So then they do episodes of like, okay, this weekend, we did the suspension and then this weekend, we did Amanda Van Den Elzen: Mm-hmm. Megan: I don't know, paint or this one weekend we did the interior. And so, yeah, like they film like each step of the way working towards that, that end goal of having this really cool SEMA build. And like, you know, like there's a bunch of those shows like on TV, like the Motor Trend, ⁓ Hot Rod Garage, like all that stuff. like, like growing up, it was the, the Chopper show with Jesse James. Yeah. My dad really liked that one. And then there was the, ⁓ Amanda Van Den Elzen: Mm-hmm. Yes. West Coast choppers. Megan: I don't know. It was like a father and son, or maybe there's like two sons. I don't remember what it was called, but like, remember growing up, like my dad was really into those shows. And so we'd watch them sometimes. ⁓ but yeah, like, like they, Amanda Van Den Elzen: Yes. Or even like ⁓ Chip Foose. Remember, like that was big all the time. Megan: Yeah, was he the monkey garage or is there a monkey garage one? Gas monkey garage. Yeah. ⁓ yeah. Richard Rawlings. That's who it is. Yeah. Okay. The shit foos guy. He's an older guy, right? I know like his, I recognize the name, but like I can't picture him. I don't know. Amanda Van Den Elzen: No, ⁓ Gas Monkey Garage, yeah, that's Richard Rawlings, I think. Yeah. ⁓ No, like terribly old. I'm trying to think of what the name of his show was. Hold on. Okay Google, what is the name of Chip Foose's show from the 2000s? Overhauling. Yeah. That one was like, ⁓ they would like take people's classic cars and he would like rebuild them without their knowledge and yeah. ⁓ And then return them all finished. ⁓ Megan: Overhaul. Okay, I don't think I saw that one. ⁓ okay. Well, yeah, that's exciting. Yeah, yeah. But yeah, so like they like the yeah, they've got a story each episode tells a story. Like that's it's cool. It's exciting. It's engaging. And yeah, I think like, for racers, like we're so caught up in the moment and like, getting to the racetrack doing the race. Okay, now we got to get ready for the next race. And we forget to like document the journey and yeah, like like think of it as like a story and like it does take a lot of prep work before you do start filming of like okay how do I want this story to go like ⁓ like if I don't prep Amanda Van Den Elzen: Mm-hmm. Megan: a piece of content or like a YouTube video, then I'll have like a crappy beginning because like I'll forget to record an intro. So then I'll have to like, just go do something really quick, like while I'm editing it, just so can have something as an intro. ⁓ So yeah, like I need to map it out. Like what's the story that I want to tell here? And I'm, learning as I go, like I'm getting better as with it, but it's, also one of those things where it's like done is better than perfect. And Amanda Van Den Elzen: Yes. Megan: you're not going to learn if you don't hit publish or if you don't hit record and actually just get something out there and then just, you know, learn a little bit more for the next time. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Yes. Yes. And you know what I love about what you're documenting and what you're choosing to document? And I think where some of that prep work comes in too is if you know what your brand is, then you know how you want to present yourself. You know the things that you need to consistently talk about, but you're also more prepared to bring the human side of it into because oftentimes I see racers telling their, and I'm going to put this in quotes, their story. but it's really just like a recap of events that happened. like good content, content that's episodic and like a story draws people in because of the human element of that. Like the shows we were just talking about, right? Like the Gas Monkey Garage and West Coast Choppers and stuff. Like you don't watch that show just because they're building something cool. you watch that show because they're yelling at each other or they're like so excited to do this big reveal and somebody's crying when they get their car back, you know? It's like the same thing with the trashy dating shows like we were talking about before or even you know like the F1 series, right? You're watching this because you feel like you know the people and if the content that you're creating doesn't get to a point where people can feel like they know you then Megan: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Honestly, you're failing and you're not going to build your following, which means you're not going to be providing value to your sponsors. Sponsors. Spurnchers. Megan: Mm-hmm, exactly. Well, like, I mean, even think of like, I mean, any show out there like a fixed wrapper with like chip and join against like that. blew up because people fell in love with Chip and Joe. Like it's not not because of like the house. I mean, yeah, like what they're doing with houses and all the interior design and all that is cool. But yeah, like people just love Chip and Joe. And that's when they created their Magnolia place like with the silos like I've visited there before. And it like they were able to expand their brand outside of just being on a TV show into something that's real life where they then have control over Amanda Van Den Elzen: Yes! Mm-hmm. Megan: You know, the sales and stuff, cause I'm assuming like with a TV show, if you're just a character, you can't really control much, you know, with that. Um, and then the, yeah, like they started their own TV series and I think maybe they have their own channel or their whole. Own, uh, what's it called? I don't know. But anyways, like, yeah, their own network. Uh, I don't know what they do. I think they do. Um, but yeah, like people just fell in love with them and then. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Like network. I don't know. Yes. Megan: because they were themselves. They showed themselves being mom and dad when they weren't on the job site. And it's just cool, because yeah, people just connected with them. Like, hey, yeah, like they're just a human being as well. Like I see myself in them, especially now that I'm a mom, I can totally relate to them. And it's just so cool. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Yes, yes. And you know what, like racers who are struggling to brand themselves and who are struggling to have this cohesive story and differentiate themselves and stuff, like every single one of you is watching TV. Every single one of you is watching these YouTube videos. Like instead of watching for entertainment, watch to figure out why are people connecting with these people? What are the things that they're saying and doing? that and showing that are causing you to want to follow along and take that back not word for word not steal their script not steal their story but take the pieces of like how are they talking about what they're doing or what are they showing me that makes me want to watch more or like why do i feel like i know this person like take that back to your own content and and learn from it don't just be entertained by it Megan: Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Yeah, exactly. Yeah, I'll... ⁓ I'll have like a couple of celebrities and that, that I'll go, ⁓ you know, even just like bigger influencers, I'll just go and yeah, like research their last couple of posts and so like they do like turn it like by episodes, like they're, they have like mini series of, know, like say if it is like a renovation of like, okay, I'm going to be renovating this bedroom and here's like a 10 part series, ⁓ you know, 10 different reels of how I'm going to do it and stuff. So yeah, so I love to get inspiration from that. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Yeah. Megan: And ⁓ I know like we've talked about having like separate like personal accounts like on Instagram and stuff. So yeah, so I've got a separate personal one and I don't I actually don't follow any racers because I want to get out of that, you know, that mindset like the motorsports world. I want to go and see like what's working in other industries. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Yes. Megan: whether it's sports or design or parenthood and see like what's kind of working over here. What's like a, you know, a hook that they're using, whether it's the visual one or text. ⁓ yeah, like how are they documenting it? What are they doing on stories? And so then I'll come back and use that as inspiration, especially when I like, I just feel like I've been in a slump, like, like, yeah, like nothing's working right now. Like I'll need just a little, ⁓ pick me up of like, here's something cool and exciting that I could do. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Yes, yes, I love that so much. When when I've been reviewing these racer profiles, there were a bunch of suggestions for me to review a racer who's doing it really well. Like, hey, can you just like share a profile of somebody who is knocking it out of the park? And I really struggled with honestly finding any racers that I was like, this is what people should emulate because of what you're talking about. Like, I don't get my ideas from Megan: Hmm. Amanda Van Den Elzen: motor sports. Like I'm the same, like I'll follow other creators and things that are so far outside of the motor sports niche because like I feel like we sit so close to this like problem that it's hard to see the solution sometimes. And also I don't know if I can think of a racer that's doing like a really stellar job like some people are in other niches. Megan: Mm hmm. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Like think there's more to be learned outside of motorsports to be brought back in. It's part of the reason why we're trying to grow motorsports, right, is because there's not a ton of really great examples of great social media in motorsports yet. Megan: Mm-hmm. Yeah, now that you say that, so I agree because Like I'll follow the big names like in NHRA, you know, the top fuel teams, ⁓ even like NASCAR or Andy Carr. Like I'll follow those like big names and I'll see that they really don't post that often. If they do post, it's obvious that they had a social media manager do it, that it's not coming from them. And it's usually just an advertisement. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Mm-hmm. Yes. Megan: or a sponsor promo that they had to do and, or it's just, you know, like just a, you know, carousel, like pictures for like a race recap or something like that. And you could like, it's just cold. Like you can tell like this professional driver is not actually using this account or posting on it. And yeah, I mean, Amanda Van Den Elzen: Yes. Megan: you can tell. So I love that you said that because now that I'm thinking about it, it's like, yeah, you know, like that is true. Like there's really not someone that comes to like the top of my mind that does it well. Or if they are like a professional that is using their own account, then it's like kind of really obvious because then it's a little sporadic. It's not like high quality. ⁓ It's kind of all over the place, but at least they're doing it. But there's, there's kind of, there's not that like Amanda Van Den Elzen: Yeah. Yeah. Yes! Megan: storyline or flow or consistency with it. So yeah, think we need to, yeah, like we've got like two extremes and I think we need to like come in the middle. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Yeah, like the brand consistency. Yes, yes. And you know what? Like I've had people when I'm like, hey, don't do this on your profiles. Like, you know, you need a better profile picture or like let's consistently do this. I've had people tag F1 drivers and go, but they're not doing that. Like their profile isn't doing this and look at how many followers they have. And I think what people are missing is that like your following is not always because of the character you are on social media. Like F1 drivers right now, they have this huge following because of the Netflix series, right? And so people feel connected to that driver, but not because of what they're posting on Instagram. People feel connected to that driver because they've just spent, you know, however many weeks with that person literally in their living room, feeling like they were getting to know them. And so it's like... Megan: Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Yeah. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Okay, but if you were producing the content that actually made them feel connected to that person, then you would have a bigger following too. Megan: Exactly. Yeah. And I think sometimes like racers want to rely on this series to do that job for them. Like if you do have broadcasting or like a live stream, like they want this series to blow them up and make them into this person that's going to get a lot of airtime or the announcers to talk about them all the time instead of them like Amanda Van Den Elzen: Mm-hmm. Megan: doing the work themselves. Like they kind of expect that to happen and then it doesn't happen. And then they're, they just like, yeah, like don't, they just want to blame them. Right. But also to kind of like add onto that, if your series does have, you know, if you got an announcer, if it's recorded, if you have a live stream or broadcast like, and you want them to talk about you, then go ask them. Cause that's like one thing that like I'll hear from Amanda Van Den Elzen: Yes. Yes. Yes! Megan: like announcers, like that, this was always something that I did is like, like, you know, we fill out our tech sheet and they might have a spot of like, okay, what do you want announcers to say? Like, if you don't fill that out, then they won't know like what to say about you. Like who are your sponsors or your past accomplishments, or you could send them an email before the race and be like, Hey, here's a paragraph of my story and how, know, how I got to this point. Um, or whoever's, know, the Amanda Van Den Elzen: Yes. Megan: interviewer that does maybe like with NHRA, they do like top in interviews. And so like, if that person doesn't get to know you, they're not going to want to interview or ask you good questions. And so you kind of you got to kind of do the work behind the scenes to get on their radar to if that is an option. And if that's what you want. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Yes. Yes, I love that you said that. Both pieces of that, because like, first off, I do think that there is an opportunity for a lot of series to promote their drivers more and frankly, to produce them as characters a lot more. That's one thing that I really loved when we went to go see Super Motocross in Vegas. ⁓ Not the time when Chris went to go see you, but the time before that, that we were in Vegas, they had Super Motocross. So we went out there. ⁓ Megan: ⁓ yeah. Amanda Van Den Elzen: And we were watching like the opening ceremonies and every single driver had like a personal video. Like one of them was like dancing with his dog, you know, and like another one was like dressed as a cowboy. And, you know, like when we're talking about like, what is your trashy dating show persona? Like if you can say the one dancing with his dog or the one dressed as a cowboy, you know, that's that's so huge. And the the series absolutely do have Megan: ⁓ yeah? Yeah. Yeah. Amanda Van Den Elzen: opportunities. Like I know that in our series, I wish that we got more coverage as the people behind the race cars. And I think there is a lot of there are a lot of series out there that could benefit from telling better stories about their racers. But that's not something racers can fix necessarily. And I love the fact that you said like, if your announcers don't know your story, then how are they supposed to tell it? And I will tell you from from our race team. So we get along really well with both of the announcers in our series, as well as our trackside reporter. And ⁓ it's really simple, even if you don't know them that well, to shoot them a Facebook message and be like, hey, here's the story that's going on from our pits this weekend, right? We were out here last week and we completely blew up our motor and you know, it was a mad dash to get it in and we have no test time coming into this race. And so like, Megan: Yeah. Mm-hmm. Nah. Amanda Van Den Elzen: That's what's going on in our pits right now coming into this race. And nine times out of 10, when they're going through the lineup, you know, before the race, they'll say, and I got a message from behind the scenes from this team. Guess what? They're out here with no test time. Can they win this? You know, and, and it doesn't stop there either because the announcers are tied to the production team. And we were just talking about how producers look for a story. Well, Megan: Hmm, yeah. Amanda Van Den Elzen: No surprise after a couple of years of us telling the announcers, hey, this is our story. This is our story. This is our story. The producers in our pits going, hey, how can we tell your story? Right. Hey, do you guys want to put together? I know you're doing some cool giveaway stuff this weekend. ⁓ Why don't you guys put together a quick video, shoot it my way, and I'll run it all weekend. You know, like they're looking for these stories. They want to tell the stories, but nobody is. Megan: Yeah, yeah, exactly. Yeah. Mm-hmm. Amanda Van Den Elzen: taking the initiative to go and tell their own story. Most people don't even know what is their own story. like the series, the production teams, they're hungry for it. Megan: Mm-hmm. Yeah. Yeah, they really are because that's going to just make their coverage so much better too. And have more people come to watch it because they want to see that source. But yeah, I think people just like, they don't think they have an interesting story. And cause yeah, like we're, so like caught up in the moment that yeah, we don't like take the step back or we don't, what's the saying? ⁓ see the forest through the trees or, something like that. I don't know. I probably didn't say that. Right. ⁓ okay. Okay. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Yes, yes. No, you did, you got it. Megan: Yeah, like kind of like, what's that, like take a step back. What's that like 20,000 foot view of like, what it is you're doing and yeah, like how you got here. ⁓ cause yeah, they are hungry for those stories. And that was always something that I think just because I think when, like when I got into racing, like I had to do learn how to like write press releases for my dad. And I would send out like a, recap to our sponsors. And so I kind of had that, ⁓ Amanda Van Den Elzen: Hmm? Megan: media side of it before I really got into media. And so that was something then like when I started racing, I just naturally was like already sending stuff out like already ⁓ getting to know the people who are doing the production and the interviews. And so they would just like kind of organically like gravitate toward us and want to share our story just because we had built a relationship with them. And it wasn't like, hey, we're begging for attention. It's just like, here's something that you could say like a quick Amanda Van Den Elzen: Yes. Megan: one minute blurb that you could say about us or hey, this is a sponsor that we're promoting this weekend. Or even also how to pronounce the sponsor correctly because sometimes they don't know and like, yeah, or your name because we've had that happen too. ⁓ Because yeah, if they don't know how to say it correctly, they're not going to say it because they don't want to look like a fool. So it's important to like Amanda Van Den Elzen: Yes, or your own name. Megan: do a voice text or tell them how to say it because then that way they'll be more confident in sharing it ⁓ as well. So that's something that I've learned over the years. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Yes. I love that tip so much. And like, and it takes nothing to just like, frankly, to walk up before the show starts, right? And say like, hey, you know, I'm so and so, because some, some announcers like our announcers, they'll walk the pits. And if they don't know somebody, they'll walk up and introduce themselves. They'll ask pronunciation and stuff. But that's a ton of footwork on their plate that a lot of announcers won't do. But if you can just like walk up, Megan: Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Yeah. Yeah. They don't do that in drag racing. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Yeah, I would imagine not. would imagine not. But, you know, if you can take that initiative, take some work off of their plate and make their job easier, like nobody is ever going to turn you down when you're making their job easier, but it requires you to shift focus from me to them, right? Like the outcome is still good for you. Megan: Yeah. Amanda Van Den Elzen: But you need to pose it as I'm making your job easier. Hey, here's how you actually say my name. And did you know I have this going on? That's a cool story that maybe you could run with if you have nothing else to talk about, you know? Yes. OK, so we've talked a lot about how to be a character, how to build your brand, how to set this up episodically so people want to follow your story. Megan: Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Yeah. Yeah, exactly. Yeah, I love that. Right. Amanda Van Den Elzen: all good and well from the racer's point of view. What do you think sponsors are looking for when they're going to a racer's social media? Megan: Mm. Good question. So I feel like they In my experience, first off, they're looking for consistency. so, I mean, yeah, if you're doing a series, not that, you know, you're required to do a series or episodes, it just flows good and helps with the views and the followers and all that stuff. But I think they're just first off looking for like, are you someone that's actually present online? And then how are you showing up and how are you showing up for your current partners? And so, If you are doing a series, they'll probably look and see, okay, is this kind of more of an organic post where you're just, you know, like, like, for example, using like break clean in the shop? Like, is it just something that like, you're just, you know, always using and it just happens, or is it kind of more where it is a promotional post, you know, it's more staged, more about how the product helps you, what results you're getting from it, that type of thing. ⁓ And honestly, I don't. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Mm-hmm. Megan: I sponsors are asking or looking for very much because I think they just like if they can get someone that's consistent, someone that is professional like presents themselves well and does some good promotion, I think that's like all they need. But it's kind of hard to find someone that can check all three of those boxes. What do you think? Amanda Van Den Elzen: Yes. Yeah, I think ⁓ I agree with all of those points. think that consistency goes beyond the number of times you're posting to. think consistency also is like how consistently are you branding yourself? So like if if in one post you're you know, this is like bad boy persona and you're like, don't know, like really rowdy. But in the next post, you're like Megan: Yeah, yeah. Yeah. Amanda Van Den Elzen: a family man in a suit coat, you know? I think that that disconnect is going to show them like they don't even know who they are. Like they don't have a brand. How can I align my brand with something so inconsistent when I'm working really hard to consistently come up the same way with our brand? like I think consistency does go a long way there. I also do think that they look at follower count and I think that it is important Megan: Mm-hmm. Yeah. Amanda Van Den Elzen: to be able to reach many people. But I think that increasingly people who are working for these companies are starting to recognize that you can buy followers. And I think that they're starting to look beyond just the number of followers you have and instead look at what is the engagement that these followers are having with your content and with your brand. So that's where I think the Megan: Mm, yeah. Amanda Van Den Elzen: deeper dive into data starts to become really important. Not just, have 10,000 followers, but I have 10,000 followers and they're interacting with my stuff. They actually care what I have to say. They're following my story and they're emotionally invested in my success. So when I say that you're part of my success, they're going to naturally be aligned with your brand too. Megan: Mm-hmm. Yeah. Yeah, you said that perfectly. I love that. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Yeah, I think too, ⁓ you mentioned professionalism and I think a lot of racers get really hung up on this because I agree it is so important to come across as a professional on your content. But I think a lot of racers confuse professionalism with polish and I Don't think that you need a ton of heavily edited content. I don't think you have to go out there and pretend to be like a consummate professional, like a business person if you're not. But I do think you need to go out there and treat people with respect and consistently, you know, show up with your own brand as a professional, whatever that brand is. Like if your brand is like rough and tumble and like third drop enough bombs every other word and like, but you're building a strong following doing that. Like most people wouldn't consider that professional. I probably wouldn't consider that professional. And I think you are going to count certain brands out, but I think you're also going to count certain brands in because of that too. You know, and so I think when we're talking about professionalism, I think we're really talking about like understanding why a brand buys in and catering to that. Megan: Yeah, right. Mm-hmm. Yeah. Mm-hmm. Amanda Van Den Elzen: not necessarily just having the best produced media with this corporate undertone. Megan: Mm hmm. Yeah. Well, and that's like, so to kind of go along with what you said, like brands that will not attract towards that or some that will like align with it. so off the top of my head, I was thinking like VP versus Fuel Factory and VP is more of the risque the yeah, like rough and rowdy racers like they're just trying to be anywhere and everywhere. And Fuel Factory is a new company. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Sure. Megan: It's a kind of branched off of VP in a way, but they have completely opposite values. They are faith driven, ⁓ family oriented. Like, so they don't want people that are going to be posting swimsuit pictures or dropping F bombs, right? Like they'll do more of the where it's mom and pop racing with their, their son or daughter, or, ⁓ you know, the, just the person that is more, ⁓ Amanda Van Den Elzen: Yes. Megan: nice and kind and put together. And yeah, like that portrays on their social media. like, when you do an application, because I think both of those companies just have like an application that you can apply for at the end of the year, like to get a discount or product sponsorship. Like the first thing they do is going to go look at your social media. And especially like if they don't know who you are, ⁓ you know, because one thing like you could do Amanda Van Den Elzen: Yes. Megan: when like we're going to PRI or like SEMA show, you know, of course we want, you know, encourage everyone to go make a good first introduction, have a good first impression with them, but that could be completely different than who you actually are online. And so if they don't like both of those pieces, then they might turn you down. so, yeah, so that's, that's another thing to think about. Like, are you actually like the... Amanda Van Den Elzen: Yes. Mm-hmm. Megan: same person is like if a fan meets you at the track, like, are you still that same person online too? Amanda Van Den Elzen: Yes, I love that. And I think too, like you mentioned, you know, the interaction that you have with somebody at a trade show like PRI or SEMA or something is probably it probably will look different than the way you're portraying yourself online, right? ⁓ Like online is going to be a lot more, hopefully a lot more raw and personal than something you would say to a stranger in a, you know, marketing role or something. ⁓ Megan: Right? Yeah. Amanda Van Den Elzen: But I think too, like understanding why you're presenting yourself the way you do online and being able to articulate the value of that to a marketing person. Like, hey, I just want you to know, like if you go out and look at my social media, you're gonna see, like I get pretty rowdy, but I found that that works really well to connect with a younger demographic that I think would actually be really interested in buying your product. You know, like. Megan: Mm-hmm. Amanda Van Den Elzen: If you're able to say that instead of them going out there and being surprised by it, but drawing that back again, not to you, not like, well, I've been able to build a bigger following. No, I'm able to connect with an audience that would buy your product. Like bring that back to them and the problems they're trying to solve instead. Megan: Nailed it. Yeah. Mm hmm. Yeah. Mm hmm. Yeah. And kind of going back to what you said, like make their job easier. Like how can you, you know, like, like in your deck, if you've got all these, all these data points of like demographics and engagement and views and reach and followers and all that stuff, like those numbers are great. But yeah, how can you tie that back to them? And by doing that, you are making their job easier so that way they don't have to go through and read. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Yes. Yes. Megan: pages and paragraphs inside of your deck that you're sending to them. It could be just as simple as like a couple of lines and that's all you would need. Yeah. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Yes, yes, exactly. And if you're saying, you know, my audience is aged 25 to 45 on average, and you leave it there, they're going to say, so what, so is everybody else's. if you say my audience is in the transition of becoming like the highest buying power, and they've already expressed interest in purchasing sunglasses in the next year and you know, you can position that to like a Megan: Yeah. Amanda Van Den Elzen: heat wave or something, you're going to get a lot more traction than if you just say, audience is 25 to 45. Megan: Yeah. Yeah, yeah, for real. But yeah, I think we get caught up in like, I don't know, think we just overthink it, honestly, like we need to simplify, but that's kind of the challenge, I think with it and with pitching. And so we go back to, okay, well, know, decks that are Amanda Van Den Elzen: Yeah. Yes. Megan: 15 to 20 pages long because we want to list every accomplishment and every data point that we have on our audience because yeah, because like that's what's comfortable. Like that's what we're kind of used to and Amanda Van Den Elzen: Yeah, and nobody cares. Megan: But yeah, nobody cares. Like we need, we need to get out of that old school mindset. And again, I think that's why like we've, we wanted to start this podcast because like, I think racers are like just digging themselves into this hole and they, because like they think this is the way they're supposed to do it. But that's not, that's not the easiest or the best way to go about finding sponsors. And it could be a lot easier if you just simplify, but it could be harder. It's not easier. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Yeah. Yeah. Yes. Yeah, you know. Megan: but it'll work. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Yeah, there's more work involved for sure, but there's a lot more yeses involved because of the work you put in. You know, I've been thinking about this a lot lately is the way that racers traditionally have approached sponsorship is like they do to like applying for a job. Right. And I do think that when you are hired as a ⁓ Megan: Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Amanda Van Den Elzen: partner because that's realistically what happens, right? You form a contract with a company and you are hired into a position of solving a problem, But I think we look at it too much like a job and too little like a contractor coming in, right? So like when we think about what kind of documents and information we're providing to a company when we're looking for a job, as we go out, we find a job listing first off, which Megan: Mm-hmm. Amanda Van Den Elzen: partnerships don't work that way. 99 % of the time, you're not going to go out there and be like, okay, what partnerships are open right now, unless you're just like signing up for a discount program, right? But ⁓ and then we give them our resume or our deck or whatever documents we have prepared. And it's listing out all of our achievements and stuff, right? ⁓ That's a lot like we do when we're submitting a job application. But If we flip the script and instead we say, well, I am ⁓ an independent ⁓ freelancer, basically, I'm going out there and instead of finding a job, I'm finding work. I need to go out and sell my services to somebody. So now I'm not going out there to find a job application and put in my resume. Now I'm going out there to say, I offer this solution, this service, but I need to find a company that has a problem that I can solve, and then I need to sell it to them. Megan: Yeah. Mm-hmm. Amanda Van Den Elzen: That's how partnerships actually work. you're not going to, if you're running your own business and you're trying to find work freelancing, you're not going to go to a business and give them your resume. You're going to give them maybe a portfolio of work that you've already done. So you're going to say, I made an impact in this way in these other jobs because they were having this problem and I provided this solution and this was the measurable impact that came out of it. Megan: Yeah. Yes. Mm-hmm. Amanda Van Den Elzen: That's what you should be showcasing in your deck and in your opening emails and things like that is like, recognize that you have the same problem as somebody that I've already helped. Or I see this problem and I'm proposing this solution to fix it. You know, it's all about them and it's not at all about you until they're buying your product. Megan: Gosh, I love that. Like you just you nailed it perfectly. Like I feel like, yeah, that's exactly like we just need to like just mic drop right there. Like that's it. Like there's nothing else to add on. ⁓ man. But yeah, like that's literally all it is. And it's not, hey, I have a race car like I can advertise for you. Let me put your sticker on my car. Amanda Van Den Elzen: You I already dropped my mic. Mm-mm. Mm-mm. Mm-mm. That's not... It's not. Yeah. Yeah. I feel like it's gonna be hard to switch gears after that, because it's just something I'm so passionate about. But... Yeah. I don't know. And I know, too, like, so many of the racers that are out there, they're running their own businesses. We've got, Megan: So yeah, I have nothing else to add. You nailed it. Yeah, no. You got it. Mm-hmm. Amanda Van Den Elzen: contractors and construction people and people who are running automotive shops or apparel businesses or whatever it is like, how do you find business for that? Like how do you partner with companies for that work and do the same thing? You're just doing the same thing. Megan: Exactly. Mm hmm. Yeah. Yeah. But they don't have that same like mindset with it, which is like, I don't get it. But yeah. Yeah, I totally understand. Yeah. Yeah. All right. So do you want to switch gears? Okay, so yeah. All right. So let's go back to social media. So okay, do want to talk about the algorithms? Okay. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Yeah, yeah, you're not applying for a job. You're finding freelance work. Yeah, let's, let's, we're gonna need a hard reset. Yeah, I have feelings about the algorithms. So I don't know, maybe we want to talk maybe a little bit about like what the algorithms are before I get into my feelings because yeah. Megan: Okay, spill the tea. Okay, yeah, yeah, let's explain. So, okay, so from my understanding, there's back in the day, it used to just be one algorithm and, you know, kind of specifically for like Instagram and Facebook, and it was just by time. So, you know, if someone posted at 12 o'clock, you would see that or someone posted at one o'clock. And then that's when the importance of, okay, I need to post at like my peak time. of when my audience is gonna be online, that's when that was like, you know, all the rave. And then, I don't know, like 2016, 17, 18-ish, I guess. I don't know, I think that's when it started to change instead of being like chronologically, then it was more of the, like what we see today is interest-based. And so, Amanda Van Den Elzen: Yeah. Megan: then I think it went off of, okay, this is who you're following. This is who you're interacting with the most. So we'll show you more of their posts instead of just whoever posted in the timeline. And now I think it's just based completely off of the topic and not at all about if you follow this person or not. And I'll see posts, I think most of my Instagram feed is more of people I don't follow. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Hmm. Megan: And posts that are even like two months old because it's just, it's got that same topic of what I spend more time watching and interacting with. But there's an algorithm for your feed. There's an algorithm for your stories. There's an algorithm for the reels, the explore tab. ⁓ and so there's not just one algorithm anymore. Like there's multiple algorithms and they are changing like every single day. So. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Mm-hmm. Mm hmm. Yeah, and I think like the most important thing to understand about the algorithms, you don't have to know how they work. And you don't have to know how to cheat them. You just need to understand that the algorithms are showing people things that they interact with and that they spend time on and that like the algorithm is picking up that they either enjoy or frankly, sometimes things that they disagree with or that frankly get them to spend more time on the platform. So Megan: ⁓ my gosh, Adam is a prime example of this because he only interacts with posts like he watches the dumbest videos of where people are doing bad stuff and they get caught and they get in trouble. And he will comment on those posts. And then he doesn't understand that he is seeing more of those types of videos because he's interacting with them. Yes. And I'm just like, babe, you have to stop. Amanda Van Den Elzen: you Is he just being rage baited? Megan: Okay, because then it like it literally will affect his mood because it'll like get him into like a bad mood. And then it like, it comes on to me. I'm like, Whoa, what like you need to stop watching those videos and commenting on that. Like, like, he is old school. So he doesn't quite understand that like, if I interact with this, I'll see more of this type of topic. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Yes. Just scroll past, buddy. Yes, and you can't just lurk either. Like if you spend time just watching the video, like sometimes the hook will get me on a video and I'll sit and I'll watch it and I'll be like, ⁓ God damn it, I just ruined my algorithm. Like now I'm going to see more like this. And this is not something I actually want to see more of. Megan: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, yeah, for real. I know there's like one thing. ⁓ because like we're working on like the farmhouse. And so I've been looking up of like, you know, paint colors or like what cabinets to do. And so now I just have like a ton of like interior design videos. And it's like, okay, like I'm, I've picked everything out. Like, I don't need to see this anymore. Amanda Van Den Elzen: ⁓ yeah. you Yes. Yeah, this is why Chip and Joanna is top of mind for you, isn't it? You got some shiplap in your future. Megan: Yeah, yeah, probably. Yeah. We did. We did do some shiplap. ⁓ Amanda Van Den Elzen: So much. Oh, just the long pause too. Like, yeah, we did. Ah, too funny. No, no, okay. So going back to algorithms and, you know, just spending time watching stuff and whatnot, like, okay, so in doing all of these racer reviews, I've been seeing so many people that are posting the same stuff, like over and over again, like, Megan: Guilty. Amanda Van Den Elzen: I'll see it on one racer's profile and then I'll see it on 16 more. And I'm like, ⁓ my God, this is not unique or creative, but they're just like trying to catch this viral hook or this like trend because they saw it work well somewhere else, right? And it's like, okay, to a point that's gonna like draw new people in, but if that's all you're posting is this stuff where you're trying to like game the algorithms, you're never gonna build an actual connection with your audience. Megan: Mm-hmm. Yes. Amanda Van Den Elzen: and like I just I hate it so much and everybody knows what it is right when you go to a profile and all you see is like the same viral hooks that you see everywhere else like I don't want to spend time looking at that I've already seen it six million times you know Megan: Mm-hmm. I agree. Yeah. Yeah, yeah, I agree. So I don't see it quite as much now because I think people have caught on that like, okay, maybe like this isn't gonna get me the results I want. like, three years ago, I really like I was seeing it everywhere. And it was the same. text in the same font, like the same style, everything would be exactly the same. They would just change out their videos. And I know that there was actually a company doing this that racers would hire to be their social media manager. And that's why they were all the same, because it was literally the same person just doing it for all these different people. they just, they use the same template. And I think, I think we've caught on now of like, Amanda Van Den Elzen: Mm-hmm. ⁓ God. Megan: Okay, yeah, like I've seen that a million times, like I'm not gonna interact with it. And so I think that's gone away, thankfully, but yeah, I know exactly what you're talking about. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Yes, maybe, I don't know. If you think it's gone away, maybe you should do some racer reviews, because if I see... Megan: Okay. Yeah. So on my feed, it's, it's, don't see it quite as much on my feed. So yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Amanda Van Den Elzen: It's because you're not interacting with it. That's what it is. My racer on demand feed is ruined. Like it is complete trash now because I've just watched so many pieces of content of things that I'm watching because I need to be critical about it. But I would never spend the time watching otherwise. ⁓ it's just completely ruined. But no, if I see one more post of only real racers know the race line in this corner or Megan: Mm. Yeah. Yeah. ⁓ Amanda Van Den Elzen: Another one where there's a cortisol ⁓ like graph or like, what's the word I'm looking for? Like a gauge, like a cortisol gauge at the bottom where it's showing them on a racetrack and their cortisol is like good or bad depending on whatever. Like if I see another one of those, I'm going to just throw my phone out the window. I don't know. At this point, I'm borderline refusing to review profiles that have those. Megan: ⁓ yeah. If you have you're gonna boycott the ones that have that on their feed Amanda Van Den Elzen: Yes, yes. I already did say on one of them, I was like, if your profile picture is a picture of your car or your helmet, I'm not reviewing you because I've told you so many times it needs to be your face. Megan: Mm-hmm. Yeah. Mm-hmm. I agree. Yeah. Amanda Van Den Elzen: So yeah, now people will comment with their car as their profile picture and they'll be like, are you still not reviewing people with cars for profile pictures? It's like, you know, you know that it should be something else. Like just fix it. Megan: Yeah, you answer your own question That's funny. ⁓ man. Yeah Yeah, I don't Amanda Van Den Elzen: Ugh, no, but that's... The way that I feel about the algorithms though is I feel like people put so much pressure on themselves to understand the algorithms and they like start to try and game it instead of just putting out content that actually engages people. Like just think about who am I talking to and what do they want to see? Like that's how you game the algorithm so to speak. Megan: Yeah. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Yeah. Mm hmm. Yeah. Yeah, it's again. Yeah, it just doesn't have to be. We don't have to overthink it. We can simplify. Yeah, if we're if we're sharing a story and especially if it's something that is like a chronological, like a build, then yeah, like people will they'll get sucked into it. And so I feel like, that's kind of like the easiest way to go about it. But it takes Amanda Van Den Elzen: Mm-hmm. Megan: more effort to think of that storyline and how am I going to record an intro or the hook or how am I going to record how I'm building this because I know with Adam doing his build for Ultra 4, there's been so many times where I'll be like, okay, stop. I need to record this like I need you to maybe can you take that bowl out so I can put like a camera angle here and then like you know, and he like he gets so pissed off. And he's like, I just want to get this done. And I'm like, I know, but this would be like so good. Like we need to share this. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Ha ha ha ha ha. and then put it back in. Yes. You know what, I love the fact that you just said like, ⁓ good content takes work. Like you will never put out good content without being intentional and putting some forethought into it. Like it doesn't happen by accident. Megan: Yeah, or on the other side of that, if you have something where it's like, you recorded like in the moment you posted it right away, like it's just fresh, like it was something, maybe it was like a story and you just posted it onto your feed. So there's like no editing, like no production, but it was like just so raw, real in the moment and people are like emotionally invested, then. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Yeah. Megan: that could like pop off. And like we've seen that happen. Like I'll do that. Like I'll post something of like, so okay. So for us on the Rainy My Racing page, like we do some more professional style, more highly produced stuff from our guy, John Willie, but every now and then I'll tell him, hey, I just want an iPhone video of just like the car. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Yes. Mm-hmm. Yay! Megan: going off the starting line and then showing the crews, standing behind them, being able to see their reaction, cheering. And I'll just post that, no thought into it, but those will do well because it is so, people are tied into the story of like, hey, we've been fighting so hard to win this race or we've got this new driver or blah, blah, blah. They'll... Amanda Van Den Elzen: Yes. Megan: they'll already kind of be invested in it. think because like they'll just be, you know, through following us and knowing like, ⁓ you know, like working way up our way up to this point. And then, yeah, just kind of that simple, like in the moment, like don't overthink it. Those do really well. And like, I'll come back the next day and be like, ⁓ my gosh, this has, you know, this many views. Like I didn't think that type of video would work. ⁓ Yeah. So I've seen that happen too, but I think it, because it goes along with the story, it wasn't just like some random Amanda Van Den Elzen: Mm-hmm. Yes. Yes. Megan: Hey, like, you know, just like another day at the shop, like it was, yeah, like there was kind of that story element behind it. So yeah. Amanda Van Den Elzen: That's exactly what I was going to say is sometimes the hard work isn't in the video. It's in building the context that that video fits into and understanding like the story that you're trying to tell and the brand that you're trying to uphold. Because like if you just put out like a random video from behind the scenes, but you've never told your story and people have no idea where you are or what you're competing in or why you're, you know, doing what you're doing. Megan: Yeah. Amanda Van Den Elzen: but then you just do like a behind the scenes of like your crew cheering for you. They're to be like, I don't even know what this is in relation to, right? Where are you competing this weekend? Like, I don't remember a six month countdown leading up to this point. Like, why is everybody so excited? Megan: Mm-hmm. Yeah. Yeah, yeah, for real. Yeah. So I guess to kind of go along with that, my piece of advice for listeners and viewers is to do like an introduction reel or a post, because those always do well for me. Like I need to do them more frequently, because yeah, they always do well. And it could be just a simple like Amanda Van Den Elzen: Mm-hmm. Megan: Like I think the last one I did was a clip of me where like I'm putting my suit and my helmet on, but I had text on top that said, Hey, I'm Megan. I'm from Kansas. I'm a drag racer. I'm getting into off-road. Like I love cats. Like, like I'm a mom. Like it was just like listed off just like a couple of facts. I need to actually do another one. Like, yes, now a cat grandma. Um, so I was funny. I posted on my Facebook, um, my, just my personal account of like, Amanda Van Den Elzen: Yes. Cat grandma. Megan: this morning like, hey, we have kittens now. And I commented, was like, so my cat count is up to 12. What at what level am I officially a crazy cat lady? Amanda Van Den Elzen: I think it was somewhere around three, Megan. Megan: ⁓ Anyways, so I would say like yeah for the viewers and listeners like do an introduction post whether it's a video a text or like just a picture or a carousel or if you want to do like all in the caption just do something and then you can pin that as your top post and I think like we need to refresh that every year like I need a I actually had one where I was talking to the camera Amanda Van Den Elzen: No, you're right though. Yes. Megan: But for some reason, the audio got removed. So thankfully I had the captions where you could, you know, you know what I'm saying, but there was no audio. So I need to record another one. ⁓ or maybe do just like a B roll one with text, but yeah, that's all those always do well, especially cause like you're, if you ever look at, I know Instagram will show you how many follows and unfollows you got. And so yeah, if you've got a couple of new followers each month, they might not exactly know. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Mmm. Megan: who you are, what your history is. So it'll be good to kind of remind them or even those that might be following you for a long time. And they've probably just don't see your posts that often anymore now. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Yes. Yes, yes, yes, yes. And I think like you said, create one updated every year. Like honestly, I think you should introduce yourself like almost monthly, especially if you are growing your content and not only like who you are and what you're doing, but like bring in the why somebody would want to follow you. Like what kind of content are you posting? like. Megan: Yeah. Yeah. Mm-hmm. Amanda Van Den Elzen: You know, I'm Amanda Van Den Elzen and I run Racer on Demand. You know, we help racers build partnerships. ⁓ And you can expect to see educational content on how to grow your following and how to attract sponsors and keep them. know, like what kind of value, again, we're thinking about our audience, like what kind of value can they expect to get from you? And like, you know, for Megan Meyer Racing, it's like, well, You know, like I'm Megan Meyer and I'm a drag racer and I'm going into off-road and you can expect to see my family and my racing and the behind the scenes and my cats, you know, like because when somebody Megan: Yeah, that's my that's gonna be my my reality show thing that people remind me as the crazy cat lady Amanda Van Den Elzen: It's gonna be called Cat Grandma. Megan: Yeah. Hey, that's, mean, I'm team Arctic cat, so it's just the natural fit. mean, was it on purpose? Yeah. Yeah. All the cat brands. Amanda Van Den Elzen: ⁓ yeah, that's true. That's true. Now you just gotta get Puma on board. Yes, really powered by friskies. Megan: Yeah, okay. Okay. We can do that. Amanda Van Den Elzen: will say, as somebody who has a cat that only has two teeth and needs wet food every day, like five times a day, I would gladly take a wet food sponsorship. Like product only, like sign me up. That shit's expensive. Megan: Yeah, seriously. I know. It is. It is. Yeah. Oh, Oh, yeah. Or just because I put some mascara on like 10 minutes ago. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Are you crying? ⁓ OK, we're that. I'd like that we're laughing so hard we're crying better. That's a way better story. But OK, before we wrap up, I want to talk about like what tech or tools make social media easier. Megan: ⁓ man. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. Yeah. So I mean, like, okay, one thing I think I've talked about this, but like my number one thing is like when actually posting is edits, ⁓ using that to post to Instagram and Facebook because yeah, we've just get, I mean, it's not, you're not guaranteed. Like every reel is going to do well, but ours do pretty well. So I'm going to keep doing that. ⁓ and then I don't really use like the meta business suite to post. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Mm-hmm. Megan: anymore or to even look at the analytics because I use autofluencer for that. ⁓ Amanda Van Den Elzen: Can I just chime in? ⁓ Two things. So first off, edits. I love edits and it is buggy as hell sometimes, but have you seen all the new features and stuff they've been adding? Like I've been using the remove silences button and it just like, makes everything like so much more like choppy and it keeps people's attention. And then also, ⁓ Megan: Yeah. ⁓ huh. Yes. Yeah. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Meta Business Suite, I found out literally late last night, I've been trying to figure out how to make it work. But you can do like, do know many chat where it's like comment this word and I'll send you a link. ⁓ You can do that natively through Meta Business Suite now, you can build that and it's free. So that's just something that you may want to take advantage of. Megan: Yes. ⁓ wow. Okay. Okay. Yeah. Yeah. Yes. Yeah. Cause I was paying for many chat when I was doing more promotional stuff with the business. ⁓ but I haven't really been doing that, especially cause I haven't the website's still down. So I don't really have anything to promote on there right now, but that's good to know that's going to change because I know tons of people, not in racing world, but just entrepreneurs, social media. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Yes. Yes. Megan: coaches, ⁓ they all use mini chats. So that's interesting. That's going to change a lot. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Yes, but even for like a racer, could you imagine if it's just like you do like a behind the scenes post and you're promoting your partner's product and you say like comment gunk and I'll send you the link to where you can buy this, you know? And so you're not the algorithms they they want to keep people on the platform. So if you're putting links. Megan: Mm-hmm. Amanda Van Den Elzen: in like a Facebook caption or like you're even saying like link in bio or something like a lot of times that'll downgrade people being able to see your content but if you are directing people like hey do you want to know where you can find this just comment gunk and I'll send you the link like then you're driving people to actually interact with your stuff people who want it are gonna opt in you'll be able to document how many people were able to click through this and all that stuff. So it's a really, really powerful tool to be able to send a link in a message. I also learned that the ⁓ number one signal on Instagram right now for interaction is DMs. So if somebody DMs you from a reel or a post or something, it spikes the views that it pushes that out for. Megan: Mm-hmm. Amanda Van Den Elzen: That's another great way is just taking things into your DMs. Megan: Yeah, and so I think for those that don't know, because I don't think we explained like what mini chat does. yeah, so so you tell it, hey, look for this keyword. And so yeah, like, let's just say gunk. So if someone in the comments has the word gunk, and it could be, you know, in its sentence, it doesn't have to be like just the words like standalone. But if they use that key word, then Amanda Van Den Elzen: No. Megan: mini chat or meta business suite now is going to send them a message automatically. So it happens like within seconds, but you have to tell the software what you want that message to be. So it could be like, Hey, I saw you commented on my gunk post. Here's that link to go see the, you know, break clean or engine degreaser or whatever. And then you can have, ⁓ make sure you do talk to the company though. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Yes? Yes. Megan: to figure out where they want that link to go. Like if they have a preferred partner or retailer, or if they want it like just straight to their website. ⁓ and then, yeah, so then it'll send that link. And sometimes like it shows up as a button in the message. ⁓ but yeah, that's something that, yeah, like it, can be a game changer to help with your engagement because then if someone comments on your video, like the middle of the night, you're not going to see that. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Yeah. Megan: manually send them a message so it's so nice to have for it to automatically do that. ⁓ Yeah, yeah and you could send them like if you got new merchandise you can just say hey comment the word shirt and I'll send you the link to go get your new shirt and yeah you can set that all up so that's cool I'll have to look that up. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Mm-hmm. Yes. Yes, yes. Yeah. Yes. Sorry, I interrupted your ⁓ tech tools, but what else? What else? Megan: Yeah. ⁓ no, you're good. Yeah, you're good. Okay. Well, okay. So speaking of meta business, we, one other thing that I saw, cause I was playing around in there last week and did you see their AI bot that they have in there? I think it's called like man or. Okay. Yeah. Sorry. With an ⁓ Yeah. So I actually did that. Amanda Van Den Elzen: No. ⁓ sure. Yeah, Manus is Meta's model. Megan: And, um, cause it was so Mondays is the day where I'm like planning out my content for the week or for the month. And so I was, I was going back and looking at some other posts and I saw that like pop up and I clicked on it. was like, okay, what is this? And so it, you can log into your Facebook through it. So it's not automatically connected, but it'll have a pop-up. can log into your Facebook and I asked it go through. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Yeah. Megan: my audience and my engagement and tell me what my my fans interests are. And it was cool because it sent me this really detailed report and like you could tell it obviously had read through the comments and looked through what people are engaging with instead of like where it's with chat GBT. I don't think it could go like that in depth with it. So that was really cool. Amanda Van Den Elzen: No. ⁓ that's really cool. I'm going to have to play around with that. I'm trying to figure out for my racer on demand audience, it skews really young right now. And I'm trying to figure out how to attract, like, this is going to sound terrible, but like kids aren't going to be signing up to sell on my merch marketplace. Right? So like ultimately my goal is to bring more racers onto our platform. So like, how do I start to skew towards the like, Megan: Yeah. Okay. Right? Amanda Van Den Elzen: 25 and up kind of crowd, know, it's gotta be people who will actually purchase my service. So that might be really interesting to play with. Megan: Yeah. Right? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Play around with it. See what you think. ⁓ I'm trying to think of what other like... Amanda Van Den Elzen: Yeah. Megan: tech that I use. I really don't do like a whole lot, I guess. Amanda Van Den Elzen: So you mentioned using. You mentioned using Manus to like, ⁓ I guess, look at your audience and stuff. I actually used ChatGPT to build out a content calendar, but I also helped it like kind of think through who my target audience probably is. Like it's not going to have the data like the Facebook one will. ⁓ But I actually I did it as a course too. So I can link that course in our show notes because you can just go out and use all of my prompts. But. I used it basically to help me think through what are the goals that I have for my social media, who am I actually trying to reach? And then took that to form my target audience and then used my target audience and my branding to help determine what my content pillars should be. And content pillars for people like I hadn't learned, I did not know what that meant before I started working in the branding and social media space, but. Megan: Mm. Amanda Van Den Elzen: A content pillar is basically like a topic that you could post about over and over again. like ⁓ for Racer on Demand, like sponsorship advice is a content pillar. You know, it's not a direct post, but it's a pillar that I can post about all the time. like our podcast snippets are a content pillar or like the Racer reviews are a content pillar. Right. So I had it. ⁓ go through like defining those content pillars for me. And then from those content pillars, I was able to get it to write out a 30 day content calendar of very specific posts that meet my goals, my target audience, my content pillars. And then I could take each of those posts and break that down into like an Instagram real script or like a carousel post and what I should have in there. And like, obviously, We don't want to rely on AI to do our social media for us, but if we can work with it hand in hand and feed it what I know and then take it and tweak it to fit my voice a little bit better. This was such a huge time saver and it really helped me think a lot more deeply about how to connect to my audience. Megan: Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Yeah. Mm Yeah, I love that. Yeah, and I love that you said like, we need to use it, like as a tool and not not to like replace us because I think that's another thing like you can kind of tell, you know, just mostly unlike the captions, if something was written by, you know, chat, TV or another AI. And so Amanda Van Den Elzen: Mm-hmm. Yes. Megan: Yeah, like I'll use it. So what I'll do is like I'll write out a caption and then I'll copy and paste it over to chat and be like, okay, how can, because I'll write it out as if I was saying it. And it's like, okay, how can this sound, you know, more professional or, ⁓ you know, more Amanda Van Den Elzen: Mm-hmm. Megan: what's the word I'm looking for? Like just, just a smarter versus like just as some like voice to text. ⁓ and so like I'll, I'll then like tweak what it said. So it still sounds like me, but it'll just come across, I think a little bit better, especially if I like miss something or had like, you know, runoff sentences and all that type of stuff. ⁓ yeah, kind of using it more for like the grammar and, you know, anything like that versus just like, Amanda Van Den Elzen: Yes. Megan: Hey, write out all these captions and then I'm just gonna like copy and paste and done. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Yes, I would say like 99 % of the time my prompt into chat GPT is can you revise this for clarity? I think clarity is like the best way to just like take something, put it in and it'll simplify it or like, oftentimes too, I ask it to keep it at a seventh grade reading level because like the majority of people are not trying to tax their brains when they're going through social media. So being able to keep things simple, concise and Megan: Mmm, yeah. Yeah. Mm-hmm. Amanda Van Den Elzen: clear is super important. It's a great tool for it. Megan: Yeah, yeah, I agree. Okay, so I do want to kind of go back. I had mentioned Auto-Fluencer. And so I know we've talked about it a few times on the show, but for anyone that doesn't quite know what it is. So Auto-Fluencer is not going to help you get sponsors. It's more of a tool to use once you have a partner in place and your... Amanda Van Den Elzen: Yeah. Yes. Megan: promoting them on your social media and you want to figure out what is the performance of that and how can I show a return on their investment? So that's kind of more what AutoFluencer is for. So if you are kind of someone that's brand new or you don't have any partners yet, ⁓ you might not need it, but there is a free version of it. So... ⁓ we have it set up to where AutoFluencer will always be free up to two campaigns, which basically means you're tracking two different sponsors. Once you have more than two sponsors that you're wanting to track, then that's where there is a paid membership version. And there's other perks with that as well. I go in once a quarter and do a coaching call. ⁓ We have some other tools on the platform as well. We're working on stuff all the time as well. Like we're working on one for to show like your follower count and your post data overall because right now it's just what is tied to a specific sponsor. like for gunk, if I mentioned gunk in a post, it will track that post. But if I do a post where, you know, maybe it's like just me being a mom, it's not going to mention gunk. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Mm-hmm. Megan: it's then auto influencer doesn't track that. So we're working on like, hey, how can we see all of our post data? What's the engagement rate overall? ⁓ Our follower account, like how is that growing month over month? So we're working on all different types of stuff like that. yeah. Amanda Van Den Elzen: ⁓ yeah. I like that. I like that a lot because I feel like, you know, when you're looking at just the campaign or like just the times that you mention a sponsor or tag or hashtag or however you're tracking that, right? If you're looking at just that little like sliver of your content, then I think you miss the whole brand alignment side of it, right? A lot of these brands. Yeah, they want you to push their products, but they're partnering with you because they want to be associated with the person that you are and the audience that you're connecting with. So being able to show like the earned media value of yourself is really important too. That's cool. Megan: Mm-hmm. Yeah. Yeah. Well, another thing is to get like the demographic information on there because right now that's not on there. So yeah, that's another thing because one thing that you can do once you have an account and auto influencer is there are applications so you can go and apply to other companies to be a brand ambassador. And it is usually just discount or product only deals that, you know, also have like an affiliate link so you could make a small commission, but Amanda Van Den Elzen: ⁓ yeah. Megan: All that information is on your profile. So you don't have to like really fill out an application. You just have to like click a button, say, yes, I want to apply for this. There might be a couple of questions. So for example, Covercraft was one of the brand partners on there that had an open open application and they specifically wanted people that had trucks. And so that was one of their questions of like, okay, what is your truck that you have? ⁓ So I was able to... Amanda Van Den Elzen: Yeah. Mm-hmm. Megan: apply for that thankfully because I've got a my husband's got a nice f-150 and he had been looking for seat covers and I was like great I can get some for free now ⁓ so that was a nice little little ⁓ gift for him but ⁓ but yeah so yeah yeah I think he's still got them too so they're still in good shape ⁓ but yeah so that is so I use autofluencer to track what we're doing for our partners Amanda Van Den Elzen: Here we go! Yeah, I saw that video those look really cool, too Megan: And actually, because we just finished up Q1, so I had used it to send out some cool quarter one reports, which ⁓ we had like, so for me, like I have a certain KPI that I want to reach at the end of each quarter. And so then I was like, you know, looking at it a few weeks before in March and it's like, okay, like we're not quite there yet. So then it's like, okay, we, so we need to like ramp it up of like, Amanda Van Den Elzen: Yeah. Megan: for the specific sponsor. Like we need to do a couple more promotional posts for them, like showing the product, you know, how we're using it at the track. And thankfully by then we were starting our race season. So we had some fresh new content that we could get at the track and it wasn't just us in the shop or stuff from last year that I had been reusing. So that was a nice little push there to get over the hurdle and now kickoff Q2. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Yeah. Megan: with like that momentum. So that's why I love to use AutoFluencer for that. And then it's also nice like when you send off this report to the sponsors and they replay back and they're like, great job. Keep up what you're doing. Like we love it. It's like, okay, cool. I'm on the right track. So, but yeah, I do want to share for the listeners that we've got a custom coupon code. So right now AutoFluencer is on sale for the membership. ⁓ Amanda Van Den Elzen: Yeah. Yeah Megan: And that is going till sometime at the end of May. so typically for membership, again, if you have more than two sponsors you want to track, then you'll need the membership. is normally $49 per month. is currently on sale for $29 per month. So almost 50 % off. But if you use coupon code R O D, then you'll get a little extra bump there to save even more on the membership. So we can link that. in the show notes. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Yeah, yep, can. Megan, you're gonna have to send me that link though, because I don't know what it's gonna look like, but I will link it. Megan: Yes, I will send you the link. Yeah. Yeah. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Yeah, that's such a cool tool. When we talk about looking professional, it's not just about the posts that you make looking professional. It's also about how you're approaching your partners and looking professional and what better way than to have another way to make their jobs easier. They get to turn around and justify your expense, the expense that they have paying you or giving you product or discounts and turn around and... Megan: Mm-hmm. Amanda Van Den Elzen: say, well, this is why, because they gave us this much in earned media value. So that's a tool. Megan: Mm-hmm. Yeah, yeah, and that's what's so nice that I love that it does have that earned media value because I think. That's what separates it from like other software and platform that can do it. Like, yeah, like we can track your social media. Like we can tell you all the numbers, but I don't think I've seen anything else out there that has an earned media value to it. And the fact that you can separate it out, like by campaign. like for us, like Gunk is our biggest sponsor. So we've got an actual, ⁓ for like the calculation there for earned media value, it's a little bit higher versus one of our other partners where, where Amanda Van Den Elzen: Yeah. Yeah. Megan: we're not contractually required to do as much about them on social media. So yeah, so I love that you're able to then separate it out. It's not just like a one size fits all, but also one thing that makes it really cool too is that it does scheduled automated reporting. you can have it, so like every Monday it sends me an email of like, okay, here's the results from this past week for each of the partners. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Yeah. Mmm. Megan: And then you can add their email address. So then it just automatically sends the report to the sponsor. So then you don't even have to try to do it. So that's what's nice about it too. Amanda Van Den Elzen: ⁓ that's cool. You know what's cool about that too is like when I'm watching videos about like how to get the most out of your social media, oftentimes they talk about like repeating the same structure or even sometimes just repeating the same posts, you know, 30 or 60 or 90 days later, but you need to look for the ones that are performing really well. And if you already have a report that like breaks it down for you so you don't have to do the research on what's working well on your Instagram or your Facebook or whatever. Like you can just look and see, oh, this post did really well. I'm gonna make more like that. Megan: Mm-hmm. Yeah, yeah, exactly. that's, that's actually what we have done. So I will use like I do like a 30 day like calendar. And if I see like a certain style that did well for us, I will actually, so for me, like I use ClickUp to track all of my posts because like I want to see it in a list that I can like check off. And so if I have one that like did well, instead of like checking it off and like it'll, you know, disappear cause it's done, I'll duplicate it and say like, okay, in 60 days or in 90 days, do this exact same thing. So then that way, like then my future content is already being planned. Then it's, it's got Amanda Van Den Elzen: Yeah. Yeah. Megan: you know, proven results behind it. So I know it will do well. And it's less like, I don't have to then try to come up with like, okay, what's another new piece of content I can do? And then yeah, like when we're working with like a videographer, then I'll be like, hey, like, for us, it's like slow mo videos. So it's like, hey, slow mo videos do really well for us. So I need you to get a bunch of slow mo like launching off the starting line or doing a burnout. And ⁓ Amanda Van Den Elzen: Yes. Megan: So then that way we can also have like a backlog of that content as well. But yeah, it's so easy. Like it does make it easier because then it's like, okay, like this, this does well. So I'll repeat it. And then now like kind of what you were talking about, the pillars, I like, I've pretty much have like on the Randy Meyer racing page, pretty much a different content pillar for each day. And now it's like, okay, so I've got seven pillars that I'm going to do. And it's just easy to like, kind of like check it off and Amanda Van Den Elzen: Yeah. Yeah. Megan: we've been like, I've been doing it for so long to kind of refine and know like, okay, this type does work, this style doesn't work. So let's drop that pillar. Let's try something else. And looking at the data. And now it's just like, I don't have to put as much thought into like planning content for that page, which is nice because now it's like really taking off. And so then like before I was, you know, like stressing over everything and like, why isn't this working? And so just, yeah, like years of Amanda Van Den Elzen: Yes. Megan: research and like just trying stuff and it's now it's paying off. So feels good. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Yay, yes. I love repurposing the structure of that content. have also, maybe we should even just throw out there who we're following to get these ideas from, but Brock Johnson is one of them, and then Ava Yerger, think, is her last name from Personal Brand Launch. ⁓ Those two, both of them. Megan: Mm-hmm. Yeah Yes, yeah, I don't know how to say it uh-huh Amanda Van Den Elzen: Sorry, both of them talk about like literally recycling your content and posting the exact same thing in another 30 or 60 or 90 days. So like, I'll take content that I know did well and I'll just schedule it to run again in like 30 or 60 or 90 days, but I don't do that and then not post on those days. Instead, now I'm getting two and three posts a day. Megan: Yeah. Amanda Van Den Elzen: because I have this content recycling and I'm creating new content. So I'm starting to see the benefits of posting like two to three times a day instead. And I don't have to work any harder for it. I'm just recycling my content. Megan: Mm hmm. Yeah, yeah, that I love that. That's, that's, yeah, that's where I got my idea from, because I've been following those two for a really long time. Like I've been following Brock and Shaleen for like, years. So yeah, yeah, that's good. Okay. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Yes. I just recently found Brock, but yeah, he was my inspiration for the the daily like challenge to the racer reviews. Megan: Yeah. That makes sense. Yeah. Another one I like to follow is Modern Millie. And ⁓ yeah, she's another she's more on YouTube, but she is she does really good Instagram reels. So she was someone that was just like an influencer and then turned into like a social media coach. And so now a lot of her content is teaching about ⁓ like how to like do your hooks and like what are some different editing styles. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Okay. Modern Milli. Megan: ⁓ and all that. she, yeah, she does a lot of really good just yeah, like educational stuff. Her YouTube is really good. Like I said, that's another one that I like to follow. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Yeah. Okay, I see her here. I'm following her now too. I really like from like a structure standpoint, like how to actually like tactically create the video. I follow one called Chris Gur, like G-O-O-R. Have you ever found his stuff? ⁓ it's so good. He'll talk about like literally like how to film it. Megan: Yeah. No, I haven't heard of him. No. No, I'll follow. Amanda Van Den Elzen: So like do like a wide shot and then walk into this shot. And if you put your camera this way and turn, like this is a great hook. And he'll talk about like, here's how to think of like how to deliver your script while you're making this visually appealing. Like, so I really liked that one too. Chris Goor, G-O-O-R. I think it's like the Chris Goor is his handle. Megan: What is his name? Okay, yeah, I see. I am not following him. Okay, cool. Yeah. He says, stop overthinking content. I think that's what we've been saying. Yeah. Cool. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Yeah, I like that one. I like that one a lot. Yes. Yes. Yes. Stop overthinking it. ⁓ All right. ⁓ my God. We've been recording for an hour and 41 minutes. Oops. It was. think I hope you guys are going to have to tell us in the comments if it was good, if you learned stuff from it. But yeah. Megan: Yeah. This was a good episode, I think. Yes. Amanda Van Den Elzen: Awesome. Well, we will see you in two weeks. We've got another guest coming on. I think you're going to be really excited to hear from her. She's going to share some pretty cool insights from the standpoint of a marketing director. So we're going to talk to her a lot about not just the marketing side, but also the sales side and how those two tie together. So come back in two more weeks. We'll have that episode up. Until then, though, we love you. Bye. Megan: Bye guys. Amanda Van Den Elzen: threw my mouse on the ground.