How to protect your energy online while building a brand

Social media marketing is one of the most amazing inventions for small business owners over the last century, but it can also be really, really exhausting and confusing. I’ve been a business owner for over 10 years, and have been teaching social media marketing for 5+ years. However, I’ve only recently started to identify as a “spoonie”, even though I’ve been modifying my daily life and work flow to accommodate my chronic pain for most of my adult life. I became familiar with the supportive online spoonie community via editing this book as well as exploring my own health trauma — but that’s a story for another day.

Some folks might say that social media marketing is over, but I think it has staying power for at least a few more years. This guide is (obviously) not medical advice, nor is it meant to be exhaustive. Rather, this guide is a spot in the middle of a venn diagram between best practices I encourage for all my social media marketing students, and what has helped me honor my energy (and still get the same or better results.)

Some things to avoid in your spoonie quest for social media marketing effectiveness:

• Don’t overthink your content. While it’s best practice to think about your posts from your readers’ perspectives, to make sure they’re not crass or disrespectful, you don’t need to mull over every post for a week. I have a friend who makes the most beautiful posts but she spends much of the week chewing over when, and what, to post. That would exhaust me. Some of my clients avoid social media burnout by writing (in Notes, or an actual journal), thoughts and captions once per week, then scheduling them out. When I was at the height of posting 5–15 times per week across 3 brands, I preserved my energy by batching (see more about batching below, and also in this article.) Regardless of how you create your captions and images — it really helps to give yourself permission to create content, put it on the calendar to post, and then forget about it for a few days.
• Don’t post more than you need to. This is somewhat amorphous advice because how much does one “need” to post? Probably less than you think, actually. My advice to my students who are struggling with consistency is that consistently posting once per month is better than posting a flurry of content and then falling off social media for several months (calling myself out here, definitely.) If you’re really ramping up your business, posting consistently 1–2 times per week to your Instagram feed is a good place to start. This is enough that you should show up in folks’ feeds, without annoying them with your over-presence. It’s worth noting that, in my experience and research, there are big differences in who is looking at your feed posts vs. stories vs. Reels on Instagram. I get my highest engagement and community building from stories (I post 1–10 times per day in my stories, precisely because it can be silly and goofy and not good photos. I like sharing bits of my daily life without the pressure of it being on my feed.) I get lots of view but few clients from Reels (I have a service based business, it could be different for you if you sell products.) I’ve noticed only my long-term followers or brand new followers see or engage with my feed posts. But I still make sure to post there, because your feed becomes like a website homepage if you think about answering folks FAQ on it.
• Don’t follow people who make you feel bad. It’s sort of surprising that I still give this advice, but I still see folks getting down on themselves because of something they saw online, whether it’s someone’s lifestyle that makes you wistful, an ex that seems super happy, or a brand you feel a tinge of jealousy over. Don’t follow accounts that make you feel bad. It’s that simple. If it’s someone you feel you “have” to follow, like a family member, I give you permission to “mute” their posts (click the 3 dots in the upper right corner of one of their posts.)
• Don’t follow everyone who follows you, or people you feel like you “should.” This is both a practical and emotional tip. Firstly, if you have a bunch of people you don’t really care about in your feed, you’re not really going to care about social media. A smaller list of folks will keep you more engaged. Secondly, Instagram is constantly shifting who they show you in your feed, so following 1,000 people makes it way less likely that you’ll actually see (and engage with) the people you do care about.
• Don’t feel like you have to follow and engage with folks on multiple platforms, even if you enjoy their content. If you regularly see someone’s posts on Facebook, and they’re posting the same things on Instagram, mute them on Instagram! Don’t allow people to clutter your feed just because you “should” follow them.
• Don’t copy what other brands are doing. I can almost guarantee that forging your own path and doing something unique will bring in more, and more loyal, customers than trying to replicate another brand’s success. This doesn’t mean you shouldn’t be inspired by other accounts, just that it makes sense to put your own twist on things. The one exception to this? TikTok. I don’t have as much experience with TikTok as I do with Instagram and Facebook, but it seems like you can build a big following by essentially copying what others are posting. (That’s not a dig — it’s the way the format is set up.) I’ve been posting very simple 1 minute social media tips on TikTok for over a year, and while I’ve gotten 10,000+ views on those videos, I don’t think I’ve ever gotten a client from TikTok. (And, because my videos don’t fit what TikTok is looking for, I’ll probably never reach Creator status where I can make money directly from videos.) I got onto (and stay on) TikTok essentially as a researcher, so I know the platform for my clients. If you’re a small business and don’t enjoy creating your version of someone else’s videos… I wouldn’t suggest TikTok as your primary outlet for social media marketing.

Some things to prioritize as you are building your business/brand:

• Share about who you are. The true magic of social media (Instagram in particular, although also Facebook and TikTok to some extent) is that people are looking for connections, values, and genuine folks. You can absolutely have a 100% business focused account where you only ever share stale stats and pics about your business. But in my experience, if you are willing to open up about yourself, your life, possibly even how many spoons you have that day — this allows people to connect with you on a much deeper level than if you just shared a photo of the clutch you made. You could view this cynically, that it could be a good business decision to share about your health issues, but I think of it as being an opportunity to build genuine community, trust, affinity, and possibly even make new friends!
• Take the time to create batches of content, being respectful of your energy levels. If you have energy to create, try to create more than one thing at a time. Batching almost always creates time savings. I used to make one of a kind jewelry. If I photographed each piece as I made it, and edited the image later on, it took me about 3–5 minutes to post one item. If I waited until I had 10 items made and photographed them quickly in the same light, I saved time on setup (getting my background ready for 10 items instead of 1) and I saved time on editing (using the same ligthing and immediately editing all 10 saves a ton of time.) Even having these 10 photos “in my pocket” saved time and energy because I could calendar them and not think about them again.
• Use a calendar so you don’t have to think about when to post. So many people let their energy go to thinkingabout posting instead of posting. If you batch create content (photos and captions), you can schedule out your posts for a month or more — and forget about it until your calendar pings!
• Use scheduling apps, if they help you be more consistent. However, I’ll share two caveats: 1) occasionally Instagram has pulled authorization from scheduling apps, causing problems for folks with permission to use those apps (including losing access to your account), and 2) I’ve noticed that scheduled posts (for me and my clients) get much lower engagement than “organic” posts. This is true even using Facebook’s own internal scheduler. This is the main reason why I plan out my posts but post them “organically” by a reminder on my Google calendar.
• Follow people who inspire you, personally and professionally. Give yourself permission to follow silly cat accounts, meme accounts (I love Cheerful Nihilism). Even if you’re just on social media for your business, you can still have a little joy while scrolling.
• It’s OK to pick just one platform for your marketing efforts. All things considered (including its many faults), I’d recommend Instagram for most small businesses getting started. But, if you’re only going to use one platform, you should still secure your handle on any/every other platform you may want to use in the future. It’s best if your handles match across all platforms, so you don’t want to risk someone else snagging it. You can use each of the “dormant” handles to direct to a different platform, e.g. on Instagram your bio could say, “Check us out for updated content at the same handle on Facebook!”
• Honor your energy. You don’t owe anyone a post. Yes, consistency is really helpful when building a brand. But if you’re putting up boring, toneless posts just to post — customers notice that.
• Use your social media accounts to answer Frequently Asked Questions. This is one of my best energy saving tips. If you get the same questions often, it means you’re not answering them properly on your social media or website. Use your bio to answer the most obvious questions, like where you’re located, your value proposition, and what your website is. Use your posts to answer questions about your products or services, shipping times, things your customers frequently overlook, etc. It’s completely exhausting answering the same DMs or emails over and over — so don’t! Use them as a springboard to preemptively answer questions and concerns. This not only saves time, but also the energy of avoiding something repetitive and boring.