Indie Advice Column: WTF Am I Supposed To Do About Instagram?

The Indie Advice Column is back and today we're covering one of the most frequently asked questions - "WTF is going on with Instagram?" If you resent how many times you refresh your feed, find yourself seriously struggling with low engagement or have ever called IG a "necessary evil" this episode is for you.

We cover:

• The emotional impact Instagram has on small biz owners
• How to think strategically (and realistically) about Instagram's purpose in your business
• Finding what kind of content "feels good" for you and your bottom line
• How to recognize when it's time to pivot

If you want to dive deeper, here are a few episodes you might enjoy:

• Outta My Way Algorithm: Growing Your Audience Off IG
• Social Media Sanity For Retailers
• Can Retail Leave Social Media? Advice For Product-Makers And Shop-Owners

Have a question you'd like to submit to the next issue? Get in touch via DM or at the email listed below.   

🕸 feelgoodretail.com
📱 @feelgoodretail
✉️ hiii@feelgoodretail.com

✨ This episode was sponsored by Shopify. Sign up for a one-dollar-per-month trial period at shopify.com/restofus ✨

Transcript

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Welcome to Retail for the Rest of Us, a podcast for indie retailers, makers, and shop owners who want to do business differently. I'm your host, Janine Malone, retail expert, small business cheerleader, and the founder of Feel Good Retail. On this show, you'll hear insights, strategies, and ideas on how to sustain and scale your shop without sacrificing your sanity. Each week you'll hear from me and the occasional guest expert in what I hope feels more like voice note from your retail BFF than a business podcast. Additional goodies and support can be, found in our show notes and at feelgoodretail.com. Now let's get into the show. Music. Hey, everyone, welcome back to Retail For The Rest Of Us. I'm your host, Janine Malone. And today you are listening to the second installment of our newest column or newest series I should say, in the advice column. If you missed our first episode, you can go back in the feed and listen to me dive deep into practices to give your eCommerce site a little bit of personality, where on your site, there's opportunity to do that, how you can differentiate your experience from other experiences online. Plus, I go into the five areas that I think are underutilized in indie retail websites because I just couldn't help myself. So if you haven't listened to that, head on over either before or after this episode. And I would suggest bringing a pen and paper because like I said, I really did go deep on that one because if you can't tell, e-commerce is one of my favorite things to talk about. So today we're going to talk about probably the most frequent topic that comes up in my business when I talk to indie retailers. When I tell people that I do what I do for a living, this is usually the question they ask me first. What the hell is going on with Instagram? You know, I'm paraphrasing. But I think we can all relate to the like, what is happening? I hate it here. It feels really bad. I don't know what's going to work. It feels like it's affecting my business. My reach makes me feel horrible. Like, there is so much swirling around this platform. And I wanted to put for the record what I think about social media right now in June, when I'm recording this late June of 2023 and hopefully give you some. Something to chew on at least and maybe something actionable to take and apply to the way that you're engaging on social media. We'll primarily focus this conversation on Instagram because I think it's the most widely used and relied on for indie retailers. I'll probably get into TikTok a little bit because that's another question that seems pretty related. It's like, okay, Instagram sucks. Should we all move to TikTok? What do we do on there? I'm certainly not an expert on TikTok, although my screen time report would tell you otherwise. But you know, I do have strong opinions as always. So if you want to dive even deeper into this topic, because I think that for this conversation, the way I've been framing it in my head is more so about like our relationship. To Instagram and how it functions within the ecosystem of our business. That's sort of what I'll be focusing today. I'm sure there will be actionable takeaways as I walk through this for you. But if you do want to dive deeper, there are other episodes of this podcast that I will link in the show notes that you can go listen to. One is called Out of My Way Algorithm, growing your audience off of Instagram. So if discoverability is something that you're worried about, you should definitely go listen to that episode. That is from a workshop I taught in the spring of last year. You can also go way, way, way, way back to the spring of 2021 and listen to social media sanity for retailers. That's kind of like a 101 approach to what I think Instagram and social media should be used for. And if you want to get even more slightly theoretic, and also, like, think about what life would look like without Instagram, you can listen to me. On Off The Grid, which is a podcast hosted by my amazing friend and this podcast producer and editor, Amelia Ruby. That whole podcast is all about leaving social media with a business. And I have found it super helpful just as I really try to reframe and recalibrate my relationship with Instagram as well. So I will link all of those in the show notes if you want to go even deeper on this topic. If it's been something that you've been thinking about, worrying about, complaining about, then there are other places to look as well. But today, I really want to talk about like, yeah, what is going on with Instagram and how do we need to think about it as really strategic business people while acknowledging that it may affecting us as human beings. And I think we should start there, because it's, I'll probably talk a bit from the eye in this section because I don't want to assume that You. Everyone feels the way that I feel, but I do have conversations with small business owners, all day long. And it seems like this is not something that is exclusive to me. So I have been on and off of Instagram for a while. I feel like I keep kind of coming back and thinking, all right, like I've taken my little break, I should start posting again. And when I do, it just feels – I just feel this like full body resistance. Like I don't have a graphic that I like. I don't know what to write in the captions. I am obsessed with like looking at who liked my content or what reach it's getting or who shared it. And as someone who's currently really trying to curb her just like general time on my phone. I noticed that on days where I do post to Feel Good Retail that I'm just like constantly checking. It's like. Seeking validation in a way that I try really hard not to do in my real life. And I've just noticed that yeah, I have this like resistance of like what's gonna work, what are people gonna like, what are people going to share? What is the algorithm going to show to people? And what does that have to do with my business, you know? And so, frankly, I've been in a place where I just couldn't deal with that pressure. So I just haven't been posting, and I've kind of gone through these like little waves. And I think that what's been helpful for me and what I'm honestly still working on is just acknowledging that like, it is affecting me emotionally. And maybe this isn't the case for you. Maybe you're just like full-blown business person and you're like, I just want something that's effective. Hats off to you. I really could use a page out of your book. But I think for me, like. It is really hard to put something out there and not see it get any traction, especially when you have so much visibility. You know, when I put this podcast out, it's like. It goes out and yeah, I check the downloads like probably once a week when I do just like generally my business analytics. But I'm not obsessing over it because it's not really in real time. And I know that podcasts have like a longer life, like shelf life. And I wanna, you know, I'm checking it before I've sent a newsletter. And then sometimes I look after and I, know that things just like it's a slower burn. And for some reason, the downloads that I get on this podcast, which are much lower than the number of followers I have on Instagram, the pressure doesn't feel there because there's been like some space between when I've recorded this podcast, and Amelia so graciously and perfectly has edited and made me sound much better than I sound in the raw cut. And I've written the show notes, and there's been enough space that by the time it goes out, it doesn't feel as like precious to me and or it doesn't feel as fragile. I'm just proud of what I put out for the most part. And with Instagram, there's just such an immediacy and such an intensity to like sitting and taking the photo, editing the photo, writing the caption. You know, maybe you're planning a handful of days in advance, but it's not like you've been planning weeks and weeks and weeks for most Instagram posts. And so that feeling is still there of like. You haven't really validated it yourself. So I think that we search for that validation because that's kind of how that platform was built, obviously. I'm getting into the weeds here. But what I want to say is I think before we can really examine the relationship that Instagram has to our business, I think that we need to personally examine the relationship, that we have personally with Instagram and acknowledge that like it might feel really bad. It actually might be affecting you pretty seriously, and that's not like stupid or shallow. And I think that's the judgment I've been placing on myself is like, it's just an app. Like, who cares? And it's like, well, I care. I actually care so much. And to feel like I have this place that really does connect me to folks but also takes a toll on my mental health, like that is just something I'm really weighing and trying to decide if there's another shape that that can take. Because for me, the platform itself just doesn't feel precious enough for my most meaningful work or my most meaningful thoughts. You know, it's still a really fun place for like... Pretty graphics and memes and connecting with folks and like DMing. And there are definitely, parts of the platform that I really enjoy and that I don't know that I'm ready necessarily to like, never use again. And maybe that's how you feel. Maybe you've been on that same kind of, teetering on the edge of leaving forever or not. But I think that that's the first piece is like acknowledging that it actually is a complicated and emotional decision. Even if that feels embarrassing. And I think once I acknowledge like that my personal feelings and like mental health, we're all tangled up in the question of like. Should I keep using this tactic of marketing for my business, then I was able to kind of separate those two things and really work on healing and consoling and grieving or whatever process I have to go through to get to a place where an app isn't making me feel that way, because I don't want to feel that way ever. And also, I need to market my business in order for my business to survive and meet like, you know, get this podcast out there and get our workshops out there and really continue to do the work that I love to do is like, I need. To work it. You know, I don't want to spend too much time in the weeds of like, is Instagram good or bad for us? I think that we all know, we all have an opinion, and we all have our own emotional intelligence. But I will say that in the conversations that I have, when I really do have my strategist hat on for other people and their businesses and their shops and their product lines. Oftentimes, what is happening is that the reaction to the lack of engagement or the lack of reach is much more emotional than it is strategic. Because in the back end, in the numbers, I can't correlate like a significant change to a lack of engagement on Instagram. And I think if I could, and there have been cases where I'm like, yeah, that is the gap. Like there is a gap in sales and I think it is seriously from this. Platform not performing in a way it used to, at least with that problem, there are solutions, right? Okay, what does that look like? And so that's what I want to get into in the next part of that conversation. But I've had to wade through a lot of those emotional conversations with retailers, because I understand that this can be an incredibly frustrating and demoralizing shift that is happening in the small business industry, in the social media industry, in tech, whatever. And that doesn't mean we need to like lament it. It doesn't mean we need to really complain that much about it anymore, hopefully. I'm certainly sick of complaining about it. I'm definitely sick of seeing people post like, like if you can see this, like I just – I think we all need to get to a place of accepting where Instagram doesn't feel good and doesn't perform in the way it used to and make peace with that emotionally and also find another plan strategically. I hope that doesn't sound callous, but it's just, you know, I think there's only so long that we can stay in this valley of like letting it affect the bottom line of our business and our mental health. So first things first, acknowledge that it just might feel bad. And I think it might be helpful to ask yourself the question as I've often been doing, what would it feel like to leave social media completely? What would it feel like to not be on Instagram at all, to not have a presence there to delete it from my phone to walk away and never return. And some days I'm like, that would feel pretty good. And then other days, there are things that I would miss, right? I would miss connecting with folks in DMs. I would miss how many cool shops I still discover on Instagram. I would miss, That's pretty much it. Honestly, the discoverability, the DMs, and I like being able to pop into stories and ask questions and connect in that way that feels like a little bit more intimate and a little bit more immediate. And so going forward, that's just how I want. To engage with that platform is like utilizing and maximizing the things I love about it that I don't feel like I can do anywhere else, and then just letting that be what it is. So maybe that's a question you want to ask yourself, like, not even just what do I like about this app, but ask yourself what would it feel like to leave social media. And if you feel resistance, that's when you ask the second follow-up questions of like, what would I miss about it? You know, what are the things that I'm not feeling like I'm getting anywhere else? And try your best not to be like starry-eyed when you answer that question. Think about things that actually happen. I think it's also very easy for us to romanticize the past version of this app. It feels like a fricking X or something, but like, you know, be realistic about what are the things that actually feel good and that actually happen regularly that you really do enjoy and would miss and try to create a strategy around this platform that optimizes those things and that really like leverages those pieces for you. You may recognize that sweet, sweet sound as another sale coming through your online Shopify store. But did you know that Shopify Power is selling IRL too? Y'all know I am Shopify's number one hype woman. If she has one fan, it's me. If she has zero fans, I'm dead. You know, that kind of energy. And part of what I love about Shopify is how seamless it makes selling no matter where you are. It's like having a ride-or-die partner that would never dream of slowing down your growth. Opening an online store? Shopify. Found a brick-and-mortar space that you're ready to call your own? Shopify. Got accepted to that market that you low-key forgot you applied for? You guessed it! Shopify. We all know Shopify for its online capabilities, but some of my most thrilling, expansive, and stress-relieving moments with Shopify have involved their POS offering. I can remember a time when setting up a point-of-sale system was weeks of headaches, really expensive, and resulted in this clunky, buggy, not-very-lux experience. And if you wanted to sell online too, then forget it. I'm just getting anxious thinking about it. But now, when an indie retailer comes to me saying that they just signed a lease on their dream storefront, or they're ready to hit the road on a series of pop-ups, I love getting to tell them just how easy it will be to accept payments, manage their inventory, connect with their customers, and even find the right hardware with Shopify. Let me give you an example. Last year, Erica and I decided to participate in Girl Gang Craft's holiday market with our brand Countermagic. Since we were already using Shopify for our online store, I was able to set us up with Shopify POS in just a few clicks to accept payments right on my phone. Plus, I guaranteed that all of our sales at the market were reflected in our inventory and in our monthly sales reports, which you know for me is a very big deal. There was no extra legwork, and we were freed up to focus on getting our brand out there, setting up a gorgeous booth, and selling seamlessly. Shopify has really leveled the playing field for so many indie retailers and provides the tools you need to sell, market, and grow your shop in person and online. And if you need any help, they've got literal award-winning support available 24-7 to answer any questions along the the way. Sign up for a $1 per month trial period at shopify.com slash rest of us, all lowercase. Go to shopify.com slash rest of us to take your retail business to the next level today. Shopify.com slash rest of us. We love you Shopify. Thank you for sponsoring this episode. Back to the show. Music. Now that we've made my little cancer son so happy, my Capricorn Moon's like, okay, but now that we feel good emotionally, like, what do we do, though? Like, what do we do? And I mean, frankly, I don't feel great emotionally about it, but I am trying to make peace. And that's important. So what is the role of Instagram and social media for brands, these days? And how can we kind of like use that strategically? How do we make peace with this app and use it in a way that is effective, uses it and views it as a tool rather than something that is like gatekeeping our success from us. First of all, one of the ways that you can continue to use and maximize social media is by using paid ads. If you have listened to this podcast before, you know that is not my preference, unless you are growing or planning to grow your company very, very significantly. I think that it's very expensive to play around with paid ads. You have to have really great creative. You have to be testing creative all the time. And I just haven't really seen for a smaller scale operation that it makes much sense because the return on ad spend is not significant enough to make a real difference. So let me give you kind of like an example. We're going to strap our math hats on for a second. So return on ad spend is how much money you are making compared to how much money you are spending. So let's say you decide you have $500 to spend every single month to be placing ads on Facebook and Instagram. Odds are if you have a great result, you're making like two or three times what you spend. So in that case, you spend $500 and let's say you're making $1,000 to $1,500 back. So you've spent the $500, so you're really making $500 to $1,000 back and let's – you know, then you have to take into consideration like the profit and how much your products cost, what your margins are. And so to me, it just doesn't seem like if you have $500, which some of you might be. Saying like, girl, if I had $500 extra, I'd be throwing myself a pizza party or something. I wouldn't be giving it to Mark Zuckerberg and I would agree with you. I would rather book myself a strategic retreat at a really nice Airbnb for two nights to. Really think about like the next quarter of my business than write a check to – my God, LOL. Imagine writing a check to Facebook. Wow, that really just cracked me up, like the thought of just…. To Mark Zuckerberg. But let's imagine that that's the plan we want to do. I just think that there are easier ways to make $500 to $1,000 personally. Maybe I should write a list of them. But that's just my opinion. And that doesn't mean that ads are good or bad. I don't think there's any morality to paid advertising. I think I used to feel a lot more aggressive about that. But I think that different strategies work for different types of businesses and work for different people. And either way, it's work. It's not like paid ads are free money. There's a lot of work that goes into there. And I'm certainly not like an ads manager. I know, just enough to be dangerous. But that's certainly not my expertise. And it's not something I really have invested time in learning because it's not a strategy that I feel really passionately about for indie retailers. But if that's something you want to explore, great. That is a way to do this. That is a way to pivot away from organic reach on social if you're feeling frustrated. Another thing I would say before I get off the paid ads bandwagon or whatever, anti-bandwagon, is that a lot of times folks will invest a decent amount of money in like boosted posts on Instagram or will invest a smaller amount as a monthly ad spend just to get their content, their standard Instagram content in front of more of their audience. And I totally, completely understand the thinking behind that. But that is like 100% ego, and 100% what Instagram and meta wants you you to do. Because what matters is not that you. Get your post in front of more people. What matters is that they're like clicking through to your website, or they're making a plan to visit you in store, or they're coming to your pop-up shop. And of course, yes, we want to get that information out there when it's relevant, and it's time-sensitive, and there is a place for that kind of investment. But I think as an ongoing strategy, just like boosting your posts and trying to get more engagement on your Instagram posts does nothing to actually help the bottom line of your business. It feels like that's how Instagram has warped our brains, kind of. Is that like, if we get higher engagement, if we get higher likes, if we get more shares, then that is what is going to support our business. When in reality, that is just a tactic that Meta has used to kind of keep us all addicted to this platform and using it for our businesses. All that to say, that is one route. We are not going to dive any deeper into paid ads in this episode. If you want to talk more about it offline, feel free to DM me. If you want me to dive deeper into what it really looks like to test paid ads, send me a question on Instagram, send me an email. I will do a full Indie Advice column about that if you are interested in me pulling out my soapbox and stepping on up. I feel like we've been getting there. We've been getting there. We've been getting there. Now we're going to talk about it. What are we doing on Instagram? So there's a couple things. I'm going to start with the truest what I think or what I'm thinking about right now. And then I'm going to leave you with a couple places to reflect and create a strategy unique to your own business. Personally, I have noticed that I am not using Instagram in the same way that I once was just as a user. And maybe you've noticed that as well. Like I'm just not opening the app as often. I really it's like such mindless scrolling when I'm on there. I have started to engage a bit more with reels. And I definitely still watch stories. The feed, though, I just really, I mean, it is like... I'm basically asleep when I'm scrolling the Instagram feed, frankly. And so maybe you've noticed that as well. I think observing your own behavior is really critical. And the ways that I do use Instagram though are keeping up with friends and brands that I really, really like whose content I really, really like. And I use it to sort of like check in on something that maybe someone recommended. So when I say that, I mean like if a friend recommends a restaurant to me, I don't go to their website. I go to their Instagram, right? If someone recommends a brand to me or a shop or I am going to a new city, I will try to find places I want to go via Instagram because I think you get a better sense of like what that shop is about, what the restaurant menu looks like, what that area is like. When you are on Instagram, you have like a lot more content versus a website, which based on our last Indie Advice column, as you know, a lot of small business websites just aren't very good. So thinking about those two use cases, that is really critical when you are crafting your strategy, right? And maybe there's a secret third option, which again, you may find in your your reflection. But I think it's really critical to think like, okay, do I want to engage with a brand that's like only posting about like new product and product flat lays and like just, selling, selling, selling all the time? No, I don't. I came on Instagram because I have five, minutes to spare and I just like needed a distraction. And that's not to say you should never sell on Instagram or never talk about your products. Of course, that is a pretty important of marketing your business. But I think that Instagram is a place where you can connect and add context to the overall vibe of your shop. What are you listening to? What's your sense of humor? Kind of like we were talking about on the last Indie Advice column about adding just that personality. And that is a place where I think it's really critical to continue to use social media for indie retailers is that like we're reminding people that we exist, we're talking about the new things that we're excited about, and we're also able to create that. World around the things that we're selling. One of the other things that I think we've all fallen into, definitely have myself, is reading these articles about what the algorithm wants right now, right? And we've seen so many of these. It's like reels have to be seven seconds. You need to put a face in it. You have to be editing the reel inside of the Instagram app. You should post at 1pm every day. You have to post every day. You should only post every couple days. There have been so many iterations and trends of like how to please this algorithm that I think all of our heads are just kind of spinning, and that's another place that I think resentment sort of breeds is when we feel like we've done everything right. We followed all the rules, right? It's the myth of meritocracy, but just on Instagram, Like, we followed all the rules. Why am I not seeing the results that I desire? I was promised XYZ. And that just might not be the case. And so my approach, as I continue to evaluate the role of Instagram in my business, is that I at least want to make stuff that I like, and that I think my. Audience would like, whether they see it or not, because we don't know what the algorithm is going to do. We really don't even know what it's doing now. But what I think is that if people do go to your profile because they haven't seen you pop up in a while, or a friend recommended your shop to them, or maybe you got a piece of press and people are coming to check you out, I would venture to guess that you don't want your feed just cluttered with shit that you made because you thought it it would work. That energy is just so different and marketing is so energetic. And I don't mean that in the like manifestation way. I mean that there has to be some truth and authenticity behind something for it to connect with your audience. And if you're just like, oh my god, I hate making reels, but I guess I have to, then like that energy comes across and it doesn't feel unique to you. It doesn't feel authentic to you. It doesn't feel on brand and it's not going to represent what you want to represent about your shop. Now, does that mean everything you make has to be like perfect? Of course not, but I think that you should try to like it. And I also don't think that's a super high bar to clear. Like you're all so creative and so funny and like have these really cool points of view and like intersections and your shop reflects those. So I think making yourself a bit more comfortable with trying and doing stuff that you like and not focusing so much on the outcome is really essential. Because frankly, we don't know what's working right now. And so at the end of the day, as opposed to, I made a bunch of stuff I didn't want to make, because I thought it was gonna get me XYZ, just that doesn't feel as good as like, you know, I made something that I thought was really funny or really cool, or like, I loved that photo, or I really wanted to talk about that, and it didn't get as much reach, but it's there now. And if people find it, awesome. And maybe I can repurpose it for an email. Or maybe I can pop it on our homepage, or maybe I want to talk about it on stories, or whatever. I think that that is really effective and is just going to change, again. Like the energy of your relationship with this platform. The other thing I will say, and I'm sure this will surprise no one is that you need to be really clear about the role of social media inside of your business using analytics. I don't even want to say I think because I know that this is true based on how many brands I've audited. Instagram does not drive the kind of business that you think it does. Again, I think that's because we just have so much visibility into how many followers we have, how many likes we get, how many people see our posts. And I think that that's like the platform that I think folks feel the most comfortable with analytics on but when you really look inside Google or you are. You know, like, even just looking on like Shopify or whatever platform you're using for your ecommerce site, like, the traffic that Instagram is driving is not super significant. So I think. That you need to be clear on like, what you want Instagram's role to be. So we just went through one example that I think is really effective, which is that Instagram is a place where our brand lives, and that I'm allowed to show like more context and more personality. It feels more like a scrapbook than a catalog, right? And I also think that there are ways that Instagram can help you with discoverability if that's important. Like I said, there's a whole episode on some alternatives to that in the feed. I also don't think that Instagram is really a direct sales channel. There are going to be some changes in the coming year about tagging products and forcing folks to use Instagram checkout if you want your products to be able to be tagged and linked. I really disagree with that. And I really don't like Instagram checkout. So that's something to consider as well. And I'm sure when that – if that does end up rolling out, I will probably do another whole episode about Instagram yet again. But for now, I think being clear on like what is the role that Instagram realistically serves inside of my business? Is it where people discover me? Is it where I connect with my customers who already exist? Is it a sales channel for me? What is the role? What is the purpose? Because that is going to help you fill in the gaps elsewhere if you're feeling like your performance on Instagram is down. An example of that could be perhaps in its heyday, Instagram was a place that you really got in front of a ton of new folks. You were being introduced to new customers all of the time. Maybe you ended up on that Discover page, etc. And so if that reach to new people is not feeling as strong as it once was, maybe it's a time for you to examine something like your SEO strategy or utilizing Pinterest or doing some newsletter swaps with folks who have similar audiences to you. There are definitely alternatives out there, but in order to solve the problem, you have to actually know what the problem is. And again. Instagram's engagement being down isn't a problem, necessarily. It might not affect your business actually at all. It just might feel bad. So this is where you can kind of customize, your approach to your unique business is by doing some of that analysis, really diving into the numbers, the performance, and seeing where there is room for you to supplement. And if there's opportunities to make some big pivots in your overall marketing strategy. But in order to do that, like I said, you need to know the exact problem. To summarize, I'll say something that I find myself saying all the time, even just to myself as an affirmation. Instagram is only one tool. And I know it has taken a huge role in a lot of people's businesses, particularly those who have opened their businesses in the last like five to eight years. Instagram has always been around and has always been a platform for them that has supported their shop and really may have allowed them to grow, allowed them to scale. And it is very scary when things that we are comfortable with and that we are used to change. It's not silly to feel scared or bad or emotional about these changes. But what I hope came through in this episode, and I hope you can kind of take away is that like, you're so smart, and there are so many other things that you can do. And there was a time where you didn't. Know how to use Instagram, and you didn't know if it was going to be effective for your business. You figured it out. And I think that there's so many other ways for us to grow and for us to market and they may look different and it may be slower growth, but it all comes down to like, what numbers are you really trying to hit? What really are your goals inside of your business for the next 12 months or the next couple of years? And being ruthless in your ability to say, like, if this isn't working, I have to try something else. That's what being an entrepreneur and being a business owner is. And hopefully, everything I shared about my own personal Instagram journey helps you know that I'm not trying to be callous when I say that. But at a certain point, we all need to move on from feeling bad about something not working anymore and find something that feels really good about that tool if we want to keep using it, or something that replaces that and feels really good and feels authentic to us and comes naturally. It's not going to feel easy in the transition because change is hard, especially change in our business when we're challenging things or changing things that might affect our bottom line or our success or how much money we make. That is scary stuff. But I think resisting is worse in the long run. And trust me, I'm there with you. I am like in full body resistance as I record this episode to this platform, and I'm trying to figure out how it looks. But this is sort of the real-time process that I'm trying to use. And it is, making me feel a little bit more at peace and a little bit more strategic and a little bit more excited about what could come next and what shape marketing could take inside of my business. So I hope that you go take like a big sip of water and a big deep breath after this episode. It was a doozy. Thank you for being in business. Thank you for questioning platforms and tactics and strategies that aren't working anymore and and being nice to yourself through the process. Thank you for being here. Cheers to feeling good. Thanks for listening to Retail for the Rest of Us. Find additional information and resources related to this episode in the show notes or on our website, feelgoodretail.com. This show was lovingly produced and edited by Softer Sounds, a feminist podcast studio. If you enjoyed this episode, please take a minute to text it to your business bestie, share it on social media and leave us a rating or review. It really helps the show grow organically and we love making new friends. Thank you for being here. Thank you for being in business and cheers to feeling good. Music.