I Believe In Me! Now, How Do I Get YOU To Believe In Me, Too?

I believe in me! Now how do I get YOU to believe in me, too?

Imagine in 1983, when the internet was first launched.
It was new. It was frightening.

Now, imagine your local small business owner, who had just paid to have their ad put into the local phonebook.
Do you think they had any interest in putting their business on the internet in 1983?

Heck. No.

Only the biggest businesses joined the internet at the start of its creation. They probably had some intel, or had already learned about how big it was about to become. The early majority of businesses didn’t have a website created until at least a decade later.

Now, think about virtual tours.
I knew I had a very important concept to share, but I didn't know where to start.

Okay ... I DID know where to start, but I didn't know how. I knew I needed to start where everyone currently was hanging out. That was online (hello, Covid era).

Where were the small business owners? Spending more and more time on their social media pages, that once only served for random information and some photos here and there. Now, their social media pages were turning into their diaries — they were spilling their hopes, their fears, and sharing their products along the way. The way we looked at marketing was changing before our very eyes.

How could I, during a global pandemic, get their attention?

I quickly learned that small business owners were utilizing Facebook and Instagram to the best of their abilities. They were posting more than ever before, even starting to do Reels and Instagram Lives where they would show their products. Social media was LIT, as the kids say, and I knew I needed to jump in Charlie’s Angels Full Throttle.

Was I a social media expert? Yes. Just kidding, that's a big no.

I didn't even have an Instagram account in 2020! I had deleted it around 2018 because I was tired of it.

But, I knew that if the world was online, I would have to also be online.

So, with a healthy mix of fear and excitement, I started my Instagram and Facebook accounts -- Me-Tour Inc.

I included a logo of my business name, made the page public and ... BOOM, that's it. I stared at it for longer than I’d like to admit, refreshing the page to see if anything happened.

…

Nothing happened.

I waited for the followers to flood in...

…

By the end of the day, I still had a whopping ZERO new followers. I wanted to throw my phone out the window, make a pillow fort, crawl into it, and spend the rest of my days there.

I had no idea what I was doing! Panic set in, and not the kind that happens at the disco. This was “oh-my-god-I-never-should-have-thought-I-could-do-this” panic.

I quickly realized that business marketing took more than a name and a logo. I needed to do some actual research.

So, I made my page private for a couple of days, watched hours worth of social media marketing content on YouTube, read hours worth of marketing information, and came back with a plan.

Did the plan work right away? You’ll have to read on to find out.

(Fun fact — my first post was smoke and mirrors— 3 stock photos, and a virtual tour of my own house!! Gotta start somewhere, right?)