Please note this transcript is generated by AI - apologies for any mistakes

Pippa Goulden (00:43)
Hello and welcome back to another episode of PR Made Simple. today I am talking about something that I know is on a lot of business owners minds and that is the algorithm, Instagram, LinkedIn, whatever your social platform is. I am seeing across all of my areas of work from my DIY PR membership.

the training I did last week, my one-to-one accelerators within the networks that I'm in, within the groups, the masterminds, people are frustrated with social media. There's no denying it. and someone said something to me recently that I really can't stop thinking about. And it was that they feel like they've hit the visibility ceiling. And as soon as she said it, I knew exactly what she meant.

She'd been doing all those tick box in inverted commas, right things, posting consistently, showing up, working on her inverted commas visibility, building her business, but she's stuck in the same circles, having the same conversations with the same people. She's being seen, but she's not getting known. And I've seen that in my own social media this week, over the last kind of week or so, I've been really focusing on the launch for Get Known. ⁓

And you know, the same people are seeing my stories, the same people are seeing my reels, it's not getting me out to new audiences. And when you're focusing on the wrong thing, there's a real difference. And there was a real problem there, isn't there, in terms of bringing new people into your world, connecting with the people that really, you know, need your services or need your products.

And this is what I think has happened. I've spent some time thinking about this over the last few weeks. We have all, myself included, put too many eggs in the Instagram basket. It worked five years ago. It worked two, three years ago, but it isn't working anymore. But we keep being told it works. We keep seeing the Instagram experts showing us their 100,000 views and their...

150 saves on their posts and showing us, telling us this is how they do it. And we're all sat there thinking, but it's not working for me. But here's the thing, I don't think it's working for 99 % of businesses. If it was, we wouldn't all collectively be finding it so hard and questioning what we're doing on it. We wouldn't be feeling like we're shouting into the void. We wouldn't all be exhausted from the content hamster wheel. And that algorithm changes, the reach drops, the engagement tanks.

and we're told to post more or try this new format or try this trending audio and it's exhausting and it's not a sustainable business strategy. And I know this isn't just theory because I looked at my own numbers across the board for January from my sales that have come in. I pulled up everyone who's bought from me this month from the Get Known launch, from my DIY PR membership, from my one-to-one accelerator.

from other bits that I do. And do you want to know what I found? Only about 20 % came from Instagram and ads. So I kind of have grouped those together. 20%. So that's not a very, it's not a huge amount, especially when you consider the emphasis that a lot of business owners put onto their social media, how much of their time it takes up.

I'd really encourage you to do this audit because it's really helpful to see where those clients and product, know, sales are coming from. Obviously for some of your businesses, it might be more difficult. I think there was about 20 % from social media and ads grouped together. I think there was about 55 % from my network, from PR, from...

getting known for what I do. About 12-ish percent came from referrals, like specifically people recommending me to others or people saying that I'd worked with certain people and wanting to work with me because of that. A small percentage has come from a very specific workshop I did in a membership, which was a PR opportunity. And I don't know if that all adds up, but

The majority of my revenue, I would say three quarters this month has has come to me from sources beyond Instagram. Three quarters of my revenue. And that's not me saying that social media doesn't matter. I'm still on there. I'm still showing up. But if social media was my only strategy, I would have lost.

a huge amount of this month's revenue. And this is what's happening with Instagram now. You're not reaching new people, you're reaching the same people over and over again. Your 2,000 followers, whatever it is, see your posts, but think of actually how many of the percentage of them are actually seeing them regularly. Your email list is seeing your content, but that's growing maybe steadily, but it's hard to grow your email list.

But nobody outside that bubble has a clue that you exist. So the podcast hosts, the journalists, the event organizers, they are not looking on your Instagram. They might be on Instagram, but they're not seeing you. They're not scrolling your feed. They're not watching your stories. They're not in your DMs. Those high ticket clients who are going to pay premium prices, they're not really discovering you through a reel anymore. You're stuck in that bubble and that is not growth. It's a ceiling.

And so here's what actually grows your business. What I found has grown my business and what happens with the businesses that I'm working with is building authority beyond your own channels. And you'll hear me talking about authority a lot at the moment because it's something in 2026 that we really need to be thinking about. It's not just about getting seen. It's not just about an inverted commas visibility. It's building authority beyond your own output.

getting featured on someone else's podcast, being quoted in an article, speaking at an event, getting recommended by someone who's never even met you. That is how you reach new people. That is how you break out of your bubble. That is how you stop relying on an algorithm that could change tomorrow. I got a new one-to-one accelerator client because I'd been recommended by somebody who I'd never worked with. She'd seen me, she'd heard about me. I had a discovery call with someone this week who...

said I just had to book a discovery call with you because I've seen you in so many places. You know, they're not finding me through my social media. They're hearing about me from other people. They're seeing me in lots of different places. I've built that trust that I know what I'm talking about because you need to reach beyond them to actually grow. And no matter how many Instagram followers you've got, you know, if you are unknown where it actually matters, you're not going to be able to grow and scale your business.

And like I've said, this matters more than ever in 2026 because we're drowning in content. We're scrolling, but we're not really engaging. We're not really seeing what we're scrolling anymore. We've become little scrolling robots. And also so many people are actually trying to proactively not spend their time on Instagram social media and be much more regimented about when they use it and how they use it. You know.

Everyone's posting, everyone's shouting about themselves, about how great they are. AI is writing generic captions. Your audience is exhausted with it. They're overwhelmed, they're tuning out. I'm doing the same. They don't want more content from you. They want proof that you are the expert you say you are. And that proof comes from the authority, not from your Instagram grid. Yes, absolutely, your social media will work as a...

shop window, they might come and check you out and have a look at your content and check your vibe. Absolutely, I'm not saying abandon your social media. I'm just encouraging you to think about where you are spending your energy and is it being spent in the right place that's actually going to help you scale and grow your business. Because when someone sees you featured in a publication or interviewed on a respected podcast or speaking at an industry event, that's going to change everything about how they perceive you.

You're no longer just another person posting on Instagram. You are the expert. You are the obvious choice, the person that other people trust enough to feature. And I've seen that myself in terms of momentum building. When I have stepped up to get known for what I've done over the past kind of 18 months, it has made a massive shift to my business in terms of me being asked to be on podcasts, me being asked to be on panels, me being asked to do talks or return back.

to places where I've done them to do additional workshops or that kind of things because I am known and trusted and I am building that profile. Absolutely, there was still a lot of work I can be doing around that and don't worry, I have a plan for 2026. But you I have got the ball rolling on that and I am starting to see the impact of building that momentum. So if you are feeling that visibility ceiling, if you are feeling stuck, fed up, exhausted,

by your social media platforms and you know that something needs to change, then here's what to do. One, diversify where you're showing up. Don't just put your eggs in one basket on a platform that you don't own. Get out of your own dance floor. Start dancing on other people's dance floors, getting featured on their podcasts, in their publications, on their stages. Collaborations are small business owners' superpowers. That's how you tap into new audiences.

not the same people seeing you over and over again. And I will say one thing about it is that this is the fun stuff. This is the stuff that you can actually really enjoy. one of my DIY PR members was saying this week how much she was loving doing podcast interviews because it was allowing her to deep dive into what she knows about.

It's not the slog that Instagram feels like at the moment. brings, for me anyway, and a lot of the people that I work with, it brings excitement back into your business. Number two, I'd recommend building assets that aren't dependent on algorithms. You your social media content has gone within 24 hours. The algorithm's buried it. Nobody's scrolling back through your feed six months ago. Or on LinkedIn, people are liking posts that you've.

you know, posted three weeks ago, because they're only just appearing in their feed. You have absolutely no control over who's seeing it and when. But podcasts, interviews, magazine features, speaking opportunities, they keep working for you for years. They're evergreen. They show up in Google searches. They get shared. They build credibility that compounds. Even if somebody doesn't read that magazine feature, you telling them that you've been...

talked about or you've written an article for somebody or you've been included in a feature in Red Magazine or Psychologies or wherever it is that makes people go, ooh, she knows what she's talking about. You're not dependent on an algorithm that is changing all the time. And the third point, and like I've said, is focus on authority, not just visibility. Stop measuring success by follower count or engagement rates or how many people saw your reel this morning.

Start measuring it by who's talking about you that you've never met. Are they talking about you when you're not in the room? What opportunities are coming to you without you having to chase them? Who's finding you through channels you didn't build yourself? That's what moves the needle. And if you are ready to do this work, to break through that visibility ceiling and actually get known beyond your Instagram bubble, that is exactly what we're doing in Get Known, my six week group sprint.

We start the week commencing the 9th of February. The early bird price is available until Tuesday the 27th of Jan. It's not about posting more. It's not about cracking an algorithm. It's not about social media. It's not about finding the next trending audio you'll be pleased to hear. It's about building authority, getting featured, knowing your positioning, knowing what you want to get known for is so important in this work.

being talked about in rooms that you are not even in, reaching audiences who have never heard of you before. But whether you want to join Get Known or not, I just want you to hear this. Please don't put all your eggs in the social media basket. Keep your audience, keep showing up, reach beyond them, build the authority, get featured, break out of your bubble because that is what is going to grow and scale your business and bring back the fun and the joy.

the journey as you do that. right I'm off to go get known, I will be back again very soon for another episode of PR Made Simple.