Youtube and Instagram Growth with Content Expert Katie Steckly
Made Remarkable intro: Welcome back. And thanks for tuning into the Made Remarkable podcast, hosted by Kellee Wynne. Joining us is Katie Steckly. A magical Harry Potter, loving friend. And our favorite one-stop shop YouTube channel to follow for content creation, tips, social media strategy, and a little bit of wanderlust on her travel channel. Tune in and listen to Katie and Kelly discuss. How to create content that will build your community in a way that won't have you doing funny dances. Or chasing the latest trends to make the algorithm happy. It's up to you to create authentic content, and this conversation will provide a few easy to follow tips on how to do just that.
Check out the show notes and transcripts for more information about Katie. Exclusive promotional offers and any special links mentioned during the episode. Kelly loves connecting with listeners. So don't be shy. Reach out on social media and together let's build a community that celebrates the remarkable. If you want to be notified every time a new episode hits the airwaves. Just hit that subscribe button on your favorite podcast platform.
Thank you for joining us today. And always remember that you are made remarkable destined to achieve the unimaginable. Now let's get to the good part. Introducing Kellee Wynne and Katie Steckly.
Kellee Wynne: Well, hello. Hello. I'm Kellee Wynne, artist, author, mentor, fiercely independent mother and wife, and the founder of a multiple six figure creative business. And I love my life, but I've been where you're at. I was slogging away at this art business thing for more than a decade. Once I finally connected with my true calling, unlock the magic of marketing and built a system that could scale, while I realize I can make an impact and make a substantial income, I'm finally running a business that I love and it makes all the.
Difference in the world. My biggest dream is to help you do the same. Let this podcast be the catalyst to your biggest success. You already have it in you because you are made remarkable
.
Hello, Katie.
Katie Steckly: Hello, thank you for having me.
Kellee Wynne: And I am super excited because you are really knowledgeable in a field that I'm trying to encourage more artists to do which is their visibility on YouTube and really understand how that compares and contrasts to all the other social media platforms.
So let's get into it. Tell a little bit. Apparently you started with Harry potter videos.
Katie Steckly: Oh, my gosh. Yeah. My backstory is a little embarrassing, a little cringy, but you know, we all have to start somewhere. So I started my current YouTube channel in 2011 when I was a young teenager, and I pretty much was just making videos about anything and everything.
One of those topics was my obsession with Harry Potter. So I was, and I still am a big nerd. I just love the idea of expressing myself online and connecting with the community. Of people that had similar interests. Cause I grew up in a very like rural area, went to school in a small town. I didn't have a lot of friends that shared those.
Like I didn't have friends that liked Harry Potter or these other kinds of niche things that I was into. And so I really found a lot of joy in connecting with other, you know, teens like me online that were interested in these kinds of nerdy things. So that's kind of my origin story. Started making videos out of this desire to connect and express myself.
And, you know, it's like. People in my real life didn't want to listen to me go on and on about my Harry Potter theories, but the camera would. So, I could film myself talking about people online. So that's really how I got started making videos and, and creating content. And I just continued doing that throughout my high school years and into university.
And I just continued getting more invested in the YouTube community and kind of learning all those skills around filming and editing and social media marketing and, and really. Found my passion in that. And after I did a few different internships in university, and I kind of realized, I don't know if the corporate world's really for me.
I really decided, you know, I want to go freelance once I graduate. That's what I'm going to try to do. I was in this predicament where I knew I really wanted to be a full time YouTuber, but. My problem was I only had about 2000 subscribers and I knew from what I had learned that that was not going to be enough to support a full time income.
So I started thinking, okay, in the meantime, while I don't have enough subscribers to make this into my job, maybe I could take the skills that I've learned through growing my YouTube channel and use those skills in work that I do for other people. And maybe I could, make some money doing that.
So that's really what led me into being a freelance videographer for my first couple of years post graduation. So I would basically film anything. I filmed wedding videos. I filmed a real estate tours and did some social media marketing work kind of here and there for local businesses. So yeah, basically applying the skills that I had taught myself through all my years on YouTube and social media and using them for other people's.
Businesses. And as I was doing that, I continued posting on YouTube. And eventually in 2019, I had a video called Instagram story hacks for creators kind of go viral. And that's really what started the growth of my YouTube channel and brought me where I am today. So now my freelance work has grown into a small social media marketing agency called Creatorly Media.
So I have a team that works with our clients. On all a variety of services like YouTube, editing, podcast, editing, Instagram, content creation. And then of course I have my YouTube channel, Katie Stuckley, where I teach all this stuff to other creators and
entrepreneurs.
Kellee Wynne: Which I love that channel. I've learned so much.
This is one of the ways that I found you, but you're not just on YouTube. I see you almost in every corner of the internet now, which is pretty awesome. Your story, not that you're Mr. Beast, but it kind of reminds me of that story arc, which is starting off not quite having a clue where you're going to go with it or why you're even doing it.
But it's in the process of doing it over and over again that you learn. And then eventually in consistency and in growth, boom. I mean, like you're over a hundred thousand now, right. And followers on YouTube. I don't remember. I had the last I checked. It's not the billions that Mr. Yeah.
Katie Steckly: I wish I got the views that he did, but yeah, similar story though. Yeah.
Kellee Wynne: But what's impressive that like, I don't know, there's, here are the things that never connected with me in the more than 10 years that I've been doing other types of social media and ignoring YouTube. YouTube is a search engine. YouTube, you can monetize and YouTube, honestly, people get connected with you in a more deep sense than like the short clips of TikTok or Instagram.
And like, that's just a completely different dynamic.
Katie Steckly: Yes, totally. I feel like you've really accurately described why I love YouTube so much, because it has that ability. Well, first of all, like what you were hinting at with the, with the search piece, there's so much natural discoverability built into YouTube.
And now with, you know, the rise of the recommendations, algorithms on Instagram, and of course, TikTok, we're seeing that in other ways too. But back in the day, like, three, four years ago, something like that, YouTube was really a much. Easier place to grow an audience than Instagram and tick tock didn't even exist yet, you know, because you were able to reach new audiences through search and also through the homepage recommendations.
But then also like you were saying, you can reach new people, but you can also build deeper connections because people are watching you for like, you know, seven, eight, 15 minutes. Maybe it depends on the length of your video, of course. And that gives you so much more opportunity to really build that trust and build that connection than you could in like, A 30 second video.
And I think the biggest thing too, is YouTube truly grows communities in a way that, for example, Tik TOK, or even like the real space on Instagram doesn't seem to have the ability to, because on those feeds, you're constantly receiving new content from people you haven't seen yet, because it's not really based on who you're following.
It's based on what the algorithm thinks you might be interested in, which has its own benefits for reaching a large number of people. But it means that people who are like fans of a Tik TOK or for example, aren't likely to be as. Loyal to them as connected to them as they would be as if they were a fan of a YouTuber, right?
Just because it's a different relationship people on the for you page come and go but when you're connected with a youtuber You're probably seeing their video and you're watching it every week and you're spending, you know Those 15 minutes with them and it's just a whole different relationship
Kellee Wynne: It is and it's sometimes not even 15 minutes.
It might be a whole afternoon of binge listening or watching and you're, and you're in it and like, you're looking forward to the next video and you can actually go and see them the moment you open up your YouTube channel and they're there. Whereas I noticed that immediately with TikTok and, and I guess we could say Reels as well, except for that I, Still see the Instagram feed.
And so sometimes I can see people from Instagram. Sometimes I can't, but that was the thing that I learned really quick with Tik TOK is you could go viral and hit it big and then never have anyone again. So those numbers didn't really matter. It was like, yeah, you got a whole bunch of new people, but if there's one lesson that I'm learning now, it's not always about, about attracting new clients, it's about getting deeper with the people that you have in your circles,
Katie Steckly: Totally. And I think that's something that I've really come around to recently as well. And the first kind of stage of my growth as a content creator, I was so focused on just increasing numbers, increasing numbers. And I think that's normal. Like we all are attached to that like shiny subscriber count. We want that to grow and it's understandable, but I think I was so focused on getting.
That silver play button that I wasn't thinking about how can I nurture my existing audience? And I really think now we're at a stage in social media where follower counts are for the most part of vanity metric because people will follow you and they may not see your content again if it's not recommended to them through the recommendations algorithms.
So it's really more about having a true Community and having people actually have that real deep connection with you. Then it is about, you know, just growing your follower count because your followers might not even see your stuff.
Kellee Wynne: Yeah. I mean, so now I'm looking at my metrics of engagement, which is not visible to anyone but me. I mean, likes and likes and follows don't pay the bills, but engagement does, right?
Katie Steckly: Exactly. Exactly. You know, buy what you're selling or, watch the ads on your videos, that kind of thing.
Kellee Wynne: Right. And I definitely feel far more connected. The two platforms that I feel more connected to people are YouTube and podcasting.
Which is one of the reasons I got into podcasting because honestly video content creation is daunting to me. Unless I'm like trying to teach something for a class. Behind a paywall, which then I, I don't know, maybe there was a psychological thing about showing up so visibly on YouTube, how that's probably a really good segment for us to go into, because I know the people who are listening want to build their YouTube channel.
They're stuck on probably two. Let's say three things. One, how? I mean, but honestly, you can just go to, to your YouTube channel and you will learn how to build a YouTube channel. So we don't have to talk about the details of how to make a pretty thumbnail and what the keywords are you're supposed to use and blah, blah, blah.
That is easily researched. But behind the scenes, sometimes the hardest part is what content should I be creating that doesn't compete with what I'm selling. And how do I show up and be confident about that? Like what is my strategy and how I'm going to feel good. I look around my room and I'm like, it's a hot mess.
I don't know how I would ever even record something that would be interesting or engaging on YouTube, other than teaching people how to make art, which I'm moving away from and I'm moving towards more practical education for business. So. What am I to do? Like, how do I get over myself?
Katie Steckly: I think that is like the number one struggle that most people have. Like, most people aspiring to be creators, they think that their struggle is, what camera should I use? How do I edit my videos Really, all of those things, they're kind of allowing to get in their way because really what their problem is, is the confidence piece.
And so it's very easy to layer on the excuses of, I don't know about the camera, I don't know about this or that. When really, you're just kind of scared to do it, which I want to say is valid. It is a very vulnerable position to be in. To put yourself on camera, put yourself in front of potentially a digital crowd of thousands, like, you know, at first, let's be honest, it'll probably not be that many people, but potentially it, your video could blow up and have all these people watching you and you, you know, open yourself up to critique.
And that is very scary. So I just want to acknowledge that anybody who is starting to create videos for the internet, there's a ton of courage just in, you know, pressing upload because. You do open yourself up to potential, criticism and, and that kind of thing. But obviously I think it is very worth it to do it.
And we've discussed the benefits of, posting on YouTube and how it can grow your business and stuff. So what I would recommend to someone who is struggling with the confidence piece is to start out by, first realizing that. That's a very, like, that's a universal struggle.
Everybody's gone through it. It's not like people who have posted have something that you don't have. It's accessible to everybody to just, dive in and start basically. It's not like you're missing something or you're not interesting enough. That's a big thing. A lot of people worry about is, oh, I'm too boring.
Everybody thinks that they're too boring, but there, trust me, is something interesting that you have to bring to the table that somebody else hasn't thought of before. And. will find it helpful coming from your perspective. So I think starting from realizing that, in a way nobody is special, but everybody is special.
Just because somebody else has started a YouTube channel before you doesn't mean that they have something that you don't, you have something to bring to the table. You have something valuable to share. And I think the next thing that can really help start to build up that confidence is also realizing that.
There's really no downside to just trying, I think when we're balancing out the positives and the negatives, we can think about it this way when you're deciding, okay, should I start that YouTube channel? Should I just kind of step out of my comfort zone and start posting? Should I believe in myself?
Should I try to move forward in confidence? If you answer no to that, if you decide not to, it's very obvious what the. Negatives are going to be, you know, you're not going to be able to grow a YouTube channel if you don't start it, you're going to lose these potential opportunities, you know, there's advantages to growing your business and having a YouTube channel that you'll miss out on if you don't do it.
But if you think of, okay, well, what would be the downsides of saying yes, and just going for it. If you kind of think through it, there's not a lot. Like, okay, maybe I'll get some mean comments. Maybe it'll be a lot of hard work. Whether you're confident or not. It's gonna be a lot of work, but it's gonna be a lot.
The work. Yes. The potential downsides though are few. So if you kind of like work through it logically like that you realize , my best case scenario is just. Going for it. Like if I say no to all of these things, I'm really just holding myself back. So what I like to tell people is like, there's no downside to just being delusional.
Just tell yourself I can do it. I'm going to grow a huge YouTube channel. I'm going to be famous on social media. Like, why not tell yourself that? Like what is going to be the downside of just, moving forward with just the most delusional level of confidence possible. If anything, it's just going to help you.
It's going to enable you to create what you need to create and. You know, show up week after week and then actually succeed in, in what you're trying to achieve. Right. So there's really no downside to just saying I'm going to be confident, and kind of faking it until you make it.
Kellee Wynne: Yeah. So everybody has to start with their Harry Potter videos, right?
Katie Steckly: Exactly. Exactly. You have to start in that cringy phase. It's just kind of inevitable, but once you push past that, you know, that's where the beauty is.
Kellee Wynne: I mean, I know artists, like, literally know them and have worked with artists who have a moderate YouTube channel and they're paying their mortgage off of it, right?
Katie Steckly: Yeah.
Kellee Wynne: Or more. So it's like, of course, when you grow even bigger and you get a lot of, traction, I mean, I finally monetized, I'm so proud of myself. I've made 26. Yes! I'm not there yet. That's great. I don't really my goal with YouTube wasn't necessarily to make the money off of it at this point. But here's where I realize what you're saying is.
10 years ago when I started really getting into Instagram and I was able to build a pretty decent following on Instagram boy has it stagnated, but we all know and and we can go into. It's not the algorithm. It's you. That's the hard truth that I'm willing to accept, but it's still a challenge right now.
Okay. But if I go back 10 years and I had looked at YouTube and said, that's a lot of work and I have to get all my followers who are following me already here over there. And that's just one more thing to do. I feel like that was the delusional thing. I should have just been delusionally optimistic and started.
And here's what I've realized too, since then is how many hours have I spent on Instagram? How many hours do I spend scrolling, commenting. Uploading the perfect pictures, maybe making reels. I could have put that, let's be honest too, it's 5 to 10 hours a week at least. I could have put that energy into making the YouTube video.
And I have this system inside of my program. It's a Prism marketing system, but from that primary content machine, I can use it to disseminate all the other things that I needed to do. And it's like, Oh, I only have the lights going on now. And it's like, it's worth the time. If you are serious about growing your business.
Katie Steckly: Totally. I think that YouTube out of like all the social media platforms has the best return on investment because yes, it is a lot of work and for me, it takes a lot more time to script, film, and edit. A, 15 minute long YouTube video than it does for me to do a 90-second reel. That's just, you know, the fact of the matter.
But I have a lot more benefit from posting a, a YouTube video. First of all, I make AdSense off of it. I'm at a stage now where I'm very fortunate to have brand deals that I, I do on my YouTube channel. So that's like my biggest source of income as a creator. And those things, you know, Yeah, I can do brand deals on Reels, but there's definitely no AdSense on Reels.
So it's just there's more opportunity, for making, and that's just like the front end kind of income you could have from YouTube. The other huge benefit is that that content lives on the platform. It's evergreen. People keep finding it for weeks and months to come. Whereas Reels kind of go away after, you know, a couple of weeks, people aren't really seeing them anymore.
So whatever I'm. Promoting in my YouTube video, maybe it's my own digital products or my own course or whatever it may be, people are still learning about that for weeks and months to come as they continue to discover that video and you know, their binge session or whatever, or through search.
Um, and the links that are in that description are continuing to, you know, drive traffic to whatever, you know, various offers I might be discussing. So there's just so much benefit that you get out of a YouTube video. Once you post it, it continues to sort of. Pay dividends, um, in the way that TikTok and Instagram content doesn't as much.
Now, obviously I do think there's still value in posting on Instagram. I do, but it's just not the same. And I think, that's why I would definitely encourage anybody who primarily has a platform on Instagram to consider having a YouTube channel as well.
Kellee Wynne: Yeah, for sure. And do you use the content that you make for YouTube and then break it down?
As an inspiration or guide for you for Instagram or vice versa. Or how do you manage the content? Because this is one of the big things for us as business owners and creators. It's like, I only have so much time. I've been working on a system, honestly, for me and for my coaching clients.
That's starting to work. But where do you manage your strategy as far as what goes where and how?
Katie Steckly: Yes, that is a great question. And something that I advocate for a lot is repurposing your ideas. I think a lot of times people get caught up in the idea of repurposing and they think that just means, clipping out a, vertical cropped version of your YouTube video to post on reels.
And that's not always going to be that effective. Maybe if you have a really, amazing 60 seconds of your video, sure. But normally things taken completely out of context that weren't Created for the platform where they're being consumed isn't going to perform as well as something that you've designed specifically to be seen on reels.
So what I recommend instead is taking your YouTube script and finding a really great sound bite in there or a really great section that you think you could turn into a real and then film that specifically for reels or tick tock. Set up your camera in vertical mode and think about, what additional visuals you can bring on screen because.
I'll be honest with my reels, I'm like adding graphics and titles and sound effects and b roll like every other second because I'm trying to keep it so engaging. If I edited my whole 15 minute YouTube video like that, it'd be so overwhelming. It'd be way too chaotic, I think, to sustain that. So my pace on YouTube is going to look a lot different than in a reel.
So for all those reasons, I think it's good to make your stuff, you know, For the platform, it's going to be seen on, you'll have the best results, but that doesn't mean that you can't, make your life easier and start with the same idea and kind of grab that YouTube idea, and then turn that into not only a YouTube video, but maybe also two or three different reels that you can film and then, and then post on Instagram.
So I think that can be a very effective strategy.
Kellee Wynne: I want to really reiterate what you just said there. We can't just clip out something and then speed it up and put it on Instagram or TikTok or whatever. This is something I see people do all the time and they're like, my reel only got 200 views. And it's like, yeah, because no one wants to sit and look at a talking head.
But I love what you're saying. Take the idea that you had in your overall longer form content, break it down, and then re film it for the platform it's supposed to be on. Right? That's like going to make all the difference in the world. And of course that takes a lot of time and effort, but when you have an actual strategy, you can like knock it out.
And of course, I absolutely encourage the people that I teach and coach in business to hire help, which is something that you also do as an agency, but hire help, return on that investment is invaluable. Hire help if you can, start with one thing, add the next thing, hire the help. Some of the very first things besides having someone answer the emails was to really get help with video and, and content creation.
And that's cause that's probably the biggest chunk of the time it takes me to run my business. So But this is invaluable to really like flip that script of if you make a YouTube video, or in my case, a podcast, I can't just put like, I could put this recording up on on YouTube, but it's not going to get the kind of attention, like a thoughtful scripted 15 minute YouTube video of the same subject that's more concise.
And just like that, I can take that YouTube video and just make it fast. I had one. I have one. She's super sweet. She can help me with basic editing, but I had one VA that I hired who would just literally take the whole art video and just speed it up for 30 seconds or 60 seconds. And I'm like, this is not working.
Stop. Nobody wants to see super duper fast 100 speed. So that takes a little time, but the payoffs are huge.
Katie Steckly: Yes, totally. And I really would encourage anyone who's thinking about what their content strategy should look like is you need to start from spending some time on the platforms where you're going to be posting and look at it from the perspective as if you were your own audience, because I think a lot of where these mistakes come in of just, Oh, yeah, I'll just throw like a quick clip from the YouTube video on reels, or I'll just speed this up 100 times or whatever.
It comes from like, folks who are doing that. It's Probably because they aren't a big consumer of reels or of YouTube videos or whatever it might be, or they might just not be doing it in like a thoughtful manner. Like the best creators start out as very thoughtful consumers, like people who can watch a YouTube video and understand.
This is why I like this video, or this is why this reel is so well done, if you can start from that perspective, that is going to completely unlock, you know, being able to create engaging content for you. And I guess like a parallel in the art world is, you know, being able to appreciate art, maybe makes you a better artist.
It's the same with content on YouTube or, or Instagram or whatever. Being someone who can appreciate a quality YouTube video and understand what has been done well here. Why do I find it engaging? Why is it, you know, well edited? Why do I think that it, sounds good or whatever? Asking yourself those questions will really, really help you be able to understand how you can create good content that your audience will appreciate.
Kellee Wynne: Yes, for sure. Being a consumer, a thoughtful consumer, you said, and watching what Is happening that you appreciate and you're right, exactly that exactly to what we do as artists. We see art that we like, we watch those artists and how they create it. We even watch how they are taking photographs of it and sharing it on Instagram.
And now we need to do the same. What is it about the YouTube videos that you're watching that really works and implement some of those ideas? Honestly, we. Oftentimes learn more just from absorption rather than like the step by step is all not always as intuitive as the watching and then
practicing.
Katie Steckly: Yes, exactly.
And I think another good comparison is almost to, learning a language. I'm thinking about this a lot lately because I'm currently trying to, uh, learn Spanish. That's my little hobby. So anyway, Oh, nice. Yeah. And so I think it's also similar to that in like, you know, A lot of us have an experience where, you know, you grow up going to, for me, I learned French in school because I live in Canada, but I took French all through, elementary school, high school, in university.
Do you think I can go and have a conversation in French? No, I really can't. You need to actually go out there and practice and see how other, like, real native speakers are speaking to one another. And I think the same is true with content. If all you do is... Watch tutorials or like read about how to create good social media content.
Are you ever going to be able to be fluent? So to speak? No, you need to actually practice, observe how other people do it and, and really try to like take it in on that sort of more organic level. And that's, what's going to make you a better creator.
Kellee Wynne: I love it. Oh, so good. So you are speaking of learning Spanish.
You're a big traveler. Yes, you have a secondary YouTube channel so that we can appreciate your travel adventures. But I also noticed, and this is the part that I'm trying to extract for myself because I love travel so much. I'm either always at home. Or I'm traveling. There's no in between for me. Like, I could care less to go out and go, go to, go shopping, go do any of that here.
Like, I'm going to order it from Amazon and it's going to come here and I'm not going to waste my time out in my suburbs, right? Like, unless I'm spending time in nature. Or I'm traveling far abroad. I went to Nepal last year. I've been to Europe many times. It's just like, absolutely love traveling. But you don't stop creating content when you're on the road.
Katie Steckly: That is true.
Kellee Wynne: So this is the dream in my opinion. Now, maybe other listeners have no desire to travel, but what this does tell me is that we don't need the ideal situation of our little bubble of our studio with the bright lighting, with the right sound barriers, whatever it's like, we don't need it all perfect in order to create content.
Katie Steckly: I love, love, love that you brought that up because this is something that I'm really trying to encourage people in because that's another one of those barriers or what people think is a barrier that comes up, which I get, which again, I think kind of is actually like a little excuse that we tell ourselves to avoid.
Fully being confident, but people feel like, Oh, like my house isn't cute enough. My lighting's not good enough. I don't have enough space. I don't have a studio, like all of these thoughts. Or like maybe when you're traveling, that's especially true, but even, you know, not everyone's home situation is maybe quote unquote ideal for, making YouTube videos.
So what I like to share with people is I really, really believe that you can make whatever situation you're in work for you. So let me describe what my kind of. My best case scenario is here at home in my apartment, which is a little 500 square foot. One bedroom kind of studio vibes that I share with my husband, Dan, who also works from home full time.
And, he is. In a lot of zoom meetings. So I always have to coordinate. Okay. What's your schedule? Oh, when do you have an hour where I can sit down and film where you're not going to talking in the background? And I live at the intersection where there's constantly, we live near a hospital. So there's ambulances of sirens and, police cars going past.
There's lots of noise. I'm trying to coordinate with his schedule and I've got a small space. So I feel like, you know, I could easily say, Oh, this is an ideal. I'm not going to be able to make Youtube videos in these conditions, but I find strategies. So that I can make it work for me, you know what I mean? So I figure out, okay, Friday's is the day when he has the last meeting.
So that's when I film my YouTube videos. If a siren goes by, I just pause and stop talking and wait for it to quiet down. And then I started at the beginning of my sentence again, and I edited out, and I try to film in, slightly different backgrounds around my apartment. So I have like different scenes that I think about.
So sitting at my desk. Sitting on my couch, sitting in my little hammock chair, all of these things are literally six feet apart from each other, but on camera, it looks like a whole different space. So whatever your scenario is, I think you can figure out those little hacks to make it work. And there's always editing, there's always editing.
So if something goes wrong when, when you're filming, it's okay. If somebody is, dog outside starts barking, I can cut that out later. It's going to be okay. So I feel like you don't need to have the most perfect scenario. There's a lot you can do to kind of make it work no matter what your situation is and I do that here in my best case scenario, which is my 500 square foot apartment and I also do it from my van, which is a lot smaller or from Airbnbs and random cities around the world.
So you can make it work.
Kellee Wynne: Yeah, that's a thought reversal. One of those magic things that in my head, I'm like, I am complaining daily that the airplanes, they switched the pattern and I live kind of close to the airport, but it wasn't flying over the first few years we lived here and now we'll have days where they're just like so loud right over my house and I'm like.
I can't create content in this environment ever. I need to move and I need a beautiful show worthy home so that I can show up like all those beautiful influencers. And I'm like, that's not who you are, Kellee. That's not who you are. So why can't you just be who you are? And I love that. You're like, just pause for a minute and then continue recording.
Here's another crazy idea. Sometimes you just let it be. So people know you're human.
Katie Steckly: Yeah, exactly. Sometimes it's okay.
Kellee Wynne: It depends on the situation, right? So like for YouTube, I might want to edit it a little bit better so that there are no distractions and they take it all in. But when I'm recording a podcast or like if I'm going live or something, it doesn't matter at that point.
Katie Steckly: Yeah, exactly. I think having an understanding of how your audience is going to consume the content. Content can help you, you know, not worry as much about those small interruptions. And I also think all of this, like, it's personality. I think that's what people forget a lot is like, if you're trying to like, have the most perfect background in this beautiful magazine worthy home, like you were saying, that's not maybe real or authentic to you.
So what I've really loved about like, showing my apartment or filming from my van is , people feel more of that connection and they know about more about who I really am. Like. You know, I'm, I'm not somebody that lives in like this perfect magazine home. I live in a small apartment and sometimes in a van.
And I found that people actually like connect with that and find it interesting to see what that looks like. Even though my content is not necessarily about my apartment or, on my main channel, anyway, living in a van, talk about that on my travel channel. But despite that, it's kind of like part of your branding in a way.
Like it, it adds to that flavor that like personality that sets you apart from other people. If everyone just had the most perfect looking background, how would you sort of set yourself apart? It's just one of the ways that you can distinguish yourself.
Kellee Wynne: Absolutely. And we don't need a perfect studio for all the artists who are like, but I usually just paint on my dining room table.
Well, great. Then guess how many other thousands or millions of people paint on their dining room table and would love to just see that that's normal.
Katie Steckly: Exactly. Exactly. It's much more relatable.
Kellee Wynne: It's much more relatable. So that's a good mindset shift for me because, you know, I think we, like I said, like I can learn the tech and I might have questions.
Should I use my phone to record or maybe I should pull out my nice camera and learn how to use it. Should I get better lighting? Yeah. All that stuff is YouTube. In fact, I tell my, my clients, the people that I coach, I'm like, don't come to me with something that you can easily Google. Right? This is information that is so easy.
And these are the tech questions are the barriers that are keep, you know, keeping you stuck in your perfectionism. Come to me with real strategy questions. Come to me with like, how are we going to take the next level? How are we going to learn how to communicate? How are we going to show up and get our message out.
So the people really resonates. And so these are the questions. I love to have conversations about even if there are times where I'm like, I could use some more tips on how to use a good camera. Yeah. And like, I get what you're saying. Like, this is this is the important part is like, just create something that connects with your audience with the people that you want in your community.
Katie Steckly: Exactly. To bring it back to like that language metaphor a little bit, like you were saying with the Googling, like you can search up translations, you can figure out, you know, you can learn the basic grammar, you can learn the vocab. But what is really hard and what actually holds most people back is having a conversation and practicing with people.
It's the same thing with content creation. We can look up how to use our cameras, how to edit in Premiere Pro, but what nobody else can do for us is just putting in the time and practicing and just trying it out and gaining that confidence.
Kellee Wynne: Oh, 1000%. Okay. So now let's talk about, the real elephant in the room.
And that's Zuck. Good old daddy Zuck, who's creating 3 platforms now and almost monopolizing all of our time and energy. What do you think? As artists, we sometimes complain a lot like I just want it to be still videos. Well, they finally said that they're not prioritizing necessarily videos, but that doesn't mean that I've seen a whole lot of a change on Instagram.
And now they've thrown threads into the whole shebang and I'm sure at the point where we're feeling overwhelmed. But how could we show up, maximize our time and like, actually get some benefit out of what's happening?
Katie Steckly: I think that's a great question and it can feel very overwhelming when it seems like there's so many different platforms to be on.
You feel like you can't keep up with the best practices for having your content perform well across all of them. And if folks who are listening are feeling that way, I would say really try to zero in on where do you need to be. The truth is, we don't need to be on every single platform 24 hours a day. I am personally not.
For example, I haven't been on Twitter in like, eight years or something like that. Like, I used to be on the app as a teenager. It felt too toxic for me. I got off of it. So I just have never been active on Twitter as a professional content creator, like ever. So that was never a part of my strategy.
LinkedIn. I have one. I never use it. I literally never open it. I also have a Facebook page, but I never touch it. So that's just an example of how like, you know, sure for, from a technical perspective, go save your username on these places. That's fine. But you don't need to have a strategy in every single place because guess what your audience.
Isn't on every single platform either. A lot of people like, am I going and scrolling on LinkedIn? No, I'm not scrolling on Twitter either. Like I don't go consume content on those places. So why would I think that the people I'm trying to reach are necessarily doing that now? You know, your audience might consume on other platforms than you that that could be the case depending on your target audience.
But the point is people all have the apps that they gravitate towards, where they like to spend most of their time. For me, that's. Youtube, Instagram, and TikTok. That's where I like to spend most of my time. And as it so happens, that's where my audience mostly spends their time too. So just kind of think about where do you actually enjoy consuming content?
That can be the place where you post most of your content. Because a lot of us as creators, as artists, we have a lot in common with our audiences. So chances are where you like to consume content is Probably where your idea, you know, target audience is also enjoying to consume content. So you can create there.
I feel like we all need to have a bit of a mindset shift where like content creation, it doesn't have to be this difficult, you know, just absolutely treacherous task that we all hate to do. Like it can be fun. It can be something that you enjoy and that you get joy out of. You just need to. Figure out like, what do you enjoy doing?
What platforms do you like spending time on? You don't have to be constantly grinding up against the Instagram algorithm if you totally hate it. Like you could be on Tik TOK or YouTube or threads or wherever you actually enjoy spending time. So I think starting from that perspective and just knowing you don't have to spread yourself so thin, you don't have to be everywhere.
Honestly, pick two. I think being, you know, primarily on two platforms is great.
Kellee Wynne: Oh man, like, that's what I've been trying to say. We don't have to Gary V this, right?
Katie Steckly: Oh my gosh, don't, like, please don't. Please don't do that.
Kellee Wynne: I'm with you. I'm, I'm mostly a pick too. I tried TikTok and it's evil because I can get sucked in and it knows the algorithm so well.
It could feed up like nobody else could feed up. But I also, Had to make a decision. So I actually shut down and just deleted Tik Tok off. I'm like you every new app that comes out. I save my space so that like my, my name and my brand hasn't been taken by anyone else. But that doesn't mean like I'm like you, I don't spend any time on LinkedIn at all.
I never understood Twitter. Now we have threads, which is apparently like Twitter, but I kind of like threads, but I don't know. I hope I'm hoping that like the initial buzz and now we're in that, like, now let's gain like proper momentum and not just the, Hey, everybody's here.
And now everybody's not. So we'll just see what happens. But threads is easy because you can dip in and out and just make casual conversations. You don't have to. Yeah. The strategy and that's why I feel like it's a relief for me. But Instagram is my main one and podcasting is my other one, which I know you're also a big fan of podcasting.
Katie Steckly: Yes. Yeah. I really think my kind of approach to it is. I think, so if you're going to pick 2 as a creator, I think you kind of want to pick 1 from the list of like what I would call sort of evergreen platforms and then 1 from the list of more timely or like community building platforms. So me, YouTube.
blogging and podcasting. Those are really your evergreen sort of content. So pick whichever one you like the most. Maybe you love having conversations with people or you feel like you could talk forever about your, you know, topic of choice, but you know, maybe you're awkward on camera or something, then maybe podcasting is great for you.
Or maybe you're really passionate about writing and you know, you're good at SEO and stuff. Then blogging is maybe your choice. Or if you love video and you, enjoy watching YouTube videos. Then maybe YouTube is a great one for you. But I think, you know, picking one of those three is a great place to start.
I mean, the truth is there's a lot of ways that you can repurpose between those and like eventually expand to more, but let's not get ahead of ourselves. You can pick one of those three to be sort of your cornerstone platform, and then you can pick a more timely platform to kind of. Do a little bit more of that day to day connection with your audience.
Maybe it's Instagram, Tik TOK threads, Facebook, LinkedIn, like wherever your kind of target audience is. You can also create there to just show up in their feeds every day and sort of build more of that, personable connection. So I think picking one from each of those lists is a fantastic place to start.
And once you get confident with being consistent on say. For me, I picked YouTube and Instagram. Once I got confident and consistent with those, then I was like, you know what? Now I'm going to launch a podcast. And then eventually, Oh, I'm also going to post a TikTok, you know? So you can grow from there, but like, don't start thinking that you have to post everywhere all at once, because that'll just be overwhelming.
Kellee Wynne: And honestly, some people build million dollar businesses and they only have one platform. So it's possible as long as up front, I'll say the most important part is, is knowing your audience and knowing how to speak to them. So it really is irrelevant what platform you're on in that case.
Right?
Katie Steckly: Yes. I think it's really, yeah, just knowing how to connect with your people.
That's ultimately what it's all about and that's going to be reflected in how you write your captions, the way that you speak on camera, the branding colors that you choose, the types of content that you make, like that's going to reflect everywhere. So starting from a position of who am I trying to reach, that's going to be, you know, always question number one.
Kellee Wynne: Who do I serve and what problem do I solve? Exactly. That's it. That's the magic to marketing that people rarely talk about. We want tactics, what's working in Instagram, what's working. And so this is why that comment that I made earlier was it's not the algorithm, it's you because you've lost sight of.
Who you serve and what problem you solve and this doesn't matter whether you're selling a product or a service or coaching or art courses. It doesn't really matter if you've lost sight of that and you can't connect for them if it's all about you and you're doing the same thing you did 5 years ago.
That's now no longer working. It's because you're not staying relevant. To your actual customer and who you want to connect with and have them buy from you, right?
Katie Steckly: 100 percent and I think like, this is a really tough one because it feels so harsh to have to say it to someone, but it is really the biggest struggle that, and this is for content.
Creators, this is for business owners to like, even traditional, like brick and mortar business owners. You like see people have this problem where they think about what they want to offer. If you go into business or go into content creation, thinking, what do I want to offer people? What do I want to do?
You're probably going to have a difficult time finding a customer base or finding an audience. You need to go in thinking like, what do people want? Like, what do people want to buy? What do people want to consume? And. I mean, there's, there's all kinds of different answers to that.
So fortunately you can figure out which answer feels most, you know, authentic to you or connected with you. It's not like you have to go in completely divorcing yourself from your own personality and just do whatever the market wants. Like there will be a connection there between what people are looking for and what you might be interested in giving.
But it's just very important that, you know, you don't always just have this side of, well, this is what I'm going to offer and here's what my content's going to be, or here's what my, services or products are going to be, and then you just try to use like cookie cutter marketing tactics to push that out there.
That's never going to work. If it's not starting from a point of like what people are actually looking for and wanting to consume or buy or whatever,
Kellee Wynne: or even just how they see themselves in what you're creating. Right. Or just a simple thing that we said before, stop making like hundred speed videos and think that that's going to cut it, right?
Exactly. This is why we're sitting here going, the algorithm doesn't work. And I am so tired of hearing people say that. And I know we are frustrated. I know it feels like there's a slowdown, but every time the algorithm doesn't work, it means that you need to work more. Which means if you're serious about your business, if you're not in a hobby situation, if you're just playing, then ignore this.
But I'm assuming most people who are on my podcast are here because they actually want to grow their business. And if that's the case, take it serious about how you're showing up, pay attention to what the market, your audience or the algorithm, which is really just in front of you, want to hear from you, want to see from you a different point of view, showing up with a. Damn good video, excuse me, but we can't just make crap, you know.
Katie Steckly: Exactly. it's also good to recognize, like, from a holistic perspective on your content strategy that, we often are going to be guided by what performs well. And that just completely makes sense. Like if you see a certain type of video of, of real that you're posting or YouTube video or whatever perform really well, then yes, make more of it.
But there also is room in a content strategy for content that isn't necessarily designed to go viral. And I think it's important to remember that, like, Content that you're making that is like specifically to sell what you're trying to sell. Like if you're doing a sales campaign or something that's like specifically has a pitch, it probably will underperform compared to your other stuff.
And that's okay. Its purpose wasn't to go viral. Its purpose was to convert your followers into customers, for example. And that's part of like, uh, Healthy, full picture sort of content strategy. So don't get like, I wouldn't say, you know, Oh, try to go viral every single time. That's not necessarily the goal here, but, it definitely is important to watch what's performing.
Well, follow your insights, see what your audience is asking more of and do more of that. And then, include your sales content or your like nurture content you're in there as well. I just say that, cause I know it's very easy once you start seeing results from. You know, when you, when you figure out how to understand your insights and understand what your audience wants, and then you create based on that, you'll start to see results really quickly.
And it can almost become addicting where you're like, I just have to make my next viral hit. What can I do to get a hundred thousand views again? And I know that I myself can fall into that trap a little bit. So, it doesn't always have to be about that. There's other purposes for content than just going viral.
So just something to keep in mind.
Kellee Wynne: Right. And, this was kind of the problem on tick tock that you would go viral, but not necessarily to the right people or people who are going to stick around. And it's still the same thing. Now that,
technically, Instagram reels is also growing. Audiences the way tick tock would, however. If you're an artist and you want to sell art and you do a song and dance and do a lot of pointing, you might have a real that goes viral, but it's going to be to all the wrong people because the trend. In order to go viral, it's much better to create content specifically with your audience in mind that connects deeper.
And I do love that you said this, and this is something I needed to hear and remember is that when we're actually making content to sell something, a campaign for a product, it's going to perform differently than a campaign that's just purely for connection.
Katie Steckly: Yes, totally. And I also love that you mentioned like going viral to the wrong audience.
That's something that I see a lot of people struggling with, especially I've seen it with artists. I've seen it with different service providers. Like I have a lot of friends who are like wedding photographers, for example, oftentimes what can happen is people accidentally start creating content that is targeted towards their peers rather than towards their customers.
So what I mean by that is like, let's say you're an artist out there who is ideally, finding people to. Purchase your art or whatever, but then if you almost post too much about, like, the back end and the behind the scenes, you'll end up attracting just other artists. And if your goal wasn't to do that, well, those people might not be interested in buying your art.
They might be, Looking for, for something else, or in the case of many of my friends who are wedding photographers, if they show a lot of the behind the scenes of like, oh, here's how I edit my photos, or here's what a day in the life of a wedding photographer looks like, you know, you can see how someone might be tempted into making that content, but then they end up just attracting it.
Other wedding photographers to see their content and not brides, which is their actual target audience. You see what I mean? So that's why it's so good Really really know who your audience is so that you can create content for them Not just like and that comes from people creating content almost for themselves, right?
Like if I'm Wedding photographer, for example, I think, Oh, what would I find interesting? Oh, well, a day in the life of a wedding photographer. I'd be curious to see that from others. But our brides interested in that or brides interested in what the experience is, is from the, from the couple's perspective.
Kellee Wynne: So you'd be doing a day in the life of the bride.
Katie Steckly: Yeah, exactly. Or, you know, here's what your wedding photographer can help you with as a bride or, that kind of thing. Like really think about, maybe it's like wedding decor inspo or whatever, just as an example.
Like that's from the perspective of your customer, a bride, not from the perspective of the, business owner.
Kellee Wynne: Oh, and that applies to any of the platforms. So when we're like designing what we want to put on YouTube, if our goal is to sell more art than making how to art videos is not going to make sense to attract the customer, but talking about the process of, the customer's journey, how they select art, how it's going to look in the room, how you work with design, like showing the designers and how a designer might be able to pick your art to match.
Okay, so this is all connecting now. Now, if my goal is that I want to teach artists how to make a particular, like, this is a trap that I've gotten into is I was really adept at teaching color and that's all I taught for a long time. So I attracted a lot of people, but then when I made some really fun crafty stuff, next thing I knew, I had like a whole bunch of people on my list that were more interested in like the fun mixed media projects.
And I'm like, so now what do I do? Do I pivot completely? But the key is, is then if you have all these people who, yeah, you had a viral video that went like a hundred thousand, maybe even a million, I've actually had customers, my clients who've had viral reels, fortunately it was specifically for the right customer, but it's like now you have, okay, great.
You just accidentally grew your Instagram account or your YouTube account by like five or 10, 000 people. Super awesome. Are your numbers going to exponentially drop off when the content you then make afterwards doesn't connect with them? And oops, now you're going to be punished by the algorithm.
I don't want to say it's really the algorithm, but now all these people who are on your platform aren't interested in what you really wanted to make. So I think that's where it's like, I need to be consistently true to myself and the customer that I serve.
Katie Steckly: Yes, exactly. And it can be easy to be tempted into these like viral formats or certain audios or whatever because you think that's going to be a great hack to get more views, but you really always need to filter it through.
What is my ideal follower, ideal customer going to connect with?
Kellee Wynne: Yeah. What's my long term goal? Is it to be popular or is it to make money?
Katie Steckly: Yes, exactly. And I think that is such a key question and that's a huge, barrier for a lot of people is we end up getting too focused on the popular thing instead of, Oh, well, this is actually my job or like, I'm trying to build a business.
Kellee Wynne: Exactly. Exactly. Oh man, I could talk to you forever because these are like the conversations that I live for. I love talking about this from like a really, a different point of view than most people are like. So how do I post a photo and how do I grow on Instagram? It's like really honestly how you grow on any platform is the same and that's.
With absolutely knowing your why behind what you're doing, then, like we said, we have to remove those barriers for confidence and just show up. Yes, show up. Well, I would love for you to tell everyone how they could work with you or what they can learn from you if they come and show up on your, your site with your creatorly agency.
Katie Steckly: Totally. Yeah. So I would love for anybody listening to come and find me on YouTube primarily. That's where you can really start to learn a lot of the details about, growth on Instagram and YouTube. And I've got some TikTok tutorials and podcasting stuff. I really am across all platforms. So whatever you want to learn about, there's going to probably be a video there for you.
So you can find me at youtube. com slash Katie, just K A T I E. That's the URL for my YouTube channel. You can find me there. You can find me on Instagram at Katie Steckley. And of course, we would love to work with you over at my agency, Creatorly Media. So like I mentioned before, we're a team of creatives that work with content creators, small business owners, online entrepreneurs, and we do everything from strategizing with you, building out a content calendar with you, figuring out, you know, what your why is, who your audience is, what your branding is going to be.
And we also do. YouTube video editing, podcast production, and Instagram content creation. So really we're across platforms over at creatorly as well. And we work with, yeah, all kinds of people from content creators to small business owners. So we'd love to hear from you at creatorlymedia. com. You can fill out the form that there and someone from my team would love to jump on a call and chat with you.
I
Kellee Wynne: would love for everyone to, to not only connect with you, but definitely watch your YouTube videos. You're going to learn so much from Katie. Now, I always like to end with one really important question. What's your big audacious dream?
Katie Steckly: Oh, that is a great question. Right now, my big dream that I'm working towards is someday I would love to ship my camper van from Canada, where I live over to Europe and drive around.
Europe in my camper van and explore it and maybe even beyond Europe too. So I've done a lot of traveling around Canada and the U S in it. So Europe is kind of the next big destination.
Kellee Wynne: I love it. Oh yeah. I would love to see Katie across Europe.
Katie Steckly: Yes. Hopefully someday.
Yes. Sounds great. Thank you so much, Katie.
Thank you.
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