Did You Factor in FUN?
Prefer audio? Listen on the embedded player below or subscribe to The Irresistible Marketing Pod wherever you enjoy listening to podcasts.
Some of y’all aren’t having nearly enough fun in your content.
Views are low. Likes, comments, shares are low. Your DMs are dead quiet. No one brings up something you posted that got them thinking in casual conversation.
You don’t get it. You’ve been posting consistently. You even have participated in a few of those post-every-day -for-30-days challenges. You may have done a little dance in the background. You may have snatched trending audios.You might have really, seriously tried. And it’s just not fair. You’re putting in so much effort! So what gives? Why hasn’t it taken off yet?
But, *Elaine Stritch voice* 🎶 Are you having any fun? 🎶
Or are you turning your own business into yet another oppressive work environment?
So, tell me:
Would you rather treat marketing like a factory with quotas and clock-ins and rigid expectations…
Or...
Like an art project where you get to play, experiment, follow your creativity, and even get a little messy?
And which marketing do you think is more fun to consume?
My Favorite Content is Fun Content
Fun is way more important than I realized.
It was downplayed when I was growing up. It was drilled into me that I should put my focus on much more serious pursuits to pave the way for My Future.
But fun is the whole point.
Classically, I realized this through- what else? Nerdy research.
This October, The Squad 🎉, my club for big-hearted, black sheep, rebel entrepreneurs, voted on “Crafting a Content Signature” as the topic for our monthly marketing masterclass.
As I prepared for class, I started gathering examples of strong signature content. I was looking for scroll-stopping content, the kind you instantly recognize, and know you’re going to love- or even love to hate-watch.
As I easily pulled examples off the top of my head and social media algos, it was easy to see that the common thread was that this content was fun, easy to consume, and so branded, you knew who made it within microseconds.
The Goddess Boys
There’s The Goddess Boys in their black & white couture, gasping in annoyance, constructing incredible drinks with glares and FACE while protecting the glam, cleaning every speck of dust, and dusting each other with makeup, then melting into gracious giggles and a third straw for the audience to enjoy the finished product with them. Those millions of likes and brand deals with the likes of Ulta Beauty & Béis made perfect sense.
Chrissy Chlapecka
There’s lesbian pop princess Chrissy Chlapecka in aggressive pink singing about the joys of being with women and vanquishing homophobes in high glam and high humor. She won me over by twerking to the rantings and ravings of homophobic protestors at a Pride event, she stole my heart prancing around with a sloppily handwritten “Future Popstar” sign, she had me roaring with her hilarious responses to troll comments (my fave is when she screams that she’s not wearing any makeup in full glam with massive lashes), now I’m staying for her fun pop songs that I’m adding to every up-energy playlist of mine. Those millions of streams, drag queen collabs, and major media write-ups are so well earned.
Franchesca Ramsey
Then there’s tv writer/actress/producer/comedian Franchesca Ramsey trolling MAGAs in the best way. Stitching videos of anguished Trump voters who somehow never anticipated Trump would turn on them, Ramsey is there to sing variations of:
🎶“I never thought the leopards would eat my face
Well we bonded over bigotry,
but they weren't supposed to turn on me
No I, never thought
The leopards would eat my face” 🎶
Solo, with a ukelele, with a full gospel choir, with a mariachi band. It keeps getting more and more epic. Of course that content is monetized and she has a full “Oh, The Leopards Ate Your Face?” merch line.
Leah Vernon
Then there is my current favorite person to follow on LinkedIn, Leah Vernon. In her words from her website, “Leah V is an international plus-size Hijabi model, award-winning author, inclusive content creator, body-positive activist, and digital brand strategist. Her content has garnered over four million views combined and her face plastered on billboards in Times Square. She’s been featured in hundreds of media outlets from The New York Times to Buzzfeed.”
Her content blasts through the boring, beige, professional norm of LinkedIn posts with humor, spicy takes, and catch phrases.
“Ashy” is how we refer to those we don’t like: from the rude client trying to get out of paying fairly to bigots in the news.
We’re all striving for Leah to deem us “moisturized” for our standout content and for walking the talk of our values. She ends each post with a variation of “Have you hired a Black woman today?” and “*skitters away like a lizard.*” Follow her for a while, and you’re excited to read her creative variations on these satisfying repetitions.
Come for the branding & content advice, stay for the absurd & hilariously inappropriate “LinkedIn After Dark” posts about um, suggestive product marketing.
Nara Smith
As suspicious as I am about trad wife/trad wife adjacent content, I still can’t wait to see what elaborate couture Nara Smith is wearing and what absurdly complicated “from scratch” rendition of a grocery store staple she prepares over the course of 8 or so hours over soft, elegant jazz. It’s fun for my eyeballs and aesthetic sensibilities and is so distinctly her, that it has spawned countless hilarious spoofs. (No wonder she’s a gajilionaire and has tons of brand deals.)
Love it or hate watch it, all of these examples of strong signature content are repeating fun, enjoyable elements over and over again.
It makes sense, though. Because,
Why Engage Without Pleasure?
There has to be a payoff for paying attention to your content.
I’m not saying you have to be a glamazon, have an incredible voice, or a hilarious, biting, wit, but there has to be some sort of pleasure to your content.
Now pleasure comes in many forms, so don’t go thinking I’m telling you to contort and mask yourself into something you’re not. Here are some ways your content can please your audience:
Make them laugh. The release, the endorphins of a good laugh. Such a lovely feeling. Of course your audience is going to want more where that came from!
Give them beauty to behold. That aesthetic ahhhh that only beauty can provide is like a little brain massage.
Acknowledgment. “I feel so seen” is such an instant bonding experience. Especially if you’re speaking to issues, experiences, identities that are often overlooked.
Inclusion. “You CAN sit with us!” It’s so fun to get to be part of the club, to be specifically invited and welcomed in. Especially when you’ve been historically left out. To belong? That feels so nice! No wonder fan clubs built around brands go so far as to incorporate the fandom into their identities! Think Lady Gaga’s Little Monsters, Swifties, The Beyhive, Giggly Squad listeners identifying as Gigglers, etc.
Aspiration. This really cool thing/lifestyle/achievement/way of being is possible for you! You can transcend the stuff about your life that you don’t like!
Inspiration: Wow, that gives me so many ideas for what I want to do!
Hope: Wow, I could feel so much better. I didn’t realize living so well was even possible for me!
Relief. Wow, I didn’t realize I didn’t have to keep carrying all that shame around. There are others like me! Also, a solution to this persistent problem!
Permission. You don’t have to do that thing you don’t like! You could ask for (& get) more!
Empowerment. Wow, now I feel so motivated to go do that thing I now believe I can do but didn’t realize I could/was avoiding before.
There are so many options to play with to make your content more fun and enjoyable to engage with.
The Grind Alone is Not Fun
I am proud of you for getting out there and posting. It’s true, just showing up at all is a marketing hurdle many don’t clear. But You did! That’s an achievement in and of itself.
But, I regret to inform you, just showing up isn’t enough.
You also have to connect with people.
And it’s hard to connect when all your energy and attention is taken up with the grind. You’re in survival mode, babe. It’s all about YOU and your effort to hit those posting frequency goals.
What we need is a way to invite other people in.
Make your marketing a party worth showing up to.
So, you know, not misery-loves-company vibes.
Fun Might Be a Foreign Concept
To be honest, this piece has taken me about 10x the normal amount of time it takes me to write a blog post/podcast episode.
Why? Well, to be honest, thinking about fun really spikes my anxiety and then I’m tempted to go into full avoidance and shutdown.
Like I mentioned before, “fun” wasn’t really a thing worth striving for, prioritizing, or valuing when I was a kid. Hobbies were about Achievement and continual improvement on the road to Excellence. And yes, that can be fun. But all that pressure makes fun a lot less fun.
Then there are the psychic scars of being punished for the things that brought me joy and pleasure within my toxic family of origin dynamics and later my abusive romantic relationships. I learned that as soon as I really enjoyed something, it would be taken away, ruined, or sabotaged.
So if you are a trauma babe like me, you may have learned through extensive conditioning that fun is DANGEROUS. Fun is punished. Fun is an unworthy pursuit.
So, doing things for fun, understandably, is not something that comes naturally to you.
No wonder your marketing feels stiff, closed off, and uninviting! No wonder you’re showing up in your marketing all bundled up in walls and masks!
But here’s the thing, for your people, your aligned clients, your chosen community, they think it’s fun to watch you have fun. They take part in your joy. It warms their hearts to see you thriving and happy. Those are the people you want in your business and your life.
You. don’t. have. to. keep. catering. to. your. saboteurs.
Making Fun a Practice
If fun isn’t your current forte, don’t worry. You can still learn how to have fun. And you can learn how to make your marketing fun.
You just need to practice.
There’s the life skill of noticing and replicating what brings you pleasure. Deciding your pleasure is worth prioritizing and clearing space in your calendar for it.
There’s the life skill of exploring your creativity and finding which modes of expression are the most enjoyable to you.
There’s the life skill of playing. Playing to find out what you DO like when you don’t know. Playing so you can keep discovering more things that bring you joy.
Then there is the marketing skill of having so much fun, in public, in your element, that other people want to join in. The, “I’ll have what she’s having” effect.
There is the business skill of turning marketing into an art project, not a chore.
But, if any of these are new skills, you’ll acquire them MUCH faster with support, community, accountability, and encouragement. The kind you can’t get alone.
It helps to have a good coach who can help you see your blind spots, give you perspectives and tools you hadn’t thought of or heard of before, AND, importantly, can help you see your progress.
It helps to have a crew of awesome, interesting people you’re learning with. Who can inspire and cheer you on, even when it’s hard.
This is what you get in The Squad🎉THE club for big-hearted, black sheep, rebel entrepreneurs with one-of-a-kind businesses bringing beauty, justice, and better quality-of-life to the world. You get me as your on-demand Marketing Director and Cheerleader keeping you on track to meet your goals, so you keep telling the world about your incredible offer, and sustain your marketing long enough for it to work. Because SO MANY people don’t understand the typical gap between effort and results and quit right before it gets good. You also get an amazing community of entrepreneurs to hype you up, cowork with you, and inspire you on to new heights. And you get a ton of education on marketing, leadership, boundaries, and nurturing your creativity.
You’re invited! 🎉 The once-a-year sale for memberships is on now through Dec. 1. Pricing goes up on Tuesday, Dec. 2.
