Entre-Talk: The Algorithm

I’m Jody Moore and this is Better Than Happy, Entre-Talk: The Algorithm.

This is Better Than Happy, the podcast where we study what the healthiest, most successful people in today’s world think, feel and do. And we leverage this knowledge to create our best lives. Are you ready, little bird? Let’s fly.

Hello everybody, welcome to a podcast designed specifically for my friends who are building businesses, fellow coaches, teachers, healers, experts especially is where I am able to provide a lot of support. And I want to talk to you today about the algorithm. Everybody loves to, in the world of online business and online marketing, talk about the algorithm. In other words, the way that Facebook or Instagram or whatever other platform you might be utilizing for your marketing, ranks and prioritizes posts, the way to get your message in front of more people.

So if you have been in this world of online marketing for very long, you’ve heard people refer to the algorithm and you might have heard people giving out advice about how to beat the algorithm or how to best leverage the algorithm. Or they’ll say, “The algorithm prefers this, that or the other thing.” And I want to just tell you my thoughts about the algorithm today. I love the algorithm, I do. Most people don’t love it. Most people talk about it as this mysterious sort of thing that you have to figure out and you have to overcome and you have to trick into getting your content out in front of more people.

And I just don’t think of it that way at all and the reason why is because I don’t see the upside to thinking about it that way. It makes me feel frustrated and defeated to think of it as this big giant machine that I can’t understand and I can’t control. And even when I do figure it out, it’s all going to change as it does. It constantly changes. And so I don’t think about it that way at all. Here’s how I think about it as something that is designed to try to help the platforms, social media platforms in this case be as effective as possible, which is what I want.

If you think about the folks who run these companies, let’s just use, I’ll use Instagram as the example. They are a business. They’re out to make money, no doubt about that. But in order to make money, there are two main objectives, and I’m sure they have a lot of other objectives, but two that I’m aware of that I can see from where I sit. Number one, they need to keep users coming back to their platform. They need to make sure that Instagram is a place where people want to login and they have a positive enough experience there or they like what they see and what they get that they want to keep coming back.

Number two, they want it to be a place where people like myself, who are going to spend money there as a marketer, have success. Because if I don’t have success with my marketing efforts there, if the money I put in doesn’t yield ultimately at some point a return in my business, I’m not going to keep putting money into it. So I want them to have those two objectives. Of course, I want them to want me to succeed, and I choose to believe that they do. But I also want them to want to protect and curate the user experience. And in my opinion, that is the purpose of the algorithm.

That is why there’s an algorithm, it’s trying to find content that people like and show it to more people. It’s trying to filter out content that is inappropriate or boring or not what people want and not put it in front of people because we don’t want people logging on thinking this is a boring platform, that’s just full of ads that I don’t really want to see. So I’m going to tell you how much time I spend learning about strategies to overcome the algorithm. Basically none, basically none and I’m not saying that’s good, if you want to learn more about it, be my guest. I’m not saying it’s wrong to learn about it.

But I just choose to kind of go off of what I heard Seth Godin say years ago when I first started building my business. I got an email from Seth Godin, who’s a marketing genius. And he said the best SEO, which is Search Engine Optimization, the best way back then, that’s what everyone talked about, SEO. Now people talk about the algorithm just as much as SEO. Search Engine Optimization means is my site going to come up when people type in the words that are associated with what I do? You want to come up highest in the search ranking as possible.

And he said, “The best SEO is just to create good content. Make your stuff so good, make your message so powerful, make what you do so good that people are looking for you so that if they go to the Google and they search your name and somebody else’s site comes up, they’re like, “No, that’s not the one I’m looking for”, and they keep searching until they find you.” That is where I wish people put more time when it comes to creating content for social media.

Put more time into making your message interesting, unique, compelling, relevant to what people are struggling with, speaking the language that will resonate for people, saying something that is different than what they’ve heard before in a new and unique way. Put more time into that, less time trying to trick the algorithm. You don’t need to trick the algorithm. I love the algorithm because it rewards me when I do what I’m trying to do, which is really help people.

And if I don’t help people and I don’t on every post, by the way, or I don’t to the extent that I would like to, then it indicates that and I’m okay with that. I’m okay with that. Don’t try to play a game to beat an algorithm, just work on creating great content that people want to engage with. Yes, invite them to engage, but it should be something that they want to engage with, not because you’re trying to trick any kind of computer system. The algorithm is not the villain in our story. It is not the bad guy.

It is a very amazing, beautiful thing that is always going to change. So once you master the strategies, they’re going to change and you’re going to have to remaster them again, just keep that in mind. It protects all of us who are trying to market online. It’s like the HOA in your neighborhood that says you know what? Sorry, but that color, you can’t paint your house that color, sort of destroys the feel of the neighborhood. We want to keep it aesthetic around here. That’s what the algorithm is doing.

Focus on doing what you’re good at. Focus on changing people’s lives and the algorithm will take care of everything.

Thanks for joining me for Entre-Talk. If you haven’t already, make sure you’ve taken my free course, you guys. I keep getting messages, which I greatly appreciate, thank you for the DMs you send me about the free course and how impactful it was and how much meatier it was than what you thought it was going to be. So if you’re struggling to know why your business isn’t taking off or where to begin or how to take it to the next level, make sure you grab my free course, it’s at jodiesfreetraining.com. Alright, I’ll see you next time, take care.

If you are a coach, healer or expert who is not yet making six figures, or not sure you’re set up properly to grow to seven figures and beyond, go take my free training. It’s at jodysfree-training.com. I’ll see you there.