3. Social Media: Posting + Etiquette

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Now that you have your initial design(s), it's time to make a social media account or two!

This part of one of the most important parts of the shop building process. In this section, I will be mentioning some tips and etiquette for managing your shop account!

Contents:

  • Instagram Business account

  • Pros and Cons of Instagram and Twitter

  • Posting Format

  • Be Respectful

  • Have fun and get to know other makers in the same community!


1. Instagram Business Account

The Instagram Business Account is an option you can change your personal account into on Instagram.

The benefits include:
  • Monitoring insights from your account

    • Insight Highlights

    • Accounts Reached

    • Content Interactions

    • Followers

    • Active Times (Prime posting hours)


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2. Instagram & Twitter

These are the two main platforms I use and some of the Pros and Cons below are based on my own experience or from what I heard.

Instagram

Pros
  • Most common way for your ideas to get to the audience
  • Many users = many potential customers
  • Lots of other amazing makers
  • Insights of account available
  • Peers may become friends and can share tips and hobbies with each other
  • More interactions compared to Twitter
Cons
  • Unpredictable algorithms
  • Shadowbanning (showing your content to only a few of your followers)
  • Sporadic update features
  • Can get caught up in numbers of likes, followers, etc.


Twitter

Pros
  • If the post starts to go viral, your account and shop will grow fast
  • Less account unfollows compared to Instagram
  • Many users (at least for the Kpop community)
  • Can post thoughts and updates that are easily tracked in the timeline
Cons
  • If you stumble into the wrong side of Twitter, some people and content can be toxic
  • Can get caught up in numbers of likes, followers, etc.
  • Hard to get more likes and retweets. 
  • More difficult to build a following compared to Twitter 

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3. Posting Format

This is the usual format I post in:

    a. Name of design
    b. Thoughts on the design
    c. Explanation of the concept
    d. Sum it up asking what the audience thinks
    e. Hashtags


Of course all these above are optional and depend on you! You can also check out how other shops write theirs, but this is more or less what many people write for their post captions on Instagram.


Because Twitter has word limits, I just write a shortened version of my captions to sum the design up. Finishing it with two or three hashtags if necessary.

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4. Be Respectful

This is a rule of thumb in the social media community, but how do you do this in a community of pinmakers and artists?

These two are the most important rules of all:
  • DO NOT TRACE OR STEAL OTHER'S DESIGNS 
    • I cannot emphasize this enough. I've seen so many times in which people trace other designers' designs and claim them as their own. It gets really ugly and looks bad. Just don't do it. It's so disrespectful to the designer too.
  • It's not great to ask other pinmakers who their manus are. It's considered kind of rude because it shows that you haven't done any research yourself
    • They've personally done a lot of research, trial and error to find to a manu they work well with (I personally went through around 5 manus before I found one I was satisfied with)
    • They cannot be guarantee that the same manu can give you the same quality pins and they cannot afford to be reliable for that
    • Oversaturating a manufacturer may result in a decrease in quality (more pins to manage = less time to check small quality details in the factory)

Here I have some tips on how to find a potential manufacturer.

These are also good things to keep in mind:
  • Use friendly language 
    • There are many who are underage online.
    • You don't want your shop and brand to be known for foul language either.
    • Also depends on who your audience is. You can throw in some slangs too
    • Emojis can lighten the mood of your text sometimes.
    • Being friendly is overall a great way for people to be comfortable with your shop, interact, and come back to it!
  • Try to resolve any problems by calmly talking things out 
    • I've also seen cases where people lash back and then get exposed. It's not a great look for your shop or you. It's a responsibility for shop owners to handle things in a more mature manner.
    • If both sides are reasonable, then there will be a compromise

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5. Have fun and get to know other designers from the same community!

Interact and on their posts and stories. There may be those who you might just click in with very well and if you are genuine, this may be a start to a good friendship!
You may even learn some useful things with them as well!

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Running an account for a shop seems like an overwhelming activity with many layers of responsibilities, but many of these things are also common sense and come as natural when you spend more time on your accounts.

If you have any additional questions for me please feel free to comment below, dm me via Instagram or Twitter @teataekl, or email me at teataekookie@gmail.com


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