Today we’re going to talk about TikTok, and specifically how to use TikTok to grow your business, make sales, and generate leads.
If you’re like me, you realize an opportunity exists with TikTok, but you haven’t yet pulled the trigger.
When I used to think of TikTok, the word that came to mind was “overwhelming.” I’d watch the videos and say, “I have no idea how they did that. I can’t do that. It would take me forever to figure that out.”
Well, my guest today is the reason my opinion about TikTok has changed. Her name is Keenya Kelly. She’s a member of our Accelerator coaching program. She’s also a coach, author, and a speaker.
Keenya helps female online course creators, coaches and consultants increase sales using TikTok. Again, if you’re anything like me, you’ve often thought TikTok is a place for young people.
Well, as you’re going to hear today, TikTok is not just for young people. There are millions upon millions of people on TikTok who are older than 30.
Keenya makes a very strong case today that your audience is on TikTok, and you don’t have to get all fancy in order to be successful. You don’t have to learn all the functions and do all the things to start having an impact.
Keenya has built up a following on TikTok of just under a half a million people in less than two years. She makes sales every day using TikTok, and she generates a ton of leads on TikTok.
Today she’s going to break down exactly how she’s done it, how you can do it, and how you can leverage the fastest growing social media platform to grow your online business.
In this episode, you’ll learn:
- How Keenya got nearly 500K followers in two years
- Surprising statistics about TikTok’s user demographics
- How to get started on TikTok
- Why you don’t need a lot of technical skill when starting out
- Keenya’s tips for what content works best on TikTok
- An easy way to see what’s trending in your niche
- How to get more followers
- How to make money from TikTok
- Tools and apps Keenya uses to produce and enhance her content
Links & Resources:
- Splice video editor
- SnapTik TikTok video downloader
- The Art of Online Business website
- DM me on Instagram
- Visit my YouTube channel
- The Art of Online Business clips on YouTube
- Full episodes of The Art of Online Business Podcast on YouTube
- The Art of Online Business Podcast website
- Check out my Accelerator coaching program
Keenya Kelly’s Links:
- Keenya’s website
- TikTok With Keenya
- Follow Keenya on TikTok
- Keenya Kelly: Before You Quit Your Job: A Strategic Guide For Entrepreneurs
- Follow Keenya on Twitter
- Follow Keenya on Facebook
- Keenya is on Instagram
- Check out Keenya on YouTube
Got A Question You Want Answered On the Podcast?
Ask your questions or let me know if there is a topic or guest you’d like to hear from in the comments below or click here to visit my contact page and submit your question there for a chance to be featured on one of my upcoming Q&A episodes.
Please support the podcast by giving an honest Rating/Review for the show on iTunes!
Other Episodes You’ll Enjoy:
How She Did It: 563K Followers on TikTok with Meg Harrell
The #1 Secret to Succeeding on YouTube, with Pat Flynn
Quick Tip: Your Audience Is Starving For Your Help…What Are You Waiting For?!
[00:00:00] Rick:
Hey, my friends, if you are looking for a faster, better way to grow and scale your online business, you very likely do not need another course or to be reading more books about how to grow your business.
What you need instead is a personalized, cohesive growth strategy for your business, along with one-on-one coaching, and group co-coaching support and accountability to help you every step of the way. Well, that’s exactly what my Accelerator coaching program delivers for you.
Accelerator is an intimate, 12 month rolling open enrollment program. It’s an ongoing open enrollment, personalized coaching program, and mastermind experience for established online course creators and coaches who want to take the guesswork out of optimizing, and grow towards a profitable seven-figure-plus business without more anxiety, without more stress and hours spent in front of the computer.
Accelerator is about thinking differently and bigger about your business, about your team, your funnels, your ads, your vision, et cetera, so you can create more profit, more impact, with less hustle.
Accelerator’s application only. Again, this is rolling, ongoing open enrollment. If you want to learn more and apply, just go to RickMulready.com/Accelerator.
Hey, what’s up, my friends. Welcome to the show today, Rick Mulready here. Thank you for tuning in. Hope you’re having an awesome day today.
Today we’re going to be talking about TikTok, and specifically how to use TikTok to grow your business, to make sales, and generate leads. If you’re anything like me, you understand the opportunity that exists with TikTok, but you just have not pulled the trigger.
When I think of TikTok personally, the word that comes to my mind is overwhelming. Like I see, you know, I go on TikTok every, not every day, but I watch, I watch the Tik talks, I watch TikTok. Right. And I watched the videos and I’m like, I have no idea how they did that.
Oh, I can’t do that. Oh, it takes me forever to figure that out. Right. And so that’s sort of my mindset around TikTok, but it has changed. Okay. And my guest today has been the reason that my viewpoint around a TikTok has changed on the opportunity that exists with TikTok and my guest today. Her name is Keenya Kelly.
She’s an Accelerator member of our coaching program. She is. coach, she’s an author and she’s a speaker and Keenya helps female online course, creators, coaches and consultants increase sales using TikTok. Right? So many of us online business owners. I mean, again, if you’re anything like me, like we’ve, we’ve often thought, well, it’s just a younger crowd on, on TikTok.
Well, as you’re going to hear today, when Keenya talks about it, That is, I mean, yes, that’s very much the case, but there’s also millions upon millions upon millions of people who are, let’s just say 30 plus. Right. And so Keenya makes them very strong point today is that your audience is on TikTok and you don’t have to get all fancy and learn all the functions and do all the things when it comes to TikTok, at least at first, right.
In order to be success. Keenya has, has built up a following on TikTok at this to just under a half a million people in less than two years. She a time recording that she has 488,300 followers in less than two years. And so she makes sales every. Using TikTok. She generates a ton of leads on TikTok. And today she’s going to break down exactly how she’s done it, how you can do it and how you can really leverage the fastest growing social media platform to grow your online business.
So without further ado, let’s go hang out with Keenya Kelly.
So can you TikTok, it’s gotta be one of those things where everybody wants to know, should I be doing it, how to do it? And I would imagine there’s probably like maybe like 12, like a dozen questions that you get every single day. Like what’s a question that people should be asking you when it comes to TikTok for business, but they’re not asking.
[00:05:07] Keenya:
What should they be asking? How are people making money on TikTok? Cause most people are saying, can you make money on TikTok? They are not making money on TikTok. You got to dance, be on TikTok, but they’re not really asking how.
[00:05:22] Rick:
So how to make money on
[00:05:24] Keenya:
Yeah.
[00:05:24] Rick:
Because, yeah, everyone thinks we have to I’ve I’ve always thought like, oh, I have to dance. I got to point at things on the like didn’t things appear. So what I’m hearing is we don’t have to do that in order to be, if we it to be successful on there, we don’t have to dance.
[00:05:40] Keenya:
You did not. Not at
[00:05:42] Rick:
All right. All right. Well, I want to get into. Why that’s the case what other things that we can be doing. And I will ask you how to be making money with a TikTok for, for business. So let’s, let’s get right into who you are and how you get into this whole thing, and really what you specialize in and who you, who you help services.
[00:06:06] Keenya:
For sure. So I got into TikTok because like I own, I owned a branding consulting business back in 2020. And when the pandemic first hit, I was kind of freaking out with the rest of the world, thinking that we’re going to go into a recession. And so I started praying asking God for a strategy for my. And I heard TikTok.
I thought I was crazy. I was like, oh no, I’m crazy. I’m dealing with fear. And so I just kind of chucked it for like a day and then it kept coming and I was like, what if this is the strategy? Like, no one I knew was talking about TikTok. I wasn’t talking about TikTok and I sure didn’t have the app on my phone.
[00:06:40] Rick:
I was going to so where have you been doing TikTok yourself?
[00:06:43] Keenya:
No. I saw Shaleen Johnson do the baby shark challenge in 2018. That was the last time I ever even thought about TikTok. So to hear that word was something that had to come from somewhere else. Cause that was not there. Wasn’t a word that was in my house or on my radar.
[00:07:00] Rick:
Yeah. And so. Maybe time to go, it’s time to go to the TikTok route.
[00:07:08] Keenya:
Yes.
[00:07:09] Rick:
So you had this, you had this branding agency and you’re like, okay, time to go this route. Did you know what this route was? Besides it being TikTok? Were you like, oh, I’m going to monetize this or do you have any plan at that point?
[00:07:25] Keenya:
No, because all I knew was the baby shark challenge. Right. And you know, so I was like the baby shark town. So I just kinda got on there. I downloaded it and I. Watching all this content. And I was just like, what is happening? It just felt like a whole new world. Like, I didn’t understand what was going on.
So when I first kind of started with it, I honestly, I started dancing cause I’m actually a really good dancer. And I was like, I’ll just learn some of these dances. Then I was showing videos of my cats. Cause they would go viral on Tik TOK. It didn’t, it wasn’t resonating with me by why I was hearing tick-tock I just knew I heard it.
And so I said, well, let me just play around with it. You know, anytime. Something is new. You’ve got to learn it. And so I’m playing around with it, not with the intention of business, but with the intention of maybe I’m about to be famous,
[00:08:11] Rick:
Okay. Let’s be here. Right?
[00:08:14] Keenya:
It’s like, maybe I’m a blow up, you know, it’d be famous. but it wasn’t until I did, what’s called a duet.
Someone had done a video and I did a side by side reaction to it and the video went viral and I gained my first 1000 followers. And then it clicked. This is why I’m here. I’ve got to figure out how to put myself on this platform with what I do creatively to get to my target audience that I think they were there.
No, but I just, I had the light bulb moment then.
[00:08:42] Rick:
Who was your target audience at that point where you. On it, because I know this is a conversation that we’ve had, but were just starting out, did you have any kind of clarity on who your audience was?
[00:08:51] Keenya:
Yeah. So I was already, I had a branding and marketing well consulting agency. So we were already designing brands for, for entrepreneurs, people that were just getting started in entrepreneurship, they needed to know clarity in their brand. They needed the logos, webs, websites, design, and things of that nature.
So that, that was who I was trying to reach on TikTok because that’s the product we were selling.
[00:09:12] Rick:
All right. I want to get into like how you started to learn it, because I think this is one of the things where people get, you know, you recently did a presentation for, our Accelerators and you asked what was one word that people thought of what comes to mind when people think of TikTok.
And think a few more than a few people said, overwhelm.
[00:09:36] Keenya:
Yes.
[00:09:37] Rick:
And there’s so many things, you know, like, well, we think that there’s so many things, like what types of videos to do, what is this with trends and music and do I have to dance and all this other stuff. So how many followers do you have now?
Or almost half a million followers
[00:10:00] Keenya:
Years.
[00:10:01] Rick:
And two years.
Okay. How did you do that? Let’s get right into it. did you create half a million followers and in two years,
[00:10:10] Keenya:
For sure. So the first thing was, I did not know what I was doing on the app. There weren’t any tutorials. There weren’t any, video like YouTube videos. I literally learned that one button at a time. Like I have a lot of really, really bad. Bad TikTok videos that are still on the platform that I refuse to delete.
And I just, I told myself, cause I remember I had one moment where I said, this is awful. I feel defeated. I feel old. I feel like I want to quit, but I said, I’m going to give it six months. And I’m going to show up every single day for six months. The same way I did when I first started my business, I was like, nobody knows me, six months.
Let’s just be consistent with it. My claim to fame is I show up, I don’t care if I’m not the best or whatever. I’m always the one that shows up as how I beat everybody. And so I said, this is what I’m going to do on Tik TOK. And every day I was just trying a different button, trying a new feature, and I just kept trying, and I will create a piece of content.
And then, and I was just, I just kept on trying. And what ended up happening was, I can’t remember which video of my know. I did like a small tray, like a sound and it was like seven seconds long was my video. And I talked about how I had gone through divorce and instead of being bitter against my ex-husband, I wrote a book.
And so I showed a book is a business book, has nothing to do with him. I showed the book, put the book down and I did a very just side-by-side dance. Like just very simple. The video goes by. Books are selling like crazy on my website, Amazon Kendall, and I’m like, what is happening? And I realized that I don’t have to know all the buttons.
I don’t have to know all the features, all the, I just had to just create a piece of content that was relatable to my target audience. That was just me on camera. And I started doing that every single day.
[00:11:56] Rick:
What do you think it made it?
[00:11:58] Keenya:
Honestly, I think that people like petty things. I think people like, cause, cause like in my video I said, confirm exactly what I said, but I was like, my, I found out my ex was cheating eight months into marriage and instead of being miserable or bitter, I wrote a book. And so I show the book and I put the book down and then on top of it and said, and I made a million dollars since divorcing him.
I bet he’s watching me on social media. So because it was petty and it was like, she made a million dollars, how she make a million dollars, you know, it was like, it was all that in the mix of it. And from a viral standpoint, the reason why videos go viral is because somebody watches it. They watch it all the way through.
They watch it again and again, and they share it. And so the video was short enough, but also cause people to want to like, repeat what did I say? What did I do? And to get, the, a copy of what the book said, and it caused the video to go viral and it.
[00:12:56] Rick:
And you were selling books in the process as a result.
[00:12:58] Keenya:
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I had never sold that many of my books in the history until that video.
[00:13:06] Rick:
Now were you telling people to go buy the book?
You were just showing it and you were like, Hey, I just, instead of getting better, I wrote it.
[00:13:15] Keenya:
I literally showed that book for like a second or two, probably a second, like 1.5 seconds. That was it. And I put the book down.
[00:13:23] Rick:
And people are like, wait a minute. I want that book. And did he linking to it in your profile?
[00:13:30] Keenya:
Yes. So it was, it was already in my bio. It was already on Amazon. And then when the video was going viral, all these people were asking, how do I find the book? And so I started going, oh my God. So I started writing. I had to respond to everybody in the comments. It was so many people asking that TikTok told me, yeah, Stop responding.
Cause it’s like, if you respond too fast to a bunch of comments, you look like a robot. And so I responded to so many people because it was so many that I had to pause for a couple of hours.
[00:13:57] Rick:
Wait, TikTok. how did that happen?
[00:14:00] Keenya:
So you get like an alert, that’s just says your same comment, repeating, please stop something like that. It just keeps you from being a, but yeah.
[00:14:10] Rick:
You. So we’re where you kind of like, all right, I got this now. Or was it like, Ooh, I caught, you know, caught something that works here. I’m going to try to keep figuring different things out. Or was it more of like more of that? was the sort of where’d you go from.
[00:14:28] Keenya:
It was more so, Ooh, I see what’s happening here. And, but the business side of me, I didn’t want to be known for being this petty divorced woman. Cause that’s not, that’s not who I am not mad at my ex, but I to myself, huh? How can I create content? That feels like that, that, that takes people through the hook, the dip, the surprise, and, and make them want to share it.
And that started to teach me this kind of viral hack with my business.
[00:14:55] Rick:
All right. So you kind of learn this format. to do more of this. Who, who are you helping right now with TikTok? For
[00:15:05] Keenya:
For sure. So now we are focused on, established female entrepreneurs that are coaches or consultants that have digital courses
[00:15:14] Rick:
Okay, cool.
[00:15:15] Keenya:
Them. I am them.
[00:15:16] Rick:
You are. Okay. so with that, Let’s let’s get like, let’s answer the million dollar question. How do we sell? How do we make money from TikTok?
[00:15:29] Keenya:
For sure. So one of the things I always tell people is that TikTok is not different than Facebook and Instagram. It’s just 100% videos right now. Right now, TikTok, you can do 15 seconds or up to 10 minute videos, but for the most part, it’s short pieces of content and it’s more creativity. So. Those of us that are coaches, consultants, whatever we’re used to doing long form content, like 15 minutes, 30 minutes, YouTube videos and all that.
But I always tell people that the number one thing that we know is serve, serve then sell. Right? And so we’ll take top X exact same thing instead of you doing 10 minute videos, you’re doing. 15 second videos or 32nd videos, or one minute video. You’ve got this long YouTube video and you can either take the content, cut it up and use it on TikTok or take the bullet points of what you would say in a Facebook live and turn it into a short piece of content and become the expert.
Now I sell on TikTok in a couple of different. One, if you’re watching the video we’re on right now, I strategically built the back end of my, my presentation back here so that my books would show in view. And so I tell my clients that if you have some type of physical product or something, set up your background and puts your product back there as like product placement, you’re not talking about it all the time.
Most times you’re not, but it’s still selling because it’s. The background. also we all know about the bio that the bio on our social media pages tell people who we are, what we do and how we serve them. And so I always tell people that you’re trying to sell something, tell them what you do in your bio, and then tell them what to do.
Click the clickable link. Now, in terms of in Tik TOK videos, there’s a lot of different ways to do it. One, it is serving in a particular video and then telling them if you want that. Go and purchase it. to a lot of times I will tell the success stories of my clients. You know, I have, we do a little bit of one-on-one, but for the most, part we do courses.
And so we’re always sharing the success stories of what has happened with our clients. And when you share that a person says, I want to be. Right, but also in these short pieces of content, I am just serving them. Like, for example, I will, I’ve been teaching people on TikTok, the value of having an email list.
So you’re starting about with the value that you’re teaching the basics of like an offer you’re teaching about the opt and Maybe the trip wire and you’re just teaching them all these little things that they would need to know if they were in this big coaching program with me. And every single time I give them one piece, they want more.
And I’m able to say either they’re commenting. I can say, Hey, if you want to join our. You know, click the link, you can join us. but most times I’m trying to get people to just grab the free tool that’s going to help them get started with TikTok. And once they get that free tool, we’re going to serve them with that amazing tool.
But we’re also going to offer them something to buy from us. I always tell people that when I look at TikTok, it’s like a massive lead generator. It’s like the fastest lead generator I’ve ever experienced outside of an ad. Right. And if you do it right, you will have thousands of people joining your email list and then you just convert them into customers.
[00:18:45] Rick:
So two things that come out of that. Number one, and this is a question I had early on and I know the answer to it now, but a lot of people think like, wait, my audience isn’t on there because it’s all teenagers on TikTok. Crushed that for
[00:18:59] Keenya:
Yeah,
For sure. So at this point, I believe it’s right around. Let’s just say 50, it’s just exaggerate. 50% of the people on TikTok are 20 years of age and. That means 50% of the people on the platform are 21 years of age and older. Right. A lot of people say, well, I don’t see my people on the platform. That just means they’re not posting.
That just means that they’re consuming. TikTok has done their own stats. And if you look and just Google. Demographics of TikTok 20, 22. You’re going to see the astronomical numbers, that there are millions of people on TikTok that are 50, that are 60 millions, millions that are forties and thirties. And so they’re all there, but for the most part, they don’t know how to TikTok.
So they’re just consuming. That’s like, anytime you pull a room of business people, how many of you guys have watched it TikTok video, the hands go up like crazy how you all are posting and you’ll see.
[00:19:57] Rick:
Yeah. Yeah, but we think it’s so hard. Right. so going back to the, to the point that the points that you were making about how to sell and how to generate leads, are we doing, I would assume that we’re not doing that in like every video. That we’re doing, like, what’s kind of the F do you follow like a frequency in which you have a call to action or is it just like, what’s the story there?
[00:20:22] Keenya:
For sure when I am intentional, not always intentional. I have a really good time with TikTok. I mean, I have a blast with that platform. Okay. But when I’m really intentional, I am doing, I would say out of four videos a day, if I’m doing four, three of them I’m serving without a direct call to action.
And then one of them. Follow Up or more, or visit my profile because what we learned is that the artificial intelligence is picking up the phrase, click the link in my bio link and bio there. They’re clicking up that they’re there, they’re picking it up and they’re not, they’re kind of suppressing content, I think.
And so we’ve. Go to my profile, go to my page and check out what we have to offer versus saying click the link. but I would say 25% of the time is when I’m actually giving a call to action. But 100% of the time I am getting a call to action in my comments. So I’m going to my comments. And I would say for this book, click the link on my profile.
And then I pin that comment to the top.
[00:21:23] Rick:
So, or, you could, didn’t you say recent, like you can say a lot of people are saying bank and Leo
[00:21:29] Keenya:
Yes. Yeah. And so I, I was doing that, but I’m still seeing, like, I’m still seeing some suppression, so I’m like, okay, let’s just say, go to my profile until they, you know,
[00:21:40] Rick:
Interesting. So, right. When, when you did your presentation for the Accelerators recently, you were showing some examples, a lot of them were showing of your own. I was looking at that. I was like, holy cow, that seems like a lot of work. You showed a couple where you’re changing clothes and you made a good point because I asked you about it.
You’re like, I’ve done, I’ve been doing this for so long now. this was like one of the first times that you had done it. If I remember correct.
How do we make this or this? Not so, so much work
[00:22:12] Keenya:
Yeah, for sure.
So it’s really important to first. I always tell people that social media has changed, right? Every social media platform has changed his entire platform to mirror TikTok. And so as marketers, it’s so important for us to go, okay, this is a time of shifting. So what we used to do, we can’t do it anymore.
Right. So that’s the first thing is just to change the mind. The second thing is to note that batch creating is your very, very best friend. You know, when I have like a free Saturday and I really know that I’m going to be busy coming up, I will have five, maybe, maybe six outfits here in my office. I’ll have a bunch of different videos that I’m going to shoot a lots of topics.
And then I’ll just shoot for like an hour, two hours, three hours, whatever. And I’ll have like maybe 50, 60, 70 videos that are sitting in my drafts. What I will say is that when you first get started on TikTok is absolutely overwhelming. It is overwhelming. There are so many buttons there’s so much going on, but it’s important that you take a look and go, okay.
I can’t learn everything. I can’t do everything, but what I can do is point shoot and post. And if you start with just learning how to point shoot posts, then learning how to use a timer, then learning how to use texts on screen. Then learning how to make a disappear. Then you’ll find yourself making it.
It’ll be so much more easier, but a lot of people, they see all the. Fancy effects or things that happen in videos, but they feel like they have to do all that. I didn’t do any of that when I got to my first 10,000, I didn’t, I
[00:23:48] Rick:
Really?
[00:23:49] Keenya:
I didn’t know how.
[00:23:50] Rick:
Wait, where are you just like front of your camera talking
[00:23:53] Keenya:
Yes. Yes.
[00:23:54] Rick:
For real, like, this gives me so much hope.
[00:23:56] Keenya:
Yes. Yeah. Like I, I learned how to do what they call that’s called the jump cuts. I was just calling it, cut where I would talk and stop, talk, and stop. And that’s all I was doing was talking and stopping. But what I was teaching people was so valuable because it’s the same thing we teach on Facebook, Instagram, and podcasts, where to teach it.
Ain’t going to TikTok. So a global audience. And so when I was doing that, They just wanted the info. They didn’t care how fancy the video was. Even now people like you will see people that are making a killing on TikTok. And you’re like how? Because they want the information. We think they want the fancy stuff.
Like I’ve had to become through my course. And they’re like frustrated because I’m not showing them transitions. And I’m like, do you want to learn transitions? Or do you want more zeros in your bank? Okay. They go the zeros I’m like, great. I don’t know, transitions. I know zeros,
[00:24:47] Rick:
Yeah, I love it.
[00:24:48] Keenya:
Don’t have to do all that.
[00:24:50] Rick:
All right. So, cause that was going to ask you, like, What would you say to me who I don’t consider myself super creative and. I D I’m currently not on, I’ve had so many students, current Accelerators challenge me to be on TikTok, but what would you say to me to get started with it?
[00:25:13] Keenya:
For sure. So the first thing I would say is I would ask you, who, who are you trying to target? and then I would, I would tell you to birth. I’ll just tell everybody, what could you talk about like that from the, from the basics to the advance? the next thing I would tell you to do is to go onto the platform at the bottom of the screen.
You’ll see a word that says, discover, click on discover at a top. You’re going to see a search box. And then I want you to type in this search box one or two words about what it is. And then start, binge-watching the content of the creators that are doing what it is you do and teaching. That’s going to give you creativity for the next six years, because what a lot of people don’t realize is that everything on TikTok it’s like rinse and repeat.
So not necessarily the actual content of what we’re teaching. But the way and the manner that we’re doing, it is someone else’s creative idea. And it’s a normal thing on Tik TOK for us to see somebody do something and they recreate it for our own businesses. People don’t. Get upset when you recreate their idea, unless you steal a dance.
That’s a whole thing with the dance community on TikTok don’t steal someone’s dance, or it’s going down,
[00:26:23] Rick:
Yeah,
[00:26:24] Keenya:
But in the creative space, like I think that I’m creative, but 99.9% of the stuff on my TikTok, I was inspired by somebody else.
[00:26:33] Rick:
You did. You showed us a video when you did that presentation of you doing the worm. My team said to me, oh, I want to see you do that. And I was like, would totally do that. I don’t mind doing that. You, you said something in your social media marketing world presentation that I thought was like a great way to look at it.
And you talked about the 5 0 1 version of you. Talk to us about that. What is that?
[00:27:00] Keenya:
Yes. So we all have the nine to five personality and that’s the personality we all develop because we went to school. We all had corporate jobs or whatever, and we had to abide by the HR, you know, HR. But then we all have this 5 0 1 personality that once we clock out, we’re an entirely different person.
And people know that no, all day long. And I tell people that TikTok is asking for the 5 0 1 personality. Right. And so I’m very polished. You know, I, you know, I am how I am. When those lights come on, lights, camera action. I am like Jim Carrey, SpongeBob square pants. Like that is just me all day, every day.
And TikTok. What I learned when I started being that with business, my success just went through the roof on the platform and other platforms because I was more of my natural self, but also. TikTok is a place of entertainment. People are going there to escape from the craziness of Facebook escape from their present reality, you know, and, and TikTok is this like, it’s this incredible jungle that I will call it.
And so if we’re going to be there, Putting out this business content, then we can’t be like the guy from the differences, clear, clear eyes. We can’t be like him. We have to be creative. Now I am someone who will do the worm. I did fall off of a bed recently intentionally for a video, but that’s me. Oh yeah.
It’s a mess. I mean, it’s a clean mess. but it’s, it’s 60,000 views on T. You know, so it’s just like, it’s about finding out what is your personality. Now I have some introverts that work with us who don’t do anything of what I do. And they’re still incredibly successful because it’s about their 5 0 1 personality, not my personality.
[00:28:52] Rick:
Yeah. And I think that’s the thing that I follow like that I run up against myself because I’m very, I’m an introvert right now when. When I get on here or when I get on stage or whatever, like I light up like, or or in person or whatever, let’s bring it right. But I don’t have, you know, like I don’t, I consider myself I kind of fall.
And I’ve talked about it here in the show before. Like, I feel like that I kind of have just like, just, Pretty even keeled personality. Right. And so I’ve been trying to figure out, like, how do I bring, how do I take it up a few notches to apply from like TikTok?
[00:29:34] Keenya:
Yeah, but see even, okay, so more than likely you don’t even have to take it up another notch, you can literally just be how you are, you know, because it’s easier for you to just be exactly the same way you are all the time. Then to try to take it up, you know, like for me to try to go. I can’t go more.
I just, I can just be, be here, you know, and when someone wants me to like, box in and be more. Team. It’s like, oh, it’s like, it’s like restrictive, you know? but it’s really about like, just starting with like, this is who I am. This is how I am, let me create content like this. And once I get even more comfortable with the platform and how I’m creating content, then you may find yourself getting inspired and creating something else.
But also what ends up happening is that. Once you start creating content and you start seeing the other creative content that’s being shown to you on the, for you feed, you, start going, oh, I can do that. And then you start doing things that you normally would not do. I mean, I’ve seen people in the space and I’m like, did they really just do that? I didn’t even know that was their personality, but it came out the more comfortable they got with the platform.
[00:30:42] Rick:
But what I’m hearing is you don’t need to start off the fancy stuff. You can just start off. You said the first 10,000 followers I had where it’s like me talking to my phone,
[00:30:53] Keenya:
Yes. I mean, one of my clients is extremely introverted. She literally taught directly to camera about medicinal mushrooms or something like that. And the video went viral. She gained, I think it was like 50,000 followers overnight and 20,000 people join our email list.
[00:31:10] Rick:
Holy cow.
[00:31:11] Keenya:
Video, very intimate.
[00:31:14] Rick:
Wow. So one thing I’m amazed at, and you alluded to it earlier, where you said, at what other P like what other people are doing in terms of the videos that they’re putting out, especially outside of your space. And you can take the concepts that they’re doing then that concept for what you’re doing.
Do you cause like my wife does this extremely well with her. TikTok videos. Do you like, take a trend and then, you know, she’s an online health coach, So she she’ll put out, like, how did you come up with that idea? Like, how did you take this over here, the trend is for this and then make it your own for over here.
And you’re, you’re you do that all the time? Like how, where does that inspiration come from?
[00:32:04] Keenya:
For sure. So the first thing it does come from the initial video, the initial video, when you, that you watched, but also you can, once you see the initial video, you can actually click on the sound and it’s going to take you to all like hundreds and thousands of other videos of people that have, that have used the sound.
And so you can then just binge watch and get some creative ideas. If you’ve already done this brain dump about what your clients are needing, you know, what they experience, how, how things can be relatable and like, and you, you take the scenario and you’re like, okay, if my client or ideal client was watching this, what is it that they, what is the scenario I can do that they will be able to relate to that I can also relate to now I will say your first five to seven, maybe 10, maybe absolutely terrible, because you’re trying to really learn.
How to be creative with your particular content for your audience, but that’s normal because I tell people that what we are doing on TikTok is not normal to like take a sound from will Smith and Chris rock, getting into a tussle and someone turn it into a piece of content for a business that is not normal.
We have never done marketing that way. Ever, you know, but we have taken the sounds from Goodfellas and turn them into strategic content. So it’s going to take time of trying a trend and flipping it, but eventually what happens once you get it? It doesn’t matter what trend it is. Your it’s just going to come to you so fast because now you’re Trent, you’ve trained your brain.
How to think about a trend.
[00:33:42] Rick:
Do you think there’s any, any, any niches that wouldn’t work on TikTok?
[00:33:48] Keenya:
No, because everybody is there. Like, I mean, during COVID I got all of my COVID news from TikTok, not from the news station. I got it from an Asian doctor in New York who was dancing. He was dancing and delivering very hard core facts about COVID and. Like, I’ve never gotten doctor’s advice from someone dancing before, you know, I’ve watched the wall street journal like them give facts about Ukraine.
I mean, every body, every niche is on TikTok. There was a guy on tape to who keeps going viral when he shows people how to, how to open the apple. Like most of us, we cut an apple down the center, but he showed people how to put your finger on the left and on the right and just pull and the apple. Who knew, but every single niche is on TikTok.
And I mean, just think about it. We all like what we, like, we all go down a rabbit trail of whatever we like the average person would not know that I love watching soldiers coming home, the prize in their families.
[00:34:56] Rick:
Yeah.
[00:34:57] Keenya:
To watch gender reveals all these things, but everything is there, everyone.
[00:35:03] Rick:
How do we get discovered? So if somebody’s starting out, so like me right now, I think I have like 13 followers and their dislike. I don’t know how, I don’t know why. Cause I have no content on there, how do we get discovered when we’re just getting.
[00:35:17] Keenya:
For sure. So TikTok, there’s three different, a bunch of different pages, but one of the pages is the following page. And the following page is where if someone follows you and you post your content, then they’re going to see your content there. That’s like the Facebook feed when someone friend requests you, but then there is the, for you feed and that’s the feed where TikTok is taking your content and they’re pushing it out to people that they think would be interested in your content.
So I have cats. I like cats. If. One or two, maybe three cat videos. I’ve just told the algorithm, send me more cat videos. So if people start posting videos about their cats and their videos are good TikTok, who’s going to serve me those videos. So if you start teaching about, let’s just say podcasting two on TikTok and there’s people that really enjoy podcasts and content, then TikTok is going to say, I’m going to send this piece of content to Sherry to see what she will be interested in.
What he’s got to say. And it just continues. It continues on that way. Now you can use hashtags on TikTok people. Aren’t searching hashtags, but you can use the hashtag. And what they do is, again with podcasts, if you type the word hashtag podcasting and post it in your video, then you’re telling TikTok, send this video to anyone had, that has used the hashtag podcasting or has interacted with a piece of content that has had the hashtag podcasting.
[00:36:41] Rick:
Hm.
[00:36:42] Keenya:
You can intentionally send your content to people, but also just because of who you are, once TikTok learns you and learns your content, they know where to send your content.
[00:36:52] Rick:
Yeah. And didn’t know that about the hashtags where it will show it to two people who have interacted with that kind of content. super interesting. You also showed us where you can tell the algorithm that I don’t want more of these, videos. I didn’t know that. Can you just share a real quick, like, so I’m scrolling through, I see a video.
I’m like, ah, this is not relevant to me. Not interested. I don’t want to see this type of content anyway.
[00:37:20] Keenya:
Yeah. Yeah. So one of these is going to happen as soon as you get on TikTok. Cause there’s going to show you a lot of random stuff and some of it may be stuff you’re like, what is happening? Well, what you want to do is immediately when you see something you’re not interested in, just hold your finger down on the screen and then a box is going to pop up and you want to click not interested.
And that’s Tom TikTok. Show me less than. The more you do that, the less, you got to see the content you don’t want to see. And then if you do want to see certain content, when you watch a video that you like just hit the like button on the video so you can train the algorithm, what to show you.
[00:37:55] Rick:
More like people coming home and reuniting with their
[00:37:59] Keenya:
Yes, exactly.
[00:38:02] Rick:
What are some, what are some tools or apps that you use to make this easier?
[00:38:07] Keenya:
Yeah.
[00:38:07] Rick:
Do you like do editing right in, right in TikTok. Are there other things that you.
[00:38:11] Keenya:
So 99% of my videos are all edited inside of TikTok. I only use the app called splice S P L I C E. If I’m trying to do something special that I’ve seen, like the video you saw of me, like changing outfits, uh that’s the first time I’ve ever done that. And so I use an app called splice to do that.
[00:38:30] Rick:
So is that how you do like the whole, like, you take like a shirt and you like throw it at yourself
[00:38:37] Keenya:
Oh, no. So that’s the, that’s the three second timer. And basically what they’re doing is, so what you’re saying is like someone is wearing one outfit and then they take a shirt and they bring it to themselves. And then suddenly they’re wearing an entirely different outfit. Well, what they did was they recorded themselves.
With the shirt and they’ve made the motion and then they stopped recording and then they have, they can use splice or you can just use TikTok for this. Then they’ve recorded themselves a second time in that same TikTok frame of them, like doing the motion where it’s like they’re adjusting as if they just popped into the outfit.
And then once they finished recording that, then there’s a feature called adjust clips. And if you click on adjust clips and it will allow you to splice those two together, To where the transition is very seamless,
[00:39:27] Rick:
Gotcha.
[00:39:28] Keenya:
All built into the platform?
[00:39:30] Rick:
Cool. Cool. So splice, is that really the only one that you’re using?
[00:39:34] Keenya:
Yup.
[00:39:35] Rick:
Interesting. Interesting. So what I’m kind of gathering here is like, just get, just get. And your audience is there. Get started. And I love how you said earlier, like make a commitment to it. You committed for six months originally.
Like I’m going to post every single day and I’m just going to try something small, like new, but yet small each time you post that reminds me. What about the frequency of hosting? How long should it be? How often should we be looking at post.
[00:40:07] Keenya:
So when you’re first getting started, I always tell people you want to try to have lots of content on the platform, because a lot of people like in order to get a clickable link in your bio and to go live on TikTok, you have to get to your first 1000 followers. And so in order to do that, People are going to follow accounts when they know what your count is about.
And so I tell people to, yes, update your bio, but try to post as many pieces of content as you can in your first couple of days, couple of weeks. That way, when someone, when your video gets sent to someone on the, for you feed and they come back to your profile, They’re able to actually scroll through the content on your page to see what your page is about, and then make the decision to actually want to follow your account.
So minimum you want to be posting once a day to sustain on TikTok. But if you’re trying to grow, I would say three to four little pieces of content per day. Now I know it sounds like a lot, but when we think about. All the content we’ve created for Instagram and Facebook, those that content can actually be, be cut up.
Or if you learn how to batch record, you can jump in on some TikTok trends or just teach and, you know, and post all the video out. I mean, it is a lot initially, but like that all the time.
[00:41:21] Rick:
But, you’ve, you’ve proven here and you talked about the plenty of examples where somebody can gain thousands of followers literally overnight
[00:41:32] Keenya:
Overnight. Yeah. I mean, I’ve, I’ve seen that. I’ve seen someone hit like a heart. She’s an attorney and she’s very strategic order concept, but she also has an agency behind her too, but she gained like 3 million followers in three weeks.
Well, she got, she’s an attorney and she’s very strategic. And she has done is she finds loopholes inside of contracts.
So if someone gets a Louis Vuitton bag and then the handbag breaks within 12 months or something, she’s got this, she’s read all the fine print and knows that if you go to Louis Vuitton, they will actually either give you the cost of the bag or the bag back. And so she takes these little things and she turns them into.
It’s between her and a brand and people go, what? I didn’t know that. And she just grows so, so fast with that.
[00:42:19] Rick:
I saw one recently where it, I, I think she was an attorney, but she was doing that for the airlines.
[00:42:24] Keenya:
That’s her Erica.
Yeah.
[00:42:29] Rick:
Ah, that’s a brilliant, like, how do you know this? Because I did the work for you or something like
[00:42:34] Keenya:
Our but she got it. She has agency behind her though. That’s what I, when I was starting with research for her, I said, okay,
[00:42:39] Rick:
Yeah.
[00:42:40] Keenya:
Is brilliant. Yes.
[00:42:42] Rick:
Interesting. Now the other question before we start to wrap up here is, is it okay be posting using our real. And posting on TikTok and vice versa.
[00:42:57] Keenya:
Yes. So technically yes. Now REOs has made it very clear that they are given like preferential treatment to those that create content on reels. and they do not want to have a TikTok watermark on the Instagram reels. So some of the people’s videos are still doing well, but they just made it very clear.
That’s not what they want. So what I always teach people is that if you’re going to post a reel and you got to move it from, from real to TikTok, Rio’s logo is in the lower left-hand corner. You can just crop it while she finished posting it. And it saves to your phone. You could just crop the logo out with TikTok.
You can definitely move your TikTok videos to Instagram. You just want to either screen record your videos before you post, or you can use currently this app works, but it may not work in the future. is called snap tick S N a P T I K. Or you can take your TikTok. Posted in there and they’ll remove the watermark and then you can post it to Instagram reels.
[00:43:55] Rick:
Alright, Keenya. you’ve convinced me.
[00:43:59] Keenya:
You got this, it’s just about getting started it like,
[00:44:02] Rick:
Yeah.
[00:44:02] Keenya:
Just about getting started. And those people that get started now, you know, are the ones like, I’m glad I got started in 2020, because it’s changed my entire business,
[00:44:12] Rick:
Yeah.
[00:44:13] Keenya:
And, but there’s still a lot of time because people still don’t know.
[00:44:17] Rick:
Well, I think that too, I kind of liken it to in a, in a weird kind of way. I mean, this is how my brain works, right? Like I liken it to like advertising or Google ad words and doing it yourself. Like there’s a big learning curve there, but when you figure it out, there’s huge upside there. Now media, like, but the point of it is like, there’s, there’s a learning curve and who are willing to learn and put the time in to figure out how to take advantage of this platform.
[00:44:48] Keenya:
Yes.
[00:44:49] Rick:
Those are the people who are going to win, you know? And like you may, you make a great point, like getting it, it’s still early, right. Getting in now learning the platform because you mentioned, so many people are on the platform, but yet, want to take advantage of it maybe for the business, but they’re like, wait, I have no idea
[00:45:08] Keenya:
Yes.
[00:45:09] Rick:
This. they’re like, I’m just going to focus on other things instead.
So big opportunity.
[00:45:14] Keenya:
That’s like when YouTube first came out, I guarantee there were people like, I would never go online on video and search how to unplug my
[00:45:22] Rick:
Yeah.
[00:45:23] Keenya:
And now we go to YouTube for everything,
[00:45:26] Rick:
Yeah. Yup.
[00:45:28] Keenya:
Got in early are the winners.
[00:45:30] Rick:
Yeah. I love it. So where can people connect with you? I know there’s going to be a ton of people. They’re like, wait, I want to learn more about this. want the things
[00:45:40] Keenya:
Yeah, for sure.
[00:45:41] Rick:
Keenya in my life.
[00:45:42] Keenya:
Yes, for sure.
The number one place you can find me, of course, is on TikTok @KeenyaKelly. But if you’re not yet a TikTok person, you can go to Instagram. Everything of mine is KeenyaKelly, including our website. And then we do have a free tool that’s for entrepreneurs, and that is TikTokWithKeenya.com.
[00:46:02] Rick:
Ooh. I like that. I liked that. And your book, which I can see over your shoulder in the video here, where can people get?
[00:46:09] Keenya:
It’s called Before You Quit Your Job: A Strategic Guide For Entrepreneurs. It’s on my website, and it’s on Amazon and Kindle.
[00:46:16] Rick:
Awesome.
KeenyaKelly.com, everybody. K E E N Y A Kelly, K E L L Y.com. Follow her on all the things. Connect with her on TikTok. Let her know you heard her on the podcast. I’ll link everything up in the show notes for the episode here today.
Keenya, thank you so much. I’ve been selfishly asking a lot of questions for myself. This is super helpful for me, and I know that a lot of people listening are going to find a ton of useful things in here for them, as well.
So, thank you, again, for coming on.
[00:46:47] Keenya:
You’re welcome. You’re going to crush it. I’m excited for you.
[00:46:50] Rick:
Alright, make sure you go follow Keenya on TikTok. Connect with her on Instagram, check out her book, do all the things. I’ve linked everything up in the show notes for today’s episode over at RickMulready.com.
Thank you, as always, for tuning in today. Make sure you hit that subscribe button so you don’t miss any of the episodes here on the podcast. Whether you’re listening on Apple Podcasts, or Spotify, or whatever it is that you’re listening on, make sure you hit that subscribe button or the follow button so you don’t miss any of the episodes.
If you haven’t already, by the way, it is still very helpful if you want to support the show, go leave a quick rating and review for the show over on Apple Podcasts. It is still very, very helpful, and allows us to reach more people with our message.
So, thank you in advance for doing that, and thank you, as always, for tuning in today. I appreciate you, my friend.
Until next time, be well, and I’ll talk to you soon.
