Max Blanshard is founder of TutorMapper, the website to find top quality, fully checked tutors. When he needed help with his social media he turned to Digital Mums.
You can make a real impact on a limited budget
"As a new start-up my original idea was to do my own social media. How hard could it be? I set up the platforms but then quickly realised that to grow a credible audience it needed expertise and time; two things I didn’t have. I contacted Digital Mums and they advised me that at my stage a social media campaign that focussed on brand awareness was what I needed. They matched me with Karen to create a strategy and execute a campaign over two social media channels.
Digital Mums are experienced self-starters
It was obvious a lot of thought had been put into matching the right Digital Mum with the right business. My Digital Mum Karen Jones had over 20 years experience in the education sector as a lecturer and manager in creative digital media. From the very start she had an intrinsic understanding of what I was trying to achieve. It also helped that as a mum she was one of my target audience so I had this extra sounding board. Launching a business was stressful enough but I was reassured that I could hand over the baton and leave Karen to get on with the social media side of things.
You get a quality social media presence
I think this was a really important distinction. Digital Mums wasn’t about a quick solution of hundreds of followers that added absolutely no value to a brand. The Process was all about creating a strategic and comprehensive social media marketing campaign that really delivered. Karen’s upfront strategy work and the care she put into User Personas showed she was really on message. Meanwhile I started noticing companies on social media that were either spammy or sent ill-thought-out posts. I didn’t want to be like that! Instead we had a very clear timeline and strategy of how we were going to succeed.
The campaigns are incredibly creative
Karen's ideas were very impressive. #ItStartedWithABook was aimed at parents and asked them to reminisce about their own school days (remember the 80s song ‘It started with a Kiss’?!). Karen ran a competition which asked entrants to share the book that inspired their love of reading and learning. It completely chimed with our ethos and was the kind of non-pushy, thoughtful campaign I wanted to be associated with. People really bought into it and engaged on a meaningful level. Our stats spoke for themselves; on Facebook, total reach increased by 3772% and on Twitter by 2658%. It was a similar story for engagement and follower numbers.
Mine made the leap to employee seamlessly
My original plan was to get some help and then take my social media back in-house and perhaps do some of it myself. But halfway through I realised that I couldn’t be without Karen. Not only was she intelligent and articulate but I could see social media required real expertise. Anyone who didn’t see that was kidding themselves. As soon as she graduated in November I snapped her up and she came on board as our Social Media Manager looking after Facebook, Twitter and Pinterest.
A flexible and remote working approach is a perfect fit
Social media quite simply is not a 9-5 job even with all the brilliant time management tools available. Karen now works around 50 hours per month and I leave her to manage her time entirely. We have a scheduled phone call every Tuesday and then we message each other on a daily basis. There is no need for us to have a physical office. The truth is we’ve never actually met each other!
A Digital Mum is always up for the challenge
With every new challenge I throw at Karen, she just takes it in her stride. I now also pay Karen to write a weekly blog for TutorMapper; a no-brainer with her education expertise. Our latest social media campaign #FutureMapper focuses on the tangible benefits that tutoring can bring and has been really well-received too. We have big plans for the future and Karen is very much a part of that."
Karen says: "TutorMapper is so perfectly suited to me and my skill set. It was a huge decision to leave lecturing but ultimately I needed a career that suited family life. Being a social media manager was exactly that with the added bonus that I could still use my education expertise.
I feel I’ve really got the inside track on curating and creating interesting content for TutorMapper. The results we have achieved in such a short time have been incredibly satisfying. We’ve been approached by some potential collaborators directly on the strength of our social media presence. I want parents to feel like TutorMapper is a ‘safe pair of hands’ in the tutoring world. I’m proud to be part of the team that is helping to achieve that."
You can follow TutorMapper on Facebook, Twitter and Pinterest
