This transcript was automatically generated and might contain errors.

[0:04] Kerry Butler: Once I played a penny who just couldn't stop a beat. Yes, with rather skits on her feet. Well loved me. Although it's recently to see a real comm. Use a club version of Tina. Tina. Now come with me, Emma. I am your host, Miss Kerry Butler. Together, you and I are breaking Runaway.

[0:53] Kerry Butler: We are back with Bret Shuford, performer, actor, and tech wizard. If you missed the first part of this interview, you can go back and listen to it. He gives incredible information on how you can use social media to help you as an actor.

[1:15] Bret Shuford: So I know that there's a way to post across platforms. Do you recommend that?

[1:21] Kerry Butler: I think that the more automated you can be, the better. You know, so there are apps, right? Or something like this. There's all kinds of things you can use. I use so mostly because I mostly post on Instagram. And Instagram is owned by Facebook. Well, not meta. But when I post on Instagram, I can also cross-post on my Facebook page. So I do that. So every time I post on Instagram, I'm also posting on Facebook, and I don't have to think about it because I don't spend that much time on Facebook.

[1:52] Bret Shuford: I don't either, yeah.

[1:53] Kerry Butler: So it's great because I'm not ignoring Facebook, but I'm not necessarily spending a lot of time on there.

[1:59] Bret Shuford: Oh, okay. So that's one thing you can do. And then there's software like buffer.com or Hootsuite.

[2:01] Kerry Butler: Buffer.com or Hootsuite.

[2:09] Bret Shuford: And you can use, I think you can have up to three accounts for free. And this is great for anyone who likes tweets or even who just wants to be consistent more consistent on Instagram, but doesn't want to spend a bunch of time figuring out what to do. You can actually spend like, let's say, block out Sunday afternoon, think ahead about the week, go on buffer and just schedule all of your posts, and it'll send you reminders or post them automatically for you. And then you don't have to really think about it.

[2:42] Kerry Butler: So is there a thing that you should be posting at a certain time and amount every day?

[2:48] Bret Shuford: There are best practices for every platform. And we can all get very overwhelmed in thinking about what those are. It comes to certain times, it's very specific to your audience. And that's why having an account that is registered as a business or creator account is really helpful. Specifically, I'm talking about Instagram, but if you can go into your settings, you can change it from a personal account to a creator account. You'll then get access to insights. And insights will give you analytics where you can look at where your audience lives. So then if there are like more West Coast, then you might want to think about when you're posting. Because if you're posting at 9 a.m. on the East Coast, they're not awake.

[3:40] Kerry Butler: Right.

[3:41] Bret Shuford: So things like that, and you can act, and it'll actually give you information about when your audience is the most engaged. And you can schedule your content around that if you want to get higher engagement. Now, there are, like I said, best practices in order to grow. And they'll tell you like Instagram, it's a lot. Like they'll tell you you want to post, you know, between five to ten stories a day.

[4:03] Kerry Butler: Whoa.

[4:05] Bret Shuford: Really? You want to post five to ten stories a day?

[4:07] Kerry Butler: Yes. They'll tell you this is best practices, right?

[4:10] Bret Shuford: Wow. Two reels a day. I think one in feed posts a day. I mean, it's overwhelming if you want to grow. But I always tell the people, tell the people. But I always tell people like maybe growing isn't your goal. And that's okay. Like just sustaining and just being consistent. And again, the most important thing is that when I look at your feed, and then I see you in person, that the two things match. And that's the most important thing.

[4:39] Kerry Butler: So you have to decide what's manageable for you, your mental health, your family.

[4:46] Bret Shuford: Yeah.

[4:48] Kerry Butler: There's stuff like that that people will beat themselves up. I'm like, you know, there's no should. There are no rules in show business, you know that. So you get to create your own rules for yourself. And what are those things and what's your goal? If you want to grow, you got to post more, unfortunately. But if you want to just be consistent and grow your following and have a strong community of people, then just choose what works for you and whatever that is, commit.

[5:16] Bret Shuford: Yeah, I went on Instagram, I think it was Instagram, because I heard that casting directors, if it was down to you and another person, they would look at how many followers you had sometimes, and the person with more followers would get the part.

[5:34] Kerry Butler: So I thought, oh my gosh, I better like get on this from my career.

[5:40] Bret Shuford: Um, isn't that crazy?

[5:42] Kerry Butler: It is it is true. I think that there are certain projects that you know especially it makes sense, right? If you can sell tickets for them through your marketing, but it's a it's not, I don't think it's a tried and true. I mean, there are so many people we know who aren't on social media that's like sure, sure, sure. No, I think it's only if like in certain cases, and if it's like down to two people and they really can't decide between those two people.

[6:03] Bret Shuford: Yeah, yeah.

[6:04] Kerry Butler: And I hear mostly, I think that happens even more frequently in TV and film.

[6:08] Bret Shuford: Yes, yeah, it was it was TV and film that I heard it about.

[6:11] Kerry Butler: Yeah. Um, and some people can make money doing social media, right?

[6:17] Bret Shuford: Yeah.

[6:18] Kerry Butler: Yeah.

[6:19] Bret Shuford: I've actually so Steven and I have an account called Broadway Husbands, and we started that account in 2018, and we've grown, I think we have 66,000 followers now, which is insane.

[6:33] Kerry Butler: Yeah.

[6:33] Bret Shuford: And now we're getting like cool, we get paid, you know, sponsorships and really yeah, we're going on a this is really exciting. Disney is sending us out on um three days on a Disney The Disney Dream and then four days at a deluxe resort at the parks next week.

[6:51] Kerry Butler: Oh my gosh, I'm so jealous right now.

[6:54] Bret Shuford: I know.

[6:54] Kerry Butler: Are you kidding me?

[6:56] Bret Shuford: Ow, I flipped out. Wait, how did you get that?

[6:59] Kerry Butler: Because of our Instagram.

[7:01] Bret Shuford: Like if we just how did they reach out to you?

[7:03] Kerry Butler: We post so consistently, right?

[7:06] Bret Shuford: Oh, about Disney.

[7:07] Kerry Butler: Yes. Every day we make we've gone to Disney. We did our baby announcement with a photo at Disney. Um with our surrogate. And I think that because of that. Oh, we also did a thing for the 50th where we recreated Julie Andrews' opening day dance from 1971 televised opening of Disney World. But we did it walking down Main Street. And I think that got their attention. And so they were like, hey, we want to invite you on this free seven-day trip. I was like, uh, yes, please.

[7:43] Bret Shuford: So you can, and you know, you can make money. And now actually, Instagram is actually paying creators for the first time to make content.

[7:52] Kerry Butler: So you can actually earn on Reels, you can earn what they're calling bonuses. Where right now we're doing a thing, you get 30 days to get like 1.7 million views on bone on reels. And if you do, you get $800.

[8:08] Bret Shuford: Oh, wow.

[8:09] Kerry Butler: Right. And if we got anything, just all it just we just try to get as many views on our reels as we can. So it's interesting what's happening. They're noticing that they can pay and reward their creators.

[8:23] Bret Shuford: Wow.

[8:24] Kerry Butler: And do you have like an agent for getting you paid jobs?

[8:28] Bret Shuford: No.

[8:29] Kerry Butler: No, we're doing it.

[8:30] Bret Shuford: A lot of it, we're just doing ourselves. And a lot of it's just companies emailing us off of our Instagram account.

[8:37] Kerry Butler: Wow.

[8:40] Bret Shuford: Yeah, I mean, I'm also, I really, really want my Instagram, you know, as a way to connect with my fans, and also for the just so the um if I'm up against somebody else for a job, that was really my main call.

[8:54] Kerry Butler: Yeah, yeah.

[8:57] Bret Shuford: But you know, I do get emails about products and stuff. And since I don't really need to do that right now, I'm not doing it. I the only one I'm doing is that I reached out to that company, um Saqara Life because I they completely changed my life, like in terms of that. I was very interested. In terms of like just helping me so much um feel better about hormones and what I'm eating and eating clean vegan. So it's stuff I really, really believe in.

[9:19] Kerry Butler: Um, but I'm always curious about people who this could be your job.

[9:19] Bret Shuford: This could be your job, like so to give you power so you don't have to take every Broadway show.

[9:29] Kerry Butler: Well, I think that I think you have to have a passion for I mean, not Broadway show. And anybody want any show, any show, like any Broadway show, you should be so lucky to be able to take everybody's show. But I think you have to have a passion for creating content, like you have to wanna because it is time consuming, like taking the photos or the videos, editing them, you know, it is it is a job.

[9:51] Bret Shuford: And then also like you pitch to that company. Imagine pitching to three to five companies a day. It's a it's a lot of work.

[10:00] Kerry Butler: Yeah, it's it is a lot of work. So you have to want to do that.

[10:03] Bret Shuford: Um, but I think that I don't trust every company that reaches out to you. You're gonna get people DMing you. The more you create content, you're gonna get companies and a lot of them are bots, a lot of them are fake. That DM you on your Instagram and say, Hey, we'd love to partner with you, email us here. So just be careful.

[10:24] Kerry Butler: Um if you if you are growing your following, just vet the company.

[10:29] Bret Shuford: I would also say if you're trying to grow an audience, don't just say yes to anything. Make sure they're there are companies that you really believe in because your audience trusts you. And if you promote something that's janky or doesn't really, you know, doesn't really align with the values that you really stand by, but you say yes to it just because they offer to pay you, you might lose trust with your audience.

[10:55] Kerry Butler: And that's really the most important thing.

[10:57] Bret Shuford: Right.

[10:58] Kerry Butler: You want you, you really want to nurture that.

[11:00] Bret Shuford: Do you have any advice for an old hag like me of something else since you follow me, something else I should be doing?

[11:12] Kerry Butler: I think you do such a great job. I you know, I don't know your I don't know.

[11:17] Bret Shuford: No, I'm serious.

[11:18] Kerry Butler: I I don't know your audience.

[11:20] Bret Shuford: So it's hard to say.

[11:23] Kerry Butler: I I know that like the things I know about you, I I feel like you're such you're very authentic and genuine. You're a mom, you love Disney, right? I feel like there's there's something about you.

[11:44] Bret Shuford: What I see a lot about your content is like I'll see so like one of those Broadway, uh Broadway for me, we'll post you singing fly away from you know, uh, what was the musical?

[11:58] Kerry Butler: Um, catch me if you can.

[12:00] Bret Shuford: Yes, you can. Right. I think you could can you not reshare those things or like repost them?

[12:07] Kerry Butler: Oh, yeah, I can. I just wasn't sure if I should.

[12:09] Bret Shuford: I don't know. I think you should. I think that's gonna help your fans, like your fans like are already following those. Because that isn't going along with the story thing that you mentioned, remember?

[12:20] Bret Shuford: Yeah, but you don't have to repost it to your feed. So here's actually a really good distinction that we could talk about feed versus stories on Instagram. Most people think that stories actually help your following. They don't, right? Your feed is the only way you grow new followers. Your stories, your stories is how you engage your current followers.

[12:46] Bret Shuford: Okay. So something like Broadway for me, like I think sometimes what ends up happening, this is what I would suggest for you is like just share those things to your stories. You can share anything to your stories. I wouldn't share it, I wouldn't necessarily share it to your feed because it's a bootleg, right? And then you're kind of promoting that, which we don't necessarily want to promote that. But um, but you could share it to your feed and say, you know, I loved singing this song, you know, or when I when I first sang this song, you could tell a little bit of a story in there, right? Oh when I first sing this song. My kid was this old, and I was thinking about I don't know, them flying out of the nest or what I don't know.

[13:29] Bret Shuford: Um, I remembered another question.

[13:31] Kerry Butler: Yeah.

[13:32] Bret Shuford: Do we what do we need to know about hashtags?

[13:35] Bret Shuford: Oh god. Hashtags are fascinating because most people get very bogged down in hashtags and trying to find the right hashtags. And over the last few months, Instagram has come out and said a lot of different things. Like first they said, you know, no longer putting 30 hashtags will help your engagement. Uh now they're first they said you need up to 20, and then they came out a few months ago and said three to eight. It's very confusing.

[14:01] Bret Shuford: And so what I tell people is stop worrying about hashtags. It just doesn't, it really doesn't matter as long as they're relevant to the post. Um, there's a company, another actually, this is a good company if people want to check it out called later.com, which is how you can also schedule posts on Instagram. They do a lot of research, and their research said that you can still get high engagement if you use up you can use up to 30 hashtags in a post on on Instagram, right?

[14:34] Bret Shuford: So you can still get high engagement up to 30 hashtags if you if you want to do that. Um but ultimately it doesn't matter. It matters more. Like when I I tell people all the time, don't get too bogged down. Put 10 hashtags in there if you if you want, um, make sure they're relevant to the post. What's more important is that you're engaging with your audience, that you're liking people's comments, you're commenting back on people's comments. That's better engagement than any hashtag.

[15:06] Kerry Butler: Oh, okay.

[15:10] Bret Shuford: Um I was gonna say anything, Carrie.

[15:13] Kerry Butler: I would say you said you set timers. I would set a timer for yourself like twice a day for 15 minutes.

[15:21] Bret Shuford: To not to engage.

[15:26] Kerry Butler: Oh.

[15:26] Bret Shuford: To just go into your comments and comment back on the people that have commented on your posts.

[15:33] Kerry Butler: Oh that no one ever gave me that advice before.

[15:41] Bret Shuford: You are very informative.

[15:44] Kerry Butler: Um you have really, really done your research.

[15:47] Bret Shuford: I'm a nerd. I'm a nerd about it. I love it.

[15:49] Kerry Butler: So people can hire you and come to you like not knowing what they should do.

[15:57] Bret Shuford: Yeah.

[15:58] Bret Shuford: Like how does it work? Most people are listening. Most people that have come to me have already started something. They're already there, or maybe they're like, I just booked a big job and I want to, like you said, like I just want to maximize this opportunity so that in the future I've grown a following and I have a community.

[16:19] Bret Shuford: And so we'll look at what they have and we'll just try to streamline it. My big thing is like creating systems and creating habits because I think the ultimately social media, if every time you make a post, it's an event, you're never gonna get consistent at it. Right? It has to become a habit, not an event.

[16:39] Bret Shuford: So we want to just make it just a pleasurable, as much as possible part of our daily routine where we just, you know, we're eating breakfast, we're having coffee, we're engaging with our audience, we're making a post, however frequently we decide to do that, and whatever we've decided to do, we commit to that. Because the way we do anything is the way we do everything, right?

[17:04] Bret Shuford: So just making that commitment um based on your goals. And for some people, you may not be in a season where you can grow, and that's okay. You'll have a season later down the line. But um, for people who come to me, most of the time, we just look at what they're currently doing and we just figure out how to make it make it so that they don't hate it as much. They can find a way to make it habitual, and they can also make it feel authentic so that it lines up with who they are, not just oh, yeah, I remember.

[17:36] Bret Shuford: Oh yeah, during that talk, you you said something really cool about how you think about the five things that are either most important to you or right?

[17:46] Kerry Butler: Mm-hmm.

[17:47] Bret Shuford: So and that's that's kind of your authentic self. And that's those are the things that you share because those are the things that are most important to you.

[17:54] Kerry Butler: Correct.

[17:54] Bret Shuford: Yes.

[17:55] Kerry Butler: Yeah, love that.

[17:55] Bret Shuford: So I mean that's that's kind of how I how we strategize is being able to look at. If I asked anybody who knows you, and they said, and I said to them, what are the five things that Carrie believes in the most? And they sit there and tell me those five.

[18:10] Bret Shuford: Disney World.

[18:14] Kerry Butler: Right, right.

[18:17] Bret Shuford: I'll send you the date so you can line it up. Um, but you know, if if the five the people that know you the best, what would they tell me about you?

[18:26] Bret Shuford: And if I looked at your Instagram or whatever, would I see that? Would I see those things represented?

[18:34] Kerry Butler: That's really good.

[18:36] Bret Shuford: Uh okay, one last thing before we end our interview because it's so long. I don't want to keep you, but it's been so interesting.

[18:45] Bret Shuford: TikTok. TikTok is like now the huge thing. Beetlejuice, TikTok actually helped Beetlejuice become a huge show in a in a major way.

[18:55] Kerry Butler: Yeah.

[18:56] Bret Shuford: Do you have any um pointers on TikTok? Or do you can you use TikTok and then put that on your Instagram? Is that okay?

[19:04] Bret Shuford: Yeah, it's weird, you know, Instagram is saying that if you take your TikToks and you just post them to reels because of the watermark, Instagram is saying that like they kind of don't drive traffic to it because they have a system or a computer software that says the watermark is there.

[19:22] Kerry Butler: Oh.

[19:22] Bret Shuford: So Instagram doesn't want you because they won't don't want you going on TikTok?

[19:26] Bret Shuford: Well, they don't they want it to be native to the platform. Like all these platforms want you to create their the create your content using their tools because I've tried different things.

[19:40] Bret Shuford: I love I love me some TikTok. The problem with TikTok is you can't necessarily take TikTok and transfer that into paid clients. So for me as a coach, like it's not necessarily helpful for me to grow my client base, but it's great for brand awareness, it's great for audience and community engagement.

[20:00] Bret Shuford: And the algorithm on TikTok is the probably the easiest to grow on because you can make fewer pieces of content and get a larger audience for some reason that they just reward you much easier than any other platform.

[20:17] Bret Shuford: The thing about TikTok is it's short form content. And most people who are maybe consider themselves perfectionists will get too bogged down on trying to make perfect content on TikTok, and it doesn't need to be perfect. It's like quantity over quality. Just get it out there.

[20:38] Bret Shuford: And they say on yeah, TikTok best practices, two to three TikToks a day.

[20:43] Kerry Butler: Wow.

[20:45] Bret Shuford: But it's it's such short content that it doesn't no one sees it that much. Like they scroll through it and they keep going.

[20:54] Bret Shuford: So but what I've also learned is I really like Instagram and Instagram reels. So I make a lot of Instagram reels, and then I will download those off of Instagram and post them on TikTok.

[21:05] Bret Shuford: Oh they'll get similar engagement.

[21:10] Bret Shuford: Um, I've tried doing the opposite too, where I'll take a TikTok, I'll use something called Snaptic, which is a free website, Snaptic uh S N-A-P-T-I-K, and I'll remove the watermark so you can there's websites where you can actually upload it and remove the watermark, and then I'll post that on Instagram reels.

[21:31] Bret Shuford: So, you know, you it's it's all about experimenting, being willing to fail, which is hard for a lot of perfectionists. But uh that's how you learn is just by trying different things, because you may find that TikTok, you'll grow an audience much faster than you would on any other platform, or you may find that you know your audience is already on Instagram, so get pick one to two platforms, like I said, in order to keep your sanity, because the most important thing is that you get to do your art.

[22:01] Bret Shuford: It's more important that you get to go out there and build real relationships, not just a following, and that you get to perform and do what you love. So don't start spending a bunch of time hiding behind social media, yeah, when you can actually be out there doing the thing that you were put on this planet to do.

[22:22] Kerry Butler: I love that.

[22:22] Kerry Butler: Yeah, and back to something that you said before about how it might not be your time to build your audience. Just for everyone listening, I think that um, you know, we're still kind of bringing Broadway and theater back. So this is actually a great time to go to someone like Brett, because you know, my time really for social media wasn't until I was in Beetlejuice in that that big show, and who knew when that was going to happen? Like I've done a gazillion shows.

[22:53] Kerry Butler: So if you go to Brett, start building these, um, get learning these tools and start have the foundation, then once that big show and or you know, your video that goes viral, once that comes, then you're set up.

[23:07] Kerry Butler: Uh so how do people find you?

[23:10] Bret Shuford: Yeah, so you can come to my Instagram account, Bret Shuford. You can go to BrettShuford.com. I have a free tool for anybody who wants to learn more about building their brand. It's called the creative marketing map.

[23:21] Bret Shuford: And um it's basically it's how I I I say it's how I take you from imposter to influencer. And so if you go to imposter to influencer map.com, you can download that map for free. It's a really fun way of building your theme park.

[23:38] Bret Shuford: So um uh anyone who's interested in learning more about that method, that is there. And then of course, come follow Broadway Husbands because it's gonna be an adventure. We're having a baby in April.

[23:48] Kerry Butler: So Yes, I don't think I I follow you, but I don't follow Broadway husbands.

[23:52] Kerry Butler: I am following you now for sure. I want to hear all about that Disney trip.

[23:56] Bret Shuford: And the baby, of course, but the Disney trip.

[23:59] Bret Shuford: Just come meet us there.

[24:00] Bret Shuford: We'll just go.

[24:01] Kerry Butler: Yes, please. Disney, if you're listening.

[24:07] Bret Shuford: Well, thank you so much. Uh, is there anything else that you need to plug on here?

[24:11] Bret Shuford: No.

[24:11] Kerry Butler: No, that's it.

[24:12] Kerry Butler: Thank you.

[24:12] Bret Shuford: I'm sorry. This was amazing. You are really knowledgeable on this subject.

[24:17] Kerry Butler: Thank you so much for sharing that with all of our listeners.

[24:21] Bret Shuford: You're welcome, and I'll come back anytime.

[24:24] Kerry Butler: Thank you.

[24:27] Kerry Butler: Together, you and I are breaking run away.