S7E10: Misconceptions About Social Media with Ola Kowalska

Expert in assisting freelance language teachers in building successful businesses, Ola Kowalska, tackles misconceptions about using social media in English Language Teaching (ELT).

---

Key talking points

Foundations Over Instincts: Ola shares her journey, emphasising the significance of establishing relationships within the ELT community before diving into social media. Many teachers rush into social media without a clear target audience or specific offers, leading to ineffective results.

Beyond Language Teaching: Ola highlights the futility of content that only focuses on teaching language points. While such content might engage learners, it doesn't necessarily convert them into paying clients. Ola stresses the importance of speaking directly to the specific audience you aim to serve.

Quality Over Quantity: Ola debunks the myth that success on social media requires relentless posting. She advocates for a more active approach involving networking with diverse professionals and directly engaging potential clients. Quality interactions outweigh the volume of content posted.

Throughout the episode, Ola emphasises the need for a targeted audience and specific offers rather than generic content. She encourages teachers to invest time in meaningful interactions and networking to grow their businesses effectively.

Overall, the discussion highlights the importance of strategic foundations, personalized content, and active engagement as components of successful social media strategies for language teachers in the ELT community.

Reference

Kowalska, O. (2023) “Why you’re still struggling to get students from Instagram,” Get Richer, Teacher! OlaKowalska.com. April 6. Available here. Accessed on 26 December 2023.

---

To watch this episode with closed captions, click on the video below or scroll down to view the transcript.

Transcript

00:00:00:04 - 00:00:26:05

Laura

TESOL Pop Season seven Episode ten Hello and welcome to TESOL Pop: the mini podcast for busy teaches. My name is Laura and joining me today to address common misconceptions about social media in ELT (English Language Teaching) is Ola Kowalska. Ola helps freelance language teachers build businesses and teach the language on their own terms. Many freelance language teachers struggle to make a decent salary and end up feeling isolated and unfulfilled.

00:00:26:07 - 00:00:44:14

Laura

They may have the skills and the passion, but they lack the guidance and support to truly thrive in the profession. Ola’s mission is to change that which she does through her wonderful podcast Get Richer, Teacher! and her coaching and courses for freelance language teachers and school owners. It's lovely to have you on the show.

00:00:44:16 - 00:00:48:16

Ola

Thank you so much for having me. Laura, What a great introduction. Thanks.

00:00:48:18 - 00:01:11:00

Laura

In today's episode, we're going to demystify common misconceptions surrounding English language teaching and social media. So if you're a freelance teacher or someone who runs their own business or school, this episode is for you. We'll cover three common misconceptions from the role social media can play in supporting your business, what to post, and how to grow your learning community.

00:01:11:02 - 00:01:19:02

Laura

So it starts us off Ola, could you share a bit about your story and how you started your business and the role social media played in that?

00:01:19:04 - 00:01:42:11

Ola

Yes, sure, of course. So in my first business, in my language school, I actually did start the way everybody else starts. So I did open a social media account, but I really didn't know what I was doing. And it took me many months, I would say, or even years. I think it was about a year and a half to realise that there was something wrong and on my second attempt.

00:01:42:12 - 00:02:11:08

Ola

So with this current business [Ola Kowalska.com], I approached things from a little bit of a different angle. And I started by basically just growing, building my relationships with other people in the community. I always had tons of contacts in the English language teaching world. So it wasn't it just felt natural, right? Then social media became part of it. It did, absolutely.

00:02:11:10 - 00:02:41:17

Ola

And still I was still kind of trying to find my way around it and seeing what worked. But I would say those early days when the relationships were formed and they were relationships with potential clients, but also I would say competitors, although I don't even consider them competitors because they were just lovely people serving a similar audience that we can do some fantastic collaborations with.

00:02:41:19 - 00:02:48:07

Ola

And they, they, they were that they would, they were really, really valuable and they still are.

00:02:48:09 - 00:03:09:07

Laura

You know when you mentioned in your first business that you leaned into social media, but you've changed your strategy for the second business that you're running - that really resonates because I see people do that. That former example you say, where teachers start their business on Instagram, for example, or on Facebook or whatever social media platform they're using, but it doesn't tend to yield the best results.

00:03:09:08 - 00:03:20:05

Laura

And I see them often stop posting or disappear or give up on their dream. Could you share a bit more about that? Like why this isn't the best way to start on social media only?

00:03:20:07 - 00:03:47:04

Ola

Absolutely. So yet that's still very common. It's it's it's kind of common sense because people don't know what to do. They kind of as a teacher especially, I work mainly with teachers, but also other teacher trainers, school language school owners. But it's mainly teachers who I see. Okay. So they decide to quit working for school and they just in their mind, I was like, okay, I need to do something.

00:03:47:04 - 00:04:20:17

Ola

I need to open some sort of a platform, start being visible. And while this this instinct is absolutely right, they usually don't have the foundations to be successful on social media. So what everybody starts doing is not exactly helpful and it's not exactly helping them attract paying students and also kind of well paying students, because I personally have a theory that it started around the time of the pandemic [circa 2020].

00:04:20:19 - 00:04:48:22

Ola

A lot of people had the same idea. A lot of people, thousands of teachers that just took to social media and thought, I'm just going to open a profile and I'm just going to start sharing what I love, which is which is bits of the language. And it didn't exactly help them grow a business. So the foundations that they are missing that I'm talking about here are having a target audience in mind and a very specific offer.

00:04:48:24 - 00:05:16:24

Ola

A lot of people think that their target audience is learners of the language and their offer is language lessons. It's it couldn't be further from the truth. It's not that. It's way more specific. And it's not to say to everybody listening here, I don't want you to come into to suddenly get worried. Like, ‘Oh, but I thought that's that.’ Like, I'm not surprised that you think that because nobody ever teaches that anything else.

00:05:17:01 - 00:05:26:15

Ola

And there is actually a better way, something that can be more sustainable. But you need to get those foundations right first.

00:05:26:17 - 00:05:52:11

Laura

That's absolutely brilliant. I feel like you've knocked that first misconception out of the park by talking about those important foundations and not just being a generic, you know, ‘I just teach language students.’ It's a lot more specific and personal, right? If you wanting to think about the people you want to work with. I want to kind of move on to the second misconception we often see in action and that is and you mention this actually, and that is accounts that just teach language points.

00:05:52:17 - 00:06:10:14

Laura

So you see like, here's the word of the day or here's a particular grammar point. And that, you know, is the majority of the content we see. I know you've spoken about this on your own podcast, Get Richer, Teacher! in episode 81, you know, Why You're Still Struggling To Get Students On Instagram. That was a brilliant episode.

00:06:10:14 - 00:06:18:00

Laura

And I wondered if you could elaborate a bit more on why teaching language alone just won’t attract the clients you’re looking for.

00:06:18:02 - 00:06:41:00

Ola

Exactly. So I am a very passionate about it. So sorry if I go on a bit of a maybe even a rant here, but people generally come into social media or open businesses with one goal in mind. They want clients. They want to work for themselves. But then everything gets lost because they get kind of buried under what everybody else is doing.

00:06:41:05 - 00:07:07:17

Ola

Because let's be honest, everybody does it. Everybody posts grammar, explanations, words, phrases. And while I'm not saying it's not useful, there are people who probably will click on the like button. They'll probably even comment and say, I love what you're sharing, but are they going to become your clients? Very unlikely, because it's not the content that a client needs.

00:07:07:23 - 00:07:38:15

Ola

It's content that may be a random learner online. So it kind of is aligned with what everybody thinks. My audience are learners. They're not. It's way more specific than that. And in our content, we need to be speaking to those specific people. If we're not doing that, we're attracting, well, randomness. And again, it's for a lot of people, this kind of this type of posting is a bit like a comfort zone because we know about the language.

00:07:38:15 - 00:08:04:17

Ola

We usually love it. We're so passionate and then we open Canva and build this lovely curated post with just our brand colours. That's that's, that's the bonus, right? With an explanation of past, simple and present perfect. And it just seems yeah eople will find it useful. Yeah, they probably will. But will they pay you for working with you? Very, very, very unlikely.

00:08:04:19 - 00:08:26:23

Ola

So there is like as I said, again, it comes back to realising who you're serving and what your actual offer is. And your offer is not just teaching the language. And one other side is that it also comes down to people not realising what their role is. A teacher's role is not just to give input of the language.

00:08:26:23 - 00:08:48:09

Ola

And we kind of all know that from our classroom practice, but then we forget it when we when it comes to social media, I had an encounter with a very, very, very experienced teacher trainer who when I said all those arguments to him that like posting language content is a little bit pointless, he said, Yeah, he always thought it was a bit silly, but I didn't know why.

00:08:48:15 - 00:09:00:17

Ola

So like, people know that it's not the way even languages are learned. But then when it comes to social media, we all become like a little bit scared and a little bit confused. So yeah.

00:09:00:19 - 00:09:27:05

Laura

Well, like you say, it's just something we haven't studied before. Like we're part of a generation where social media is very new and we're also experiencing quite a surge in freelancing or people starting their own businesses that was propelled by the pandemic. So just people just don't know and. Exactly. And it's okay not to know. And that's why we create podcast content like this, to inspire you to to learn and and to try different ways to help, you know, help you be successful.

00:09:27:07 - 00:09:56:13

Laura

For those listeners that may be thinking, ‘oh no, what do I do now with my post about language?’ It's okay, there's other ways. So as a final misconception I thought we could address then is, I see marketing posts from this is non-ELT, but like the marketing gurus on social media where they say things like you just need to post more, you just need to post three times a day at least a reel and, you know, be live once a week to be successful.

00:09:56:13 - 00:10:10:17

Laura

That's how you grow a business. And for me, that's really off putting because it seems just non-sustainable and exhausting. I know there's obviously other things that are problematic about this that I'd like to invite you to talk about.

00:10:10:19 - 00:10:37:08

Ola

Absolutely. So again, another topic that I'm very passionate about, it's it's not that it's not true, even. I would say that at some point in business, it may make sense for some people, but for many teachers, educators, trainers that I work with, it just doesn't because we've got our lessons to teach. We don't have the time to be spending days and hours on social media.

00:10:37:14 - 00:11:07:08

Ola

So it's exactly that. It's unsustainable. But another side of that coin and another angle here is that it's also very passive. So people have this misconception that by posting content, people will just discover them. Unfortunately, it's only true when you exactly do it like the marketing gurus suggest you do it at volume, so you do it in a massive kind of amounts.

00:11:07:12 - 00:11:34:06

Ola

And it also takes a lot of time, right? Normally, we usually don't have that time. We want clients, we want a steady stream of clients, right? And that's that's normal. So let's not fall into that trap. A much better alternative to that is something that I always do. And like, don't get me wrong, I post on social media, but I do other things that are much more effective short term.

00:11:34:08 - 00:11:55:03

Ola

So for example, networking with other people and I'm not necessarily saying network with other teachers because that's a little bit tricky. Then you just like exchange it. Like if you're not, if you don't have a specific offer, then the student might get a bit confused, like, why would I go to this teacher? Not to that teacher? Because one has a different brand.

00:11:55:05 - 00:12:19:09

Ola

Like it's a bit confusing. So I would rather network with people who serve a similar audience, but does a different thing. So it could be anyone. But I think building those relationships is going to have a much, much more, much bigger effect on on your business. And another side of it is just reaching out to your potential clients.

00:12:19:11 - 00:12:48:07

Ola

Like, honestly, nobody ever thinks that having a conversation, one conversation a day with someone in whatever Facebook group in direct conversation messages is probably way more effective than a month worth of content. Honestly, it's sometimes hard to find those people. But that's why, again, we're going back to the foundations: offer and target audience. That's it.

00:12:48:09 - 00:13:05:11

Laura

Thanks so much, Ola. It's been really inspiring talking to you today and just getting reassurance that we don't have to be part of this content creation whirlwind. It feels like sometimes you just go back to the foundations and trust in that, and that's what will help grow our businesses. It's been really helpful. Thank you so much.

00:13:05:13 - 00:13:14:04

Ola

No problem at all. I was so, so happy to share everything I know I've learned. So good luck to everyone trying out a different approach hopefully.

00:13:14:04 - 00:13:21:14

Laura

As a fellow podcaster, would you like to close today's episode to let listeners know where they can find out more?

00:13:21:16 - 00:13:39:21

Ola

Absolutely. So you're more than welcome to come and listen to my podcast called Get Richer, Teacher!, especially episode 81, where I talked more about social media. But there are nearly 100 other episodes there now, so I would love for you to explore that.

00:13:39:23 - 00:14:00:21

Laura

Super. And as always, if you have a question you'd like us to answer, or if you have a topic you'd like to pitch for the podcast, then you can contact us via Instagram, Facebook or the website tesolpop.com Finally, you can support the work we do at TESOL Pop by leaving a rating and review wherever you listen, by sharing today's episode with your teacher community, or by even buying a coffee at ko-fi.com/tesolpop

You might also like

---

Good to know

This blog space and its associated multimedia content contain affiliate links. To learn more about how affiliate links work, please read our disclaimer here.