Alright – so today we’ve got the honor of introducing you to Heather Young and Chauncey Woods. We think you’ll enjoy our conversation, we’ve shared it below.
Alright, Heather and Chauncey thanks for taking the time to share your stories and insights with us today. What was it like going from idea to execution? Can you share some of the backstory and some of the major steps or milestones?
We started So she Slays about seven years ago at one of our favorite taco places in San Francisco over a glass of sangria. At the time Chauncey was a very big blog consumer and I was writing for a few. We would always discuss the lack of representation and not feeling like our voices were heard, or the fact that it was very sugarcoated, so we decided to start our own that would show the less pretty side of life while also inspiring others to go after the life that they wanted. At first it just started out with Chauncey and I doing social media posts and writing blogs. We would interview people, write articles, do social media, and just try to make a name for ourselves. Two years into So She Slays the Me Too movement started, and all of a sudden our account blew up. Some might say our account went viral as we gained thousands of followers in a matter of a few months. I think we like to attribute some of our success to right place right time.
I remember a specific memory of all of us who were a part of So she Slays at that time sitting around a dinner table after going to complex con in Long Beach, and watching our account just explode with followers. It was such a surreal moment for all of us we just looked at each other with shock and started laughing because what else could you do. There’s been a lot of great people who have helped us along the way, and have been a part of So she Slays.
As for how we launched it was pretty easy. We just bought the website name designed a website created a social media account and started going. We didn’t really question it too much. Once we decided what we were going to do we just did it.
As always, we appreciate you sharing your insights and we’ve got a few more questions for you, but before we get to all of that can you take a minute to introduce yourself and give our readers some of your back background and context?
Chauncey and I were actually best friends before So she Slays even started. We worked at a gym together. We went to grad school together. We partied together. We were around each other a lot. So we like to say that So she Slays was built on a foundation of friendship. I think that’s why we’ve also seen the amount of success because we even tell our readers and audience that we are you’re older sisters/best friends just here sharing life with you and giving you advice along the way.
So she Slays is a multi media platform. We have a social following of 700,000, two podcasts, and an editorial site that’s updated weekly. What makes us stand out is our relatability. We tell it like it is because that’s who we are as people and if it’s a crappy day, then it’s a crappy day, but we always try to remember the positive aspect of things as well. Our readers and followers come to us for laughs, motivation, career, life and love tips. A lot of our featured, collaborations and interviews are with women from all different backgrounds and all different industries. We do this because we want our audience to know that just because you may not see someone who looks like you doing what you would like to do it doesn’t mean that I can’t be done. In doing these types of interviews we like to prove to our audience that these people did it and so can you.
We are most proud of the community that we have. We are nothing without our followers, our readers, our audience, and the people who have helped us create So she Slays on the way. Our community is full of empowered women who are trying to create the life they want for themselves and are tired of putting up with anything less than that. We love the fact that we’ve created a safe space for people to share their grievances, tell their stories, celebrate their wins, and encourage one another.
Any insights you can share with us about how you built up your social media presence?
We are both people that love quotes and witty, comebacks and motivational tidbits. So we started taking quotes that really resonated with us and posting those. We like to say that we would always pick quotes that really referenced what we were going through at that moment in time or what some of our friends were going through. Maybe they were words of wisdom that we needed to hear or a way for us to laugh. All of our posts always came out of relatability, and what we would love to see. We combine that with our article posts, and our interview posts to get started. We went out of our way to call out really great creators and people we used to have this Slay Bae category where we would feature women that are slaying. We would tag other women all the time in our posts and we would comment a lot so our engagement was really high. The strategy really worked for us.
Because social media changes a lot obviously our strategy has changed as well but for the most part, the same principles are there. We make it a point to feature a lot of content that other creators help make especially creators of color since they don’t always get as much attention as other creators. Engagement is still one of our highest priorities followed by making sure we post content that hits the interest of our audience.
If we were going to give advice on how to start an account today, we would say it definitely takes longer than you would think to build an audience especially if you’re trying to do it organically which is what we did. Although it may take longer that doesn’t mean it can’t be done. The first questions we recommend you ask is, what would I like to see, what do I like to do, what do I like to show? Because if you don’t like doing what your social media is trying to do you will absolutely hate it. It does require a lot of time, energy, and effort. So make sure you love what you’re doing. When you’re trying to create a community and get seen we recommend that you tag people, you comment on other peoples posts, you go into their stories, and like their stories. That’s a good way to get started. We always see the same people in our comments and that are reposting our content. We absolutely love it and show them some appreciation. Don’t be afraid to do collaborations or interviews with people as well. It’s a good way to network and also help each others social media accounts.
This question actually makes us smile since this is the reason why we opened up our sister company Slay AF Creative Studio. We would always get this question when we would speak on panels and since we love to give advice, we would just give directions on what they would have to do for their social media. It wasn’t until years later that we sat down and Chauncey said hey, I think what we’re doing is a business. Fast forward two years and we launched our digital marketing agency that specializes in social media marketing and management.
Can you tell us about a time you’ve had to pivot?
A lot of times pivots can be seen as a negative thing. Like you have to pivot in order to save some thing or because somethings not working the way you thought it would. We pivoted to actually help other businesses.
Like we mentioned above, we opened up our sister company, Slay AF Creative Studio, to help business owners really capitalize on the way they use social media. We always talk about how we wish we knew all of the things that we know now when it comes to social media and the marketing aspect of things. When we started out, it was a lot of trial and error and we had no idea what we were doing but once we figure out what works for us, we created a formula and it just took off and it was a lot easier for us to manage. We wanted to be able to take our expertise in digital marketing, social media, content creating, the list goes on, and share it with people.
Chauncey has a background in tech working for a lot of the most popular social media companies and Heather has a background in production, creating a lot of photos, videos, graphics, and so on. Combining these two sides really creates a powerful marketing formula not to mention our background in creating So She Slays. We specialize in creating communities for new and established businesses while also figuring out ways in which all different businesses can utilize social media for their particular goals. It’s not a one size fits all although that would be a lot easier.
So this pivot was a positive one and a new journey that we are excited to be on. We are always looking for new clients and love working with businesses, who are passionate about what they do.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://www.sosheslays.com/
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/sosheslays/
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/sosheslays
- Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/company/so-she-slays/
- Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@sosheslays1276/featured
- Other: https://www.slayafcreativestudio.com/ https://open.spotify.com/show/03GHDwW0bPdWeidNwiufkI?si=d9474b03e3f74e04 https://open.spotify.com/show/6jUQ7teTTzqrZe7Ha6spkp?si=2c644ff6d29b4a82
Image Credits
Devon Odom IG: @devonodom