Healthy Wealthy & Smart 478: Dr. Domenic Fraboni: Instagram 101
On this episode of the Healthy, Wealthy and Smart Podcast, Jenna Kantor guests hosts and interviews Domenic Fraboni on content creation for social media. Domenic Fraboni is a physical therapist in Los Angeles, California and lifestyle consultant focusing on mindset, movement and meals through online coaching.
In this episode, we discuss:
-How to choose the right social media platform for your target audience
-The importance of developing engagement with your content
-How to stay authentic and avoid the negativities of social media use
-And so much more!
Resources:
A big thank you to Net Health for sponsoring this episode!
Check out Optima’s Top Trends For Outpatient Therapy In 2020!
For more information on Domenic:
Domenic Fraboni is a Doctor of Physical Therapy and Certified Strength and Conditioning Coach. He earned this after graduating from Mayo Clinic School of Health Sciences in Rochester, MN IN 2018. He is a member of the American Physical Therapy Association (APTA), attending many events nationwide to advocate for the advance of the physical therapy profession as well as accessibility to higher quality of care. As a recent member of the APTA Student Assembly Board of Directors and active advocate for healthcare reform, Domenic likes to focus his efforts on systemic healthcare change. He was an avid coach, unified partner, and volunteer coordinator for Special Olympics. He now has relocated to Los Angeles where he coaches people into their bodies using a unique approach of Health and Lifestyle consulting in the areas of mindset, movement, and meals through his company, The Wellness Destination. Domenic focuses his services on the true and authentic connection he hopes to create with patients, clients, or those who looking for help on their health journey. Then he may be able to help empower individuals overcome some barriers and create true progress and independence in their lifelong healing journey!
For more information on Jenna:
Jenna Kantor (co-founder) is a bubbly and energetic girl who was born and raised in Petaluma, California. Growing up, she trained and performed ballet throughout the United States. After earning a BA in Dance and Drama at the University of California, Irvine, she worked professionally in musical theatre for 15+ years with tours, regional theatres, & overseas (www.jennakantor.com) until she found herself ready to move onto a new chapter in her life – a career in Physical Therapy. Jenna is currently in her 3rd year at Columbia University’s Physical Therapy Program. She is also a co-founder of the podcast, “Physiotherapy Performance Perspectives,” has an evidence-based monthly youtube series titled “Injury Prevention for Dancers,” is a NY SSIG Co-Founder, NYPTA Student Conclave 2017 Development Team, works with the NYPTA Greater New York Legislative Task Force and is the NYPTA Public Policy Committee Student Liaison. Jenna aspires to be a physical therapist for amateur and professional performers to help ensure long, healthy careers. To learn more, please check out her website: www.jennafkantor.wixsite.com/jkpt
Read the full transcript below:
Jenna Kantor (00:01):
Hello, this is Jenna Kantor with healthy, wealthy and smart, super excited to be here at Graham sessions 2020 with Domenic Fraboni, who I know from student assembly running for that, the board of directors and then also now on social media, which is our big focus because he has been putting a lot of work specifically on Instagram. So I wanted to have a discussion on this journey, I'm going to call you Dom now. Let's make it casual with Dom, so, first of all, thank you so much for coming on.
Domenic Fraboni (00:37):
Thanks for having me and being interested in what I might have to say. It's been kind of a journey this past six months with a lot of changes for me, especially career-wise, location-wise, and the social media thing. You just want me to dive in a little bit.
Jenna Kantor (00:50):
Actually first, let's start with why you chose Instagram, because when choosing a social media platform that you're thinking of a specific audience, so would you mind diving into that so people can start picking their brain and thinking, even if Instagram is where their audience is?
Domenic Fraboni (01:06):
I think my choice in platform had a little less to do with what I was wanting and just have more by chance. You know, I started dating somebody who has a big following and notice some of them started taking a liking in me or an interest in me. And it was at that point that I realized, Hey, Instagram, I've wanted to find a place I can start creating some content, whether it's recording exercises, whether it's just putting out thoughts, thought provoking things for potential clients or potential humans. I'm all about getting access to good information out to the humans so that they can make the decisions for themselves. And we know in this online era and the age of information, I would love to be contributing to what I think can be, you know, more trustworthy information that's online. So I started getting this Instagram following and I'm like, okay, let's do this. Let's put out some content. And I think it worked great for that because a lot of times people go to Instagram for content of that sort. So I'm like, Hey, great marriage. So that's kind of how choosing Instagram as a platform came about more by chance than by my direct choice.
Jenna Kantor (02:12):
How did you figure out what your content would be on?
Domenic Fraboni (02:19):
Yeah, that's another great question. I'm kind of in my purpose moving into this career as a professional. I always said I want to empower people to independence in their journey, right? And then kind of my themes that came out of that were movement. I'm a doctor of physical therapy. So clearly movement is huge to me and how I deal with clients and patients. Mindset. Cause I do also understand that in the psychosocial realm of how we treat humans and how we deal with humans, our mindset, our emotions, our mental state has a lot to do with how we feel physically and how we move and meals. So I'm like, Hey, maybe if my content surrounded those three themes, that can be my stick mindset, the movement and the meals. And it had a little, a little bit of a ring with the three M's there.
Domenic Fraboni (03:03):
So that's where I just started with those three things in mind and trying not to question myself was the biggest thing going in where you asked, Hey, how'd you know what kind of content to put out? I knew I had these people following me and that they might be interested in what I have to say. So my first step was just doing, it was starting to put out content and asking questions. If you ever have a time online where you have people following you and you don't know what they want, ask them. And so I started asking questions. I was very lucky to have people around me who had kind of gone through a transition like this into putting themselves out there. And a lot of what they said is just do it. You know what you're good at, you know what you're passionate about. These people have started following you for a reason, the ones that need to hear it will resonate and the ones that want certain things, we'll let you know when you ask. So I started asking questions to the people that were following me and they also just started putting out content and realizing what it was that people resonated well with.
Jenna Kantor: (04:04):
And for you, what were your measures that you are using to go, Oh, this is what they want to see from you?
Domenic Fraboni:
So I like to say that and a lot of people in social media want to try to separate the success of their posts and their media from the likes and the comments and that stuff. And it can get really kind of cloudy in our head as, Oh, why did this not have as many likes as this? And so really early on when I started doing this, I tried separating myself from likes. Everyone wants a lot of likes on their stuff and it really is not likes on your posts that mean people are engaging with it or connecting with it. The things that I really started to realize is the more direct messages, the more DMs or the more comments that people are connecting with are saying like, Hey, I love this.
Domenic Fraboni (04:56):
I tried it. It feels this way or I'm glad you shared that. Thanks so much for sharing more about yourself, whatever that means that I'm connecting with them personally in some manner. And so I liked to kind of dive into those ones that got a lot of personal direct messages or comments. And I'm big when it comes to feel and the energy between an interaction with people. So when I got interactions back from people that fueled that same purpose or energy, that was the reason I put that post out. There we go. Like those are my metrics. And I live in more of a subjective world myself because research makes me cringe a little bit sometimes. But it's the field that you can't get away from. So when I had people responding to me that made me feel something, I understood that maybe they took something away from that that made them feel something inside.
Domenic Fraboni (05:43):
So try to steer away from becoming obsessed with likes or comments and really steer towards and into the things that, you know, people feel something when they read it and will connect with it and reach out because of that. And I feel like I've helped to engage my audience a little more.
Jenna Kantor:
I love that. And with all the content that you're doing, how did you figure out how often you're going to be posting?
Domenic Fraboni:
Yeah, so like the frequency is huge too because consistency breeds trust, you know, people, although we are putting out this free content and it does take time to put together, you know, people like following, you know, people are content providers that they know are going to be there for them or that they know are going to be there and continue to put that out. So I'd say the first thing was like, okay, I need to be consistent.
Domenic Fraboni (06:35):
And initially when I was starting this, I had a little more time on my hands and I was, I decided, okay, I can take Sundays off and I'll post six times a week. And then I realized as I started getting more coming onto my schedule that that was a bit tough and so I landed on doing something about three times a week, three to four times a week and making sure I'm very consistent in that, but then also engaging when possible and making sure that those connections that are made aren't just done because I need to make my three posts a week again is all has to come from this intention inside me, so whether it ends up being two times a week or six times a week, I know that it's all still coming from this great energy that I trust and in behind what I'm putting out.
Domenic Fraboni (07:18):
Again to create those relationships, whether online or whether in person or whether just through DMs or comments. We are creating relationships and connections with these people in some way and so if the post I can put out has a slight influence on that energy that might drive them to be open to different options, then that's what I'm going to put out. I've landed somewhere in that realm of three or four days just based on how much other work I have in my collective sphere right now. But I think that's plenty for me to continue that frequency of engagement to make sure people know that I'm going to show up.
Domenic Fraboni (07:54):
Do you have to know everything to start something on Instagram? Yes. If you're not an absolute expert, then you no, absolutely not. And I think if you look through Instagram pretty quickly, you'll realize that not everybody is an absolute expert or knows everything in what they're posting. And I hear a lot of PTs or specifically younger PTs who will see other pages and be like, what the heck is this? Like, this isn't how it is or this isn't how you should do that exercise. Or like, wow, they aren't even paying attention to this. And my thing to them is like, we'll record an exercise and put it out or record a video of yourself doing it and say like, this is how I do it. Not to bash or be against that person. I'm very, very much so against calling people out. I put my air quotes over that even though we're on audio, but calling people out or having turf Wars with other people because you don't agree with them. We don't have to agree. We do also just have to understand that there are a lot of people that are open to those other routes. And this isn't for PTs.
Jenna Kantor (08:56):
This is for people.
Domenic Fraboni (08:57):
Yeah. So leave your ego at the door, leave your ego away from your phone and put out great content that you know you can stand behind and you won't have to worry about that as much.
Jenna Kantor (09:10):
I love that so much. What has been the biggest lesson you've learned since really diving into your consistency and all your content on Instagram?
Domenic Fraboni (09:19):
Yeah. Be authentic and trust yourself. It's really empowering. Well one, when you find that empowerment within you just to say like, I know what I know and I know where that comes from. And when you sit in that space, no matter what you put out or what someone says about it can impact that. And so yeah, I spend time on posts that I put out and they don't go anywhere. Maybe I have a slight bid or a question in my head like what happened there? Why did that not get that following? But I don't emotionally attach myself to any expectation on that. So the biggest challenge is the expectation of yourself or the comparison bug that might come out. Instagram's doing this thing where they're taking away the ability to see likes on a lot of posts now, which I think in a lot of aspects is great cause there are a lot of people in these younger generations that are going through anxieties and depressions because of this technology addiction, which is a whole nother topic.
Domenic Fraboni (10:17):
And that's the initial reason I never wanted to get into this cause I knew technology draws on these very addictive processes to get people to continue to use and to continue to abuse those processes until literally we are physiologically addicted. And that's why I stayed away from it. And instead knowing that that can happen and the intent from where I'm coming, I know that we can use these processes that may be addictive to get great information out to people and to help them understand and have access to that kind of stuff. So yeah, my biggest challenge, a challenge is going back to your initial question was you know, comparison and seeing what other people are doing, which is why I brought up the likes and like, Oh they got that many likes and they have this many followers and this and that. You know, like you start wanting to do that in your head again, shut those things down right away because you don't know what their purposes are, where the people that follow them are coming from or what they're looking for. And so be authentic and try not to get that comparison bug on your shoulder.
Jenna Kantor (11:18):
Boom, Shaka Laka I love that. So where can people find you on the Instagram?
Domenic Fraboni (11:24):
So if you type in doctor, just drDomDPT, it's drDomDPT, you can find me. I put out stuff on movement, mindset and meals. And my goal is to empower you to independence in your journey. Cause everybody could use a little bit of good information to maybe open up what other possibilities could be on your path.
Jenna Kantor (11:45):
I love that. So thank you for everyone who tuned in to listen to this podcast. You can also get that information on where to find Dom in the bio as well. Dom, thank you so much for coming on.
Domenic Fraboni (11:56):
Thanks. This has been amazing. Jenna. I love getting to see you here at Graham sessions and thanks for interviewing me.
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