If you started the new year without a clear social media strategy, this episode gives you a practical starting point. Christina May sits down with Stacey Holsinger of Steel Toe Communications to break down what worked in 2025 and what did not, especially for B2B businesses.
They cover why LinkedIn should be your foundation, how video and YouTube can drive long-term results, and how platforms like Instagram, TikTok, and Twitter (X) fit into the bigger picture. This episode is packed with straightforward, actionable advice to help you focus your efforts and stop wasting time on the wrong channels.
Christina May: Welcome back! Again! It’s like you didn't go anywhere.
Stacey Holsinger: I know!
CM: It's amazing when you do these, like, back to back to back. It’s the transparency we want to bring. So, breakout moments for social media. Now that full transparency is all you. If anybody who is creeped on my socials knows, unsubscribe when it comes to me. Like I know what we do with this data.
SH: Except for the podcast!
CM: Except the podcast! It isn't really social media. I don't mind content. I just mind the social side of it. Maybe that's like my origin story of my grandfather, like creeping up where I just you even talking about gives me the heebie jeebies.
SH: I wanted to talk about breakthrough moments for the, I guess, major platforms that B2B organizations use,
CM: Which would be?
SH: LinkedIn.
CM: 100%.
SH: Yes. 100%, and I tell all my clients this all the time. If you're still brand new to social media and you're just getting on board now, and you're a B2B.
CM: And that's okay.
SH: Yeah, that's okay.
CM: That's totally okay. We're not judging, coming on.
SH: Thank you for coming on. You know, your world of opportunities, your mind is going to be blown if you actually utilize this and stick to LinkedIn. LinkedIn has done wonders for my career and business. But B2B LinkedIn is where to be. Sorry for that.
You want to start there if your resources and your time is limited. But what I'm seeing from LinkedIn, this year. Skilled trades if you're hiring for those positions. LinkedIn is not going to be your go-to for that. But any office positions, estimators, project managers, CEOs, engineers, that kind of thing.
CM: Anything. We only post on LinkedIn. We don't we don't use anything else anymore when it comes to hiring. Only use LinkedIn.
SH: Internships. I found so many great interns on there, too. Speaking of internships, a lot of people don't know about a platform called Handshake. Do you know about them? I just learned about them this year, but it's getting a lot of momentum.
It's been around for a while, but it's building momentum. Handshake is basically connected to all the universities. It's a safe platform. So the interns who are looking for employers, they're not showing up on LinkedIn first. Interesting. They're going because they have their school account connected to Handshake. So they have a profile there. My best piece of advice is for businesses to just set up a profile in Handshake first, because they're going to learn about your company on the Handshake first.
Then, after talking to a lot of my interns, they'll learn about your company first on a handshake. But the companies actually don't respond very well in Handshake. So then they'll look you up on LinkedIn and apply through LinkedIn. So that's what I'm seeing. Okay. And that's verified not just through the interns, but I'm talking to a lot of CTE, college professors, and career counselors.
CM: I bet you a lot of people don't know about that.
SH: Always still in person is great. The students want to meet you in person. That's the feedback I'm getting there for internships.
CM: Do you think that's for, small businesses, a lot of times what I hear about internship programs, etc., and I even experienced it, they're incredible amount of work on the employer.
SH: Yes.
CM: An incredible amount of work on the employer. You are not hiring an employee. So I know a lot of small businesses, you know, will get on the fence because of that. You know what? What advice do you have, for them?
SH: Well, right now, through my business, serving as a middleman. So different counties have different programs that can help you with their internship program, which is great. And some of them will even pay your interns and give them a stipend.
CM: So, like counties within your state?
SH: Yes. So Frederick County, I just learned, has one. I forgot what it's called. Unfortunately.
CM: We'll just have to put it in the show notes. It's okay. We're human. We only live here, and we don't know. It's fine, my apologies!
SH: I started my internship program in Montgomery County, here in Maryland. And it's been going on for five years now. But a lot of business owners, they can't find the time because they all have different requirements. This one is 50 hours a week that you have to make sure you're keeping the interns busy.
You know, teaching them, giving them research projects, things like that. So, over a five-week period, and then there's a giant graduation ceremony. What I'm doing is, I'm partnering with various businesses in the contractor space, and I’m doing the heavy load, you know, coordinating where they should go to learn about other small businesses. That's just one solution. Where was I going with this?
CM: No, no. You're good, you're good. So we're bringing it back about. I just asked a kind of a tangent question about, like, handshake, even though it's not social media, but it's tied to your social media. But you were highlighting that LinkedIn is such a great place in general for B2B, which I completely agree.
Even the antisocial girl over here we use LinkedIn quite a bit. But particularly when it comes to internships, which I know was a passion for you.
SH: That's one thing about LinkedIn. If you have a business development professional, you're thinking about putting that person out and about and attending every breakfast, lunch, and dinner.
They need to be the face of your company online in my personal opinion. Because I see a lot of people doing it, and they're doing a really frickin good job at it.
CM: Really?
SH: Yes. Think about networking on LinkedIn, in person, and digitally. Just make sure, like if you trust that person to network with people over drinks, you should be able to trust what they're going to say online.
CM: Right? To network online.
SH: Yeah. You might have some guidelines, you know. Right. Or have a conversation about what to post, but they should definitely be showing up for you on LinkedIn and online.
CM: I think to that point, to, I think that is a pause that comes to mind when businesses are thinking small businesses, especially thinking about social media.
They're like either they don't have time for it because you're too busy running the business, right? Or you're having to have an outside agency or someone internally do your social. There's a trust there. And then what I would suggest, and what we have suggested to customers too, is if you can hire out the posts, do it, and then augment those posts with the spontaneous posts that come from inside your team.
The things that a company or agency, can't grab for you, and you can really put some guidelines together so that there's trust there. And, you know, you really want to encourage your employees to like that. I guess this is the biggest thing. If you're taking the time to post, have the people within your company like and share. It's the simplest thing you can possibly do to get reach. I can't tell you how hard that is to get.
SH: It is. I have some companies I work with where their employees are so involved, and they're great.
CM: And you love it.
SH: You can tell actually which company has a good called company culture by the socials.
CM: By the socials.
SH: You really can. If they're sharing a ton of stuff about their company or even their coworkers, what they're working on or interacting online, you know, that's a great company culture. And then the other ones are just like quiet.
CM: Crickets.
SH: Or you're like, begging for them, you know? Or sometimes you can tell the age of the company too. If you have a more older audience that's kind of quiet online.
CM: They're the more traditional breakfast-lunch crowd.
SH: Every year, they switch up their algorithm and everything like that. If you're an association or someone that runs company events on LinkedIn, they are rewarding comments first over your posts.
That means you have to promote your event at least three weeks out now. If you log on to your LinkedIn today and you look at your feed, you'll see a post from three weeks ago. Two weeks ago.
CM: I’ve been noticing that.
SH: It’s so frustrating.
CM: It's not timely.
SH: I've missed events because of that. Then I was like, maybe it's just me but I talk to a lot of people and they're all frustrated. If your attendance is down, that's because you really need to step up your prep game on social media.
CM: Yes. Well, and if LinkedIn, if you're listening, change it because that just doesn't make any sense. It doesn't benefit anybody.
SH: This year's been a hard hit for LinkedIn. In my personal opinion.
CM: Agreed.
SH: I'm still cringe. Moving on to Facebook and Instagram. The biggest changes I've seen for those two it's a pay to play Instagram larger hit. Actually, I've been having a hard time with Instagram. Now we got to show up for skilled trades professionals on Instagram because there's a ton of influencers there. It's a hands on community, so they want to show off their work on what they're doing.
CM: It’s visually appealing.
SH: Yes, video and photos are all about on Instagram.
CM: If you're a manufacturer or like we both have a tendency to work for what I call the “boring businesses” that don't get any love. Like none of what we do is sexy. It just isn't. And it just doesn't make for it. There's only so many different ways to try to make that content interesting. If you already have that impediment working against you, it's just going to make it harder.
SH: I truly believe that it's just them. They need to take the leap and try more creative things.
CM: Put a phone in a blender.
SH: There's so much talent there. I've got to tour so many manufacturing facilities and I'm like so impressed and blown away. From guitar making to sheet metal. You do the same thing day in and day out. But there's so many creative ideas that I can help spin this.
CM: I think companies are a little hesitant to show authenticity because it might come off as unprofessional.
SH: Or they're afraid to brag, or they're afraid that their secret sauce is going to get exposed, but there's not a lot of secrets, like from business to business. I'm like, you're doing the same thing. It's the people that are different.
CM: It’s the people that make the difference. It's the way we put unique ideas together. The authenticity is what makes it special.
SH: Definitely.
CM: They're not going to get your secret sauce.
SH: Definitely show up on Facebook and Instagram like they're still the top platforms, but it's a pay to play it.
CM: Would you change the audience? For instance, you know, LinkedIn, we all know business owners are there. But Facebook and Instagram, obviously a lot of the pushback that I hear for B2B is that that's a B2C thing. Why would I waste my time? But that's also where your future potential employees could be. Would you think about changing the audience?
SH: It's just because it’s a little bit more casual. And it's recruitment-focused.
CM: We're not selling wages.
SH: We're not selling. No.
CM: No.
SH: It's just like this is a great place to work. And this is what you'll be working on. These are the people you're going to be working with type of thing.
CM: I think that's an important distinction for people to know where it's like LinkedIn. We talk a little bit more about what we do. We are selling more. You're selling more on LinkedIn.
SH: YouTube is huge. A lot of B2B people aren't utilizing that, you know?
CM: No. Oh my gosh. Also, can we just say for the people in the back that don't understand YouTube is a search engine. You get more bonus for doing video and using YouTube than anything else other than like maybe your Google business profile with Google. Just going to say it for the people in the back.
SH: Videos last a long time. I mean I did a recruitment video so many years ago I think it was 2014. It's still up there. It generated it's probably at 400,000 views and it's generating, anyone that wants to learn about an HVAC tech, knows about their company, and it pushes you right to their careers page.
It’s been working. We're going on 11 years now, and that's a really good quality video. They had a whole production company. But I have had videos that are really crappy that we just scrapped or used with our phone that still did so well!
CM: That phone camera now is actually is pretty good quality. You don't really have many excuses anymore, especially with a newer iPhone. You can capture some really. YouTube is different but for social everything's going native. You know, to not a horizontal format but vertical video format now and then YouTube is your horizontal. Any thoughts on shorts?
SH: Huge right now. That's why I started up my channel on short-form video. But then when we did our podcast last year, the fourth year into our podcast, we used, and we started experimenting with shorts and, we got a whole new audience almost. You've got to do shorts and clips. But the good thing is there's AI out there that can help you.
CM: With all the above.
SH: The days when we didn't have that and shorts are what, 30s or 30s minute. I think maybe something like that. I can tell you my seven-year-old's obsessed with shorts. Like these kids just love watching shorts. So they're growing up on this stuff.
CM: It's the new TV. You can see that in the change of the entertainment industry and how we're delivering longer-form content now. We're delivering things in shorts. It’s really changing the definition of the media landscape for sure. So definitely YouTube's a biggie. Anybody left? Do we want to talk about the artist formerly known as Twitter?
SH: I haven't met one person who does not disagree with me on B2B, that Twitter is not where it’s at.
CM: We've discontinued that, actually, from our strategies. We don't even engage, there any longer.
SH: It’s news, politics, and sports.
CM: Correct. It just doesn't have the staying power. Aso you need to go where your audience is. I mean, that's just like the golden rule marking, right? Your audience isn’t there.
SH: They're not there.
CM: Most of the time, they're on all these other platforms. And I think maybe something you talk about too is a piece of advice you don't have to be on all of these platforms. I mean, you're listing them all off, right? But do one well. Instead of trying to do all of them terribly.
SH: People put too much on their plate when they’re just starting out
CM: Then they just fail.
SH: If you talk to any marketing agency and they say you have to be on all these platforms,
CM: No, you don't.
SH: Red flag.
CM: Huge Red flag. Run.
SH: I'm like, no, just start on LinkedIn and then let's see how the contents go in. If the contents flowing and we’ve got a good system going, then let's push out more channels.
CM: You always have what I consider to be your home channel. Then you know you can add 1 or 2 to that, and that's probably it. You don't have to be everywhere
SH: It depends on what your team does well, too is what I say. Because I'm working with a sheet metal contractor now, and I had no idea where this was going to go. They're giving me such great content. I have struggled, getting video from people.
CM: Oh, preach.
SH: But they're doing really well with it. I'm just thinking, you know, you might want to consider TikTok here. Because a lot of what I'm learning about sheet metal.
CM: Sheet-tok
SH: In the sheet metal industry, they start young too, like 16.
CM: They do. Welding all of that.
SH: That is your perfect audience for TikTok. I think under 3% of B2B companies use TikTok. So the organic reach is there
CM: It’s huge.
SH: So jump on board or get with someone who knows how to do it. And start getting those videos out because that's where you're going to get the most bang for your buck.
CM: I think the best advice I could say is just be cringe. It's okay. Be cringe.
SH: Everybody was once cringe.
CM: We are still cringe.
SH: I'm still cringe.
CM: I'm still cringe.
SH: The older we get, we’re going to be more cringe. We're probably cringe for saying cringe right now.
CM: Oh, we are 100% cringe for saying cringe. Are you kidding? My niece right now is just like rolling her eyes if she's listening to this, like, oh my God, when did you get old Aunt Christina?
SH: But don't be that company, just because TikTok is scary to you and you don't understand it, doesn't mean that you don't want to get left behind. Because that generation's all over TikTok, and they're looking, they're going to see the other contractor on there or the other business. I want to go work for them because they learned about them first.
CM: That's right. Well, real quick recap for everybody. So sounds like LinkedIn if you're just starting out, if you're doing nothing else, sounds like you want to start a LinkedIn. All of the content you can sell on LinkedIn. You can talk about just about anything on LinkedIn. It's all game.
SH: Recruit or recruit or sell, you can do both.
CM: Or educate any of those. If you go and expand from there, where it's appropriate for you. If you do have a B2C component to your business, look at Facebook, look at Instagram, look at TikTok, like those are really viable options for you. But master one first.
SH: Yes. Talk to your team too, see what they like.
CM: Yeah. See what they use. Because if you can get your team on board, it will be successful for sure.
SH: They have to be part of the process for sure.
CM: Yes. Always part of the process. All right.
SH: Cool.
CM: Well, that wraps up what to do a good, moment for everyone to pick up and use in their business. That's where you'll find this, too, at some point, right? LinkedIn. Except that's you. Not me.
SH: I'll be controlling the LinkedIn.
CM: She'll be cringe on LinkedIn for me. All right. We'll see you next time.