Ready to turn your “business” into a sustainable brand?
Get a step-by-step process for producing, amplifying & monetizing content that attracts a loyal following & generates consistent growth.
In this streamable*, 13-module course you will learn the same 5-step I.C.O.S.A. Social Framework that Laura Palladino used to help build a $125 million brand.
Table of Contents
Ready to unlock the next level of scale? Social is the key.
You might be wondering, “Is social media still relevant to a modern digital brand?”
Social isn’t just relevant; it’s probably the most important part of a sustainable marketing strategy, and it’s usually the missing piece of the puzzle for brands that have plateaued and want to reach the next stage of growth.
A solid social strategy will help you:
Make Facebook your friend.
Did you know social sites don’t like you taking users off their platforms? That’s why they make it so hard to scale those ad-to-offer campaigns you run to cold traffic. So instead, use our Engage & Filter Method to segment your fans with content (which social sites love) then monetize them with offers. That’s how we dropped our CPA by 50% and got 2,000,000 free impressions.
Stand out from the competition.
The more crowded the marketplace gets, the harder it becomes to offer a product or service that’s truly unique. Most competitors can match you on price, shipping and features, but if you use content to establish your authority in the marketplace and build a community of loyal fans — like BOOM!’s 355,000 Facebook fans and 700,000-person email list — that’s something they can’t copy.
Future-proof your brand.
A brand without content is just a “business”, and a business can stop working at any time: they have no way to get repeat purchases or grow a customer base, making them vulnerable to platform updates and algorithm changes. A real “brand” has a strong email list, authority in their market, and a community of loyal fans who buy their products again and again. This makes them practically bulletproof to changes in the marketplace.
Supercharge every part of your marketing.
The results of good social marketing don’t stop at your Facebook page; it helps every part of your business including your ads, emails and website. These all rely on a stream of fresh content, and a good social strategy produces those for you. Not only did BOOM!’s social generate $2.4 million in directly attributable sales, it also provided the content for our most profitable ad and email campaigns.
But to do any of this, you have to consistently create content that engages your audience. Then you need a process for turning all those likes, shares and retweets into real dollars for your brand.
Unfortunately, most businesses don’t know what to make, how to make it, or the best way to leverage the content after it’s been created.
That’s where the ICOSA Framework comes in: it’s a system that gives any team a reliable way to create an unlimited amount of content that drives engagement and generates loyal customers.
Here’s the framework we added to our social strategy to generate $7.5 million worth of sales & visibility in just 12 months.
Last year, we used the I.C.O.S.A. Framework to generate $2.4 million in direct sales from organic social.
But, by leveraging this same social content in ads and emails, we generated an additional $5.1 million, bringing social media’s total impact to $7.5 million in value across the business — not bad for a 5-person team!!
5-Step I.C.O.S.A. Social Framework
STEP 1: DEFINE YOUR BRAND VOICE
Ideation: Start by listening to your customers (and your data) and join the conversation they’re already having.
STEP 2: IDENTIFY MAJOR CONTENT THEMES
Creation: Produce content that drives that conversation and captures customer attention.
STEP 3: MAXIMIZE CAMPAIGN VISIBILITY & IMPACT
Optimization: Optimize your creative so it’s easily accessible on every platform your customers use.
STEP 4: LEVERAGE ALL PLATFORMS
Syndication: Post content on all relevant channels and in all media formats.
STEP 5: SCALE THE WINNERS. UPCYCLE THE LOSERS.
Amplification: Use paid ads to amplify your content to engage more customers and grow the conversation. Repeat for scale.
I.C.O.S.A. is a simple, 5-step process that turns scattered Facebook posts and ineffective tweets into a high-impact social media machine.
And the value of this framework doesn’t end with social media. This machine can be the engine that drives every department in your business.
Because not only do these campaigns produce measurable dollars for our brand, they also produce the content that we use in all of our top-performing ads and emails, as well as on our sales pages and throughout our website.
Laura Palladino – Smart Social
Over 13 modules you will learn how to implement Laura’s 5-step I.C.O.S.A. Framework for growing any brand with social media — whether you run an 8-figure brand or you’re building a team from scratch.
Each session mixes strategy, implementation and feedback to give you a clear path to success in your social media journey.
SESSION 1 Think Like a Social Media Manager
COURSE VIDEOS
- Welcome to Train My Social Media Manager
- How to Think Like a Social Media Manager
- SaaS I.C.O.S.A. Walkthrough (Zipify Apps)
- Ecommerce I.C.O.S.A. Walkthrough (BOOM!)
- Info Product I.C.O.S.A. Walkthrough (Smart Marketer)
- Session 1 Q&A and Feedback
SESSION 2 Forging Your Brand Identity
COURSE VIDEOS
- Forging Your Brand Identity, with Ezra Firestone
- Session 2 Q&A and Feedback
- RESOURCES
- Brand Identity Worksheet
SESSION 3 Finding Your Customer Avatar
COURSE VIDEOS
- Why Customer Avatars Are Key for Social
- How Do I Find My Avatar?
- Getting Into the Mind of Your Avatar
- Transformation Grid
- Session 3 Q&A and Feedback
RESOURCES
- Customer Persona Example from BOOM!
- The Customer Persona Canvas
- Customer Avatar Questionnaire
- The Transformation Grid
SESSION 4 Setting Social Media Goals
COURSE VIDEOS
- Setting Social Media Goals
- Facebook Walkthrough
- Instagram Walkthrough
- YouTube Walkthrough
- Which Advertising Platforms Should I Use?
- Session 4 Q&A and Feedback
RESOURCES
- Goal Setting, Achieving & Measurement Worksheet
SESSION 5 Content Strategy & I.C.O.S.A.
COURSE VIDEOS
- Content Strategy & The I.C.O.S.A. System
- Session 5 Q&A and Feedback
SESSION 6 Content Ideation
COURSE VIDEOS
- ICOSA Deep Dive: Ideation
- Agora Walkthrough
- Evaluating Content Performance with Google Analytics
- Session 6 Q&A and Feedback
RESOURCES
- The Content Grid
- The Content Marketing Funnel
SESSION 7 Content Creation
COURSE VIDEOS
- ICOSA Deep Dive: Creation
- Video Formulas
- Video Gear
- Blog Process, with Colleen Taylor
- Editing for Consumption, with Russ Henneberry
- Visual Systems, with Alison Matheny
- Video Content Formulas, with Ezra Firestone
- Session 7 Q&A and Feedback
RESOURCES
- Template: Blog Post, Email & Social
- Video Gear Order List
- Headline Formulas
SESSION 8 Content Optimization
COURSE VIDEOS
- ICOSA Deep Dive: Optimization
- IGTV: Resizing
- Creating Quote Images
- IGTV: Converting Horizontal Video to Vertical
- Session 8 Q&A and Feedback
SESSION 9 Content Syndication
COURSE VIDEOS
- ICOSA Deep Dive: Syndication
- How To Upload A Video To YouTube
- How To Upload A Video To Facebook
- Pinterest Pin Tutorial
- IGTV: Uploading Tutorial
- How To Upload To Instagram Stories
- Session 9 Q&A and Feedback
SESSION 10 Content Amplification
COURSE VIDEOS
- ICOSA Deep Dive: Amplification
- Amplifying a Blog Post Via Email
- Session 10 Q&A and Feedback
SESSION 11 Content Data & Analysis
COURSE VIDEOS
- ICOSA Deep Dive: Analysis & Re-ICOSA
- Engagement Data in Facebook Creator Studio
- Analyzing Content Performance in Google Analytics
- Looking at Post Data in Agora Pulse and Klaviyo
- Session 11 Q&A and Feedback
SESSION 12 Customer Communication
COURSE VIDEOS
- Handling Customer Feedback / Protecting Your Brand’s Reputation
- Session 12 Q&A and Feedback
RESOURCES
- Responding on Social: Macro Examples
Meet Your Instructor
Hi, I’m Laura!
I’m the Social Media Director for BOOM! by Cindy Joseph, an ecommerce brand that’s made over $125 million.
But I didn’t go to college for this stuff…
When Ezra Firestone hired me in 2015 I was working at Cracker Barrel — I didn’t know the first thing about digital marketing!
Back then Ezra’s startup was doing $3 million per year and he was convinced that if he was going to scale further, content would be his secret weapon. After a year working customer support, he asked if I wanted to help him. That was 2016.
By 2017, Ezra’s bet had paid off. Our new content attracted hundreds of thousands of new fans, and BOOM! exploded from $3.5 million to $16 million.
Sales Page: _https://landing.smartmarketer.com/pages/smart-social