Using Social Media to Grow Your MLM Business
Social media is an awesome tool and has made life easier in many ways.
It has allowed us to connect easily with anyone in the world and can make life more fun.
However, social media is a double edged sword and can also HURT you and your network marketing business if you use it the wrong way.
There are 15 common mistakes that MLM distributor make with social media…
So, let’s get right to them!
The 15 Common Social Media Mistakes
1) Not Being Active on Social Media
There are still some who are afraid of exposing themselves on social media.
It’s time to get on with the show!!!
Social media is here to stay and is an excellent way to grow your business.
The good news is that social media is just like meeting people in everyday life.
You’re doing it already.
Which leads us to the next mistake.
2) Treating Social Media As Something Different
The good news is that social media is NOT something different.
There are NO new rules nor etiquette that you have to learn!
Social media is just another way to meet people.
There is only ONE RULE to remember,
If you won’t do if offline, then don’t do it online.
So would you walk into a house party and without getting to know your new friends begin immediately start pitching products?
Of course not.
So don’t do it offline either.
3) Focus On Too Many Social Media Channels
You have limited time and there is no way you can stay active and do well on all social media channels (such as Facebook, Linkedin, Youtube, Pinterest, Instagram) unless you have the budget to hire a full time social media manager for you.
When you set unrealistic goal to be active on all social media channels, what ends up happening is you door a poor job on all of them and it ends up hurting you.
It’s like going to 10 parties in 1 night and then you don’t remember anyone you met.
It’s better to focus on just one.
The network that is most popular with MLM prospects is Facebook so I would focus on that.
4) Trying to Sell Your Products and Opportunity Immediately
Just like you won’t walk into a party and start selling immediately, you also don’t do that on social media.
You have to provide value and get to know people first before you start posting links to your products and business.
5) Promoting Your Company and Products
This may be controversial and goes against what you’ve been taught but top online marketers don’t use social media to sell.
They use social media to create curiosity and then when prospects become interested, then they sell them.
When you post links to your company, you kill the curiosity and people become less excited to meet and learn about your business because they can Google and learn everything on their own.
6) Don’t Provide Value
Always think about how to help your audience and give value.
You get people’s attention when you help others.
Here are 3 Simple Ways to Provide Value in Social Media:
1) Sharing knowledge
2) Sharing interesting personal info
3) Sharing something funny
7) Not Engaging
By now, you already understand that social media is just like attending social events offline.
Just like you don’t walk into a party and stare and talk to no one, you have to engage with your audience on social media.
That means you have to like, comment and communicate with others.
It takes time but you have to do it otherwise you’ll just be like the guy who walks into a party and stares at everyone and leaves.
Most importantly, if you don’t engage with others, you are telling Facebook that you either have no interest or people are not interested in you.
In other words, “you don’t matter” to this Facebook world.
And if you don’t matter, Facebook will “penalize” you by decreasing the number of people who sees your posts and you become irrelevant.
8) Posting Things That Are Not Consistent With What You Represent
People forget that everyone is always watching what you do. They post things that are inconsistent with their business.
An example is a distributor in a health wellness company that posted pictures of him eating fried chicken wings!
I’m not saying he shouldn’t be eating them but if the does, he shouldn’t be posting about it!
9) Not Showing Commitment to the Business
What is your main vision?
Are you being committed?
Are you a real entrepreneur?
Most important, are you a SERIOUS Entrepreneur?!
I see this frequently.
A distributor claims he’s an entrepreneur and serious about his business when he prospects but on Facebook he invites me to play these dumb Facebook games like Candy Crush Saga or posts about his high scores video game such as Game of Thrones.
Sorry but the last time I checked, serious entrepreneurs are not wasting their time playing video games!
If you want to be taken as a serious entrepreneur, make sure your posts are consistent with that image you want to create.
10) Lack of Consistency in Posts
When you are not consistent people start doubting your commitment and vision.
You have to make it a daily habit to post consistently.
This is another reason why you should focus on only 1 – 2 social media channels. It’s better to post consistently on one channel than being on every social media but with no consistency.
11) No Personal Content
People are interested in what’s going on in your personal life.
Many of my most popular posts and videos are ones that have my kids in them.
If you just share business stuff, people will start ignoring you and you become irrelevant.
See #7 about consequences of Lack of Engagement.
Now… we’re going to go into more advanced strategies and the mistakes that are made.
12) Not Segmenting Your Friends and Leveraging Friend’s Lists
This is one of the best parts of Facebook and I show you how to do it in this quick video post.
You get to create different groups (not to be confused with Facebook Groups) of friends and then you can decide who gets to see what.
For i.e. I put all my family into a “Family” list. This allows me to post things that only my Family gets to see.
You can do this for prospects as well.
To learn how to segment and create Friends lists, watch this short quick video.
13) Not Having a Time Budget for Social Media
Social media can HURT your business if you let yourself get carried away with it.
There are endless things to read and things to comment on and you can easily spend too much time and find yourself not doing the 5 money making activities to build your MLM business.
To prevent from falling into this trap, the best thing to do is set a timer on your phone and give yourself 5 – 10 minutes per social media session.
Once the timer is up, you have to stop and go back to doing what you were working on.
This creates urgency and also make you more productive in your social media activities.
14) Replying Back to People Too Quickly
Successful people are busy and if you reply back immediately it shows lack of posture and success.
Just imagine if you emailed the President of the USA or even the President of your MLM company, who they reply back immediately?
Most likely not!
They’re too busy doing important things.
If you reply back to prospects immediately on social media, people will lose belief in your leadership and also success because if you were truly successful, how would you have so much time to waste on social media?
Quick replies are also not sustainable.
One of my Advanced Diamond Mastermind members struggled with this.
You can reply back immediately if you have a few prospects or downlines but what happens if you have a team of 1,000 distributors and everyone messaged you and expected you to get back ASAP?
It will drive you crazy!
There’s no way you can get back to people immediately so it’s better to set the right precedent from the start and train people to wait.
15) Spending Too Much Time on Social Media
Just like anything in life, too much of a good thing becomes a bad thing.
Let social media be a friend and not a foe.
Don’t be so connected that you’re not connected in life.
I know people who have huge followings and thousands of friends online but no true friend in the real world…
And that’s a sad life.
Make sure you avoid mistake #13 and set a time budget so that you have time to be present and be with your loved ones.
Turn off the phone and computer and go out for a walk and cherish your surroundings.
You have to make that decision now or else you can be consumed by it for hours and then not only will your MLM business fail but deep down you realize you’re living an empty life.
Those are the top 15 common mistakes that MLM distributors make with social media.
Which ones do you need to work on?
Simon Chan
PS. Check this video out & see how some of the top network marketers today, defeat overwhelm and stay consistent in their business activities.
Because hey, sometimes it’s not more info we need, rather, more ACTION! Where would you be in your business, if you were part of a community like this?
