I'm a beginner network marketer. I've joined an MLM business. What's the best social media strategy for a beginner?

Does that sound familiar?

Some say don't promote your business on your personal page. They say only on a business page. Some say it's okay on a personal page. What is better?

How about that one? Have you heard it before too?

It's all about engagement. That's the main thing. Your #1 goal is to create engagement.

But why? What does that do?

I want to make sales and enroll team members.

How will this "engagement" thing help me do that?

Engagement is interaction. Sales and team building comes from driving traffic to your websites, to your content, and to you. There are a lot of triggers that create this traffic, and social media interaction is one of those triggers. A big one.

So keep reading we are going to break this down as to the how's and why's. It will answer those questions.

It's really a personal preference. Are you passionate enough about your business to shout it out to the world? If the passion is not there, or if you are afraid of what your friends and family will think, then you might not be all in.

It's like sticking your toe in the water but being reluctant to jump. 

I promote my business on my personal page because it's something that I believe in and that I'm proud about. But I do it in a strategic way. You can do it effectively without being a pain in the rear.

Teaching things that are somehow relevant to your product is a good strategy. Mixing your posts up with personal stuff, raising awareness of issues, and offering solutions to problems is a good mix. So are testimonials and talking about benefits. Not being overly repetitious will keep you out of that "you're annoying" space.

Just so you know ... not posting regularly, is NOT a good strategy.

But if you hold off talking about your business while you're building up your business page, then nothing is happening for you. You already have an audience on your timeline or personal page. Learn to use it effectively.

If you are serious about your business and what you are doing, you won't worry about what your friends and family think, and you might even win some of them over. They will see your passions and that you believe strongly in what you are doing. They will understand that you don't care if someone else doesn't like it. And they might even want to follow you because of those qualities. Some might not, and that's okay.

But there are other advantages that come with learning social media marketing as well. Use it to build social signals, social proof and website syndication. Learn how to create a web of your internet real estate and link it all together. And posting all the content you are learning to create is putting social media to work for you.

Okay .. so what are social signals? The MOZ blog says it like this ....

So you see... social media marketing really does have more of an effect on your business then you might realize, and the way you market on the social platforms has everything to do with your social signal strength.

The more popular you are, the more people want to follow you. If there's a crowd, people stop to see for themselves. They want to know what's going on. If people are gathering, they want to gather too.

It's a phenomenon. We don't know why it is, it just is. People might not know you at all, but if you have a following they will want to follow too. They will think you must be really good at something. On social media they call this social proof. The more popular you become, the more social proof you earn..

Search engines even give points for social proof. You can literally rank higher for being popular. They might judge your reliability, or your trust factor on your social proof. It must mean to them that you are putting out high quality content and providing useful information. Why else would people want to follow, like, and comment on your posts?

 It starts with being social, and learning how to communicate on the social platforms in an engaging way that provides value and benefits. Engagement is a big factor. Friends of friends and friends of family really do care about what those that they are connected to are doing and saying, and who they are following and engaging with. You can become an influencer just in the way you post and the content you provide.

So start creating social signals and earning social proof. These alone are a good social media strategy for a beginner.

Here's something interesting. In the Kissmetrics Blog article 7 Things You MUST Understand When Leveraging Social Proof in Your Marketing Efforts, #6 Authority Rules! states the following ....

You are in this for business. If you weren't you wouldn't be reading this post. So you should present yourself as a professional. Let your visitors know that you have a business and let them know that you are serious about building your business.

Fill in the about me sections and your mission statement. Have a complete page so your visitors can read and learn about you. Let them know that if they were considering a business you would be a good person to talk to and to learn from. Don't try to be someone or something you're not. Just be yourself and be real. If you are new at your business or at marketing it's okay to tell people that. Tell them you are working hard at learning it all and getting better, and that you like to share what you learn with others..

Showing yourself as a serious professional really is the best social media strategy for a beginner I can give you. It's the foundation of it all. Getting other peoples attention and holding their attention is the first step. If you can't do that they just won't take you seriously enough.

 It takes time to learn the techniques for posting and sharing, and it takes time to learn content marketing. But you can start now. You have the basics. Now it's time to take action. Start with your page and fix it up so you come across as a person who is serious about being taken seriously.

Creating and posting quality content that people can and will share can really give you a boost. It's a known fact that word of mouth recommendations are the strongest there is. If your friends and contacts like and share your content, their friends and contacts are likely to do the same thing, and so it goes.

If you learn content marketing you can share variations of your material so it never gets boring. Your friends will begin to anticipate what you are going to come out with next. They might even start asking questions about learning how to do the same things you do. This could be the beginning of your first training or tutorial product.

There is one last thing I absolutely cannot leave out especially while I'm on the subject of sharing content and getting engagement on your posts. Have you ever felt like only a small percentage of your friends are seeing your posts on Facebook? Well it's not your imagination. Facebook is programmed that way. It's in their algorithm. Those who are engaging with you are the ones who see your posts.

They call this your "reach" So if you want to expand your reach, then expand your content sharing and give it value. Make it beneficial and engaging and shareable. The more people who like, comment, and share your posts, the wider and deeper your reach becomes. And those people's friends and their friends begin seeing your posts also.

But you can't count on getting likes, comments, and shares alone. You must give likes, comments, and shares as well. It's a two sided thing, and it's what creates engagement. If you engage with others, they will engage back. So make it part of your routine.

This is really just the beginning, but it will get you going. There are tools of the trade that will help you automate and syndicate. Learning how to create a web of online real estate is when it starts getting exciting and very real. Start with your social presence and then move to blogging. The two work hand in hand. Putting them together will seriously boost your social signals and your social proof. 

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