by Jonathan Gilliam, Momentum Factor

It seems natural that companies whose primary driver is person-to-person relationships would have jumped on the social media bandwagon early on and embraced it, singing “hallelujah!” the whole way. You would think. Network marketing companies have been too slow to adopt social and have been left behind by many other more progressive consumer industries.

And when they do sign on, they tend to get it wrong:

They don’t engage their fans and connections.
They hire someone from outside network marketing who doesn’t understand the nuances of our industry.
They hire a “marketer” from inside network marketing with little social media experience to “figure it out.”
They turn it over to their marketing coordinator or office receptionist.
They put up a Facebook page only to let it rot over time.
They ignore Twitter and every other free channel to reach their audience.
They post blogs and status updates about virtually the same thing every day.
They treat their social media like an advertising channel (it is not).
They fear the freewheeling internet chatter and the damage that negative discussions can do to momentum.
They fail to appreciate the power of social networking for its promise — and its threat — to their business.

Here are a few tips on what NOT to do on the social web:

Don’t be boring – this includes repeating yourself, posting boring things nobody cares about, not posting enough, posting too much, not using videos or pics, and just being plain and uninteresting overall.
Don’t sell – People use social media to SHARE, LEARN, and HAVE FUN. They are not there to buy (This is why it’s taken Facebook Ads so long to catch on). This doesn’t mean they won’t buy, but that’s not why they join social media sites. I guarantee if you constantly shout about your latest tool or event, you will turn away many otherwise eager fans.
“Hide” is one click away. Just as people can “like” you, they can also “hide” you – and you’ll never know it. Hiding is the Facebook equivalent of an unsubscribe – even though they will still appear as a fan of your company. Upon every action you should ask yourself, “will this annoy people enough to hide me?”
Hire someone with strong knowledge in both network marketing as well as social media marketing and who understands how they should work together.
Stop trying to get dates and start making relationships happen. Make it fun. Make in interesting and make it last.

To learn more about social selling, read this article from Momentum Factor’s Jonathan Gilliam as well.

And to find out how Momentum Factor can help protect your company from compliance issues related to social selling, contact our team today.