How I made Social Media work for our direct sales business #Avon

Recently I was invited to speak at my local Avon Division Spring Rally. I am an over-preparer, so I decided to type everything I wanted to say. So, as I share everything online! Here is what I shared with my division that night. I don't know it all obviously, but I am proud of what I have learned so far.

As many of you know Judy and I moved from Las Vegas to here in August last year. Initially, what that did to our Avon business, was crippling. We lost all our customers we had face to face. The time when we used to ramp up our business, we were packing boxes. Several of our regular customers didn't know what to do with the internet. So, once we got settled here and the wifi set up I decided to focus on our online sales. I began reading and watching all the videos I could, and I picked the brain of my software developer husband. Through solid stubbornness, I posted, blogged, and tweeted as much as I could to try to break this barrier. With losing almost three solid months of sales due to the move, we were able to earn almost $2000 of our sales we needed to make presidents club, just online in the last three months of the year. So, I took a few notes to share with you all about what we did and how you can get started to really utilize social media in your business.

Avon is a personal contact business, it has been and always will be for over 130 years. Just because we are talking about social media doesn't mean we lose that connection. I will talk about this more, but the more you utilize the tools Avon gives you and the more you personalize them, the more personal the responses to your business will become.

Use what Avon gives you.

-In the world of technology, Avon has really began to catch up to the trends especially when it comes to social media. The new changes coming in next quarter are astounding! The social media center will be even hipper and cooler. How many of you have actually opened up and looked at the social media center? There are several links with specialized content on the right and several unique videos to our business down below. This is a great place to start when looking for what to share online. You can share this information on your Facebook, Pinterest or Twitter pages. Use the share button on each product it's a great way to highlight it.

-However, Many people make the probably biggest mistake while sharing, they forget to make it their own. When you click on the share button, you get a preview screen, be sure to share with your friends and the entire internet world, WHY this is a great sale, or what about this product do you love, or how have you been doing in Avon and how much fun are you having while doing it. Make it personal to you.

-Update your estore regularly. You do not need to have a computer degree to get this done. Go in to edit my estore, select different options on the boxes to mix up the look. Change your greeting every campaign, maybe even include a code offer on that front greeting. This is important because the more your estore changes, the less static it will appear on the search engine rankings, therefore moving it up in the rankings when someone searches for Avon.

-Sign up as a customer on your estore. You will get all the emails and code so you know what to share on your other sites.

Take small bites of the social media apple, but keep chewing. Post every day

-Start with what you know. If you are on Facebook, consistently share on Facebook. Don't try to tackle Twitter, Pinterest, Tumbler, or even blog until you really feel consistent about your quality and content you share.

-Once you feel comfortable than start a blog. You can go to Wordpress or blogger to start a free blog. This gives you a vehicle to share lots of information, picture, videos, on one location that's easy to share with others. One tip, do not use AVON in your blog or Facebook names. It actually is against social media guidelines. Don't stress about not writing enough. Set a goal of once a week and raise it once you are ready.

What do you blog about?-Your story, why you started selling Avon, you favorite products and why, a video of you going and working your business, product reviews, recruiting tips, funny stories, the point is, when your talking about any form of social media, your goal is to provide a large variety of information to attract a variety of people. Our blog is still my work in progress, it's chasingdreamsinpa.com We talk about everything from reviews to working at home to funny stories to funny videos to recipes. Point is, I constantly am blogging and sharing content to attract people to my blog and estore.

Don't be a robot

-People don't like to be linked at. So, yes it is good to share all these great tools Avon gives us, however we need to share what makes us who we are. My husband, the software developer gave me a formula, for every link I share I need to share 3-5 organic posts. Pictures of me with my kids, pictures of my favorite product, check ins of Judy and I at lunch or the mall working our business, video of me talking about my day, or as I am a graphic geek an inspirational quote. Organic posts are posts you create. You can make them still be about your Avon business. Whenever I take a picture of myself wearing an Avon item like new sunglasses or new shoes, I usually say, in the latest book for this price, let me know how many you want, all my friends would then comment. Last year we sold 30-40 Elsas doing this, by posting a video of Elsa singing and asking for people to comment with how many they want. Just remember, companies actually create robots who post links of products All day long. We are not robots, we are individual business owners running our own business on our own time and we Love what we do. Use the Avon links, but mix them with posts about YOU.

Don't be shy or forget you in your business I think several people are scared to post on their social media that they sell Avon. Maybe afraid you will annoy your friends? Share what you LOVE! Several reps we've had have commented they don't know why they aren't getting any estore customers, yet they couldn't tell me their estore address. So, be proud of your Avon business and share your estore address, or the link to your favorite product.

-Just be sure to use your words on why they should buy from you this week, or what makes this product so fantastic. Your personalizing your links is what will make the post more informative versus just saying please buy from me. You put the personal in YOUR business.

-Share everyday. Even if it isn't an Avon post, Share and be active on social media. That way you are in the habit of sharing EVERYDAY.

-People can buy from anyone online, especially when it comes to makeup. What makes YOU standout!

Diversify and Automate

-Once you are comfortable with one form, stretch your reach to the other forms of social media.

-Facebook, Pinterest, Twitter, Google +

-Utilize the tutorials and learn how to really use these sites to best benefit your business.

-Still remember to stay organic, and sell the You in Your Avon business.

-When you are really rocking and rolling with content you have created, you can reshare it all day even while you are sleeping. Several Apps are out there created to do this. The free ones I use for Twitter and Facebook are Hootsuite and Buffer. The more action on your Twitter, Pinterest, Facebook, or Google + feed the higher your information goes in the search engine rankings when people are looking for something related to Avon.

Always keep learning and don't give up

Confucious once said “It does not matter how slowly you go, as long as you do not stop” This is not a quick process, but it's a fruitful process in the long run. Before you know it, the sales will start coming in. Just like with anything in Avon, the work time put in, will equal the payout. You put in an hours worth of work a week, you will reap an hour, put in more, reap more.

Read, read, read, there are several blogs now to follow. The beauty for a purpose blog gives you great content to share and learn about for you. Emily Seagren, who was Avon's Woman of the Year last year, has a very successful business and an online group to follow, Makeup Marketing Online.

So, I still have Loads to learn and adjust as I go. You can connect with me on FB, Twitter, or Pinterest. The key to this whole thing is it's a huge internet world out there. To make your mark, you can utilize the tools Avon gives you, but share them and make them your own. Make your online presence be about Your Avon business.

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