With 60 social media platforms in use worldwide, you might feel like you have to get active on three or four of them to make a difference.
Don’t do it.
- First, you’ll be overwhelmed trying to figure them all out at the same time.
- Second, you’ll have to come up with more content more often.
- Third, it will dilute your effectiveness as you try to engage with your audience across several platforms.
Pick one platform, use it consistently, and analyze your results before adding another.
Here’s a graphic list of the most popular social networks as of January 2018:
Because of its near universal reach (over 79% of all Internet users hang out there), we recommend Facebook as a starting point in your social media marketing strategy.
That’s what we’ll be focusing on in this Launch.
At this point, you might be asking yourself whether to use your personal profile as you get started, or take the time to build out a business or fan page.
Here are the pros and cons of each:
Your Personal Profile
Pros: | Cons |
| ·Shows your commitment to your business | ·Limited to 5000 “friends” |
| ·Great way to build a network | ·Can’t target and market to them |
| ·Can use Messenger to sell products and build relationships | ·Takes up to 7 days of Messenger chats to build enough trust to promote your business directly |
| ·Great way to share your work-from-home lifestyle | ·Not scalable (requires lots of time devoted to individual contacts) |
| ·Free | ·Can’t attract or target “ideal” visitors – you’re mixing friends with business |
| ·People already know, like, and trust you | ·Facebook can shut you down for improperly marketing and selling on your personal profile |
Your Fan Page or Business Page
| Pros: | Cons: |
| ·You can laser-target your audience | ·Learning curve of weeks to months |
| ·Market to your fan base, and create custom audiences based on reactions | ·Risk being shut down if you don’t properly target and place your ads. |
| ·Allows paid advertising = faster results | ·Requires a daily budget (start with $10 per day for best results) |
| ·Scalable (no need for individual contact) | |
| ·Long-term way to build your brand | |
| ·Illustrates your home business lifestyle | |
| ·Easy to analyze and learn from your results | |
| ·Can create massive engagement with Facebook Live for very little money |
Our recommendation: why not use both to create massive engagement?
Facebook makes it easy to share between your Business or Fan Page and your Personal Profile. You can set it up to alert the friends on your Personal Profile page whenever you post something on your Fan Page.
That way, those friends who are interested can see more of the business side of you, and you won’t end up annoying those who aren’t interested.
One other option to consider is forming a free Facebook Group around a topic of common interest to your intended audience. For example, you could form a health and nutrition group, a financial planning group, a home-based business group – whatever topic makes sense to your niche.
Invite everyone who connects with you – on your Profile Page, your Fan Page, or offline, to join your group to share relevant information. Post training, webinar, or podcast announcements, and offer to email anyone who wants further information. It’s a great way to collect emails and contact information.