Thursday What's New: Fragrance Samples

There is no doubt that one of the most appealing things about an Avon catalog are the fragrance scratch and sniffs! Avon long ago mastered the technology to put a sample of fragrance on a bit of paper and entice us to buy those luxurious scents.

Not only does the brochure have fragrance circles, Avon representatives also have the opportunity to purchase fragrance sample cards to include with brochures and to share with customers.

In the What's New for Campaign 12, reps have a fragrance sample package available.

Men's fragrances sample pack:

• Avon Alpha 
• Black Suede Essentials 
• Mesmerize Black 
• Wild Country 
• Black Suede Sport
• Exploration
• Mesmerize

Women's fragrances sample pack:

• Avon Femme
• Rare Gold
• Flor Algeria
• Rare Pearls 
• Outspoken Party
• + lipstick bullets

Individual fragrance samples are also available!

• Alpha
• Attraction
• Black Suede
• Black Suede Essential
• Black Suede Sport
• Exploration 
• Far Away
• Far Away Gold
• Femme
• Fergie Party
• Flor Alegria
• Haiku
• Haiku Kyoto
• Imari
• Imari Elixir
• Imari Seduction
• Little Black Dress
• Luck
• NEW! Mesmerize
• NEW! Mesmerize Black
• NEW! Wild Country
• Passion 
• Rare Gold
• Rare Pearls
• Today Tomorrow Always Daydream
• Today, Tomorrow, Always, Amour
• Ultra Sexy Heart
• Ultra Sexy Pink

To purchase samples, sign up to be an Avon representative!

To receive free samples and try a fragrance, go to: youravon.com/cheriefrid and click on Contact Me!

Tuesday Tip! Flat Lay Photos for Instagram

Each time you create a piece of content and push it out to social media that content needs to "fit" the social media channel it is on. You cannot just replicate content and use the same imagery for Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, etc.

One type of imagery that works extremely well on Instagram is called the flat lay. Flat lay photography is the idea of placing objects flat on a surface (like a table or the floor), and then taking a photograph of your objects from above, as a bird's eye view.

For an attractive, quality flat lay:

focus object - Choose a focal object that you want to showcase. This could be a product if you are doing the flat lay to help promote a product or a blog post about a product.

complimentary objects - Choose other objects to compliment and place with the focus object. Many bloggers and photographers use similar products, accessories, flowers, cute objects, tchotchkes or trinkets.

simple background - Let the objects be the focus by avoiding busy backgrounds. Keep the background simple, bright and allow the objects to pop. A white background is ideal, but if you want to mix it up, keep the background texture simple and the colors light. (I like to use light colored, simply designed scrapbook paper.)

good lighting - Anytime you take photographs, lighting is key. Your ideal light is natural (filtered and not too bright) sunlight. Using lighting fixtures can get you the light you need, too. Play around with lighting to try to get your arrangement well lit without shadows. Avoid using the flash on your camera or your phone.

thoughtful arrangement - The composition may be the most challenging part of flat lay photography. Setting up the arrangement can be time consuming and nerve wracking. Take photos every time you change the position, because you may end up liking a composition and can't recreate it again. To get things to stick in place, use poster putty. Take advantage of the principles of good composition: position, orientation, balance and harmony. A thoughtful arrangement should look appealing and artistic to you. If it seems too cluttered, boring or unbalanced, it probably is. Rearrange!

common theme - Build thematic arrangements. Pick a color scheme (such as all blue, or blue and yellow), choose similar shapes (all round shapes, for example), or use all the same object type (like all lipsticks). For pop, make your focus object "off theme" but complimentary in another way. For example, have the focus object be black and all of your complimentary objects white.

Inspiration! Google Image Search for Flat Lay Photographs

Seeking: Blog Writers, Lifestyle Photographers, Product Testers, Influencers

Business has changed. Social media has been accelerating at breakneck speed, and it is literally everywhere now. Businesses have been using content marketing through social media networks, and over the past few years, social has risen to become THE primary marketing tool for companies that sell consumer products over the internet. Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, YouTube, Pinterest, and others, are all tools to promote and communicate socially. And this format of marketing is not going anywhere.

This is a HUGE opportunity. Many companies have a very specific marketing plan for television, print and radio. However, companies are struggling to move into the social space because it is such a different way to market.

Companies that sell through direct representatives have an opportunity to really excel in the social media space. Why? Because social media is about two things: individuals and relationships. Social works best when it is individual people connecting through relationships within the social media space. This is ideal for direct sales because the individual representatives can really showcase themselves and the companies products in conjunction.

The true opportunity comes because more content is needed. Content creation is still an enormous opportunity, and the more content that can be created around a product or a company, the more that company will excel within the social media space.

What does social media content look like? It looks personal, it looks unique and it looks valuable. It is authentic. And it looks different for every single platform, which is part of why more of it is needed. Facebook content looks different from Tweets, which look different from Instagram, which is definitely different from video social like Vine and YouTube. The mood is also something to consider. Is the content funny, inspirational, informative, promotional, educational? New, fresh, authentic, valuable content is very needed.

Content forms can include:

• blogs

• photography (all types, but flat lay photos, especially in Instagram, are on trend in social)

• tweets and retweets

• Pinterest images and infographics

• product reviews

• videos (short, highly engaging videos are really starting to define social media this year)

• interactive, such as quizzes, games, tools, and apps (a true need: there are nearly none for beauty, but people are clamoring for them!)

Would you like to blog?

Do you want to write informative blog posts about people, products and your love of beauty? Like to share everything that's going on? new products, news, promotions, and sales? As a blog writer, the name of the game is share, and often. Blogs should have editorial schedules: write about new products on Sundays, write about the upcoming week's promotions on Fridays, and so on.

Blogs should be an engaging blend of text and images. The content should be useful to the reader... people should be able to get something valuable from the blog post. If you like the idea of researching expert information, writing quality, fresh content, consistently, then start writing blogs!

Qualifications:

• Grammar and writing skills
• Able to create original and engaging blog content
• Passionate about sharing your love of beauty

Want to learn more about being the best blogger?

Are you creative with a camera?

When you are out, are you the type of person to pull out your smartphone and start shooting pictures? Do you love taking selfies, or photos of your makeup hauls? As a photographer, you really have a lot of fun, creative things you can do and then share on social media channels like Instagram.

Photographs about beauty come in a variety of formats: lifestyle photographs of people, well lit professional style photographs, even flat lay product photographs. (Which are really hot on Instagram right now, by the way). If you love the idea of using your smartphone, digital camera or even high end SLR camera to take gorgeous photographs, then start shooting!


Qualifications:

• Creative photography skills
• Enjoy shooting photographs of people 
• Able to setup a creative scene

Looking for some great lifestyle photography tips?

Do you love trying new beauty products?

Do you pick up the newest lipstick, eyeshadow palette or beauty gadget (BeautyBlender anyone?) just to see how it works? Would you love to try new fragrances or fit new clothing styles? As a product tester, you try out new products for quality, look, feel, and other consumer focused characteristics.

Product testers are usually the first to buy something that has just been released to market. Often, the new products are part of a product review - sometimes done using video and shared out to YouTube.

Qualifications:

• Connected with beauty news, new products and trends
• Like reading or watching new product reviews
• Love to try out new products when they are released

Check out some pretty intense tips for top product review writing.

Are you an influencer?

Image makers are at the top of their industry. They are the people that influence what others do, and they are very much trendsetters. Becoming an influencer takes expertise and patience in order to build a loyal and trusting following.

Influencers have the ability to create action, and are often the go to resource in their industry. To be a beauty influencer, you have to focus on developing ultra high quality content, network and build a strong presence over time. It can be done!

Top tips for becoming a social media influencer.

Qualifications:

• Want to be a leader in beauty
• Reliable image maker and able to share expert news with many people
• Connect with people... daily

If this business lifestyle sounds great to you, you can do it. Right now. Build your very own business online, write blogs, take photos, test new products and influence others through social! You have the power to create this rockstar social media presence, and you can do it in conjunction with a wonderful company that offers amazing beauty products.

Check Your Social Media Hustle: Would you follow you?

Social media is THE channel where most direct sales representatives should be putting their marketing efforts. Consider your local advertising, purchase the promotional items that make you happy, but social media and the reach of an enormous audience is where you will find your sales success.

Plus, it's mostly free.

BUT (there's always that but)... you really, truly, absolutely need to hustle it. The Social Media Hustle is very real. You can't just BE on social media, you have to live and breathe social media. You have to work social media. And you have to make social media consumers want to engage with you.

Previous resources I have shared about social media content:

• Social Media Network Marketing, Simplified offers a run down of social media tools and Four Key Social Media Network Marketing Activities: Content, Listening, Relationships, Linking.
• In Create and Share Content on Social Media, I reiterate that you have to have to have to create content, and frequently.
• In Selling With Social Media: Creating and Pushing Content, I offer even more resources to get that content train chugging.

Putting this social media train into practice requires planning, scheduling and implementing.

PLAN

Create valuable content. Consumers of social media content do not want to keep seeing the same content; they are looking for the newest, freshest, most interesting content. Make sure you know your products very well, you know the needs of the consumers that use your products, and that you actively seek the newest information within your product niche. What does that mean? Consider what products you sell: you should know the benefits of your products, and be able to speak to those benefits easily. You should also know about similar products in the industry, and what is currently awesome. Remember, would you follow you?

Example: If I sell lipstick, I'm going to know my lipsticks inside out and upside down. I'm also going to know about other lipsticks: what is available, what colors were just released, benefits of other brands, where you can purchase those lipsticks and how much they cost. Why do I need to know? Because my customers know. And I need to have the same information my customers have, or more.

Create content in many different forms:

• Photographs (Flat Lay, Behind the Scenes, Organic/Natural/Not Posed, etc.)
• Videos
• Infographics
• Blog Posts
• Tweets
• Quotes
• Conversations about products
• Links to industry news, research and events
• Sharing similar content created by others (Retweets)

Adapt your content to fit each social media channel; you will not want to share identical content on all channels every time. This takes some work, but you have very different audiences on each social media channel, and they expect to see the type of content that is suited for that channel.

SCHEDULE

You need an editorial calendar. Every single week, share the same type of content on specific days, make it consistent and stick to it. Every. Single. Week.

Skincare Sunday, Makeup Monday, Throwback Thursday. You've seen these, right? Get on this hashtag content train. Tag your original content and visually appealing images with known hashtags for more exposure, but do it carefully, thoughtfully and on a consistent editorial schedule.

Followers want to see a reliable amount of quality content, but they do not want to be inundated with too much invaluable content. There's a sweet spot, and this chart actually provides soem posting guidelines about how frequently to post for each channel. When scheduling your content, ask yourself, would you follow you?

Channel	Minimum	Maximum
Facebook	3x per week	10x per week
Twitter	5x per day	none
Pinterest	5x per day	10x per day
Instagram	3x per week	10x per week
Google+	5x per week	10x per week
LinkedIn	2x per week	5x per week
YouTube	1x per week	5x per week

IMPLEMENT

Push content our to social media channels. Push current content first, and make it a focus. But don't be afraid to push related content, similar products, and older content that you want to reintroduce into the feed.

Connect with other people to form relationships, grow your network and hopefully, reach your sales goals through volume. Follow for follow, like for like. Comment, interact, engage with other people, and you will begin to see the same engagement with you.

Action, Action, We Want Action. A-C-T-I-O-N! Use a Call To Action (CTA). In every content post, have a call to action. Join. Click. Shop. Save. Login. Follow. Find out more. Subscribe. Download. Email. Snag this. Get it now. You get the idea: Use an action verb that drives visitor traffic to engage with you. If you were a social media consumer, would you engage with your own call to action? Would you follow you?

Visit my beYOUtiful business blog to read more articles about social media and direct sales!