What is the best way to communicate with your downline?
This is what I do.
My basic communication is to use the general communication tools provided by SFI to send a message to my whole team (PSAs and CSAs) or to a group of them through the TeamMail and Stream Post facilities available to us in SFI.
I use TeamMail for such things as my welcome emails, my weekly group chats and for special information messages that I want to share with a group – such as a great Forum post or a SFI News item. The great thing about a TeamMail is that they are also sent to your team members private email address – so they receive them even if they don’t log into SFI (provided their email address is valid and whitelisted, of course).
Are these successful? Do any of my team even read them? It’s very hard to say because I get very little response from any of my team to anything I write. Even though in each communication I encourage them to ask for help if they have any questions or are confused about anything. But I have been encouraged to hear from one or two of my team who are workers that they do find these helpful and that they sometimes share my material.
I try to make these group mailings practical. The information I share in my weekly group chats is mainly divided into two areas: –
1. How to help those who have no funds to invest in SFI get started. Such things as planning a budget, transfer buying, selling to others, exploring the products and services in TripleClicks and particularly those from ECAs in their own country, and how to save so that you can invest in SFI, and what you need to be able to work your SFI business.
2. How to progress through SFI to EA, BTL and STL especially in month two and beyond. Here I am encouraging them to become a “Power User” in SFI – such things as: - what best to invest in and how to use the SFI system to your best advantage.
I also write at least three Stream Posts each week and sometimes more. Stream posts are great for short tips, notices, advice and encouragement. Each post is limited to a maximum of 340 characters. That is always a challenge to me and I have to rewrite each Stream post several times to be able to say what I want to say within that limit. Often I do my three Stream posts each week on the same day and all on the same topic – part 1, part 2, part 3 etc. Again, very rarely do I get a comment back from any of these.
And the third way in which I can reach a group of affiliates (and in this case it is not only my team) is with a Forum question or answer, and when I write an answer to a ASK SC question – but only if they read them, of course. Still, I mention this here, because I do think these are also great group communication tools.
They also increase your credibility within the SFI community – becoming a Forum Guru, displaying the “Like” badge, and being a “Top Author”, winning some VP for submitting one of the “top 10 highest rated answers”. These all contribute to your standing within the SFI community and hopefully your team will take more notice of what you say to them because of that.
But I use the Forum and ASK SC mainly for training purposes: –
- Firstly for myself, because when I prepare an answer I learn a lot about the topic, and
- Secondly for my team. These become training materials that I can post on my Leadership Page, enclose in my TeamMails or use to answer specific questions.
So those are the general communication tools with which I communicate with all or a group of my team. But for specific advice to one of my team I write to them individually.
I would usually start with an E-Card. That is good. If they respond I also get a copy in my private email and I can then respond by private email too. Personally I like using our private email addresses to communicate. You have a record of all the communication and you can attach things to the emails, which you can’t do in SFI.
A third way is the “chat” function in SFI. You can access this through the “send message” button on an affiliate’s “snapshot” page. In fact I have found that best for talking live with an affiliate when they are on-line. It’s immediate and very direct. Great for discussing a particular issue or problem and for giving specific training about something.
I don’t use the telephone because my budget doesn’t stretch that far. But I do use all the other forms of communication I have mentioned here.
Really, at the end of the day, the best way to communicate with your team is whatever is most effective at the time and that works for you both. That will vary depending on circumstances but we can be so grateful that SFI offers us such a variety of free ways to communicate. Really SFI is an exceptional business platform!
less
