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What ever you do as a work at home mom, you need to manage social media. Sure, you can outsource it eventually, but when you’re starting out in your business venture, you just can’t afford that.

So you need to do it all yourself. And social media just seems like this huge minefield.

There are lots of different platforms, with different names for the same thing (likes = followers = circles!) so it does get a little confusing to make it work.

Before you just right in with every single social media network, I want you to work on these five quick tips for all work at home moms. Even if you plan on hiring a social media manager, focus on these five tips to make social media marketing work.

Interact, engage, connect with your audience

This is my biggest tip. You need to connect with and engage your audience. Social media platforms will push your stuff to newsfeeds more if you’re popular and interesting.

Remember this is SOCIAL media—you need to be sociable. You can’t just leave a link to your latest post and then move on.

Go back and answer questions, thank people for sharing it, and have a conversation with those linked to you. When networking within groups, actually do some networking. I spend time chatting to other business owners. You’ll be amazed at where you can get clients from.

Give your audience a reason to remain connected to you. Give them a reason to share your stuff. Give them a reason to read! And give them a reason to follow you.

The Art of Social Media: Power Tips for Power Users ($)

Share others’ stuff too

Your pages can’t be full of your stuff. It starts to look overly promotional. The social networks are pushing people further down the list for doing stuff like this.

Share the stuff that others have written to. That doesn’t mean you have to go out specifically searching for something—you probably already read shareworthy material—you do read as well as write, right?

You can share something quickly by retweeting or Facebook sharing. You can store up some links of blogs that you enjoy to share with your readers every now and then.

And don’t forget about photos, memes, and GIFs. They all tend to stand out and give you something different to share. Get creative with your social media.

When you find something that you enjoy, share it and tell people why. It doesn’t have to be someone else’s blog post. It could be a news article connected to your dream or an image about your niche that made you laugh.

There are different opinions on the amount you should share of others compared to yourself. The general rule is for 1 piece of yours, share 3 of others’. Experiment to find the ratio that works for you.

MORE: What to do if you have no home office when working from home

Grow one, automate two

Don’t try to handle more than three social media accounts at once. When you do that, automate two of them and work on building the following on one particular account.

You can automate in a few ways, including through tools and by joining accounts together. For example, anything posted on one of my Facebook pages is automatically shared on one of the Twitter accounts.

By working on just one account at a time, you have the chance to fully engage. You won’t end up as overwhelmed. If you don’t find that it’s where your audience is, you can automate it and grow another account. If it is where your audience is, grow it to the point where it’s easier to manage and then mostly automate it and move onto another social media account to grow.

When automating, you will still need to check in live every now and then. This is a good way to share new stuff and connect with your followers.

Where do you start? A lot of people love Pinterest. That isn’t where you find me a lot, but it can be good. I prefer Twitter or Instagram.

Make your username the same

When you open a social media account, make sure the username is the same as others and your business. You’re creating a brand!

If you are trying to create a brand for your business, use that as your username, otherwise, stick to your own name. Having everything the same makes it easier for people to connect to you in multiple places, which is better for expanding your reach.

When you do choose a username, keep it as simple as possible. Having a string on numbers and letters that mean nothing is not hard to remember—just think about what this does to your readers! It turns them off! They won’t connect to you and will forget about you.

The biggest of all social media tips when it comes to usernames: make it memorable for easier sharing.

Test different things

Don’t be afraid to experiment. This helps you find something that works for you.

There are plenty of different social media strategies and not all will be effective. This involves tracking your progress, which you can do with software, to see what works, what doesn’t and where you may need some help.

Once you find a strategy that works, stick with it but keep tracking. Eventually that strategy may not work so well!

So, there you have it. Five social media tips for work at home moms. See, social media doesn’t have to be so scary, does it?

MORE: 5 top tools for time management when working from home

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