Facebook Marketing Tips For Businesses of Any Size
Of all the social media platforms out there, Facebook is the best one for reaching a specific audience. You have excellent control over growing your business, and targeting a specific audience. You can hire a social media marketer to handle your account so you can focus on running your business. However, if you decide to do it yourself, here are some Facebook marketing tips to help you get the best results.
Forget Vanity Metrics
Vanity metrics are when you get a lot of likes on a post, or your Facebook page gets a lot of likes. That shouldn’t be your focus if you really want to bring in new business from Facebook. Your focus should be getting people to click your Facebook posts and go to your website and buy. If you have an actual location, you want people to come in and buy. It doesn’t matter if you have 2700 Facebook likes on a post if none of those people ever buy anything from you. Likes don’t translate into revenue.
It doesn’t Cost Much to Reach Far
A lot of people have a misconception that it takes a lot of money to reach a lot of people. However, you can refine your Facebook ad, targeting certain zip codes. You control the budget of your ad, meaning you can spend as little as $5 up to as much as you want.
Example: One client of mine runs different sales on a weekly basis, and for as little as $10 I boost a post with their promotion, getting 70-80 likes, sometimes up to a dozen shares, and reaching several hundred, even a thousand people. I find that people often tag others in the comments section of the post, to tell them about the sale, because they know their friends shop there. I target households in specific zipcodes, which are people that will actually shop at their store. If you have a sale and you want people to know about it, this is a great way to spread the word.
You can promote your Facebook page, or a page on your website.
If you sell a high price service or product, you can direct your ads to people, directing them to your Facebook page for generating warm leads. You can also direct them to a landing page on your website. You can track all of this, so you can see how effective your campaign is. You can also see where your conversions are coming from. This gives you a few things to focus on. If you aren’t converting traffic to buyers, is your landing page designed well? Do visitors know what to do? If a lot of people are seeing your Facebook ad, but not many people are clicking it, maybe your ad needs to be tweaked. Maybe the message doesn’t resonate enough with them. If you aren’t tracking specifics, you won’t know what to change to make it work more effectively.
Post regularly, but don’t overdo it
It’s important to be active with your followers, but don’t blast the same stuff over and over. Also, don’t post only promotional content, like sales, etc. Post fun images, like photos from events, a new project you’re proud of, or something interesting that happened at the office. People like to see a little company culture, too. The key is balance. Below is a graphic from Hubspot where they did a test on frequency of Facebook posting.
The graphic reinforces the idea that you have to find the right frequency of posts for your business that works with your particular audience. If you see a decline in engagement on your posts, that doesn’t mean post more. That may actually mean that you might take a step back and post more useful or interesting content. The idea is that it’s not quantity, it’s quality that drives engagement.
Add a Call to Action to Your Facebook Page
A call to action is a button or a graphic that gets a user’s attention and tells them what action to take next. Notice on my Facebook page, I have a button that says call now! I could also use something like “Call a quote” or something similar. This instructs the visitors to your Facebook page what they need to do next. Sometimes they don’t know.
Link your other Social Media Accounts
You can cross promote your social media accounts on your Facebook page, too. It’s a good way to spread your reach a little further. Some people prefer Twitter over the other social media accounts. Some prefer Google+. Others prefer Tumblr over the other ones. If you post content on those (which you should), you can connect with them where they are most likely to be. All those social links back to pages and posts on your website are good for SEO, too.
You can build a community around your page
Facebook groups are a big hit with creating engagement and a sense of community around your brand. This is one of the best Facebook marketing tips I can give you.You can decide who’s in your group, and it can be open or closed. You can add people or businesses that make sense for your business and add a lot of value for them. I know a lot of business owners that have closed a lot of sales through their Facebook groups. Members can post questions, you can share files and promote content directly to members, and you can be sure the right people will see it. If you already have a Facebook business page, then you can click on the Community link in the left column. Then, you can create a Facebook group around your business page. It’s that easy!
One thing that works well is encouraging user-generated content. Neil Patel, one of the most influential online marketers, says that “User-generated content actually drives 6.9x higher engagement than brand-generated content.” You can read more about that here. This can be anything like having a dedicated post each week where each member shares a link or an offer they have that other members might be interested in. This cuts down on spam, but can greatly benefit your members. Just remember to have strict rules in place to weed out spammers and people trying to promote their own groups.
Post Mixed Content
It’s not a good idea to post only blog posts or links to your website. You will want to share other forms of content. Share an infographic that is relevant to your business, but one that resonates with your audience. Post a video or share a PDF guide. If you do something like a guide, you might have them opt-in via email for it on a landing page on your website. You should also mix in relevant content from other people in your industry, as long as they aren’t direct competitors. You don’t want to send business to them! The key to success when sharing content with your audience is asking yourself one question. Is it useful?
Conclusion
All social media platforms have become a focal point for businesses to reach customers. Businesses are closing more sales and engaging better with their customers. With the Facebook marketing tips I’ve shared should help you to build a community around your business and connect better with your ideal customers.