Facebook is an excellent online tool to help increase business and attract potential customers by sharing critical information about your company. For businesses, a Facebook page with many likes/fans, along with updated content, helps to gain exposure, cultivate relationships, and communicate with your targeted audience. Increasing fans on your business page ensures that your Facebook updates will be seen by more people’s news feed where fans can like your content and share it with their friends. The issue is that Facebook has gotten so large, and there are so many businesses marketing on Facebook that the social network has implemented an algorithm that prioritizes content that gets engagement. That means that if your content gets no likes or comments from a targeted audience, your chances of being seen by the people you’re marketing to significantly decrease. Don’t worry, these 17 simple tips will help you gain fans, and grow your company’s organic reach.
Small Businesses Facebook Tips
1) Post Regular, Fresh Content
If you don’t invest time in maintaining your Facebook page, it will do little to nothing to help your business. When using Facebook as a marketing platform, a considerable amount of time is required in monitoring feedback posted to your Facebook Page, and keeping your page updated with fresh content. You can’t expect to get likes if you leave questions unanswered and fail to encourage conversation. “Research shows that a Facebook post receives half of its reach within 30 minutes. Consequently, you should try to determine when your fans are on Facebook and aim to schedule your posts around that time.” A few tips on content creation:
- Keep it short & simple
- Use images, GIFs and if possible video that is uploaded directly to Facebook (the last will get you the most organic reach)
- Always include a call to action
2) Remind Fans to React and Share
Facebook reactions are incredibly powerful. Likes have the least power, so if you can prompt your audience to love or laugh on Facebook, you’ll get a boost on the Facebook algorithm. Create react posts to execute this technique (polls are a great way to sneak this in). Try it out and measure your results. Burger & Lobster restaurant uses these to get their audience involved with their page.
3) Interact
The more interactions on a page, the more the Facebook algorithm is positively affected. Make sure you reply to each interaction individually. While you’re at it, personalize the responses. This will build a personal relationship with the peron who left the comment and possibly transform them into a brand ambassador.
4) Use Tagging and Acknowledgments
Status-tagging can drive in new connections. Tag an author or a popular Facebook page to draw attention, but only if you have good reason to do so. For example, selflessly promote a niche-post and how it benefits people who like your page. Be authentic, and the page admin (hopefully the fans as well) will appreciate you for it.
5) Use engaging Images and Videos
Rich media like videos get more reach, more attention and help your message stand out in News Feed Lifestyle images like the ones you see from your friends on Facebook are always engaging. Try sharing images of your products or photos of your customers enjoying your services. Greenish and blue-gray hues tend to be less popular compared to colors like aqua, bright red, navy and chartreuse. And open scenes with little activity tend to be unpopular.
6) Instagram-it
You do know that Facebook owns Instagram, right? Something tells us that Instagram posts will be held in high regard & given love by Facebook’s algorithm. Besides, this is a visual medium, and as you read above, images are key. Socialdraft’s PHOTO SHARING FEATURE MAKES THIS A SNAP!
7) Share Exclusive Discounts and Promotions
Offer special deals or perks to your customers to keep them interested and to drive online sales. Include call-to-actions with links to the most relevant page on your website. Valuable offers like buy-1-get-1-free or discounts over 20% are more likely to be shared and it helps spread the word about your business. To improve engagement with your promotions, include clear calls to action, redemption details, and when the promotion ends to add a sense of urgency.
8) Provide Access to Exclusive Information
Reward people who are connected to your Page and drive loyalty and online sales by providing them with exclusive information. Make them feel special by sharing exclusive product news, contests and events.
9) Create Contests
One way to attract Facebook likes and obtain those all-important email signups is by running a contest on your Facebook page. A well designed contest with a fairly valuable prize can land you contact information on hundreds of potential customers. Because when people enter your Facebook contest and provide their email and contact details, they become a new lead. You can run a Facebook contest to meet specific goals. For example, you can run a contest to get new fans, or keep fans engaged, to get new emails and leads, to expand awareness of your brand, or to generate fresh user content. [See 7 Facebook Contest Ideas].
10) Create a Two-Way Conversation
Ask your audience to share their thoughts and feedback on your product and services. This is another way to listen to your customers and improve your business. Posting content that shows you took their feedback into consideration can build customer loyalty and show you value their ideas.
11) Use Power Editor for More Targeting Options
All advertisers have access to Power Editor (as long as you have Google Chrome). Use Power Editor for more advanced targeting and for an easier way to create a campaign involving multiple ads.
12) Test Different Promoted Posts Using “Dark Posts – Now Called Unpublished Posts”
Another feature available through Power Editor. Ever want to test multiple different promoted posts (in terms of image, targeting, and text), but want to avoid annoying your fans with a ton of posts discussing the same thing? With Power Editor, you can create something called a “dark post” that is exactly the same thing as a regular post, but doesn’t appear on your page’s timeline. You can use these posts for advertising purposes to help test different creative, targeting, etc.
13) Target Your Posts
This is a tip for brands that have a high volume of likes. Even with the decline in organic reach, brands can benefit from targeting their posts to specific, relevant likes. If you have a promotion taking place in New York only, for example, target the post to reach only a New York audience.
14) Posts that Contain Just Text Generate a Higher Organic Reach than Posts with Images
There’s no arguing that posts with images tend to stand out more than posts without images, but Facebook provides a higher volume of reach to posts without image content. Consider this when you are posting content that doesn’t necessarily need an image coinciding with it.
15) Use Custom Audiences to Gain Additional Insight about Your E-mail List(s)
Take an e-mail list (prospects, customers, etc.) and upload them to Facebook to create a custom audience. From there, you can layer on things like interests, buying behavior, and other targeting options on Facebook to gauge the interests and behavior of your e-mail list. This can open up the door for new advertising opportunities and can help dictate your e-mail/content strategy.
16) Don’t Use Mobile Ads Unless Your Website is Mobile Friendly
Facebook makes it easy to target users by both desktop and mobile. While it’s tempting to try and reach your target audience as much as possible, if your website isn’t “mobile friendly”, you should avoid serving ads to mobile users.
17) Use Your Page’s Timeline as a Timeline
This is a great feature on Facebook for brands who have been in business for many years. Post your milestones (i.e. when you were founded, location openings, new product launches, etc.) and include a relevant picture to coincide with it).
18) Invite People Who Like Posts to Like Your page
This is the ultimate trick. Sponsor a post, then invite the people who liked that post to like your page. Think of it as a vetted ad, they already showed interest.
19) Use a strong social media management tool like Socialdraft
Socialdraft is an all-in-one social media dashboard. With Socialdraft, you can:
- Schedule to Facebook pages, Instagram accounts, Pinterest boards, Twitter accounts, and LinkedIn business pages.
- Identify influencers
- Pull reports
- Engage your audience
- Keep an eye on your online reputation
- and a ton more.
If you are looking for the ultimate social media tool, check out Socialdraft. We offer a risk-free trial and training for you and your team. We look forward to working with you.
Most businesses using Facebook on a regular basis to promote their company know by now that posts on Facebook continue to reach fewer and fewer users. With Facebook’s organic reach rapidly in decline, some experts claim it will eventually plunge to virtually nothing.
This realization has driven marketers to devise experimentally creative ways to reach more users. Most savvy marketers know that photos drive engagement on Facebook pages. According to Social Bakers, 87% of a Facebook page’s interactions happen on photo posts. No other content type receives more than 4% of interactions. Facebook pages embrace photos as posts, and 75% of page updates are photos.
Okay, So How About a Facebook Post With Multiple Images?
Early this year, Jon Loomer, one of our favorite marketing consultants, claimed it was possible that using multiple images in a Facebook post may increase Reach.
Loomer explained he had received information from various vendors that if you create a post with multiple images, you will reach far more users than with a typical image share — not a photo album, but a standard text share with added images.
In the example Loomer provides, this is done within the “Status” area of the publisher by typing your message and then clicking the camera icon to add multiple images from your desktop.
The key, says Loomer, is for the images to look presentable when uploaded together. “If you post two or three images, all will be presented side-by-side within the News Feed, on your Timeline and within the permalink.”
Loomer cites several people who provided him with successful illustrations. One was from Patrick Cuttica of SocialKaty.
Patrick provided the examples below:
* Home decor brand page with 5k-10k fans saw 262% increase over average Reach of five prior single image posts
* E-Commerce apparel brand page in 20k-40k fan range saw 280% increase in average organic reach over five prior single page posts
Patrick highlighted a couple of more important points: The decor page saw a 989 % increase in post clicks while the apparel page saw 870%. In each case, this happened even though fewer stories were generated.
Here are a few more success stories people shared with Loomer:
From Michelle Goulevitch:
“If you post 2 images instead of 3 its a better look in the news feed. Not only is reach up on these types of posts, but my engagement is up too (yay!).”
From Dennis Meador:
“Yes I post 3-4 pics at a time and get 2-3 times the reach even with same likes/comments.”
From Jose Mathias:
“Have seen that actually, with a page of 4,200+ likes. Multiple images reach like 3000 while text 2000 and links around 900-1000.”
From Bridget Cleary:
“We’ve found the same, by posting multiple images the reach seems to have improved.”
Considerations
Loomer suggests thinking of this multiple image concept in terms of utility: Do you think that sharing multiple images in this way will provide value? Is it something you think your fans will respond to?
Quick Tip: In Loomer’s own test, he only used square images that were 1200×1200 pixels. Facebook appeared to crop out the outer 5px or so, but kept each image square.
“I plan on experimenting with it. I recommend you do the same. But when you do, make sure you look beyond the metric of Reach. Does it lead to more engagement? More stories? More website traffic? More sales?”
How to Manage & Grow Your Social Media Accounts
Socialdraft is your all-in-one tool for Social Media management. Socialdraft allows you to:
Schedule posts to multiple Social media accounts
Monitor your online reputation
Have multiple people create and post content
Pull Reports
Engage
and much more
If you’re curious about how Socialdraft works, take us for a risk-free trial.
In order for business owners to successfully market their goods and services on the Internet, they need to understand the social media landscape, along with all the associated esoteric terms. For example, there are dozens of Facebook metrics, but even the most popularly used metrics are largely misunderstood because they don’t mean what people think they do.
As Jon Loomer, a digital marketing consultant points out, Facebook marketers regularly confuses Facebook Insights terms, so Loomer has provided a thorough breakdown of every important Insights term — both popular and obscure — that you need to know.
Reach and Impressions
Total Reach: The number of unique users who were served at least one impression of your content via News Feed, Ticker, Timeline or an ad.
Organic Reach: The number of unique users who were served at least one impression of your content via News Feed, Ticker or Timeline without advertising.
Paid Reach: The number of unique users who were served at least one impression of your content via News Feed, Ticker or Timeline with an ad.
Total Impressions: The number of times your content was shown on News Feed, Ticker, Timeline or an ad. One unique user can be shown multiple impressions.
Organic Impressions: The number of times your content was shown on News Feed, Ticker or Timeline without advertising.
Paid Impressions: The number of times your content was shown on News Feed, Ticker or Timeline with an ad.
Logged-in Page Views: The number of times your page was visited by a logged-in user.
Logged-in Tab Views: The number of times a tab was visited by a logged-in user.
Frequency Distribution: A breakdown of the number of unique users served an impression of your content by frequency (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6-10, 11-20 or 21+ times).
Engagement
Engaged Users: The number of unique users who clicked anywhere on your content, whether it resulted in a story or not.
Engagement Rate: The percentage of unique users who liked, commented on, shared or clicked on your post after having been served an impression.
Consumers: The number of unique users who initiated clicks on your content that did not result in stories.
Consumptions: The number of clicks on your content that did not result in stories. Types of Consumptions: Link Clicks, Photo Views, Video Plays and Other Clicks.
Post Clicks: The number of clicks on your content, whether it resulted in a story or not.
Talking About This: The number of unique users who generated a story about your content.
Stories: The number of times users interacted with your content in ways that were displayed to friends and followers. Examples: Page like; check-in, page mention, Event RSVP; Offer claim; post like, comment or share.
Negative Feedback: Actions users can take to tell Facebook that they do not want to see your content. Examples: Hide post, hide all posts, report as spam, unlike page.
Positive Feedback: Actions users take that generate stories and spread your message to their friends. Examples: Question-answer; Offer claim; post comment, like or share; Event RSVP.
Fan Data
The following terms are found in the Page Level Export…
Count of Fans Online: The number of your fans online per hour, by day, to see any content from any source.
Daily Like Sources: The exact location a user chose to like your page.
Total Likes: The number of likes accumulated by your page through a particular day.
Daily Likes: The number of likes accumulated on a particular day.
Daily Unlikes: The number of fans who unlikes your page on a particular day.
The following terms are found in the “Key Metrics” tab of the Post Level Export…
Fan Impressions: The number of times your content was shown to fans in News Feed, Ticker, Timeline or an ad. One unique fan can be shown multiple impressions.
Fan Paid Impressions: The number of times your content was shown to fans on News Feed, Ticker or Timeline with an ad.
Fan Reach: The number of unique fans who were served at least one impression of your content via News Feed, Ticker, Timeline or an ad.
Fan Paid Reach: The number of unique fans who were served at least one impression of your content via News Feed, Ticker or Timeline with an ad.
Engaged Fans: The number of unique fans who clicked anywhere on your content, whether it resulted in a story or not.
How to Manage & Grow Your Social Media Accounts
Socialdraft is your all-in-one tool for Social Media management. Socialdraft allows you to:
Schedule posts to multiple Social media accounts
Monitor your online reputation
Have multiple people create and post content
Pull Reports
Engage
and much more
If you’re curious about how Socialdraft works, take us for a risk-free trial.
For businesses that advertise on Facebook, it’s important to be able to determine the number of paid versus organic activities on your page in order to accurately measure organic growth. And since organic growth reveals successful tactics for building your audience, it can also be used to calculate your Facebook advertising budget.
According to Facebook, if someone views an ad for your Page and likes your Page several hours later, it’ll be counted as a paid like because it occurs within one day of viewing your ad. If someone clicks your ad and likes your Page several days later, it’ll be counted as a paid like because it occurs within 28 days of clicking your ad.
Some marketers urge brands to create new ad campaigns in order not to get overcharged for ads by Facebook.
Calculating Paid and Organic Likes
Paid and Organic Likes are broken down within Facebook Insight’s Like Sources which can be viewed within the Insights Tool, or the Insights data export, where the number of unique people that liked your page is listed by location.
There are three components of Paid Likes found within Like Sources: ads, mobile ads, and sponsored stories. The sum of these three components represent the total number of Paid Likes for your page. Organic Likes, page Likes that cannot be attributed to Facebook advertising, are calculated by subtracting Paid Likes from Total Likes.
Simply Measured’s Nate Smitha points out that the challenge of measuring paid ads and forecasting performance isn’t limited to Facebook Likes. Paid advertising also affects Engagement, Reach and Impressions.
To analyze Organic Likes further, try using SocialDraft.
Free Lunch is Over
Christopher Penn notes: “Facebook has made it abundantly clear that the free lunch of unpaid social media marketing using their service has come to an end; this ‘strategy pivot’ is punishing brand Pages repeatedly until they pay to reach their audiences.”
4 Tips to Maintain Low Cost Engagement
Penn has provided 4 tips to help maintain engagement and mitigate the cost of Facebook ads.
First, stop chasing Likes. Every 2 Likes you get is essentially a penny more you have to pay per post. Let people Like your page if they truly do like your brand, but stop asking them for Likes, and certainly stop paying Facebook for more Likes unless you’re prepared to pay again to advertise to that audience…every Facebook Like will cost you $1.82 in Promoted Post payments (at one sponsored post a day) to ensure that your new Like can consistently see what you’re publishing.
Second, you don’t have to necessarily pay to promote every single post. If you can’t afford to sponsor a post a day, consider sponsoring one every couple of days, paying only for the posts that are likely to generate the down-funnel activities you are trying to achieve. For example, you may not want to pay to promote a daily blog post, but you might want to invest in a post promoting an eBook or app download.
Third, supplement your Facebook marketing with other forms of digital marketing. Put a roundup of your blog posts in your weekly email newsletter. Share your best stuff on other social networks to ensure that it gets seen. Hop on new networks as you have time and resources to do so; newer networks are focused on audience building rather than immediate monetization.
Fourth, make some room in your marketing budget for Facebook if it’s still important to you. The bottom line is that the free ride is over on Facebook. If you want to play, you have to pay, so allocate budget accordingly. If you use our calculator, you’ll see what Facebook expects you to pay per day for the rest of this year.
The surest sign that social media has achieved maturity is that the free ride has come to an end. Expect more social networks to follow Facebook’s path. If you’ve been overly reliant on Facebook for your business, it’s urgent that you diversify as quickly as possible to other networks and other digital marketing tools that will help you save money – like Socialdraft.
How to Manage & Grow Your Social Media Accounts
Socialdraft is your all-in-one tool for Social Media management. Socialdraft allows you to:
Schedule posts to multiple Social media accounts
Monitor your online reputation
Have multiple people create and post content
Pull Reports
Engage
and much more
If you’re curious about how Socialdraft works, take us for a risk-free trial.
Some well-known public figures and Pages with large followings such as celebrities, journalists, government officials, popular brands, and businesses, are verified by Facebook for authenticity which is signified by a blue badge next to a verified profile or Page’s name. Today we’ll discuss the process on how to Verify Your Facebook Page.
Verify Facebook Fan Page With 3 Simple Steps
Facebook verifies profiles or Pages to ensure people and organizations are who they claim to be. A recent update from Facebook also allows local businesses to verify their page. However, they won’t get the blue checkmark, they will get a grey verification check mark instead.
However, not all authentic profiles and Pages are verified, and according to Facebook, you can’t request to have your profile or Page verified. You can report fake accounts that are impersonating you, your business or your brand.
If your profile or Page isn’t verified, there are other ways to help your followers or the people that like your Page know that your identity is authentic. For example, you can: link to your Facebook profile or Page from your official website, or complete the About section of your profile or Page to provide more information.
If you fall into the qualifying categories listed above, it’s a pretty easy and and process to apply for your Facebook page verification…[sociallocker id=”10536″]
Follow the process below to apply for Facebook Fan Page verification
1. First login to the Facebook account in which you created your Page and then click on below link: https://www.facebook.com/help/contact/1448613808726619
2. Request a “Verified Badge Page will open.“
Facebook Mentions is only available to people with verified Pages. To request a verified badge for your Page, you must fill out the included form. You must identify the Page you’re requesting to verify, but Facebook will not be able to verify business Pages.
3. Now select your Facebook Fan Page from dropdown list.
4. Then attach a photo of your ID if you’re a public figure or articles of incorporation if you represent a media, entertainment or sports company. (You can add more than one ID, If you have)
5. If you have official website then you should also add the official website.
6. At Last click on send button. [/sociallocker]
You will receive a message indicating your request has been submitted. After 2 or 3 days, Facebook will identify your page and if they found your page to be genuine, they will verify your FB page and inform you via Email.
Follow the process below to apply for Facebook Business Page verification
These directions are from Facebook directly. Your page must have a profile picture AND a cover photo.
1. Click Settings at the top of your Page
2. From General, click Page Verification
3. Click Verify this Page, then click Get Started
4. Enter a publicly listed phone number for your business, your country and language
5. Click Call Me Now to allow Facebook to call you with a verification code
6. Enter the 4-digit verification code and click Continue
How to Manage & Grow Your Social Media Accounts
Socialdraft is your all-in-one tool for Social Media management. Socialdraft allows you to:
Schedule posts to multiple Social media accounts
Monitor your online reputation
Have multiple people create and post content
Pull Reports
Engage
and much more
If you’re curious about how Socialdraft works, take us for a risk-free trial.
One way to promote your business and build support for your band is to create a Facebook fan page. A fan page differs from a personal Facebook profile because fan pages are visible to everybody on the Internet. Anyone on Facebook can connect to and receive updates from a page by becoming a fan.
Share a User Post on Facebook’s Fan Page
As with a friend’s profile, Facebook pages enable public figures, restaurants, hotels, retail stores, community organizations and other entities to create a public presence on Facebook.
How to Create a Facebook Fan Page
Log in to your Facebook account.
Click on the settings gear on the top right-hand corner of your page.
Click on “Advertising.”
Look under “Step 1: Build Your Facebook Page” to the left of the center of the screen and click on “Create a Page.”
Click on the type of page you’d like to create.
There are six categories:
* Local business or place: If you choose this option, you need to select the category of your business or place and to type in the address of your business.
* Company, organization or institution: If you choose this option, you’ll need to select the category of your company, organization, or inawstitution, and to type in the name of your company.
* Brand or product: For this option, you’ll need to select the category of product and to type in the name of the product.
* Artist, band, or public figure: For this option, you’ll need to select the category for the type of artist, musician, or public figure you’ll be promoting as well as his or her name.
* Entertainment: For this category, you’ll need to type in the type of entertainment as well as the name.
* Cause or community name: For this option, you’ll have to type in the name of the cause or community.
For all of these categories, you’ll have to click to “Agree to Facebook Pages Terms” before you can move on.
Click on “Get Started.” After you’ve chosen the appropriate category and provided basic information, you’ll be able to start adding some information for your page. There’s a few more steps but you get the idea.
Difference Between a Fan Page and a Group
As David A. George points out, unlike groups, fan pages are visible to unregistered users and are thus indexed in search engines. Unlike pages, groups allow you to send out a “bulk invite” while with pages you will be forced to drop some invites manually.
As a result, groups are better for viral marketing, while pages are generally better for long-term relationships with your fans, readers or customers. Groups are generally better for hosting an active discussion and attracting quick attention.
Facebook Recently Updated Their Fan Page Layout
We’d like to extend a hat tip to Luke Beaumont for this little gem. Beaumont reports that Facebook recently updated their fan page layout and moved some vital features in the process.
It’s still possible to share fan posts to your Facebook page but you’ll no longer find this feature in the activity log where it used to be. When Beaumont queried Social Media Examiner about this topic, they said it wasn’t possible.
The reason why you want to share these user posts is that it’s free advertising: great reviews that are unpaid and user generated. They give validation to your brand and make for great content.
To share a fan post on your page timeline just follow Beaumont’s simple instructions:
1. Go to the drop down arrow at the top of Facebook on the right hand side and change to the page you want. (See Fig 1)
2. Scroll down to the ‘posts to page box’ and click the top of this box. (See Fig 2)
3. Once all the post pop up, scroll to the post you want to share on your timeline and click the “share button.” (See Fig 3)
4. Add any additional information or a comment in the text box then press the blue “share” button. (See Fig 4)
5. A confirmation message will briefly pop up. Press the X in the upper right hand side of the box to close it down (See Fig 5)
6. Click the name of your page at the top of the screen on the right-hand side to refresh the page. (See Fig
7. That’s it you’re done. The post has now been shared on your page.
How to Manage & Grow Your Social Media Accounts
Socialdraft is your all-in-one tool for Social Media management. Socialdraft allows you to:
Schedule posts to multiple Social media accounts
Monitor your online reputation
Have multiple people create and post content
Pull Reports
Engage
and much more
If you’re curious about how Socialdraft works, take us for a risk-free trial.
