A lot of your time on Facebook is going to be spent just posting on your own page. Remember this: a completely ‘dead’ Facebook page that is like a ghost town is worse than having no Facebook page at all. So keep it active, even if that means just the occasional ‘hit and run’ post.
Another benefit of just posting occasionally is that it shows that there are real people behind your brand and that your company is approachable and interactive. This wil give people a lot of confidence when they’re thinking of buying from you for instance.
Note as well that you can automate the process of commenting and posting. One way to do this is to use the amazing IFTTT. IFTTT can be 19
found at IFTTT.com and is an acronym of ‘If This, Then That’. The general idea here is that you link accounts and connect ‘triggers’ to ‘actions’. So for instance, you can use this to post automatically to your account when you upload some new content, or you can use it to respond to people’s comments. You can even set something up to allow yourself to text a number that wil lead to comments being uploaded on your Facebook page.
One more use for IFTTT is to link your Facebook and Twitter accounts.
This way, anything you post on Twitter can automatically be added to your Facebook page, which wil in turn mean that you spend less time on your social media to keep it looking highly active.
Another popular, well known tool here is ‘Buffer’ and this can be used interchangeably with ‘HootSuite’. Both of these tools have options to
‘queue’ posts to your Facebook page and this then means that you can set aside a day to write lots of posts and then have them post regularly at set times during the day. This saves a lot of time overall and it ensures that your social media pages wil never appear to be very quiet and abandoned.
What’s more, it’s very useful for going on holiday.
Use these simple ‘hit and run’ posting tactics and you can keep your Facebook page alive and sharing interesting content and value for your followers. At the same time, you’l consistently be sending more people to your external pages with the hopes of potentially converting.
Hit and Run Comments and Posts
Another way to get a lot of attention for your posts is to post to other pages and groups. Here you have a large audience of people who are interested in the same thing and this gives you the perfect place to market to.
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Unfortunately, a lot of pages and groups won’t allow ‘non-administrators’ to post which presents something of an obstacle. You can join some groups which wil then allow you to share your content and some pages do al ow anyone to post. In most cases though, you’d have more luck trying a similar strategy on Google+ or on Reddit.
So what can you do instead, you can simply comment on pictures and images as a one off and then use this to increase awareness of your page and even get likes. Remember: every time someone sees your brand that wil be free exposure for you and this is a great way to increase your visibility. So even if you’re looking for active comments sections and just engaging in a discussion, that’s al good stuff and it can lead to likes. Visit a popular page and look at the comments on some of their images – you’l see that they can sometimes have hundreds of likes themselves! Find a Facebook page about Jackie Chan, post a picture of you with him, or a meme featuring him, or a popular quote – and you might find it drives more people to your page.
This is something a lot of people forget with Facebook. Not everything that you do has to be outwardly ‘promotional’. Sometimes, it’s actually more effective just to join in with the discussion and let the likes come naturally.
Just remember to act ‘in character’ for your brand and to post things that wil be helpful and interesting, or that wil help to demonstrate your expertise, knowledge or entertainment value. You can try and make direct sales or gain traffic from comments on other people’s pages but it’s likely to just result in your comment getting deleted.
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Another big strategy for generating income from Facebook or for building your brand awareness is to use Facebook Ads. Why is this so important?
Well, simply put, your Facebook Page will have an ‘organic reach’ of about 1-2%. What does that mean? It means that if you have 100 followers on Facebook, only one or two of them will see what you post each time you post. If you have 1,000, you’ll get 10-20 views for anything you post.
Of course your followers can see your content if they visit your Facebook page. But as far as content appearing in the newsfeed goes, only that small proportion are going to see what you’re uploading unless you do something extra to promote it. This is where Facebook advertising comes in, which effectively allows you to extend that reach to everyone in your list of followers and further.
Facebook ads can take multiple forms, they can appear as ‘Page Posts’, they can appear as promotions for your page (to increase likes), they can appear as pictures and they can appear as videos. If you’re selling products, it’s also now possible to have a multi-item advert that wil show off your items in a carousel-type display.
The great thing about Facebook ads is that they let you target your audience specifically based on their age, sex, location, interests, job description, marital status and more. This way, you aren’t wasting money on adverts shown to people who aren’t likely to have any interest in what you’re selling.
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Better yet, Facebook ads can be ‘CPC’. That stands for ‘Cost Per Click’
and effectively means that you only pay out when someone actually clicks on your ads. So if your advert is completely ineffective at getting people to click, you won’t be charged anything at al .
And it gets better. Using something called ‘CPA’ (cost per action) you can create a scenario where you’re only charged when a click results in a particular action. For instance, this might mean that you only pay for people who actually like your page. You can also use Facebook promotions and only pay when someone redeems a promotional voucher. This way you almost guarantee your ROI and you know you’re going to get tangible results from your efforts. The best way to manage Facebook is by using natural posts and adverts together synergistically. Build your Facebook page and with posts and ads and then use that page to fuel more posts and ads…
Letting Your Fans do the Work
And don’t forget that you are not the only one who can post content to Facebook. We’ve already seen the type of content that can get re-shared and remember, when people comment on your posts or like them, that also means they’l get seen by that person’s network. Each time someone likes or comments on your posts, it opens it up to a larger audience and creates the opportunity for more comments, likes and shares. This is how content can potentially even go viral.
But that’s not the only way you can leverage your fan base and get them to do the work for you. Also effective is to encourage them to share your 23
content directly from your blog or website. Here, you just need to add social sharing buttons onto your posts and that way people who enjoy the content can show it to their friends and this is great for getting your old content to keep giving back. This way, even if you don’t have a large Facebook page yet, you can stil benefit from a post potentially going viral on Facebook!
There are countless plugins you can use on a WordPress website to add this functionality. One of the best known and most feature rich though is
‘Shareaholic’.
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Chapter 4: How to Find Pages and Groups to Share Your Content To
As we mentioned briefly in the last chapter, one of the best ways to get your posts seen by a targeted audience is to post to existing Facebook pages and groups. This way, you can choose who sees your content based on their interests and you can benefit from al the hard work that the creator of that page or group has already done.
You’l find that most Facebook pages are built for promotional purposes by their creators. As such, you often won’t be able to add your own content there unless you first become an administrator – which requires permission from the owner.
Instead then, look for and join groups. This way, you’l be able to take part in the discussion and this wil often include the ability to post links if you so wish.