Facebook is no doubt a force to be reckoned with in the social media industry. With over 2.01 billion monthly active users around the world as of June 2017, Facebook has the kind of reach marketers dream about. Whether you’re seeking to attract leads, boost sale, or increase customer engagement, Facebook is the social media tool to use.
If you’re new to the world of Facebook marketing, you will need to begin by setting up a Facebook page. Listed below are why having a Facebook Page is essential to growing your business.
The numbers don’t lie. 2.3 million Kiwis reportedly access Facebook every day, rivalling Australia’s 12 million. That’s approximately half of both the Kiwi and Aussie population engaging with content on Facebook every single day.
To reach your audience, the first step is to create a Facebook Page. Getting your page “liked” allows your content to appear on a customer’s News Feed, although the organic reach of Page post content has been steadily declining. Regardless, having a Facebook page helps fuel discovery and action: 80% of Kiwis on Facebook discover products and brands on the platform, and 56% of them remain on the platform to learn more or go to a business’s websites.
Your Facebook Page allows for multiple interactions between you and your customer. These include the custom Call-To-Action button (e.g. “Call Now”), direct messaging, direct posting on your Page and many others.
Your customers will see your posts on their News Feed if they Like or Follow your Facebook Page.
Facebook is an all-encompassing engagement tool because of its many capabilities – most important are the react (previously like), comment and share features. The latter two are perhaps the most important because they allow customers to engage with the content as well as with the company directly. It’s never been easier to write questions and submit feedback online as a customer. Commenting on and sharing a Page’s Facebook posts helps people feel connected to their favourite products to an almost personal level. The tag function also helps people share your content with their friends by tagging them directly.
The Events function is also particularly useful for nurturing and even gaining audience engagement. If your company is hosting networking, sales or not-for-profit events, Facebook can help you spread the word online through the easy-to-use Events template. Once an Event is created, a post is created on your Page where people can interact and share your Event. Doing this can increase event awareness significantly. Facebook even does all the hard work for you by sending reminder notifications to your audience.
Facebook posts act as useful marketing tools if optimised correctly. Relevant posts such as events, offers, discounts and even general information can spread like wildfire or become viral under the right circumstances.
The important thing to keep in mind when making Facebook posts is that they have to be “thumb-stoppers” (i.e. they have to catch attention and make people pause, read, and ultimately share them). The best way to do that is to make sure your content is engaging and entertaining – in short, appeal to your audience’s senses.
We’ve mentioned before that video is dominating Facebook. Videos are vital for marketing because they capture attention and reward the visual, aural and even tactile senses. But that isn’t to say that image-based posts aren’t effective either; video posts outperform image-based ones by only a small margin (12.05% vs 11.63%).
At any rate, videos and images are significantly more likely to lead to engagement than either links or simple status updates.
Let’s face it – Facebook is everywhere. There is a high chance of your potential or loyal customer already having a Facebook account. Whatever your business goal is, a Facebook Page is essential to increase your customer reach and maintain them. Make sure your posts are engaging and attention-grabbing so you can land on your audience’s News Feed the next time they’re on their lunch break – and maybe even earn a comment or two.
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