Publishing personnel and policy
It is of utmost importance that all people who manage and/or publish content on your Facebook Business Page are in sync as far as the quality of content is concerned. It is a good idea to have a written down policy.
Updates
– Non-text updates: Use images, videos and links. These are known to have a better impact in terms of engagement than your regular text updates. However, the image/video should be relevant and not just be there for the sake of having non-text content.
– Crisper updates: To cater to short attention spans along with competing content, updates have to be short. So, when you do have text updates, which are good once in a while too, make sure they are short. Alternately, if what you have something longer to say, say it straight, say it systematically and get out of the way.
– Post frequently: Your readers are likely to have hundreds of friends/groups on Facebook. Their timeline is bound to be busy. Post regularly so that you are in the eye of the reader. At the same time, be careful not to overdo it. You are likely to be muted/unfollowed/reported if the timeline starts getting crowded with only your posts.
On the other hand, you could post the same update more than once to reach out to different time zones. Use analytical tools to find out when is the time most of your followers are online.
– To promote or to not promote?: The answer, as always, lies in a balance between promotional and non-promotional content. In fact, post a lot of relevant stuff that is not necessarily related to your business. This makes you the go-to place for information related to the product type, and not just your brand.
Instead of direct promotional material, try sharing inside stories that readers might find interesting. That gives your page a personal touch.
– Use tags: To end up in search results and get your content trending, use intuitive tags. A lot of tags have a shade of “too smart for itself”, which should be avoided. Again, do not over-tag. Too many tags may distract users from the actual content.
Also, tag relevant people and other pages to get them engaged with your update. However, do not tag people and places unnecessarily, because it could get annoying.
– Be conversational: Have a human voice. Make people feel they are talking to an actual person and not a brand.
– Bring in humor: Be relevant while being funny. Remember, many people are on Facebook for to take a break from work or to connect with their friends’ updates. Make your content entertaining.
These tips are all directed towards making your content shareable. That is how word spreads on Facebook. That is what you want, ultimately.
Connect with your followers
Following up on wanting to create shareable content, you will realize people aren’t going to share unless they feel connected.
– The comments section is a fertile ground for interacting with your followers who have already taken the trouble of leaving a comment on your content. Interact with them, thank them, address their concern if any. But don’t leave a comment hanging.
– Enable private messaging. If you do not allow your followers to send you a message one-on-one, you might be missing out on valuable feedback and/or other comments. Make yourself approachable. And of course, do reply to private messages.
– Participate on others’ pages: Another way to connect with your followers is to participate on other pages. Pages that you might find your followers and/or potential followers on. Your interaction there could create curiosity about your brand.
Facebook Tools
Facebook has some very handy tools that you could use to make your updates more effective.
– Schedule posts: This could aid you in re-posting updates to suit different time-zones. Also, it helps with planning your update strategy. This can be done either using “Publishing Tools” or the option on the “Publish” button of your update.
– You can also set individual updates to expire at certain times. These come in handy for time-bound updates like events or limited period offers or contests with deadlines and so on. You have to allow admin to set posts to expire by changing the “Settings” of your page.
– Use the “Pin to Tab” option of an update to keep it at the top of the page. You can, obviously only pin one update at a time.
Page insights
Use the analytical tools provided by Facebook itself and third-party analytics applications to know which of your updates are working and which aren’t.
– Experiment with your content. Try and isolate one idea for an update to see if it is being effective. You can experiment with more than one idea at any given time, but do it across updates rather than all in one update. This will help you figure out what’s working with better accuracy.
– Replicate success. Apply the strategies that work to fresh updates. Track their performance so you know for sure it is working. Also, each idea has an expiry date or a marginal utility so to speak. So, you want to track performance to know when the idea is dying out too.
– Use these success stories to decide what to promote using Facebook ads. How to create a Facebook Ad is a topic that merits its own article.
Having said all of this there are two things that you have to keep in mind while applying the strategies, especially the ones related to dynamic content. Facebook is continuously working on making the pages work better. You have to keep track of the new or updated features and use them to your advantage sooner rather than later. And be patient. Social Media strategies take a time to evolve and start showing results in terms of likes, shares, and comments.
