Achieving sustainability might be one of the most significant challenges for small businesses. Being able to generate leads and grow your customer base is essential for the future of your business. Facebook is a platform that can be leveraged in your favor. Focus your efforts around a few key areas and you’ll grow your brand while bringing in paying customers.
Differences Between Organic and Paid Social
Organic and paid social media tactics can both be useful in helping you achieve your goals. The differences lie in the scope of exposure your content gets and the immediacy of results.
Paid social is an excellent way to get results shortly after placing your ad or paying to boost your Facebook post. With paid social, as soon as the allotted budget runs out, your exposure ends.
With organic methods, you’ll have to invest a little more time, but results can be longer-lasting.
Because online promotion can be costly, you need to maximize the impact of the money you spend. By combining organic strategies and achieving the best return on investment for paid methods, you can attain excellent results. Check out these 7 tips on how to grow your brand with Facebook.
1. Optimize Your Profile Page
Optimize your profile page and maximize the amount of information available to your audience about your business. Make sure that all your contact information is complete, correct, and updated.
Once you get to 25 followers, don’t forget to select a suitable vanity URL. A vanity URL is the custom page address for your business page. It will usually be your business name or a phrase associated with your brand.
Your profile page should link to your website, and you should also ensure your website links to your profile page. Add your logo as your Facebook profile picture and create a suitable banner for the cover image.
2. Create a Content Calendar
A successful Facebook marketing strategy requires that you post content regularly. To make sure you do this, you should create a content calendar that includes:
- industry and social events,
- seasonal trends,
- popular topics,
- and interactive content.
Also, keeping your communication bidirectional will ensure that people revisit your profile.
Research keywords when you plan your content: determine what keywords are being searched for in your field and create your content based on those keywords. You can also use a tool like Google Trends to discover the hot topics in your niche.
Once you’ve built your keywords list, you can use Facebook Creator Studio to schedule your content ahead of time – saving you a lot of time by doing all of your content planning for the month at once.
3. Post with Intent
Though regular posting is essential, you don’t want to reach the point where you are merely uploading content just for the sake of posting. If you are to maximize your return on time invested, you want to post with a clear purpose.
When preparing your content, try and relate to your customers: how will your audience see your content? After all, you’re posting it for their sake. Be friendly, engaging, and informative.
Writing a valuable post will not achieve any sales unless you can get your audience to act. That’s why you need to include a strong, visible call to action – and don’t forget to add a phone number or page link to it.
4. Follow Your Competitors
In the Facebook marketing game, your small business isn’t the only player. You’ll need to keep an eye on your competition so that you can benchmark your efforts against theirs. Try to leverage any additional research you may have that your competitors do not.
When benchmarking, you should also take a look at what is working for your competitors: which types of posts get maximum interaction for them? What kind of ROI are they getting on their paid ads? What kind of money are the top players investing?
5. Focus on Building Your Community
Build a Facebook Group centered around your customers’ interests. The tighter the community you create, the more trust people will have in your brand. Not all small businesses can benefit from the creation of a Facebook Group, so you’ll have to first think about if your audience needs this and then figure out what conversation topics would engage them.
What’s in it for them to want to join your group? People enjoy having a dedicated space. Think of ways you can give back to your community and support your clients. This will definitely pay-off, as you’ll soon see an increased brand loyalty and you might even discover some brand ambassadors!
Also, be sure to engage in other community interest groups. By placing your business as an authority in your space, you’ll build a loyal following, which will translate in sales and brand equity.
6. Use Custom Retargeting Audiences
Facebook retargeting is a type of advertising that targets users that interacted with your brand but didn’t convert. Here’s what you need to do to start using custom audiences:
- Go to your Facebook Ads Manager
- Select Audiences.
- To create an audience, choose Custom Audiences.
- Then pick a target audience from the dropdown menu.
- This will create a pixel code that you must then place on your website.
You can use retargeting on your email and eCommerce lists with the Custom Audiences feature. You’ll also be able to show ads to a custom audience created from your email lists.
7. Boost Posts When Possible
When you post content, Facebook doesn’t show it to your entire following. This is done so businesses like yours are motivated to pay a small fee to boost their content. Though this may sound like a strange business model, you can use it to benefit your business. By spending five dollars on boosting a well-crafted piece of content, you can end up growing your following and generating leads. When promoting a post, don’t neglect to invite people to like your page and follow your brand. A small investment can go a long way if implemented correctly.
Leveraging Facebook for Maximizing Your Results
Facebook is a robust platform, with over 2.6 billion monthly active users. With so many people spending their time on Messenger, in groups, and just browsing their feed, your business’s target audience could be on Facebook as well. If they are then turn them into paying customers with an effective marketing strategy.
The best way to go about applying Facebook marketing for your small business is to incorporate both organic and paid methods. Monitor your metrics to track engagement and compare your methods and results against the top players in your market.
With over 80% of businesses being active on Facebook, why leave the extra revenue on the table, for someone else to grab? Your small business website, together with a solid Facebook marketing strategy, can generate leads and sales even when talking about smaller budgets.
And, even more important, you’ll have a chance to strengthen your relationship with your audience. This can only result in greater business authority and will also contribute to higher conversion rates.
This article was originally published at Hostpapa.ca, by author Maria Bustillos. Original article >>
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