Facebook is an incredibly powerful tool for businesses of all kinds. Through features like Pages and Groups, the social media kingpin provides a selection of ways for companies to raise their online profile. Many companies also see great success through Facebook’s paid advertising options such as Ads and Boosted Posts.
However – how can a small business stake their claim when they have absolutely no budget? If your company is new or going through a dry spell, it can feel like so many marketing options are closed off to you!
During times like these, it’s important to focus on the free options that are available to you. Thankfully, there are a number of free and easy ways to make the most out of your business’s Facebook Page.
Let’s take a look at ten of them…
1. Refresh your cover image and profile photo
A Page’s cover and profile images are significant places to show off your company’s visual branding, and have the potential to leave a lasting first impression. If you haven’t changed these for a while, it might be worth updating them to give your Page a new, updated look (check out the optimal dimensions for cover and profile images here).
In fact, you can now use a “cover video” rather than a still image if you prefer. Your video needs to be at least 820 pixels wide by 312 pixels tall, and between 20 to 30 seconds long. If you have a video that fits the bill, why not try it out?
2. Make sure your contact info, opening times, and “About” information are all up to date.
I know this one might seem a little obvious, but it might be worth going to the “About” tab on the left of your Page and checking that your physical address, phone number, email address, and opening times are all up to date. If you set up your page a long time ago, a few things may be out of date or refer to products or services you no longer provide. Contact information submitted to sites like Facebook can help local search visibility, so it’s well worth making sure everything is present and correct.
3. Invite your friends to like your page.
If your Page doesn’t have many likes, why not invite your friends to like it? Inviting friends can be a great way to grow your Page’s like count, in turn making your page appear more established to new visitors. Those who know you well may be a surprising source of fresh engagement, and even those who aren’t within your target market may still take a genuine interest in what you’re up to.
4. Share high quality visual content like images and videos.
When you’re considering the types of content to share on your Facebook Page, remember that plain text posts tend to get lost in people’s news feeds, with images and video generally taking precedence; we’re naturally quite visual creatures, so pictures and videos grab our attention far better than text does. If your business isn’t particularly visual, put some thought into how you can introduce a graphical element. Attractively presented testimonials, “how to” guidance videos, staff profiles, and behind the scenes content are all well worth considering. The only limit is your imagination!
5. Focus on engaging your audience rather than blatant promotion.
Though the aim of all businesses on social media is to promote themselves, social is really about making meaningful connections with people rather than pumping out the same old marketing messages again and again. Try to spark new and interesting conversations by asking for opinions on a relevant talking point within your industry. Start a Q&A session, share a piece of relatable content from elsewhere, or run a competition.
On a similar note, aim to share content with your followers that they’re likely to want to share with their friends, therefore increasing your reach. Offering up handy tips, relatable (and tasteful) humour, or captivating information pieces all work well in this regard.
6. Schedule regular content output.
Maintaining regularly updated social feeds is an important part of keeping up online appearances. However when you’re running a business, it’s easy to forget to post to social media every day. Thankfully, Facebook Pages now have an in-built scheduling function, so you can put posts together in advance at a time that suits you.
7. Keep an eye on Insights and Analytics.
Once you achieve 30 likes on your Page, you will gain access to Insights, a function that provides usage analytics for your Page. This tool provides reports on what times of day your audience is most engaged, the performance of individual posts, how engaged your audience has been, how many likes/followers your page has received, and more. It’s also well worth keeping an eye on your website’s own Google Analytics too, especially the Acquisition>Overview report, to see how many visitors are actually reaching your site through Facebook, giving you an overall picture of how effective your Facebook activities are.
8. Use Facebook Live and do so regularly.
One of Facebook’s more popular recent features is Facebook Live, which allows you to transmit live video to your page’s followers. One popular way in which business owners are using Facebook Live is to broadcast at a regular time each week, so their followers know when to tune in. Brainstorm topics to discuss on a live broadcast like you would topics for an informative blog post, but don’t stick to a rigid script; keep it fluid and chatty, and interact with those who tune in and engage.
9. Use your Page for customer service and reviews.
Businesses can also make positive use of Facebook’s private messaging functions. By inviting users to contact you via private message (or though Facebook’s Messenger app) you provide a quick and convenient method for customers to approach you about order updates, service enquiries, and customer service concerns.
Facebook Pages also provide the opportunity for customers to leave star ratings which can show up in local Google search results, so you may want to encourage happy customers to leave reviews through your Facebook Page.
10. Promote your offers and discounts in the Offers tab.
Depending on what your business does, how you promote yourself, and your plans for social media; the Offers tab may be very useful to you. By clicking on this tab and then choosing “Create Offer”, you can publicise an offer that people can redeem either in store or online. This function allows you to describe the offer using text and images, provide a promo code, display terms and conditions, and show an expiry date. If you regularly run sales or money-off promos, this may be a great way to get the word out.
[bctt tweet=”Check out these FREE ways to make the most of your Facebook Page!” username=”yellbusiness”]
Attention Facebook aficionados! Do you know of any other free ways that businesses can make the most out of their Facebook Page? Are there any new and interesting (and free) features that you think small businesses should know about? Let us know down in the comments!
Image Credit: Jack Moreh at FreeRangeStock
