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How To (Easily) Boost Your Facebook ROI, Part II | June 19, 2013 (0 comments)
Merrick, NY—Last week, The Centurion Newsletter discussed how to identify return on investment in social media, which focused on leveraging Facebook—the most popular site—creatively. This week, we turn to one of the experts featured in that article, Howard Cohen of The Jeweler Blog, a company that provides blog and social media postings for jewelers, for more smart Facebook tricks to help your business increase your 'likes' and how to better promote your posts.
It’s Like, Really Important to be Liked. Cohen explains why fan 'likes' matter to your Facebook visitors. "Having a nice Facebook presence is just as important as having a nice website presence. If you're the business with a Facebook page that has only 20 friends/likes, and the next guy has 5,000, then you look like you're neglecting your online presence.
“Take advantage of the Build Audience button on the top right of your business Facebook page. If you are an administrator of the page, that button will allow you to invite your email contacts and personal Facebook friends to ‘like’ your business page. You may also ‘share’ the page."
All the managers of your Facebook page can take advantage of this feature, he continued. To add managers to your business page (meaning other people who can post and make changes to it), go to the Edit Page function on the top right of your business pages and select Manage Admin Roles. There you will be able add new managers. Note that Facebook will only recognize and accept the new manager if that person has 'liked' the business page."
According to Cohen, some jewelers have taken questionable shortcuts to build their 'likes.' On sites such as a Fiverr.com, companies offer 1,000 likes for $5. These companies allegedly harvest unused personal Facebook accounts and program them to 'like' your business page. One of Cohen’s clients had 50 ‘likes’ on a Monday and 1050 ‘likes’ on Tuesday. Although he doesn’t endorse this method because the 'likes' do not represent active, participating fans and customers, he acknowledges there’s a perception that the jeweler has a much more powerful presence on Facebook than he would have otherwise.
"The best choice is to grow your social media presence with true fans,” he emphasizes. Facebook also can help your increase your 'likes' with a paid ad that encourages people to find and like your page. If you have a business page, the pitch comes on your admin panel and looks like this:
(Image: Facebook)
Facebook will then estimate the number of 'likes' you can get for a price each day, and the choice is up to you whether you spend a little or a lot.
You may not think that 'likes' matter that much, or feel that your business has enough of them and that when you post, your post goes to everyone who has 'liked' your page, ensuring your fans see your message. But does it?
Not necessarily. Cohen says only about 20% of your fans see each post. Suppose you have 1,000 likes. When you post, you assume those 1,000 people get your posts—but instead, only about 200 receive it.
Promoting posts. So what do you do to reach more eyeballs? A simple, inexpensive and effective option is to promote a post. Under each individual post, Facebook has installed a new “Boost” option. The Boost button generates a pull-down menu that tells the jeweler what his/her potential reach is based on a budget, starting at $5. For this modest one-time fee, jewelers can promote a product, service, event, etc., to a group that includes all their 'likes' plus a portion of their 'likes' friends. Exponentially, this number can get into the thousands and even the tens of thousands.
“With thousands of new eyeballs now seeing your posts, you have a fighting chance to impress them with your Facebook presence and convert them into 'likes,'” said Cohen. But if the Facebook page is infrequently updated and has no compelling content, it is an opportunity lost.”
(Image: Insidefacebook.com)
Insidefacebook.com, a website devoted to insider insights, comments on this type of promotion. From its website: "Promoted Posts are page posts that get additional paid reach in News Feed among fans and friends of fans as a result of using a button on the page. Part of their appeal is that they don’t require page owners to create campaigns through the more complex ads create tool or Power Editor. With Promoted Posts, page owners pay a flat rate to reach a given number of users. For Sponsored Stories, Page Post Ads and other Facebook ad types, advertisers pay per impression or per click.
Another difference between Promoted Posts and Page Post Ads is that Promoted Posts are only shown to a page’s existing fans, with an option to reach friends of fans as well. Page Post Ads have more flexibility in that they can reach non-fans or only friends of fans. Promoted Posts also do not have for interest- or category-based targeting, which other Facebook ad types do.
Promoted Posts are shown exclusively in News Feed, both on desktop and mobile. The goal of these ads is to reach more of a company’s existing audience and some of their friends. These help get a page’s content seen but generally do not result in many new page Likes."
Cohen says it’s all a numbers game. Some of his jeweler clients have achieved more than 5,000 'likes,' and that’s money in the bank. Even though Facebook is delivering individual posts to only 20% of their 'likes,' the posts still hit 1,000 potential customers — for free.
Now it's easier to see where and why 'likes' are important to your online strategy. Today, where each 'like' matters and can ripple out to get more 'likes' and begin to make friends of friends into customers, these strategies may help you take your social media networking to the next level.
Top image: Wikimedia.com