in: Facebook
by: Katie Hellmuth Martin
There are many ways to market to everyone in the world who is addicted to their Facebook feeds. But how should you do this in a way that makes sense for your brand? What I am about to give you is permission to use a myriad of strategies for marketing on Facebook to people who know you, and to people who have never heard of you in their lives.
Balance Your Personal Facebook Sharing With Your Business Page Sharing
Knowing when and what to share on your personal feed is always the question most business owners and marketers ask themselves. Do my friends care? Wouldn't they rather see pictures of my cat? Sure they do! But many of them may need what you sell, may love that you sell it and want to support you, and may have friends who would be the perfect fit for what you are marketing. Plus, working your personal Facebook with your Business Page does have a physical effect on how your business performs in Facebook. Therefore, you have permission and a requirement from me to blend your marketing on your personal and business pages.
Press The "Share" Button On Your Photo, Video or Status Update From Your Business Page
Newsflash: Facebook rarely shows your amazing update or photo to your Facebook Business Page to those folks to clicked to "Like" it. Even if you paid for likes, those people won't see it! It's the big buzz kill about Facebook. No joke. They really want your $5 to "Boost" your update so that the people who love your business can actually see what is going on. That said, the computer scientists working at Facebook did factor in natural popularity into your Business Page. In the math behind what makes it into your Newstream, those computer coders did factor in if certain people are liking items on your Business page all of the time, then maybe they can see your update naturally in their Newsfeed. If that status update starts getting engagement on its own, then that update or photo will start to naturally show up in people's Newsfeeds. Facebook is not like Twitter or Instagram, where items that were posted seconds ago actually get to the top of your stream. No no no. The item has to be really popular, or has to have paid some money.
Therefore, I want you to press the "Share" button on a photo or status update before you press the "Boost" button for a minimum of $5. But who are you going to share it with? You are going to balance when you share it with your entire personal timeline, and when you share it with individuals so that the update or photo shows up on your friend's timeline.
Share Business Page Updates With Individual Friends
Sometimes you will not want to blanket share an update you made to your Business Page with your entire friend collection on Facebook. Especially if you are updating your Business Facebook Page a lot, you don't want to share every single thing on your own personal timeline. There are times when a post that you wrote, or a photo that you published is perfect for a friend of yours to see - or three friends of yours. Or maybe even 10 or 20. When you press the Share button, Facebook will ask you if you want to share it with a friend. This will look like this:
"Share with..."
Click that "Share with..." and then Facebook lets you write in one person's name. You write in and select their name, and then you write a personal note. For example, if you published a guide of Halloween Parades near your town, and you want to go to a parade with a friend, you could Share with your friend and say something like: "Hey! This is the parade I was talking about - do you want to go?". Or, if you sell baby products, and you are having a sale and your friend has always wanted to buy your product but hasn't pulled the trigger yet, you could "Share with..." your friend and say: "Hey! We just put this on sale and I thought of you!" Most of the time, when I share a blog post that I wrote for A Little Beacon Blog, I share it with at least one person. Even if that person is my mom: "Hey Mom, this is the beautiful historical hike I was telling you about that I think you will like!" Or to my partner Sabina who I try to recruit moving to my town:
"Hey Sabina! You too could live in all of this fall foliage!" when I'm sharing our 2015 Fall Foliage Roundup.
Or to some business friends when I or other writers publish an article on Tin Shingle: "Hey Jesse! This is an Instagram article you will LOVE for Pergamena. It's totally about hashtagging and your pictures will be seen by even more people who want the parchment you make."
Doing this helps the update actually do better for two reasons:
- People who watch your friend's timeline are able to see your post and any picture that went along with it.
- Under the hood in the code, Facebook makes a note that someone is sharing this (even if it's you the admin), and considers that the post may be popular, and that others might want to see it too.
Share A Business Page Update With Your Timeline
This share I would do less frequently. You don't want to bombard your people. However, if you want your friends and aqcuaintences to know what you are doing or have accomplished, you need to share this with your entire timeline. Stop doubting me here and listen. If you are a professional person, and you are speaking on or hosting a webinar at a certain time, you post it on your Business Page and you share that with your timeline. If your business got an award or mentioned in the press, you post that with a picture onto your Business Facebook Page. And then you share the entire thing with your timeline. Easy peasy. It's one click, and will not bombard your personal audience. And yes, your friends are your audience. We all are. Anyone who watches other people at any time is an audience. You want to inform and entertain them.
Personally Invite People To Your Event That You Created On Facebook
There are a few ways to invite people to an Event on Facebook, but one way that has the most impact: clicking a link to personally invite names that you type in. The reason for this is that the notification of your event shows up differently for people depending on how you invited them.
If you run a Facebook Group, and you click to invite everyone from the page, then people do get a notification that you did something. But they aren't told what. They just get a regular notification up in the top right hand corner of their Facebook accounts that you were active somewhere, and does not mention that what you did was an event, or even the name of that event.
If you manually type in and click on names, and send an event that way, then the notification looks like: "Katie Hellmuth Martin invited you to her party "Halloween Spooky Fun!!".
Which one would you respond to?
With so many ways to use Facebook to get in front of the right people at the right time, you can try different tactics that cost little to nothing and can do a lot for your brand's buzz. I encourage you to share selectively from your Business Facebook Page to your personal friends. Doing so in moderation can have big impact for your brand awareness and sales.
