Facebook Marketing – A New Trend after Google Marketing

Facebook was founded in Feb 2004.After it entered the marketing field a lot of changes have taken place.Its daily active users are exceeding 1.56 billion and increasing daily. Apart from the number of users, the average time spent by a user on Facebook daily is about one hour, making this platform unique.

Almost all active users know its manifold uses, and some of the most relevant ones are marketing, e-commerce, referrals, customer relations, brand awareness and many more.While marketing through this unique platform is very successful, it is used under expert’s guidance. There are several factors required to be considered for achieving the desired goals on Facebook.

The main aspects have been described below briefly, which you will find very useful in your endeavour of progress through this most popular social media platform.

Setting Up a Facebook Page –

• Select one of the two categories – Business or Brand
• Choose the name of your Page carefully to avoid the subsequent tedious process of changing it. Fill the requires data correctly. Add a suitable photo of prescribed size with short and relevant description, user name for the Page.
• Add Page to short-cuts, set-up Page roles like Admin, Editor, Moderator Job Manager, Advertiser etc. Customise the notification. Add CTA, organise Page Tabs and verify your Page. The top priority is given on launching new products, building brand awareness, increasing sales turnover or consolidating leads for follow up. The ‘Likes’ are most important for all the above efforts. A ‘like’ is not just a response; it shows that the user is interested in your product or services and wants to get updates from you in their news feed

Fill up the ‘About’ section of your Page carefully. Include searchable information avoiding overstuffing the keywords.

Your business offers, proper categories and links back to your website are to be included.

You can share your Page with people you are already connected on Facebook. Avoid excess promotion as Spammy marketing does more harm than good.

Don’t forget to include Social Media Follow Button on your website and blog as the website’s limitations are taken care of on Social Media platforms where you can upload contents of various formats like images, videos etc. Another way is to use a Page plug-in to promote your Facebook Page on the website easily. Facebook builds the iframe code that shows a feed of your latest posts. The visitors need not leave your website to like and share your Facebook Page, which is essential for you.

Verify your Page –

Depending on the category, the verification badge is given by Facebook. E.g. a grey badge is provided for business or an organisation. Though it is not compulsory to have a badge, it still adds a sense of authenticity to your Page and company. This is more important in online services or e-commerce business which requires the trust of potential customers.

Getting Facebook Likes and Fans –

As it has been experienced, images have more impact than texts. The size of the image, as well as the ratio, are essential. The rate of 1:9:1 is ideal. There are fixed specs for different pictures, and the same should be followed. The quality of the image is very crucial to grab the attention of users. Try to maintain a consistent style among all photos posted.

Facebook Links-

Share the blog posts you publish. Select those blogs that are in sync with your Facebook audience’s liking and preference as they may share it further. One or two sentences about the brand should be intriguing and inspire the audience to learn more.

While using the Facebook platform for your marketing, you should be aware of the platform’s practice and system to use the same for your benefit. E.g. inclusion of a meta-description with each blog post enables the Facebook system to pull it in to describe your link.

Facebook Video –

To tell a story video is the best and most popular option. Keeping in view, the Facebook Algorithms live and longer videos with high completion rates get priority in users’ news feeds. Proper preparation is to be done under the guidance of an expert team as videos’ popularity increases. The quality has to be unique to grab attention among n number of options on Facebook. Most compatible are MP4 or MOV formats. Next, you have to add a title, tag or some text to your post and add it to your playlist. With Facebook links, use this text to attract your audience to watch the video.

One essential point to be remembered –

As Facebook auto-plays the videos, the content has to be very catchy and exciting right from the opening and the first five to ten seconds are crucial to keeping the viewer hooked.

Facebook Live –

It differs from the pre-produced videos. A compelling title grabs attention in the crowd. The viewers’ live participation is necessary; it can be done by asking questions and encouraging them to respond in the comments. At regular intervals, it’s essential to re-introduce your brand and other details in brief. To get new ideas to check out ‘the best Facebook Lives’.

Facebook Instant Articles –

This feature offers 360-degree video, which allows the marketers to tell engaging stories that share places and experiences with their followers. On mobiles, this feature is more suitable to view. Even with VR Headsets, this feature is compatible. The specific cameras have to be used to capture the videos.

Strategies For Facebook Marketing

You need to understand your audience most comprehensively then –

•     Develop the right mix of contents to get the desired results.
•     Schedule posts in your editorial calendar
•     Explore Facebook’s new offerings for connecting with your audience.

1. Know fully about your Facebook Audience

Your buyer personas should be studied and evaluated at large. Make the best use of Facebook helping tools in identifying your audience and learning about your buyer personas. On Facebook, you can get the detailed information regarding your customers, competitors and market trends.

What are buyers personas – They are generalised, fictional information or data of your potential customer that better relates to your target audience. Based on this information, you can determine which content would be the best to post and decide the positioning accordingly.

Interview customers of a diverse mix, referrals to know their background knowledge of your industry, their difficulties and goals and their priorities. View your competitors’ activities on Facebook Pages and analyse each for a few key factors like visual quality, Post frequency, content mix, likes, comments, shares, response time, etc.

Using Facebook Tool “Audience Insights” —

It’s a free analysis tool offered by Facebook. It enables you to obtain demographic and behavioural data about your audience as well as competitors. It also helps to determine the type of content your audience is looking for.

The “Interest” section is instrumental in getting vital information about industry and competitors.

You can add general interest or names of specific pages. The pages which do not have a substantial number of likes, will not appear here.

2. Social Media Content Calendar for Facebook Marketing

It is like a spreadsheet where you prepare posts in advance and slots them for specific times.

It will keep you alert and help you keep tracking links organised and make it easier to evaluate the overall mix of format and topic you are posting.

A perfect social media should have –

• Tabs for each Social Media platform
• Daily schedule further divided into time slots
• Columns for a message, link, campaign name, character count and image.
• A monthly view to plan more extensive campaigns.

Scheduling Facebook Posts —

Use tools that enable schedule and automate posting. All scheduled posts can be managed through ‘Publishing Tools’. The seats can be previewed, edited and deleted for desktop and mobile viewing.

Best times for Posts On Facebook —

It depends on your region, goals, industry and how your target audience interacts with the Social Media platforms. After considering all these, the best time for posting should be determined.

Thumb Rule is for weekdays afternoon typically between 01 p.m. to 04 p.m., for weekends, the preferable time slot is between the Noon and 01 p.m.

In this practice always give priority to the quality than quantity. Better quality posts get more clicks and followers. Devote more time to creating the best engaging content.

3. About Generating Leads on Facebook —

A lead is a person who shows interest in your company’s products or services by giving part of their information in some way. They may fill up a form for eBook or request a demo of your product. The critical question is “How to turn your Facebook fans into your paying customers?” —

You have to be strategic about posting your contents that directs to a form, e.g. you could post

• Landing Pages with offers
• Blog posts that you know generate a lot of leads based on historical conversion rates
• Videos to promote lead generation offers.
• Facebook Lives to remind people to register for an upcoming event.
• Facebook events for upcoming webinars.

Please remember that every piece of content you post may not generate the lead, but you should experiment with a content mix that works for your business.

You can use Facebook Lead Ads to capture lead information from the Facebook platform and avoid friction of a landing page and a longer click-through path. This feature allows potential customers to access your offers without leaving the Facebook Application.

Facebook BOTS —

BOTS is a text-based programme that can communicate with humans to automate specific tasks or seek information. It has been noticed that about 48% of people are interested in buying items from a BOT. Facebook Messenger app should not be ignored; instead, it should be utilised maximum since the potential clients prefer ‘personalised’ touch than the mechanical process of interaction.

Tracking and Measuring Results through Facebook Analysis Tool –

After putting all these efforts, investing time, money, and energy in marketing on Facebook, the entire campaign’s overall performance has to be analysed and interpreted perfectly to locate the areas where scope of improvement is there and make future strategies. Otherwise, the results will be only guesswork and ultimately lead to underperformance.

Facebook has developed a comprehensive Page Insight Tool that helps you analyse your Page as a whole and amend the specific posts required.

Use Page Insights —

Read carefully the “Overview” section, which gives you a seven-day snapshot of your Page’s most important activity. To view, the different aspects of your page metrics lookout for the left vertical navigation bar. The key tabs should be read carefully to arrive at a meaningful conclusion.

“Likes” —

Daily gain and loss of likes are displayed on Facebook. The graph of “Net Likes” shows the daily movement of likes and unlikes. You can view shorter date results as well. The “Benchmark” section provides the comparison of your average performance over a while.

Reach —

It shows the number of people who have been served to your posts. The broken figures of Organic and paid traffic are also available. The more likes, comments and shares a post gets, the more it shows in the News Feed. For meaningful analysis, if you notice a spike in Reach on a particular day, click on the graph’s point to see the specific content and not how people engaged.

Page Views —

It helps you figure out how people got to your Page and where they go once they arrive. Look at the “Top Sources” graph to see what external referrers bring you the most traffic. Likely it may be your website, search or a search engine.

Posts —

It is the most useful section of all tabs in Page Insights. At the top, a graph can be found showing when your fans are online. This information is to be utilised to build your Content Calendar and schedule the posts.

Below is a record of all your published posts in reverse chronological order and their core metrics. Keep track on this chart to track your results and learn what types of posts your audience tends to engage with.

Post Details —

It is also essential to view a specific post’s performance for which you have to browse your Page. Post details can be viewed by clicking the “people reached” number directly above “Like” button. You can quickly see post details without flipping over to Page Insights. You can find more in-depth metrics for video content, including “Ten seconds Views” and average watch time.

Facebook Reactions —

Facebook introduced this feature later to enable the users to express their response specifically rather than likes and unlikes. These reactions can be anger, love, laughter and more. The reactions are counted in the same manner as Likes and their break down figures can be viewed as well on an individual post by looking at the Post Details.

Due to this feature, marketers now have more significant insights into their audience’s content. Take note of the people who love your content. They are likely to be useful for improving your brand image. Remember that an ‘angry’ may not mean they dislike the content but instead their response is to the subject matter.

Measuring Social ROI —

It is one of the essential data to know the worth of all your efforts. Before tracking ROI, you should set your goals. Key performance indicators could include views, engagement, lead generation or a combination.

Remember to use tracking links with UTM Parameters every time you post blink to Facebook. If you are using a marketing automation platform, you can create these links directly in the software, assign them to a campaign and track the number of clicks they contribute to your overall view and lead goals

Finally, the Closed Loop Reporting provided by a marketing automation software will help you know which Social Media posts impact the business’s bottom line in leads and customers. That way, you can be confident in your decisions and receive more buy-ins from your social programme executives.

How to Create a Facebook Ad Campaign—

Paid advertising is divided into three categories

• Campaigns — All of your assets are included.
• Ad Sets — These are groups of ads that target specific audiences. If multiple audiences are to be targeted, you will need separate sets for each.
• Ads — The personal ads you will post on Facebook each with their colour, copy, images etc.

When you create your first ad, Facebook offers two editors: the Ad Manager and Power Editor. The latter is for larger advertisers who need precise control over a variety of campaigns. Most companies prefer the Ad Manager.

How to Target and Optimise Ad Sets —

Once you select an objective for your campaign, Facebook will guide you through a few steps to define the audience, budget and schedule for your Ad Set. If you have used Facebook’s advertising tool before, you can select a saved audience here. Otherwise specify demographic information like location, age, gender and language.

Next, you can make the targeting more specific in the detailed targeting box. Choose any one of Facebook’s pre-made categories or type the name of a particular business page your audience may have liked. In the “Placement” section, keep the “Automatic Placement” (Recommended)  selected.

Next, choose a budget and schedule select one of the two – Daily Budget and Life Time Budget.

Facebook Ad Formats —

You have to select the format, media, text and links to create one or multiple ads.

• Format 1 – Carousel – two or more scrollable images or videos.
• Format 2 – Single image or video.

Next, upload your creative contents and write a clickable headline.

For each format, Facebook will provide some design recommendations including image size, headline length and more. Facebook prefers images with minimal text. To test your image, there are tools available to decide specs.

Next, make your text and preview your ad for desktop or mobile viewing.

Next place your order.

Measuring Results of Facebook Ads —

FB Ad Manager provides an overview of all ad campaigns which are running.

At the top, the dashboard will highlight the amount spent by you on each day on ads. The dashboard is further divided into columns to make it easy to filter by results, reach or amount spent.

There are many metrics to be considered to determine your ad’s success, like Reach, impressions, clicks, click-through rate, and more.

Pay particular attention to

• Actions – Always consider your initial rationale when weighing the success of your campaign.
• Cost Per Action – Look at how much each action costs and compare this between your different ads within Ad-Set.

Frequency –

How often someone saw your ad is called frequency. An ideal frequency should vary depending on the type of ad you ran. If any of your ads have a very high frequency but the low performance it may be the time to retire the ad.

The different topics elaborate above are in brief. The marketing of business on Facebook is a complicated exercise. It requires many studies, clarity in your goals, patience, and perfect planning and integration of all aspects fro start to finish. Services of an expert team are advisable.

If you need help with your Facebook Marketing and ad campaigns you can email us on [email protected] or contact us here

*Facebook is a trademark of Facebook Inc.