As a Business owner with a lot on your plate, you may wonder if investing time into your Facebook page is really worth it. With over a billion users and 65 million business using the platform, what are your odds of finding success?

In a survey of over 3,700 marketers, Social Media Examiner found that only 45% felt their efforts on Facebook were working. If you agree with that 55%, you may be surprised to find that if done right, this popular social media site can be a valuable asset for your business.

Optimize the Basics of Your Facebook Profile

When someone finds themselves on your business page, will they stay? There’s a number of easy things you can make do to make sure your page is distinguishable, provides valuable information, and shares any specials you want to promote.

The first step is making a recognizable profile picture that’s sized correctly (160 x 160 pixels); this is likely your business’ logo. Your profile picture should also correlate with your cover photo (which should be sized 851 x 315 pixels). If there’s a marketing campaign you want to promote, advertising it in these two photos is a great way to do it.

Next, fully fill out the “About” section with relevant information about your company. In this section, be sure to accurately describe your business and the products you sell, while using keywords that customer might use in search queries. Include your website URL as well to encourage clicks to your site.

Facebook Ads

Facebook advertising is a hugely beneficial way to promote your business without throwing away thousands of dollars. An ad-spend of only a couple hundred dollars has the potential to bring in a lot of leads, whether it’s in the form of page likes or traffic to your website.

Your ads will only be successful, though, if you do them right. Listed are a few guidelines to follow when creating your ads.

• Take advantage of target audiences: Even if your ad includes valuable content and an amazing offer, you won’t see any return if it doesn’t get in front of the right people. Facebook allows you to target users based on location, interactions with your site, age, gender, demographics, interests, and more. If you were a remodeling company in Michigan, you wouldn’t want your ads to be show to renters in Texas, right?
• Use a remarketing pixel: By installing a remarketing pixel, you’ll be able to target people who have previously visited your website. You know that they’re familiar with your brand and have some kind of interest in your service. Seeing your Facebook ad may be all it takes for them to revisit your site and turn into a customer.
• Play around with split testing: Split tests are great for testing out what kind of content your audience best responds to. For example, you could share two ads with the same content, but different images, and see which one was more successful, or keep the same image and change the content.
• Use a strong call to action: It’s important to tell users directly what you want them to do. You don’t exactly have to tell them to click on your ad, moreover, you should tell them why they should click on your ad. Highlight a service you offer that they should schedule or a product you sell that they’d be crazy not to buy.

Organic Facebook Posts

Will your Organic Facebook Posts bring in hundreds of customers? As much as we wish they would, they most likely will not. But do they have the potential to increase brand awareness and visibility? Absolutely.

How often you should post and what kind of content you should share are very dependent on a number of things and ultimately each business is different.

Lucky for you, Facebook makes it easy to track what kind of posts are getting the most engagement and what time people are viewing your posts the most. Regularly consulting your insights page can save you time you may have wasted creating content that your followers won’t engage with.

If you click into insights at the top of your page, then click posts, you’ll be able to see what times each day users have been on your page.

If you scroll down, you’ll also be able to see the reach and engagement that each of your posts has gotten. After looking at all of the information offered on this page, you can see what topics are resonating most with your audience, as well as which days and times are working best.

How often you should post also varies from business to business. What’s consistent for everyone, though, is not to post too often and overwhelm your followers. Hubspot found that companies with fewer than 10,000 followers receive 60% fewer interactions per post when they posted more than 60 times a month.

Instead of oversaturating your followers with content, take the time to post higher quality content.

This requires a balance between sharing pages from your own site, while also sharing content from other sites that would be relevant or helpful to your audience. But not from your competitors.

If you own a remodeling company, don’t share content from other companies offering the same services, even if they aren’t located in your service area. Instead, share posts from sites like HGTV.com. The information this site provides will be of interest to your followers, but won’t lose you business.

Communicating with Customers

Facebook offers you a unique opportunity to directly communicate with your customers or people interested in your business.

It gives satisfied customers the chance to post reviews, offers potential customers the chance to learn more about your products, and allows unhappy customers to express their disappointment so you can apologize and learn from what went wrong.

A great way to encourage followers to engage with your posts is through your organic Facebook posts. Ask questions in your posts to start conversation. For example, if you’re a moving and storage company, share an article about moving into a new home and ask “What are some things you’ve done to make a new house feel homier?” Your goal should be to encourage conversation not only with your business, but also with one another. This can create a sense of community within your fans.

When it comes to responding to reviews, both positive and negative, that’s a whole different story.

42% of consumers who complain on social media expect a 60-minute response time, meaning you should respond quickly whether the feedback from them is positive or negative.

Add a CTA Button

Sometime people won’t do something until you flat out tell them to do it. That goes for a lot of Facebook users.

Adding a CTA (Call To Action) button on your business’ page tells the user exactly what you want them to do and how to do it. Like this:

The CTA button options that Facebook offers are:

• Sign Up
• Shop Now
• Contact Us
• Book Now
• Use App
• Watch Video
• Play Game

Adding one to your page is easy. If you don’t have one, the space where a button could be will look like this instead:

Simply click the button and fill out the required information!

Use Visuals

It’s no surprise to hear that images and videos will catch a person’s eye faster than a paragraph of text with. Hubspot found that your content can generate up to 94% more views if you add compelling visual elements and graphics and that the use of visual content in Facebook campaigns generates 65% more engagement after only one month.

Include an interesting, eye-catching photo in your ads and if possible, in your organic posts as well. Sharing short videos on Facebook can be another great way to catch users’ attention on Facebook.

To learn more about creating visuals for Facebook, visit our page here.

The Secrete Success That Comes with Facebook Marketing

Though Facebook does offer the opportunity to find great success, it can only come if you play your cards right. Facebook marketing requires just as much strategical thinking as all other aspects of marketing. It may take some trial and error before you figure out what exactly the best tactics for your business are, but once you discover them, you may find that Facebook is one of your newest business partners.

Want us to take the reins on your Facebook marketing efforts? Fill out a contact form or give us a call at (800) 696-4690!