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Facebook Pages may be taking the social network by storm, but they can take time and technical skill to set up. When you need to promote something quickly, or are looking to foster a stronger sense of community, the more traditional Facebook Group is often the way to go.
While not as fancy as Pages, Groups offer many of the same features, with a slightly more streamlined look. This makes it easy for virtually anyone to create a Group, for any number of purposes, and get them live quickly—an important benefit in the time-sensitive social media sphere.
However, the ease and speed with which a Group can be set up has created a lot of spammy or messy Groups that are slapped together in minutes and abandoned soon after. In order to break through the clutter and gain members, you need to take the time to set up a Group correctly. Here are a few tips:
Global, Open, and Public
In order to get the maximum reach and value out of your Group, you need to ensure that anyone who wants to can join, without you having to approve them. You also want them to be able to invite their friends, as this cuts down on the work for you and allows you to focus on building a Group people want to join and share with other people. So, when setting up your Group, make sure you create it as a “Global” Group so it is visible to all ofFacebook, and that the access is set to “Open,” allowing members to invite friends. Members should also be able to post and share links and media on the Group page.
Fill Out All Fields
First and foremost, you absolutely must include as much information as possible—not JUST the required fields. This is what truly separates a successful, professional Group from a spammy, “I-lost-my-phone, give-me-your-numbers” Group. Don’t go overboard with lengthy text—stick to basic web-reading principles—but don’t leave anything blank. This includes the image field: think of it like a profile picture; would you really friend someone with a question mark for a head? Didn’t think so.
Use Correct Grammar, Punctuation and Spelling
Another huge tip-off that a Group was slapped together in a few minutes and won’t provide much value to members? Spelling mistakes and grammatical errors. Print out your Group and proofread it to make sure it says what you want and reads the way you want it to sound.
Include Keywords for Easier Search
Groups are indexed by the ever-evolving Facebook search, as well as traditional search engines. So having a completely and accurately filled-out Group description not only looks good and provides valuable information to those clicking on an invite, it also increases the chance that a potential member will find your Group while searching for similar topics, organizations or events. Put on your SEO hat when coming up with a Group name and crafting a description; think of keywords people would associate with your content or purpose of the Group and popular searches around your topic of interest.
Use With Profile or Page
When Facebook first introduced Pages, they offered Group admins the option of automatically transitioning members into fans. As a result, many brands now have a single presence on Facebook, in the form of a Page. But in order to launch a Group, you need a “parent” Page or Profile. This will give you a base from which to invite people and provide you with a more human connection.
Make New Friends
Since a Group cannot exist on its own (see above), your Profile, as admin, will more than likely be tied to the initial members, as they will have to be your friends in order to invite them. Send a friend request that explains how or why you found people and want to be friends. Selling socks? Search for “funky socks” and friend people in relevant groups, with a personal message attached to the friend request that says something along the lines of “I share your love for unique footwear."
Segment Friend Lists
While building your friend list (and by extension, potential member base for your Group), segment your friends into lists relevant to the Group for future marketing purposes. If you start friending random people based on a search for similar Groups, name lists after the keywords you searched for to find these people. The “funky socks” friends could go in a list called “funky” or “crazy patterns,” so you know that these people will appreciate updates on your more outlandish designs.
Incorporate Events
Events and groups have a greater reach than other elements on Facebook, as they have built in “pass it on” functionality. Always include a brief intro when sending event invites and keep them as open as possible: allow guests to invite other people and post their own videos, links and photos. Try out “virtual events” as well, asking people to invite their friends to join the Group.
Participate and Post New Content
Keeping the Group wall, photo and video restrictions open encourages content sharing and discussion, but that only goes so far; you need to post and update yourself as well. In order to create a Group that people remain members of, particularly engaged members, you need to keep the Group’s page fresh. Pages can be automatically updated, and to compete, you need to provide interesting, valuable perspectives or information to members.
Post Links, Photos, Videos
Besides providing fresh content, frequent posting keeps members engaged and allows for greater interaction. Post a link to any site, or off Facebook, to ask members to join, sign up or take action in some way. You can also post photos or videos from events and tag members in them to increase their connection to the Group.
Send Messages
Groups have mass messaging capabilities, allowing you to quickly keep all members up to date on Group news, events and information. Select “message all members” and draft your message like any other private correspondence on Facebook; it will be delivered to members’ Facebook inboxes just like a message from anyone else. This is one advantage Groups have over Pages; Page updates are dumped into a hidden folder, whereas Group messages carry more weight. That said, they lack the formatting functionality of Page updates and can clog up inboxes quickly, so use sparingly. You may also want to utilize your segmented friend lists to deliver more targeted messaging.
As you can see, a lot of elements go into even the simplest of Facebook Groups. But the tools are all there for you; you just need to use them correctly. And as Facebook pushes users from Groups to Pages, it will be easier and easier to stand out from the crowd of “lost cell-phones” and differentiate your Group as one of the ones to stick with.
