Facebook promotion for business

There were times when social networks perceived as a way to have fun or just pass the time. Today, they have become one of the important platforms for the promotion and popularization of many types of business, various goods and services.

Facebook is one of the few social networks that confidently remain in the TOP of preferences of a wide audience. More than 3 billion users come to Facebook every month, which indicates its insane popularity and the opportunity to find buyers and brand supporters among a huge audience. Therefore, promotion in FB is a must have for business.

In this article, we will analyze in detail how a business owner can start interacting with Facebook to get leads and how to create, configure and launch their sales offer step by step.

Why do you need Facebook promotion?

A Facebook business requires constant daily attention and involvement from the owner or employees. And this is the main thing that is necessary if you want:

• increase the recognition and popularity of the company or brand;
• build or increase loyalty target audience;
• organize meetings and events for existing and potential clients;
• get new potential customers;
• increase sales and achieve marketing goals.

A large number of Facebook advertising tools will help in the implementation of all these points, you just need to know the rules for creating and promoting a business page.

What can be promoted on Facebook

Creating a business on Facebook is relevant for many niches. So, who exactly needs promotion on this social network?

1. For companies that want to increase their brand reputation and gain more trust from potential customers with an overall improvement of their image on Facebook. A competently created page adapted to the interests of the target audience quickly helps in this.
2. To those who sell their product with worldwide delivery or one that is designed exclusively for foreign buyers. For example, it can be language courses.
3. Companies operating in the segment B2B, because a more mature audience spends time on Facebook. Such as owners of small and medium-sized businesses, top managers.
4. Newly created companies that are starting their way in business and have online stores. The social network can be a good place to start, to better understand your potential customers and their needs.
5. Private specialists in any field, for example, SMM specialists, target marketers, photographers, copywriters, hairdressers, designers, tutors, etc. Facebook helps to increase popularity and number of customers.
6. To owners of companies that offer services or services. Beauty salons, swimming pools, restaurants or cafes, sports centers, etc.

Creating a business page on Facebook opens up new opportunities for almost anyone. But, before starting to use the social network, it is important to do an in-depth analysis of your product, competitors and their experience. Taking into account all the received data, objectively evaluate the possible results and profitability of investments.

Remember that FB has a large list of prohibited topics for promotion, and some products are not at all relevant to post on the social network (such as, for example, overall equipment, some specific professional products).

Which account to choose for business promotion on Facebook?

There are three types of pages you can create on Facebook: a personal profile, a group, and a business page. It is important to understand what type should be created for high-quality promotion of a business on Facebook.

Personal profile

A personal account is not suitable for business promotion. First of all, because of such a profile, it is almost impossible to do this – according to the rules of FB, it is forbidden to write the name of your store (“Things for children” online store) or your specialization (Psychologist for children – Kyiv) in the “name” line. Moreover, if the page is blocked, it will not be possible to restore it due to the lack of a real name; Facebook requires proof of identity by providing your passport.

You can try to use a personal account if it is part of the business promotion strategy. To do this, you need to create a page like an ordinary private one (with your real name and photo), and place information about your activities in the “About” line. Also, don’t be too active in sending out friend requests or messages. Publish content that is light and unobtrusive, sales are exclusively native.

There is no way to promote your personal profile through advertising, which means that very few people will be able to find out about your business. And time is money, so we don’t recommend wasting it.

Thematic group on Facebook

Promoting the group is again the wrong way. Although everything is not as clear here as with a personal account. Among the advantages:

• can be used as an additional sales platform;
• participants willingly leave reviews about the product, which can then be used on the site or in advertising;
• group members have a high level of trust in the brand;
• a great option for running a public blog with follower benefits and native advertising.

Unfortunately, the advantages end there. And among the disadvantages of promoting groups in FB are the following:

• they usually come here to chat, discuss something, and not to buy;
• it is forbidden to publish content on behalf of the group;
• posts of FB groups are promoted much less often, which means small reach and minimal audience engagement;
• geotag and contacts cannot be added;
• there are no analytics and statistics, so there is no chance to understand what should be improved in the group;
• unavailable targeted advertising, which is important for every business;
• groups are not indexed by search engines.

So, promoting a thematic group on Facebook can be a useful marketing tool for promoting a product or company, but not for sales. Inviting participants and maintaining dialogues on a daily basis is time-consuming and rarely makes business sense.

Business page on Facebook

Marketers and SMM specialists advise to create a business page on FB and promote it. It is in this case that it is really possible to use all the functionality offered by the social network for promotion and profit.

Step-by-step guide for designing a business page

A business page can only be created with a personal account. The author of such a page becomes an administrator and has all the powers.

Step 1. We create a business page

To create a business page on Facebook, you need to be on the main page of your private account, click the “Menu” icon in the upper right corner and select “Create page”.

By pressing the button, we see the following.

Here we fill in all three fields:

• page name – you need to add the name of your company, brand or other name that will help explain what your page is about;
• category – choose up to 3 categories to which the company can belong;
• biography – a field for a brief description of the specifics of the business.

After adding the text, click the “Create page” button and fill in the additional fields: contact information, location, hours of operation.

Step 2. Add a cover and an avatar

To successfully promote a brand on Facebook, it is necessary to immediately add a high-quality photo or design picture to the avatar. Alternatively, it can be a company logo.

Regarding the cover – upload a high-quality photo or video with a length of 20 to 90 seconds (820 px x 312 px). For example, the following:

Facebook also offers to immediately add an action button, for example, “Order”, “Register”, “View the store”, “Send a message”, “Make a call” (call), and others. This has a good effect on business promotion and helps to get contacts of interested users.

Step 3. Fill in important information on the page

The more information you add about your business right away, the fewer questions potential customers will have and the more trust you will develop.

If you add everything that a social network has to offer, it will be very easy for your audience to find out where they got to from the first seconds. And this is already a great chance for a subscription and, perhaps, the purchase of a product.

Important information also includes the URL of the page. In the About section, change the obscure character set to your company name. In this way, it will be better remembered and look more solid.

Step 4. Linking a Facebook business page to Instagram

Targeted traffic can go from Facebook to Instagram and vice versa. You need to do this in the FB settings. It won’t hurt.

Step 5. Select tags for posts

Each publication should use tags of different frequency. However, remember that they are not guaranteed to attract a large amount of traffic. Hashtags help to understand the main topic of the business page and should correspond to the content of each individual post, and not be placed randomly.

Step 6. We create content

Content is the basis of the business page, which is constantly updated depending on the marketing strategy and goals. A content plan is drawn up in advance, taking into account the characteristics of the target audience, situational publications, and sales. Next – in detail about content, because it is an extremely important part of promoting a business on Facebook.

Content for a business Facebook page

Texts do not only inform users. Written by an experienced copywriter, they become a very effective way to promote a business page. Let’s analyze how to plan and create such content.

Effective content strategy and content plan

A content strategy is a document that contains all information regarding future actions with content: its creation, placement and distribution. A well-made strategy for Facebook contains certain data.

Of course, the strategy necessarily includes drawing up a content plan for publications. It includes interesting and useful texts and a visual part (photos, pictures, infographics, videos), which allows you to gather and retain a loyal and active audience on the FB business page.

The optimal ratio of information published on the page is 80/20, where 80% is entertaining, useful content for readers (memes, professional humor, survey results, video reviews, posts with lists of useful sources, interesting infographics, etc.), and 20% – materials about business (texts about the company, services and products, offers). Note that these 20% cannot be made boring, otherwise they will simply be missed; tell about business processes in the company that take place “behind the scenes”, employees, principles of work, mission. Create and publish interviews with niche experts, thought leaders.

To create really interesting content for publications on the Facebook business page, study the interests of your target audience and already existing followers. Posts will collect a lot of likes and reposts if they are light, interesting and relevant.

Promotion of posts on Facebook: useful tips

It is not enough to just create posts in the Facebook account of an online store or a company that provides services. After all the preparatory stages, it’s time to move on to the promotion of the business page. Let’s consider in detail some chips that everyone can use for their business.

1. Leave a link to your page as often as possible.

No, it doesn’t mean you have to spam everyone and everywhere. This will only cause mistrust and annoy potential customers. Leave links dosed and only where it is appropriate – on your own pages in various social networks, on the website, in the newsletter (if you do it among subscribers).

Add intriguing text to the link that will grab the user’s attention and make the user go and view the content of the business page. You can attract the attention of potential subscribers to the company’s new information channel with the help of an offer to receive a personal, useful guide, discount, bonus, etc.

2. Invite everyone you know to sign up for a business Facebook account.

This is the main and easiest way to get the first loyal followers. Send a newsletter to your Facebook friends, contacts from the phone book and e-mail.

3. Activate the chatbot from Facebook.

This is very easy to do in your account settings, and the benefits of this chatbot are too many to ignore. You write a certain script in the program, according to which it will communicate with interested users. All conversations take place in Facebook Messenger and the answer comes to the potential client immediately, regardless of the time of day. It’s free and partially replaces support while you’re busy with other things.

4. Encourage users to communicate.

Make it a rule to give feedback on any reaction from followers, all comments (even negative ones) and questions. This way, you will increase user loyalty, which significantly affects sales.

Among the non-standard methods of engaging the audience are holding webinars with the presentation of useful information and launching live broadcasts from a personal account with an invitation to the business page.

5. Look for opportunities for mutual PR.

Try to constantly get to know the administrators of pages that are similar in subject matter to yours and agree on free mutual PR. For publications on third-party accounts, create the same useful and interesting content as for yourself. Be honest with leads and friendly pages and you’ll get loyal followers and “warm” leads for your business.

6. Make the right visual content.

Everyone seems to know that visuals should be unique and of high quality. But there are sometimes problems with technical aspects. Remember the requirements for the format of photos and videos for the feed on the FB business page:

• aspect ratio for photos – 1:1 or 3:2;
• post with photos – 1200 x 800 pixels;
• post with a link – 1200 x 630 pixels;
• video length – up to 60 seconds.

Create visual content that grabs attention at first glance.

7. Leave comments under the posts of other users of the social network.

Activity under user posts on Facebook operates on the principle of “word of mouth”. In the comments, give sincere advice on expert questions that acquaintances, friends or just outsiders cannot handle. When users see an expanded, useful comment, they will definitely go to see who wrote it. And there it is already a matter of your well-designed business page and sales manager.

8. Use all the possibilities of the target on Facebook.

Paid advertising from FB is unlimited opportunities for the growth of a business page. Create and run ads with useful or entertaining content and attract new users to your business account every day.

In addition, add a Facebook retargeting pixel to your site to track the actions of users who moved from Facebook to your site. In this way, you can form audiences that will give better conversions.

9. Analyze the obtained results and accelerate the promotion of the business account.

Promotion without analysis of results is nothing. Facebook’s built-in analytics system, after setting up and launching advertising campaigns, provides reports for the selected period and in real time. This helps to make the business page better and get more leads. Pay attention to all the statistics tabs and create more interesting content for your subscribers based on them.

To summarize

Promoting a business on Facebook is painstaking work. To get the first results, you need to spend a lot of time and effort, as well as allocate a budget for paid advertising. The presence of a quality product, well-established business processes, knowledge of Facebook algorithms, constant monitoring of updates and the ability to quickly adjust the obtained results guarantee the ability to stay ahead of competitors and receive more income from promotion on Facebook.