Xplore.net Seminar Notes: Facebook
Why do I need to know about Facebook?
Traditional “push” marketing mediums (such as TV, print, radio, static
websites, etc) are drowning in the wake of “pull” marketing platforms
(such as forums, blogs, social networks, etc) - those who cling to push
marketing (alone), refusing to integrate social media into their overall
marketing plan, will see their businesses sink within the next five years.
You can’t say it. You have to get
other people to say it to each other.
James Farley, CMO, Ford
• Over 450 million users.
• 100 million users access Facebook through a mobile phone.
• 50% of users log on, on a daily basis.
• The average user spends over an hour on Facebook, each day.
• Over 20% of users update their status each day.
• The average user follows 4 new Facebook pages a month.
• 61% of users are over 35 years old.
• The average user has 130 Facebook friends.
• Most users only “friend” people they know in real life.
• Social media has overtaken pornography as the
number one online activity
• 78% of consumers trust peer recommendations,
while only 14% trust advertisements.
• 25% of search results for the World’s top 20
largest brands are links to user-generated content
(e.g. Facebook posts).
• Facebook has now overtaken Google for weekly
traffic in the US
• Google now ranks social media content
higher than any other type of content.
• You need to get involved in the online
conversation about your brand to avoid
the wrong information going viral.
Consumers are now immune to push marketing.
Xplore.net Seminar Notes: Facebook
How your target market uses Facebook
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Facebook: a trusted network of opinions
People create personal profiles on Facebook so that they can post text, images, links and video about their lives and share these with their Facebook “friends”.
Because Facebook users share so much about themselves on the social networking site, most users will change their profile privacy settings to allow only their Facebook “friends” to see their full profile – other users cannot see their status updates, photos, etc.
Most Facebook users will only “friend” people they already know and trust in real life, creating an exclusive network of individuals who genuinely trust each other – the perfect environment to stimulate positive chatter about your business.
Facebook’s power lies in the Newsfeed
When a user first log’s in to Facebook (either through a computer or mobile device) they are automatically taken to a newsfeed that shows them what has been going on, on Facebook in their absence.
Facebook records all the actions/activities of its users on each users “wall”, this information is then fed to the newsfeed and stimulates a “me too” response from users (the viral spread of information). For example, if a user sees one of their “friends” has “liked” a certain business page, they can easily click a link to view that page and like it too.
Create photo galleries and upload an unlimited number of images to these
Populate an “Info” tab with demographic profiling information, such as: gender, birthday, home town, relationship status, interests, etc
Post blog entries to their “Notes” tab and allow others to subscribe to their own RSS feed Upload and share video
Add a wide array of applications, such as social games (Zynga’s Farmville game has over 80 million active users). Follow “friends” on Facebook – updates about these friends activities on Facebook will appear in the user’s newsfeed. Likewise, any actions they take on Facebook will appear in their friend’s newsfeeds.
“Like” business pages on Facebook – allowing them to subscribe to automatic updates (which appear in their newsfeed) whenever content is posted to these pages
Post status updates (answering this simple question: What’s on your mind?) to their “wall”, including text, images, links and video, for their friends to read and comment on.
Show their “friends” everything they have been up to on Facebook – the “wall” tab records all the activities of each user on Facebook (e.g. comments made to others, pages they liked, etc).
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Within each personal profile, Facebook users can:
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Xplore.net Seminar Notes: Facebook
How to develop a Facebook presence for your business
About Facebook Pages:
Do not use personal profiles to try to promote your business (even if your business is you e.g. you’re a consultant) – this violates Facebook’s terms of use.
Instead, setup a Facebook Page (see: http://www.facebook.com/pages/create.php).
Public by default, but can be targeted to appear for only specific countries or age ranges.
Can be viewed by not-logged in Facebook users – making them more accessible than groups or personal profiles.
Can be indexed by search engines – helping people find your page and boost your corporate website ranking.
Facebook users can choose to “like” your page – this means they subscribe to receive automated newsfeed updates whenever you updated your page.
Include a “share” function that makes it easy for Facebook users to share a link to your page with friends.
Provide page statistics (called “Insights”) that give the page administrator information on page views, media consumption, followers gender, age distribution, country, city, etc
Page administrators get an automated weekly email with page activity updates, with performance compared with the previous week.
Can add a wide array of applications to the page to provide additional functionality.
How to setup an effective Page:
Create a main page image that immediately lets your page visitors know what you do – using text and images.
Your main page image needs to be no bigger than 200px wide x 600px high.
Your main page image should have a 172 x 172px area that can be selected to be your thumbnail image (used on any comments/posts you make to your page).
Use the 250 character editable area on the left of your page for keyword rich text about the benefits of liking your page - include a link to your corporate website.
Before promoting your page, ensure you have made at least 4 posts to your page “wall” Keep your page looking interesting by making only every second post a “text only” post. Break up these posts with images, links and videos.
Regularly post interesting articles to your “notes” tab to draw users back to your page, on a regular basis.
Create a custom “welcome” tab (as opposed to having users “land” on your “wall” tab) – this allows you to control the first impression of your business.
Note: Please ensure you select a Page, as opposed to a Group. Groups are used by people who share common interests (but who are not friends on Facebook) to interact, while Pages are used by businesses to promote their products/services.
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How to promote your Facebook page
People rarely search for brands on Facebook – they need to be put in front of them, as
an option (by friends or by you). The following are just some of the ways you can grow
the number of Facebook followers you have.
Use Facebook Social Plugins
Facebook has released a number of social plugins that you can embed on your corporate website, in order to drive traffic to your Facebook page. Remember, in most industries, a person needs to have 5 interactions with your brand before they feel confident enough to buy from you. By driving your website traffic to subscribe to your Facebook page, you ensure you will be able to capture (and be able to interact with) up to 50% of first time visitors to your website.
Tell your newsletter
subscribers
Once you are ready to promote your new Facebook page, make sure you tell your newsletter subscribers about it. This can be a great way to stimulate renewed interest in your brand. Facebook pages allow for brand engagement that email marketing can’t facilitate.
Add a link to your page to
your email signature
This is a subtle and effective way to promote your Facebook page in every email you send (hundreds a week).
Get users to “tag” themselves in your photos
If you host or participate in events, take plenty of photos and upload these to your Facebook page. You can then encourage your Facebook followers to “tag” themselves in your photos. This will automatically send all of those user’s “friends” (130, on average) a newsfeed update with a link to your page. This can be a fantastic way to tap into your follower’s Facebook network.
Comment on more popular pages &
autograph your post
Actively seek out pages that relate to (but are not in direct competition with) your business and post helpful, credibility building information/advice to these pages and autograph your post (this provides a link to your page). To do this, type the @ symbol followed by (with no spaces) your page name. Provided you are a follower of your own page, you will be able to create a link to your page in your post. This is a great way to leverage the followers on other pages.
Place Facebook Ad’s
If you’re serious about using Facebook as a marketing platform, then paying for targeted Facebook advertising is a must.
Run a promotion
Promotions and competitions are a great way to encourage people to “like” and follow your page. However, ensure you consult Facebook’s promotional guidelines before running any promotions.
How to Advertise on Facebook
Advertisement targeting
Using the information Facebook users enter into the “Info” tab on their Personal Profiles, you can target your advertisements using the following criteria:
Advertisement design options
Like the rest of Facebook, Advertisement formats are generic – creating a level playing field.
Your advertisement can include:
The most successful Facebook advertisements usually link to a custom Facebook Page tab that carries on the theme of the advertisement. This is less “jarring” for a user than being taken to an external website.
What it costs
You can set a daily budget Minimum daily budget is AUD$1
All pricing is transacted in Australian Dollars You can Pay Per Click – bid the amount per click OR you can Pay Per View (bid amount per 1000 views) For more information or to create your own
advertisement, please go to:
www.facebook.com/ads/create
A title (up to 25 characters) Main content (up to 135 characters) Optional image (100px wide x 80px high) A link to a website or your Facebook page
As you go through the setup process, a panel to the right of the page will update to tell you the “Estimated Reach” of your campaign, based on your criteria.
Location – by both country and city.
Age range – promotion to users under the age of 18 are banned, but all other age ranges can be targeted. Birthday – allowing for “birthday greetings” advertisements
Relationship status – great for businesses that may offer relationship based services (e.g. wedding photographers). Gender and what gender they are interested in.
Language options Listed interests
Education and workplace
Facebook makes its money mainly from selling advertising space
on user’s pages, and creating your own advert can be a great
way to boost your follower numbers and extend your reach.
Xplore.net Seminar Notes: Facebook
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Running promotions on Facebook
Facebook has strict rules and conditions regarding what
promotions/competitions can be run on Facebook Pages.
For a full and current copy of these conditions, please go to:
http://www.facebook.com/promotions_guidelines.php
Do not run promotions that users auto-enter through a
Facebook action.
Do use Facebook to publicise your “off Facebook” (e.g. on
your corporate website) promotions.
Do not administer promotions on Facebook, without
written consent from Facebook.
Do not run promotions that are open to under 18 years
olds.
Do not offer prizes of: tobacco, dairy, firearms,
prescriptions drugs, etc
Please note: these rules were current at the time of
the seminar, but please check the Facebook
guidelines before running any promotion.
An overview of what you can and can’t do:
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Xplore.net Seminar Notes: Facebook
What content you should post
If you’re a B2C:
Your Facebook page will only be as successful as the content you post. To entice
people to “like” your page you need to engage them. The following outlines the
type of content you should and should not post to your Facebook page.
• New products/services – but, ensure your posts aren’t a hard sell.
• “Facebook-only” links to promotions on your corporate website (to encourage followers). • Industry news and trends.
• Encourage existing customers to post comments/thoughts about your products/services. • Ask your users for their ideas/advice on new products/marketing ideas.
If you’re a B2B:
• Post industry related news (with links to your website).
• Encourage followers to ask you questions and answer them (demonstrate your expertise). • Ask existing customers to post their experiences with your business.
• Share weekly/daily tips, related to your industry.
• Turn your page into an “added value” service – Dell made $6.5 million doing this. • Make sure you don’t turn your page into a “hard sell”/push marketing channel. • End all posts with a question – ask their opinion.
• Quiz your followers – fun and educational.
• Be human – give your page a personality that people can relate to.
• Ensure every post addresses your follower’s key concern: What’s in it for me?
Engage your followers:
• Designate an employee (or hire a consultant) – don’t assume “someone” will just do it. • Post new content at least once every 2 business days.
• Someone must monitor the page and respond to all posts. • Commission a developer to create a custom tab for your page. • Develop a strategy (more than one) to attract people to your page.
