Using Facebook for Business: What You Need to Know to Succeed

Social commerce is growing day in and day out. And Facebook is a huge part of this growing revolution.

People are buying more products/services online due to the recommendations and promotions they come across on Facebook.

A trend that won’t die down any time soon.

While the social media giant doesn’t quite reach the status of Google in terms of being a purchasing channel.

It definitely is becoming a strong influence on purchasing habits and decisions. For anyone using Facebook for business, that’s a huge plus point.

In fact, studies show that Facebook is the primary social media platform that influences people when it comes to making purchase decisions.

Even though Facebook has upped the game for businesses (in more than one way).

Many are still hesitant to tap into the full power of Facebook marketing.

But by ignoring it, they’re only leaving room for their competition.

With over 2.41 billion users (and counting), Facebook is a platform that your business or any business can tap into.

It’s where everybody is hanging out. So why wouldn’t your target audience be left out?

Gone are the days when marketers had to depend on slow.

Old school marketing methods such as print newspapers and Yellow Pages to connect to market their products/services.

Facebook is where the action is happening now.

In the following article we’ll be looking into how using Facebook for business not only makes sense.

But could prove to be the smartest marketing move you make.

Here are a few things that every entrepreneur/marketer needs to know before using Facebook for business to increase their chances of success.

7 Proven Tips in Using Facebook for Business to Achieve Growth

1. Posting Frequency Matters

Posting relevant content to your Facebook page consistently can and will make a difference to the kind of response you generate.

So if there is one thing that a brand should never worry about, it has to be “posting too much”.

Keep in mind that Facebook has become overly competitive. Which means many businesses (of all kinds) are vying for attention.

Facebook on the other hand wants to serve its users in the best possible way by showing them the most relevant content.

The result? Not all that you post on your page is seen by your fans. Only a small percentage is.

This reduction in organic reach has prompted businesses to post more often.

But the ones who are the most successful with frequent posting are brands that are doing it without sacrificing quality.

So there has to be a definite balance between the quality of content you are posting with the quantity.

Now, the question is, what kind of posting frequency you should aim for?

There’s no doubt that your engagement rates improve when you post regularly. But it has to be done in a optimal manner while keeping quality in mind.

According to a study jointly conducted by Buffer and BuzzSumo, pages now are moving towards posting more content.

After analyzing 43 million posts from 20,000 popular brands using Facebook for business.

They found out that pages that posted at least 5X per day received 2,466 engagements on an average.

However, pages that posted 10X experienced 50% lower engagement.

So it could be said that posting 5 times in every 24 hours is an effective posting frequency.

Is this posting frequency definitive? No, absolutely not.

When it comes to using Facebook for business, nothing is etched in stone. Strategies are evolving as Facebook evolves.

So there can never be a perfect, one-size-fits-all approach that gives the best results to everybody.

Keep experimenting to find out how often you should be posting for higher engagement.

2. Leveraging User-Generated Content Works

When using Facebook for business, it’s crucial that your products appear as authentic as possible.

The level of authenticity that resonates from user-generated content or UGC cannot be denied.

This UGC can be any content such as texts, videos, images, reviews, etc.

These are all from real people who’ve actually tried your product or service. And sharing this kind of post is proven to be highly effective.

In fact, consumers say that they are 2.4 times more likely to see a UGC post to be authentic compared to the brand’s own post.

This is why it gets the highest amount of engagement on Facebook and other social media platforms.

If you look around the Facebook marketing arena, you’ll find that some of the most profitable Facebook marketing campaigns had an element of UGC involved.

This just goes on to show that content created by your followers, prospects and customers doesn’t get ignored. In fact, it fetches much higher conversions.

One of the biggest examples of successful implementation of UGC can be found on Facebook’s Coke page.

Which itself was created by two die-hard Coke fans.

A lot of content shared on this page came from real (and normal people), which propelled its growth.

Since the page had gotten astounding amounts of engagement, Coca-Cola let the guys continue with posting natural user-generated content.

Social media audiences are smart enough to differentiate relatable stories with ones that are purely made up for marketing.

UGC not only helps brands build awareness but also lets them build strong relationships in the long run.

Looking at the recent research, it’s not surprising to know that social media users consume a lot of UGC per day (in excess of five hours).

Not only that, Facebook ad campaigns that leverage UGC have around 20% higher influence on purchase decisions when compared other types of promotions.

UGC is growing by leaps and bounds. The proof is in the numbers…

There are many ways to use UGC, such as promoting your product/service by showing how your customers are using it.

But again, there are ways to get creative with UGC as well, so don’t hold back.

3. Remarketing Means Higher Conversions

There’s little doubt that proper targeting plays a key role in making your Facebook ad campaign successful.

In other words, using Facebook for business works better when you’re sure of your target audience.

And one proven way to do that is to target prospects who have already shown interest in your product/service.

That’s right, we’re talking about Facebook remarketing that usually gets better conversions.

Remarketing is a common (and successful) tactic that helps you show your Facebook ads to only those people who have…

• Already visited your site in the past
  
• Shown some kind of interest in your product/service

There’s no rocket science involved here. It’s pretty simple if you look at it…

1. People visit a page or pages on your website.
2. You segment your visitors based on the pages they visited.
3. Create targeted, custom ads that are displayed to these visitors on their Facebook.

Ask yourself, why does someone visit your business website in the first place? It’s usually one of the following three reasons.

1. They want to gain some relevant information about you, your product or your industry.
2. They want to get in touch with you with a query or with a suggestion.
3. They want to buy your product or service.

What we’re concerned about is obviously, the sales numbers.

We want more and more people to buy from us. But the thing is, buying decisions are rarely on impulse and they may take some time.

This is especially true in the B2B marketing arena where the purchases are big and the commitments are long.

However, by using Facebook remarketing, you can keep exposing them to your offer and try to remove their hesitation or doubt.

It increases the chance of them changing their mind.

Facebook remarketing actually works when executed well, and mainly helps you…

1. Increase your conversion rate
   
2. Lower your cost per acquisition

Now, as to why Facebook remarketing can prove to be such a great strategy is because of who is seeing your ad.

The people you remarket to are familiar with your brand and have higher interest in your product/service. This includes….

1. People who are not familiar with your product/service but may want to buy it.
2. People who have already visited your website, have viewed your product/service but haven’t hit the buy button yet.
3. People who have bought your product/service and have become customers.

The good thing about remarketing is that it lifts your marketing up from where you are standing.

And that too by leveraging the audience or the traffic you’ve already built.

4. Creating Shareable Content is Important

Going viral on Facebook can send you lots of traffic, if that’s what you’re looking for.

But how often do you see content on Facebook go through the infamous viral marketing loop? That’s right, not very often.

However, you sure can increase the chances of spreading your content further and having it shared by the right people.

How? By making sure your content as highly shareable as possible.

Using Facebook for business becomes easier and a lot more fruitful when you give priority to creating content that encourages people to share with others.

It’s how you ultimately improve your social media content strategy.

To understand how you can create such content, you need to know why people share content in the first place.

What exactly pushes them to hit the most coveted share button and spread the word?

A study conducted by New York Times aptly called “Psychology of Sharing” found that people share content for…

…several different reasons and motivations that you need to tap into. They share it to…

1. To learn something new
2. To inform others and influence them
3. To help their friends and family
4. To show identity and get known
5. To connect with people in their circle
6. To simply participate and spread the word
7. To lend support to ones who need it

So whether your Facebook post gives, inspires or amazes, it has to touch the right emotions of your target audience so that they are inclined to share it.

Give them a reason to share, and make sure it is worth it.

5. Sharing Native Video is Better

Dropping a YouTube link works on Facebook, but it isn’t worth it in the long run from a marketing perspective.

Why? Because Facebook favors native video content over a link from YouTube or Vimeo.

They want you to upload more video content directly to your Facebook page.

So every brand using Facebook for business should understand the power of native videos.

Also, sharing native videos is much better from an engagement point of view as well.

Because the videos play automatically as your followers browse the newsfeed.

This not only helps you generate more views/clicks but also gives a positive impression to both, your fans and Facebook.

Leading to more comments on your video.

Here are three real benefits of uploading native videos…

• Helps Create a Video Gallery
  

Having a separate section for your social media videos makes a lot of sense. And that’s exactly what happens when you use native videos.

Facebook creates a dedicated video gallery for your page to store all of your video content.

People who like your videos can navigate to this section and access them later on.

Which gets more exposure to your videos and boosts engagement.

• Improves Organic Reach

They say content is king, which is true. But due to the growing popularity of visual content, video is becoming highly effective and engaging.

If you want to improve your Facebook organic reach while adding variety to your content mix, then native video is the way to go.

Facebook’s algorithm has changed over the years and continues to evolve.

And since Facebook is trying to become bigger than YouTube in terms of video views/engagement, their algorithm is clearly favoring native video.

In a case study it was discovered that native video content lead to a 135% boost in organic reach when compared to links and photos.

In a different case study conducted by Quinty.

They found that native videos on Facebook got 4 times more interactions than video links from other sites.

• Gives Access to Better Analytics

Your social media campaign success depends on how well you read into your success and failures.

One of the perks of using native videos is that it helps you gain access to better social analytics.

Which you can use to improve your results.

For instance, if you look into Facebook Page Insights, you’ll see how many people viewed your video for ten seconds or more.

Not only that, you also get to learn how your top videos are performing in terms of engagement.

6. Using Facebook Live Improves Reach

Are you working with a limited marketing budget? Then Facebook Live is something that you should be focusing on.

While there are many benefits of using Facebook Live such as lower quality requirements, free cost, etc.

One advantage that clearly makes it worthwhile is that it can help you increase your Facebook organic reach.

Sometimes the reach is even higher than that of native video.

When you have better reach, you have more of your audience consuming your content.

Which directly affects the kind of results you generate from Facebook marketing.

Facebook even sends out a notification to your fans when you go live. Which increases the chances of them engaging with your video.

Also, Facebook Live makes it easy to stand out in your followers’ newsfeed because your video will stay on the top as long as you are live.

So if you are not taking advantage of Facebook Live, you are leaving money on the table.

Given below are some Facebook Live video ideas your business can take advantage of.

a. Host a Q&A Session

If you get a lot of customer queries regarding your product or the industry you are in. You can invite your prospects/customers to hop onto a Q&A session via Facebook Live.

This will allow you to clear their doubts/questions and also showcase your own knowledge.

b. Do an Interview

Know an industry expert that can weigh in on an important topic? Have a colleague that can shed light on the current industry trends?

You can interview almost anyone that brings unique value to the table. And broadcast it through Facebook Live.

c. Stream an Event

Whether it is a tradeshow or some other kind of event that your audience can benefit from. You can live stream it using Facebook Live.

The whole idea of capturing a live event and streaming it screams “value”, which means your audience will love to tune in.

d. Announce a New Product

No matter what industry you are in and the type of product you’re selling.

You can use social media to announce your product release and get more people to join in the event. 

Facebook Live is great for doing this because it not only helps build the right level of anticipation but also lets you engage viewers with a bit of preparation.

e. Create a Daily/Weekly Show

If there’s one thing that you need to do to grow your business it has to be providing regular value to your fans.

It helps cement your relationship with them and makes you stand out from the crowd.

You can use Facebook Live to create a daily or a weekly show to connect to them on a personal level.

Engaging with your fans/customers with a regular show is a sure shot method to grow your influence with them. It’s perfect for social media branding.

Just make sure you are consistent in your efforts. Choose a time of a day that you are comfortable with so that you can answer any fan questions.

A side advantage of doing this is that you will get to explore and understand the latest trends as you share them with your audience.

7. Offering Discounts Increases Sales

How about making your followers/customers feel extra special by giving them an exclusive discount?

That’s exactly what you can do using Facebook offers, a popular feature to tap into if you are using Facebook for business.

Using Facebook Offers, you can post generous discounts, special deals, and coupons on your Facebook page.

Whether you are the admin or the editor, you can create a relevant offer.

Here are the three types of Facebook Offers that you can leverage:

a. In Store Only

These offers can only be redeemed by customers in-store where they have to present a print out of the offer or display it on their mobile phone.

b. Online Only

These offers cannot be redeemed offline in a store. Rather, customers can make use of them on your website or some other online destination.

c. In Store and Online

This option offers best of the both worlds as your discount can be redeem by customers both offline and online.

Here are a few tips on using Facebook Offers efficiently…

• Be Generous

Giving a tiny discount would defeat the whole purpose, so make sure your discount is substantial.

A good thumbs rule is to not give a discount below 20% than regular price.

You may also want to experiment with giving away free bonuses along with the purchase as they generally give better results.

• Practice Simplicity

The more complicated your terms and conditions are, the harder it will be to convert.

Remember to keep things simple for your potential customers. Any extra, unneeded steps should be avoided.

• Use an Engaging Image

It’s a good idea to choose a photo that shows your customer using your product in some way. If you simply post the image of your item, it may not be as engaging.

And yes, use an image that is different than your profile picture because they will be appearing side by side.

• Use Natural Language

Besides making your headline enticing, you also need to ensure there is enough clarity for your potential customers.

The more natural and direct your language is, the better results you will see.

Try adding the USP of your product to your headline so that people can see the main benefit.

• Have a Practical Expiration Date

You don’t want to give your customers too much time, but also avoid rushing them.

Giving them the right amount of time is crucial so that they can see, understand and then claim your offer.

By offering some time, you also increase the chances of people discussing your offer and spreading the word about it.

• Promote the Offer

You may want to pin your offer to the top of your Facebook page for added exposure.

It’s difficult to track too many offers so (as per Facebook’s recommendation), keep re-sharing your existing offers. Avoid creating new offers when not needed.

Start Using Facebook for Business

Now it’s time you put all this information to work.

If you’re already using Facebook for business, then you now know how to use it even more efficiently to capture the results you want.

If you weren’t using Facebook for business, now you know what you’re missing out on and the next steps you need to take. 

Don’t feel like tackling this project on your own? That’s where we come in.

We have a full staff of Facebook marketing experts ready to help you grow using the social media giant.

It’s a marketer’s favorite tool and small business owner’s best friend.

Contact us today to discuss a customized plan on how you can start using Facebook for business growth.