“Are you stroking your Facebook fan’s VIP’ness?”

Posted by Garth Ledwidge

If you’re one of the many businesses up in arms over the recent dramatic drop in your Facebook reach, then you probably aren’t.

According to Nick Bowditch, marketing consultant at SMB Marketing Australia and New Zealand, it is a bit of an unfortunate coincidence that Facebook’s paid promoted posts were released around the same time that everyone’s Facebook reach suddenly dropped.

Facebook provides access to140 billion friend connections and studies have proven that if they don’t have to, businesses using Facebook won’t spend 1 red cent on it. With approximately 4000 staff and now shareholders, the bills have to be paid somehow.

Coincidence or not, it is a great wakeup call to businesses who have been using Facebook as a free marketing tool, to lift their game.

Remembering that Facebook was created for users to share their lives and not for businesses to spruik their latest wares and make the most of the free exposure, businesses now have basically 2 options if the want to increase and maintain their reach.

 

Option Number 1

 

“Stroke your fan’s Very Important Person’ness”.

 

• If you want your reach back without spending any money, then start creating engaging content that your fans enjoy enough to not just “Like” but actually “Share” with their friends. Sharing is the currency of Facebook. Lots of your content “shared”= lots of reach.
• Remember Facebook is all about your fans, not you. They want to connect with you, that’s why they liked your page in the first place. Aim to make your page a conversation with your fans. One where you take the time to ask them what they want and like, and listen to them when they are telling you what they don’t.
• Create exclusive content available only to your Facebook fans, or at the very least give them the exclusive heads up or sneak peaks before you release it anywhere else.
• Don’t just assume you know what they want or treat your page like a one-way megaphone to shout your agenda at your fans, and ignore them at your peril!
• The more fans who unlike your page or even just hide your posts, the less relevant Facebook considers your content to be and your reach will be diminished even further.

 

In listening to your fans and creating content based on those insights, you give your fans a sense of ownership over your content, and create a community who are not only much more likely to purchase your product or service but share your content, increase your reach and become offline advocates for you as well as online.

 

 

Option 2

 

Pay up!

Promoted Posts, Sponsored Posts, and Facebook Ads are all effective forms of advertising assuming you choose the one that best suits your needs and you target them correctly, and of course an advertising budget.

I could go into the Pro’s and Con’s of each of them but as I’m probably not going to be offered any sales commission by Facebook I’m not going to. Well not right now.

Facebook makes changes to its platform to enrich the user experience and by user I mean the fans. So for businesses that have basically had a free ride up until now (not that there’s anything wrong with that), it’s time to contribute to Facebook’s on going up keep. Either in the form of great quality, emotive and shareable content

or cash.

I will get to the Pro’s and Con’s of the afore mentioned payed options but until then if these options have sparked your interest head to Facebook to find out more. If you found this post useful check out the wealth of knowledge on our Bluewire Media blog.