For a business, Facebook allows create what they call a “Business Page”. It has pretty much the same functionality, which makes it really easy to use facebook for a business if you are using it in your personal life. One thing to remember though – in a business page I want all my content or at least most of it to be publicly available.
Using facebook makes it easy for me to see what my friends are doing, what they are up to. So I naturally want to share with them what I am doing. And this part becomes really challenging to me in a context of multiple social media. Let me explain.
I have my facebook page, twitter and a blog. Of course, I want to include links to all of them on my Etsy shop, so whatever platform you are using you can comfortably connect with me on that particular platform. The challenge arises when I have something new to share.
For example, I do a new blog post and want to let everyone know I have posted it. If I post news about it on my twitter and facebook at the same time, users who are following me on both of those social media will get notification from both places, which is a bit annoying. It is really easy to share on all platforms simultaneously, keeping in mind that all social media suggest you to link your “other” accounts and constantly remind you to automatically place news on all platforms. So, my rule is do not get lazy and place links on each platform individually apart by a few hours. And most important part is “apart by a few hours”.
At the end of this post I want to add a chart of the number of users coming to my Etsy shop from my facebook page. I’m very happy about my latest improvement. I believe the reason is very simple – I started to post new things more frequent and also started to link my Etsy, facebook, twitter and blog in a better way (I’m trying to include them more often and place updates on different platforms with few hours delay.)
As a bonus for today’s post I want to list a few social
media “update ideas” I borrowed from article "How to Use Facebook to Build a Likable Reputation" by Megan Petersen:
"As a general rule, only 25% of your updates or less should
be links to your listings. Also, space your updates apart by a few hours each,
so you aren't bombarding anyone’s feed, which can be annoying no matter how
awesome your updates are.
Mixing up the type of updates you post keeps your Page
refreshing and fun. It also keep people checking back to make sure they haven’t
missed anything, and increases likes and comments (the things that help your
posts get seen.)
Some Update Ideas:
- Link to your latest blog post, with an interesting lead-in
that makes me curious to click.
- A funny (but tasteful) joke.
- Link to your newest listing, again with an interesting
lead-in that makes me curious to click.
- An inspirational picture.
- Link to a cool treasury you've been included in (be sure
to thank the curator!)
- Point out a helpful online tutorial you've discovered.
- Quote feedback from one of your customers. Upload a
screenshot the feedback for an even bigger impact.
- Upload an in-progress image of one of the projects you are
working on.
- Offer an exclusive coupon code for your Facebook fans.
- Share a cool or funny YouTube video.
- offer a tid-bit of life advice.
- Start a conversation by asking your fans a question.
(Example, “What are you dressing up as for Halloween?”)
- Upload a picture of your studio/work space.
- Let your fans know what shows/galleries/market places you
will be attending.
- Promote other sellers and their items. (Share the love!)
- Share cool status updates from other pages you've liked
from your business page.
Rinse, and repeat. I get a lot of people asking me what the
“secret” is to having an interactive Facebook page. Really, it’s all about
getting into the rhythm of mixing up the type of things you post. It’s okay to post
links to your listings, as long as there is a good mix of other stuff that help
your fans relate to you as a PERSON, not just a company. It’s not as much fun
being friends with a company."
If you'r found this useful, please feel free to share this post on your Facebook. :-)
A lot of interesting advises! Thanks for sharing...
ReplyDeleteGreat info on Facebook! Thanks for sharing :)
ReplyDeleteI am still on the fence whether or not I find any of the social networks to be useful in promotion. However, someone told me that a lot of people use mobile apps, and they are not counted when traffic is added up to your store, or blog. So, you don't really know what your stats are, they could be a lot better. These are all great tips, and I will try to use them all.
ReplyDelete