Your business Facebook page can be a fantastic marketing tool. Used properly, it can build relationships, build your brand, build trust and credibility and drive enquiries and sales. However, there are some common mistakes you need to avoid if you're going to get your Facebook page really working for your business. If you are doing any of the 5 things below, you're at best wasting your time on a Facebook page that's just not going to do you justice and at worst heading for trouble, even getting your page shut down.
Here's a list of the 5 biggest mistakes I see on Facebook pages - there's no excuse to fall foul of them now.
1. Rants
I know, it's so tempting to vent your anger/frustration/opinion of your competitors on your Facebook page but it's the equivalent of washing your dirty linen in public. It doesn't look good and doesn't help anyone, least of all you. It looks unprofessional and all you'll do is create a pity party, which is a total distraction from your business. Don't get me wrong, I'm no angel, but I think I've ranted just once on my page in 3 years (in response to a spate of really rude emails) and I regretted it almost immediately. It's just not worth it. Complain to your pals, vent to your family but keep it OFF Facebook and other social media. Better to maintain a dignified silence and let karma take care of the rest.
2. Other People's Memes (Rather Than Sharing The Original Post)
SHARING other people's memes or posts is fine, in fact it's a brilliant idea. When you share from their page, they benefit from the shares which helps their page engagement. This is called Ethical Sharing. The great thing is you benefit too as Facebook seems to give greater weight and reach to popular posts shared from other pages. It's a win win. If you do the opposite - in other words you just save the image to your computer and post it on your page, rather than sharing then that's just not cool. Not only that but if the owner of the meme or artwork finds out, they can legitimately report you for stealing their intellectual property. Ethical sharing is the only way!
3. Sell Sell Sell Posts
Nobody wants to be sold to. Everyone wants to be helped. If all you post on your business Facebook page is pushy sales message after pushy sales message, pretty soon you'll end up with a page that's as flat as a pancake. Nobody is going to engage with that! Instead, think about the people you want to attract to your page and think about what they want to see. By all means post offers and deals, but put a bit of YOU into the page. Record some videos showing your products, talking about your suppliers, telling a story about your business - anything to inject some personality into your page and start to build relationships with your page fans. Ask questions, share tips, HELP people. You'll get a much more engaged page and remember, people buy people!
4. Like & Share Competitions
They are against Facebook's Promotional Guidelines (See E.3) which means YOU SHOULD NOT USE THEM and Facebook can and will shut down your page if they catch you. I've seen it happen more than once - it's just not worth the risk. And apart from that, they are a huge wasted opportunity - it's much MUCH better to use a dedicated competition app that lets you collect email addresses of entrants, that way you grow your list while you're promoting. Even if the app charges you a small amount to add the 'collect emails' feature, it's definitely worth it because you NEED to start building your email list. If you're not sure why, I have loads of blogs and podcasts about this, check them out here!
5. Anything NOT Aimed At Your Ideal Customers
By ideal customers, I mean people who are not a good fit for your business and are not likely to buy. If you're not clear who you're trying to attract to your page then you're going to be wasting a ton of time, money and energy and getting lukewarm results. Instead, figure out who is most likely to buy from you and target all your marketing at them - including your business Facebook page. Work out how you can add value, how you can help them, what sort of stuff they are likely to love and share. The more ideal customers you can attract, the more engagement you'll get on your Facebook page. The more engagement you get on your Facebook page, the more likely people are to stick around and take up any offers you put in front of them.
So, there you go. I'd love to know what you think and if you've got any more to add!