Why use Facebook for business? What can it offer you when it comes to marketing your company, brand and product or service?
When concentrating on social media marketing, it’s important to become familiar with all the major social platforms out there. Facebook is one of the big players and therefore essential to wrap your head around.
Setting up your business page and getting started
Most people will have basic knowledge of using Facebook. It has been around for years and almost everyone uses their personal profile frequently, but the big question is, do you need a Facebook Business page?
Having a Facebook Business Page set up for your company is, in fact, quite crucial. Facebook has more than two billion monthly active users and is the leading platform for both B2C and B2B business. It is therefore vital to not ignore it as a marketing platform. It’s pretty much a sure thing that your audience is using Facebook, along with your competitors, so make sure you are present and make your business stand out.
If you haven’t used Facebook before, or you want help in setting up a Business profile, Facebook itself is best to help you do this. Facebook, like all the other Social Media Platforms out there, has really good, interactive on-boarding to help you get set up easily and effectively, leaving you feeling confident using the platform.
Use the links below to get started or to help jazz up your current business profile:
- ‘Facebook Help’
Use Facebook Help if you are new to Facebook and wish to set yourself up from the very beginning. - ‘Facebook Business – Marketing’
If you wish to learn more about what Facebook Business can offer you, start here. - ‘Set up a page for your business’
The vast majority of businesses say that having an online presence is important to succeed in the long-term, so why not set up your free Business page here. - ‘Help Community’
‘Reach one of the world’s biggest communities’ is a tagline that Facebook Business uses. They aren’t wrong and in fact offer a help community too where you can get help from other people on Facebook, asking similar questions.
How to use Facebook effectively
Once you have set up your business profile, there are a few things that are going to be vital to make your page pop.
Make sure your Business page looks rich with content.
- Choose a Username and Page name that fits in with your other social handles to avoid confusion for any Facebook users.
- Fill your profile with all relevant and important information so that visitors can see what you are about.
- Include your contact details so people can get a hold of you.
- Upload high quality images at all times, starting with your profile picture and banner image.
- Make sure that your branding and messaging is on point.
- Start to follow and like people and pages that are of relevance, interest or importance.
Share rich content
Facebook is a good way of sharing richer content. In contrast, Twitter is very fast moving and posts can easily get missed, and Instagram, however great, has limitations in what form your posts take, which Facebook does not. Use this to your advantage.
- Use lots of videos in your content.
- Initiate lots of discussion with anyone who is tuned in.
- Get people talking and debating in your community.
Facebook is a place where you can start to build your community around your values and around the product or service that is on offer.
Most businesses will have a website set up to offer value and show they mean business. All websites should be filled with some great content and hopefully a frequently updated Blog to start gaining traction and get people following them. Blogs are important and there are sites out there like Medium that will allow someone to set up a quick and easy one if they do not have a website.
Facebook is a great place to share this sort of content. You want to be directing people to a website ideally, where they can really access your proposition in a slightly richer way.
Facebook is one of the best, if not the best platform for:
- Building and shaping a community
- Sharing information
- Communicating in a richer way
- Expressing your brand values
Keep your Brand consistent
As with all social platforms, it is really important to make sure that your Facebook business profile and presence is really brand consistent. In fact, it is more important to get this right with Facebook than Twitter for instance as the shelf-life of your posts on Facebook is so much longer.
Select images (your profile picture and cover image) that are appropriate for your brand and when using videos, try and add some branding elements within them, particularly if you think they are likely to be shared. It is good for them to be brand consistent too.
Consider your tone of voice
When thinking about brand consistency of Facebook, it is really important to think about the tone of voice you are using with your different posts. You do not want to be using inconsistent tones of voice as this will confuse your brand. You want your tone to be appropriate to the type of content you are sharing, whether it is serious or funny, long or short, but you really have to try and keep the same tone of voice throughout ALL communications for people to take you seriously.