This week we're continuing our series of So Easy Social Media. We're going over how to get more likes and engagement on Facebook with absolutely no money in advertising.
How to Create a Page on Facebook:
Announcements (new posts, blogs, videos)
The “Drive By” message
Memes
Short videos and teasers (ideally under a minute, but no more than 2 mins TOPS)
How to Create a Group on Facebook:
This gives them a call to action immediately upon joining and you’ll have warmer leads.
What to post on Your Group:
Get a discussion going.
Ask questions.
Provide quality insight (not available on your blog or anywhere else).
Don’t promote or sell anything here. That’s what your page or website is for. This is a nit community.
You can create imagery for your group, a place where you’re hanging out: chillin’ in the living room or lying on the shores of Lazy Island.
You can link to your blog where you do the selling, but the group should be strictly value and conversation, not promotion.
Go Behind the Scenes and other exclusive content
Be consistent with when you post and how often. When starting a group it’s recommended to post DAILY.
Your goal is not to constantly create content but to encourage discussion. Reply to comments and ask follow up questions.
Get people talking.
You push the boulder down the hill and let it roll by itself,
Eventually, you can kind of slide back and let the discussion take care of itself. Veterans and experts will share their knowledge and opinion with new members.
People will begin opening up their own discussions and you can begin just popping in every once in a while.
Remember you set the tone. Decide FROM THE BEGINNING if you want it to be fun and laid back or more serious.
Other people will follow your lead
You lead and decide how drama will be handled when it arises. You decide how members will be treated. You create the environment.
So create a warm, welcoming environment that people want to join and look forward to coming back to. Handle haters, spammers, winers and complainers politely, yet firmly.
When you have a warm welcoming, helpful environment full of knowledgeable and friendly people (including yourself), people will naturally associate those warm feelings with you and your brand.
Welcome New Members:
Take time to reply to comments.
Not all at once.
Facebook will bring the post up , not only on the group page but also on people’s timeline each time someone comments
Recruiting New Members
Add people as friends from other groups in your niche. Then add
You can also invite them to like your page. Page likes are really just social proof and“street cred”though
...because FB changed their algorithm to punish brand pages, causing them to show up a lot less frequently, if at all.
You may get soft banned if you start adding too many people, so pace it out.
A soft ban prevents you from sending friend requests for up to a few days. After this happens, just lay low and stop adding people for a couple more days after the ban is lifted.
You can add ~100 per day.
Facebook algorithm will suggest groups to people if it sees “mutual members” so sometimes people will just come to your group without you inviting them.
Include a link on your Facebook (Business) Page
On the right hand corner of your timeline, you’ll see a button. Click it to edit it and go to Join Your Community > Visit Group
Why Groups are Better than Pages
Facebook algorithm changed to be geared toward “quality discussion”. They don’t want people “alone” reading news headlines, thus page content, unless paid for and promoted is rarely seen in the timeline.
This is a combination of two things.
If there's a graph out there for those things, I'm sure you'll see an increase.
I find I get bigger reach if I share a post to my personal page (from my business page) than a typical day when I don't.
If you're not reaching many people with your page's post, try sharing it in a group or personal page and you'll see the numbers go up.
Pages are really just kind of here now to create ads and pixels, and be a hub for official announcements, not to actually reach out to the community and followers like it used to be.
Summary:
Create a page for promotion
Create a group for discussion
Add people from niche groups as friends then invite them to your group/page
Give people encouragement to discuss
Join the ProcrastiN8rs Group on Facebook
How to Create a Page on Facebook:
- Go to pages on the left side bar
- Click Create Page at the top right
- Select Business (if it’s your blog) or Public Figure (if you’re selling yourself as a personality, on YouTube or Twitch, for example). Mos tlikely you’re gonna wanna pick the prior.
- Hit Get started
- Name your page your Brand Name and select a category relevant to your niche
- Add a profile pic and timeline photo (It’ll automatically wlak you through these steps)
- Invite friends who will be genuinely intereste din your topic
- Hit edit page info and fill out the details
- Hit settings at the top right of your page
- Once you have 25 fans or more, go to your main business page and click about on the left sidebar, choose a username (your business name)
Announcements (new posts, blogs, videos)
The “Drive By” message
Memes
Short videos and teasers (ideally under a minute, but no more than 2 mins TOPS)
How to Create a Group on Facebook:
- Go to Groups on the left side bar
- Click Create Group at the top right (Green button)
- Give it a title that makes it clear what the discussion is about (not necessarily your brand name)
- Add some friends who would be genuinely interested in your niche
- Make it a CLOSED group. This makes it seem like an exclusive group, a little hang out space
- Check the box “Add to shortcuts”
- Upload a photo, include some text or images relevant to the topic covered. You can put a “slug” of your brand’s logo in the bottom right corner
- Go to More..Edit group settings
- Select the group type. Social learning will give you “units”to organize posts by category
- Add apps and tags relevant to your niche to increase your chance of showing up in search results or recommendations
- Link your page
- Anyone can post. Only Admin add stories
- Click Ask questions and create questions. Ask for an e-mail (optional), How did you hear about this group? And a question relevant to your topic or niche
This gives them a call to action immediately upon joining and you’ll have warmer leads.
- Click More... at the top again and go to Moderate Group
- Create Rules. What type of behavior do you expect? What should they avoid posting? By default: be kind, no hate speech, no spam, & respect privacy Give some suggestions on what they CAN post, not only what to avoid.
- Click “About” and write what the group is about and who is welcome to join. Describe your target audience. Set any goals you have for the group.
- Go to discussion (left bar) and make a generic welcome post, set the tone and give an overview of the goals. basically combine the about page and rules you just posted, but re-word it.
What to post on Your Group:
Get a discussion going.
Ask questions.
Provide quality insight (not available on your blog or anywhere else).
Don’t promote or sell anything here. That’s what your page or website is for. This is a nit community.
You can create imagery for your group, a place where you’re hanging out: chillin’ in the living room or lying on the shores of Lazy Island.
You can link to your blog where you do the selling, but the group should be strictly value and conversation, not promotion.
Go Behind the Scenes and other exclusive content
Be consistent with when you post and how often. When starting a group it’s recommended to post DAILY.
Your goal is not to constantly create content but to encourage discussion. Reply to comments and ask follow up questions.
Get people talking.
You push the boulder down the hill and let it roll by itself,
Eventually, you can kind of slide back and let the discussion take care of itself. Veterans and experts will share their knowledge and opinion with new members.
People will begin opening up their own discussions and you can begin just popping in every once in a while.
Remember you set the tone. Decide FROM THE BEGINNING if you want it to be fun and laid back or more serious.
Other people will follow your lead
You lead and decide how drama will be handled when it arises. You decide how members will be treated. You create the environment.
So create a warm, welcoming environment that people want to join and look forward to coming back to. Handle haters, spammers, winers and complainers politely, yet firmly.
When you have a warm welcoming, helpful environment full of knowledgeable and friendly people (including yourself), people will naturally associate those warm feelings with you and your brand.
Welcome New Members:
- More > Moderate Group > Membership requests
- Tag the names of people you add and welcome them to the group. Ask a question
Take time to reply to comments.
Not all at once.
Facebook will bring the post up , not only on the group page but also on people’s timeline each time someone comments
Recruiting New Members
Add people as friends from other groups in your niche. Then add
You can also invite them to like your page. Page likes are really just social proof and“street cred”though
...because FB changed their algorithm to punish brand pages, causing them to show up a lot less frequently, if at all.
You may get soft banned if you start adding too many people, so pace it out.
A soft ban prevents you from sending friend requests for up to a few days. After this happens, just lay low and stop adding people for a couple more days after the ban is lifted.
You can add ~100 per day.
Facebook algorithm will suggest groups to people if it sees “mutual members” so sometimes people will just come to your group without you inviting them.
Include a link on your Facebook (Business) Page
On the right hand corner of your timeline, you’ll see a button. Click it to edit it and go to Join Your Community > Visit Group
Why Groups are Better than Pages
Facebook algorithm changed to be geared toward “quality discussion”. They don’t want people “alone” reading news headlines, thus page content, unless paid for and promoted is rarely seen in the timeline.
This is a combination of two things.
- Money. Organic traffic and growth is stinted. Paid traffic is really the only traffic you get, well most of it anyway. Facebook started lowering a page's reach, under the guise of "FB is about community and people, not businesses," simply to encourage businesses to buy more ad
- R. Between the election and the recent Cambridge Analytics fiasco, Facebook has quite the public relations stunt to pull off. They're probably lowering the virality of a post just to sort of keep things under control and lower their chance of being blamed for (actual) fake news going viral. Don't let the illness spread too quickly. Of course nothing's really stopping a personal or group post from going viral (right now)
If there's a graph out there for those things, I'm sure you'll see an increase.
I find I get bigger reach if I share a post to my personal page (from my business page) than a typical day when I don't.
If you're not reaching many people with your page's post, try sharing it in a group or personal page and you'll see the numbers go up.
Pages are really just kind of here now to create ads and pixels, and be a hub for official announcements, not to actually reach out to the community and followers like it used to be.
Summary:
Create a page for promotion
Create a group for discussion
Add people from niche groups as friends then invite them to your group/page
Give people encouragement to discuss
Join the ProcrastiN8rs Group on Facebook
