Facebook makes your brand extremely accessible, providing an informal yet professional way of connecting with your target market. That may sound all well and good, but how do you get this said target market to your page in the first place?
How to increase your Facebook following
In answer to that question, we take a look at 7 smart hacks to increase your Facebook fanbase in 2018:
1 – Call to Action
Telling your website or blog visitor (in a fun, warm polite way : ) what action you would like them to take on the page can have an effective result.
Call to Actions can be subtle such as asking your reader “Like what you’re reading so far?” followed by “Follow us on Facebook for the latest web design and social media news” is an effective way to encourage people to like your Facebook Page.
In this way you Call to Action allows your reader to further engage with your content, strengthening the reader’s interest and connection to the brand.
2 – Facebook Groups
Start engaging more on Facebook Groups which have similar interest to your page. By making valuable comments, you start to build up relationships, drawing attention to your brand and your page.
As the group caters for people who are have similar interests, they will be more open to joining other pages which can provide them with valuable information and assistance in their field.
3 – Visual Content
Images are a key ingredient to attracting your reader’s attention. Images can be used to provide further insight into your blog or post or they can be used to symbolically represent your content such as using a nifty sports car to illustrate a blog post such as ‘taking your social media impact to the next level.’
Think out of the box can be effective when it comes to images, as long as the image relates to the theme of your content in some way.
While images are still significant, the rise of video brings visual content to a whole new level. Just scrolling through your Facebook feed is testament to that with video content often given preferential treatment, appearing more frequently than static images in the newsfeed
4 – Leveraging your communications
Email provides an ideal means of creating awareness of your Facebook Page with the opportunity to include a link to your Facebook Page in the communication.
Ideally, this can be done in your signature with a quick and easy way of clicking through to your Facebook Page by inserting the Facebook icon into your email signature as follows:
- Download the Facebook icon and save to your desktop or mobile photos
- Click on the insert tab in the email menu
- Select the ‘picture’ option (this will allow you to access the saved Facebook icon)
- Once pasted into your signature, select the icon and click again on the insert tab
- Select the link option and add your Facebook URL
In this way the person receiving your email will be able to click on your Facebook icon and go directly to your Facebook page.
5 – Invite people to your page
If you click on the names of people who have liked your post, either as a result of posting on your newsfeed or through boosting a post, you will be able to invite people who responded to your post to like your page. When you click on the number next to the reactions, Facebook will automatically generate an invite option for you to click on in order to invite the people to your page if they haven’t liked your page already. This is an option that can be quite effective as the person is already engaging with your content, making them likely to convert if an invitation is sent to them.
6 – Provide valuable content
It goes without saying that your content must provide value to your followers. By ensuring that your content is current and cutting edge, you motivate your followers to share your content, exposing your posts to a wider audience.
Additionally, this creates a loyal following where you provide access to key information for your followers.
7 – Listing on Google
Google bots index the title, custom URL and tab headings of your Facebook Page. This is key to creating awareness of your brand, enabling you to extend your reach to your target market.
You can check to see if your Facebook page is on the search results page by inserting your full Facebook Page URL in the search box of Google page. If you don’t see your Facebook Page listed, you don’t need to send your URL to Google. In fact, there is a fairly simple solution to getting your page indexed and listed.
This is when you need to check your Facebook settings and make small modifications to enable Google bots to crawl to your page, while keeping in mind that this is a social platform with the emphasis on creating engaging interesting content, you can still insert keywords into your tab content to maximise the SEO potential of your Facebook Page.
Wrapping up
Creating your fanbase is a key step to being able to grow your brand on Facebook. Keep in mind that this is not an overnight sensation. Facebook marketing and growing your fan base takes time, thought and careful strategising. But once established, you get to reap the rewards, using the platform to nurture and grow your relationships to create brand loyalty where leads become both brand advocates and loyal paying customers.
