You might think you know how Facebook works. You upload cute photos of your cat or baby, your friends like them, and you use it to keep in touch with people you haven’t seen since school and might cross the road to avoid if you saw them in the street.

Easy, right?

Wrong. Although when used for personal accounts, Facebook is pretty straightforward (though there’s actually a lot going on in the background that you might not know about), but when it comes to using it for business it’s a whole other story.

As a business, you really do need to set up a Facebook page. It’s almost expected these days. And it’s a valuable tool. Don’t be tempted to use your personal account or to set up a group – it’s specifically a page that you want.

If you haven’t already got a Facebook business page set up, then this week’s email is going to be very useful for you indeed – complete with video tutorial!

Yes, here at Internet Income Detective we currently have lots of truly exciting new developments happening behind the scenes. You’ll be finding out all about these developments over the next month…

But one thing I can tell you about right now is that we’ve been recording lots of new tutorial videos that you can follow to learn how to do everything from creating you website to getting started on social media.

Lots of us struggle with the technical aspects of Internet marketing, but tasks like setting up your Facebook page are a lot simpler than you might imagine.

In this week’s video, our technical whizz-kid talks you through this task. The video is only seven minutes long and teaches you everything you need to know to get to grips with your own business page.

You can find the video here.

Can a page like this work for you?

Once you have your page set up, you might think that in order to run a successful Facebook page you need lots of money.

It’s true that Facebook will try their hardest to get money out of you. Next to every post you will see a button inviting you to ‘promote’ the post. By spending a little cash, you can greatly increase the number of people who see your posts, because if you pay for promotion, Facebook will show your updates to a much higher percentage of your fans – and their friends.

This can be tempting but you need to exercise caution. What will you actually achieve by spending this money? If it sends more traffic to your site or gets you more Facebook fans it may be money well spent.

But my advice is to only spend money on activities that are related to monetary value. For example, you could be directly promoting a product or trying to get sign-ups to your email list. It needs to be something you can measure.

So, you can start off by spending a little and then measuring what you got from it. Start by choosing one of the cheaper options and if you make a profit, expand the campaign. If you lose money, move on.

So how can you build your business on Facebook without spending any or much money? The important thing here is to be creative. You don’t need to spend anything at all. If you can find interesting pictures or inspiring quotes, then you have content that users will like and share.

You can engage fans whatever the topic.

An example I like to cite when talking about making Facebook work is the ‘Money Saving Expert’ Facebook page. It works well because they talk about things that are of interest to their audience – namely, saving money.

Lots of posts on that page get hundreds of comments because they encourage users to share their experiences. Even better, they allow them to show off by sharing how and where they’ve got a bargain or made a saving. People love boasting about anything that makes them look clever, or even lucky.

Sometimes, just asking people to make a very simple choice can encourage them to take part – e.g. a poll or question about which new design of something they prefer.

The easier you make it for people to take part, the more successful a post will be. Complicated questions, anything that requires more than a few seconds’ thought, and you will lose most of your audience.

‘Naming competitions’ always work well. Got a new kitten? Ask people to name it! I guarantee it will be the most popular post you’ll ever do. It doesn’t even have to be a real kitten – a cuddly toy will work just as well.

Whether you are selling a newsletter about Internet marketing or you have an affiliate site promoting financial services, you should be able to find an interesting angle.

You don’t have to try to make it funny or silly. Pictures of amusing cats might not work for your audience, but basic human psychology applies whatever you are trying to sell.

Show me the money

With everything above, you must never forget to keep your goals in mind. While it might be fun to get people to take part in a competition to name a cuddly toy or like a funny picture of a cat, how does this translate into the important stuff: revenue?

There are two ways of looking at this…

The first is the soft sell approach. This is the theory that by engaging people, by getting them to like your brand/business – or you as an individual – when they next want whatever you have to sell, they will think of you. It’s called being ‘front of mind’.

Keeping existing customers engaged through your Facebook page can also be effective. As the saying goes: ‘people do business with people’ – and if they like you and your company, your customers will keep returning.

Writing nice things about your fans, trying to get to know them and responding to their questions and comments – these are all incredibly important. You need to let people know you are human.

The second is the hard sell approach. This is where you are more aggressive about monetising your page, by frequently posting links to products and posts on your site.

This can work too, but my view is that on Facebook, it’s better if done in moderation. People won’t engage if you are only trying to sell to them.

You should, though, make sure that you mix in sales messages to remind users what you do, and hook them in if they are interested on the day they see it.

It’s also completely fine to post special offers, sales, bargains, etc: if you have a big price promotion running, don’t forget to let people know about it.

Plus, it’s a good idea to post good reviews and feedback about your site or product. Don’t be afraid to ‘big yourself up’! This can lead directly to sales.

Creating freebies like downloads on your site and promoting these on your Facebook page can work well too. Give people a solid reason to go to your site and sign up.

The first step, of course, is to get that page set up. So, do make sure you check out that free training video over on the website.
 
Make sure you let me know if it helps you out.

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