chapter 3
Drawing More People to Your Page
You can drive additional people to your business Page by using contests, polls, and questions. By incorporating these items into your Page, you add a much-desired variety to your postings. Instead of arriving at a Timeline full of status updates, customers first see a few interactive pieces that directly ask them to participate. These Facebook apps also create ways to encourage customers to communicate with you when they may not know exactly what to share.
The most powerful way a company can build its community on Facebook is through audience engagement. This chapter covers how to use Facebook apps to bring interactivity to your business Page.
Creating Contests, Polls, and Questions
Additional Ways to Drive More Facebook Visits
Leveraging Offline and Online Marketing
Creating Contests, Polls, and Questions
Your Facebook business Page will not be a successful part of your marketing plan if you can’t get people to visit your Page. Encourage people to visit your Page and interact with your business by using contests, polls, and questions.
Contests
People love contests and sweepstakes. The opportunity to beat the odds and win a contest, even with a one-in-a-million chance, is alluring. Facebook has features for incorporating and managing a contest on your Page (see Figure 3.1). These contests are run by third-party vendors, not Facebook.
3.1 Contests are a great addition to your Facebook business Page or group.
This chapter covers the basics of creating a contest on Facebook. Contests can attract visitors to a Facebook fan Page or serve as a supplement for a Check-in campaign. A Check-in campaign is a way to drive repeat traffic to a local store — the more people Check-in via Facebook, the more points they receive for a chance to win something. Many businesses have seen success with contests.
All contests promoted on Facebook must use a Facebook-approved app. There are absolutely no exceptions. Facebook monitors businesses to ensure that promotions fall within its guidelines, and it can penalize a company by removing content and disabling a Facebook Page. Read Facebook promotion guidelines here: www.facebook.com/promotions_guidelines.php.
Fortunately, a number of contest applications are available, each providing services perfect for creating contests, sweepstakes, coupons, polls, or other promotions. These apps provide various data collection methods for the contest, such as entry forms within the app link or an e-mail form. The most common applications currently available are the following:
• Wildfire (www.wildfireapp.com)
• North Social (http://northsocial.com)
• Woobox (http://woobox.com)
• Votigo (www.votigo.com)
• Strutta (www.strutta.com)
• Offerpop (http://offerpop.com)
You can search for all these applications on Facebook or on websites such as Appbistro (http://appbistro.com) or All Facebook (http://allfacebook.com). You can also use sources such as Mashable to research contest success stories from various businesses to decide what type of contest or promotion might be most effective for your business.
Contests, like other promoted content online, take time to promote. Try to promote a contest or sweepstakes at least a few weeks before its starting date and then run the contest or sweepstakes for at least two to three weeks, if possible. You need time for the news about the contest to spread and for people to participate.
Facebook ads can be used to market your contest (as long as the content adheres to guidelines). The ad-creation process is, of course, the same as for standard Facebook ads. You have to ensure the ads link to your registration page or a landing page that explains the contest or sweepstakes. Make sure that you have a few images for your ads, especially if the promotion is lengthy. Different images may prevent the ad from appearing old, while the new images can help generate interest, if not a lot of clicks.
Also consider focusing ads on particular demographics or regions. You can use the Ads Manager (discussed in depth in Chapter 4) to determine how well the ads are doing. These ads can augment your other marketing efforts to build your contest audience. You can access your Ads Manager and read more about Facebook Ad Guidelines here: http://ads.ak.facebook.com/ads/FacebookAds/TheNewAdsManager_May2011v2.pdf.
You can also create and send video messages about your contests. Share these with your Page followers and ask partners to mention your sweepstakes in their posts or podcasts.
Polls
Facebook polls are another way to engage with your customers, gain insight from your Facebook audience, and start conversations. Polls, of course, seek insights from people regarding topics. I suggest you create short questions with multiple-choice answers. The polls you create display your care for customer opinions and enable you to discover ways to improve communication with your followers. This can lead to new ideas for your Page and refreshing the engagement (see Figure 3.2).
3.2 Creating a poll generates additional interaction from your members and offers valuable insight to your business. Polls can be created daily or at any frequency level you choose; just keep in mind they are designed to create interaction between your company and your followers.
The steps to creating a traditional poll, one in which you specify all the options up front and people may not vote for more than one option, are quite simple:
1. Click the Event, Milestone link beneath the cover photo section of your home Page and then click Question (see Figure 3.3).
2. Type your question in the Ask Something box.
3. Click Add Poll Options to enter the answers you want to have as options.
3.3 The first step to adding a poll to your business Page is to click Event, Milestone and then click Question.
4. Deselect the Allow anyone to add options check box if you want your poll to only contain the responses you supplied. If you want to create a poll where people can add options, ensure that the Allow anyone to add options check box is selected (see Figure 3.4).
5. Click the settings gear box to choose additional targeting options, which include language and country.
6. Click Post. Your question is posted to your Timeline and sent to your users (or only those who meet your targeted criteria).
3.4 Type your question and a selection of answers that your followers can choose from to answer. Deselect the Allow anyone to add options check box to ensure that only your answers appear as choices.
Here are some tips to make polls successful:
• Keep poll subjects short.
• Make questions as direct as possible.
• Only ask one question — avoid compound questions.
• Post the results as soon as possible. For a weekly poll, give the results weekly; for a daily poll, give the results daily.
There are a number of Facebook tools you can use to encourage participation. For example, send a video message to some of your followers. The message can alert them to the poll or be a reminder to participate. Be careful you don’t go overboard in reaching out to followers. Contact them too much and you can start spamming them, but contact them too little and they’ll forget you. Be balanced.
Once your poll is complete, be sure to share some behind-the-scenes perspective with the results. Create a blog post that elaborates on the results and draws conclusions. Share the information on your Facebook Page, either through your notes or a post on your Page’s Timeline. If you have feedback, you can share the comments anonymously.
Questions
Another way to further engage your fans is to set up an environment for them to ask questions that are shared publicly. Facebook lets users ask a question and get quick answers from their friends and other people on Facebook. A poll has predefined options for the potential answers, and a question is where the respondents provide their own answers. Questions are designed so that anyone on Facebook can help you find the answer, so when you ask a question it is shared in your friends’ News Feeds. If your friends answer or follow that question, it is shared with their friends, and so on.
You can ask any type of question you want, but remember that questions are designed for fast, short-form responses. For example, you can use questions to get recommendations from your customers (What are your favorite business apps that you use while traveling?), learn more about the people within the group (What drew you to this line of business?), or start discussion about current events (How can I help reduce the unemployment levels in our industry?).
Anyone on Facebook may answer a question you ask, but answers are always filtered to show you only the responses from your followers. To access the responses from anyone else, click Others within the Posts section of the question.
Questions can yield some excellent results for your business. It did for Dell, according to my friend Laura Thomas, corporate reputation manager for Dell’s global commercial channel vice president/general manager. She told me in an interview that “It’s a very easy way to get a quick response to serious questions that can provide feedback for business decisions, or for fun questions that just help build a sense of camaraderie with Page fans.”
Additional Ways to Drive More Facebook Visits
There are a number of ways to make your presence on Facebook an attractive draw for customers and clients alike. You can create a poll, create sweepstakes or contests, share blog posts that are related to your Page, announce Check-in campaigns, and run Facebook ads. But do you think that’s all? Of course not! Your business can apply some advanced methodologies to drive more traffic to your Facebook Page. Although it may seem like a hassle, keep in mind that your business can already drive this traffic naturally in many ways, so the effort is not necessarily an extra task. My goal is to show you how you can make the most of the Facebook audience.
Include a link to Facebook in your business material
Make sure your business materials reflect that you have a Facebook presence. This may sound like a simple act, but you would be surprised how many small businesses overlook this opportunity to provide a coherent message. You should make incorporating Facebook (and truthfully, all your social media presences) a habit so that it’s second nature to have a card or pamphlet that shows where and how people can join your business on Facebook.
You can have a sticker in your store window that reminds customers to go to your Facebook Page. Brochures for your services can display the fan Page with the ubiquitous Facebook symbol next to it, the address of your Page, and a note to “Join Us.” You can do the same for the ending and beginning of video you create. The key is providing some reminder of your media property and asking people to join you there (see Figure 3.5).
3.5 This business owner has created a business card that ensures that you can find her on every social media site that she belongs to.
Online small-business service directories like Manta allow user profiles to include a link to a Facebook business Page. Another service, an app called WiseStamp, includes Facebook comments within the closing of an e-mail. This can be a draw for followers used to seeing a simple Facebook fan Page name at the end of their e-mail.
Your badges or links should send potential customers to the portion of your business Page where they can engage and listen most naturally. Doing so tells your customers they can ask questions to learn more about your services and how to ultimately reach you when they are ready to do business.
Make your Page name simple
When you first set up your business Page, you are given a standard fan Page URL, which is a series of random numbers that are not very easily remembered. The first thing to do is to create a username for your Page. Usernames allow you to easily promote your presence on Facebook and can be used in your marketing communications, company website, and business cards. Creating a username gives your Page a specific name that becomes the URL for your business Page. Use the name of your business as the username, if it is available. For example, if your business name is Acme Printing, then make your username AcmePrinting, and the corresponding URL would be https://www.facebook.com/AcmePrinting. You can follow these steps to change your Page username:
1. On the upper-right corner of your business Page, click Admin Panel.
2. At the top of the Page, click Edit Page.
3. From the list of links on the left side, choose Resources (see Figure 3.6).
3.6 Changing your Page username is simple! Click Edit Page under the Admin Tools, and then click Resources in the left-hand column and choose Select a username from the available options on the Page.
4. Choose Select a username from the list of available resources. If you are currently using Facebook as your business Page, you will be asked to continue under your personal account.
5. Choose which Page you want to create a username for from the drop-down list. If you have only one Page, the name of that Page shows by default (see Figure 3.7).
6. Choose a username for your Page by typing the name of your business in the box and then click Check Availability.
7. If the name is available, confirm that you want to make the change by clicking Confirm. Once you confirm, your new URL that you can use in your marketing materials is displayed.
3.7 Type in the name you want to assign as your username and check its availability. If it’s available, click Confirm and your username is changed.
All names are given on a first-come, first-serve basis, so if your business uses a widely used word in its name, you may find that it is unavailable. If that happens, get creative when choosing your name but remember not to defer too far from your business name, as it may make it difficult for people to find you.
You should also remember that your Page is searchable through search engines outside of Facebook. This means that you may want to incorporate a keyword in the title to help your business be discovered.
You may want to control how exposed a Page is to search, particularly at the launch stage when you are still making adjustments and edits. To hide your Page from search engines, go to the privacy settings and deselect the Public Search check box.
Once content is already online and indexed by search engines it’s hard to take it down. To remove online content, try these two steps:
• Delete the original post. This is probably the easiest option of the two given here. When you do this, the content may still show up in search engines, but the link to that content is invalid.
• Contact the specific search engine’s support team. If you want the entire search result to go away, you need to contact the search engine to remove it. Each search engine will have a different process to contact them — e-mail, phone, an online form, or other means.
Tag people
Another great way to attract more people to your Page is by tagging photos that you post on your Page. Tagging is identifying a person in a photo as one of your Facebook friends. Tagging photos on your business Page tells your fans that they are noticed and appreciated and gives others the chance to see firsthand how you interact with your customers and business partners.
Upload photos from seminars, panel discussions, and trade shows you attend and tag as many people that you recognize in the photo as possible. Once you tag people in a photo, they receive a notification on their own Page that they have been tagged in your photo. This invariably leads them, and any of their friends who see the post on their Page, to your Page. Tagging a photo is quite simple:
1. After you upload your photo to Facebook, click Tag Photo on the lower-right of the picture.
2. Click on the image of the person you want to tag in the photo and a small box appears on the photo.
3. Type the name of the person in the photo. If the person is a fan or friend of yours, his or her name appears in the list to choose. If the person is not a fan or friend, as you type in the name, a list of potential names appears. These names belong to groups or public figures. Make sure you do not improperly tag the photo with the wrong name (see Figure 3.8).
Many businesses take advantage of mobile phone cameras to make photo sharing and tagging really effective. You can take pictures of customers in your retail shop during an event or sale and then instantly post them to your Page and tag the customers while they are still in your shop. Another great idea is to ask your patrons to take photos of themselves wearing your business T-shirt, button, or other promotional item, and then upload them to their Page and tag your business. In both instances, you are exposing your business to an endless number of people on Facebook.
3.8 Tagging people in photos is a great way to establish additional interaction on your Page.
Participate in forums
Participating in forums is a great way to promote your business and, through good forum discussion, drive fans to your Facebook Page. You may be working in an industry where participating in the industry forum is essential for being visible. That forum can be on a number of platforms, from Ning to LinkedIn. When you do participate, see how you can enhance the forum discussions. Be careful not to overpromote, however, and follow community guidelines about bold promotional efforts. People usually are grateful for helpful and meaningful participation, so learn how to be a good neighbor. Your signature in each forum post can provide a link to your Facebook Page.
Encourage fans
Do not be too controlling of who promotes your product. Discouraging fans that suddenly create a Page about your business may do more harm than good. A great example of cooperation is cited in the 2010 Harvard Business Review article “Empowered” by Josh Bernoff and Ted Schadler. Coca-Cola discovered an unauthorized Facebook fan Page about its soda by two raving Coca-Cola fans who wanted to share their love for Coke with others. Their site became one of the most popular fan Pages on Facebook.
Instead of using legal action to take the fan site down, Coke partnered with its fans. The fans were given a rare tour of Coca-Cola headquarters and Coke allowed its fans to direct their customer engagement. This did not take anything away from Coke, and it really enhanced the company’s standing online.
The point is that it’s good to listen and be aware of who your fans are and what they are saying, and know when it may be better to use a good comment or fan Page to your advantage.
Make it easy for folks to share
The Coke story is not just an example of control but of simplicity. Imagine the resources and time Coke would have had to invest to replace Song and Jedrzejweski’s Page with its own. It was much easier to keep the ball rolling with the content they had already created and the following they had generated. Though your business is most likely on a smaller scale (and probably involves much less soda), you should always keep such simplicity in mind when you seek interaction from your followers.
If you request content from your followers, make it an easy act. The request can range from a simple photo post to a simple thought or comment in a Timeline post. Remember that their time is as precious as yours. The easier you make it to fulfill the request for content, the easier it is to generate engagement and maintain the vitality of your Page.
Using Groups
Groups provide a way to engage a dedicated audience. Groups are more private than Pages, but they provide a means to share information and receive feedback with a highly engaging set of people.
How are Pages different from groups?
Groups are more private than Pages, but their privacy creates a community within Facebook. This may be convenient for businesses that need to communicate with clients closely and continuously to provide faster service and retain customers in a competitive field. Pages, on the other hand, are public and can be accessed by anyone. Interaction on the Page is typically open to anyone who visits, unless it is specified that you like the Page before you can add comments and interactions, and most of the interaction is generated by you in an effort to inform visitors about your business.
Pages enable real organizations, businesses, celebrities, and brands to communicate broadly with people who like them. Pages may only be created and managed by official representatives.
Groups provide a closed space for small groups of people to communicate about shared interests. Groups can be created by anyone.
Other differences include the following:
Pages
• Privacy. Page information and posts are public and generally available to everyone on Facebook.
• Audience. Anyone can like a Page to become connected with it and get News Feed updates. There is no limit to how many people can like a Page.
• Communication. Page administrators can share posts under the Page’s name. Page posts appear in the News Feed of people who like the Page. Page admins can also create customized app links for their Pages and check Page Insights to track the Page’s growth and activity.
Groups
• Privacy. In addition to an open setting, more privacy settings are available for groups. In secret and closed groups, posts are only visible to group members.
• Audience. Group members must be approved or added by other members. When a group reaches a certain size, some features are limited. The most useful groups tend to be the ones you create with small groups of people you know.
• Communication. In groups, members receive notifications by default when any member posts in the group. Group members can participate in chats, upload photos to shared albums, collaborate on group docs, and invite all members to group events.
How do I set up a group?
Creating a group is as simple as creating a Page. Follow these simple steps to get started:
1. On the left side of your personal home Page, under the Groups section, click Add Group. (If you have existing groups, you may need to click More before you see this link.) If you don’t have a Groups section, go to www.facebook.com/groups to add a group.
2. Click Create a New Group if accessing from your home Page (see Figure 3.9) or click Create Group if accessing from the web address (see Figure 3.10).
3. Choose a name for your group and type it in the Group Name box.
4. Add members to your group. Type names in the box and then choose them from the drop-down list of names that appear matching your search.
3.9 This image shows the path of creating a group from your home Page.
3.10 This image shows the path of creating a group through the web link.
5. Select the appropriate privacy setting for your group. There are three levels of privacy:
• Open. Everyone on Facebook can view the group and join. The group appears in search results and all content (photos, videos, and discussions) is visible to anyone viewing the group.
• Closed. Everyone on Facebook can see the name and members of a group, but only group members can view content in the group.
• Secret. These groups cannot be found in searches, and nonmembers can’t see anything about the group, including its name and membership list. The name of the group is not displayed on members’ profiles.
6. Create the Group by clicking Create at the bottom of the pop-up box.
If you are unsure of the privacy setting you should select, don’t fear. If your group has 250 members or less, your admins can adjust the privacy settings of the group after it’s been created by clicking the settings icon and selecting Edit Group at the upper-right corner of the group Page. All members of the group will receive a notification that the settings have changed.
Once the group is created, you are taken to the group’s Page. You can set the group settings by clicking the settings icon at the top of the Page and selecting Edit Group (see Figure 3.11). Here you can add a group description, set a group e-mail address, add a group picture, and manage members (see Figure 3.12).
3.11 To edit the group, click on the settings gear icon and then choose Edit Group.
3.12 Once in the group editing field, you can add a group description, set the group e-mail address, add a group picture, and manage members.
Once a group is created, set a group e-mail address to help your group stay in touch. Follow these steps:
1. On the top-right of the group Page, click the settings gear icon and then click Edit Group.
2. Click Set Up Group Email.
3. Type an e-mail address for your group. No special characters can be used — the e-mail address can only include letters, numbers, and periods.
4. Click Create Email. If the e-mail address you picked is available, it becomes your group e-mail. If it’s taken, you need to choose a different e-mail. Once your group e-mail address has been set, it cannot be changed.
5. Click Save.
Only members of the group are able to use this e-mail address. When a member sends an e-mail to this address, the message is posted in the group and other members are notified. If a group member responds to an e-mail, the response appears as a comment on the group post.
If you want to have a social media team or another group member manage your group, your current admin must add more admins to the group so they have access and control of the group. Keep in mind that admins can remove members or admins, add new admins, and edit the group description and settings. You should only add members as admins if you already know and trust them.
To include additional admins, follow these steps:
1. On the group Page, click on the link X members (where X is the number of members in the group) under the group name.
2. Find a member by typing a name in the search box.
3. Click Make Admin next to the name of the member you want to add as admin.
The group admin can set who can approve requests to join the group. If you only want admins to be able to approve the request, follow these steps:
1. On the top-right of the group Page, click the settings gear icon and choose Edit Group.
2. Select the Only admins can approve requests to join check box.
3. Click Save at the bottom of the Page. Now only admins can approve members’ requests to join the group. When members add friends to the group, those friends need to be approved by admins before becoming members.
How do people join my group?
People search for groups by name and interest. Once they find a group they want to join, they simply click Ask to Join Group in the upper-right corner of the group’s Page. A person can also be added to a group by a friend who is already a member that submits a request for him or her to join.
Depending on the privacy setting of your group, a member may be able to join immediately or may require admin approval to join. If your group is closed, make sure that your admins are constantly reviewing and approving requests to join your Page so there are no delays. If you receive a request from a person you do not want as a member to the group, your admins can deny the request and block that specific person from joining a group.
If your group is secret, it does not appear in search results and people cannot request to join. You only gain members by sending individual invitations to people that you want to include in the group.
Just like on your business Page, you can share photos, questions, links, and other posts within your group and on your group Page. And just as with your business Page, you want to keep the content on your group Page fresh and engaging so that your members stay interested and are encouraged to interact.
How do I poll a group?
One way to encourage interaction of your group is by creating a poll, posing a question to your group members to gain opinions. This is the same as creating a poll on your business Page, but it is specific to your group and only seen by your group members. To create a poll within your group, follow the same steps as listed earlier in this chapter for your business Page.
How do I find a specific post in a group?
If you want to search for a specific post in your group, use the Search This Group box at the top right of your group Page. The search results will show the part of the post where your search words appear. Click the search results to see the original post.
How do I delete a group?
There may be a time when you feel a group has run its course or may not have the amount of engagement you expected. If you created the group, you can delete it by removing all members and then yourself. To remove members from a group, on the right side of the group select See All in the members section. Next select an X next to each member’s name you wish to delete.
If you had no members, you can do nothing. Facebook automatically deletes groups that have no members after a certain amount of time. If you were not the first admin and creator of the group, you cannot delete the group unless the group creator has left it voluntarily.
Managing Backlash
So far this chapter has covered what to do to gain Facebook fans and followers and how super easy it can be with a few reminders. It can also be super easy to get into trouble with negative reactions to an announcement.
The first rule is to respond to fan posts quickly. Posts should not linger unanswered. A nonresponse sends the message that you don’t care about your Page followers, which only angers them further. Moreover, a nonresponse tells other followers that you are unconcerned with customer support, which can be detrimental to your reputation.
A response that illustrates respect and understanding for customers’ concerns is an indicator of your business’ intention to rectify problems. So it is very important to ensure that you have someone in your business responsible for addressing posts from less-than-happy customers.
Responses can make things worse if not managed well. Just ask Honda. Honda encountered negative buzz when it introduced a new vehicle based on one of its most popular models, the Accord. The Accord Crosstour was a five-door vehicle with all-wheel drive. Honda decided to introduce the car on Facebook. The shape was different from what a traditional Accord buyer had typically seen. The body was a cross between a hatchback and an SUV. Moreover, when Honda decided to introduce the car exclusively on Facebook, the first few pictures revealed the car in a basic white color that did not flatter its shape. The reaction from Honda enthusiasts and auto fans (reported by car blog Autoblog and other automotive media outlets) was harsh. They did not like the car’s appearance. Many posted statements comparing it to a noted unloved car, the Pontiac Aztek, while traditional Honda enthusiasts complained that they preferred a different body style, a wagon, over the Crosstour’s hatchback/SUV hybrid approach.
Honda’s response to the negative comments it received on Facebook only made matters worse. According to Autoblog, rather than acknowledging its customers’ comments and opinions, Honda insisted that the vehicle should be accepted. Moreover, comments were deleted from the fan Page, including one comment that was posted by a Honda product planner.
The following sections outline some of the most important lessons on managing fan backlash.
Do not be overly insistent on your point of view
Indeed, you want to support your offering and present it in the most positive light possible, with the most accurate information. Be mindful of the replies to your efforts, but do not be condescending to those commenting. Carefully consider the right way to respond to a negative post. A good PR firm with experience in social media may be worth the expense to review the comments on your Page, but in most cases people are just looking to be heard. Be an active listener and show genuine understanding of what is being said. Be authentic.
Do not delete comments
Deleting comments is a big negative for a number of reasons. First, it shows people that you are controlling behavior and tells them that they must say the right thing to be heard. Guide your conversations in social media; don’t outright edit what is not spam. Second, you never want to hijack the conversation. If there is a debate, address it with enlightening information, but never discount what the person has typed. Beyond spam, consider deleting a Timeline post that contains threats, profanity, racial slurs, and pornography. Consider creating a Posting Policy that spells out what is and isn’t acceptable.
It is understandable that you would want to prevent negative information from spreading, but also remember to take criticism as an opportunity to do better at managing a situation and improving your products and services. Many small businesses have learned not to fear the feedback but instead to use it as a way to truly improve their business.
Consider judgment in using planted posts
Having support from those outside a business is not a crime. It’s natural for a blog to have supporters who help with affirmative comment. But here’s the rub: People with a vested interest in the product, service, or event should disclose their relationship with the topic when making comments on a blog or Facebook Page. You want authenticity in the replies as much as the post itself. You want real language and real explanations.
Not only is disclosure an ethos of social media but also the effort can create more negative buzz that spreads farther than anticipated. Moreover, in some instances, nondisclosure can hurt other aspects of a business as an underhanded act. In 2007, the FTC investigated Whole Foods CEO John Mackey when it was discovered that he had posted seemingly negative comments about then rival Wild Oats under a pseudonym. He did this for seven years! Although Mackey was cleared, the effort nearly compromised a Whole Foods acquisition of Wild Oats.
In short, be ready to disclose those who have been posting to your Facebook Page and not disclosing who they are. If you are working with an employee team, encourage members to inform others who they are and avoid harsh debates when possible.
An automobile is a difficult product to market on social media. Negative comments like those regarding the Crosstour can be hard to deflect when a product aspect is set, such as a vehicle’s overall shape. But many times people want to be heard rather than feel that their comments have been diminished. Use comments to develop future refinements as well as develop new ways to respond to customers. In many cases, customers can forgive a faux paus when they see a business make an effort to respond to feedback.
Social Media Examiner offers the following thoughts to address problem posts:
• Be patient and understanding.
In dealing with upset fans, you must remember that you are closer to your industry, products, and services than they are. What may seem like basic, common knowledge to you is often foreign to the end user.
Take a step back and put yourself in your customer’s shoes. This can go a long way in understanding why he or she is frustrated. It may not be your company’s fault that the customer is upset.
Whether or not the fault lies on your end, a simple apology will go a long way in keeping the customer’s business. Instead of trying to figure out where the blame lies, turn upset fans into loyal customers by making their experience better.
• Contact the customer privately.
Sending a private message or e-mail to the customer opens up more options for you to address his or her complaints. The goal here is to extend some sort of token, letting the customer know you’re sorry he or she is dissatisfied with your company and you’re willing to make it right. Whether that’s offering the number of the manager’s direct phone line or a discount off the next purchase, moving the conversation from public to private allows you to give the customer a personal touch that signals you care.
However, offering things like direct lines and special discounts publicly can lead to other people creating problems just to get that special treatment, so it’s best to keep these practices off the Timeline.
• Consider asking the fan to remove the post.
Say you’ve discussed the issue privately, any problems have been straightened out, and the faultfinder is, once again, your happy customer.
While your Timeline is an integral part of your web presence, the customer may be unaware of how important it really is to your reputation. If he or she is satisfied with the resolution you’ve reached and grateful for the time you’ve spent making things right, there’s nothing wrong with privately asking the person to remove the post. Most of the time, he or she will remove the angry Timeline post.
• Respond back to the original post.
As a general rule, you, the Facebook Page admin, should not remove negative posts. Not everyone is going to have a glowing review of your product or company. Social media users know this, and if they see nothing but positive comments, they’ll assume your company is deleting the bad comments.
If you don’t feel comfortable asking your customer to remove the post, you do have the option of publicly responding back to that post. Express happiness in the resolution you’ve reached and thankfulness for her business. Even a negative post can be a good thing, as long as the last comment is positive. Your reputation among your community will soar when they see how well you take care of your customers.
Having a helpful attitude effectively nullifies any poor reflection on your business or its services.
• Let your community respond.
Letting your community respond for you is really the end result of all the earlier steps. It requires copious time, energy, and patience with your fans, and a fantastic product. After you’ve engaged with your fans for a period of time by answering questions and offering support, you’ll notice that your fans will be more active on your Page, even to the point of assisting each other.
What’s great about getting this community support is that there’s a genuine credibility when fans endorse your business for you. They become your eager virtual support agents, answering questions and solving problems before you have a chance to. But this is a level you can only achieve if you’ve nurtured and supported your community.
Using Social Media Dashboards
Sharing information about your business on multiple social media sites can be very time consuming. Going from Twitter to Facebook to StumbleUpon to the company blog can be dizzying enough to wear out any small-business social media manager. Moreover, managing multiple platforms in a standard browser can lead to errors, such as posting on one account but forgetting to post to another. You may overlook your supporters who spend most of their time following your blog, reading your Facebook statuses, or reading your tweets.
To save time and effort, you, your social media manager, or your team should use a social media dashboard. A social media dashboard is a desktop application or online service that makes it easier for your business to share posts across the major social media platforms (see Figure 3.13). Examples include Postling, Roost, TweetDeck, and HootSuite. The dashboards show the managed platforms in one browser window, as opposed to switching between browser windows to see Twitter versus Facebook, and so on. Most social media dashboard applications are inexpensive or free and come with management features such as a URL shortener, like ow.ly or bit.ly. These apps shorten your URLs so that they can fit within the character limits of your social media sites (140 characters for Twitter and 420 characters for Facebook).
You also typically find a post scheduler included in a dashboard (see Figure 3.14). This feature enables you to plan posts to various sites. You can write multiple posts and schedule when you want them to appear on your social media sites. By using a post scheduler, you save an enormous amount of time and effort by not having to continuously update your sites, which allows you to focus on other aspects such as responding to customer service posts. For Facebook, many dashboards provide the ability to post to a profile, a Page, or both, so you have posting schedule flexibility.
Another advantage of dashboards is that they separate feeds into customizable columns (see Figure 3.15) By contrast, a standard Facebook account only lets you see one stream of content per account at one time. A dashboard (or social media manager) enables you to manage multiple Facebook accounts.
3.13 A social media dashboard, like this one provided by Hootsuite, allows you to manage multiple social media sites with one application.
3.14 A post scheduler saves an enormous amount of time and enables you to schedule posts on your social media sites.
3.15 A dashboard, like the one shown here in Hootsuite, allows you to see multiple feeds in customizable columns.
The majority of the current dashboard applications cover the big three social media applications — Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn — but coverage beyond the most popular social media platforms varies. For example, at this writing, Hootsuite can post to WordPress.com blogs, while Tap11 and Postling can post to WordPress.org. That detail can be significant if you rely on your blog heavily. To choose, consider how you intend to use other social media alongside Facebook and your website. Also consider which media you use frequently, as some dashboards have convenient sync to other media-sharing sites. For example, TweetDeck supports sharing of photos with Flickr, Twitgoo, and Mobypicture. So depending on your needs and what sites you want to incorporate onto your dashboard, you need to research which dashboard works best for you.
Dashboards provide a number of convenient ways to access information. Nearly all have a mobile app available and some offer e-mail notifications. For example, Postling provides a daily e-mail summary that shows your social media engagement based on keywords you select. This feature is excellent if an e-mail verification is easier for you to review and manage.
If you have a few people maintaining a social media presence for your business, a dashboard can coordinate access for all involved and can be used as a team collaboration tool. Many dashboards enable you to manage all the contacts through various social network accounts. Most dashboards provide immediate communication, and you can send tasks to the members and monitor their progress and responses. This saves time for everyone to focus on other essential activities in your business.
At the same time, be cautious about posting too frequently. The convenience of being able to post across platforms can be too convenient, causing you to share repeated posts if the dashboard is not set up correctly. Be sure to map which platforms automatically share with each other when you post, so you don’t overwhelm your followers.
Also, some Facebook users are not comfortable with tweets that appear in a Facebook feed because of the hashtags and notations that are frequently used in a tweet. Not everyone understands the Twitter language and the Twitter trends that you may be following, such as #FollowFriday. Be somewhat conscious of this as you set up your posts.
Another helpful aspect of a social media dashboard is the analytics tool, which provides very important information that you can use to determine what to post and when to post on your sites (see Figure 3.16). The analytics tool only analyzes the performance of posts shared from within the dashboard. Many dashboards have begun to combine data from several tools to create comprehensive reports. For example, you can have a report displaying Google Analytics data alongside your Facebook fan Page data.
3.16 Analytics from your social media dashboard provide valuable insight to activities on your sites and the response from members.
Dashboards, in short, are great social media management tools for your business. The separate columns can help you focus on your clients in social media and can save time in sending messages, scheduled or otherwise. The gains in efficiency will permit your business to understand which channels provide immediate results from your communication efforts as well as which channels require some adjustment.
Leveraging Offline and Online Marketing
Facebook, as you are now beginning to see, is a very powerful tool to engage your existing customers and find new ones. However, it becomes even more powerful when you use it along with other marketing strategies. For example, maybe you have an event planned for your business. Along with your traditional marketing for this event, such as print and advertising, you can also promote it on your Facebook business Page and group Page. Create it as an event in Facebook and invite your Page followers. You can also post pictures from similar past events so your members can see how fun it will be.
Here’s a story of how a hotel used Facebook and a mannequin (yes, just like in the stores) to generate buzz about its business. Scene Marketing Group (www.scenemarketing.net) is the PR and marketing company for the Portland-based Jupiter Hotel. The company’s role includes traditional public relations, such as pitching, writing press releases, and managing media relationships as well as digital public relations, such as social media management, blogging, and search engine optimization.
Scene Marketing Group’s most successful campaign brought Jupiter Hotel’s mascot, Jupiter Lily, to life. A mannequin in the front lobby, Lily was named by the front desk agents after a hotel owner purchased her to showcase T-shirts, sweatshirts, hats, and underwear guests could purchase. The director of marketing, Shannon Pratuch, noticed that guests were snapping pictures of Lily in the lobby and posting them online and bands were leaving her swag and notes. From that came a viral campaign that was launched in January 2010. Facebook is home to Jupiter Lily’s profile and the Jupiter Hotel fan Page.
As a result of the Jupiter Lily campaign, the number of reservations at the hotel increased significantly. The Jupiter Hotel received many accolades, including the award for Best Social Media in Hospitality in Portland, Oregon by the Social Media Club of Portland. Jupiter Lily was even inducted as an official Radio City Music Hall Rockette in December 2010 with a costume sent from New York City.
Lily is unique because her following online is purely motivated by word of mouth and friends interact with her as a person (see Figure 3.17).
3.17 Jupiter Lily, the mascot of the Jupiter Hotel, has her own Facebook Page with her own set of friends, who interact directly with her as if she were a real person.