So what exactly is Facebook?

“I did it again! I find myself at the top of the screen, putting in my email address and my 8 digit password and I start my day logging in to find out what everyone is doing on Facebook.” We get a similar testimonial from many computer users today.

Facebook has become a massive part of millions and millions of people's lives. It is a social tool where we can find out what our friends, family, colleagues and acquaintances are doing with their lives. Perhaps what gets most people hooked is the ability to reconnect with old school and work friends and people that have been out of touch for years and even decades.

So, what is it about Facebook that makes it such a phenomenon? Perhaps, it's the fact that it's a social portal. It provides us with both information and updates about people. It taps into that human instinct in ourselves that makes us want to connect with other human beings. But even more than that, it taps into the instincts to gain information about the people in our world.

So, how can you start taking advantage of the power of Facebook in your business?

For many, it's a massive leap to go from, yes; it's a fantastic tool that millions of people are using to: I can use it in my business and I can connect to these people to drive more sales, drive more business to my website and increase my brand presence and market share.

In reality though, Facebook is an ideal tool to get in touch with people that do want your service. The fact that it's a sharing medium, a medium whereby people can find out things about other people, enables you to put yourself in the line of sight of your target demographic. By being in the faces of your target prospects, and by associating in an online way with the friends of potential prospects, you really can interact, engage and influence new customers. As well as this quest for new customers, you can engage with your existing customers. You can pass on information about new products, you can talk about promotions and you can facilitate a viral process where they pass on your details and your offering to their friends, family, colleagues and acquaintances. Your Facebook audience will conduct your sales activity for you.

Having a fan page enables you to get ‘Likes’ and get you your name quickly and easily in front of potentially millions of people. The beauty of Facebook is that you gain the power of word of mouth recognition and word of mouth recommendation. Now, the Internet world doesn't work exactly like the offline world. It's not really word of mouth, more word of word. The biggest key to using Facebook in your business is thinking about the tool in the correct way. You have to think that it is a social interaction referral tool. You have to engage with people in an interesting and innovative way so that you can get more ‘Likes’, get more referrals and get more interaction going with your fan page, your events and generally your business profile. 

So, you have a Facebook fan page and you want to revive it.

There are a lot of things you can do if you have a fan page and it isn't really having the impact that you want it to have. Perhaps in the past it was running really well and you were getting some business through it, but now, it's languishing and not producing any activity.

Here are some things you can do to revive your fan page:

1. Use the like box.

You've all seen them. These are the boxes that you can put on your websites and in various places online where people can “like your business”, your charity or whatever you're promoting. Your target audience can get to know more about you. Your existing users and clients can like you and then you can get increased exposure on the Internet. Also, the like box can show your visitors that you have a presence, that you have people that like you. Just the process of this can build credibility and trust for your brand and can facilitate increased sales conversions.

2. Have Facebook referred to in your emails.

Obviously, social media is part of an online strategy it is not the whole online strategy. By putting it in your sidebar or the footer of your email, you can just let people know about the fact that you can interact with them on Facebook.

3. Use different content mediums in your Facebook fan's page.

By sharing different types of information that are related to your business you engage with your fans. Diverse content will mean you'll get more referrals and show up in more news feeds. With Facebook, if someone posts your contents on their wall, or if they like something that you have said or posted, then you will be referred to all of their friends through their activity updates. Different people have different preferences for types of content that they refer on Facebook. Some refer music videos, some refer funny contents, some refer articles, some refer links. By using a variety of content on your fan page, you'll see more exposure on the activity feeds.

4. Allow your Facebook fans to post different types of content.

This is similar to no.4. Many different Facebook fan page moderators don't allow their fans to post content. They are missing an opportunity. By enabling people to post in your fan page, you'll be able to receive more referrals through Facebook. As long as you moderate content properly, allowing people to post their updates, their contents, and their interest topics will make you more successful as a Facebook exposed company.

6. Take a look back at previous interactions and conversations.

When you reply to previous comments and contributions to your Facebook fan page there will be notifications sent to users, drawing attention. This can be through email or through the activity feeds. By keeping activity high on your Facebook fan page you are more likely to gain interactions and connections.

7. Be human.

Although Facebook is a social media tool, essentially, you are actually interacting as a human being with other human beings. You are connecting with people so by thinking like a human being with human interests, rather than like a company, you are far more likely to be successful.

8. Recognise who your main fan bases are.

By understanding who your fans are and connecting with them you won’t even have to ask for referrals. You can dramatically increase your Facebook presence through your existing customers. This can truly become viral if you do it in a powerful way. You hear radio stations asking for likes on Facebook and even offering prizes for liking a fan page. They do this because they know that if they can interact with their ready loyal base and get them talking about them, they will increase not just to the next level of friends, but perhaps in a spiral effect through many, many levels.

9. Using events and event deep briefs.

By using events and talking about them you are opening them up to a wider community and you can dramatically increase your exposure. Your event can be passed from one to another and you can end up with long lists of interested parties. Post events you can keep this flow going by discussing the event, having a question and answer session, or thanking the contributors and asking for comments.

There are many more ways your business can interact with fans and potential fans on Facebook. It's about being innovative and using the media that have been put in place to help you. By engaging with more people on Facebook you have the opportunity to dramatically and speedily connect and market to a much larger customer base.

Best of all, it's free. You don't have to pay to advertise, although you can if you want to by using Facebook ads. There are marketing agencies that can help you and provide you with the expertise to enable you to make the transition into the Facebook marketing world, such as building a customized Facebook page for you. Then once you have the skills, knowledge, the tools and the habits in place, the processes are fairly simple and straightforward.

Facebook marketing is fun; it's social. The same benefits that attract people into Facebook on an individual level can help you at a business level. So, like us you might be logging in first thing in the morning, finding yourself putting in your email, putting in that 8 digit password. But you might do it for a more functional purpose. Knowing that you are building your business and having fun at the same time.

We hope you found this article useful and you are more empowered and equipped to increase your business’ Facebook presence. If you liked this article, nothing like sharing your joy by clicking on the Facebook Like button above!

We would love to hear your feedback and questions in the Comments section below.

Next month we will be talking about how to use Linkedin for your business. Have a great week!

Digital Empowerment Week - What is Twitter?

witter has come a very long way since its beginning in 2006. At the start, it was just people informing others what they were doing right at that very instant. So you had useless information such as “just had breakfast!” and “going out to work soon!” But today it has become so “mainstream” that large global information organizations such as CNN and the BBC are using it to gather information. More importantly, many Small to Medium businesses are using Twitter to engage with their audience and keep them updated on new products & services, promotions, announcements, etc.

SO WHAT EXACTLY IS TWITTER ?

A Twitter page is a web page where you can keep information snippets each up to 140 characters long for other individuals to read.  Think of it as the on the internet comparative of delivering a cell-phone SMS. The information will immediately appear on your Twitter page with newest information at the top going down to earliest at the bottom.

If individuals like your ‘Tweets’, they will ‘follow’ your page, after which any subsequent Tweets you make will appear on the ‘Home Timeline’ of their own Twitter page – this is good marketing, because if these individuals have ‘followed’ you they are keen to hear more of what you have to say.

BENEFITS OF TWITTER FOR YOUR BUSINESS ORGANIZATION.

Twitter is a highly effective tool. Every week immeasurable Twitter posts circulate through Tweets about every possible topic. A wide range of individuals, companies, big and small, local and worldwide — all use Twitter posts to make their existence known.

1. Generate Traffic for Your Website and Local Store/Branch: By using Twitter, you can capture your customers’ attention through special offers or announcements of online or offline events like openings or contests. You can point people to your local store or website to sign up, get more info, leave feedback etc. For example, if you sell catering equipment online, you may offer promotional discounts for your new equipment line.

2. Increase Customer Satisfaction through Improved Customer Service: Business updates can be followed by your existing or potential customers in real time from your Twitter account. This gives you a valuable opportunity to adjust or tweak your business activities immediately as per your customers’ reactions. This ability alone can give you a significant advantage over your competitors who not yet aware of the power of Twitter.

3. Strengthen Your Connection with Members of Your Local Community: If you have a local business or a local branch, you can mention this location to your tweets. You can also share useful local information, suggest solutions to local social issues and support local events or causes. All these efforts put together will create awareness for your local business and strengthen your connection with people in the local community. 

SO HOW CAN YOU START TAKING ADVANTAGE OF TWITTER FOR YOUR BUSINESS?

1. GET STARTED

Your clients are already on Twitter posts. Don’t miss the opportunity to be part of the discussion. Learn how to use Twitter posts successfully to fulfil your business objectives.

Setting up your own Twitter account is very simple. Once you go to http://twitter.com/   and find the sign up box enter your full name and email address and choose a password.  Click Sign up for Twitter. On the next page they will ask you to choose a username. Usernames are unique identifiers on Twitter. You can either pick your own username, or choose one suggested by Twitter making sure that the username you chose is available and not being used by someone else. Click “Create my account” and you are done. You should get a confirmation in your email box, and instructions on how you can confirm your Twitter account. For more help on this, please follow this link https://support.twitter.com/.

2. ENGAGE YOUR AUDIENCE

Make sure your speech forms the online identification of your company. ‘Tweet’ about the ideas, concepts and value of your company. Discuss hyperlinks and images with your clients. Let them see what happens behind the curtain.

Below are few points:

Tell your Story: Your interaction with your potential customers should be at a personal level. People would rather follow a person than an entity. People want to hear a personal story more than the company.

Increase your followers: By increasing your network, you are able to Direct Message with your followers. This way you get your message across quicker.

Follow your true friends: Once you have plenty of followers, track your true followers and filter through potential noise by creating a Twitter list. This way you can track your say 100 true followers or so.

Post Links to your website: Every post that you make must be linked to your website. This kills several birds with one stone by bringing more traffic to your site and also increasing your page rank.

Share your experience and more: Twitter has become News Source for many. So do not hesitate to share things that you might have found interesting and express your own opinions about it.

3. AMPLIFY YOUR IMPACT

The more individuals who talk about your company on Twitter posts, the more followers (and customers) you will get. Concentrate on actions that enhance your @username and increase your company. To follow others, you must click the follow button next to a user’s profile photo or page. You can also click the “Follow” button next to any of your “Who to follow” suggestions, next to user search results, or anywhere else you see the “Follow” button on the web. So this is quite simple.  When you people click the follow button on your profile or next to your name, you get followers.

If individuals like your information, they can select to “follow” you by simply clicking an option at the top of your information (they can “unfollow” you later by simply clicking the same button). By following you, your information will appear in your followers’ Timelines and if you select to follow back, their information will appear on your Timeline.

ANATOMY OF A TWEET

You’ll be amazed by how much you can say with 140 characters or less.

1. HASHTAG

A hashtag is any phrase starting with the # sign. People use hashtags to organize interactions around a particular subject. Clicking on a hashtag takes you to the search result for that phrase.

2. MENTION

Sometimes you want to carry a Twitter to somebody's interest, but you still want all of your supporters to see the concept. So instead of a reply, use a mention. Include the @username of whoever you want to carry up in your Twitter page, and it will appear in the ‘Refers to’ area (in the Link tab). All @username mentions are clickable and backlink to the described person's information.

3. REPLY

You can reply to a Twitter by striking the reply option. When you respond, your response is displayed publicly, and will appear in the ‘Home timeline’ of the person to whom you are replying. The reply will also be noticeable in the home timelines of people who follow to both you and the individual to whom you sent the reply. Significance, someone not in the discussion has to follow to both of the people replying to be able to read both factors of the discussion.

4. RETWEET

You can repost and pass along somebody's Tweets by “Retweeting” it. Just hit the “Retweet” button to deliver the original message to all of your followers.

5. LINKS

Twitter’s link-shortening function allows you to insert a weblink of any length into the Tweet box and it will instantly be shorter to 19 characters. 

This creates it easier to fit lengthy URLs into the 140 characters restrict. A Direct Message (DM) is a private message. You can only deliver a DM to individuals you follow who also follow to you.

 


We hope this article has been useful to you and you are more empowered and equipped to increase your business’ digital presence. If you liked this article, nothing like sharing your joy by clicking on the Facebook Like button below! We would also love to hear your feedback and questions in the Comments section below.

Next month we will be talking about how to use Facebook for your business. Have a great week!