Facebook is the #1 most used social media network across North America, Europe, Australia, and South America. It's a key place where people spend significant amounts of time online and did you know there is a powerhouse of Facebook Tools your business can be using to help your marketing on this network?
A key reason Facebook is a powerful platform for marketers is the time spent by users on Facebook. Recent stats released by Facebook show U.S. users are spending on average 40 minutes per day total on the platform in bursts of 2-5 minute increments.
The majority of this time spent is on mobile devices, particularly the mobile app, and it is spent surfing the news feed. So within that backdrop, what do we need to know about Facebook Tools for business? I bet you are not using all 15 of these!
Let's dive into 15 Facebook Tools you need to know about for your business today!
Ready to go?
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Facebook is a powerful tool to market your business and brand.
People spend an enormous amount of time on the site, the age demographics span all major buyer profiles, and the people use the site daily. A bonus is that Facebook gives businesses plenty of tools to use for successfully engaging your ideal audience.
An example of a social media service you can use is Facebook advertising, which uses the ads manager tool to promote a product or business through the social networking platform. Business owners can use social media services to boost online presence, brand awareness, and overall business reputation.
Likely you are using Facebook for your business already if you’re a reader here. The question is whether you are using the Facebook Tools that you should be. Might there be some you are missing?
This is the starting point for a company on Facebook. Different from a profile, you need a Facebook Page where you can post as the company and grow a fan base who "like" your Page that you can communicate to. It's the core foundational Facebook tool you need for your business.
Using Facebook Pages is a popular way to highlight your business’s portfolio. If you’re too busy to manage your social media pages, a professional can help you. Social media service providers provide assistance to business entrepreneurs, helping them manage their Facebook and other social media pages.
Here’s how you can use your Facebook pages to help your business reach greater success:
Go here to create a Facebook Page: https://www.facebook.com/pages/create.php
Customize the URL of your Facebook Page:
So, first and foremost, make sure your business has a Facebook Page and all the Facebook Tools it offers! You can customize your Facebook page by uploading your company or brand logo, theme, and posts. Also, remember to set your control, management, and security preferences.
This is a key Facebook tool within your page for when and how you can post. You don't have to be on Facebook at 8 pm to have a Page post for your business go live! You can schedule them to go at key times of high Facebook use by your fan base.
Use this tool to ensure your target audience will see your posts when they’re online. In this way, you can boost your social media page followers, likes, and shares, as well as the number of customers you gain through social media.
Anytime you create a post, you get the option to "Schedule". Go through the quick setup to deploy it at the time you desire. NOTE: In the Insights area within any Page you Admin, you can go to the
A free app for managing your page on the go via your smartphone! This is a powerful way to keep posting to your page and responding to comments while out of the office. It's a "must have" tool for any Page admin.
A key feature on desktop for Facebook Pages is the ability to add 3rd-party apps to your page. Our TabSite.com software is one of these apps.
3rd Party apps allow you to add functionality to your Page that doesn't exist such as to run a Photo Contest or to host a Sweepstakes right on your page. Key TabSite apps for Facebook Pages include:
The benefit of a app like TabSite is that you can simultaneously embed the app on your website as well.
In the "Settings" area for your Facebook Page you can add other users with specific roles on your Page. It's a good idea to have a trusted person be an additional Admin on your page and you can assign employees or third party social media management helps to specific roles such as Editor, Advertiser, or someone that can go Live on the Page.
Be sure to check this section and manage it. Best practice is to have a second user as a Admin that you trust! (spouse, partner, etc.)
Setup and get RSVPs for events on Facebook! A great and simple way to have focused attention, including sign-ups, around a event. Perfect for a training event, grand opening, special event, and more.
You’ve seen them before – they’re the ads in the news feed with “Sponsored”. These ads are designed to look like a typical post made by a friend. On a desktop they appear in your sidebar and can be images or video. Some are specifically created as an ad setup and launched. But some are posts that have now been “boosted”. If you have a popular post, it can have a wider reach by paying to boost it.
How they work
Facebook offers a dashboard to manage your ads and monitor their performance. You design the ad, specify the budget, and pay out for every click on the ad. There are other options as well such as paying per impression (when an ad is seen).
There’s a corresponding cost for every click on your ads, but you can manage your spending by setting a per day budget. This will spread out your total budget across several days.
You can target your ads by choosing from the massive filters available. Make your ads visible to everyone, or you can limit your audience by geographical area, gender, age, language, and/or specific interest. You can be as broad or specific as you want, though it’s advisable to start with a wider audience and just narrow it down as you go along.
More on Facebook Ads >
What is Facebook Audience Network?
This is how Facebook allows its advertisers to advertise off of the platform with the exact same targeting it offers on the platform. This can be remarkable for advertisers, websites who want to generate revenue by being a part of the network, and of course, for Facebook who now has, even more, ways to offer advertising.
There are 3 types of visual ads your business can place: banner (shows up at the bottom of the screen), native (appears in an article), and interstitial (takes up the full page above or below the article). You can also place Audience Network video ads that will appear throughout a video stream.
Custom Audiences are great Facebook Ad tools for reaching exactly that.....custom audiences. For example, by adding a Facebook Pixel to your website (web developers can do this) you can then setup an ad just for those who recently visited your website!
If someone visits your website after clicking on a Facebook Ad, they may not always complete an action like making a purchase or giving you their contact information. The Facebook Pixel can help you by:
More on Custom Audiences >
Video is a leading Facebook tool today! People watch video and Facebook shows video to more of your fans than they do a text post! You read that right.
Native video is the key....By this I mean videos loaded directly to Facebook for your Page, as opposed to videos on other services like YouTube and Vimeo that are shared on Facebook.
I’ve done a number of tests for my own videos like this: I load the same video to YouTube and to Facebook, and share them at the same time of day on my Facebook business page. The results are not even close! The Facebook video reach and engagement is MASSIVE compared to the YouTube link share. This is important because marketing on Facebook is about getting in front of your audience and providing some of value that they want to engage with.
In fact, I’ve found that little videos I post to Facebook are performing from 50-400% better than text, photo, and link posts for many of the Pages I manage!
More on Facebook Video >
Facebook wants people to understand and engage with video content, so they created the auto-captioning feature to add context for the people who watch videos without the sound on, and they made it dead simple for the average person to use.
When you upload your video to your Facebook page, it goes through an automated process that attempts to accurately transcribe the video.
While auto-captioning is very effective, it doesn’t always get everything right on the first try. So Facebook gives you a simple way to edit, line by line, the transcription of the video. Generally, Facebook does a solid job transcribing and it can be from 75-95% correct from the start!
More on Facebook Video Auto-captions >
Crossposting is a way to share videos across multiple Pages.
Crossposting can only happen between Pages that have added each other. You control which videos you want to crosspost. When a Page crossposts your videos, they will also be able to view video insights for their posts.
Perfect if you have complimentary pages or multiple Pages for different store locations! Go to Settings / Crossposting to access this for your Page.
One of Facebook’s newest features to help businesses to market is live video. You don’t need special equipment or any special software, all you do is open your company Page in the mobile App and click on the live video icon where you publish a new post!
With this feature, you can see the number of people watching, along with their names and comments. As soon as the video is over, it’s saved and posted on your timeline automatically as a new video post others can watch. You can share it on other social media platforms, such as Twitter, or even embed it in your website.
Here are some of the benefits of using Facebook live video for your business >
Make sure you have this turned "on" for your Page so a visitor can contact you via Messaging. It's like a contact form, only better with the Artificial Intelligence options for intelligent immediate responses that help you be efficient and effective!
New since mid-July 2017...Groups for Pages!
Having the ability to add groups to your Facebook page helps you foster a real community around your brand. Knowing they can have extended interactions through a group, page followers are likelier to become more loyal to the brand.
Full details on ways to use Groups for Pages >
This is a newer mobile format developed by Facebook which is used to serve pages rapidly to visitors accessing website content from the Facebook mobile app.
Why should I optimize my content for Facebook Instant Articles?
Facebook Instant Articles is built to load instantly on mobile devices and designed for higher engagements, resulting in improved News Feed reach.
More details on the where and how for Facebook Articles here >
Signup link for Facebook Instant Articles >
Yes! You can manage Instagram on Facebook!
Add your Instagram account to Facebook so you can easily edit your account details, create Instagram ads and more.
Yes, you can list jobs on Facebook and they appear in the marketplace. Think of it as a growing Monster.com or Indeed.com with the ability to reach your desired employee target with the powerful targeting tools on Facebook!
More on Facebook Jobs >
That's a bit more than 15 tools! Are you using all of them? Implemented within an overall digital marketing strategy (see my book link below), these tools can be key pieces that add to the success of your online marketing.
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I’m an Indiana Hoosier native where basketball is the top sport. Every team heads to the locker room at halftime to evaluate the first half and create an updated plan for the second half. That plan includes adjustments based on reviewing what worked and what didn't. The “halftime” is a key review point where the game stops, the team pulls away to huddle in the locker room away from the fans, and they come out prepared and ready to succeed in the second half.
That’s what this podcast is all about, taking the time to pull away for a bit to evaluate, learn, and set some strategies for your business to succeed in the second half. Join me by subscribing and let me be your “business halftime” to help you find great success going forward!
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