It’s harder than ever to get your Facebook content in front of the right people. Over the past five years, the Facebook algorithm (how Facebook decides what users see) has dramatically restricted the reach of posts. Hootsuite’s 2019 Global Facebook Report found that a content post from businesses only reaches around 5.5% of their audience. In Facebook’s increasingly crowded and restricted environment, it’s never been more important for businesses to ensure their content is polished, precise and effective.
Five ways to avoid losing business on your Facebook page
Here are five Facebook content and page best practices to get the most out of the platform.
1. Facebook is not just a marketplace; you need to do more than sell
Although Facebook users often make purchases off the platform, they don’t go there for that purpose. Whilst it is always a good idea to put a call to action at the end of your social media posts, they can’t solely be about selling. Facebook is primarily a platform used to connect, entertain and sometimes inform. You need to offer your audience one of these things in order to gain traction.
2. Customer service is just as important online as it is elsewhere
On Facebook, customer service is known as community management. Effective community management includes replying promptly to private messages as well as comments on your page or tagged mentions of your brand.
It is important to have a strict reply schedule or a process to respond to comments from your page followers. When done right, effective Facebook community management builds brand trust and helps your audience feel seen and acknowledged.
Although you can’t stop people from saying good or bad things, what you can do is respond respectfully and provide useful information.
3. Maintain and display a consistent brand image, voice and values
No amount of great content will help you if your Facebook audience doesn’t understand what your brand looks like or stands for. Facebook users follow and engage with brands that they can relate to and who consistently post content that aligns with their interests. Creating and sticking to a brand style guide is the best way to ensure consistency.
4. Create targeted ads with Business Manager
Promoting a business is like sowing seeds; the yield depends on how you nurture them. On Facebook, the best way to maintain and hone your promotional activities is through Business Manager. This function enables you to organise your page and create targeted ads to reach a specific audience with defined interests, locations, behaviours and purchasing habits.
5. Maintain your page security practices
Facebook page security is rarely thought about until something goes wrong and a page is hacked and overrun with spam, or the owner finds themselves locked out of the account with no way of regaining control. Although the platform itself is relatively secure, Facebook puts the onus of maintaining things like password security and page administration control on the user. Maintaining your account security is relatively simple. To get started, have a look at Facebook’s best practice guide to keeping your account secure.
Last updated 30 March 2021
