With more and more consumers opting for social media as part of their product or service discovery journey, relying on social proof, and trusting the recommendations of both friends and prominent influencers, it seems as if every successful business has some form of social presence.
Facebook remains one of the most popular platforms on which to advertise a business – largely because of the plethora of marketing options available to business owners.
In this article, we’re sharing some of the best ways to advertise a business on Facebook, with advice on how to not only reach your target audience but how to engage and ultimately convert them into customers.
Create a Business Page
The first step in advertising a business on Facebook is to build a business page.
Once active, you can track your stats and audience engagement through your page, link your business website, add CTAs to your page, and encourage customer reviews and other interactions.
Join Relevant Groups
Armed with a compelling business page, the next thing to do is to join any relevant groups that may contain users who are part of your target audience demographic.
If you are a local business, then joining community groups in your local area is crucial.
You can also join groups that are active in your industry, and that contain users who will be interested in your products or services. For example, if you sell kids clothing then joining groups for new mums makes sense!
Use Live Streaming
One of the best tools that Facebook has released is the ability to live stream. Live streams let businesses, content creators, and other users create authentic content streams for their audience – with users able to submit questions and share live reactions to the content.
A live stream is a good step in building trust in your business, especially if you can show yourself as the face behind the business and start to establish your reputation.
Explore Facebook Ads
Facebook ads are paid ads that you can tailor according to your ideal CTA and target audience.
The specific group that you select as part of the ad building process will see the ad on their feed, with compelling copy going a long way towards encouraging them to click. Your business will be charged based on how many clicks you get.
Focus on Your Content and Copy
As a business, knowing how to market your products or services is integral to your success.
Remember that the Facebook audience is not the same as your website visitors. Website visitors are already engaged and have made it to the final hurdle in becoming a customer, while Facebook users are likely to be at the start of their discovery journey with your brand.
Tailor content so that it effortlessly underpins the reasons why they should trust and dive deeper into building a relationship with your business.
This can be backed up with reputable stats, authentic reviews, and more.
Balance Soft Selling With Hard Selling
There’s a place for both hard and soft selling on Facebook.
Hard selling is telling followers directly about a product and encouraging them to buy it themselves, whether by highlighting its benefits, sharing a deal, or announcing a launch.
Soft selling is much more subtle and relies on things like customer reviews and testimonials, as well as videos and images that show a product being used.
Both styles of content work on Facebook but they must be balanced if you want to keep followers engaged and interested – without feeling like you are trying to sell to them.
Position Yourself as a Solution
Following on from the above point, perhaps the most important thing to remember when advertising on Facebook is the problem that your business solves.
This can influence everything from where you spend your budget to which groups and communities you interact with. You need to find the Facebook users who are experiencing a problem that you can solve, and then gear your content towards outlining yourself as a reputable solution.
A lot of this will come from user-generated content (UGC), particularly in establishing reputation and authenticity – with reviews shared directly on Facebook actively encouraged by successful businesses.
Interact!
By far the most important thing that you can do when advertising your business on Facebook is to interact with your audience.
From posting regularly to responding to comments and consistently checking and replying to direct messages, if you are going to advertise on Facebook then you need to be active. After all, that is what social media is all about!
More and more consumers are using social media as an alternative customer service outlet – and will quickly be put off brands that seem to ignore messages and comments.
Armed with all this advice, you can start to build a reputable, authentic, and compelling business presence on Facebook that doesn’t just sell but that seeks to engage with your target audience.
