Facebook Marketing

Quick Guide

Keeping up with the ever changing

landscape of Facebook can be a

challenge for marketers and

business owners. This mini-eBook

will provide you a quick resource

full of tips and ideas for using

Facebook as a marketing channel.

Updated For

Timeline

March 30, 2012

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Table of Contents

Common Mistakes Business Owners and Marketers Make…………….………………..…………page 3

Why You Should Invest In a Facebook Page……………………………………………….…..………page 4

How to Create a Page……………………………………………………………………………..…………….page 5

Why You Should Use Custom Tabs…………………………………………………………..….……..….page 6

Business Page Tips w/ Timeline….………………………………….…………………..………………….page 7

How to Grow Fans & Followers….……………………………………………………………………………page 8

How to Find Customers…………………………………………………………….……………..……………page 11

Free Additional Resources……………………………………………………………………………………..page 12

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Common Mistakes Businesses Make on Facebook

Profile instead of a page

Facebook has designed and developed its business pages for optimal use by

business type. It offer pages for local businesses or places, companies,

organizations, or institutions, brands or products, artists, bands or public

figures, entertainment, and causes or communities. They will continue to build

out these offerings as the ads platform continues to expand. Some of the

functionality that is lost by using a profile in place of a page includes less visibility in search

engines and in Facebook, less analytical data about the page. No business or brand should

have a personal page.

Engagement with Customers or Clients

A static Facebook page is not worthless, but it’s close. The point of Facebook is to engage with

fans and followers to build community around your brand, business, product, etc. If you are

shutting off comments, not using your wall, or not posting content to your own Facebook page,

you are totally missing out on the opportunity to directly communicate with paying customers.

Remember, this was not even possible just a few of years ago.

Self-Promotion

Self-promoting is a sure-fire way to drive Facebook users away from your page. If it’s self-

serving enough, this type of post could even cause a user to un-like you. If you don't have

anything better to talk about than how great you are, you may need to find another medium.

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Why Invest in a Facebook Page?

EdgeRank – Facebook’s Secret Sauce

EdgeRank is the algorithm Facebook uses to determine what content is shown

to whom. Every post you make has a quality score. If the post has a high

quality score, it is seen by more people. The main factor of the quality score is

the number of interactions you're getting on your post: likes, comments,

shares and how often and long all of those actions are being taken.

Build Community

The Facebook wall is the place to build community with your fans. Your fans will interact with

you here and you should interact back with them in a conversational, non-promotional way.

This area gives you direct communication with your fans and followers, unlike any

communication tool we have used to date. This is equivalent to a phone call or someone

walking in your businesses door and you can build relationships with this tool.

Promotion & Advertising

Facebook allows business owners and marketers to run targeted ads based on a variety of

demographics and interests. The number one reason people become fans of pages is to take

advantage of promotional offers. If you advertise, make sure that your fans are seeing

targeted ads. Then, take them to a targeted landing tab where they can take an action: like

the page, share the offer with friends, etc.

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How to Create a Page

Now, users are able to create a page that has its own profile. There should be no reason for

issues if a team member creates a page and then leaves your organization or if you decide to

leave an advertising agency that has created a profile for you. With unique profiles for business

pages, you can now act as the page, making updates and posting content on behalf of the

page, not individually.

To create a page, simply log in to Facebook with your personal account, navigate to the footer

(the very bottom of the page) and click the Create a Page link. You will then be prompted to

choose the type of page you are creating. The rest is straightforward. For full instructions, see

this Getting Started Guide.

1. Click Create a Page Link

2. Choose the Type of Business (Above)

3. Complete the Fields When Prompted

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Why Use Custom Tabs?

What Are Custom Tabs?

This is a fairly recent addition to Facebook, allowing page owners

to create custom pages using HTML, similar to how we build web

pages. Prior to HTML, Facebook required users to create pages

using its own version of HTML called FBML, however, they

converted to HTML early in 2011.

Why It Matters

This is a huge deal that not nearly as many pages are taking advantage of as should be.

Basically, you are able to create a page on Facebook (just like most that have been created

throughout the broader web). Now, we just have to think about landing pages in a social way,

within the context of Facebook.

Brand Consistency and Calls-To-Action

Having a consistent look and feel to your Facebook page, as you do with the rest of your

marketing, helps develop brand equity. Calls-to-action allow you to increase the top-level of

your sales funnel with actions like the following: Like Us on Facebook, Sign Up For Our Email

Newsletter, Sign Up For Special Offers, Subscribe To Our Blog, etc. These actions give you

permission to send your target audience specific communication based on what they requested.

We can also use Google Analytics to track the performance of these pages, in addition to the

fantastic analytical tools offered by Facebook.

Facebook is the Destination

Facebook is a destination site meaning that users want to stay on the site. Facebook users

spend more time on the site than Google, YouTube, Bing, and Yahoo combined. This is

incredible. People are willing to spend some of their Facebook time with your brand, but they

want to stay on the site and be able to interact with the other streams of communication while

they do.

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Business Page Tips w/ Timeline

Likes are Comparable to Email Subscribers

Yes- Facebook pages are just like email lists. Just as you need to make it clear what a

subscriber will receive when they sign up for an email newsletter, you should do the same with

you Facebook business page. Facebook likes are ultimately another form of subscriber and it

shouldn't be more complicated than that. Who wouldn't want to grow a list of fans and

followers?

Below is an example of our new business page on Facebook. When managing a new page or

converting your page to timeline, use each of these steps to create a successful presence.

1. Set Your Cover & Profile Photos

2. Add Milestone to Identify Important Events

3. Pin Important Stories to the Top of Your Page

4. Post Regularly

5. Use Admin Panel to Manage Page

6. Respond to Messages

7. Rearrange Apps

8. Claim Your Vanity URL

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How to Grow Fans & Followers

Leverage Your Existing Marketing

Use your existing marketing efforts to promote your page. Email lists,

direct mail lists, in-store signage, physical newsletters, fliers, menus,

brochures, business cards, and signature cards all offer a great way to

promote your new page.

Claim Your Place

Facebook lets businesses claim its Place page which allows customers to check in to your

physical store location and share it with their friends. Businesses can also create special deals

for people that check in. If you’re in retail, you definitely want to use this feature.

Create Remarkable Content

The point of being on Facebook is to form and develop community. In order to form and

develop community, you must create content that fans and followers want or need. Creating

content that they view as remarkable, a phrase coined by Seth Godin, is “content that they

can’t do without.” Remarkable content helps solve problems and provides amazing offers that

they can’t resist. Most importantly, if you can create content that fans find interesting enough

to remark upon, you will succeed in developing community.

Off Facebook Calls-To-Action

Social calls-to-action, such as adding Facebook like buttons to any content you create on your

website or blog and offering Facebook fans special offers and promotions by liking your page,

are examples of ways you should optimize your Facebook presence.

The biggest reason why people like a page is because they were invited through an email or

website or they were driven to the page by an advertisement. Another popular reason is

because they were referred by a friend to receive promotional offers.

Adding widgets to your website is another way to optimize your off Facebook calls-to-action.

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Develop a Conversational Calendar

A conversational calendar is simply a planning tool that will help to keep your Facebook fans

engaged with your page. It should consist of company goals, the approach the company will

take on Facebook and themes for each day. See sample conversational calendars provided by

Facebook below.

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You may access these calendars in the Facebook Paged Optimization Guide.

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How to Find Customers

Facebook Ads

You can find out how many potential customers you have on Facebook

without even running an advertisement. Simply sign up or have a

professional marketer sign up for Facebook Ads and you can begin to

target users based on demographics and interests, seeing a specific,

immediate reach that changes with every choice you make.

This platform is truly something that every business should try. We're talking about a daily

user-base of over 500 million users worldwide. Try it!

Check out this special $50 offer from Facebook Advertising!

The Value of Geo-Targeting

Geo-targeting is simply targeting an audience by location. With the click of a button in the

Facebook Ads Manager platform, we are able to see an immediate number of people that the

chosen criteria will reach. We can offer ads to everyone on Facebook, a particular state, city, or

a surrounding area based on radius around some point.

The Value of Behavioral Targeting

Behavioral targeting is simply targeting an audience by what your audience is interested in.

With the same immediacy of geo-targeted criteria in the Facebook Ads Manager, we are able to

target by: language, education, work, age, gender, birthday, relationship status, likes and

interests, friend connections and connections. This is an area where Facebook has an edge

over most other advertising platforms and a compelling reason for businesses to try it. The

specificity of the target audience is remarkable. We can target more specific interests as well,

such as entertainment properties, celebrities, sports teams and players, political figures, and so

on. You can literally choose your most ideal target audience. All that said, you will need a

professional to write and test creative ads that compel targeted users to take action.

Examples: A dental practice could target women within the geographic area it is located, and in

a certain age range, that like a particular TV show which most of its clients like. A sports store

could target fans of the particular apparel it’s offering. Business-to-business services can target

prospective customers by title or by interests - a commercial real estate company might target

the titles “business owner”,” President”, “CEO”, or “COO”.

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Free Additional Resources

Facebook Timeline Introduction

Facebook Marketing Solutions

Social Media Governance Policy Database

About eLink Design

eLink Design is unique from nearly every Internet Marketing company through

its broad offering of in-house services, empowering clients across all facets of

the economy to work with a single company to design, develop, host,

maintain, support, and market their websites.

Online Database of

Social Media Policies