What is your organic reach with your Facebook following? As it turns out, the organic nature of your Facebook page’s reach is diminishing at a pretty rapid rate. The equation used to be quite clear, if your engagement is high, more people are viewing your posts, thus boosting your reach…organically! Not so fast.
Facebook may change the rules on us but it is still an invaluable tool in connecting with new clients as well as the ever-important client retention. In fact, a relatively small budget to enhance engagement can really pay off. Always keep in mind, the results are not likely to happen overnight, unless of course you are purchasing likes. Patience and quality of content are what are going to pay dividends for you and your practice. This is where CONTENT IS KING. Content that engages your fans is going to bring them back for more. Here are a few of the tricks to try to increase your engagement and ultimately reach, MOST are FREE but there is benefit to the PAID promotion as well:
1) What is Facebook monitoring that effects engagement? It’s really quite simple, do your fans LIKE your content, do they SHARE your content, do they COMMENT on your content, and/or are they CLICKING links in your posts. That’s it, if your fans aren’t doing any of those four, then Facebook is assuming that you are not engaging your fans, not creating engaging content and this is where Facebook reduces posts that are pushed into feeds, thus reducing your reach. Simple right? Do keep in mind though, where the number of LIKES a page had used to indicate to Facebook that content on this page was worthy of pushing through to more news feeds, this is no longer the case.
2) The everyday content posts are INCREDIBLY important. These posts are what are going to carry your promotions and contests on to as many news feeds as possible. To put it another way, if your reach and engagement rely solely on your monthly promotions or contests, your reach is going to be less due to the infrequent and reduced engagement nature of this type of post. If you have regular and quality engagement on daily posts, you are essentially using those daily posts to carry the promotional posts when you have them. And you didn’t have to pay for this either, you simply created quality, engaging content for your fans and that engaging content created a pathway for your promotions and sales related content to be seen by more of your fans and their friends.
3) Create content that incites action via a comment or share. The COMMENT and SHARE are where Facebook is able to assess the quality of your content, again… increasing your reach. One way to do this is to create posts that require a comment to answer or enter the contest. No longer should it simply be “LIKE this post to enter”. Create posts asking fans to select a product preference (Brand X vs Brand Y), have them choose the following month’s promotion, have them guess the number of an item (ex. Botox vials) in a jar, or simply ask questions that create nostalgia or emotion (What age have you felt the most beautiful?). People are more likely to engage with this type of content and once they’re engaged, you’ve improved your reach.
4) Promoting your page and Boosting your posts are options that Facebook has to increase your reach as well. It is important to understand the difference between the two. Promoting your page creates an ad, this is best used to engage your current fans. Boosting your posts targets the friends of your current fans or can target a select audience/demographic. With as little as $1/day, you can see an increase in reach. You will want to be selective in your criteria here, making sure that you are targeting an audience that will be a long-term fan and more likely to engage with your future posts.
5) Have fun! Have posts that reflect your practice, the personalities of the members of your team, evidence shows that people are more likely to comment and share when content is funny and relatable.
Facebook can seem like more trouble than it’s worth and often times is quite frustrating but with a clearly laid out marketing plan and goal oriented posting, the results can really add up!
Oh…and one last tip! If a post WORKED, i.e. you saw great engagement, those are the posts to promote and replicate again and again!
Social Media can be intimidating and at first glance to be more trouble than it’s worth but it is an integral part of your marketing strategy. To learn more about how to turn Social Media into another essential tool in your toolbox, Click Here.
