With Facebook boasting 2.4 billion users according to Sprout Social, it is likely already part of your small business’s marketing plan. Evaluating the success of your Facebook campaign is an important step in determining if what you are doing is on target or missing the mark.
It’s important to regularly ask: How is your Facebook campaign growing your business? Is your audience growing? Are you generating more leads and sales? Is your brand growing in recognition? If you aren’t seeing the results you would like, then it is time to reevaluate and adapt.
Here is a house-cleaning checklist to guide you:
___Check Your Profile
Is your profile/page complete and accurate? Look at the map, addresses, phone numbers, and hours of operation.
Does it show personality? Give some attention to your content there. Make sure that your profile looks professional. You are judged by first impressions, so if you neglected your banner when you started your Facebook account, it is time to go back and add some fine touches. You might consider hiring a freelance graphic designer or a professional photographer to create an image for your profile. It would be worth the nominal fee to convey the right message and make the right impression with new customers.
___Content, Content, Content
Review your content and check out what received the most feedback. Create a content calendar if you haven’t already and add more high performing content ideas. Remember to throw in promotions and holiday specials. According to SproutSocial, over 40% of your consumers are following you on Facebook so that they can get discounts and promotions.
___Scheduling your Posts
Prime time television is called prime time for a reason. Your social content should be posted in the prime time as well. This helps to eliminate your content moving to the bottom customers’ feeds. Scheduling your posts in the evenings and on weekend mornings will likely ensure that your target audience and your followers are viewing your content.
___Use the Data
If you aren’t already doing so, use Facebook Insights to determine how well your content is performing. This will allow you to see how your content is performing. If you are missing the mark or not quite where you want to be, then it is time to adapt your strategy!
___Do You HAVE a BUTTON?
You should! Make sure you have a Call-To-Action button on your business profile. This can be a link to your catalog, or a place to book appointments, or even a place to sign up for emails. Maybe you want to add a “Shop” feature where visitors can shop directly. If you are a retailer, it could be beneficial to try to directly make sales through your Facebook campaigns by adding tags to your posts.
There will hopefully become a day when directly talking to each customer individually is much too time-consuming, but until then, add a “Message” button so that customers can directly message you using Facebook. It is a great way to build trust and relationships with future and present fans of your brand.
___Facebook Ads
If you are spending money with Facebook Ads, make sure that they are performing how you would like. Facebook has recently declared that it will be trying to reduce the number of Ads users are seeing in their news feeds. This means that your ads may be seen less. Determine if the cost versus reward is worth it.
___Management Systems
Once your Facebook marketing is out-performing you, for example you have multiple pages, you don’t have time to utilize key performance data for each page, and/or you are using Facebook ads, you may realize you don’t have enough time to dedicate to its proper management. This is the time when you will want to consider Facebook Business Manager or hiring a small firm to manage your account.
___Cash Grants
Because COVID-19 has hit small businesses so hard, Facebook is giving away $100 million in cash back grants. It would behoove you to take a few minutes to see if you qualify for some funds.
Social media platforms and all their idiosyncrasies are changing week by week and day-by-day, so staying attuned to what is evolving is important to your success in utilizing the platforms to grow your business. Facebook offers a number of resources on a continual basis to help you stay abreast of any changes with the platform and provides you with classes, updates, and information on how to maximize Facebook to grow your business. Likewise, subscribing to Anneomaly Digital will allow you to get information, updates, and tips for improving your marketing campaigns and helping your small business flourish!