Successful Facebook Marketing

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Rockablepress.com Envato.com © Rockable Press 2011 All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or redistributed in any form without the prior written permission of the publishers.

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Table of Contents

CONTENTS

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Table of Contents

Publishing Unique Content on Facebook

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The Basics: Importing RSS

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Updating from Twitter

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Unique Facebook Content

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Driving Traffic

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Encouraging Actions

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Deepen Relationships

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General Tips for Content

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Getting a Vanity URL

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Introduction

INTRODUCTION Hundreds of thousands of words have been written about Twitter’s power as a marketing tool for brands, businesses and websites, but now there’s a new player on the scene: Facebook. Since its launch in 2004, the social networking site has primarily been viewed as a platform for personal expression, and a place to connect with friends. However, Facebook has put significant effort into creating a platform that individuals, businesses and organizations can use to promote themselves. These are Facebook Pages. By gaining an understanding of how to use Facebook Pages now, you’ll reap the benefits of being an early adopter. While many of your competitors probably don’t even have a Facebook Page, websites like Psdtuts+ (part of the Tuts+ Network I manage) are finding Facebook is now its highest referrer of social media traffic, even though it has a Twitter account with more than 40,000 followers! Facebook is being used more and more as the primary front for large-scale social media campaigns and promotions. But why is it so effective? • There are over 600 million Facebook accounts. On any given day, 50% of Facebook’s active users check their Facebook accounts1. While Twitter usage is generally restricted to people who are social media savvy, Facebook is used by just about everyone.

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http://www.facebook.com/press/info.php?statistics

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Introduction • Facebook is an intimate platform. When your Page updates show up in the News Feeds of your fans, they are appearing alongside the status updates of some of their closest friends. This is a very powerful and intimate place for your content to appear, bringing your brand into your fans’ personal lives. • Facebook commands more attention. When people are using Facebook, they are strongly focused on it. Unlike Twitter, which most people keep running in the background while they work on a handful of other tasks. • Threaded comments encourage better quality discussion. On Twitter, discussion generally only occurs between Twitter users and their followers. On Facebook, it’s easy for fans to participate in discussion with both Page admins and each other, making it much easier to develop a sense of community among fans of your brand. • A Facebook Like is more public than a Twitter follow. When a Facebook user Likes a Page it’s added to their profile for all to see. It becomes a part of their Facebook identity, and because of this, a Like is a powerful gesture. A follow on Twitter, by comparison, is much more hidden. • Pages are flexible. Twitter is restricted to a 140-character text update, but Facebook allows you to post photos, videos, links, events and more. • There are a wide range of promotional tools available. Tools such as the Like Box and Like Button make it very easy to get a steady flow of new Likes and Facebook interaction happening on your Page.

With all these advantages, it’s stunning that there are still so many brands, businesses and websites that don’t have a clue about how to use Facebook for marketing. By owning this book you’re already ahead of the curve. When others in your industry finally get around to creating a Facebook Page, you’ll already be enjoying the

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Introduction

benefits of having a fan-count in the hundreds, or even thousands. To capitalize on this advantage, we’re going to get started building your Page right from the first line of Chapter One. As Tuts+ Manager at Envato, I manage Facebook accounts with over 87,000 fans. I believe a big part of the reason we have such a strong Facebook presence is that we were relatively early adopters. Though it’s important to create the best Facebook Page that you can, it’s more important to just get started!

The Like Currency Twitter’s currency is made up of follows and retweets. On Reddit, it’s upvotes. For Facebook Pages, it’s Likes. Users can Like your Page, your updates, or content you’ve published. Each of these translates to different benefits for you. When a user Likes your Page, this means: • A link to your Page will appear on the user’s Info tab. • A notification that they’ve Liked your Page will appear on their profile (temporarily) under Recent Activity. • Your posts will now appear in their News Feed. When a user Likes an update on your Page, this means: • Other users can see that they have Liked the item. If enough people Like the update, their name will be replaced by a total count of Likes. This doesn’t share the update in any way and is primarily a source of social proof.

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Introduction

When a user Likes your content on another website (outside of Facebook): • It will increase the number of people who are shown as Liking the content, which adds social proof. • An update is posted to their Facebook profile saying that they Liked the content. The update links to the content they Liked. • An update is posted to their friends’ News Feeds saying that they Liked the content, and linking to it. The most important of these actions is Liking your Page. Once a user Likes your Page, they’ll be subscribed to your updates forever, unless they Unlike your Page or close their account. This is a powerful way to keep the user engaged with your brand over the long-term. The second most valuable form of a Like is a Like on your content. This shares the content with the user’s Facebook network and can drive new visitors to your website, blog or store. The least valuable form of a Like is a Like on an update you’ve posted to your Page. This is useful for social proof, but little else. It’s still a good thing to have, but there’s no need to worry about this too much. Post good content and the Likes will follow.

Your Facebook Strategy It’s tempting to view your aim with Facebook very simply: to get as many Likes of your Page as possible! While having more fans certainly doesn’t hurt, the level of engagement of those fans is what truly matters. There are Pages with tens of thousands of fans, but these people never visit the Page, never comment and never visit any of the links shared on the Page. There are other

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Introduction

Pages with only a few hundred or a few thousand fans, which have extremely active and engaged communities. The ideal is to have a large and engaged community, but if you’re forced to choose between lots of fans and active fans, choose active fans every time. Likes are important because they enable you to get a return on investment from the work you’ve put into Facebook, but getting fans should never be your only goal. Instead, fans are useful in that they enable you to reach other goals, like increasing traffic to your website, making more sales, raising brand awareness, or getting more clients. Before we start building your Facebook Page, take the time to decide what your real end goals with Facebook are. What made you decide to invest in this book? Was it the thought of opening up another avenue to get clients? Getting more traffic to your blog? More opt-ins to your newsletter? There are a thousand possible reasons, but some of them are likely to outline exactly what excites you about learning Facebook marketing. Rather than focusing on fans, it’s these goals you should have in mind with everything you do on Facebook. As long as you make your Facebook Page easy to find and post good updates, your Page will add fans on autopilot. Facebook is an exciting, ever-changing platform. Every day, new Pages are created, and more people discover how useful Pages are for keeping up with their favorite things. The Pages platform is growing at a rapid rate, but the knowledge in this book will put you ahead of the curve. This is information that companies pay social media marketing consultants thousands of dollars to share. By the end of this book, you’ll have the knowledge required to create a Facebook Page that’s as good as those run by some of the world’s biggest companies. I hope you enjoy learning about Facebook marketing!

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Creating Your Facebook Page

CREATING YOUR FACEBOOK PAGE To begin, go to the URL http://www.facebook.com/pages/create. php. You’ll be met with a grid of six colorful icons for different Page types. Click the one most appropriate to the kind of Page you want to make. • Choose Local business or Place if you’re setting up a Facebook page for a brick and mortar business or noncommercial location. An example of a ‘Local business’ Page is Zachary’s Chicago Pizza. • Choose Brand or Product if you’re creating a Page for a product brand (like Adidas), online-based business (like The Book Depository), a freelance business or firm (like Make Design, Not War) or a website (like Psdtuts+). • Choose Company, Organization or Institution if you are creating a Page on behalf of a company (like Intel) or an organization (like Amnesty International). • Choose Artist, Band, or Public Figure if you are an author, artist, musician, performer or other figure marketing your own personal brand. • Choose Entertainment if you are creating a Page for a particular source of entertainment, like a movie, TV show, book, song or sports team. • Choose Cause or Community if you are creating a Page for a political cause (like Animal Rights Now), a group, or a community (like Real Madrid Fans).

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Fig. 1: Create your Page

Naming Your Page In my case, I’m creating a Page for my blog, Skelliewag.org. I’ll click ‘Brand or Product’. From the drop-down list that appears, I’ll select ‘Website’ and carefully type the intended name of my Page.

Fig. 2: Spot the typo? Make sure your Page’s name is correctly spelled or you’ll be stuck with the mistake!

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Next, you need to enter a name for your Facebook page. Once again, be very careful with this step, as names can’t be edited after you have 100 fans. In general, the simplest, shortest, most accurate name is best. Long or descriptive names don’t work well, as shown in the comparison below.

Long and descriptive

Fig. 3: Long and descriptive

Short and accurate

Fig. 4: Short and accurate

Lastly, you’ll need to tick a checkbox to verify that you agree to the Terms for Facebook Pages.

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Once you’ve made sure there are no mistakes in the title and that you’ve chosen the most relevant category, proceed by clicking ‘Get Started.’ Congratulations, your Facebook Page is live! Right now, it looks frighteningly bare, but that will change soon.

Fig. 5: It’s alive!

For now, resist the urge to immediately Like your Page. Doing so will cause it to show up in your News Feed and make it accessible to all your friends. Before your Page makes its public debut let’s take the time to jazz it up a little.

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Adding an Image Let’s start by adding a profile image. This will replace the question mark in a grey box on your Page. Note that images with a width larger than 198 pixels will scale down to 198 pixels wide.

Fig. 6: Upload an image

Fig. 7: Choose a file

Fig. 8: Check the results

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Here are some suggestions for choosing an appropriate image for your profile: • For a business, use your logo, or an image prominently featuring your logo. • For a freelancer, use your business’s logo, or a picture of yourself. • For an organization, use your logo, or an image prominently featuring your logo. • For a product, use a good picture of the product. • For a website, use the website’s logo, or a screenshot of the website. • For a personal Official Page, use a picture of yourself. As mentioned earlier, it’s best to create an image 183 pixels wide or less so that you can keep image quality high. When Facebook sizes down an image, the result can be blurry. You want your image to be crisp and high quality. Keep in mind that you can get creative with your profile image. You can add text, messages, a tag-line, use it to promote current offers, causes and new products, or briefly describe what the Page will offer. For inspiration, here are a number of different approaches to profile pictures for Pages: Profile pictures: 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6.

The Gnomon Workshop Zippy's Restaurants Nettuts+ reddit Howls! Texas A&M University

7. Whole Foods 8. Curli 9. P.E.T.A 10. Sennheiser 11. Amnesty International 12. Cheetos

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1

2

3

4

5

6

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Adding Information Let’s add some more detail to your Page by filling out the ‘Info’ tab. Note that depending on which of the six options you chose when first creating your page, the fields you see in the ‘Info’ tab may differ from these examples. Because I’m creating a Page in the Brand or Product category, let’s run through the options for that category.

Brand or Product Info Tab

Fig. 9: Edit info

Fig. 10: Basic info

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When you click ‘Edit Information’ you’ll be met with a drop-down to change your Page category, as well as a field where you would be able to enter a username if you had more than 25 fans. Once you’ve hit this milestone you can add a username at any time. Every field is optional. You may wish to mention when your business, brand or organization was Founded. The next three fields, Address, City/Town and Zip are important for businesses and organizations with a physical address you would like people to visit, such as a brick and mortar store. In my case, I’m going to leave these fields blank, as they seem more appropriate for a physical business than a blog. Because of the short length of the About field, it seems like it’s intended for a tag line or motto. It’s not immediately clear how Company Overview, Mission and Description differ from each other. Remember that any fields you leave blank will not be shown, so you can choose to only fill-out fields that are appropriate for your Page. I suggest choosing just one of these options to avoid repetition. A trophy case made of text, you can list any awards you’ve won in the Awards field. You can use the Products field to list your product line, or if you offer services, to list your services. Enter an Email and Phone if you want people to be able to contact you via your Facebook Page. This will be visible to both fans and non-fans. Note that neither of these fields are required, and you can provide just your email address, just your phone number, or neither. If you would prefer to be contacted in another way, such as Twitter, it’s possible to add a URL or plain text to either of these fields. Because I’d prefer people contacted me via Twitter rather than a phone, I’ll be a bit tricky and use that instead.

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Website: add a website address to be linked to from your Page. URLs will be clickable, and http://www. will be automatically added to links if you have not done so already. You can add multiple links by adding a space between each link, or putting each link on a new line. You are limited to 10 links.

Fig. 11: Finished product

Are Your Fields Different? Depending on the category and sub-category you selected when creating your Page, your ‘Info’ options will vary greatly. The following principles apply to the ‘Info’ tab for all categories: • Leave a field blank and it will not show. Focus on what’s important and appropriate, and resist the urge to pad the ‘Info’ tab with unnecessary information. • Some text fields can be bent to your own purpose, such as providing a Twitter URL in the Phone text field.

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Adding Content to Your Wall The first item on your Getting Started page suggests that you post your first update. You can post a Status Update, Photo, Link or a Video.

Fig. 12: Post status updates

Adding content is done via the “Wall” tab. Your Page’s Wall is the primary means to communicate with visitors to your Page (it is visible to both fans and non-fans) and to provide value to them.

Fig. 13: The Wall tab

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Fig. 14: Sharing is caring

We’ll be exploring unique Facebook content more deeply in Chapter 3: Publishing Unique Content on Facebook. For now, let’s post our first ever Status update on your new Page.

Fig. 15: Hello world!

Fig. 16: Your first Wall post

Adding Photos to Your Page The photo bar at the top of your Page is looking rather empty! Uploading and sharing photos is a well-loved Facebook activity, so it’s no surprise that this feature is available for Facebook Pages, too.

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Fig. 17: Add a photo

Hit “Select Photos” and a file select window will open. Browse to the photo/s you want to upload and hit “Open.” Watch as your photo is uploaded. While you wait, you can create an album to house your photo.

Fig. 18: While you wait...

You have the option to give your album a descriptive name, and provide a location. The Location field works well for a personal photo album (i.e. “St. Kilda Beach”), but it doesn’t make sense for an album like “Portfolio” or “Products.” Luckily, it is completely optional, and can be left blank. If the images you’re uploading are already optimized for the web, selecting “High Resolution” will not take significantly longer than selecting “Standard” resolution. In cases where image quality is

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very important, such as when uploading examples of your graphic design or photography work, consider selecting High Resolution. However, if you’re uploading images pulled directly from a camera, or that you know to be more than 500k, select Standard quality to have the image undergo Facebook’s basic image compression. When you’re ready, select “Create Album.”

Fig. 19: Preparing the album

If you want your album to be posted on your Page’s Wall, select “Publish Now.” If not, or if you want to add it later, select “Skip.” In my case, I’m going to hit “Publish Now.”

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Fig. 20: Your first Photo Album

A little bare, but it’s a start! Soon I’ll add photos of the rest of my book covers to fill out the album a little. I can do that at any time by selecting “Add More Photos.” For now, let’s fill out some details for our album by selecting “Edit Album Info.” If appropriate, add a caption to your image. If there are people in your photo, you can click on them to tag them. This opens a context menu you can use to type in a name or select from your Facebook friends (drawn from your personal “admin” account, not from people who have Liked your page). When you tag someone in a photo, a link to his or her Facebook profile appears beneath the photo in your album.

Fig. 21: Adding a caption

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Lastly, you can select the “Edit Info” tab to add a description to your photo album. Let’s do that now.

Fig. 22: Adding a description

If you view your Photos again, you’ll see your new custom album next to the default “Profile Pictures” album. Success!.

Fig. 23: My albums

Your new album has also been posted to your Page’s Wall. Your Page is starting to look a little less empty!

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Fig. 24: Posted to your ‘Wall’

You can also quickly post either a single image or a new album to your Wall via the “Share” options:

Fig. 25: Posting photos and albums to your Wall

Using the Photo Bar Every Facebook Page has a series of five photo thumbnails that display across the top of the Wall. Any photo you upload to your Page will be added to your photo bar. Though you can remove photos, you can’t re-order them. By using small thumbnails that randomly shift in order, Facebook is trying to prevent companies using the photo bar as a banner ad

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by stitching images together. Even so, many Facebook Pages are putting the photo bar to good use.

Fig. 26: ShortStack photo bar gives highlights of the business

Fig. 27: The Psdtuts+ photo bar shows previews of recent tutorials

Fig. 28: The FreelanceSwitch photo bar shares various photos

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Even if your business is non-visual (for example, maybe you’re a freelance writer), I would still strongly suggest filling out your photo bar with five good photos. To help you, here are a number of ideas for ways to use your photo bar: • Product thumbnails. If you run a business that sells products, showcase them here. • Recent work. If you’re someone who does visual, creative work, showcase it in your photo bar. This is especially useful for freelancers, who can use it as a mini portfolio. • Articles you’ve written. If your blog posts have images (they should!) you can use these as thumbnails, and link to the full article in the photo description. • Photos of you, or your team. You can use the photo bar for up to five headshots. • Community pictures. This could be photos of your fans, or photos of fans interacting with your brand at conferences or community events. If you want to add a picture to your photo bar without publishing it on your Wall, upload it as normal. When it gives you the option to “Publish” or “Skip,” select “Skip.”

Customizing Your Page Tabs To remove a tab from your Page, select “Edit Page.” then navigate to “Apps” in the sidebar. Select “Edit Settings” on the App you would like to remove, and select “Remove” next to “Tab: Added.”

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Fig. 29: Re-adding a deleted tab

Deleting a tab is a reversible process. Go to “Edit Settings” for the tab you want to add again and select “Tab: Available (add).” You can also use the Apps page to add additional Apps and Tabs to your Page. • Events. The Events tab allows you to post events related to your Page. • Links. Similar to a Twitter feed, this tab provides an easy way to share links with your Page visitors. • Notes. Facebook Status Updates are limited to 420 characters, but the Notes app allows for longer, blog-post style updates. • Videos. Upload videos from your computer, record videos on the spot, and store them here.

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Promoting Your Page

PROMOTING YOUR PAGE Now you’ve fleshed out your page a little bit, it’s time to get your first Like. While you weren’t looking, I added some more content to my Wall, and my Page is looking much more finished (though really, it’s only just getting started!).

Fig. 30: A basic finished Facebook Page

Now that the structure of your Page is finished, let’s take advantage of some of Facebook’s sharing options to get some eyes on your new Page. In the right-hand admin menu on your Page, select “Suggest to Friends.”

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Promoting Your Page

Suggest to Friends

Fig. 31: Suggest to Friends

Let’s suggest the page to a friend or two. Family and close friends are a great source of charity Likes to get your Page started!

Fig. 32: Recommend your Page

Once you’ve found the friend or friends you want to send your Page to, hit “Send Recommendation.” Though it’s possible to send your Page to all your Facebook friends, it’s a little spammy. Stick to friends who you know will understand and appreciate your Page.

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Promoting Your Page

Promote this Page on Your Website This option suggests that you add a Like Box to your website to help promote your page. It’s no surprise Facebook recommends this as one of the first things you should do, since adding a Like Box to your website will hugely increase the amount of traffic your Facebook Page gets.

Fig. 33: Promote this Page on your website

You may have seen a Like Box before. It looks like this:

Fig. 34: The Like Box

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Promoting Your Page

The Like Box is useful in a number of ways. It’s a great way to let your audience, customers and clients know that you have a Facebook page by promoting it on your website. They can Like your Page without having to visit Facebook. If anyone in their friendship network also likes the page, their friends will often show up among the sample thumbnails of people who Like the page. While helping to manage the Facebook Pages for the Tuts+ Network, we noticed a huge increase in Likes after adding the Like Box to the sidebar of one of our websites, Nettuts+. The arrow points to the day we added the Like Box.

Fig. 35: Effects of adding the ‘Like Box’ on Page activity

I strongly recommend that you add a Like Box to your website. Now that I’ve created a Facebook Page, I’ll add a Like Box to the sidebar of my blog, Skelliewag.org. You can follow along and add a Like Box to your own website (or get someone more technical to do it for you!). After selecting “Add the Like Box” you’ll be whisked away to a page in Facebook’s area for Developers. Facebook have created a helpful widget you can use to build a custom Like Box for your Page, no coding required. Start by copying and pasting your Facebook URL into the Like Box builder. Right now, your URL is probably long and complicated. The good news is that once you get 25 fans you’ll be able to select

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Promoting Your Page

a so-called Vanity URL for your Page. My Page’s URL is currently http://www.facebook.com/pages/Skelliewag/183414908349583, but by the end of this book it will be http://facebook.com/ Skelliewag. Next, select a pixel width for the Like Box. If you’re adding the Like Box to your sidebar, this pixel width should be thinner than your sidebar. If you’re not sure how wide your sidebar is, you can find a good width through some trial and error. Next, you can choose a light or dark color scheme for the Like Box. The next three options are the most interesting. They’ll determine how much stuff is packed into your Like Box. For the simplest possible version, leave “Show Faces,” “Stream” and “Header” unchecked.

Fig. 36: The simplest Like Box

Select “Show Faces” to put a selection of your fans’ profile pics in your Like Box. The Like Box can show profile thumbnails of up to 15 fans if left at the default 290-pixel width. Select “Stream” to add your latest Wall posts to the Like Box. Lastly, you can enable “Header” to show a “Find us on Facebook” header. I’m going to use a Like Box with only “Faces” enabled for my own blog.

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Promoting Your Page

Fig. 37: Like Box with faces

Fig. 39: Like Box with Faces and Header

Fig. 38: Faces and Stream ‘Like Box’

Once you’re happy with your Like Box, hit the “Get Code” button. You’ll be met with two different code formats, iFrame and XFBML. iFrame format is easiest to setup and retains the core functionality of the Like Box (being able to remotely Like) a Page. XFBML is an acronym for Extended Facebook Markup Language and is an ideal choice for web developers, as it allows further customization with the JavaScript SDK. To keep things simple, I’m going to walk you through adding iFrames code to your website. Select the iFrames code from the pop-up box and copy it, then hit “Okay.”

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Promoting Your Page

Fig. 40: Plugin code

The next step is to add the code to your website where you want the Like Box to appear. If you run a standard HTML site, open up the HTML file for the page you want to add the Like Box to and copy and paste the code where you want it to appear. I’m using WordPress for my blog, so I can access my theme’s code by going to “Appearance” > “Themes.” If you’re not 100% comfortable with code, make sure to save a copy of your theme file before you modify it, or find someone to help you.

Fig. 41: WordPress code

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Promoting Your Page

With a bit of tweaking the box sits nicely in my sidebar. The more traffic you can send to your website, the more people will see your Like Box and know that you have Facebook Page. The presence of a Like Box will help you to add new fans automatically over time.

Fig. 42: Like Box in a sidebar

What You’ve Done So Far You’re now running an Official Facebook Page for your business, organization, website or personal brand. You’ve fleshed it out with information and photos. You’ve added content. You’ve shared your Page with friends and contacts, and added a Like Box to your website. By now, you might have even seen a little activity on your Facebook Page, such as comments on your posts, or Likes (but don’t worry if you haven’t yet... you will soon!).

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Promoting Your Page

Fig. 43: First blossoms of activity on my Facebook Page

You’ve built strong foundations for a popular and well-liked Facebook Page. And yet, there’s still much more you can do to build your Facebook fan-base and increase engagement with your Page. In the next section of the book, I’ll be focusing on key ways to promote and enhance your Facebook presence. These strategies are focused on increasing the number of fans for your Page.

Adding a Like Button to your Site If you’ve ever used social media voting sites like Digg or StumbleUpon, you’ll be familiar with the concept of “voting up” content you find online. The Like Button is Facebook’s voting up mechanism. It’s a social plugin that allows Facebook users to Like specific pieces of content. A link to the content they’ve liked will be

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Promoting Your Page

posted to the user’s profile and to their friends’ News Feeds. When a user Likes your content, they share it with their entire friendship network on Facebook. For this reason, the Like Button is a musthave for your website. To start the process, visit Facebook’s page for the Like Button. There you can read an explanation of how the button works, but most importantly, you can use the supplied widget to generate a customized Like Button for your site. Similar to the Like Box we added earlier, this comes in both iFrame and XFBML versions. This time, we’re going to install the XFBML version by default. It’s easy, and means you do not have to enter anything for “URL to Like.” The code will detect the page or post the user is on, and they will automatically Like that page. Users will also be able to leave a comment on the post to their News Feed and profile whenever they Like your content. 1. Since we’re using XFBML, we do not need to enter a “URL to Like.” 2. Next, choose between the three layout options available. Keep in mind that the “Show Faces” feature is only available when you choose the standard layout. 3. Show Faces” will display profile pictures of friends who have Liked the same page beneath the Like Button. 4. Next, set the “Width” so that the Like Button is not wider than the content it will be displayed within. 5. Choose whether to display the verb “Like” or “Recommend.” While “Like” is the standard, “Recommend” might be more appropriate in formal contexts where “Like” would seem too colloquial. 6. Lastly, choose your preferred font and color scheme. 7. When you’re done, select “Get Code.”

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Fig. 44: Like Button widget

Fig. 45: Selecting XFBML code

Promoting Your Page

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Promoting Your Page

Just as we did with the Like Box, we need to paste the code into our website where we want the Like Button to appear. In my case, it’s at the bottom of all blog posts. In a basic HTML website, simply paste the code where you’d like it to appear. In WordPress, you can access this by editing the code for the PHP file controlling single posts. To find this, look in “Appearance” > “Editor.” Unless you’re a code maestro, make sure to save a copy of the original before making any changes. In my case, I’ll open the Single Post PHP file and look for php the_content, a tag which serves up the content of your blog post. I’ll paste the Like Button code directly below this to ensure the Like Button is the first thing that appears at the end of a post.

Fig. 46: Adding the Like Button code to WordPress posts

Fig. 47: It worked!

If you’re a developer, make sure to read through Facebook’s Like Button documentation to discover more advanced functionality. When a user Likes your content, a link to the item is posted under “Recent Activity” on their profile. The anchor text will be taken from the title attribute of the page being shared. Now, anyone who visits the user’s Profile will see a link to your content.

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Promoting Your Page

Fig. 48: Likes are posted to “Recent Activity”

After you’ve added the code to your site, no more work is required to maintain the Like Button. You’ve just installed a fully passive promotional channel for your content on Facebook!

Adding an Activity Feed to Your Site The Like Box showcases users who Like your site. The Activity Feed shows visitors to your site how people are interacting with it on Facebook, including when they Like your content or share it on their profile. Unlike the Like Box, it doesn’t allow for users to Like your Page directly from your website. If it’s a choice between the Like Box or the Activity Feed, I’d go with the Like Box. If you have the space for both, however, consider what the Activity Feed may be able to offer your site. Let’s take a look at how to install the Activity Feed. Fig. 49: Activity Feed widget

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Promoting Your Page

Navigate to Facebook’s Activity Feed page. Once again, there’s a helpful widget available to help you craft your Feed. Because we’ll use the XFBML version of the code, we don’t need to specify a domain. Set the width smaller than the area you want to display the Activity Feed within. The rest of the choices are cosmetic, though you can select whether or not you want to show recommendations in the feed. When you’re happy with your settings, hit “Get Code.”

Fig. 50: Getting the XFBML code

Select the XFBML code from the pop-up screen and hit “OK.” I’m going to test the Activity Feed in my blog’s sidebar, below my Like Box, so I’ll navigate to “Appearance” > “Editor” in WordPress and add the code there. Here’s how it looks:

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Fig. 51: The Recent Activity feed

Looking good! I can see one issue, though. Instead of pulling the correct thumbnail for my last two posts, it’s pulling a Twitter icon I have in my sidebar. If I decided to keep the Activity Feed in my sidebar, I would need to remove the incorrect image, or specify the image I wanted to use as the post thumbnail in my blog’s code. Here’s a possible solution.

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Promoting Your Page

Adding a Recommendations Feed to Your Site The Recommendations Feed is very similar to the Activity Feed, but it’s focused on recommending your content to users based on what they’ve Liked in the past, and what their friends have Liked. If you want the feed to serve up what Facebook believes to be your site’s most relevant content, rather than its most popular, use the Recommendations Feed rather than the Activity Feed.

Fig. 52: The Recommendations Feed

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Promoting Your Page

Adding a Login Button to Your Site A clever way to integrate Facebook into your web app or membership based site, the Login Button shows users which of their Facebook friends have already signed up for your site. As always, Facebook has provided a helpful widget to generate the Button code. You can choose whether to show faces, specify the width of the Button and faces area, and select how many rows of faces you’d like to display.

Fig. 53: The Login Button

Adding Facepile to Your Site The Facepile widget shows the faces of friends who have Liked your page or have signed up to the site. If none of your friends have interacted with your content, it will show the total number of Likes without any accompanying faces.

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Promoting Your Page

Since the Like Button also shows faces of friends who have Liked the same page as you, this seems mostly useful for membership sites. To add Facepile to your site, visit Facebook’s Facepile page.

Fig. 54: Facepile

Add a Live Stream to your site The Live Stream widget lets people comment about an event on Facebook as it happens. This works best for things like live streaming video, product launches and live chats. It gives visitors a place to discuss what is happening, while also posting their responses on Facebook and further promoting the event. To add a Live Stream to your site you’ll need to first get an App ID. Your account will also need to be verified by adding a mobile phone or credit card. Once you have an App ID, head back to Facebook’s Live Stream widget. You can customize variables like height and width, and select whether comments in the Live Feed are posted to the user’s profile.

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Promoting Your Page

Fig. 55: Live Stream

Adding Comments to Your Site The Comments social plugin lets users comment both on the page it appears on as well as reposting the comment on their Facebook profile, if they so choose. The option to “Post comment to Facebook profile” is ticked by default. This can work as a replacement for blog comments, or for use on pages where there is currently no commenting functionality. The best thing about the plugin is that it takes something that would not normally help to give your site more exposure (commenting) and turns it into a way to share your content. The drawbacks are that users need to have a Facebook profile in order to comment, and that you can’t moderate comments before they appear (though you can report comments that violate Facebook’s Terms of Use).

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Promoting Your Page

A number of companies have started to use the Comments social plugin on product pages. Users can give feedback and testimonials for a product, then have those recommendations shared with friends in their stream. Additionally, a number of high profile blogs have been trialing the use of Facebook comments on their blog posts.

Fig. 56: Comments

Promoting your Facebook Page on Social Media Since you’re interested in marketing with Facebook, you may already be using other social media outlets for promotion, such as a Twitter account. These social media outlets are an excellent place to promote your Facebook Page, because the people who follow your brand on these services have already shown that they’re willing to engage with you on social media. Your Twitter

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Promoting Your Page

followers or LinkedIn connections are perfect candidates to become Facebook fans.

Fig. 57: Linking to Facebook from social media profiles

One of the simplest ways you can promote your Facebook Page on your other social media accounts is to add a link to your Facebook Page in your profile. In this screenshot, you can see that I’ve added a link to my blog’s Facebook Page to my Twitter bio. Most other social media services will allow you to add several links to elsewhere on the web, so make sure to add links to your Facebook Page to as many of these as possible. On social media platforms where you generate unique content, like Twitter, there are many ways to encourage followers to also Like your Page on Facebook. The simplest is to let your followers know that you have a Facebook Page! Here’s an example tweet: If you use Facebook, you can also follow us there: http://facebook. com/yourusername

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Promoting Your Page

Another option is to encourage your followers to engage with content you have posted on your Facebook Page, for example, a question you have asked your audience.

Fig. 58: Asking followers to answer on Facebook

Often, you’ll need to share a photo or screenshot on social media. These can be hosted on Facebook, so why not link to the image on Facebook, rather than using a service like TwitPic?

Fig. 59: Share photos on Facebook rather than a third party service

If you’d like to promote Facebook to your Twitter fans more heavily than the occasional update, you can link your Facebook account to your Twitter account by visiting Facebook.com/twitter. Click “Link a Page to Twitter,” and on the next screen, select the Facebook Page you want to link. Note that you will be able to choose which kinds of updates you do or don’t want to post to Twitter.

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Promoting Your Page

Next, you’ll receive a Twitter notification that Facebook wishes to access your Twitter account in order to post the updates. Select “Allow” if you are happy with this.

Fig. 60: Giving Facebook access to Twitter

Now that you’ve linked your Facebook Page to Twitter, you can choose which updates to auto-post across, and which to post on Facebook only. You can toggle Twitter sharing on or off for the following update types: Status Updates, Photos, Video, Links, Notes and Events.

Fig. 61: Choosing which updates to post to Twitter

Now that Twitter is integrated with Facebook, let’s test it out by posting an update.

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Promoting Your Page

Fig. 62: The Facebook update

Fig. 63: The Twitter update

After publishing this Facebook update, my Twitter account immediately tweeted the same update, though it’s worth noting that only my comment on the link was posted on Twitter. The title of the link wasn’t included in the tweet. Because of this, you might consider adding the title of the link to the comment field when you’re posting to Facebook, so it’s retained when the link is also posted to Twitter. Unfortunately, there is no way to stop a specific update from being shared. You might have wanted to do this when posting an update that doesn’t make sense outside the context of Facebook (for example, a status update thanking your Facebook fans for their support). To temporarily disable sharing you’ll need to visit Facebook.com/twitter again and disable ‘Status Update’ from the list of content types to be shared. Then, you’ll need to re-enable it once you’ve made the update you don’t want to share on Twitter.

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PUBLISHING UNIQUE CONTENT ON FACEBOOK We’ve explored a number of ways to promote your Page from outside Facebook, but what about the promotion that happens on your Facebook Page itself? Everything you post on your Facebook Page can be Liked, Commented on and Shared. Though Likes are very valuable when it comes to your Page, they are much less valuable for individual Wall posts. Liking an individual post does not post it to your “Recent Activity,” or into your friend’s News Feeds. Sharing and Commenting are much more valuable. If you comment on a post, it will appear in your profile page’s “Activity Feed.” If you Share a post, it will appear on your personal profile’s Wall as well as being posted to your friends’ News Feeds. When it comes to promoting your Page within Facebook, Sharing and Commenting is extremely valuable.

Fig. 64: Like, Comment, Share

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Though Sharing and Commenting helps you promote your Page within Facebook and is a great reason to post unique content to your Wall, it’s not the only reason. By providing value to your Fans and interacting with them through Facebook, you help to deepen their relationship with your brand or product. By posting unique content, being active in discussions, or letting your Fans post content and questions to your Wall, you can create a thriving community on your Facebook Page.

Fig. 65: Interacting with fans leaves a good impression

None of this can happen without content on your Page which can be Liked, Shared and discussed in comments. In this section, I’ll explore the myriad options for unique Facebook content available to you.

The Basics: Importing RSS If your website, product or brand has an associated RSS feed for new content, this gives you a means to automatically update your Wall with new content.

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Select “Edit Page,” then select “Apps.” From that page, select “Go to App” under the Notes App. If you previously disabled the Notes app, you’ll need to reactivate it through the “Edit Settings” window.

Fig. 66: The Notes app

From the Notes page, select “Edit import settings” from the bottom left of the sidebar.

Fig. 67: Edit import settings

Next, enter your RSS feed into the text field. If you’re not sure of your RSS URL, you can enter a direct link to your website. Tick the checkbox to verify the content is your own, then hit “Start Importing.”

Fig. 68: Start importing

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You’ll be treated to a preview of what your feed will look like. If you’re happy, hit “Confirm.”

Fig. 69: A preview of your feed

Courtesy of the Notes app, your RSS feed is now neatly displayed in individual posts. If you want to make this a tab that visitors can access at any time, you can do so via “Edit Page” > “Apps” > “Notes” (Edit Settings) and selecting “Add” next to the Tabs option. Otherwise, posts will be added to your Wall but the Notes page will not be accessible to visitors. Navigate back to your Page’s Wall and you’ll see the most recent posts from your RSS feed have been automatically posted there. If this amounts to too many posts you can manually delete some of them by mousing over the update and selecting X (delete).

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Whenever your RSS feed is updated, your Wall will update with a link to the new post that people can Like, Share or Comment on. This is an excellent way to ensure your Wall is always fresh and active, even on days when you don’t have the time to update it with unique content.

Fig. 70: Wall posts from an RSS feed

Updating from Twitter If you use Twitter, it’s easy to cross-posts your tweets as status updates to your Page. While you could set up an RSS feed of all your tweets, some of your tweets might not make sense on Facebook, and you may not want to flood your Wall with too many tweets. One solution is the Selective Tweets app for Facebook. It enables you to choose tweets to add to your Facebook Page by adding the hashtag #fb to the tweet.

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Go to the Selective Tweets profile and you’ll be met with a Page for the app. In the sidebar, select “Add to my Page” and choose the Page you’d like to add. Head back to your Page and select “Edit Page” > “Apps.” Select “Go to App” under Selective Tweets. From there, enter your Twitter username and select “Grant permission.”

Fig. 71: Installing Selective Tweets

You’ll receive a pop-up notification telling you that Selective Tweets needs to access your basic information, as well as access to post to your wall. If you’re happy with these terms, hit “Allow.” Make sure “Has permission?” has changed to “Yes,” then hit “Save Changes.” To test the app, publish a tweet with “#fb” added to the end. If Selective Tweets is working, the tweet will be cross-posted to your Page’s wall with the #fb hashtag removed. Rather than posting duplicate content between your Twitter account and Facebook, you can now update both at the same time. Coupled with the RSS feed you’ve added to your Facebook Page, it’s clear that keeping your Wall updated won’t be too difficult!

Fig. 72: A tweet posted to your Wall

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Unique Facebook Content Though you’ve learned some quick and easy routes for keeping your Wall updated, there’s much more you can do with Facebook content. It requires more effort, but the rewards are worth it. By posting updates unique to Facebook you’ll help your fans to feel like they’re part of an exclusive group, bringing them closer to your brand, product or website. In the “Creating Your Facebook Page” section of this book we walked through the different types of content you can post to Facebook: status updates, photos, links and videos. When you post one of these content types, your Page’s visitors can interact with it in one of three ways. • Leave a comment. When a visitor to your Facebook Page leaves a comment on something you’ve posted, it’s also posted on their Wall, sharing your content with their friends. • Share this update. Used to repost your content to the user’s Wall, this is the best way to get exposure for your content within Facebook. • Like this update. Though having a high number of likes on an update helps with social proof, Liking an update does not share it in any way. For this reason, comments and shares are more valuable than Likes on individual updates. Somewhat confusingly, the same term (“Like”) is used for how visitors become a Fan of your Page. And, when a user Likes a page on your website, it will be shared on their wall. If you are confused by the “Likes” system, you’re not alone!

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Fig. 73: Like, Comment, Share

Regardless of whether your fans interact directly with your content or not, your Wall posts will be posted to their News Feed. This is the most powerful way Facebook drives traffic back to your business or website.

Fig. 74: A new item from a Page I’ve Liked shows up in my News Feed

Though it gets far less publicity as a source of traffic, for some sites, Facebook can be a bigger referrer than Twitter. This is all generated by Wall posts showing up in the News Feeds of your fans, people Liking your website content and sharing it in their friends’ News Feeds, as well as by other big Pages linking to your content. Below, you can see the top traffic sources for Psdtuts+. Facebook is just behind Google and RSS in this top 10 list of referrers.

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Though the site has a Twitter account with nearly 40,000 followers, and half that number of Facebook fans (as of this writing), Twitter is not even in the top 10 list of referrers. Why is this?

Fig. 75: Top 10 traffic sources for Psdtuts+

When people are using Twitter, they’re generally doing other things. You work on a task, glance at Twitter, then start on another task. Also, depending on how many people a user follows, tweets can disappear very quickly from the stream if not read soon after they’re published. Contrast this with Facebook. When people use Facebook, they give it their full attention. Most importantly, unlike Twitter, people don’t use Facebook when they’re busy. People turn to Facebook in times of boredom, relaxation and procrastination. They’re looking for something to catch their attention, which is why getting your content in front of Facebook users is so important. Though we know we can publish a number of different content types on our Facebook Page, and have already experimented with a few, this doesn’t help us to decide what we should publish on Facebook.

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What you publish depends on what you want to achieve with your Facebook Page. Do you want to: • Drive traffic back to your product or website? • Encourage specific actions (sales, sign-ups, subscriptions, hiring you)? • Deepen your relationship with your customers, clients, audience, or fans? Rather than focusing on one of these aims exclusively, you’re likely to be working towards a percentage of each. For example, 50% of results being traffic, 30% of your results being sign-ups and 20% of results being more community engagement. This means you need to choose the same proportion of content types that work towards each of these aims. • To drive traffic, you must post content that links back to your website. • To encourage specific actions, you must post content that is a ‘call to action’ (specifically asking your fans to undertake the action you want.) • To deepen relationships, you need to ask your fans for their opinions and answers, and respond to their comments and feedback. You can also build loyalty by helping fans get to know your brand, product or website better. Let’s look at each of these three content paths in detail.

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Driving Traffic This is, arguably, the easiest type of content to produce because it must always meet one key requirement: it must contain a link. Earlier in the book I showed you how to pipe an RSS feed into your Facebook Page. If your website has an RSS feed, the auto-posted updates give you a good foundation from which to drive traffic. But you can go further. For any update designed to drive traffic to your website, you will usually need to use the ‘Link’ content type. However, URLs included in Status updates will also be converted into clickable links. In this example, I’ll post a link to my blog’s most popular post. Because it was published some time ago, it’s not going to be automatically posted via RSS. I need to take matters into my own hands!

Fig. 76: Posting a link

Paste your link into the field and hit “Attach.” Facebook will automatically pull an image thumbnail from the URL, as well as some text. If the widget chooses the wrong thumbnail, you’ll be able to scroll through several options, or select “No Thumbnail” if there are no suitable images on the page. You can also edit the text preview Facebook automatically pulls from the URL by clicking it.

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Note that you can add an additional comment to your link. This is a good idea, as it helps to add more personality to the update.

Fig. 77: Customizing a link

When you’re happy with the customizations to your link, hit “Share.”

Fig. 78: Published link to a past post

In less than a minute I’ve created a new pathway into my website, via Facebook.

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Though the process for adding a link is simple, there are a number of ways you can link back to your site: • Bloggers and website owners can link to great posts from the past, interesting user comments, or category pages. • Businesses can link to products, a company blog, testimonials, landing pages, and fun stuff created for branding. • Freelancers can link to their portfolio or post recent work, to service pages, or blog posts. Though what you link to is important, how you link back to your website or product is crucial. In the example above, I offered a little bit of description of the link, but didn’t directly engage with my Page’s fans. Though commonly seen, this is not the best way to link to your content. Instead, you should ask your fans to provide an opinion on what you’ve linked to, or to add to it in some way. As we discussed above, every time a fan comments on your content the comment is posted on their wall, spreading the reach of the post to their entire social network. In this way, you can drive traffic back to your website while also promoting your Facebook page. The majority of what you publish on Facebook should be designed not only to achieve your aims, but also to stimulate comments.

Fig. 79: Asking for an opinion

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Fig. 80: Asking fans to expand on the content

That being said, make sure to do so in a way that will not annoy your fans. Being controversial or provocative might get you more comments in the short-term, but it could damage your relationship with your fans. Instead, it’s best to engage with fans openly and honestly, asking them to enhance what you’ve posted with their tips, advice and reflections, or to share their own opinions. Whenever you post something to Facebook, ask yourself, how can I encourage my Page’s fans to discuss this further?

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Encouraging Actions When you were first setting up your Facebook Page, I asked you to think about your goals. While creating a Page and amassing fans is fun and easy to measure, it’s not the end goal. After acquiring a fan, the next step is to encourage that fan to take action. We’ve already been through encouraging your fans to visit your site, but what about other beneficial actions they might take? In this section, we’ll discuss the different content types that encourage fans to take a certain type of action. Following your brand on Twitter. A Facebook fan is an excellent candidate to become a Twitter follower. To encourage your fans to follow you on Twitter, it’s important that they know you have a Twitter account. A Wall update specifically asking fans to follow on Twitter will help you gather a number of new followers. The same strategy can be used for any social media account. Let your fans know you’re active on that service, ask them to follow you, and provide them with a link. This strategy is simple, transparent, and effective.

Fig. 81: Encouraging fans to follow

Pre-order a product. Facebook is a platform suited to brief updates. Because of this, it’s perfect for revealing dribs and drabs of information about an upcoming launch. After you’ve posted a number of updates building anticipation about the product or event, you can conduct a launch on Facebook.

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Use discount codes and coupons. Many companies post discounts specifically for Facebook fans. This is a great way to make your fans feel special while giving exposure to your product and encouraging sales. Hiring you or your company. To be hired more you need more people to know about your services, and their benefits. Because of this, you should occasionally post on your Wall about one of the services you offer, and link to a page where people can contact you about it. To convince your fans that you do quality work, it’s a good idea to share examples from your portfolio. These can be links to articles, or screenshots of work. And of course, sharing testimonials from happy clients is excellent content for your Wall!

Fig. 82: Sharing work can help you land clients through Facebook

Signing up to your newsletter. Because you can’t embed HTML in Wall posts, it’s not possible to post a newsletter sign-up form directly to your Wall. But you can add a sign-up form to your Page within an iFrame (discussed in Chapter 4). You can also take the simple route of posting a link to a page with a newsletter sign-up page on your Wall. This will always convert better if you offer a bonus for signing up, and let your fans know. These days, many newsletters come with a bonus for all new subscribers.

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Fig. 83: A bonus offered with a newsletter from ChrisGuillebeau.com

Share your content. Some of the actions you will want fans to take will occur directly on Facebook. Remember that when a fan shares your content, it appears on their personal profile to be seen by their entire friendship network. A “Shared” post has the same visibility as a normal status update from that user, and appears at the top of their profile rather than tucked away under “Recent Activity.” Sharing your content is the best possible way a fan can support your content on Facebook. Instead of waiting for users to share your content, why not ask them at the end of a high quality update? Here is a simple script you can add to the bottom of an update every so often: If you liked this, please Share it using the link below! Attend events. If you’re active on a personal Facebook profile, you’d be familiar - perhaps too familiar - with Facebook Events. A Facebook Page also has the ability to create Events, and you can then link to them from your Wall to get more RSVPs.

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Fig. 84: Sharing a promotional event.

Sell your product. Your Wall is a great place to post short updates about new products. Despite the potential to generate sales directly via your Wall, any time someone shares or comments on your product post, it will be posted on their profile and spread to their network of friends, helping your product sell through new channels.

Fig. 85: Selling a product on the Wall

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Deepen Relationships Your goals with Facebook should not only be to get more Likes and more traffic. One of the first things people learn at Business School is that it costs much more time, energy, and often money to add a new customer than it does to retain an existing customer. Keeping your fans loyal and happy is just as important, if not more important, than finding new fans. For this reason, it’s important to use your Facebook Page to build more loyalty among your existing fans, and to gain a better understanding of them. As I mentioned earlier, comments are one of the most useful ways fans can interact with your Facebook posts. Every time a fan leaves a comment it is shared on their profile and in their friends’ News Feeds. While you’re building brand loyalty and interacting directly with your audience, you’re also creating pathways for new fans to find your Page. For this reason, content that encourages discussion will be one of the best possible additions to your Facebook Page.

Ask Questions! If you want to encourage discussion, sometimes the simplest path is best. Ask a question! You’ll see this kind of content on many Facebook Pages. There are lost of different types of questions you can ask. To ask a question or poll, use the ‘Question’ link under your Page’s ‘Share’ options. If you like, you can convert your question into a poll by selecting ‘Add poll options.’

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Fig. 86: Using the ‘Question’ update type

Fig. 87: Adding poll options

Fig. 88: A live poll

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Questions about your brand, product, or service. Though these kinds of questions do stimulate discussion, they’re particularly useful for the insights they can give you about your audience. Here, you can see an example of a Page asking for feedback on how fans consume the website’s content, and how this could be improved.

Fig. 89: Polling fans

Questions that are relevant to your audience. This operates on the basic social principle that people like to discuss the things they have in common. If you ran a blog about graphic design, for example, you’d be safe in betting your Facebook fans are interested in the topic. So why not post a general question or discussion point on graphic design? The same approach can be applied to any Facebook Page. Here you can see an example of an expert in making money with blogs asking fans whether they sell eBooks through their blogs.

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Fig. 90: Asking related questions

Questions that are relevant to everyone. Facebook is, by its nature, a fun and informal platform. People are familiar with using it to chat with friends, organize their social calendar, and share bits of their everyday lives. Brands have been able to add a similar feel to their Facebook Pages by asking fun, informal questions that everyone can participate in. This can include questions like ‘What are you doing right now?’, ‘Do you prefer Coke or Pepsi?’, and ‘What’s your favorite video game of all time?’ If the tone of your Page is usually quite formal, you may need to set up your question a little bit, or the change in tone could be too jarring. Try something like: ‘Fun question today: What’s the most beautiful place you’ve ever visited?’ By making it clear that this informal question is a departure from your usual content style, fans will be more accepting of the change in tone. If you’re still concerned about changing your tone too much, try saving these kinds of questions and discussions for the weekend. Fans may be much more receptive to a ‘Favorite movie?’ discussion point on a lazy Sunday afternoon than they’d be on a hectic Monday morning!

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Fig. 91: Asking an informal question

Controversial and breaking news. Nothing generates comments like a controversial topic. That being said, taking sides can damage the brand perception of those who disagree with you. You can harness the discussion power of controversy by reporting on the issue without taking sides. Instead, ask fans ‘What do you think?’

Fig. 92: Breaking news

One case where it might benefit you to take sides is when your audience, by their nature, will agree with you. For example, if your Page was for a political party or pressure group, presenting your group’s stance on an issue is likely to be well received among fans of your Page. Alternately, you might make the decision to take sides, knowing that your position will resonate with the majority of your audience.

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Even if some people disagree, the benefits should still outweigh the negatives. Useful and valuable links and tips. One of the most popular uses for Twitter is to share links, tips and quotes that your audience will find interesting. People love recommendations that are well tailored to them, and this kind of content does well on Facebook, too. However, where this kind of content is often the majority of what’s shared on Twitter, it’s a good idea if this kind of content only features occasionally on your Facebook Page. People usually ‘Like’ your Page not solely because of what you post on your Wall, but because they Like your brand. For that reason, most of what you publish should be about, or related to, your brand. It’s the reason people Liked your Page in the first place! Treat it as a mini-blog. This type of content can be particularly effective if your Facebook Page is dedicated to a website or blog. On your Facebook Page, you could share extra ‘mini’ blog posts, almost like it’s a tumblelog. Post photos. At the time of this writing, Facebook Pages display a photo bar of five photos across the top of your Page. To keep your Page seeming fresh and dynamic, it’s important to occasionally refresh your photo bar with a new photo. Here are some ideas for photos to post to your Page: • Photos of your products. • Sneak peeks at things you’re working on. • Photos of you or your team. • Photos of customers and clients. • Photos from events you’ve held. • Images of your branding, i.e. a logo.

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Engage with video. Video can be a more intimate form of communication than writing. By talking to your fans ‘face to face’ through video, you can bring them closer to you. Video content on Facebook has another impressive benefit. If you upload video to Facebook, rather than linking over to YouTube or another video hosting service, your video will display a ‘Like’ button when viewed by someone who’s not yet a fan of your Page. If they click that Like button, they’ll become a fan. For this reason, it’s often best to host your video content on Facebook directly, unless a YouTube subscriber is as important to you as a Facebook fan. Fig. 90 shows this custom video Like button. Because the video is hosted on the Mari Smith Facebook Page, the button says ‘Like Mari Smith’. If I hosted a video on my own Facebook Page the button would say ‘Like Skelliewag’.

Fig. 93: The Like button on a Facebook video

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General Tips for Content There are two principles that will serve you well regardless of the types of content you want to publish. The first is that you should be active in the comments on your own Facebook posts. One of the most helpful ways a fan can interact with your Facebook Page is by commenting. To encourage comments, you need to set the example. This includes answering direct questions, but you might even want to thank people for their comments, even if they’re not specifically looking for a response. Additionally, you can use comments to add persuasive weight, or extra information, to your posts.

Fig. 94: A Page account responds to comments

The second guiding principle for Facebook content is that more is better. Because posts are naturally limited in length, and more comments means that your Page will spread further on Facebook, it’s ideal to update your Page a number of times per day if possible. The next best thing is to update once a day, and the next best thing after that is to update a few times a week. How much time you commit depends on how important Facebook is to your business, and how much you enjoy creating Facebook content.

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There’s one catch with the ‘more is better’ philosophy: what you post needs to be unique content created specifically for Facebook. Upping the number of RSS feeds you pipe through your Page won’t have the same effect. People are very tuned in to separating the unique from the generic and the personal from the impersonal. Your Facebook content should, as much as possible, be handcrafted by you or your team.

Getting a Vanity URL

Fig. 95: Applying for a Vanity URL

Once you have at least 25 fans for your Page you’ll be able to choose a shorter “vanity” URL for your Page in the form of facebook.com/<username>. To do so, go to http://www.facebook. com/username/. Select your Page, then carefully type the name of the username you want. You can’t change usernames after you have 100 fans, so be certain there are no typos, and that you’re not planning a name change in the future. When you’re ready, select ‘Check Availability’. You’ll be met with a number of warnings. Double-check you’re happy with your username, take a deep breath, and hit ‘Confirm’.

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Fig. 96: Take a deep breath...

Fig. 97: Success!

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Fig. 98: Looking good!

There’s no need to worry about breaking old links, as Facebook will automatically redirect your old URL to your new vanity URL. Looks much more professional, doesn’t it?

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Turning Visitors Into Fans

TURNING VISITORS INTO FANS In Chapter 3: Publishing Unique Content on Facebook, I mentioned that encouraging people to post comments on your updates helps to spread the word about your Facebook Page. But once someone visits your Page, there’s no guarantee they’ll ever click the Like button. If your Page is not immediately compelling, they’re more likely to browse somewhere else! To get around this problem, many Pages have started to practice the old marketing adage, that if you want people to do something, you need to tell them what to do. When a visitor comes to one of the following Pages, they’re met with a message asking them to Like it, located on a “Welcome Tab.”

Fig. 99: Like our Page! (Redbull)

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As you can see, this is very different to greeting first-time visitors with the hubbub of your Page’s Wall, and much more likely to convert visitors into long-term fans. In this section, I’ll show you how to easily set up something similar for your own Page. Earlier in the book, I showed you how to add and remove Tabs from your Facebook Page, such as the Photos, Notes, and Discussions tab. Aside from these pre-built tabs, it’s also possible to add new, custom tabs to your Facebook Page. We’ll use this functionality to create a landing page within your Facebook Page, specifically designed to encourage visitors to become fans. With a custom tab, a unique graphic and a little bit of magic, you can create something like the following examples.

Fig. 100: The welcome tab for Kotaku.com’s Facebook Page

Fig. 101: The welcome tab for The Book Depository’s Facebook Page

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Fig. 102: The welcome tab for Backcountry’s Facebook Page

This system means that rather than potentially being distracted by the many updates and comments on your Wall, visitors are immediately urged to Like your Page before going further. Before we start, be aware that adding a custom tab to your Facebook Page requires that you have a basic knowledge of HTML and CSS (or can work with someone who does) and have a server where you can upload files. To create our custom tab, we’re going to use an iFrame. An iFrame is essentially a means to show one webpage within another webpage. We’ll create our “Welcome” tab content, then use an iFrame to reveal it on our custom “Welcome” tab. Most of the websites showcased above have opted for the simple route of using an image to urge visitors to Like the Page. This means the iFrame can contain very minimal code. The image you or your designer create should be 520px wide, as this is the width of Facebook’s layout.

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A little while ago, I showed you some call to action images from a selection of different Facebook Pages. Looking at these, you can find some tips for your own call-to-action image. For example, many of these graphics directly call attention to the Like button by pointing to it with arrows, or using an image of the button itself. They also ask visitors very clearly to Like the Page. These two tips will serve you well in creating a call-to-action image that successfully converts visitors to fans. Create this image, then embed it inside a HTML document. It should be contained inside a containing that is also 520px wide. You can use an internal stylesheet to set these parameters. Facebook also supports JavaScript within iFrames. When you’re happy with the “Welcome” tab HTML you’ve created, upload the files to your server. In order for Facebook to allow you to run an iFrame on your Page, you need to install the Facebook Developer Application. If you’re happy for the app to access your basic information, click “Allow.” Next, hit the “Set Up New App” button.

Fig. 103: Setting up a new app

If you haven’t yet verified your Facebook account, you’ll be instructed to add either a phone number or credit card number before proceeding.

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Next, you’ll need to choose a name for your app and accept the Facebook Terms. When you’re happy with your app’s name, hit “Create App.”

Fig. 104: Adding your app’s essential information

After a security check by way of a Captcha, you’ll be met with a detailed set of options and information fields for your app. The good news is that you only need to worry about a few of these.

Fig. 105: Entering Basic Information

First, add a description for your app. Up next, you have the option to add an icon and a logo. The icon is what will be displayed in your Page’s left-hand navigation, so make sure to add a custom icon if possible, or the default “gears” icon will be displayed. Next, select “Facebook Integration” from the left-hand menu.

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Fig. 106: Facebook Integration

On the Facebook Integration page, scroll down to “Page Tabs.”

Fig. 107: Page Tabs

The “Tab Name” is the word or phrase that will appear in the left-hand navigation of your Page, linking to your custom tab. It’s limited to 16 characters. In my case, I’m going to name it “Welcome!” For the “Page Tab Type,” select “iFrame.” In the “Tab URL” field, enter the URL of the HTML file on your server where you have added your “Welcome” info. In the “Secure Tab URL” field, add an https:// version of the same URL if you have an SSL certificate for your server. If not, you can leave this blank (as a result, visitors to your Page using SSL will be taken to your Wall rather than your Welcome tab, but this is OK for now).

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And you’re done! Hit “Save Changes.” On the next page, you’ll see a summary of your new app. In the right-hand menu, click “Application Profile Page.”

Fig. 108: Visit your app’s profile

From your application’s profile, hit “Add to My Page” at the bottom of the left-hand menu.

Figure. 109: Add to My Page

Select the Page you want to add your “Welcome” tab to and click “Add to Page.” Navigate to your Page and you should see your custom tab appear in the left-hand menu. We’re done!

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Fig. 110: Your new app

If your tab isn’t showing, click the “Edit Page” button and select “Apps” from the left-hand menu. Click “Edit Settings” for your app, and make sure it is set to “Added.” If your tab content isn’t showing up, double-check there are no mistakes in the URL. To do this, go to your app’s profile and hit the “Edit App” button in the top right-hand corner of your Page. From the “Edit App” page, click on “App Settings.” From there, select “Facebook Integration” from the left-hand menu, where you will be able to double-check your URL. If it looks correct but you are still having display problems, copy and paste it into a browser to double check there are no problems with the HTML file.

Fig. 111: App Settings

Now that your Welcome tab is ready for action, we need to set this tab so that it’s the default landing tab for your Facebook Page. At the moment, new visitors will still arrive at your Wall and can only access your Welcome tab by navigating to it in the sidebar. To change your Welcome tab to the default, click “Edit Page” and select “Manage Permissions” from the left-hand menu.

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Fig. 112: Selecting “Manage Permissions”

From this view, look for the “Default Landing Tab” drop-down menu. If you haven’t changed this previously, it will be set to Wall. Open the drop-down menu and select your Welcome tab, then hit “Save changes.”

Fig. 113: Set your Welcome tab as the Default Landing Tab

To test that your Welcome tab works, log-out of Facebook and navigate to your Page. You are viewing it as a new visitor would see it. If everything is working correctly, visitors should be met with your Welcome tab and have the option to Like your Page.

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Fan-only Content This method is one of the more subtle ways to increase the number of people who Like your Page, but more can be done here, particularly if you’re willing to invest some time and effort in enticing people to become fans. While many Pages ask visitors to Like them, others offer extra incentives like discount codes, bonus content, or sneak peeks at upcoming events or products, which are visible to fans only. To access the content, visitors must Like the Page. When done right, this can be a powerful way to convert visitors to fans. Here are some examples of Pages offering exclusive fan-only content through their call-to-action images.

Fig. 114: Non-fan view of the 1-800flowers.com Facebook page

Fig. 115: Fan view of the 1-800flowers.com Facebook Page

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Fig. 116: Non-fan view of the Teesey Tees Facebook Page

Fig. 117: Fan view of the Teesey Tees Facebook Page

Let’s look behind the scenes at one of the Facebook Pages I administer, Facebook.com/vectortuts. Vectortuts+ is a website offering tutorials for Adobe Illustrator, and its Facebook Page gives fans access to an exclusive pre-release tutorial. Here, you can see the landing page non-fans are greeted with when they visit the Page.

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Fig. 118: Non-fan view of the Vectortuts+ Facebook Page

The text in the image says: Click the Like Button to become a fan and get an exclusive pre-release Vector tutorial! Fans of Vectortuts+ on Facebook will get pre-release tutorials and regular sneak peeks at upcoming content. Join us as we discuss industry news and Vector tips and opinions, participate in activities and get to know our readers better! Upon clicking the Like button, you receive your Facebook-only tutorial.

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Fig. 119: Fan view of the Vectortuts+ Facebook Page

The coding aspects of adding a fan-only content tab have been covered in this excellent tutorial by Bill Dailey on the HyperArts blog. A basic knowledge of the PHP programming language is required for this implementation. The key elements you need to set up fan-only content are as follows: • Text, or a call-to-action graphic, letting people know about your fan-only content and encouraging them to Like your Page • Then, a means to deliver the fan-only content. This might be an image containing a coupon code, a download link, or you might choose to display the content directly on the Page. • Code to hide the content from non-fans and show it to fans. Instructions for this are covered in Bill Dailey’s previously mentioned tutorial.

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Now you have an overview of the How of setting up fan-only content, it’s time to think about the What. What kind of incentive will be most effective for converting visitors to fans on your Facebook Page? • Discount coupon. If you sell a product, a natural fit is to offer your fans a coupon that will apply a small but worthwhile discount when purchasing your product. • Exclusive content. If you run a website or blog and your fans are likely to be more interested in your content than anything else, you can provide an exclusive in-depth article to Facebook fans. • A free resource. For a long time, internet marketers have been using free reports and eBooks to entice people to sign up to their email lists. This strategy can also be effective for Facebook, and you can offer a free report or eBook to fans. • Access to a special event. The Levi’s clothing brand recently used a fan-only bonus tab to give their fans exclusive access to a live stream of a concert. If you have a big enough audience, you could hold a special event and make the address and time available only to Facebook fans. • Secret information. People love to hear news and information before everyone else. If your Facebook Page is dedicated to a product, brand or website that hasn’t launched yet, you can use fan-only content to give Facebook fans news and information before everyone else. If possible, I do recommend creating fan-only content for your Facebook Page. A call-to-action image asking visitors to Like your Page will go a long way, but raising the stakes by adding fan-only content will help to convert people browsing your Page into fans.

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Setting Up Custom Tabs The strategies you used to create a Welcome tab can also be used to create a number of custom tabs for your Facebook Page. In this screenshot, you can see six custom tabs Intel have created (http:// facebook.com/Intel) for a number of different promotions they’re running.

Fig. 120: Intel’s custom tabs

Note that Intel actually has a whopping 20 tabs on its Facebook Page, but the left-hand menu cuts them off at eight. Be aware that tabs only visible by clicking the ‘More’ link are likely to get significantly less exposure than your other tabs. To create a new custom tab, you’ll need to follow the process for setting up a Facebook app and iFrame we explored in Chapter 4. Here are a number ideas for custom tabs you could set up for your Page: • Deals and special offers. If you sell a product, advertise deals and special offers on this tab.

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• Careers/Jobs. If your Facebook Page is dedicated to a company, why not create a custom tab for job openings? • Product pages. If you sell a product, why not make a custom tab that serves as a landing page for it? • Other ways to follow your brand. One option is to add a custom tab linking to other ways fans can keep track of your brand, such as Twitter or YouTube. • Services/Hire me. If you offer paid services, create a custom tab on your Facebook Page to sell them to fans. Each service you list can be linked to the appropriate page on your website, if necessary. • Event page. Use a custom tab to promote an upcoming event, or launch date. • Resources. You can create a custom tab to share relevant links and resources with fans. • Recommend products. Even if you don’t have products of your own you can use a custom tab to recommend products to your fans and, if you choose, make affiliate income from any sales. • Contact page. If you want people to be able to email you directly through your Facebook Page, use a custom tab to create a contact page. • Team pages. If your Facebook Page is for a band or other team undertaking, you can create a custom tab with more info on each member of your team.

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Facebook Metrics

FACEBOOK METRICS “You can’t manage what you don’t measure.” - Anonymous At this point, you may be regularly posting updates to your Facebook Page, promoting it outside Facebook, and hoping to see the results of your actions. Though it’s always easy to see how many fans you have, you may also want to measure things like which posts have been your most popular, whether interactions with your Page are increasing or decreasing, and the rate at which you are adding new fans. Fortunately, Facebook helps you to see all these things (and more) with its analytics tool, Facebook Insights. To access Insights for your Page, click the “Edit Page” button at the top right-hand corner of your Page. Then, select “Insights” from the menu on the left.

Fig. 121: Accessing Insights

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Facebook Metrics

On the Insights Page, you’ll see an overview with data on Users and Interactions. On the left, you have the option to dig deeper and get more specific data. You can change the date range you’re viewing in the top-right corner of the Overview. For now, let’s go through the information on the Overview. On many of the following charts, mousing over the top-right corner provides buttons you can use to View Full Screen, Print, or Save Image. As your charts become more complex, the ability to view Full Screen may come in handy.

Fig. 122: Users overview

The Users view tells you the following data for the date range you’ve entered: • New Likes. The figure on the left is the number of new fans who’ve been added to your Page. The percentage tells you whether this is an increase or decrease on the previous time period. You can see the previous date range by mousing over the percentage that’s shown. • Lifetime Likes. This figure tells you how many people have Liked your Page in its lifetime. • Monthly Active Users. The total number of people (fans and non-fans) who have viewed your Page or its posts in the time period you’ve entered. In many ways, these people are more valuable than fans. A fan does not help you much if

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Facebook Metrics

they don’t interact with your Page! On the right, you can see whether your number of Monthly Active Users increased or decreased on the previous period, which you can reveal by mousing over the percentage. In my case, I have some work to do to get my Monthly Active User count growing again. Below these three statistics you can see an “Active Users” line chart with three lines. Active users are people who have viewed your Page or posts, or commented, shared or liked your posts. The blue line shows the daily trend, the green line shows the weekly trend, and the purple line shows the 30-day trend. You can see daily figures by mousing over any of the lines, and toggle lines off and on by selecting or deselecting the checkbox associated with each one.

Fig. 123: Interactions overview

Below the Users chart is the Interactions chart. It tells you a number of things about how your Page is being used. • Post Views. The number of times people have viewed a story from your Page in their News Feed. This represents the total reach of your Page on Facebook. Non-fans are also included in this count, as when a friend Likes your Page, it is posted to the News Feed of all their friends. The percentage figure on the right shows you whether this is an increase or decrease on the previous time period (visible by mousing over the percentage shown).

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• Post Feedback. Feedback is the total of every Like and Comment on your posts within the date range. If there is enough data, you will see a percentage to the right comparing how Feedback has increased or decreased in the date range, compared to the previous period. • Page Content Feedback. Shows a line chart of your daily Likes (blue line) and Comments (green line). You’ll find that the spikes correspond very closely to the days when you post new content. This chart is very useful, as it provides a quick and easy way to see whether the content you’re publishing is, firstly, high quality (number of Likes), and secondly, whether it encourages discussion (Comments). Both of these things are crucial to the growth of your Facebook Page. If your Facebook Page is quite new, like mine, you may not be able to see a clear trend yet, but this chart will become more useful the busier your Page gets. Below is a sneak peek at this chart from a Page I manage with more than 25,000 fans: http://facebook.com/psdtuts.

Fig. 124: Interactions chart on a Page with 25,000+ Likes

On both the Users and Interactions chart you are able to dig deeper by clicking the “See Details” link. You can also access this data by selecting “Users” or “Interactions” in the left-hand menu. Let’s take a look at the “Users” detailed view.

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Users Detailed View The Users detailed view starts with the overview chart we already examined on the general Overview, so let’s skip that and move on to the next one.

Fig. 125: Daily Active Users Breakdown

We’ve already learned that your Page’s Monthly Active User’s count includes all the views of your Page and content, and interactions with it. This line chart gives you a breakdown of all the actions this can include. • Unique Page Views. A unique view means that one view equals one person, rather than counting multiple views from the same person as separate views. If you have ten unique page views in a day, this means 10 different people have viewed your Page on that day. • Post Viewers. The number of people who have seen your posts on a given day. They may have seen a post on your Page, or in a friend’s News Feed. This explains why the number for Post Viewers can be higher than Unique Page Views, because not all views of your posts are taking place on your Page. • Liked a Post. The number of people who clicked Like on one of your posts (rather than people who Liked your Page). • Commented on a Post. The number of users who left a comment on your posts, either on your Page or elsewhere.

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• Wall Posts. Number of Wall posts made by visitors to your Page. As with the overview charts, you can toggle individual lines on and off by selecting and deselecting the corresponding checkbox. You can use this feature to more easily compare smaller subsets of the data (i.e. Wall Posts vs. Page Views).

Fig. 126: New Likes

This chart helps you to see both the Likes and Unlikes of your Page you are receiving each day. On the right-hand side of the chart you can see where these Likes originate from. In my case, most people are clicking the Like button in the Like Box I have installed on my blog. To get a useful visual overview of the ‘Like’ growth of your Page, click the ‘Total’ tab.

Fig. 127: Total Likes

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This chart shows you where your total number of Likes stood at the end of each day, throughout the date range. This view is useful to identify where your rate of growth in fans increased, or slowed down.

Fig. 128: Demographics of Skelliewag.org Page visitors, gender and age

This bar chart is extremely valuable for your business, website or brand, as you may not have had access to any of this kind of demographic data before. While services like Google Analytics track country of origin very accurately, it can’t provide information on gender and age - information that Facebook has easy access to. In my case, you can see that the split between men and women who visit my Page is roughly even, with the median age of male visitors being slightly younger than female visitors. Let’s compare this with the demographic data from a different Page I manage for a web development blog, http://facebook.com/nettuts:

Fig. 129: Demographics of Nettuts+ Page visitors, gender and age

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The Nettuts+ breakdown is very different! The audience is much more strongly male, and younger overall. Do pay attention to this data, as it’s information that companies would have had to pay market researchers many thousands of dollars to access in the past. Now it’s available for free, and it can help you tailor your Facebook Page, and your brand, to perfectly fit your audience.

Fig. 130: Demographics: location

This view shows you where your visitors are from, and the language they browse the internet in. This data is once again from http://facebook.com/nettuts. It tells us that while the majority of visitors are from the United States, the second highest number of visits come from India. Despite this, the highest concentration of visitors in one city is in Jakarta, Indonesia. Since Nettuts+ is an English language blog, it’s no surprise that a majority of visitors are browsing in English. This data can help you to target your content based on location. For example, on the Nettuts+ Page, the admin could send out a greeting to Indian fans, or ask them their thoughts on the state of web development in India.

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Fig. 131: Page views

Logged-in Page Views show you the number of times your Page was viewed by someone logged into Facebook, and includes multiple views from the same person. Unique Page Views counts only the first visit from a new person. It gives you the total number of Facebook users who have viewed your Page. Tab Views counts the visits to your individual tabs. This is particularly useful if you are running promotions on custom tabs, and want to see how they’re performing. Lastly, you can see a list of external sites linking to your Facebook Page, and how many visits they sent. In this date range I’ve done little promotion outside of Facebook, so I have only a couple of visits from Twitter. Compare this with the External Referrers data from Psdtuts+, which is a much bigger blog than my own:

Fig. 132: External Referrers for Psdtuts+

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As you can see, the site is very effectively sending traffic from its home page and through Twitter, but significant amounts of traffic are also flowing in from third party websites. By publishing high quality content on your Facebook Page, you can work to create a diverse set of referrers to send you traffic.

Fig. 133: Media Consumption

The Media Consumption Chart helps you to see which types of Media perform best on your Page. This is the chart for http:// facebook.com/psdtuts. So far we’ve only posted Photos to our Page, and the chart reflects that. Note that Video Views counts only videos you’ve uploaded to your Page, rather than YouTube videos you’ve linked to. While posting Audio to your Page is not a default feature, you can do so with the help of Apps, such as Music Player.

Interactions Detailed View While the Users detailed view focused on the visitors to your Page, this view focuses on the content you publish to your Page. The Daily Story Feedback chart is the same as the Page Content Feedback chart on the main overview, so we won’t go over it again here. Beneath this, you’ll see a table showing your most recent

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Posts, how many impressions they had, and how much feedback they’ve received.

Fig. 134: Page Posts

Impressions counts the total number of times the post has been seen, both on your Page and in user News Feeds. Feedback is the ratio of views of content vs. interactions with the content. So, if your post is viewed one-hundred times and one person comments on it, it has received one interaction. Therefore, its Feedback percentage is 1%.

Fig. 135: Page Activity

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The Page Activity chart presents an eclectic mix of data, including content you’ve posted, user generated content, and mentions of your Page. • Mentions. Users can Mention your Page in their status updates by typing the @ symbol followed by the name of your Page. • Discussion Posts. If you use the Discussion Board app on your Page, this tracks the number of new posts by users. • Reviews. Like Audio embedding, this is not a default Facebook feature, but can be added to your Page with the Reviews app. • Wall Posts. The daily number of posts visitors make on your Wall. • Videos. Number of videos uploaded to your wall by your fans.

Using Insights While it’s undeniably useful to have all this data at your fingertips, what should you be looking for when you begin to pore over your Insights? • Determine the best days to post. If you need to have a day off posting updates to your Facebook Page, Insights can tell you when that day should be. On the Psdtuts+ Facebook Page, Insights tells me that traffic dips significantly on Sundays. This makes it the perfect day to take a break from posting. • Compare the performance of different content strategies. If you posted mainly links to interesting content

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in December, then switched to posting questions in January, Insights would help you to see which of these different content strategies was more successful. • Determine your best Like sources. If you experiment with moving the Like Box on your website to a more prominent location, for example, you could use Insights to track how this affects the number of Likes you get from that source. • Tailor your content to your demographic. If your Page is frequented mainly by women under 25, you might consider tailoring your Page content to that audience. If your Page receives many visitors from the UK, you might choose to make an update welcoming your UK visitors to your Page. • Evaluate the performance of your external promotions. The External Referrers display can help you to see which sites are sending the most traffic to your Facebook Page. If you decided to do a big Facebook promotion on Twitter, you could use Insights to see the number of visitors Twitter ended up sending over.

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Facebook Advertising

FACEBOOK ADVERTISING With a captive audience of millions, it’s no surprise that Facebook runs a highly successful advertising platform. In this chapter, you’ll learn how to boost your Facebook Page or business with a Facebook Advertising campaign. The two key advantages of the advertising platform are: 1. The minimum budget of each ad campaign is small enough that it’s very cheap and easy to run an ad and test whether it’s working for you. 2. Facebook collects so much information about its users that you can target with remarkable specificity. As part of a comprehensive knowledge of Facebook marketing, you should aim to familiarize yourself with its advertising platform. In this chapter I’ll examine both Facebook advertising and Sponsored Stories.

Creating Your First Ad

Fig. 136: Promote with an ad

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You can access Facebook’s advertising interface from the righthand sidebar of your Page when logged in as an admin. Alternately, you can access the “Marketing” tab through the “Edit Page” view. If you’ve been using Facebook as your Page, you’ll be asked to switch to your personal account before you can proceed further.

Fig. 137: Design your ad

Next, it’s time to start designing your ad. The first field allows you to choose a Destination, which must be either an external URL or a Facebook Page. If you manage multiple Pages, choose the one you’d like to run your campaign for.

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You have two choices of the Type of promotion you’d like to run, Facebook Ads or Sponsored Stories. In this walkthrough we’ll cover Facebook Ads, but Sponsored Stories are explored later in this chapter. If you’ve chosen to advertise your Facebook Page rather than an external URL, the Destination Tab is the first page visitors will land on when they click on your ad. Ideally, you will have created a special landing page or Facebook tab tailored to people visiting through your ad, which suits your advertising goals. If the purpose of your campaign is to get new Facebook fans, it should feature a call to action to Like your Page. If the ad is selling a product, the landing page should provide information about the product and a means to buy it. If you’re advertising your Facebook Page (as I am in this example), you may choose to have the landing page be your Wall or Info tab. The Title tab can be the title of your Page, or an attention-grabbing headline. It should directly relate to what you’re advertising. So, in an ad to build brand recognition for a business the title should usually be the name of a business. On an ad about a product or service, the title should be the name of the product or service, or a key benefit (i.e. ‘Feel Younger’). Now for the hard part, your ad Body. Even veteran marketers still find copywriting tough, and you only have 135 characters to work with. Fortunately, Facebook has revealed that the best performing ads have three key things in common:

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1. They Keep it Simple The best performing ads use clear, short, concise sentences and proper grammar. Instead of this: Web design - 1 page $999 - SEO optimized call 4400 0123 or email [email protected] Try this: Web design, starting from $999. Free SEO, super-fast turn around. Click to learn more! Facebook is a platform where people write short, clear (most of the time) messages to each other. Your ad should be the same!

2. They Call the Viewer to Action Let’s look at the above ad copy again. Notice that it ends with ‘Click to learn more!’. This is a call to action. It suggests that the viewer take a specific action in response to the ad, and the viewer must decide to obey or ignore the suggestion. But why is this better than, say, the following ad copy? Web design, starting from $999. Free SEO, super-fast turn around. This ad copy isn’t terrible, but it’s much weaker for not having a call to action. It’s become purely informational. It’s not asking the viewer to do anything, or react in any way, and because of this, it’s much easier to ignore, and that’s not what you want for your ad.

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Here are some classic call to action phrases you can use in your ad copy: (Note: exclamation marks are an optional extra!) • Click to learn more.

• See it now.

• Don’t miss out.

• Click here to...

• Sign-up here.

• Be the first to...

• Join now.

3. They Use an Image By default, the image for your ad will be your Page’s profile image, but this may not be the best choice for your ad if you’re promoting something other than your Facebook Page. In that case, it’s a good idea to upload a more relevant image. The maximum image size is 110px wide by 80px tall. • If you’re selling a product, a good choice of image is a picture of the product. • If you’re selling a service or raising brand awareness, your logo will work well as part of the ad. • And in general, a good choice of image is something that will appeal to your target market for the ad. If you’re advertising a consultancy business for people who want to start working and traveling, a picture of a beautiful, exotic vista is likely to catch their attention. Dog walker? Try a picture of a cute puppy!

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Targeting Your Ad Once you’ve added a Title, Body and checked that you have an appropriate image, it’s time to start defining the target market for your ad. Click ‘Continue’ on the ‘Design Your Ad’ page and let’s proceed to the next step.

Fig. 138: Targeting

The array of targeting possibilities presented to you might seem overwhelming at first, but only some of the features are likely to be relevant in defining your particular target market. You can target as broadly or specifically as you want. Unless you have an enormous advertising budget to chew through, broad targeting is bad. You want your ad to have a very low ratio of views to clicks so you get more returns for your ad budget. To do this, you need to show your ad only to people who are likely to click on it. Targeting can help you do this.

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Location Probably the most commonly used method to target ads, location is very important since what you’re advertising may be relevant in some locations but not others. You can target by country (up to 25), state/province, or city. • You’ll want to only target Countries that predominantly speak the language required to understand the ad, or what you’re advertising (for example, only Spanish-speaking countries if your ad, product or website is in Spanish). • You should only display ads in Countries where what you’re advertising is available for purchase. For example, if you don’t ship outside the United States, then target only the United States. • For a local business, ads should be targeted down to City level. Because I’m Australian and my blog is best known in Australia, I’ve decided to target only Australian traffic with this campaign. As you enter targeting parameters, you’ll notice the “Estimated Reach” box on the right-hand side of the targeting area. This will tell you the current specifications for your campaign, and how many Facebook users it’s expected to reach based on the data you’ve entered.

Demographics Next, you can specify age and gender targeting for your ad. Even if you don’t target by gender, I strongly encourage you to consider tweaking the age range for your ad based on what you know about your business. If you don’t have any demographics information, remember that your Insights page may have much to tell you. In my case, my demographics information suggests that most of my

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blog’s fans are in their mid-20s or older, so I’m going to start my age targeting at 20 rather than 18. Since there are many 18 - 19 year olds using Facebook, but Insights suggests they’re generally not interested in my blog until they get older, I would rather save my impressions for people more likely to click my ad. If I wanted to get very specific I could target the most common age range for fans of my blog (25 - 34), but some of my other targeting specifics already narrow down my reach enough that this isn’t necessary. If relevant to your product, brand or website, you can also target by gender. But unless being a certain gender precludes a person from using or being interested in what you are advertising (for example, an online dating guide for women), it may be better to target by Interests. Let’s say you wanted to advertise a website where people buy and sell muscle cars. If you could target your ad only by gender, you’d probably assume you should target this ad to men. And this would work, as there are currently 6,540 Australian men who have listed ‘Muscle Cars’ as an interest on their profile. But, there are also 3,440 women who’ve done the same! By targeting your ad by Interest rather than gender, you can reach all of these people.

Likes and Interests One of the most interesting features of Facebook’s ad targeting is the ability to specify the Likes (pages they have Liked) and Interests (things they have written under ‘Interests’ in their profile) for your target market. You can also enter job titles here, such as “Web Developer,” to target people who have listed that as their profession. • For a tennis news site, you could target only people who say they are interested in tennis or have Liked the Facebook Page of “Roger Federer.”

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• If you’re looking to hire a Software Engineer to work on a web app you’ve created, you could target people who’ve listed their profession as “Software Engineer.” • If you offer a landing page design service, you could target people who’ve listed “Internet Marketing” as an Interest. • In my case, Skelliewag.org is a blog about blogging, so I’m going to target only people who have listed “Blogging” as an Interest. If I also wanted to target people who blog but don’t list it as an interest, I could target people who are fans of blogging-related Facebook Pages, like the Facebook Page for WordPress, a popular blogging platform.

Connections on Facebook This section allows you to target based on the user’s relationship with your brand on Facebook. For example, under “Connections,” you can specify that you only want the ad to show to people who are not already your fans on Facebook (useful if your campaign is to build brand awareness, or to get people to Like your Page), or to show your campaign only to people who are already your fans (useful if you have a large fan-base and want to make them a special offer). Selecting “Advanced Connection Targeting” lets you target based on other Pages, Apps and Events you administer. In my case, because I’m advertising to increase the number of Likes of my Page, I’m going to target people who are not already fans of my Page. Lastly, you can choose to only show your ad to friend of people who Like your Page. When a user sees this ad, it will also say “Friend Name Likes This” beneath the ad. This can be powerful social proof for your brand and an excellent way to build brand awareness among peers. For example, if you ran a small comic book store with a reasonable number of Facebook fans, you could

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target people in your city who are interested in “Comics” and “Graphic Novels” who are also friends of fans of your Page. You might find next time one of your fans is heading down to the store, a friend or two ask to tag along!

Advanced Targeting Though the basic targeting options are enough to build a solid, well-targeted campaign, it’s worth looking at the more advanced options available to you. Click “Show Advanced Targeting Options” to expand the additional options.

Fig. 139: Show Advanced Targeting Options

Fig. 140: Expanded Advanced Options

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Advanced Demographics These options are much more specific. From this panel you have the ability to show ads to users only on their birthday, target by sexual orientation, relationship status, and Languages. If you’re advertising an English language product or website, it may be wise to list “English” here. The same applies to any other language you are using for your brand.

Education and Work This panel gives you the ability to target users by education level and workplace. If you ran a tutoring business, you’d probably target users in school, for example. You can easily imagine companies using the Workplaces targeting feature when searching for new employees. For example, a new social media startup might target employees of Facebook and Twitter.

Campaigns, Pricing and Scheduling Once you’ve finished narrowing down your target audience, it’s time to set a budget and schedule for your ad. While most of this page is admin, there are a few key elements. First, pay careful attention to your budget settings. If you set a Daily budget, you’ll be charged that amount for each day of the campaign. If you select a lifetime budget, you’ll be charged this amount over the entire life of your campaign. I suggest you run a number of small tests before committing to a significant ad buy. Try three different sets of copy over three ads, and you might discover that Test #2 is 40% more effective than the others. Target people who are interested in ‘Stock Trading’ and

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you might find the ad gets 50% more clicks than your ad targeting people interested in ‘Finance’. Lots of small, carefully measured tests will get you closer to the perfect ad.

Fig. 141: Campaigns, Pricing and Scheduling

Your Campaign Schedule is also negotiable. If you’re targeting a small number of people, try a longer campaign to ensure your ad gets enough exposure. If you’re advertising a specific promotion, run your campaign for as long as the promotion lasts, rather than spending all of your budget on the first or second day. Under Pricing, you might be confused to see that Facebook would like you to go with their suggested “Bid” for your ad. But if this isn’t an auction, why are you bidding?

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Because there are often a number of ads competing for the same demographic, Facebook determines which ads get shown by taking into account three key factors: • Maximum Bid. Quality and Performance being equal (see below), one advertiser will win over another by entering a higher maximum bid. Here, you should enter the maximum you are willing to pay per click on your ad (CPC, or Cost Per Click), or per 1,000 impressions (CPM, or Cost Per Milli, which means cost per thousand impressions). • Quality. Facebook determines ad quality by taking into account the ratio of people who Like or click your ad, and the number of people who hide it by clicking X. • Performance. This translates to how much money Facebook earns from your ad payments per 1,000 impressions of your ad. If your ad is cost per click, this will be the total value of clicks over 1,000 impressions. Facebook calls this the eCPM of your ad. A high performing ad is very good for Facebook and, if you’ve correctly calculated the real value of a click or thousand impressions, very good for you. Once you’re happy with your campaign schedule, budget and maximum bid, it’s time to review your ad.

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Fig. 142: Review Ad

See a mistake? Make sure to “Edit Ad” before it goes live. When you’re happy with it, click ‘Place Order’. You’ll be able to make payment for the ad via credit card or PayPal. Though most of your interactions with Facebook so far have happened while using Facebook as your Page, monitoring the performance of your ads requires you to be using Facebook with your personal account. Navigate to your Home screen and look for “Ads and Pages” in the left-hand sidebar.

Fig. 143: Ads and Pages

The Ad Manager gives you an overview of the performance of all the ads you’re running. Once they’ve run long enough to gather

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data you’ll be able to see impressions and clicks, as well as a CTR (Click through ratio) for your ad. After just under one day, my test ad has 654 impressions and 1 click, a click through ratio of 0.153%. This isn’t bad compared to many ad campaigns, but I should create another ad to see if I can improve that figure by testing different ad copy and targeting parameters. One interesting column on the report is the “Social %” of the ad. This is the percentage of impressions where the user saw “Friend name Likes this” on your ad. If you want to see the raw numbers, click “Full Report” to see how many social impressions there were in total. So far there have been three social impressions in my test. This figure can be useful to tell you if you’re targeting the right people with your ad. If you’re unhappy with your ad and want to start again, click the ad’s name in the report view. Once on the ad’s page, click “Edit” under “Run Status” and select “Deleted.” If you only want to put your campaign on hold, select “Paused.”

Fig. 144: Ad manager report

Sponsored Stories As mentioned earlier in this chapter, Sponsored Stories are another option for marketing on Facebook. Choosing to sponsor your Page, or a story from your Page, shares it next to the News Feed of friends of fans of your Page. This advertising option ensures

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that your Page will always be promoted in the company of some powerful social proof. When creating an ad on Facebook, select “Sponsored Story” rather than “Facebook Ads” under “Type.” You’ll then have the option to choose a “Like Story” or “Page Post” story. • Like Story - shows friends of a fan that the fan has Liked your Page. • Page Post - shows friends of fans a post from your Page. If you choose the Page Post option, your Page’s most recent update will be used. Once you’re happy with your Sponsored Story, set a budget and submit the ad. You’ll be taken to the Ad Manager page where you can make last minute edits and see whether your ad has been approved yet. If you have a change of heart you can Delete the ad by clicking “Edit” under “Pending review.” Here you’ll also get a preview of the metrics the Ad Manager will track for your Sponsored Story.

Fig. 145: Sponsored Story Report

• Imp. is the number of times your sponsored story has been loaded on a user’s Facebook profile. • Social % is the percentage of time a user saw that one of their friends Likes your Page or Post.

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• Clicks is the number of times your Sponsored Story has been clicked. • CTR (%) is the percentage of overall impressions where someone reacted to your ad (a click, Like or RSVP to an event). • Actions is the number of times someone Liked your Page or Post or RSVPed to an event you are promoting. • AR (%), meaning Action Ratio, is the percentage of impressions where users ended up Liking your Page or Post or RSVPing. • Avg. CPC ($) is the average cost of every click. • Avg. CPM ($) is the average cost incurred by your campaign over 1,000 impressions. • Spent ($) is your total campaign spend so far. Just like with regular Facebook advertising, it’s a good idea to run small tests of the Sponsored Story format before launching into a full campaign. You could try running one small ”Like Story” campaign, one small “Like Post” campaign, and comparing the results. While some brands do extremely well with Facebook advertising, others don’t fare so well. But you have nothing to lose if your tests are small and their performance is monitored closely.

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Conclusion

CONCLUSION By now, you should have a Facebook Page showing its first signs of activity and engagement. You should be slowly adding new fans, getting Likes on some of your Wall posts, and see discussions blossoming between you and your users. Even if you only have a handful of fans, or a few dozen, stick with it! Your Facebook community grows exponentially. 10% of 100 is not a whole lot, but 10% of 10,000 is huge. A steady growth rate of 10% - 20% per month will add up very quickly. Now that you’ve learned all this book has to offer, there are some things you can do to make sure your Facebook strategies keep getting better. The most important of these is to engage with the Facebook Pages system as a user. Like Pages of your favorite TV shows, sports teams, brands, and public figure. In particular, Like the Pages of your competitors so you can see how they’re using Facebook. As a user, what kinds of updates do you enjoy the most? What don’t you like? Every Page you follow has the potential to teach valuable lessons you can apply to your own Facebook Page. Facebook is constantly making changes to its Pages platform, and it’s important for you to stay up to date. Often, Facebook will give advance notice of upcoming changes and give you time to prepare for them. To track Facebook news and get high quality tips, there are a few excellent blogs you can track: • Social Media Examiner - though this blog covers all kinds of social media news, its Facebook coverage is unsurpassed. With a team including some of the world’s leading Facebook marketers, it’s a Facebook resource I recommend above all others.

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Conclusion

• Mari Smith’s blog - Mari Smith is a Facebook expert and publishes in-depth Facebook marketing advice on her blog. • All Facebook - much more strongly focused on news than advice, All Facebook is a good place to track upcoming changes to the (ever-changing) Pages platform. I wish you the best of luck with your Facebook Page! Skellie

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About The Author

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Skellie directs strategy for a group of Facebook Pages with over 100,000 fans. The blog network she manages, Tuts+, is viewed more than twenty million times a month. A veteran blogger, she has written for top blogs like Zen Habits and ProBlogger, and has over 10 years experience in web publishing.

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The Facebook Marketing Book

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Essential Facebook Development: Build Successful Applications for the Facebook Platform

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Facebook Marketing: An Hour a Day

Facebook Marketing: Designing Your Next Marketing Campaign (2nd Edition)

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Facebook Marketing All-in-One for Dummies

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Marketing Planning by Design: Systematic Planning for Successful Marketing Strategy

Successful Marketing Strategies for High-Tech Firms

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Social Media Marketing: Strategien für Twitter, Facebook & Co

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Facebook Marketing: Designing Your Next Marketing Campaign (2nd Edition-May 2010)

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The Guide to Web Marketing: Successful Promotion on the Net

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