Are Facebook groups the place for you?
If you’ve been on facebook for a while, no doubt you will have joined a facebook group or at least been invited to join a group? You may be wondering what is the benefit to this and “should I start a group?”
Personally I feel there’s a whole world of value that can come from these groups, but that does come with a caveat - set a timer for how long you spend in there!
Choose your groups wisely
Do you join every group you’re invited to? Do you get that feeling that you “should” join a group because it belongs to a friend of yours? Remember, I’m looking at this from a business perspective and if for personal groups you want to spend your whole evening on facebook, then go for it, it’s your choice, but when it comes to growing your business, you have to be so much more protective of your time. We love to support our friends and business colleagues in their endeavours, as we would hope they would support us, but the reality is that we need to find tribes that will actually benefit from our groups and conversely groups that will benefit from us being in them, otherwise it’s simply a numbers game.
Sadly, most groups won’t let you join as a facebook business page so we have to join as individuals, which means you have to be open to having your personal profile and all its contents on show for the group members. If you’re comfortable with that, go ahead and see which groups are out there that feel like a good fit for you.
Search for the Blue Ocean
I heard this expression this year - Blue Ocean Strategy, which is actually a book written about marketing theory - have you heard it too? It refers to finding a place to market yourself where there is little or no competition, and in fact this was a practice we looked at when attending exhibitions in a former life - so much of the time we were at the same expos as our direct competitors, so we chose a complementary sector to exhibit at and it was really successful. So, for example, if you’re in the business of social media marketing like I am, it wouldn’t make sense for me to hang out in other social media marketing groups as it’s likely that they will be full of social media marketers like me. So take some time to think of the people you serve or aim to serve with your product or service, and consider the type of groups they are likely to hang out in.
Perhaps you’re a hairdresser, so choose a group that is complementary to your business like beauty therapy groups, or maybe you’re an accountant and it would be good to collaborate with other professional services like solicitors - both of you are looking for the same type of customer but you’re not in competition with each other.
Once in these groups make it a regular practice to show up and spend a bit of time interacting with others in the group. You’ll soon get to find the conversations where you can fit in and add value.
Want to grow your audience?
A top tip for growing your audience is to find others who you believe are your ideal client and preferably people who are quite active. If you like someone’s comment and then also comment on it, that person will get not one, but two notifications to say you have engaged with their post. And what’s in our human nature to do when someone appears in our notifications? We have to take a look and check them out to see “who is this person who has liked my comment”, don’t we? If you like and comment regularly, you will inevitably start receiving friend requests, as others will be drawn to you with your interesting comments and your interest in others. We have to remember that this activity happens on our personal page, so it is essential to have a link to your business page in your “about” section so they can understand more about you and what your business does.
Another useful aside for growing your audience is, when posting from your business page, remember to mention and tag the personal “you” in some of your posts as that will help increase your reach. We all know that the algorithms have changed to reduce business page reach, so we have to use every asset we have to make facebook work in an organic way.
Looking for new content?
By posing questions in facebook groups we can find new ideas for content for our own purposes. Ask your ideal clients questions about their greatest challenges surrounding what you do. You might be surprised by the answers, or you may qualify some of the offerings you have through this “market research”. You may find yourself with lots of new ideas for your business and work on bringing those to life. When we look at marketing and selling our products and services it’s crucial to know what pain points your ideal client has in that field, so these answers will be so valuable to you moving forward.
Encourage questions from your ideal clients
As you start to position yourself as an expert amongst this group, you may find you are being asked questions directly, so use all this material in your marketing strategy. There may be a possibility for you to go live in the group with the owner as a Q & A session so that members of the group can get to know you better. The know, like and trust factor is essential in business, so this offers a perfect opportunity. You may also consider if it’s time for you to set up your own facebook group?
Running a facebook group is a big time commitment, so you need to be sure that it’s the right thing for your business. We’ve certainly seen successful facebook groups around us and I’m sure if you approach the owner of one, they will tell you the blood, sweat and tears that can go into making it a success. The most successful ones tend to have a community manager in them as it can become overwhelming, so be prepared before you dive in, that if you want real success, you will be in your group most days in the first few months, if not years.
Let’s assess the positives
There are some real positives though - there have to be otherwise people wouldn’t set them up! If you can create an engaged audience in a facebook group, you then get the opportunity to reach out to them on a regular basis, and unlike your business page where a mere 5% of your followers see your posts, your group members will receive a notification when you post. So whenever you go live in your group or whenever you post a promotion, your audience will see it. It beats paying for advertising doesn’t it? The real gems are in the conversations that you spark though, as that will give you breakthroughs in what your audience wants and needs from you, and also boosts that all-important engagement algorithm.
If you’re planning to start a facebook group for your business there are a few guidelines I’d encourage you to use.
Have a clear code of conduct - you’ll have seen this when you’ve joined a group in the past. It gives clarity to anyone joining and gives you the confidence to eject someone from the group who isn’t abiding by the rules.
Give opportunities for your members to sell themselves and what they offer, typically once a week.
Ensure you’re present regularly to answer any questions that come up and always welcome in new members. You’ll find after a while your members will start to answer questions on your behalf - this is when you’ve achieved a real fan base.
Try to post content in the group that your fans won’t see elsewhere, ie. don’t simply repost from your page. Perhaps present exclusive offers that are only available to the members in your group?
Don’t forget to tell people about your group - your twitter followers, your LinkedIn followers etc
And most of all have fun with it! Your aim with a group is to turn your followers into fans who will tell others about you and how brilliant you are at what you do. If you’re looking for a more strategic way to approach your audience growth, groups could be the answer, either to join and/or to start.
Do you already have a facebook group? If so, what have been your major challenges?
Have you joined a group? If so, what are your bugbears?
I’d love to hear your thoughts, so please use the comments section below and let’s start a discussion right here!
