Why Must I Like Your Page – by Rebekeh Seragih

Since the birth of Facebook, it has become a very popular social networking site to strengthen and re-engage connections with friends, families, colleagues or even potential employers. When Facebook was originally created, it was intended to be just a communication tool between university students for communication purposes. Over times, it has evolved beyond personal networking to business networking and engagement with potential customers on an individual level. With this change in the nature of social network platforms, for businesses it also means that when people interact with your brand, their activity is broadcasted to their own network leading to greater brand exposure for you. It is information disseminates at great speed!

This increased exposure may not immediately translate into a direct sale for your business product or service, but it may result in future sales to buyers who have already become familiar with your brand. In the Facebook social game, it is not about how big you are, how much budget you have for marketing spending, but about how effectively you can connect with your target market and getting them to engage with you in a two way conversation, i.e. it is important to have an effective Facebook Marketing strategy.

Social networking tools differ in niche, purposes and functions. Some are narrower in scope while others allow you to interact and share in broader spectrum. LinkedIn, for example, specifically targets professionals while Facebook lets you create your own identity to social among friends, businesses, customers or even for a particular cause. Just as the purpose of each social networking tool varies, the way to market your business also differs from tool to tool. In our Facebook 101 for Business course, it covers all the aspect you need to know in targeting your potential customers online, engaging them and setting up another form of channel for them to find your brand without you having to hard sell.

Before starting on your own Facebook Marketing, begin with setting up your Fan page and define a reason for your Fan Page on why everyone must become your fan. For businesses looking to create a Facebook page for their products or services, never assume that everyone will want to become your fan just because they know your brand, you are big or your product is one of the hottest selling items on the shelf right now. Creating a Facebook Fan Page is easy and any business can do so, even your competitors. You may be competing with thousands of other pages in the same industry for attention in Facebook, locally and internationally. For this reason, you need to ensure that your page can compete with other business pages in your subject area and that it stands out strongly in the face of competition on Facebook. How do you do it?

To cut through all the noises in Facebook for pages with similar products or services, is to give people an incentive to “LIKE” your page. There are limitless options to get people to like your page, for them to keep coming back and to share it on their walls. This will greatly depend on your product or brand, and it is important that the incentive must benefit your fans. For an example, if you are a photographer, you can provide a free ebook download on how to take photographs on nature using different types of lens. Every week, you can feature a new photography technique in your ebook download for the week or you can post your techniques in the NOTES function in Facebook. Alternatively, you can run a competition with fantastic cash prizes on the most creative photographs taken based on a theme. And for them to participate, they must be your fans first. This gives your fans an incentive to LIKE you and to engage conversations with you.

One of the reasons behind the success stories of brands such as Dell Official Page, Dell for Business, Coca Cola, and PAssion Chingay Club, is the Content Strategy they have applied in their Facebook Fan Page. The contents that you publish in your Facebook Fan Page determines whether it is interesting, helpful or useful for people to read, share or interact with you online. Think of it this way: if you spend time conversing with someone at the party and have a great conversation, you would want to invite the same person back for another function engagement. But if the person is boring and talks nothing but about himself, you wouldn’t think twice about inviting the person for another meeting, let alone to continue with the conversation for another hour. The same concept holds true for your Facebook Fan Page or even your Business Blog. Nobody wants to hang out with you if the conversation fizzles out. The objective of your content is to publish materials that get people talking and intrigues them enough to make them want to come back, be linked to you or even to share about your Fan Page postings.

Social media tools such as Facebook are not called ‘social’ for nothing. Just as its name depicts its purpose, everything about Facebook is about ‘socially friendly’, personal, sincere and approachable. Facebook and all other social media tools are popular because of the free of speech that it provides for the users. People are free to voice their thoughts and they want to manifest their opinions openly to the world. Each voice in the social media platforms have their own stories to share and to be heard. They want the world out there to engage them and to participate in the online cyber life these voices have which they may or may not be able to do so in the real physical world. To reach your target groups of customers, you must know the voices to engage in and to be able to portray your own Voice in a conversational, unofficial and entertaining manner where threats and authority are missing. Focus on building relationships with your fans as a friend rather than a client-vendor approach. Be human, fun, accessible and honest.

When you are deciding the types of incentives for your fans as they like your page, make sure that you identify the demographic groups that you are targeting in Facebook or in any other social media platforms you are using. Your regular customers and your targeted social media groups may be different groups with different profiles, age, interests, technical ability and purpose for liking your Page. Just as in any other marketing campaign, make sure that you know your target audience well so as to give you a head start as you plan your campaigns and incentives.

Taking on a Facebook Fan Page management is not a difficult but neither is it an overnight activity that spells success. All it takes is a little extra effort to put up a business social media marketing blueprint based on your business goals. If you are creating your business Fan Page for the first time, generating your business social media marketing blueprint is critical as you integrate both your online and offline marketing strategies into one. Bottom line is to create positive experiences with your customers that are engaging, entertaining and exhilarating.

Rebekeh Poh-Seragih
Director of Adonai Training LLP

Join Rebekeh as she shares on ‘What gets measured gets improved – How to measure your returns on social media investments using different social media metrics’ at The Internet Show Asia, on 15 April 2011. Register now and get a $50 Google AdWords voucher!