8 Essential Facebook Tips for the Small Business Owner - Please feel free to use this or embed it on yourwebsite

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April 2013 ©Copyright – Martin Reynolds
www.martinreynolds.co.uk
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8 Facebook Tips for the Small Business Owner
1. When setting up your Facebook business page make sure that your vanity URL is available
– this is your Username and can only be changed once, by changing it to something more
simple you are making it easier for the search engines and visitors to find you, plus it is
easier to use on all your promotional and marketing material.
2. Once you have 30 Likes you have access to Facebook Insights - make the most of this as this
gives you valuable information on your target audience and when and what to post at the
best time of the day on the best day of the week.
3. Be careful with your Cover Photo – it is vital that you DO NOT place a Call-to-action on your
cover photo, this includes a web address, phone number or anything like “Buy Now” or “Like
Us”. Facebook can and will suspend pages that break these conditions.
4. Make use of the “Pin” and “Highlight” features – these enable you to Pin an important post
to the top of your Timeline for up to a week or Highlight any important posts within your
Timeline. Try Highlighting a post to see what happens.
5. Facebook have recently added a “Reply” button to Facebook Pages – this is valuable as you
and others can reply to an individual post on your Timeline instead of a reply being added to
the bottom of the whole conversation, this gives it a more of a Forum feel and the
conversation begins to make far more sense! The main benefit of this as far as I can see is
that anyone asking a question can see a reply directly underneath their post rather than
trawling through the whole thread.
6. Be visual – Photographs and videos have a far higher response rate and encourage`s
engagement. They also stand out against a whole screen of text posts so make the most of
images.
7. Be consistent – Just adding a post once a month or even once a week isn`t going to give you
much return, be consistent and post regularly but on the other hand don`t go mad and post
20 posts straight off and then do nothing for the rest of that week! Be consistent, be helpful,
be interesting and forget the sales pitch! The time to sell will come but build up that trust
and relationship first.
8. Respond everytime – Answer everything, even if it is negative or criticism. If you just ignore
it there will be many others that will see this and it will not reflect very well on you or your
business. Likewise if you attempt to help a unhappy customer resolve their problem many
will see that you are prepared to help and listen to your customers.