Getting more fans on Facebook
-
Does anyone have any tips or experience on how they increased their Facebook fan base? I work in the oil/fuel industry and getting people to like your Facebook page is quite difficult because our customers are mostly middle-aged men, who if statistics are to be believed aren't the most active on social media anyway.
I've been doing regular posts for the past couple of weeks, liking other pages and joining conversations but don't seem to be getting any increase in followers.
Does anyone have any advice, ideas or examples of what you did that worked?
Thanks
-
I think this is exactly the point - no matter now boring you perceive it, now matter how niche the problem your business solves, then there is someone out there who needs that information.
Now, whether they will share it or not is another matter but if you answer those questions, they will certainly find you and then you can look at other ways of converting a percentage of those visitors in leads or prospects down the road.
-
Some industries just aren't suited to Facebook or Twitter, because people aren't interested in thinking about that niche in their free time, or because your target audience isn't active on social media. You should still have a presence there and occasionally participate, but don't expect amazing results.
Have you already captured your low-hanging fruit -- inviting your most faithful repeat customers to connect with you on social media? Every employee should have a link to your Facebook page in their e-mail signature. Then social media becomes a brand loyalty tool.
-
A thought for a content idea -- FAQs for someone who is new to oil heating. This comes from my own situation right now, as I sit in front of a wood-burning fireplace and I'm afraid to turn on our oil-burning furnace. We moved into this house a couple of months ago, and the neighbors told us that all of the walls were repainted because of the oil stains, and we're seeing stains by one vent near the carpet. We're using space heaters and the fireplace until we can get a gas line to the house and a gas furnace installed. I'm sure I'm not the only one that has relocated and found myself in this situation. It may not cause me to be a forever fan on your facebook page, but it might turn me into a heating oil customer if I were convinced there was a good way to get heat.
-
Hey Brian, if the only reason you are doing this is for an SEO benefit you would be better concentrating on the content, adding some social sharing buttons (like, tweet, +1, recommend) and then directing your efforts in other directions.
This is a good read:
http://www.seomoz.org/blog/do-improved-social-signals-cause-improved-rankings
-
One of my businesses is B2B and I have found that engaging people on LinkedIN is a good way to get people back to my FB page.
I join in a variety of groups on there and just talk to anybody in my market
-
The main reason we do social media is for SEO. I believe that the social triggers have an impact on SEO and that's why we want to be there.
At the moment, I'm putting up relevant news stories and because we supply oil, this time of year is when we sell a lot of home heating oil - so I'm trying to push that. I have come up with a few ideas like 10 ways to save on your heating bill but I don't want to put a lot of effort into something that won't work.
Contests are not really suitable for us because the vast majority of our business is from B2B sales. Unless someone has a good idea, I don't see the relevance.
I was thinking of giving away company stationery for likes, but I think the problem is directing people to the page in the first place.
There is an energy saving week coming up in just over a week, but it's a bit late for us to organise something and promote it properly.
-
The main reason we do social media is for SEO. I believe that the social triggers have an impact on SEO and that's why we want to be there.
At the moment, I'm putting up relevant news stories and because we supply oil, this time of year is when we sell a lot of home heating oil - so I'm trying to push that. I have come up with a few ideas like 10 ways to save on your heating bill but I don't want to put a lot of effort into something that won't work.
Contests are not really suitable for us because the vast majority of our business is from B2B sales. Unless someone has a good idea, I don't see the relevance.
I was thinking of giving away company stationery for likes, but I think the problem is directing people to the page in the first place.
There is an energy saving week coming up in just over a week, but it's a bit late for us to organise something and promote it properly.
-
Well, some niches just aren't meant for social activity.
However, you can still succeed with the right content. What exactly are you posting to your page? Try going with some creative content ideas or throwing some contests. If your business is a local company, partner up with some local businesses to give away gift cards and other prizes in exchange for likes. And then promote that contest through each site.
Try running community events and just stuff that will get people engaged. I know one company that runs a FB fantasy football league.
-
I guess the big question is whether facebook is a relevant platform for marketing this business. If your customers and prospects are not there, and the business has little to share in terms of interesting, shareable content, then... maybe you are barking up the wrong tree?
Got a burning SEO question?
Subscribe to Moz Pro to gain full access to Q&A, answer questions, and ask your own.
Browse Questions
Explore more categories
-
Moz Tools
Chat with the community about the Moz tools.
-
SEO Tactics
Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers
-
Community
Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!
-
Digital Marketing
Chat about tactics outside of SEO
-
Research & Trends
Dive into research and trends in the search industry.
-
Support
Connect on product support and feature requests.
Related Questions
-
Facebook Like button and Google plus
I can't believe that I still did not figure out what would be the best way to have facebook like button and google plus on the home page. I have tried several options but I was always receiving errors in W3 validator. Can somebody help please? Thank you Iris
Social Media | | Rebeca10 -
When with Google+ bio area backlinks get devalued if we have everybody link to our site
Hello, As you know, Google+ bios, if they have a link in them are dofollow. I'm doing a link building campaign, and we already linked one of our Google+ pages to our home page and top 2 articles. My question is, to get links, can we have family and friends add links in their bios too for a total of 6 links to the home page (6 people) and some links to our articles? Or will Google devalue them because we are family and friends? How many is too many? Thanks.
Social Media | | BobGW0 -
Facebook Contest: Fan or Not?
Let's say that I manage a Page for a company, and I run a contest through a "Promoted Post". Does every single Like to that "Promoted post" will be counted as new fan? My objective is to increase the fans number of the page, which is your best practice to achieve that through a Facebook contest? Many thanks.
Social Media | | YESdesign0 -
How to coordinate blog, facebook and twitter.
I have a small law firm with a website including a blog, as well as accounts with Twitter and FB. I usually write a blog on the website then reference and link to that blog from twitter and FB. I also do short blogs that are basically links to other interesting articles about my field, and link to those as well. Is this helpful or correct from he perspective of SEO for the website? Is there a particular way to do this? I have much to learn so any comments are welcome. Many thanks.
Social Media | | NCCompLawyer0 -
Explanation of Facebook referral paths in Google Analytics
In the past month I have seen a huge increase in the visits + conversions from Facebook (which is obviously great). However, from Google Analytics it appears that most of my visits are not coming from my brand page. Is there an explanation of what these referral paths mean? Top Facebook referral paths: / /l.php /home.php /ajax/emu/end.php /brand - much less visits than above URLs
Social Media | | theLotter1 -
How to define image to display on a facebook link?
Currently I am in the process of relaunching http://www.grassrootsseo.co.uk - however a friend pointed out to me that no image displays when I'm on facebook and link to my site. Anyone know how to define which image you want Facebook to show when you link to a certain page? Many thanks...
Social Media | | GrassRootsSEO0 -
Facebook Share Metrics
Is there a method, program, or app to view how many Facebook shares each page/content has on a website. Is there a plugin if the site is a wordpress blog? I'm looking to see how many shares or top shared content are on a specific website. Thanks!
Social Media | | MasonInteractive0 -
Sending a global facebook message
Hi, This is really a social media question, hoping you can help. We have 2 facebook sites that we are going to delete. One is a group and one is a page. Here they are: http://www.facebook.com/pages/NLP-Institute-of-California/101752159860852?ref=ts and http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=90698249783 How do we send a message to all people in both groups all at once letting them know of our new facebook page that we're making? We're also concerned that people will get 2 emails that are subscribed to both sites to be deleted.. Thanks!
Social Media | | BobGW0