I’m looking to expand my management service into using Facebook in the coming months but the first step for me is reorienting using Facebook for business purposes so that I can use it both for myself but also for my clients.
Trudging through these forums there’s a lot of information but most of it is exceptionally outdated (ie 2017) or just referring to different things that can be done but not why or how.
I don’t mind researching and learning but I’m suffering here from information overload so I’m hoping someone more familiar with this particular service can stop me from spinning in circles and point me in the right direction.
To start I’m just looking for basic strategies. Assume an account eventually intended for business is created. No friends, no pages, no groups. What are the general next steps to moving forward?
Here is what I’m assuming based on my research (feel free to correct me if I’m wrong)
#1 Add bio and setup account so it’s not so bare bones. #2 Post a few stories on the wall, perhaps a few of my IG posts. Something to at least have something there #3 Start searching for groups relevant to my niche (although not sure what to look for to determine group quality yet) #4 Join said groups or apply to join said groups #5 Start engaging in the groups*…preferably through some level of automated means but not in blatant self-promotion…more just to get noticed as a contributor #6 Build one (or more) pages #7 Start putting content on the pages and share with the above groups from time to time
There’s still a lot of “not sure” factors. I’m not positive what is considered a high quality group to go for, general expected etiquettes with FG postings, limitations on automation I need to be aware of, things I should prep for accounts I plan to keep to deal with FG security (I read something about having multiple profile photos of the same individual for verification things). I don’t even know if the above is all correct for improving reach.
Should I also be trying to encourage people to become my friends? Should content be exclusive away from Instagram or is it okay if they’re shared.
As I mentioned before I’m not looking for anyone to walk me through everything step by step (although the more help you’re willing to offer I’ll gladly accept). I would however appreciate at least a nod if I’m moving in the right direction or pointers if there’s anything I’ve missed or gotten wrong.
A lot of my clients are involved in real estate so that’d probably be my first client based start. For testing though I’m open to anything as I’ll be using throwaway accounts for the most part. Only exception to that is once I’m a bit more confident I’ll start building a presence on FB for my management services. If I’m not confident enough to do it for my own company I won’t offer it to my clients.
Facebook works best when your social and if you plan on marketing to real estate agents, you better have a kick-ass personal page that you’re actually social on…
I did figure in terms of actual marketing being social would be a key factor. But growing reach is more what I’m concerned about now. Especially for prospective clients.
Ok, are you trying to get a bunch of small clients to sign up or a few whales? There is a different strategy for each in the real estate sector…
Growing reach needs to be done after you’ve grown a good base that responds to your content. Most people in the real estate world should be using their personal page to grow their reach instead of the business page. Your posts need to be about anything other than real estate, they need to be engaging with your audience. Then post something about real estate every 3rd or 4th post. I had a post get 300 likes, 900 comments and 3 referrals a free weeks ago using this same strategy… Most posts won’t get that many likes and comments but there are always referrals… and don’t forget Messenger…
But it skips a major step which is the majority of my original post. You mentioned growing a good base that responds to my content. How does one work at that? Obviously just posting to my wall won’t cut it, I need to put myself out there. So I’m trying to establish a reproduceable step by step process to create an account, grow that base, then cultivate that base, then expand my reach or accomplish whatever goal(s) I had in mind.
Simple… Create an account, I used a professional headshot some months, others it was me with a horse or dog… Then to another headshot… Change your background every month too… something that says business but I’m not gonna shove it done your throat… friend some people that actually know you and like you…
Engaging content… Here is what works… Good morning Monday, Tuesday-something cool that happened to me or a cool place I found and how much I love my community, Wed-stupid question, thur-how I saved the real estate world post, Fri- ask for a referral for another professional. Sat-here’s what I do with my family Sun-look I’m at an open house, please come drink with me…
Are you trying to target a location or nationwide?
Joining groups is helpful it depends on whether your an agent looking for clients or if you’re targeting people in real estate…
What…I have to know people…and they actually have to like me? Sounds like some form of witchcraft to me.
Probably nationwide but I might take a stab at state/city targeting if I find nationwide targeting too slow a process (at least during growth)
But how will people see that content? I was always under the impression content typically revolves around people on your friends list or groups see it…if they like or repost then it shares to their friends and the circle of life continues. If I manage to get some friends and they happen to like me that will rely on them actively engaging with my content for it to spread will it not? Am I not understanding how FB operates in terms of content aggregation?
Please note, not trying to be difficult here. As I have said before it has been eons since I’ve used FB and there’s so much information I’m sifting through, either extremely advanced or outdated I am still working at grasping the fundamentals. I appreciate the info.
Also, @benny mentioned joining groups was a bad idea for until “aged” …whatever aged means in FB timeframes. What options do I have until I can get to that stage?
The first thing you should do is definitely to convert your personal account to a business page. If you do that all your friends automatically become likes on your business page. You can change the name of your business page later on.
I very much appreciate the advice, however what I’m primarily working to figure out is how general growth of a clean FB account would be handled.
All the suggestions I’m getting are how to cultivate an already established account…which while incredibly insightful doesn’t help me solve that initial problem.
Thats in my opinion a big mistake i see a lot of people doing. In most cases your friends are not your customers. You dont want and need them on your buisness page. if they are not realy interested in your product/services they like and interact in the beginnig because they are polite but then they stop interacting and become dead weight.
I find content that performed well with others and rewrite it…
Joining a massive amount of groups is bad but you need to find a few relavent groups, help others in need long enough to establish yourself as an expert… Then slowly start to send friend requests to active members of the groups…
Regarding business pages, they are like a business card in real estate you need to have one but the majority of your relationship and account building needs to be done with your personal account and through messenger.
It’s difficult to spam FB in this way but there are some functionalities that can be automated to help you.
Okay that makes a lot of sense, get the feet wet before jumping in the deep end. Any recommendations as to what a reasonable amount of groups is vs a massive amount? 5, 10, 50? That’ll go great for personal growth
How would this apply to client management? I’m assuming I would expect to get content from the client to post ahead of time or ghost write it for them? What about automated measures of cultivating their current audience base.
Less then 15 to start … Most of the good groups you’ll need to request access too…
This may sound funny but make sure they friend all of their current and past clients on the personal page and make sure birthdays are automated…
It depends on what types of clients you have… Agents with new listings will want those homes posted in local groups with a funnel attached to generate leads to feed into their crm…
I write most of the content because I have a formulated template that I use to help me…
I think it really depends on what you do and how close your relationship with your friends is. From my personal experience the friendship circle is often the starting point for small business owners - and if you do something interesting or very personal like music or politics they usually stay interested and supportive over time. Also when you are converting your page you can specify which people you want to become likers so you can pick only the ones you think will be interested.
Hy. Thanks for your reply it’s always nice when opinions are different and people dont get offended Because that’s the point where a learning process often starts.
Here I agree a 100%
But I will explain you where I come from.
I think starting with a personal account is nice because.
1 You can add 5000 friends* (it’s not as easy anymore but you still can do this if you are related (friends, location,…) to them)
2 you have a feed with your followers and can see and interact with their posts
Due to 1 and 2 Personal accounts are pretty “overpowered” compared to buisness accounts on FB.
But instead of starting with your own personal account I suggest to start a personal account just for your niche - And go for 5K followers.
Main challenge for this method is the adding friends part. you have to find critera (content) to get your “new friends” And send the requests in a way you dont get blocked.
If you want try this and do it manually here is a nice link to see all open friend requests.