5 Top Tips to help B2B’s on Facebook

Over the past six months, I have seen more B2B businesses start using Facebook as part of their marketing. The ever increasing popularity of Facebook, has been enough for some business owners to say, what have we got to lose by adding Facebook as another ingredient to our marketing mix.

If you are a B2B business, ultimately the people who buy from you are still people and the whole emphasis of Facebook is engaging and communicating with people.

Here are 5 Top Tips to help you get more from your Facebook Page:

1. Engage with your customers

To increase your ranking in the Facebook search, the most important factor is the amount of two way interaction (number of Likes, Comments and Shares) that people add to your page.




There are a couple of ways of doing this effectively.
Ask questions that will get a reaction from your audience.
Ask open ended queestions that enable people to comment easily.
Add statement that people can easily ‘Like’.
Add stuff that funny or informative, that people might like to share.

2. Maximise the size of your profile picture

Many people are unaware that the size of your Business Page Profile Picture can be up to 180 x 540 pixcels. This allows you to not just add your company logo, but also add a summary of what your company does or your USP’s. You can even add your telephone number and a call to action, perhaps visit our website for more information...

3. Add Profile Photo’s.

At the top of your Wall you can have up to 5 different photo’s. Make sure to add photo’s that demonstrate your expertise, your products and your customers. You are selling to people, so it’s good for your potential customers to see other customers being happy, satisfied and liking your product or services.

4. Maximise your Online Presence

Facebook has the facility for you to add lots of applications and additional tabs along the lefthand side, use them. You can add your company Blog, you can create bespoke web pages, you can add your twitter account, you can add customer surveys, there are discussion boards, you can even run incentives like Competitions…

5. Run Competitions and Promotions

We all have to start our Facebook Business Page with no ‘Likes’ to start with and we all want to grow our Facebook fan base, so we know we’re not just updating our pages for our own benefit, we want to be communicating with our clients and prospects. The quickest, easiest way to get a good following is to run a competition. If this is something you’re interested in doing make sure you do this using an app and not directly from your wall, it’s against Facebook Policy and could result in your account being closed down.

A couple of Apps you can use for FaceBook Competitions

http://northsocial.com/apps/sweepstakes/

http://northsocial.com/apps/fan-offer/

The Facebook Policy on running Competitions and Promotions

http://www.facebook.com/promotions_guidelines.php

If you have any top tips or examples of great Facebook Business pages, we would love to hear from you.

Many Thanks Helen

Top 10 New Blog Ideas...

Use alternative story forms (ASFs) - what are ASFs?

Alternative story forms (ASFs) are content formats other than traditional long-form narratives you might typically use in your newsletter.

Show me some examples of ASFs

1. Top 10 lists like this one!
2. 'How to’ features.
3. Case Studies
4. Bulleted Lists
5. Videos & Podcasts
6. Checklists
7. ‘Did you know’ facts/hints
8. Interviews
9. Charts/Graphs & Surveys
10. Photo journals

Why do readers like ASFs?

Readers like ASFs as they offer quick, interesting, bite-size ways of absorbing your content that can offer instant gratification to the reader. They don’t have to be used exclusively in your newsletter and can make a wonderful accompaniment to the more traditional story forms used. They can be used to:

• Show your clients things (watch, listen)
• Explain things
• Make comparisons
• Present information in unique ways
• And best of all, they're easy to share online!

Do ASFs actually work to increase engagement?

Well yes, according to Poynter Institute’s EyeTrack project ASFs not only generate more interest than regular story forms, but they help readers to retain more information.

If you have any other top tips you would like to share - we'd love to hear from you...

How strong is your current profile picture?

There’s nothing worse than being on the receiving end of a soft handshake. You know what we’re talking about, the clammy dead fish introduction where someone places their limp hand in yours and you feel like your holding a lump of jelly. Not good. Unpleasant. Creepy. Memorable for all the wrong reasons. Make sure you maximize the grip strength of your Facebook page by taking full advantage of the often-overlooked profile pic. The competition for mindshare on Facebook has become increasingly steep, and all it takes is one botched first impression to stunt any shot you have at making a quality fan interaction. The odds are that you're under-utilising your available image real estate (yes, the profile pic accepts images up to 180w x 540h). That's plenty of space to promote a weekly special, highlight a “Customer Of The Month”, or just lead eyeballs and clicks to one of your custom tabs. So don't forget to take full advantage of the profile pic, it's a great way to add some strength to your Facebook page without doing any hand exercises. Need some inspiration? Why not search for some of your favourite shops and brands online to see what they are doing, or take a look at the links below and let me know what you think... http://www.facebook.com/gap http://www.facebook.com/ColdicottTraining http://www.facebook.com/burgerking http://www.facebook.com/Sexandthecity http://www.facebook.com/pizzaexpress Profile Picture - instantly recognisable plus great competitions...