If you’re being creative with your social marketing and taking the initiative to experiment, you’re going to find content that really excites your Facebook fans. You’re also, inevitably, going to lose their interest. At some point, you may even launch some real stink bombs into their newsfeeds. Here are some suggestions for how to fine-tune your strategy as you go along:
- Fans used to love our posts, why have they stopped responding? Do you need to shake things up? Be cautious about relying too heavily on the same schtick. Fans may dig a series of posts at first or enjoy a repeating theme for a while, but make sure to have new content ready to roll when interest begins to fade. Are you posting enough? or too much? Some brands post several times a week; others post several times a day. You want to post enough (and at the best time to post) to get noticed, but know where your fans draw the line – and honor it.
- We all know that photos boost engagement, so how come our recent photos aren’t scoring likes, comments and shares? Photos on Facebook are not only commonplace now… they’re pretty much requirements! It’s no longer enough to publish any old image. Here are some questions to guide you: Is your photo extraordinary? (Everyone’s a photographer these days – there has to be something special about your photo.) Is your photo reflective of what rallies your fans? (If your fans love stunning scenery, give it to them. If your fans like humorous images, give it to them. If you fans like puppies and kittens – you guessed it! – give it to them.) What photos can your brand provide that fans can’t get anywhere else?
- Fans don’t engage with our links, so should we stop publishing them? Maybe. But don’t be afraid to look at low-performing posts (like links) and dig into why they failed. Not this: “Fans don’t like links to our blog, so let’s not post anymore of those.” But this: “What is it about blog content – or how we’re pitching it – that isn’t resonating?” Though revealed through Facebook, these kinds of insights are far more valuable than a simple analysis of what fans “like” on the social network. They can impact the brand’s broader content marketing strategy.
- Fans of another brand went crazy over “X,” so why did our fans hate it? No two brands are alike, and no two brand communities respond to the same social content. We saw a great example of this last month with 1-800-Flowers. It tried posting someecards, and they bombed. Hard to believe, right? They’re typically so popular. Who doesn’t appreciate some snark? 1-800-Flowers fans, that’s who. The cards didn’t strike the right tone for the brand, and that’s OK. It can try something else.
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Through our “Retail Social Juice Index Spotlight” at Retail Online Integration, we’ve covered social media tactics for over 30 brands and garnered from them about two dozen takeaways. To celebrate a full year of writing the column, we’re revising and sharing some of the content with Media Logic’s audience via a blog post series that highlights our favorite takeaways; this is the third, and final, part. (Part one is Details That Matter in Social Media, and part two is Social Promotion Fundamentals.)