In this post, we're going to dive into some effective methods for growing your Facebook audience in 2021. Not only that, but we'll also take a look at some of the tools currently available that you can use to grow your fanbase on Facebook.
Using Facebook to increase awareness about your brand. Is it really all worth it in 2021?
For the most part, yeah, I would say it is worth it. As in, it's worthy of your time and effort.
Over the years, Facebook has evolved. Some may say for the good of things, others not so much.
If you were one of the first to adopt Facebook for business. Perhaps you created your fan page many years back, you'll know just what I mean.
Things were good. The organic reach and engagement you could get on Facebook business pages were exponential. Especially if you compare it with today's Facebook for business.
About five years ago (2015), I made the decision to shut down my original Facebook page for my blog here at Magnet4Blogging.
I originally launched the page back in 2010. In five years it had reached around 10,000 fans.
I deleted the page forever.
Why did I do this?
Facebook simply stopped working. The organic reach and engagement slowly fizzled down to almost nothing.
It's easy for digital marketers who're only been doing this Facebook thing for a few years to say -
"Well, you're not doing it properly."
Actually, what they really mean is that you're not giving Facebook your hard-earned cash to get your content seen by your hard-earned fans.
I admit, yes, I made some silly mistakes with my page many years back. I did things like -
Yep! buying fans was one of the dumbest things I've ever done as far as using Facebook for marketing goes.
I had the fans alright, around 5,000 extra fans. But the fact was that I discovered the majority of those bought fans were worthless. Fans generated from fake Facebook accounts. Yep, Facebook had a huge problem when it came to fake users.
From October 2018 to March 2019, Facebook reported that it removed 3.39 billion fake accounts.
Oh boy. Think of all those poor businesses that invested in the growth of their fanbase and had gotten fake fans. Not a great deal, right?
Yeah, so I made this silly mistake myself too. I've learned from that mistake.
I decided to start a brand new page a few months after deleting the old page and went about doing things very differently.
Within a few months of promoting my new page, and with just 100 fans, the engagement was far better than my previous business page that had 10k fans!
The moral of the story is?
That's right, don't even entertain the idea of buying fans from any third-party websites.
It might sound like a tempting deal, but in the long run, it's not worth it.
Why?
Because you will never get the level of engagement that you can get from real, targeted fans.
Yes, I've seen the claims. A lot of websites swear that they offer 100% real genuine followers. Don't fall for it, there's zero guarantee - that is what you are going to get if you go down this route.
Right, moving on, because this post isn't about what I did to screw up my first Facebook page, this post is about growing your Facebook audience. But I needed to make you aware of this just in case you were considering using third-party sites to buy fans.
Right then, here are some smarter and genuine ways to grow your Facebook audience. Let's get to it!
Yep, as obvious as this first piece of advice might sound to you, it's darn well true -
If you want Facebook's algorithms to work in your favor, you've got to be active. Posting once per week or per month won't cut it. Start posting daily.
Here's the thing:
By being active daily, you have more chance of getting your content noticed and therefore liked and shared by your existing fans, assuming they follow your page notifications, of course.
Remember, not all your fans will be on Facebook at the same time. So it's really important you share a piece of content once or twice per day!
I know what's one your mind. You're thinking to yourself -
OK, let's back up...
Don't make excuses for yourself. First rule of Facebook marketing.
Here are some content ideas worth sharing on your page, that can help you boost engagement and shares. And which in turn will help you grow your Facebook audience.
When it comes to finding the time to post on your Facebook page, I would recommend you schedule and automate your content sharing.
Consider using a social planner template like this one. This template, by the way, is part of my Ultimate Social Media Planner Workbook for Bloggers. You can get it for free here.
Here are some other tools I recommend you check out for scheduling your Facebook marketing.
Bottom line is this:
If you really want to see your Facebook page fans grow, then you've got to share more engaging and delightful content. Remember, it's not just about sharing marketing content.
Here's an interesting statistic -
People using smartphones and desktop computers spend on average, 50 seconds engaging on Facebook?
That’s 50 seconds per user! (Source)
Now, you do the maths. Think about how active you currently are on Facebook, and how much more you could be doing.
This is not a new strategy by any means, however, it's so easy to overlook the potential behind using your Facebook page to engage with other similar pages on Facebook.
I've done this a few times myself. I've used my Facebook page to engage with other content on pages that I follow.
Doing this not only means you're adding value, but you're also increasing the chances of getting your own Facebook page noticed. This, of course, helps towards growing your audience organically.
Give it a try.
Facebook insight is a great feature that can provide you with lots of useful information to help you improve your Facebook marketing.
Be sure to keep an eye on your posts > all posts published and pay special attention to the reach and engagement columns. Then click to select ‘Reactions’, ‘comments’ and ‘shares’.
Take note of things like:
With this knowledge, you can create more content of interest to share, and therefore boost engagement, and thus grow your Facebook audience.
I realize that this is something you might feel reluctant to do, but when done correctly, a powerful and targeted Facebook Ad campaign can help you grow your audience.
And here's the thing:
You don't need to spend a huge fortune to make just a few of your posts more visible to your intended audience. Or, you might want to run a page promotion campaign a few days each week like I do.
There’s an excellent post over on Social Media Examiner titled: 6 Tips To Improve Your Facebook Advertising Results, which provides some valuable tips and insights. You can check it out here.
Also, be sure to read my post on how to optimize your Facebook Ad Campaigns.
This goes without saying and is such a simple thing to do. Yet very few folks actually do it.
If you haven’t already done so, then go ahead and do it right now! Let all your friends, families, and perhaps some professional contacts on your friend's list - know that you have a Facebook business page that they might be interested in.
Let them know that you work there and that they can follow your updates on your page.
If you are active on other social media sites, definitely link to your Facebook page from those channels too, if you like.
I wouldn't recommend cross-promoting content you post on other social media sites with Facebook. The reason is that sometimes content you share on, let's say, Twitter, for example, may not be suitable, engaging, or relevant enough for your Facebook audience.
In short, your fans on Facebook may prefer to engage with videos and images. Whilst your followers on Twitter may engage more with links and news.
Recommended Podcast: Advanced Social Media Marketing Strategies For Small Businesses
Whether you're sending emails from Gmail or Hotmail. Or an email campaign through your email marketing service provider, your Facebook page URL should always be present in your email signatures.
This is useful if you are sending email quotes to your prospects, connecting with new influencers, responding to client or reader enquires, etc.
If they see you're on Facebook, they may be encouraged to come over and like your page. Moreover, it also provides your prospects with some social proof!
Don't be afraid to use call-to-actions either. Actually, ask people to follow you on Facebook otherwise they may forget to.
Finally, very occasionally, (I can’t stress on the 'very occasionally' enough) you can share something cool from your Facebook business page to your personal profile.
This works great in instances where you might have interviewed someone who you've become friends with. Like someone influential in your niche or industry.
In fact, how many friends do you have right now on Facebook that are actually professional contacts?
I bet you have a few, right?
Once again, this tactic is great to do from time to time. Especially if you want to encourage some of your friends that might be interested in becoming a fan of your business page, services, and products. If it's relevant to them.
Right then, let's finish this post with some useful links to recommended Facebook tools and resources.
Just for the record, I've used most of these tools myself. Chances are you're already using a few of these too. But if not, then feel free to dig in.
#1. CoSchedule - This is a powerful social media, content, and marketing calendar planner for bloggers. I've used CoSchedule for the last two years! It's become one of the business tools I can't live without. Everything social media, blogging, and email are now managed through this app for my blog.
#2. Post Planner – A useful Facebook marketing tool to help you find relevant and quality content to share and sky-rocket your reach on Facebook. It's also a great scheduling tool.
#4. WooBox – An awesome Facebook marketing app that allows Facebook page owners to create powerful contests, sweepstakes, coupons, and more to grow their fans.
#5. HootSuite – One of the oldest and best social media management platforms on the web. I used HootSuite for many years before moving over to CoSchedule.
#6. Facebook Page Manager App – An app for iPhone (App Store) or Android to help you manage and post to your Facebook business page on the go.
#7. Facebook Page Insights – A useful analytical and engagement feature that provides insights into business page usage, such as engagement, likes, and reach.
Recommended Post: Check out this useful post on KISSmetrics on what you need to know about Facebook’s insight tools and analytics.
There are various other plugins, tools, apps, and services out there you can use to improve your Facebook marketing and grow your audience that I’ve not mentioned in this post. I’ll be sure to update this post again in the future, so don't forget to subscribe for updates.
OK, so there you have it! Those are just a few of the tactics, strategies, tools, resources you can use to grow your Facebook audience.
Facebook marketing isn't rocket science, it's just a case of testing to see what works best. A strategy that might work for me, may not always work for you. So keep testing.
Once you find the tactics that gives you the best results, put all your effort in using those tactics.
One more thing:
Growing your audience on Facebook won’t happen overnight, especially if you’re starting from complete scratch. It takes time. It takes patience.
Keep working at it. Even though Facebook is now considered a Pay-to-Play platform, you can still grow your fans and increase engagement and ROI organically.
The very best of luck to you.
