What exactly is it that you want from Facebook?

[Lynne Baker]

We had a meeting with our web developers yesterday and we learned to our astonishment that you can actually "buy" likes! There is a team of people in far flung lands who will sit and create fake profiles and then like your page.

Do I want a million likes from people who have no idea who I am, who have no intention or need, to do business with me? Do I want the bragging rights? Erm, well, no, not really!

What I want from Facebook is not 500 likes from people who might not interact with my page, or more importantly, my business, but I want exposure to relevant people.

We've just started a very targeted Facebook ad campaign. We want people to see the brand logos and start to recognise them; a kind of drip drip drip approach into their consciousness. We want people to know that there is an alternative to xyz brand of skincare or makeup. So, we've set up the campaign to show our ad to people who currently like the Professional Beauty FB page, and to those who have commented on a couple of other pro skincare pages.

I'm not interested in looking at my ad settings and seeing woohoo, my ad's been clicked on 1254 times, go me! I'm interested in seeing that my ad's been served 12897 times!
Why?! Because if 12897 people have seen my ad then my brand logos start to get recognised. It only starts to cost me money when people click on my ad, not when it appears next to the Pro Beauty timeline.

I'm all for supporting each other, and I fully understand that the more popular one appears the more popular one will become, but it's really important to understand how Facebook works so you can make it work FOR YOU!

So, ask yourself what it is you really want from Facebook; only then can you work out what it is you need to do to make it do it for you.

Does all that make sense?!

 

[shazzawilson]

Yes it does. I looked into advertising a while back and thought the same so I'd rather have people who are interested than not. Hence I didn't bother as it doesn't work for local small businesses.

 

[MrsHBeauty]

I think having a facebook page with a lot of likes make you appear popular.

I want people to interact with my facebook page, so other people will see their interaction on their news feed so that more people will like our page and raise awareness of my salon locally.

I ran and "offer" and it was fab. I had a free £15 in facebook advertising credits so I set the budget at £15.

 

[PremierIan]

It's actually worse than it initially seems, which is why I do get a bit annoyed at companies that sell you 'likes'.

If you've looked at the reach statistics on the posts from your page, you've probably noticed that your posts aren't visible to all of your pages fans. Ignoring promoted posts for a minute, this is because of something Facebook calls Edgerank, which acts as an indicator of how useful your page is to people. The higher your Edgerank, the more people will see your posts.

A big part of your Edgerank is based around how much interaction you get with your followers - if you have lots of posts that lots of people like, then it'll boost the Edgerank. Lots of posts and no interaction means that it'll drop.

Now, just imagine having 1,000 'likes', none of which click 'like' on your posts, nor add a comment.. your Edgerank has just pretty much disappeared!

 

[nicole333]

I've been looking into the promoting posts function today. Have you seen it Lynne? I'd be interested to hear your thoughts on it.

I did start another thread asking about others experiences with it and if it bought them business, but I'm still waiting on replies answering my specific queries with it.
If it is the case of reaching friends of friends then I think it is worth doing, to show people you are there.

 

[Zooks]

I am also really interested in this.

I think you need a good "like" base to gain more ineterest BUT like Lynne says you want these people to genuinely be interested in the page, otherwise whats the point?

I get some interaction from pictures I post of my work but not as much as I would like.

I'd love to know more about this. Reading through Facebook is like a minefield and it changes every god damn minute.