Simple Tips to Optimize Your Facebook Business Page

Social media should be the main ingredient of any marketing strategy. While some marketing techniques may get a bit expensive, this one is free and may bring you big profits.

It’s vital to have your Facebook Business Page correctly optimized with some SEO best practices in order to maximize conversions. First of all, there is a correlation between a well-developed social presence and your search rankings and in the end, a Facebook Business Page becomes a “second home page” for your online business. Since there are many rumors about Facebook Business Page Optimization on the Web, let’s put this straight. Within this post, you will learn some essential rules that will leverage your Facebook page….

Let’s start with the optimization basics!

New to SEO? Learn more about Search Engine Optimization!

1. Choose the right name

When it comes to correct optimization, it is fundamental to find the right name for your Facebook Business Page because you choose it once and it is permanent. It’s key to remember that the first word of your Facebook page title is the most significant in the eyes of Google.

This is why stuffing your page title with generic keywords won’t work. Doing so might make it look spam-like and discourage people from getting engaged, let alone sharing your updates. You need a brandable name that represents your business and shows its personality. This is the real intent behind any Facebook Business Page.

2. Custom your vanity URL

Never settle for the dynamic URL which is automatically generated when you sign up. On Facebook, you can easily personalize your address and unify it with your brand name. Make it unique and easy to remember. If you match your Facebook vanity URL with the page’s title you are going to strengthen your brand recognition. Moreover, personalization will hugely improve the findability of your page both in Facebook search and in search engines.

3. Fill out your profile

Make sure that your avatar, cover photo, bio and profile info are complete and contain up-to-date information. A complete profile reveals your professional attitude and is a clear signal to your audience that you are engaged. Moreover, aim for consistency across all of your social media channels, and make sure that the main visuals match. Utilize a Facebook cover photo that is 851 x 315 px.

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Build your marketing personas and improve the communication with your targeted audience by using the appropriate voice and tone.

4. Pay special attention to the “About us” section

The truth is, your visitors want to know all of the details about your business: where your office is located, what service you offer, what your working hours are and so on. Therefore, provide them with complete information. The “About us” section is a good place to emphasize values and benefits your products or service may bring to the customers. Similarly to Meta Description, you need an apt description short enough [you get 155 characters] in order to be correctly displayed in the search engine snippet, both on desktop and mobile. Make sure that you choose an appropriate category:

• Local business or place
• Company, organization, or institution
• Brand or product
• Artist, band, or public figure
• Entertainment
• Cause or community

Complete your short description diligently and use accurate wording (including targeted keywords) to concisely characterize your business.

Pro-tip: Remember to add the link to your website or landing page within the short description because it strongly improves the find ability of the particular offer or content page.

5. Sprinkle your business page with keywords strategically

Optimizing for keywords remains crucial, even when it comes to social media. Place your targeted ones in the most important, strategic parts of your page. Include them in the URL, page title and “About us” section because they will be visible on the front page and will appear in search results.

Remember that the name of your page corresponds with the title tag and your short description works as the meta description tag. However, make sure that you do not overuse keywords: stick to a top six and mention them naturally in the proper context.

6. Include the phone number and address in your Facebook page

The current Facebook design shows your business category, location, phone number and business hours straight away, on the front page. Therefore, make sure to fill out your street address, city, state, zip, and local phone number. Adding the address helps with indexing your brand for local search results and increases page following. Google simply pays more attention to pages that give specific contact information.

7. Optimize Facebook updates

The first 18 characters of each of your Facebook posts serve as the meta title and the meta description in SERPs. Therefore, anytime you are going to post on Facebook, share the content or upload a picture, and take advantage of the fact that you can add a description.

8. New features that you should implement

Facebook is constantly introducing new useful tools that are going to make running your business easier. To keep your page well-optimized, make sure that you keep an eye on any new features that emerge and implement them when available.

Call to action on Facebook

Worth mentioning are call to action buttons for Facebook Pages introduced in December 2014. Thanks to the call to action, people can easily i1nteract with your business page. You can choose the suitable destination for your type of business and direct your followers to it. The full list includes 7 types of actions:  

• Sign Up – mailing list or webinar sign up page, join the tool.
• Book Now – hotel or restaurant reservations   
• Contact Us – contact form
• Use App
• Play Game
• Shop Now – e-commerce store
• Watch Video

Messenger for Business

Just recently, Facebook officially launched Messenger for Business to let users chat directly with the companies. Some U.S. businesses can already have a personal, real-time conversation with their customers.

Payments via Facebook

Facebook launched a payments feature on its Messenger app available on mobile and desktop. Payments can be made with a debit card, and the best part is, Facebook won’t charge you for it.

However, at the moment payments are only available for United States’ users and are limited to  circles of friends. We hope that it will soon become accessible in other countries and useful for businesses, also.

Saved replies

Moreover, Facebook is currently testing a new feature called “Saved Replies” which is going to help business page owners speed up communication with templates. This will save you precious time from repetitive customers service inquiries. Saved Replies enables you to create a message and save it for later use. It will be accessible via the messaging interface within a particular message view. When the message pops up, the Saved Replies will appear on the left sidebar with the “Manage Replies” button at the bottom.

Prepare generic replies for all of your frequently asked questions and always personalize them before sending.
This functionality is targeted to small business including startups and e-commerce shops who are not using any helpdesk platforms like, for example, Zendesk.

Choose Post Time

Post Time is more important in all of things like if your page is related to   Yoga then you need to Update your Post in Morning  . . . .  .

Conclusion

Of course, the overarching objective of Facebook is to stimulate engagement and produce valuable and exciting content. Therefore, tailor your language to your audience, be personal and personable, and use fresh and simple wording. Executing these optimization tips will improve your Facebook Business Page visibility and user experience, both of which are crucial for your success.

Tips for Creating a Social Media Plan for Your Business

Do you have social media plan?

Are you looking for an easy to follow guide to formulate a plan for your business?

Keep reading for seven tips to help your business develop a social plan…

Why Businesses Fail With Social Media

Businesses often fail in their social media efforts for the same reason New Year’s resolutions fail: It’s a good idea, but there’s no structure or commitment.

Then, when there are no immediate results, or the goal ends up being more difficult to attain than previously thought, it goes by the wayside.

Has this happened to your business’s social media presence? You aren’t alone. Very few people can simply choose to be active in social media and stick with it.

For the rest of us, we need something to keep us honest. That’s why I advocate youcreate a social media plan—a checklist, if you will—complete with daily maintenance, recurring tasks and milestone projects.

These seven tips will help you design a social media plan that will keep you on track, active and moving forward.

#1: Make a Commitment

Before you even start creating your plan, you have to make a promise. Establishing a healthy social media presence can be a very slow process. You can’t expect your list of fans, followers or subscribers to grow overnight.

You don’t want to start your business’s presence out by posting and updating consistently, only to get bored, lose interest and forget to log in when there’s no immediate gratification.

To prevent that kind of slide, make a commitment. Even if it’s just to yourself—even if you have to frame it and hang it above your computer.

No matter how silly an exercise it may seem, acknowledging and agreeing with yourself that building this presence could take upwards of a year (and then some), and then promising to invest time, energy and resources into it no matter what, will keep you committed and prepare you to be active and engaged even when you feel like your presence is stagnating.

#2: Find Your Best Fit

If you’re just getting your business’s social media efforts up and running, part of creating your plan revolves around seeing if you already have a fanbase out there.

Search for your business on sites like Yelp. Thank customers for their good reviews, and apologize to customers who gave bad reviews. You could turn that bad experience into a loyal customer and a better review.

So do some searching. Are there lots of people posting videos to YouTube of themselves using your product? Does your company have a bunch of mentions on Twitter? Do you have reviews on Yelp?

Although it’s important to establish a presence on a giant like Facebook, make sure you also set up shop where you’re already visible.

#3: Schedule Engagement

Now that you’ve identified the social media platforms you’re going to focus on, it’s time to turn your attention to the ways and frequency with which you’ll engage with your users.

Infrequent interaction is one of the main reasons businesses experience social media failure.

Those who are most successful in social media know that you have to engage steadily.

Funny, engaging and prolific, Taco Bell's Twitter feed provides fans with frequent news, entertainment and engagement—a model for other companies.

Think of creating and responding to comments, tweets, posts, etc., as simple daily maintenance. It must be done. You need to start the conversation with your users, and anytime they reach out to you, you need to be prepared to respond.

Remember that the timetable for creating and responding to content is platform-specific. Twitter moves so fast that tweets can become irrelevant within the hour, whereas Facebook status updates and posts have a few hours of staying power, and videos are great because of their longevity.

#4: Create Expert Content

Your fans and followers don’t want commercials, they want conversation. They don’t want to hear how great your company is, they already like or follow you. They don’t want sales numbers, they want industry news and thought leadership.

A good rule of thumb is to talk about your customers and your industry 80% to 90% of the time, and then discuss your own business. That means you need to start a blog, write white papers, explore trends, release case studies and create infographics.

Post frequently and do it consistently. Your ideal goal should be some kind of content every couple of days or so. Avoid going longer than a week without posting.

Thorough, in-depth articles and papers will position your business as an industry expert and thought leader, and keep your fans and followers (and even competitors) looking to you.

MailChimp's more than 30 Guides cover a range of topics—from email marketing best practices to papers on how to use MailChimp most effectively—positioning them as a leader in email marketing.

#5: Run Contests and Promotions

Contests and promotions keep fans and followers excited, interested and coming back. Most importantly, they’re a covert way to get your business or brand in front of more people. That doesn’t mean you need to run one all the time.

If you’ve always got some kind of giveaway going, they’ll soon become more social background noise. This is especially true if you’re giving away not-so-great prizes.

Run a contest or promotion every couple of months, and make sure the prize is something to get excited about.

Falken Tire's Porsche Giveaway is gated to fans only. And when the prize is as great as a Porsche, their fanbase is sure to be active and their fan count is sure to go up.

#6: Broaden Your Horizons

Every social media plan needs to start out the same way, with a commitment to the long haul and a focus on the basics like interaction and content. But once your presence is established and your users are engaged, you’re free to open things up to experimentation.

If you’ve built a solid fan following on Facebook, create and install some custom apps on your page, start posting videos on YouTube or interact more frequently by hopping on Twitter. Try things out for a few months, and then go back and see how they’ve performed for you.

Not every platform will be a fit, so if your business isn’t performing well on one for an extended period of time, don’t be afraid to pull the plug and explore different options.

Rosetta Stone's numerous custom apps help them better engage their fanbase of over 1.1 million.

#7: Delegate Tasks

If you’re at the point where you’re looking at expanding to new platforms, congratulations! You’ve likely got a healthy presence. But don’t let all of this growth overwhelm you. The larger you grow, the more in danger you are of failing to engage (point #3), because—let’s face it—social media is a lot of work.

So look into adding some more team members. Graphic artists for your infographics, writers for your blogs and white papers and even some interns to manage the day-to-day social media conversations and information-gathering. A talented team can give you a richer, more robust presence than you could ever achieve on your own.