Marketing on Facebook

Inside Facebook had a great post yesterday about marketing on Facebook that I recommend taking a few minutes to read. While some of the recommendations may make sense for your business, others may not. As with any marketing strategy, the right solution depends on your audience, their needs, and your business objectives.

Of the ten things that are listed in the article, the 5 that stood out the most to me, particularly for any business new to Facebook, are:

1. Create a Facebook page - Somewhat related to my post the other day, create a page with the understanding that it will require a commitment and investment of your time to maintain. If you are willing to make the effort, then this step is a no-brainer and a must have.
2. Create Facebook events - If you are a business that has frequent events (i.e. open houses, tours, happy hours, public meetings, etc.) then creating Facebook events is a low effort action you can take to get the word out. When someone agrees to "attend" your event, that action will show up in the news feed of their friends virally extending your event to others.
3. Add Facebook share links to your website - Again, a low effort action that should be a part of any good design process (it is certainly a part of ours). Assuming the content of your site is appropriate for "sharing" then a share link makes complete sense.
4. Publish fresh photos, videos, and updates - I want to emphasize that it's not just posting fresh photos and videos, it's consistently posting content that your intended audience perceives as valuable. But this also circles back to #1... if you cannot commit to posting content consistently, hold off on jumping into the social media waters.
5. Talk to your customers - This is a no brainer. It would not be called social media if it did not require you to be social. Facebook and other platforms allow you the opportunity to hear what your customers are saying, and a chance to respond. While you must be prepared to take the bad commentary with the good, I view that negative feedback as an opportunity to turn a bad brand experience into a good one and through social media, that opportunity has become even easier than it was before.

So, start with these five, and then based on how successful you are in taking these steps and how committed you are to marketing your brand on social media platforms decide whether or not social ads and applications make sense for you. As I said before, when we (or you) develop a social media strategy, the platform and mechanisms should be determined by the audience, the message, and your business objective.

Check out the whole article here.

Mark Zuckerberg Speaks (continued)

Ted Leonsis posted this today about Zuckerberg's post on Facebook, and I agree with what Ted is saying...

I Doubt Mark Zuckerberg Wrote This Blog Post

I don't think Mark wrote this either.

Hey Facebookers... Quit Your Bitchin'

A million people have blogged about this already this week, but I'm still happy to weigh in myself. What am I talking about? The new Facebook. With your friend's Facebook status updates ever-present in your life, whether it be through your IM client, browser, iPhone, WAP, etc., you instantly know when there is either a major newsworthy event, or Facebook has done something to upset their users. In this case, the final roll out of the new Facebook has been one of those events that everyone has to voice their opinion on. And you know what? I don't really care what anyone thinks about the new Facebook, so please quit your bitchin' and stop spamming me with your whining. It's just something new to get used to, and this, like most things will pass, and in the long run you will find yourself better served.

Someone yesterday wrote a fairly objective post about how a significant site redesign always incites a reaction (the source escapes me for the moment), and Facebook is actually lucky that so many users are paying such close attention. The same thing happened when USA Today integrated their social elements throughout their website as a part of a significant redesign. As I cruised through the feedback, the large majority of it was NOT good. But did USA Today crumble, give in, and revert back? No, as any good publisher would do, they reviewed the comments, separated the emotional and passionate comments from the invaluable, objective feedback. As a former product guy, I'm sure they weighed this feedback with their business objectives and have slotted some items as future product changes, and others as "good ideas, but will require more justification to implement.

What I find interesting throughout this whole process is where Facebook stands on these changes and what their users are saying. I am a big proponent of interacting with your users and not only listening to what they are saying, but talking back. Having a conversation with your users. For large publishers, this is no small task and it may require additional resources to sort through the feedback, or it may require the business owners to spend a little more time with their product, but in the end it not only gets to the root of the problem, it reinforces the brand-user relationship. So where IS Facebook on this whole change? From what I have observed thus far, invisible, not that this won't change.

I write this because I find how strongly people have reacted to this change, and how public the dissent has been to the change funny. But as anyone knows, the people who like the change will more than likely keep quiet because they are happy and can go about their business. It's only the relative "handful" of users that have been upset. "Relative" meaning that only a few hundred thousand out of the multi-millions of users have joined the various groups to protest (this figure I also read somewhere but can't remember where).

I ask all of you to accept the change, know that Facebook IS taking note in some way, and understand that progress cannot come without some short term cost. The minor inconvenience that you are suffering from at this time IS that cost... deal with it and find somewhere more product to direct your energy - perhaps by offering actual constructive feedback. Now THAT'S a new idea.