What is Facebook marketing?
Facebook marketing is the act of promoting a business or brand and its products/services via a Facebook business Page. By fully optimizing these business Pages, brands create a second website of sorts, where you can advertise and sell products and services directly to your target audience. Facebook’s ad platform enables you to go beyond organic promotion, creating paid posts in various post types (i.e., photos, carousels, videos, links) to maximize engagement.
Thus, with a well-planned strategy, you can use Facebook to support the full customer experience from awareness to purchase and loyalty.
Benefits of Facebook marketing for your business
There are several reasons to include Facebook in your social media marketing strategy. This includes enhancing brand awareness, increasing customer engagement and reaching new audiences. Facebook has the potential for significant brand amplification and return on your investment with over 62% of U.S. social commerce buyers using it regularly.
Not convinced? Here’s a breakdown of our top five picks for why Facebook marketing must be on your radar when planning your marketing strategy.
Improve your brand’s visibility
While 72% of Facebook users are primarily on the site to keep up with friends and family, a sizable number visit it for customer service, entertainment and to follow brands. This means you can present your brand to visitors whose motivations range from idle curiosity to active engagement, which includes purchases. The average conversion rate on Facebook for sales is 8.25% across industries.
Create more engaging content
Facebook offers ongoing opportunities to engage your target audience. What’s considered “engaging” depends largely on your industry and the type of business you run.
For example, retailers can use Carousels or Stories to show off a new product line or UGC. B2B brands and service providers might publish video testimonials. A food brand might poll followers about a new flavor.
From images and interactive content to videos and beyond, there’s no one-size-fits-all approach for how to market on Facebook with content.
Beyond organic posts, Facebook supports ad content in four formats: images, video, carousel and collections. This gives you four ways to use captivating visuals to engage prospective customers.
Appeal to your target audience
Facebook analytics provides a wealth of data about your performance and audience preferences. Use this to tailor your content to meet your audience’s needs and wants, increasing your engagement and improving your brand experience. Facebook ads also contain sophisticated tools for market segmentation, including:
- Geographic: Choose a specific region or define it by population density.
- Demographic: Select age, gender, marital status, family status and occupation.
- Behavioral: Define groups by brand loyalty or user status (from non-users to regular users).
- Income: Select from lower, middle or upper class.
- Lifestyle: Segment by interests, according to keywords used in searches.
- Interests: Choose interests that intersect with the common pursuits of your chosen group
Selecting your target audience using these parameters when creating an ad campaign ensures you get the best return on ad spend (ROAS).
Incorporate ecommerce directly
Create online stores directly within the platform and make them visible on Instagram to reach more audiences.
You’ll need business accounts on both sites to do so but the set-up process is relatively straightforward.
Once you’ve created your accounts, refine your online catalog to target new and returning customers like State Bicycle Company, with over 400,000 followers, does when promoting its wide range of single-speed city bikes.
The community vibe associated with Facebook means the brand can create a Page that effectively blends news, articles, offers and competitions.
