It’s so easy to get carried away by the hype.
Urgent voices will scream that you must drop everything right now, and invest your entire marketing budget to develop a strong Facebook page. Pay for a professional design, and spend money on Facebook ads.
The voices will tell you with complete confidence that you must do these things immediately. Yesterday if possible. Why? If you have been paying attention, the reasons are obvious (sarcasm alert).
- Facebook has 618 million people use Facebook every day.
- Facebook is taking over Google.
- In 6 months the entire internet will be replaced by Facebook!
But the voices will be full of portent and bloated with certainty.
You must not listen to them.
What you must listen to is good sense. Stick a very sharp pin in the balloon of hype.
Just to be clear, it is quite possible that your business would benefit from an active presence on Facebook and most do when it is part of a bigger strategy. Facebook is a very powerful platform for promoting certain kinds of businesses.
But before you go tossing all kinds of time and money on what may be a bottomless rat hole, it’s absolutely necessary – that you answer a few simple questions.
Are Your customers using Facebook?
It’s true that more and more people have Facebook accounts. Even so, a significant part of the population just doesn’t tune in to Facebook. Don’t waste your time if your customers aren’t on Facebook. Another important factor to look at is if your target customers actually use Facebook to help them make a purchasing decision, or is it just a place for fun and selfies.
Perform some guerilla market research. Go to a good sample of your customers and ask how they use Facebook. If you get long pauses and blank looks in return, you may want to ditch your Facebook plan.
Is your website not optimized for conversion?
It’s a basic principle of achievement – first things first.
If your website just isn’t up to snuff, you have no business fooling around with a Facebook Page. Your website is the core of any online marketing strategy. Facebook acts as a powerful net and funnel to drive leads to your website.
Without a quality website, Facebook efforts are wasted. Fix your website. Then worry about Facebook.
Do you have the time or money to take on the responsibility?
Setting up a Facebook page for your business is a lot like taking a pet into your home. Once the excitement of the first few days is past, you are faced with the fact that you have to feed and walk the dog every day.
Setting up your page is just the beginning. You need to post engaging content regularly. You need to watch your insights (FBs version of analytics), respond to comments, and generally manage your page.
If you aren’t willing or able to invest that time (or pay someone to do it for you), then you should carefully consider whether Facebook is a good place for you. A Facebook page is a commitment to cultivate a relationship with your customers. A stagnant and out of date Facebook page will actually work against you!
Bottom line: while it is important to be open to new ideas and new opportunities, don’t just rush into anything that comes along. Do some research and consider carefully if it really is right for you and your business. There are lots of good reasons to create that cool Facebook page – but there are also lots of good reasons just to take a pass for now.
Contact us if you need help figuring out your digital strategy, and if Facebook should be a part of it!