Facebook Marketing: Even More Takeaway Tips

Facebook Marketing: “Are we there yet?”

You could be one block away from your driveway or entertaining this question for the millionth time along a ten day roadtrip. “Are we there yet?” drives us all crazy no matter where we are going. Yet, we continue driving, onward, forward, closer to our destination.

Today, as we examine Webtrends latest road trip, the four-city series of Facebook Sessions we review the digital road most traveled: Facebook.

Traveling to Atlanta, New York City, Chicago and San Francisco, Webtrends led the path with other social trailblazers who presented best practices on the latest trends in Facebook marketing. Participants included top tier agencies mixed with marketing and technology leaders representing companies like @Motorola, @CBSi, @CharlesSchwab, @PopChips, @LeoBurnett, @Groupon, @StateFarm, @MillerCoors, @Mortons, @McDonalds, @LeviStraussCo, @potterybarn and many more!

In previous posts, we shared a robust list of takeaways from the Chicago session, including the the first Facebook marketing takeaways and tips followed by a deeper look into Facebook’s Edge Rank and its impact on your wall posts.

The previous posts include Facebook marketing references for you:

- Facebook Marketing: Takeaway Tips to Help You Make Sense of the Madness

- Facebook Marketing: More Takeaway Tips

And, that is just the beginning of the rich resources on Facebook marketing that we want to share with you. The following tips, trends, facts and whatnots are additional references collected from the Chicago Facebook Session, as presented by Dennis Yu and Justin Kistner:

L. WHATNOT: Apps can be customized for the end to end management of Facebook initiatives including 1. Driving.   2. Engaging.    3. Measuring. tweet this >

M. TIP: Create customized tabs as landing pages and apps to send alerts and use direct ads to highly segmented targets and more to meet company goals. tweet this >

N. WHATNOT: Facebook marketing is all about brand strategy. Facebook marketing basic truth: Get the people who already love you to share the love. When in doubt, go to the brand roots. tweet this >

O. TREND: The Facebook engagement funnel model starts at the top: Awareness > Like > Permissions > Share > Engage > Buy. tweet this >

P. FACT: A typical Facebook fan has an average friend network of 310 and makes 5.3 clicks per day. 83% of fans want exclusive offers and benefits. tweet this >

Q. TIP: Treat your fans like VIP and your brand value will grow. For example, don’t devalue your brand by offering 2 for 1 discounts to fans, instead give premium offers. Enrich, nurture and engage with your existing customer base to grow a quality, loyal fan base. tweet this >

R. FACT: What are the main drivers that bring new fans to your page? 75% of fans come from an invitation or an ad, 59% from a friend and 49% from search. tweet this >

S. WHATNOT: Images are the #1 most important aspect of your Facebook advertising. You may be surprised with the images that drive best results. Focus group research is simplified with social. Use a variety of images with your ad message on your next campaign. Facebook ad’s click-thru rates typically go flat within 3 days. tweet this >

T. TIP: For Facebook advertising, use a variety of images for testing and refreshing. For a 30 day ad run, consider using 10 refreshed versions thru cycle. tweet this >

U. TREND: An average of 7 hours per month are spent on Facebook activity, giving Facebook the highest levels of traffic than any other search, social, game or other stand alone site. tweet this >

V. TIP: For your next campaign, use ads, wall posts, email, website, tv, print and more to drive traffic to a customized landing page on your Facebook page. tweet this >

W. WHATNOT: What is “like blocking a tab?” A: Behind this wall, there will be goodies. Like us and you can see it. (“Want a banana? Click “Like Us” and get free bananas!”) tweet this >

X. FACT: Like-blocking a tab is a technique that may grow the quantity of fans, but not quality. Overall, it is not fan-nurturing. tweet this >

Y. TREND: Google and Facebook offer analytic and insight tools limited to page metrics, tab views and site referrals. Check out the value-added Webtrends Analytics 10 that provides more metric options to help you analyze more data for greater campaign impact. tweet this >

Z. WHATNOT: There are many drivers to get traffic to your Facebook page. From a variety of channels, online and in print, the simple wall posts are most liked by clients. They are FREE and EASY. However, if the Edge Rank value is low, then no one is viewing your wall posts because it isn’t making the news feeds. The more you continue to add wall posts, with no engagement, the more your Edge Rank score decreases and spiraling downward quickly leaving your Facebook page with little to zero value. Make wall posts engaging. Some themes of wall posts that are most likely to be clicked include: 1. Touching, emotional stories. 2. Provocative, passionate debates. 3. Important sport wins. 4. Simple and easy questions. tweet this >

Where are you on the map of Facebook marketing?

Considering that hundreds of ad agency mavens and marketing experts from leading Fortune 100 companies were represented, with only one person in the Chicago Facebook Session raising his hand when asked, “Who is using fan-leveled data for marketing research?” is it safe to say that as an industry, we are only beginning?

As we embark in this digital frontier, we can easily get lost, anxiously asking if we will ever clearly understand the technologies in our midst.

As we reflect from the lessons shared on this series in Facebook marketing, from A to Z, including wall posts, tabs and metrics, from the review mirror, the overall takeaway is this:

It’s not about the message or the medium. It is about the brand. tweet this >

About the Author: Andrea Cook is a brand builder, buzz generator, media developer and out of the box razzle-dazzler. She works for marketing agency in Indiana called The Midas Center. As owner of iHEART Green Media, she creates media for street-corner communities that promote all that is good in the marketplace for local businesses and the quality of life in small towns.