Facebook Marketing Mistakes Your Business Should Avoid

With over 1.55 billion active users every month, it’s easy to see why Facebook is a favorite with marketers. However, investing in Facebook marketing can be wasteful if you don’t do it right. Here’s a list of top 5 mistakes to avoid.

1. Promoting too much

Being too promotional in your posts can backfire. People go on social media to connect, even with brands. Whether you do this by offering value or through posts with a more personal touch, this softer approach to building an audience yields much more positive results than a hard sell.

Innovation works as well. Jokes, memes and any kind of novel material can draw in an audience and build brand engagement. There is also Newegg’s example. Newegg managed to gather 1.4 million likes for a single post in which the company congratulated one of its customer service representatives on her 15 years anniversary with the company.

2. Focusing on Likes too much

Likes are important, there’s no doubt about that, but they shouldn’t be the main focus. What you are trying to do with your Facebook marketing campaign is to create brand loyalty. If you focus on brand loyalty, the Likes and Shares will naturally follow.

Reese’s managed to gather 11,815 like and 7,508 shares with a simple post of a brownie recipe that used Reese’s Minis as garnish. Again, we see the importance of engaging the audience in an innovative way.

You can also maximize your engagement by posting at the right times of day in order to increase shares. According to Buddy Media, Thursday and Friday have 18% higher engagement rates than other days.

3. Not enough information for your brand page

When it comes to brand pages, there’s no such thing as too much information. You want your visitors to know everything about your company, from contact details and URL, to working hours and address. Whatever you think a visitor might need to know about your company, throw it on the brand page.

4. Using too many words

Keep it short and sweet. Posts that are around 250 characters get 60% more shares, with 80 character posts getting even more.

You also want to have a regular posting schedule that is tailored to your audience. Depending on the audience, your engagement rates are affected if you post too often or too rarely.

Whenever you have to stop posting for a while, it’s a good idea to let your audience know. Likewise, let them know when you are ready to start posting consistently again.

5. Posting out of context

Avoid going to out of context with your posts. You want to keep it brand related. Whether this is through videos, images or text, the message should remain close to home. This does not mean rigidity however. When a major event happens, you can always take advantage and create a brand-related post. For example, when Luiz Suarez, the star of Uruguay’s soccer team, bit the shoulder of a defender from Italy’s national team, brands such as McDonald’s and Snickers didn’t miss a beat.

Conclusion

The best way to go about marketing on Facebook is to establish a back and forth with your visitors. You want to have a flexible enough relationship, where you are comfortable with trying out new things. If you engage your audience in such a way, while being aware of the mistakes that should be avoided, you’ll find great success in your campaigns.