How often do you post on Facebook for your business? Are your fans liking, sharing and commenting? I love social media as much as the next person, but sometimes too much of a good thing is just, well, too much. Sometimes, the continuous posts blowing up news feeds can cause fans to scroll past your posts.
Besides the news feed overwhelm for your fans, there are other disadvantages to over posting:
You’re in a constant content struggle, trying to come up with interesting things to post.
This struggle often results in posting content of little value that doesn’t really engage your followers.
Engagement drops when you over post. People stop caring about what you have to say.
Engagement is the key!
Do the math for your posts:
But all is not lost! There are some things you can try to see if your user engagement improves:
Look at the engagement stats inside your Facebook insights: number of views, shares and comments for each post. You can tell which ones are of interest to your followers and which ones aren’t. Stop posting the ones that aren’t.
In general, Facebook users react more favorably to posts they see between 8pm and 7am, a less busy time for businesses posting. Schedule your posts to occur at different times and experiment a bit, to see what works the best.
Be sure you’re posting something of value: New merchandise or services, discounts or special offers.
Use appealing visuals and videos. Every time. But don’t re-use the same ones too frequently.
Ask a question and encourage followers to answer, but make sure it’s relevant to your business. For example, if you’re a fruit & veggie mart, ask people how many apples they ate this week. Include a recommendation for healthy eating habits. And offer them a free apple next time they stop in!
With ranking algorithms as mind-blowing as they are, it’s hard to quote a good engagement rate. But if you’re a small business with less than 10,000 fans it’s safe to say that an average engagement rate (likes, comments, shares) should be close to 1%, which is considered good.* That doesn’t sound like a lot, but consider that only about 1% of your social network is truly engaged. (The 90-9-1 rule of thumb suggests that 1% is your naturally engaged audience, 9% your infrequently engaged audience, and 90% your unengaged audience.)
So keep being social, but keep it valuable and keep track of what your fans love!
*Source: MichaelLeander.me