Maximizing the engagement on Facebook News Feed posts is critical to Facebook Marketing.
Building engagement is a process, not a once and done function, and there are multiple keys to the process including:
- Interesting Content
- Publishing at key times for the audience
- Inviting comments, questions, and shares
- Offering promotions. Contests, deals, and offers can help
If you offer a contest, deal, or promotions to assist in pulling fans and a larger community to your Page, a key is posting that promotion correctly to maximize it's visibility in the News Feed and to best prompt viewer actions.
Too many businesses are failing to get the word out effectively in the News Feed and then wondering why the engagement is lower than expected.
Getting the attention of and making it easy for all fans (desktop and mobile) to access the promotion can totally make or break your promotion getting traction! It can mean the difference between 5 entries and 500 entries; between 5 Likes and Shares and 5000 Likes and Shares!
So how do you best get the word out on Facebook?
The Answer:
Post a photo or video to your News Feed with a call to action and a Smart URL in the description field.
Why a photo or video?
Facebook, in its own research, found that the most successful posts for capturing the attention of users and inspiring action are visual. Photo albums generated 180 percent more engagement than other types of posts, and individual photos 120 percent more. Since 40 percent of a Facebook user’s time is spent in the News feed, capturing attention to inspire a “Like,” comment or share by using images is critical.
Quick Guide for posting your contest or promotion to Facebook.
1. This works for posting to your Facebook Page or a Facebook personal profile.
2. Next Select “Attach Photo / Video”
3. Choose the photo
Choose the image you want to post, add a text description to inform viewers of the promotion (this is the call-to-action that fans will see in their News Feed when the image catches their eye!), and include a smart URL to the tab in the description so that desktop and mobile viewers can access the tab.
4. Schedule the Facebook Post
You can simply publish the post, but best practice would be to schedule it to go out at a optimum time.
On each fan page Facebook offers ability to schedule a time when a post will go live. This is a valuable tool because you can plan ahead and ensure posts go live at times when your audience (fans) are most likely to be on Facebook.
You can prepare a post and schedule it to appear later by adding a date and time in the future before you post it. You can schedule a post up to 6 months in advance in 10-minute intervals.
From your Page’s sharing tool:
- Choose the type of post you want to add to your Page
- Click the time
icon in the lower-left of the sharing tool - Choose the future year, month, day, hour and minute when you’d like your post to appear
- Click Schedule
If you choose a date in the past, the post will appear immediately at the appropriate place on your Page’s timeline. All times correspond to the current time zone you’re in.
Following this procedure gives you the best means of sharing information about your promotion and drawing in fans to participate. As the Facebook study showed, photos and videos get the most engagement. They capture the attention of viewers. Since most Facebook users spend the most time on Facebook in their news feed, this offers a way to capture their attention and pull them in to the promotion. With photos and videos continually performing better in engagement (Likes, Shares, and Comments) this method is the best current practice for sharing your promotion on Facebook.
