BACKSTREET BOYS ISN'T JUST A BAND. IT'S A LIFESTYLE.

 

 

 

 

Class 5: Getting Social: The Ins and Outs of Facebook Fan Pages

A lot of people don’t realize it, but Facebook was created originally for college students. It was not meant for your Mom, your Dad, your Grandmother, or that teacher you had in second grade who wants to be friends with you and keeps requesting.

Alas, everybody is on Facebook, which makes having a kick-ass Facebook page a big deal.

Facebook is more than just posting content, which is a big deal, but it goes a lot deeper. There’s the number of likes or follows, engagement, and how many people are actually seeing your content.

But let’s not get ahead of ourselves.

Creating It

First thing you need to know is that to create a fan page, you should not create an actual Facebook account. That’s a personal account. You have to approve who follows you which isn’t what you want to do. What you want to do is create a page as a part of your personal account. Most call it a business page, but really, it’s just a page.

  1. Make sure you are logged into your personal Facebook account.
  2. At the top of your Facebook home page, select Create and then Page. In the new Facebook layout, the + sign beside your name is actually the Create
  3. You should have already decided on this, so type in your Page’s Name and type in and choose “Fan Page” for your Category.
  4. Share your Description on what your Facebook Page is about.
  5. This is where you can add a Cover Photo (the big photo at the top of the page) and a Profile Photo. You do not have to do this right when you create the Page, but if you already have things created, you can.
    1. Remember when I mentioned Canva.com last time? Canva is a GREAT place to make graphics with specific sizes just for Facebook – even the cover photos.
  6. After you have done all of that, you can go through and add more information about your page such as your other social media accounts or link to your blog.

“If you’re keeping the right company, then you’ll have surrounded yourself with women who want to conquer just as much as you do.”

Kathleen Smith, The Fangirling Life

Content For The Win

It doesn’t really matter how much you promote your Facebook page, because without content, it will go nowhere.

The first real rule is to post content that is relative to your followers. For instance, if you are running a Taylor Swift Facebook Fan Page, you are going to want to post content that Taylor Swift fans want to see. You would not want to post things about Ariana Grande because unless your followers are also a fan of Ariana. There may be some overlap, but maybe no.

Another example with me is when I post about my books that I write. There are some followers of my Facebook page that do read my books and stories, but not everybody. Those posts do not do as well as the ones when I’m posting breaking Backstreet Boys news or what I think about a new song.

So sometimes I think about this not being my website or my Facebook account. I think about what I would want to see show up on my Facebook homepage from a fan page.

Here’s a list of content ideas that I like to use when coming up with Facebook content:

  • Blog Posts
    Blog posts are the number one thing for BSBFangirls.com. When I publish a blog post, it will automatically go out to Twitter and Facebook. But posting blog posts automatically can be tricky because Facebook will sometimes try to post the entire blog post, or more than you want to give away. If you give away too much of the blog post, why would anybody want to go to your site? It’s like the old saying, “why buy the cow when you’re giving away the milk for free?”
  • Questions
    Whatever you post, you want to get user engagement. It makes your numbers better if you’re into that kind of thing. So asking questions on any kind of Facebook post, whether it’s a blog post, a photo, or a video, you want to entice a response. Maybe you’re asking what they think about a certain TV appearance or music video? Always end your post with a question. Always.
  • Videos
    Videos are a big thing on Facebook, especially if the video isn’t a link to YouTube but an actual video that will keep people on your page. However, if you’re uploading non-original content such as TV appearances, be careful because the Facebook law enforcers will get you for copyright infringement and block your video.
  • Photos
    Photos on Facebook are a little tricky. Sure, it’s easy to post one, but Facebook is not Instagram which is made for photos. You want to have a reason for your photo. Maybe you’re telling a story about an event you went to as a Throwback Thursday. Don’t just post a photo. Make sure you’re saying something about the photo and even better, ask that question we talked about!
  • Did You Know …
    Reliving a fact or even a Today in History post is always a good idea because it can make people share the post, which in return gets your content out in front of more than just your followers.
  • Contests and Giveaways
    Everybody loves free stuff, right? Especially when it’s something they like, such as some Backstreet Boys merch or anything from your specific fandom. Don’t go overboard though. It’s a great way to expand your reach, brand awareness, engagement, and get more followers. Make sure you list the rules, such as when entries close, locations that the contest is open for, and anything else.

These are just a few tips of things you can do for content on your Facebook page. And yes, the same can be done on other platforms, but … not everything that is good for Facebook is good for Instagram or Twitter.

“Social media platforms want to profit from our cultures and memory-making but have shown no desire to archive and care for them. As fans, we have to ensure that what we’ve made isn’t just data to be dropped into the online after. Because what we do matters. We make cultural history.”

Hannah Ewens, Fangirls

Consistency & Overdoing It

The biggest thing with any social media is consistency, but how consistent should you be? That’s the thing. It’s different for every social media platform. We will talk about the other platforms in our other social media classes, but for today, it’s all Facebook.

The rule for Facebook is don’t post constantly.

There was a study by the University of Colorado Denver that said that the number one reason why people dump Facebook friends is that they get annoyed of being continuously bombarded with useless posts.

This goes for pages, also.

Hubspot also did an analysis of Facebook data from their 13,500-plus customers to see if posting more helped their businesses. While this is for businesses, running a fan page is almost like a business, but a lot more fun.

They found that businesses with more than 10k followers were the only ones who saw increased clicks when posting more than once a day. Businesses with less than 10k followers received 50 percent fewer clicks per post when they published twice a day.

However, the analysis showed that Facebook pages that posted 1-5 times a month saw their engagement almost double. I personally do not agree with that figure because I feel like you lose touch and that connection with your followers if you don’t even post some weeks.

As a general rule, I try not to post more than once a day. I do skip some days when I don’t have any new content on the blog or anything interesting to post. Facebook has algorithms that if you post too much, it will block out some of your content.

It takes a bit to find your happy medium of being consistent and not overdoing it.

What Not To Do

Resharing Official Accounts

Much like I said in the overview for social media, you do not want to consistently only repost things that your official fandom accounts post. Not only do sharing post count towards your post that day, it’s also annoying. Instead of just reposting, how about sharing the news in your own words if you have nothing else new to post that day.

Buy Followers

You can spend your hard-earned money to buy follower, but guess what? They got paid when they followed you, so unless they are an actual fan of your content or fandom, they are not going to waste their time liking your posts or engaging. Facebook uses algorithms to decide what to include on home pages of followers and non-followers. How do they get the algorithms? Your engagement numbers – likes, comments, shares, etc. That’s why sharing original content or at least having a purpose behind posting something, is important.

Quick Tips

  • When sharing a link to Facebook, write something about the link you are sharing and Facebook should populate a quick tease to the post. Therefore, you can delete the actual long URL in the post. It’s cleaner.
  • Share original videos. Facebook has recently changed their algorithms so that live video and longer videos are prioritized. Thought about making a vlog? Or do you edit videos? Get on it.
  • When you have a Facebook page and have had it for a bit, you can use Facebook Insights to learn more about those who follow you and like your content. You can learn a lot about the demographic that makes up your followers and likes. You can see what times they are mostly online and what kind of content is the most popular. This goes a long way. I use this both professionally and for BSBFangirls.com’s Facebook page.
  • Use a calendar system to come up with a content calendar. I will suggest this for Facebook and Instagram, but also your blog. You mix the three into one calendar to write down important dates and keep track of things for social media. I started doing this personally for BSBFangirls.com after I started doing it with my job. And it helps me! You can plan out posts and schedule it on Facebook.com in your Creator Studio, which is a part of your Facebook page. If you have an Instagram story, you can also schedule those there. I’m going to talk more about Creator Studio in our Instagram class.

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