The Big, The Bad and The Beautiful: Facebook's Potential for Business
A few months ago, I posed the question here (and to myself) "Is Facebook marketing dead?" If the title of this blog post doesn’t give away the answer, then let me be clear – it’s not. I recently attended Facebook’s Boost Your Business event in Minneapolis where experts such as Mari Smith and others talked about the potential Facebook holds for businesses. Here are a few facts I learned:
- Facebook now boasts more than 1 billion daily active users.
- Time spent on Facebook accounts for 20% of total time spent on mobile devices.
- The average mobile user checks Facebook 14 times a day and spends an average of 41 minutes on the social network.
- There are 4 billion video views on Facebook every day.
These facts come from Jonathan Czaja, Facebook’s director of small business and the event’s keynote speaker. Granted, one must take those statistics with a grain of salt considering they came directly from Facebook. Still, Facebook is clearly prime territory for marketers, and that doesn’t seem to be changing any time soon.
Size Matters
What is amazing to me about Facebook is that you have so many people on one platform. I mean, 1 BILLION daily active users is an astronomical number. And yet, the true value for marketers on Facebook is the network’s ability to help you find the right people.
At the July 30th event, Czaja implored those of us in attendance to tell our authentic story and to keep the user in mind. It can be tempting to see these huge user numbers and try to reach as many people as possible. However, time and time again as I talked to marketers at the event, it was impressed upon me the value of targeting your audience and finding the right people.
So Facebook’s sheer size is a huge advantage, but maybe not in the way you may have previously thought. Its ability to give you so much opportunity to find the right people for your brand makes it a valuable tool for marketers.
Let’s Talk About Ads
Just as I addressed the shifts in Facebook marketing, Villing and Co. president Thom Villing has discussed the changes occurring in advertising (Spoiler alert: He doesn’t think advertising is dead, either).
DVR and video streaming have allowed people to skip ads if they desire. Some newspapers are now even eliminating ads in their membership. It’s no secret that some people are not all that fond of advertising.
Don’t think I’m about to tell you that Facebook is a magical land where everyone loves seeing ads and they click on every one. No, it’s not. However, the value I discussed earlier that comes from the network’s large user database plays a role here as well. Not only can you find the right people to connect with your brand on Facebook, you can find the right people for your ads.
Facebook is a personal forum. Ads show up between pictures of family and friends. So traditional ways of doing advertising may not be the best idea. However, features such as Facebook’s Carousel Ads allow you to present advertisements in a way that feels natural. On top of that, you can target ads to the people who are most likely to interact.
To be clear, I am not advocating for ads to be disguised on social media – something that has been a focus for the FTC recently. No these are ads, and they are clearly designated as such. What I’m talking about is Facebook’s ability to help you serve ads to people who will probably be inclined to click and NOT serve them to people who will only be annoyed.
Build a Strategy
Social media marketing is an ever-shifting landscape. Just as with all types of marketing, a clear strategy with targeted goals goes a long way. Facebook is not some kind of silver bullet in marketing, and you must have realistic goals and expectations. However, the fact remains that there is a wealth of opportunity for marketers on Facebook. It certainly deserves your attention.
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