6 Ways to Make Your Social Media Stand Out on Facebook

July 23, 2018

We all pride ourselves on getting the job done right — on time and on budget (we’ve actually been hard-pressed to find a construction company that doesn’t…). But what do you do when your social media efforts aren’t getting the kind of quality results your company is used to?

Follow these six simple rules to improve your return on investment and make your company’s Facebook projects really stand out:

1. Target fans, not followers.

Random Likes may make you feel good, but they don’t put money in the bank. You’ll find the most long-term success if you have a solid foundation to build upon.

Focus on a smaller, more targeted community. Speak to the people who are actually interested in your product or service. These are the people that will form your base, the people who will engage with your content: liking, commenting and sharing, essentially vetting your company as they connect you to their followers.

2. Keep posts short and sweet.

Facebook is a social media, so think of it as a social function.

Think cocktail party: nobody wants to get stuck in a long-winded conversation they really don’t care about.

Think punchline: you don’t need to be the life of the party, but you should have a point, make it and get out.

According to Buffer Media, the optimal length for Facebook post engagement is 40 characters. Forty! Seems like bupkis, right? That’s less than the length of this sentence!

Fortunately, this is just a best practice. Sometimes weighing in with a lengthy explanation or opinion is necessary to display your expertise, but in general, recognize that your real estate is precious, attention spans are short, and it takes work to be concise.

If you consistently find yourself going long, ask yourself — “could this be multiple posts?” Series of posts scheduled out over time effectively and consistently deliver quality content to your audience.

3. Put images with your posts.

No matter how great your wordsmithing gets, a post with an image is always better. Forget the studies showing visual content is 40 times more likely to get a reaction — go with common sense: Facebook is a visual medium, so make your posts visually appealing.

Your pictures don’t need to be perfect. Live videos and spontaneous photos are ideal for encouraging engagement because they add urgency and immediacy to your content. Take a “men at work” photo or video at a jobsite (I don’t mean performing their own rendition of “Down Under,” though I bet that your engagement from that post would go through the roof!). Tons of successful brands only use amateur footage to promote themselves on social platforms because their fans consider it more authentic.

Experiment and be creative — but remember to make your posts visually appealing.

4. Start a conversation.

Asking questions inspires comments; you’ve probably noticed everyone loves sharing their opinions… But if your goal is to grow your following, don’t ask pointless questions and hope someone has the free time to answer. Again, think cocktail party. If you were at a party with nine other construction people, what would you talk about? Work? Sports? Fishing? Work backwards, think about these conversations and find the questions you could ask to start them. Real conversations around posts can last for days (or weeks) and get picked up by anyone interested in the topic.

Think of conversations, not questions.

Consider tough business choices you make everyday and ask your fans for their opinions: Which equipment is best? Which stingless paving system do you prefer for concrete gutter work? Where should we go for lunch?

Build a sense of community around your page (different than actual Facebook groups) to encourage your followers to interact with your content. This will increase the success of your content every time you post.

5. Use social tagging.

Using social tags is a great way to reach out to other people or companies you don’t know directly. So, when you create that post celebrating your great supplier, don’t forget to tag them. Social tags (or @ mentions) will notify the person you’re tagging and allow your followers to easily find them on Facebook.

For example we are @MayeCreate on Facebook. If you tag us in a post or like us on Facebook, we may like or share your post (we definitely will).

This method of social tagging can be great for “borrowing” another brand’s reach. (If we interact with your post, some of our followers will see it.) More importantly, it’s a great way to build relationships in and around your field.

6. Ask for likes.

Remember when we told you the best way to get client reviews for your construction company is to ASK? Same goes for growing your Facebook following:

Need another compelling reason to encourage engagement when producing your content? Facebook will allow you to invite the people who reacted to your post to like your business page. So every time someone reacts to your Facebook content (Like, Love, Haha, Wow, Sad or Angry) do that. It’s that simple…. All you’ve got to do is click on the link next to the reaction on the actual post to bring up a list of everyone who reacted to that post.

Click on your post reactions to bring up a list of people you can invite to like your page.

This can be an effective way to invite new fans who are already interacting with your content to like your page, or to remind others who may not realize they aren’t following you directly.

Behavioral scientists call this a “nudge.” The rate of return on this can vary, as many people will choose to ignore your request (or possibly not even notice), but asking for likes can be a very effective method for increasing the number of followers on newer or less-followed pages.

Future Advice: Try Boosting Posts

Once you’ve mastered these six steps, try putting some money behind your posts! Boosting a post on Facebook is an inexpensive way for you to reach new audiences and build your following. Check out this in-depth blog post by MobileMonkey, How to Boost a Post on Facebook for Top Results: Step-by-Step & Tips from Facebook Ads Blitz King Dennis Yu to learn how to effectively boost your first Facebook post! 

Go forth with confidence.

So, as we’ve always said, there are benefits to having a social media presence. Now it’s time to harness its power without feeling like you’re going to break the Internet — and knowing what your audience responds to while interacting with your followers will help you to develop an engaged audience over time and earn you significantly better results for your Facebook business page.