3 Ways to Increase Your Reach on Facebook
Facebook is a powerful and expansive channel for connecting with your target audience. However, as the number of posts and interactions increase, the likelihood of a specific user seeing your wall post decreases.
Here are 3 ways to change that.
1. Pin or Highlight Wall Posts
Pinning a wall post attaches it as the first post to appear on your Facebook Page’s timeline even when more recent posts are published. Pinned posts will automatically unpin after 7 days if it is not manually unpinned.
Highlighting a wall post enlarges the post to stretch across both columns of the timeline. Compared to pinned posts, highlighted posts still shift lower as new posts are published.
Both options increase the prominence of a post on the Page’s timeline.
2. Encourage Users to Comment or Interact
Newly published wall posts are typically seen by only a fraction of people who Like your Page. If a users comments, likes or shares your post, your post has the chance of appearing in the users’ friends’ news feeds. As a result, your post will be exposed to a secondary audience.
Users who regularly interact on your Facebook Page are more likely than others to see your wall posts on their news feeds.
3. Promoted Posts
Promoted Posts is a Facebook advertising option that lets Page Administrators pay to have specific posts displayed to users or friends of users who like the page. Facebook charges a flat fee based on the number of people the advertisers want to reach. Promoted posts are displayed within the news feeds of users.
Promoted posts may be a suitable option if you have an important event or conversion goal you want to promote.
Victor Chan
Digital Strategist
Tags: advertising, facebook, pin, promoted posts, Social Media, strategy
New Moves in the #SocialTV Sandbox
Comedy Central, MTV and NBC Universal’s Syfy channel continue to muck about in the social TV sandbox – and are seeing successes.
Already there is considerable buzz about Comedy Central’s plan next week to hold a comedy festival exclusively on Twitter. The lineup can be seen here. The hashtag #ComedyFest will be the glue for all the disparate pieces.
Content will be short, to suit the social platform. Comedians (and there are some big names) will post jokes and short video clips – all using the #ComedyFest hashtag. At one point there will even be an online party called “Vine Dining” – leveraging comedic Vine videos for Twitter.
The whole festival will kick off on Twitter with a live stream of Mel Brooks talking about his life, answering questions from a live audience and of course – signing up to Twitter! This event will be moderated by Judd Apatow and Carl Reiner.
It’s interesting for traditional television properties to take bigger chances like this online. And they’re not alone.
MTV is considered one of the leaders of the pack. Most recently, MTV held its Movie Awards show. But to keep its young target audience engaged MTV had to develop several second-screen additions (distractions..? I’m not sure). One such arrangement saw Selena Gomez posting frequent MTV-Awards-Show-related content to her Facebook page. This began days leading up to the show, continued through-out the show and ended when the show concluded. This tactic tapped into Selena’s 42 million+ fans and gave the audience the equivalent of a backstage pass. 
Facebook users were also given access to an exclusive Thank-You Cam where they could watch exclusive interviews of the MTV award winners as they came off stage. Additionally, for weeks leading up to the awards, fans could vote for their favourite movie hero using a designated hashtag on Instagram and Twitter: #besthero. In just two weeks, 3.2 million votes were counted.
Perhaps they’re onto something with all these second-screen additions. At a LostRemote conference this week in New York, a GetGlue executive was quoted as saying “Fans are distracted while watching your TV shows. Why not distract them with your second screen instead?”
MTV is constantly testing and innovating in the digital space. Its audience, consisting largely of 18-to-24 year olds, demands it. MTV launched a Tumblr blog dedicated exclusively to interpreting teen-speak. It also offers up a Facebook app that helps students calculate the cost of college.
Numerous other television networks are experimenting with expanding narrative online, and nurturing relationships between audience and cast, online.
HBO’s cast of Veep create and share “Vines” (short video loops for Twitter) on Twitter. NBC Universal’s Syfy Channel has green-lit a series called Fandemonium. When it premieres in the fall, part of the show will reportedly include regular Google Hangouts between cast and fans.
But the bigger attention getter on the Syfy Channel currently is Defiance.
What sets Defiance apart from other shows is its video game component which, when played, can affect events and characters in the show. This gives fans more than just a chance to further engage with the show, they can actually see how the game play alters its course. Syfy is pushing the social TV agenda hard in many of its shows.
Then there are the pseudo-networks that are now creating original “television” programming, like Netflix and Amazon. Even they’re making headlines with innovative approaches to audience engagement. To help Amazon.com develop bullseye programming for its Prime Instant Video portal, it will first post 14 TV pilots online. This means before any show makes the cut, it must first pass muster with online audiences. All pilots will be free to watch – and judge.
The parameters of the social TV sandbox have yet to be defined. Until that time – if it ever comes – it’s fun to watch the dance between the traditional land of lean-back-and-watch TV with the lean-in-and-engage online space.
Tags: audience, Comedy Central, Comedyfest, facebook, MTV, NBC Universal, selena gomez, socialtv, Syfy, Tumblr, TV, Twitter, Veep, vine
Why Monitoring Matters
A key feature of ALERT & ALERT-TV+ is a way to set up monitoring for your social media channels and general online presence. This is an essential part of any social media strategy. Monitoring not just your own social media channels but also your competitor’s social media channels can pay dividends.
Let’s take a look at two recent case studies to illustrate the point.
Case #1: Samsung – Monitoring and Responding to Its Facebook Fans
In August, electronics giant Samsung showed how monitoring and responding to its social media followers can result in great publicity.
It all began in May 2012 when Facebook user, Shane Barrett posted a picture to the official Samsung Facebook Page. The picture of a crudely drawn dragon was accompanied by a message asking Samsung for a new Galaxy S III smartphone to replace his older model. In return for the phone Shane said that Samsung could keep the picture he had drawn.
Samsung responded, thanking Shane for his picture and query but declining his request for a new phone. Instead, Samsung’s online community manager drew a Kangaroo on a unicycle and sent it back to Shane in response! Shane posted the conversation on the popular social news website Reddit. The post of the conversation quickly became one of the most popular on Reddit and the story went viral.
At this point, Samsung could have sat back and enjoyed the free publicity it had earned. Samsung did not, instead choosing to send Shane a brand new Galaxy S III smartphone with a custom case featuring the dragon he had drawn on his original Facebook post (see below). After receiving the phone, Shane posted a picture of it on Reddit and once again the story and picture went viral earning even more publicity for Samsung.
This token of Samsung’s appreciation for a customer resulted in lots of positive online sentiment for the brand and millions of views of the Reddit posts. By monitoring and responding to its Facebook fans, Samsung gained loads of publicity for the low cost of a new phone.
Case #2: Low Cost Holidays Moves in on Another Travel Firm’s Turf
In November 2011, UK based travel agency Thomas Cook received an interesting request posted to its Facebook Page. The request came from a man who shared the company’s name, Thomas Cook. In his request Thomas asked for a free holiday, posting “Seeing as I share the exact same name as your huge company, and because of this I have been ridiculed for as long as I can remember. I think it’s only fair that you help compensate for this by giving me one of your lovely holidays.” Thomas Cook politely declined and instead directed Mr. Cook to its website where he could book his own holiday.
One of Thomas Cook’s (the travel agency) competitors, Low Cost Holidays was monitoring this conversation. After reading of Mr. Cook’s plight and of Thomas Cook’s reluctance to offer him a free holiday, Low Cost Holidays intervened and offered him one instead saying, “Here at lowcostholidays.com we completely sympathize with your suffering and if your name was “lowcostholidays.com” we would certainly have accepted your request to be sent away on a weekend in Paris. … So how about we send you on that weekend in Paris? In fact why not make it a week for you and a friend?”
After his free holiday Mr. Cook posted a picture of himself in front of the Eiffel tower along with screenshots of the Facebook exchanges he had between Thomas Cook and Low Cost Holidays to Reddit. The posting quickly shot to the number 1 most read slot on Reddit and has garnered thousands of views and comments since. By monitoring its competitors social media channels and reacting in a humorous way, Low Cost Holidays has received lots of positive online sentiment and has been featured across news websites such as Fox News and The Daily Mail.
Despite posting a message to Facebook stating how happy the company was for Mr. Cook and his free holiday, Thomas Cook (the travel agency) received criticism online for its lack of sense of humor when Mr.Cook initially approached for the holiday. Mr. Cooks Reddit post has received over 2,000 comments and has been viewed in excess of 50,000 times, add this to the publication of the story in major news outlets you’ll see that Low Cost Holidays has gained lots of publicity for the relatively low cost of a holiday for two to Paris.
What other great examples have you seen of companies monitoring and responding to their online followers?
Aidan
Tags: digital strategy, engagement, facebook, internet marketing, monitoring social media, Social Media, strategy
Magnify Digital Featured in Forbes – Social TV is Not the New Nielsen
Forbes recently published an article, Social TV Data Is Not The New Nielsen: How It Might Be Better, about whether the average viewer would engage and “lean forward” with television shows in a more active way. The article notes, with the current state of this evolving industry, there are few straight forward conclusions to drawn upon just yet. However, Michael Humphrey, Forbes Contributor, highlights several companies who are working towards game changing answers.
On one side of the argument experts argue no, viewers will not engage with social tv tools, and the metrics do not offer official tracking results, only guesstimates. Experts beg to differ, stating whether the results are 100% accurate or not does not matter. What counts is that there is a huge opportunity out there to engage with the audience in ways that broadcasters and producers have never been able to before, that goes beyond just metrics.
Moyra Rodger, CEO Magnify Digital, weighed in on this topic by stating that producers and broadcasters are not monitoring social data early enough in the process in order to make strategic decisions.
While the entire industry is maneuvering their way through new tools, metrics, statistics, and reports, only one thing can be said for certain of the future of social tv: it is not going away anytime soon.
Read the full article here.
Tweet us @magnifydigital or comment below to let us know your thoughts about the future of Social TV.
Maryam Mehrtash
@socialmaryam
Tags: digital strategy, facebook, forbes, Social TV, Twitter
You Can’t Do That On Facebook
Did you know that Facebook reserves the right to “reject or remove (Facebook) Pages for any reason” at any time? Of course you did, right? It’s stated in those terms and conditions you read and agreed to. Except, even if you were one of the few that really did read through every word of the legalese, rules can change. And they do. Especially on Facebook.
Recently, I’ve stumbled across various articles that have laid out what you can’t do on Facebook, which inspired me to write this post. Consider it a Coles Notes version of the current status of Facebook “law”. Because the last thing you want is to have your Facebook Page, including that carefully cultivated community you’ve been building, torn out of the almighty book.
So listen up. Here are just some of the things you cannot do on Facebook Pages:
- Be Real. You can’t use a fake name or pseudonym for your Facebook username, and you need a legit username before you can launch a Page. Oh – and while we’re talking about name restrictions, don’t use ALLCAPS, or any $ymbol$ in your Page name.
- Keep Your Contests (Mostly) Off Facebook. You are not allowed to base a contest solely on Facebook. You also can’t make Facebook functionality, as in “liking”, sharing or commenting, the core action of your contest.
- Take Responsibility. You cannot hold Facebook accountable for any data collected on Facebook via promotions, surveys, or polls you run. You must include a disclaimer not only stating that you are collecting the information (not Facebook) but also disclose who the entrant is giving their information to and what it’s being used for.
- Find Another Voting System. You cannot use the ‘like’ button as a voting function. For example, stating that an entrant can win a contest if his/her photo receives the most ‘likes.’
- Reach Out To Contest Entrants Outside of Facebook. You cannot use Facebook messaging features, including inbox messages, wall posts, chat, or a business Page to notify contest winners (or losers) of their status in the contest.
- Keep Advertising Tactics Off the Cover Photo. The cover photo cannot be used as an advertising billboard. That’s right folks. That means no contact details, no pricing information, no discounts, no promotions, and no calls to action. You can’t even have any graphical elements in the cover photo that would entice users to select a Facebook feature, such as pointing to the Like or Share icons. As if that wasn’t enough “don’ts” for one photo space, there is one more, don’t upload any photos you don’t own the rights to.
- Use a Third Party Application. Since you cannot use Facebook features to run a promotion or contest, instead use a third party application to make sure you are in the safe zone. You can ask an entrant to like your Facebook Page, check in, or connect to your app as a step in the process of entering, but this action alone cannot automatically result in the entrant registering for the contest or promotion.
As you read through these rules, you’re probably thinking how can any of these actually be true since you see people break them all the time. Well, you are right. People do break them all the time, likely because they have no idea what the rules were or are now. Facebook has been known to shut down or remove Pages it feels violates its rules, but how does it monitor and keep track of every Page? Especially considering the rules, functionality, and features change all the time. It’s really tough to say, but best to stay on the good side of the world’s largest, arguably most powerful, social network.
Maryam Mehrtash
@socialmaryam
Tags: contests, cover photo, facebook, pages, promotions, rules, Social Media
