Every day, I am amazed, bewildered, humored, and saddened by some of the things I see Small Business Owners do on Facebook.
There seems be chaos and confusion amongst many of the small business owners that are suddenly posting in groups! I feel compelled to shine some common sense on this particular subject.
Let’s say your name is Joe and you are the owner of Joe’s Pizza (yea, I know. I mention pizza quite often!) Okay, so Joe from Joe’s pizza has a Facebook page for his small business. That’s great! Good job, Joe! Then somebody tells Joe that he should post an ad for his business in some of these groups. Great idea! Posting in groups is a fantastic way to get your name in front of potential customers! Here’s the most common scenario that I see…
Joe, from Joe’s Pizza is a business owner. He types in “business” or “small business” in the Facebook search bar. Then he clicks on GROUPS. So far, so good right? Wait! Don’t answer yet! So Joe’s clicks JOIN on a few of the groups. Within a short period of time, Joe’s get notified that he has been added to these groups. Aww, life is good! Joe’s gonna reach a lot more people now by posting in the groups, right? Go ahead, say “right”.
Here’s the problem(s) that Joe just created for himself….
1. Business groups are mainly small business owners advertising to each other. Not a complete waste of time, but definitely not the best groups for Joe to join! There aren’t as many people in those groups and at least 40% of them are from other states and/or counties, and they’re only in the group to advertise their best-in-the-world SEO service or some kind of magic Facebook Ads formula…
2. Joe joined groups that are NOT within his customer radius. (A pizza shop has about a 6 to 8 mile radius for customers) Joe is wasting his time if he expects results of any magnitude from these groups.
So, Joe writes a post & publishes it in the business group and includes a photo (many times it’s a poor scan of his business card). This makes Joe look like the total amateur that he is.
Anyone in that group the happens to see Joe’s post & crappy scan of his business card, is most likely never going to Joe’s Pizza. WHY? It’s simple: Joe didn’t include a link to his page, so there’s not a snowball’s chance in hell that anyone who happens to SEE his post, are going to search for the Joe’s Pizza Facebook page! Joe is actually relying on the memory of the people in the group if he expects to get any business from his post! It’s not going to happen.
Here are 3 simple rules to follow when posting in groups:
1. Use your head. Know your customer radius. If you’re a brick & mortar retailer figure out where your customers are coming from and how far they’ll travel to spend their money at your business. (be realistic about it) If you’re a service related business, how far will YOU travel to do what you do? Posting and fielding phone calls from outside of your service area is a waste of your time.
2. Always SHARE a good, creative, attention getting posts from your business Facebook page, to the group(s). This way, with a simple click, people will visit your page and they’ll LIKE your page.
3. Reaching people OUTSIDE of your realistic customer radius is a waste of your time. (It doesn’t matter how fantastic your pizza is, no one is going to consistently travel 30 miles each way to eat it!)