25 Red Hot
Facebook Group Hacks
Do you know what
gets 10 times the engagement of a Facebook Page?
A Facebook Group.
If you’re still
using Facebook Pages, welcome to 2020, where Facebook GROUPS are the way to win
new customers and make sales.
I’m about to show
you how to get people to automatically want to join your group, how to grow
your email list and how to get your group members to tell you want they want to
BUY from you, too.
Here are 25 rapid
fire tips to help you master any Facebook group you're using for business.
1: Invite Them
to Join Your Group Right Away
When someone comes
to your website, send them to your ‘start here’ page. Give them a little bit of
an introduction, and then immediately invite them to join your community on
Facebook, a group of friendly members who are all there to help each other
succeed.
Give them the link
with the words, “Click here to request to join.”
Or right after
they subscribe to your email list, ask them to join your Facebook Group.
If you’re doing a
promotion of some kind, maybe step 1 is to share the promotion on Twitter or
LinkedIn, and step 2 is to join the group.
You get the idea –
make it easy, invite them early and often, and tell them why they want to join
you group.
2: Invite
Them Again
Place an invitation at the end of your emails in the
signature section.
Place it in forum signatures and any and everywhere else
that it’s appropriate.
3: Create an
Effective Link
Create a link that is YourWebsite.com/community to take
people to your Facebook Group to join.
Why not use the word “Group” or “FBGroup” instead of
“Community?”
Because a community implies a sense of connection and
belonging – two things people crave.
4:
Sprinkle that Link EVERY Where
Do you have your own podcast? Mention the link. Are
you a guest on someone else’s podcast or webinar? Mention the link.
Social media? Use the link.
Hand out your Group Link like a business card. Or
like candy. Or both.
5: Link
Your Groups Together
If you have multiple Facebook Groups, link them
together like this:
Go to a different group than the one you want to
promote
Go to ‘more’
Click on ‘link existing group,’
Then type in the group your linking and hit ‘link’
Now it will say that the Group Admin recommends
this other Group
6:
Feature a Group Member Outside of the Group
Choose someone inside your Group to feature in a
blogpost, podcast, video, social media, or wherever you like.
This lets people know that there’s a community they
can join, and that you’re featuring people from there, giving them free
publicity.
7: Get
Personal
Write personal messages to the top contributors in
your group.
To find them, go to your Group and click on “Group
Insights.” Click on “members” and you’ll see a list of the top contributors,
how many posts they've created and even the comments they've made.
Send them a personal message THANKING them. In most
cases you will totally make their day. They’ll feel the warm fuzzies and
they’ll want to contribute even more to the Group.
8: Share the Prestige
Choose some of your top
contributors to be moderators.
By giving your top people
authority to moderate, they can help you control the spam and police the
trolls.
They can also remove and
delete posts, as well as approving new members into the group.
Perhaps best of all, it
rewards your top contributors and allows them to feel chosen and special. This
takes work off of your shoulders and creates ‘superfans’ who have your back and
know they are part of your team.
9: Share Exclusive Content
Show them stuff behind
the scenes that no one else gets to see. Make them feel like they're a part of
something special and exclusive.
You might show them your
process, what you’re working on, or give them info or stories that you share
with no one else online.
Tell them what you're dealing with right now, and
even go live and share something important about yourself or your business.
You might also give them first looks at a new
product you have in development, and even get feedback on it, too.
If you’re writing a book, share a chapter with
them, or a first look at the cover. People want to feel like they are on the
‘inside,’ and they’re interested in the processes that bring things to
fruition, too.
And they even love hearing about the mistakes
you’ve made and what you learned from them – maybe even more so than hearing
about your triumphs.
10: Ask for Their Help
People love to be asked for their opinion and
advice. Maybe you’re working on something and you have multiple options - share
those options with your group members and see what they think.
Are you designing a logo or book cover? Show them
the options and ask which one they like, and why.
Are you debating between two courses of action? Let
them know and ask for their advice.
These will likely be some of the most active posts
you make, as people get involved and talking, weighing in with their own
thoughts and ideas.
And they can be tremendously helpful for you, too,
by providing insights and ideas you never even thought of before.
11: Share Short, Highly
Actionable Info
Post things that can be consumed quite quickly but
yield powerful results.
For example, the exact formula you use to create a
winning product.
Or the 3 questions you ask every single outsourcer
that guarantees great results.
Or the 8 words that reduce refunds by 50%.
Post something super quick and easy for people to
take action on and get results that make them happy.
And by the way, this is a great way to turn your
members into raving fans, too.
12: Do a Monthly Survey
Again, people love to give their opinion, so why
not give them a poll or survey now and then?
This can help you to better understand your
audience, who they are and what they want.
It’s also a great way to inject some humor as
well. Make a couple of your possible answers silly, funny or even ridiculous.
Stuck for questions?
How about…
What is the one thing
that is driving you crazy about ___?
What is one small
secret about your experience with ___ that you have never told anyone?
If you could choose
any small superpower that would change your business for the better, what would
it be?
What’s the stupidest
advice you’ve ever heard in this niche? What was the best advice?
To create a poll,
under the status area click “poll.” You can add different options, then click
“post” and you're done.
13: Start a
Discussion
One of the reasons
why groups are better than pages is because of the discussions. And if you
choose something that has some controversy behind it, you can get a lot of
people talking.
How controversial you
want to get is entirely up to you.
I once saw a debate
that raged on for three days on social media, about what was better: Smooth or
chunky peanut butter.
I can’t imagine
anyone’s feelings were hurt during this great debate, but there sure were a lot
of opinions.
14: Pop a Quiz
With a poll you’re
looking for opinions.
But with a quiz
you’re looking for specific answers.
Maybe you pose a
riddle or a question, giving a scenario and asking what the answer is. Don’t
make it too easy, but don’t make it so hard that nobody gets it, either.
People love to shout
out the answers to those game shows on television, and a quiz in your Facebook
Group should garner plenty of responses, too.
15: Go Live
Have a regular
schedule of going live. It will do wonders for connecting with your group and
increasing your authority with your members. Pick a specific topic or maybe
just go on to say hello and answer questions.
To go live, go into
your group and click live video.
Start your live video
by acknowledging the replay viewers, so they feel welcomed, too, when they see
the video later. Then talk to your live viewers, say hi and just be yourself.
16: Spam Day
This one is a little
strange, but it works. You can go a long way towards controlling the spam in
the group by letting it all happen in one post on one day.
Choose a day of the
week where you give your members total permission to promote whatever they want
to promote. You’ll make a post just for this.
Once you have a lot
of members, you’ll find there are hundreds of comments in there. It gets people
to talk and communicate, which is a wonderful thing because the more engagement
there is, the more likely members are to see your posts in their news feed.
It gives your folks a
chance to promote what they’re working on, which makes them feel good and might
even send them a little traffic.
And when they post on
any other day, it’s easy to give them a warning and let them know that you do
allow them to do this on that one day you’ve chosen, which makes them more
receptive to not posting spam the other six days of the week.
If you see certain
kinds of spam in this weekly post – things that just don’t belong in your group
– get rid of those posts right away.
By training your audience to promote their own
stuff only in a specific place and day, it makes it easy to clean up the rest
of the group.
17: Automate
Choose a tool to
post automatically on Facebook and even Twitter and other places, too.
MeetEdgar and
Buffer are both good, and there are dozens of others to choose from.
The more you can
automate, the more time you have for other things.
Realize you can’t
automate everything, since social media is supposed to be social. You do need
to respond and interact.
But there are
posts you can plan for and have the software take care of it for you.
18: Educate on Notifications
You want to show members
how they can get notified when new posts are up in the group.
You might create a
video for this or show a screenshot with an arrow. Have them click on the
notifications box that's right under the cover art, and then click on highlights.
They can choose if they want all posts or just ones from friends.
And they can even
click the off button, too if they want to.
Adjusting
notifications allows the posts they want from this group to be shown in their
news feed.
On a mobile device
they need to look for the blue check mark to the left, underneath the cover art,
or they can click on the information bar or icon at the top right and then hit
notification settings from there.
19: Be Open and Honest
This one is maybe
so obvious, I don’t have to spell it out, but I will anyway just in case.
You always want to
be honest and authentic with your members. It’s even okay to be vulnerable with
them as well.
We all love to
connect with other people in general, but we especially love to connect with
people who are real.
Don't be afraid
to be open, to talk about the tough times, to just be honest and authentic.
Doing this is going to take you a very long way when it comes to them seeing you
as a leader.
And of course,
never speak down to your members. Speak on the same level and even ask them for
help if needed.
They're going to
respect you a lot more for that.
20: Use Group Insights
Facebook collects
a ton of data on our members and luckily, they share some of it with us.
To get access to
this data, just go to your group and click“group insights” on the left-hand
side.
It's going to tell
you a few things such as how many new members you've gotten, how many posts and
comments and reactions and so forth. But the most important thing here is the
member details on the right-hand side.
Click
on that and you'll see a list of the top contributorswhich you may recognize
from earlier.
Scroll down and
you're going to get some good demographic data such as age and gender, and also
geographical data such as top countries and top cities.
This can be
especially useful if you’re doing Facebook advertising, since it is giving you
a very good idea of who to target. You get key insight on who is actually
interested in your group and how to find more of those people.
21: Content
Polls
You’re going to
create another poll, but this time it’s not on a random topic. Your one goal
with this poll is to understand more about what your audience needs and wants.
Give them a choice
of topics for your next live training.
This will not only
tell you what topics they’re interested in – it will also tell you what topics
they’re NOT interested in.
You can use this
information to help you choose which product to make next.
One time I was all
set to create a new product on a certain topic, but when I did a poll to see
what kinds of training my group wanted, that particular topic received almost
no votes.
That little poll
saved me from creating a product that my members simply weren’t interested in,
which was almost as valuable to me as finding out what they did want to learn.
22: Crowdsource
Information
You can collect
information from your members that you can use elsewhere.
For example, you
might ask for case studies, testimonials, success stories, tips and even
resources they found especially helpful.
I once asked my
group what was the best product they had purchased in the last six months. I
was astonished to find that a large number of them said the same thing, and yet
it was a product I had never taken notice of before.
I ordered a copy,
loved it and started promoting it, banking an extra $4,300 over the next month
from that one product recommendation.
I’ve also gotten
some of my very best testimonials from my Group, as well as hot tips that I’ve
expanded upon and then posted back onto the Group, using them in a lead magnet
and a product, too.
It’s amazing what
the collective minds of your group can offer you, if you only ask.
23: Create
Events for Launches
You’ve got a
product coming out, or a book or some type of event.
To get your
members to join you for this event and even help support it, create an event.
Go to events on
the left-hand side of your group and then click on “create event.” Fill out the
information, include an image, and start creating buzz.
It will also send
out a notification at the time at which this event is about to happen.
24: Grow Your Email List
While you can utilize your Facebook group to
grow your email list, I realize that some folks might wonder why you should
bother.
After all, you’re getting fabulous
interaction with your group. There’s plenty of activity and communication and it's
thriving which is fantastic.
But you still want the email for a couple
of reasons.
Email is a great personal one to one way to
communicate with somebody, especially if you're promoting something or sharing
something important, because it goes directly into their inbox.
And while Groups are great, what happens if
Facebook changes the rules for the groups? What if they throttle how
often people see your messages, just like they did with pages?
And what if Facebook goes away altogether?
Not likely, but definitely possible.
In that case, at least if you have your
email list. You have a list of people who are interested in what it is that
you're doing,and you could setup shop somewhere else.
This is why growing your email list is one
of the most important things that you could do.
One more thing – the more people see your
name, the more you are remembered, the easier it is to sell to them. If they
have contact with you in your Facebook Group and in their inbox, you
become someone even more familiar to them, and familiarity breeds trust.
25:
New Member Questions
You can ask questions to members before you
let them into your group.
You setup these questions ahead of time so
that you can collect answers from people before they get access to the group.
To do this, go to your group, click on ‘more’
and then click“edit group settings.”
Some sample questions you might ask are:
How did you find this group?
What's your biggest struggle when it comes
to building your online business?
Which of the following best describes your
situation?
I want to start an online business
I have an online business but I’m
struggling to make it profitable
I have an online business and it’s doing
great, but I want to grow it even bigger
The first question tells you where your
traffic is coming from, which also tells you where to focus your attention to
get even more traffic.
The second question is important because
that's how you find out what they need.
And the third question tells you if you
should address your content mainly to brand new marketers, marketers with some
experience or seasoned marketers who want to grow their business even bigger.
There
you have it – 25 tips for growing, managing and scaling your Facebook Group to
get more engagement and grow your business.
Please let me know how you get on :-)
To Your Online Success
Steven Morton
Founder-Marketing Mastermind Tips
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