5 Ways to Engage And Grow Your Facebook Audience

If you manage a Facebook Page for your business or organization, you've surely noticed that not all of the people who “liked” your page see every update.  Even taking away the fact that not everyone is on Facebook on any given day when you post, the amount of people who have your update show up in their news feed can be as low as one percent of your total fan base or even less.  You can thank Facebook’s drive for more advertisers for that.  What can help boost that number, however, is engagement.  It’s a fact that if more people “like” or comment on a post today, more people will see it, and that engagement can even boost the number of people who see your next post.  Because of this, it’s crucial to select material to post that is designed for engagement.  Here are 5 ways to engage and grow your Facebook audience:

1) Contests and Giveaways

I decided to put the hardest to implement at the top of this list, but if you’re willing to do the work, it can really boost your engagement.  You’ll need to create some way for people to sign up and you’ll need to be careful about the legalities involved, but I’m sure you wouldn't be shocked to hear that people love free stuff.

2) Special Days of the Week

Select a day of the week and make it a special day.  On the Sleep Better Facebook Page, which I manage for Carpenter Co., we have a couple of these.  On Monday’s, when there isn't some special program going on, we do “Sleep Myth Monday”.  I post a statement about sleep, and invite people to guess whether it’s a myth or not.  The answer is posted at the end of the day.  Another example of this comes from The Homestead, which conducts Throwback Thursday (posting old pictures of the resort), Wedding Wednesday (information about wedding offerings at the resort, and Travel Tuesday (posting information about their resort as a destination).

3) “Like” If You Agree and “Comment” If You Disagree

You've probably seen these. You post a statement and ask people to click “like” if they agree and comment if they disagree.  You’d be surprised the results you can get.  Another version of this is to ask people to click “like” to recognize something, like a birthday or anniversary.  Example: Our founder, Bob Smith, is 97 years old today. Click “like” to wish him a happy birthday!

4) Post Funny Stuff, Particularly Animal Pictures

It may seem like pandering and it probably is, but people love it.  Making it relevant to your industry is key to keeping people from being annoyed and furthering your brand at the same time.  You can even make this a once per week thing and combine the strategy with a “special day of the week”.  On the Sleep Better Facebook Page, for instance, we have the “Friday Sleep Funny” where I post a cartoon or funny sleep picture.  Here’s an example that led to nearly 2,400 “likes”, nearly 3,000 “shares” and 60+ comments.

5) Advertise

If you can’t beat them … join them.  Facebook has lowered the number of people who see a Facebook Page post in order to push page owners into advertising.  Fortunately, advertising works and is reasonably cheap.  If you have a special program or offer that you’re starting, consider paying a little bit of money to “boost” the post, to see if it works for you.