7 Common Small Business Facebook Page Mistakes You Should Avoid

Small Business Facebook Page Mistakes:- A Facebook page for any brand or company is like a window to their services, products, and offerings. Easy accessibility, the recommendation to their friends and users finding you through the search bar has made Facebook brand promotion easy. 

Yet, many businesses are not able to take full advantage of it. A business Facebook page is your gateway for establishing your brand. Users get to know relevant information about your business, such as the link to your website, opening and closing hours, and the goals and aims of your organization.

You should know how and when to promote your business through a Facebook page. However, knowing what should not be done to avoid fallbacks is equally essential. Therefore, read on to learn seven mistakes to avoid when promoting your small business Facebook page.

Your USP (Unique Selling Proposition) Should Reach The Audience

A good USP is the most crucial aspect of marketing your products. Most of the consumers are attracted to your business or product because of this USP.   

Your selling proposition would persuade the audience to engage with you and make your business a success. It even helps in showing a comparative analysis with your competitors.

Although, USP is a vital part of any brand or product, many ad campaigns on Facebook neglect it, they don’t put much effort in making their selling proposition noticeable or do not include it at all.

Failing To Maintain Audience Reach

According to Statista, the user base of Facebook stands in billions, in fact, it is approximately 2.85 billion users active on the platform. Therefore, the probability of your post wandering unguided is relatively high, since a massive volume of content is updated daily.

Did you know that on average per day frequency of posts shared by Facebook Page is 1.55?

These posts are further divided as follows-

• Photos- 55.6% 
• Videos-22.2% 
• Links- 18.5%
• Status updates- 3.6%.

There is cut-through competition among millions of Facebook business pages and ads trying to reach the audience also being targeted by others simultaneously.

It is not just limited to your opponents, but your consumer’s friends, relatives, co-workers, etc., are also part of the competition; consistently posting on the platform.

All this proves that if you fail to reach your audience correctly, the odds of your ads getting misplaced in the vast stream of content is relatively high.

Steps to create engaging content: 

• The content should educate, generate interest, spread awareness and  motivate
• Everybody likes short and crisp content to not waste time and effort on reading something lengthy and detailed.
• Prioritize quality over quantity 
• Include excellent and catchy images
• Use videos, and if you can broadcast live, the better
• Content that encourages response from the user, like asking a question
• Always reply to queries, feedback, complaints, etc.
• Posting frequency should be consistent and well-timed

Think out the box: go beyond the comfort zone

For some time, in the beginning, playing safe may seem the easy way out, but this does not work for long in the world of social media marketing. Instead, most small businesses use similar content for engaging the audience and putting the remaining content strategy on autopilot.

This strategy will not hold the user’s attention for long, and ultimately you will have to experiment with different kinds of content. For example, a good blend of the creative content plan includes photos, capturing visuals, infographics, videos, etc.

You should try and maintain a balance between reaching the users through paid promotions and organic reach. There should be consistency in your posting frequency which can vary from business to business. The recommended frequency by experts is 3-5 posts per week in most cases,

Posting content infrequently will make you lose the user’s attention. On the other hand, posting too frequently will annoy them.

Identify Your Audience & Test Your Ads

Before posting any promotional content, you should research thoroughly on the type of audience you want to engage with. Well, you have Facebook to help you with this; it has inbuilt features that will assist in identifying the exact demographic of people.

Watch out for the following key points while identifying your target audience:

• Track Location information: it is important to keep location data like country, state, etc., of your audience so that it becomes easier for you to organize the information for the future when you target people working in a specific location.
• Census information: This data consists of sex, age, marital status, income range, etc. This information is helpful for you to know your audience better.
• Should catch attention: While defining your target market, ensure to give priority to audience interests. 
• Track Facebook reach and Engagement: you can utilize the help of Facebook’s analytics tool or third-party software. The tool helps in analyzing how much of your content is being liked, shared, or disliked. It even tells you the percentage and region from where the most engagement is coming.   
• Detect behavior patterns: by using Facebook’s targeting tool known as “Facebook Pixel,” you can identify behavior patterns of your users and display only relevant ads accordingly. 
• Automating Optimization: After identifying prospective areas provided by Facebook, you can set Facebook to optimize this selected audience for you automatically.

Don’t hesitate to test

Testing ads is an essential aspect of avoiding malfunctions and mistakes, helping run your small business efficiently.

Testing ads is one of the essential steps in creating a compelling Facebook ad. But being a small business, having monetary concerns is obvious since testing requires funds.

You can also think of testing as an investment as testing ads can save you money by preventing you from spending finances on advertisements that have no possibility.

Before creating different versions of ads for testing, make sure you test them on the following factors.

• Image – select images and videos that carry different messages or engage with the consumer’s psychology on different levels. It consists of testing other formats of Facebook ads such as the carousel or single image.
• Audiences that are pretty popular on Facebook might be expensive to target, but they bring more conversions. At the same time, lesser-known audiences are budget-friendly in terms of targeting. But every ad will bear more cost per impression. Through testing, you will get a clear picture of which is better between the two.
• Relevance Score – evaluation of Facebook ads depends upon several factors like clean conversions and click-through rates. Ads having high relevance scores mainly bear a lesser cost per click.
• Copy Text – you should try phrasing in different ways, changing the length of the copy, and including a CTA (call to action) to know how the audience responds and what resonates with them.

Neglecting Your Ads Initiatives

This is one of the commonly found Ad mistakes that many marketers make. Running a small business requires constant monitoring and check on the ad performance on your part.

You need to ensure that your ads are not repetitive as they will bore the audience, and they might lose interest. Without a proper check, you will not know whether your campaign realizes the goals you want it to achieve.

Things to watch out for while checking the progress of your Ad:

• Frequency of your ad
• CTR (Click-through rate)
• Conversion ratio
• Amount of leads created
• Ad performance measured in terms of  type and placement
• Clicks by interest

Following these points will help you create a place for yourself in the consumer market and leave a lasting impact.

Data plays a crucial role in the world of marketing. This data can offer better productivity and guarantee a successful ad campaign for your small business in the digital market.

Avoid Selecting Incorrect Format for Facebook Ad

Facebook has numerous formats for ads to choose from, so before making the final selection, you need to identify your audience. Examples of few popular Ad types include –

• Photos having different size options
• Videos
• Carousel (a feature that makes use of many images or videos clubbed in one ad)
• Slideshows
• Canvas 
• Collections (a feature displaying your entire products in on single ad) 

Facebook also offers you different options to place your ads such as-

• Mobile 
• Desktop
• Right-hand sidebar

Then there are different ways to display your ads that rely on your business aims and objectives listed below-

• Lead ads (mobile-based) – This feature uses a pre-populated form to extract data from the user.
• Link ads – These types of ads have a link that points to your website. The links are present in the form of CTA content. 

Limiting the Scope of Facebook Ads For Just Sales

It is another mistake that could ruin your dream of establishing your small business among the global audience. Using the social media platform as a medium to sell and promote your products and services will negatively affect your business. 

A successful Facebook ad would use your ads campaign and brand promotions to tell a story to its audience or viewers. This helps in establishing a better tuning and connection with your viewers. 

Winning the trust and heart of the audience is essential so that it generates convertible leads. Ads that feature content showing success stories, inspiring or motivating content, customer satisfaction, testimonials, industry recognitions, etc., contribute more towards the business’s success.

Driving Ads More than Required on a Low Budget

Small businesses running campaigns on Facebook tend to create ad accounts that try fitting all in a single space. In other words, you will find many small businesses using single Ad accounts for featuring several promotions that too with many Ad sets.

Such practices not only hamper productivity, efficiency, but also cause a lot of confusion. It becomes challenging to keep track of every activity that goes on a single ad account. 

To make the most of the social media platform, you require at least 50 to 100 lead conversions per Ad obtained per week. To reach this target, you need a substantial budget that helps Facebook to back your ads successfully.

A good solution for it is to spend a considerable amount on your ad campaigns. Then, it will help you achieve a higher rate of conversions with improved ROI.

Conclusion

To successfully promote your Facebook page mainly depends upon knowing how to establish and set valuable strategies. Remember to always analyze your approach when it comes to ad campaigns through the Facebook business page. All you need to do is work hard and smartly to establish a connection with your audience. 

The critical factor is identifying your target audience and monitoring the type of Ad type that works best for your business. If done correctly, Facebook ads can prove to be a game-changer in expanding your small business in a big way. Moreover, it can lead to the growth of a company in less time.