This is the fourth of a 5-part series about social media marketing using Facebook by guest blogger, Alexander Alaric. You may read his other posts here.
Start Your Own Group
The advantages:
Although it does take time to administer and oversee a Facebook group, one of the main advantages to starting a group is that Facebook allows you to mass email your group members. You can notify all the members of your group about a new product you are launching, an article of interest or some other resource of interest to your Facebook friends.
However, once you get 1200 group members though Facebook cuts off your ability to send a mass email.
You can also post messages on your group's information section with updates anyone visiting the group can see.
Each group also has a ‘wall' on which you can post messages and start conversations with other group members. It is similar to comments on blogs.
The disadvantages:
It takes some initial time to setup.
It takes much more time to promote your group. With a good group name you'll get people who naturally find you and want to join because they are interested. But you'll also need to promote your group link to really build your membership.
I recommend including it in forum posts and you can twitter about it so that it will show to your friends.
Stumbleupon and Twitter on your Profile
Stumbleupon and Twitter are two sites you need to be using if you want to dramatically increase your website traffic.
As you build your Facebook network, your friends will be able to see what you Twitter and Stumble. You want to mark some cool stuff you randomly find on the Internet that'd be of interest to your business or personal contacts to build your reputation and credibility with your friends.
They'll be much more trusting of you and connect with you far more when you provide them value. And articles you find of interest to them is very valuable because they may not have ever seen that article without you mentioning it to them. This is just like telling your friend about that super cool ‘Iron Man' movie you just saw.
But what is really awesome for you is that you can twitter and Stumble your own articles and products and immediately your entire Facebook network can see that and click right through to your website.
This is a very powerful technique that can bring instant traffic to even a one minute old website.
All you have to do is search under the applications for twitter and stumbleupon. Then you can place those strategically on your profile so that people can see them.
What's really cool is it will automatically show in your mini news feed. You get instant exposure to your entire network because people do read your news feed which takes us right into our next topic.
Here is my list other must-have apps:
- Blog friends
- Blog RSS feed reader
- Business cards
- Events
- Notes
- StumbleUpon
- Video
To discover more about Facebook and claim your free social media marketing bonuses click here.