As it approaches one billion users, Facebook has evolved from a site where friends and family share photos to an online marketing juggernaut rivaling Google. And while its primary marketing value is on the B2C side, more than a third of B2B marketers also rate it as their most active social network.
So, as Facebook continues its never-ending stream of changes, what are the current and emerging best practices for marketing on Facebook? What common mistakes should marketers avoid? How can Facebook be used to support an SEO strategy?
Find the answers to these questions and many others here in 26 more of the best Facebook marketing guides of the past year.
Facebook Marketing Tips & Techniques
7 Sneaky Ways to Use Facebook to Spy on Your Competition by KISSmetrics
***** 5 STARS
Frequent best-of honoree Kristi Hines reveals techniques for evaluating your competitors’ strategies and success on Facebook, such as using the “link.getStats console that will give you basic statistics about any domain’s popularity on Facebook” and viewing a competitor’s raw Facebook data, information, categories and more through the Facebook Open Graph.
Facebook Custom Landing Tabs + Measurement = Best Practice by Beth’s Blog
Citing research “that shows Facebook pages with custom landing pages have a higher conversion rate than those without landing pages,” Beth Kanter explains how custom landing pages work, why they are important and how to create one. Her focus is on non-profits, most of the information here can apply to almost any organization.
The 7 Biggest Fan Page Marketing Mistakes by All Facebook
Brian Carter identifies seven common mistakes made by businesses on Facebook and how to correct them. For example, “Fan Page Mistake #1: Assuming People Go To Your Fan Page (Versus Seeing Your Posts In Their News Feed).” The solution? Use keywords, interact with fans, and engage with groups.
64 Awesome Facebook Marketing Techniques by All Facebook
Maria Peagler shares an infographic focused on strategies for being successful–not boring–on Facebook, among them: using contests (e.g. best fan photo of something specified), highlighting a “fan of the month,” post product reviews, host a panel chat, and offer fans-only coupons.
iMedia Digital Showcase: The 10 best branded Facebook apps by iMedia Connection
Michael Estrin notes that “For most marketers, Facebook apps probably conjure up images of staff members wasting precious hours tending their “crops” on FarmVille or rubbing out their adversaries in Mafia Wars. But while a handful of apps have skyrocketed into the cultural stratosphere, brands that have deployed their own apps have used Facebook to make powerful emotional connections with users,” then highlights ten such apps from companies like Intel, Toyota and Bacardi.
How to Create a Facebook Business Page in 5 Simple Steps (With Video!) by HubSpot Blog
Anum Hussain walks through the process of setting up and launching a basic Facebook business page, from choosing a classification and completing basic information through adding features and tracking results–in both text format and a concise five-minute video.
10 Best Practice Tips for Facebook Page Content Publishing by jeffbullas.com
Jeff Bullas serves up 10 best-practice tips to “help you increase your engagement and interaction with fans so that they will keep coming back and provide you with valuable feedback that will drive inquiry and sales and keep you on top of your market segment with real time comments,” such as keeping posts short, asking fans for their opinions, and giving fans access to exclusive information or perks.
Why Facebook Should be Part of Your SEO Strategy by gShift Labs
Krista LeRiviere of gShift Labs lists 10 reasons why Facebook activity is now essential for successful SEO, such as that much of Facebook’s content is indexed by the search engines; having a Facebook presence is critical for web presence optimization (WPO) which is the overriding concept into which SEO is now wrapped; and, not incidentally, “Your Facebook presence adds quality backlinks to your website.”
Facebook Checkups and Check Lists
11-Point Facebook Checkup by Social Media Today
David Corr recommends a periodic Facebook checkup “to diagnose and treat the biggest small problems before they become big ones,” starting with reviewing your privacy settings and email notifications, then working your way through managing your Featured Likes and deleting any dead apps.
The Checklist All Facebook Pages Absolutely Must Have by All Facebook
Jasper Krog reviews the five essential areas to consider when formulating and executing a Facebook marketing strategy, starting with analysis (of internal resources, your target market and competitors) and working through setup, management, and advanced techniques (e.g. running Facebook ads).
Using Facebook for B2B Marketing
5 Foolproof Ways to Generate Leads From Facebook by HubSpot Blog
Pamela Seiple explores five ways that B2B companies can generate leads from Facebook, from sharing links to content on your company’s Facebook wall (“This works particularly well if the link directs people to a landing page with a lead generation form for downloadable content such as an ebook or a webinar”) to adding the Facebook Like plugin and share button to your content.
7 Steps For Awesome B2B Facebook Marketing by Social Media B2B
Contending that while “many B2B marketers have dismissed Facebook as a B2C channel with no application to B2B, that is a false assumption—Facebook can be a strong driver of B2B traffic and leads,” Kipp Bodnar provides a seven-step guide to B2B Facebook marketing best practices, from using a “like and lead gate” through analyzing engagement via Facebook Insights.
Facebook for Small Business Marketing
HOW TO: Claim Your Business On Facebook Places by Mashable
Sarah Kessler steps through the process for small businesses to claim their page on Facebook pages in this richly illustrated post. As she notes, “By claiming your Page, you have the opportunity to customize that free advertising. It also makes it easy to purchase pay-per-click advertising for your Places page.”
Facebook launches how-to Page for small businesses by BizReport
Helen Leggatt reports on Facebook for Business, a centralized spot for small business owners and marketers to learn the details of creating business pages, placing Facebook ads, using sponsored stories, and transforming a company’s “website into a social experience with plug-ins and custom apps.”
Dealing with Facebook’s (Never-Ending) Changes
8 Facebook changes marketers need to know by iMedia Connection
Jeff Ragovin offers a helpful guide to changes in Facebook pages (to make them look more like user profiles), iframes (which, despite their drawbacks, do improve flexibility and trackability), sponsored stories, ad targeting, Facebook Places and more.
How to Make a Custom Facebook Page with an Iframe Application: Updated Instructions by (Anti) Social Development
Kim Woodbridge provides detailed, illustrated, step-by-step, and most importantly updated instructions for creating a custom Facebook page tab with iframes, from creating the page at the proper size to filling in the required information to adding the tab to your page and renaming the tab.
Notice Anything Different on Facebook? Big Changes are Happening by iMedia Connection
Angela Brown helpfully summarizes the Facebook changes made in late 2011, including how to obtain a vanity URL, the ability for non-friends to subscribe to your updates, changes to privacy settings, and Facebook’s Smart Lists, which “allow for more robust filtering and targeted posting, among other great features.”
Facebook will Turn Off all FBML on June 01, 2012. Transition to iFrames Now! by Wildfire Social Media Marketing Blog
This post outlines how FBML and iFrame apps work, Facebook’s plans for the transition, alternative scenarios for the changeover, and the next steps that Facebook page administrators need to take (or more likely, need to have taken by now).
How to Take Advantage of The Latest Facebook Updates by jeffbullas.com
Mitt Ray summarizes the impact of and techniques for capitalizing on three areas of Facebook changes that were implemented at the end of last year: subscriptions (“now with the subscribe feature, people can just subscribe to your Facebook profile”), posting Facebook updates and tagging people.
Optimizing for Facebook EdgeRank
News Feed Optimization: 14 Ideas To Get Noticed In Facebook by Get Elastic
Linda Bustos delves into Facebook’s EdgeRank algorithm for determining what appears in any user’s newsfeed and how marketers can utilize news feed optimization practices to increase the likelihood that their content will be seen by their fans and likers, from the creative use of tabs to being timely and responsive.
Infographic: How to Improve EdgeRank on Facebook by Marketing Technology Blog
Stating that “Most companies don’t realize that only a fraction of their page status updates are actually being presented to the audience,” Douglas Karr explains a bit about the EdgeRank algorithm and how to make it more likely your content will be seen by your users, illustrated with a clever Genghis Kahn-themed infographic.
Facebook Advertising Tips
An Optimizer’s Guide To Facebook Ads Performance Reports by aimClear
***** 5 STARS
Marty Weintraub serves up red meat for data junkies in this impressively detailed post explaining how Facebook advertising reports work and how to interpret each metric, from reach, response and frequency through bids, social impressions and social clicks.
The Photo Strip: Facebook’s Most Underused Free Ad by BlueGlass
Contending that “Many brands trick out their Facebook pages with flashy apps while ignoring some of the most valuable (and free!) tools available…When done right, the photo strip creates a stunning page design,” Kerry Jones explains how the photo strip works then showcases nine creative examples of how brands can take advantage of it.
How To Use Occupational Targeting In Facebook For B2B Leads & Sales by Search Engine Land
Musing that B2B marketers have tended to embrace LinkedIn advertising over Facebook because it is seen as more of a professional networking site—even though Facebook has seven times as many users as LinkedIn and a significant percentage of those users have jobs—Lauren Litwinka demonstrates, step by step, how b2b marketers can take advantage of occupational targeting to drive results from Facebook ads.
Facebook Skeptics
5 trends that could take down Facebook by iMedia Connection
Based on conversations with “entrepreneurs, digital marketers, and venture capitalists,” Dave Knox concludes that while it’s unlikely any single, giant “Facebook killer” will emerge, the behemoth social network could be at risk from a multitude of smaller sources chipping away at its dominance, from specialized niche interest networks and privacy concerns to entertainment services like Pandora, Hulu and Spotify.
Most Of Your Friends Still Don’t Trust Facebook by All Facebook
Jackie Cohen reports on research showing that 47% of users say they are “explicitly concerned” about their privacy on Facebook (versus just 15% who are explicitly unconcerned), and that “people feel more confident about privacy on YouTube more than Facebook, and thus trust the video sharing site more.”
