We can’t speak for you, but we’re just about exhausted by all of this “It’s the end of Facebook marketing as we know it!” talk. Sure, maybe the bubble has burst on the usefulness of Facebook advertising, and maybe the demographic of Facebook users is changing. But that doesn’t mean it still doesn’t have its merits when it comes to being an incredibly effective marketing tool.
For example, no social network platform is better at simply being a social network than Facebook. With that one billion users mark right around the corner, Facebook is unbeatable when it comes to the sheer number of people brands can be in touch with. But what marketers are slowly discovering is that Facebook users don’t want a hard sell. They want a long conversation. Recently, we’ve used Facebook for different clients to reach out to their audiences. Facebook is a great place to run by new products, specials and programs while getting the input of the people who already love your company. There’s no other site that gives you instant access to consumers’ thoughts, so why not get inside their heads and use the tool in a more thoughtful way? Research continues to show that Facebook users don’t dump brands who are willing to actually talk to them. This shift back to using Like pages for brand-consumer interaction is great news for local independent businesses.
And ads, as much as they don’t work for big brands on Facebook, are truly hit and miss for the little guys. Instead, small companies can drop the intense selling tactics and talk to their loyal following. But the Catch 22 with this return to conversational social media marketing is this: Instead of blasting ads that we hope users will respond to, we now need to go back to taking the time to get to know our Facebook friends.
Leave a Reply