Experimenting With Facebook Fan Page Growth

Corralling facebook fans can be a tough sled. All of our facebook in boxes are inundated with fan page requests, most of which are ignored. Search the web and there are dozens of “How To” guides on the topic

Mashable penned a 5 Elements of a Successful Facebook Fan Page

For many companies a Facebook fan page is an integral part of their social media campaign. But, what elements help fan pages build up large followings and what can brands do to emulate the success of others? I’ve put together a list of specific elements that I believe have helped create fan pages with large, engaged, followings.

As we grow our Digital Sherpa Brand and our Turn Key Social Media Product, one of the things we are constantly doing is trying experiments, some of which may seem small, some that don’t work, and some that have an impact to results.

Experimenting With Facebook Fan Page Growth

So we started our Digital Sherpa Facebook Fan Page about 30-45 days ago. Our first exercise was to do like most folks do, which is to invite your friends from our personal profiles, which netted about (350) fans. Next two weeks, hardly nothing, fan adds completely stalled for the next couple of weeks.

Time for Something New

Sometimes to my demise, I am an action oriented guy, and while that doesn’t always work, some of our best discoveries have been from twisting and turning when things aren’t working. So, for the last two weeks, we have been adding three to five articles of interest, our own morning reads to the Digital Sherpa Fan Page, and I have tweeted the article, but linked to the Digital Sherpa Fan Page. The hope was that our Community of Interest found value in the shared, filtered article, and also became a Digital Sherpa fan.

I am a big believer in “borrowing ideas”. Dan McCrthy has blogged about how his blog traffic has increased from his recent, regular Good Reads posting, which is a similar idea on “sharing”

I’m acting as a curator of content that I’m experiencing. I’m applying an editorial filter on that content, and in each summary providing some context for why I think the post is interesting. The blog post itself isn’t strictly original, but it is definitely presenting a point of view that some number of my readers find useful.

Here are Our Two Week Results,

We have added a little over (200) facebook Fans in two weeks. Not bad, and that is helping us move from the staled position. That tact may not work to get us to (5,000) fans, but it has moved the needle for now. I liken this to one of our angles as to how to grow blog followers, is by leaving thoughtful comments on like other blog posts. The point is this is, we are filtering and sharing what we find with our Community of Interest.

So we will keep you posted. What has worked for you in adding Facebook Fan Page fans?

Tactic Lust Has Little Value

Are you in love with on line tactics, such as facebook and twitter, but are wondering why you only have a handful of followers or fans? It is all the rage today to be a part of this craze we call Social Media Marketing, but if you are just talking to yourself, there is no net effect for your business. Said differently, being on facebook and twitter alone has little to no value to your small business unless you are engaging with your community of interest.

What Do I Say or Post

Social Media is outreach on steroids. it is a way for folks to share things of interest with other like friends and associations. Social Media Marketing can be an excellent way to expand your customer base. Master aligning content with your core customer base, and become a source conduit via the various social platforms within your Circle of Influence.

Be a Curator of Content That You Are Experiencing

Dan McCarthy summed it up nicley on a recent comment he left on his blog

The distribution challenge — how do I get the content I want to share out into my social graph as easily as possible — is a technology-standards issue. For Facebook et al to leverage value out of their audience, they need techniques to keep their audience as organized as possible. Ergo, a walled garden of a certain degree. As a marketer or a media player, you want to assess each potential distribution channel in terms of the scale that you can aggregate and the results that you get from distributing content. The equation would be something like: (Size of social graph on platform/click-thrus)+(Redistribution of links)+(Inbound link recognition by Google)=Weighted value of audience.

The broad debate across the social media community about “original” versus “repurposed” content defines the content question in a way that is too confrontational, I think. A good example is the Good Reads summary of things that struck me that I do on this blog. I’ve been fascinated by the volume of upstream click-thru’s I’m driving with those posts. People are reading them and clicking through to the articles that I’m highlighting.

I’m acting as a curator of content that I’m experiencing. I’m applying an editorial filter on that content, and in each summary providing some context for why I think the post is interesting. The blog post itself isn’t strictly original, but it is definitely presenting a point of view that some number of my readers find useful.

That’s the role of curation, and every brand can benefit from it. For instance, imagine posting once a week on your Urbane apartments blog about new reviews of restaurants in the surrounding area. The reviews can come from any number of sources, and you pick out the ones that you think would be the most interesting to your Community. That’s curated content. It’s not original. But it is incredibly useful.

Social Media Marketing: facebook news

One of the things that make the digital world so fascinating is the ability we all have to Share Content with our  Community of Interest Sharing can consist of our own content or others content we finding interesting, engaging and of value.

Facebook Makes Sharing Easier

As reported by Mashable on their blog titled Facebooks Version of the Re-tweet has Arrived

It appears the feature is live for everyone. To try it, just go to a friend’s posted item in your news feed, click “share,” and you’ll see a “via [your friend’s name]” (with an option to remove it). Once shared, the item will appear on your profile, with a via link that points to your friend’s profile. Your friends will also see the item in their News Feeds, creating the viral loop that is the Twitter retweet.

It will be interesting to watch how this unfolds, and we will keep you posted of what we see and hear, and how it affects your Internet Marketing Strategy. We sure would like to here your comments on this too.

DigitalSherpa:Content, Engagement, Analytics, and Lead Creation

For a manageable monthly fee, DigitalSherpa will develop and execute a complete social media Internet marketing program. This is a fully integrated approach with a custom blog at the core. Content management, social newtork identities, tools, SEO and reporting analytics are all included.

 

 

 

DigitalSherpa provides the following services for an affordable, fixed monthly fee:

Content Management

• Blog hosting and maintenance for your single location business, or a network of blogs for regional and national businesses with multiple locations.
• Ongoing content creation and management; regular blog posts with content written specifically about your products, events, promotions, projects, and business highlights. Also relevant content created by our award winning home design journalists along with additional sources we identify and source for you
• NCI supplied content is selected and developed to establish community engagement around the design sensibility, budgets, and project scope of your target prospect and existing customer;
• Image galleries to present your perspective;
• Interactive content;
• Helpful resources, tools, and answers to FAQs;
• Content that you want to share about personal favorites, tips, and activities that define you, your community, or your business.

Social Network Development Maintenance

• Creation of social identities for your business on Facebook and Twitter
• Development and publishing of content for your social identities
• Recruiting and development of your social network connections among your clients and prospects
• Monitoring of your social network activity for problematic or sensitive issues and dialogue

Internet Tool Development / Search Engine Optimization

• Periodic enhancement and upgrade of social media tools, such as blog platforms, interactive widgets, etc.
• Analysis and refinement of Search Engine Optimization performance for your professional business blog in search engines such as Google, to increase traffic and raise your business and personal brand’s profile.

Reporting Analytics

Monthly reporting and analysis will include:

• Measurement of how many members of your network interacted with your program
• Report on traffic and leads
• Referal activity measurement
• Measure business activity among customers who are participants in your social network vs. non-participants

Social Media Campaigns Build Strong Community Preference

Consumers are engaging with businesses and brands they follow through social networks and media platforms. A recent study by Razorfish entitled “FEED: Digital Brand Experience Survey” polled users that were active “friending” businesses as summarized in a recent report.

The research showed a dramatic increase in awareness or inclination to consider the brand when in the market to buy, and then to ultimately purchase or recommend the businesses’ service or products for consumers following those businesses through their online social communities. Here are some of the highlight results:

DigitalSherpa programs allows companies and brands to integrate social media into their marketing plans by simplifying the process and doing all the heavy lifting at an extremely affordable monthly cost. Just email us at ajapko@nci.com and let us help you put the social web to work for your business.

Welcome to DigitalSherpa

About DigitalSherpa
Welcome to DigitalSherpa, a social media and internet marketing service for companies of all sizes ready to build and participate in communities that  influence and directly contribute to the success of their business. Created by Network Communications, Inc., an experienced social media services provider, DigitalSherpa is a turnkey custom social media marketing program that helps your company grow through consistent quality engagement.

Social Media Marketing
What is it? Increasingly people are engaging and connecting around businesses, brands, and issues that interest them. The explosion of social media tools and networks, like blogs, Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn, has created a unique opportunity for you to engage desirable audiences around your company’s voice. This has real and measurable business benefits: increased visibility, new leads, referrals, reputation enhancement, and more.    By outsourcing the heavy lifting involved in deploying effective social medial programs to DigitalSherpa — for an affordable fixed monthly fee, you get all the benefits of a powerful Internet marketing  campaign without the major time investment that is usually required. Your customized program will:

- Improve Google visibility

- Drive web traffic in new ways

-Create community engagement

- Unearth new clients

- Enhance client retention

- Turbo-charge word of mouth and referrals

- Build brand and online visibility

DigitalSherpa: An Experienced Partner
Using the latest social media tools, DigitalSherpa programs engage communities of interest, including your customers and prospects, in ways that benefit your business.  NCI’s Sherpa services have helped hundreds of businesses deploy social media marketing programs in a variety of markets. With DigitalSherpa, you have an experienced partner to help you leverage this exciting new marketing channel. We recognize the incredible potential of social media marketing to improve your bottom line; we also recognize the challenges that social media marketing present: the complexity, the costs, and the time.

DigitalSherpa: A Turnkey Solution
DigitalSherpa offers a monthly subscription service that provides a turn-key solution to create active, engaged and effective virtual networks. Creating this engagement results in outcomes that are clear, beneficial and measurable.  We help you create and define your audience, locate your potential clients, build social relationships with them, and promote your brand and website.  Together, we tailor the program to meet your business objectives to maximize your time and financial commitment.