You worked hard on your Facebook page and expect to see rapid growth in your Fanbase. After all, your store carries the finest jewelry and watches in the area and your service is unparalleled. With Facebook having over 1 billion users, surely your pages should have thousands of fans.
Unfortunately there are reasons you don’t get the likes you think you deserve. In this article we will explore some of the major reasons why people do not like your page and why if they have liked you in the past they unlike you now.
You haven’t promoted it
If you build it they will not come, Unless You Promote It! Let your customers know about your Facebook page. Send e-mails, place signs in your store, link to it from your website, print your page URL on your business card and sales slips, and include it in all your advertising.
It is always easier and cheaper to get a current customer back into your store than it is to find a new customer. So first target your existing customers. Send out an e-mail, encourage them to like your page and become involved on your page. The people on your e-mail list will be your best fans. Your good customers will be the most likely to engage with your status updates and write positive reviews.
Facebook has built in features to help you promote your page including tools to invite your e-mail list, to invite your Facebook friends, and to share your page on Facebook. In addition, you can promote your page to your geographical area and chosen demographics with Facebook Ads, Contests, Sweepstakes, and other promotions.
You don’t give them
a reason
People are constantly inundated with Facebook requests. If you don’t give them a specific reason to like your page they will ignore your request with all the others they receive. Studies reveal that 55% of all people that like a page on Facebook did so to receive some type of promotion or discount. Offering a discount to your Fans or weakly Facebook Fan Appreciation coupons is not only a great way to build your Fanbase, but it also brings your fans into your store, the ultimate goal of your Facebook Marketing.
You target the wrong
demographics
If you target outside your geographical area or to the wrong demographics within your area you are bound to see a low ROI for your efforts. And if you do gain fans from these labors you may see a large drop out rate as fans unlike your page when they realize they are not an appropriate match.
Sometimes unscrupulous agencies will purposely target users outside your geographic area as a means to get more fans to make them look good. Unfortunately, these fans may soon unlike your page, or worse than that they continue to be fans but never interact with your page lowering your EdgeRank score and hindering your message from getting out to your true fans.
Generally speaking, men do not make good Facebook Fans for jewelry stores. Except for jewelry store owners and employees, few men have any real interest in jewelry. As such they typically make poor fans. Those men who do become fans of jewelry store pages seldom if ever engage with the page. And when they do, often their comments are sarcastic or negative creating a detrimental effect on your marketing efforts.
Now, men do make terrific jewelry customers and Facebook provides great opportunities to reach them. Ads, Contests, and Sweepstakes are but a few of the tools available to you. When connecting with them through these means it is best to invite them to join your text message list and/or e-mail list. There you can more effectively continue to market to them, rather than invite them to become a fan of your Facebook page.
Your posts contain spelling
and grammatical errors
OK, we are all human and Miss Steaks do happen. However, if your posts are full of misspellings and grammatical errors, it looks unprofessional. Write your post in a word processor to help you catch any mistakes and proof your writing before you copy and paste it to Facebook. If feasible have someone else proof your text before you post. A second set of eyes often see issues you overlooked while writing. Sure it takes a little more time to proof your work, but it goes a long way in maintaining your professional image.
You violate Facebook’s
Rules and Terms of Service
Most Facebook users are unaware of Facebook’s Rules and Terms of Service and this will not be an issue to them. However, there are those, especially other business owners and managers who work hard to be compliant on their pages, who can be alienated by your blatant disregard of the Rules. It doesn’t help you look professional and it makes them wonder that if you cheat on Facebook, in what other areas in your business do you skimp by.
An even greater risk of violations is that it is cause for Facebook to disable your Business Page. If this happens you will loose all your hard work and your ability to communicate with your Fanbase in the future. Facebook has begun cracking down on violators and many pages and profiles have been warned and/or disabled.
The three areas I see violated the most are:
1. Business set-up as a Personal Profile rather than a Business Page. If you are not sure how your store’s page is set-up on Facebook, an easy way to tell the difference is Personal Profiles have Friends, and Business Pages have Fans. If your store’s page has Friends it is set-up improperly and you need to convert it to a Business Page.
2. Facebook Cover Photo Rules. Some of these include no contact information including phone number, address, and website URL, no call to “like” the page, and that text is no more than 20% of your photo.
3. Facebook Contest and Sweepstakes Rules. For Facebook’s Rules and Terms of Service go to www.Facebook.com/policies and www.Facebook.com/page_guidelines.php.
Next month we will continue our discussion of issues affecting your Facebook page and reasons Facebook users don’t like your page with a look at your Status Updates.
To learn more about Facebook and how to use it to market your jewelry store, Brad and Debbie Simon of Internet 4 Jewelers have developed a training website “Facebook for Jewelers” at www.FBforJewelers.com. This website contains Step-By-Step video tutorials, a library of training articles, webinars, and more. It’s everything you want to know about Facebook but did not know who to ask!
In addition, they provide affordable Internet Marketing Services exclusively for retail jewelry stores including Facebook and other Social Media Marketing. For more information contact Brad Simon at Brad@Internet4Jewelers.com or call 864-680-4416.
