Rebelling

Facebook continues to be one of the most popular social media channels in India with 241 million active users. Since it has such a large user-base, marketers use it extensively to promote their brand and increase awareness. Facebook helps brands provide information about what they have to offer with just the tap of a button. Digital marketing on Facebook can be significant in helping startups acquire new customers and also build long-lasting relations with them. The best part about Facebook marketing is that the social media platform permits businesses to target niche audiences based on demographics, interests, behaviours etc, thus optimising their reach. Facebook marketing tools like pages, groups and ads can be used by startups to get discovered, build presence, create awareness, generate leads, boost sales and more. Thus, Facebook has the power to shape a startup’s early growth strategy by providing a huge platform to reach out to its customers. Below are some ways of using Facebook as a marketing strategy for Startups:

Facebook Page Optimization:

A brand’s Facebook page is like a personal profile or a hub of information for a brand, marketing its product or service. Users may ‘like’ and ‘follow’ a page that automatically enables them to receive updates in their news feed. For a startup that has joined Facebook to grow their business, certain guidelines need to be followed for setting up a professional business page:

• The brand’s logo should be the profile photo of the page.
• The cover photo can be anything as long as it provides an insight or is relatable to the brand and grabs the attention of the users who visit the page.
• In the ‘about’ section, the nature of the business, working hours and location should be properly explained.
• The best approach is to keep the tone friendly and informal.
• A business page should post relevant information like product announcements, blogs or other details that are useful to its users.
• Multiple postings in a day should be avoided as it is considered spamming and may lead to loss of followers.

Targeted Advertising:

Facebook ads are very powerful, and they’re more likely to succeed than pages or groups since you can choose who sees the ads. Paid advertising is quite inexpensive, as compared to other advertising channels and platforms in the market. It can help a startup get a number of potential leads and most importantly create awareness among the brand’s target audience. As a marketer, there are several options to choose from when creating a Facebook ad for a business page -

• Facebook ads can be created that are targeted to specific geographical areas, ages, genders, education levels and more.
• Ads can be run on a per-impression or per-click basis.
• Facebook shows the bids for ads placed by competitor brands, so the brand has knowledge if its bid is in line with others in the industry.
• Brands can also set daily limits, so there’s no risk of blowing the budget.

Post Boosting:

Facebook’s ‘Boost Post’ feature allows startups to expand the audience for their individual posts exponentially and target highly engaged and relevant potential users within a very limited budget. It helps increase visibility as well as generate traffic to content. With boosted posts, a startup just needs to set up their target audience and a budget and the rest is good to go.

Contests & Giveaways:

Arranging interesting contests and giveaways every month can help keep the audience glued to the page. Such activities increase the number of followers, create awareness about the brand and also drive engagement and positive interactions to the page.

Posting in Third-party Groups:

This is a free of cost Facebook marketing strategy where most discussions take place outside the business page. The best approach is to post frequently in relevant third-party groups within a similar industry. This way, a startup can remain recognisable and provide value to group members. It is not necessary to just post links to brand-related content or curated content. In addition, startups can post questions, helpful information in bite sizes, pictures, or embedded videos. By these measures, startups will gain brand awareness and become more of an authority in respective groups on the topics they post about. This authority leads to trust which later translates into followers, subscribers, clicks to the startup’s website and conversions. Facebook is a powerful and flexible social media marketing tool. It comes with various options for marketing which a startup can tailor according to the nature of business, budget and time restrictions. It has several features to successfully achieve business goals and meet the desired target. To maintain a good position on Facebook, content marketing, paid advertising and engagement should be consistent or growing. To know more on how to use Facebook as a marketing strategy, leave us a message and we will get back to you!