Infographic: Tactics to increase fan interaction

Target audience: Nonprofits, cause organizations, foundations, NGOs, social enterprises, businesses, educators, journalists, general public.

American Express Open Forum recently published an infographic of Facebook engagement stats and recommended tactics for improving engagement rates on your Facebook page content.

Although this infographic isn’t specifically for nonprofits, the data and tactics still apply to nonprofits.

Improve your Facebook engagement

Here’s a summary of the most useful bits from the infographic:

1. Post short updates – Updates with fewer than 80 characters get 23 percent higher engagement rates (sigh).
2. Post images – Photos get a 39 percent higher rate of engagement than all types of content on the whole.
3. Use emoticons – Using emoticons increase shares and likes by 33 percent.
4. Try caption contests – Asking fans to write captions to interesting photos increases comments by 550 percent.
5. Respond quickly – 25 percent of Facebook and Twitter users expect a response to inquires and complaints within 60 minutes. Facebook community guidelines help immensely with this!
6. Run a photo contest – Encourage fans to post cause-related photos for a chance to win something amazing. Note that a third-party app needs to be used for photo and video contests.

People first, tactics last

If your takeaway from this infographic is a plan for Facebook success, you’ve got it backward. Tactics should always come after:

1. Understanding your people
2. Developing clear objectives
3. Developing a smart integrative strategy

Have you guys tried these tips? What tactics have worked best for you?

The post 6 ways to improve your Facebook fan engagement appeared first on Socialbrite.

Target audience: Nonprofits, cause organizations, foundations, NGOs, social enterprises, businesses, educators, anyone with a Facebook page.

Network for Good hosted a free webinar the other day where I presented 27 Ways to Increase Engagement on Your Facebook Page.

According to a recent survey by NTEN, 89 percent of nonprofits today use Facebook to expand awareness around their cause and to grow their fan base. One challenge that many nonprofits face is keeping fans interested and engaged after they like their page. (Remember, most people who Like your page never see it again — unless it turns up in their news feed.)

Above are the slides from the webinar. Some of the things you’ll learn:

• The three most important pillars of your content strategy
• Three shocking facts about every Facebook Page
• The best times during the day to post content
• Facebook’s EdgeRank algorithm defined and why you should care
• What types of content get more exposure in news feeds
• How to post links in a page story
• How to use photos to spark engagement
• How to use questions to spark conversations
• How to use closed and open questions to spark conversations
• And lots more

If you want to hear the 60-minute recording, download it here. You can check out the SlideShare presentation above or download it as a PDF.

Related

• 19 ways to engage your nonprofit’s Facebook fans (Socialbrite)

The post 27 ways to increase engagement on your Facebook page appeared first on Socialbrite.

Target audience: Nonprofits, cause organizations, foundations, NGOs, social enterprises, marketing professionals, businesses, educators, photographers, general public.

The reason Facebook paid $1 billion for Instagram is the same reason why Pinterest is one of the fastest-growing social media sites in history.

It’s also the reason why Facebook redesigned pages to the new Timeline layout: People love pictures.

People upload more than 300 million photos to Facebook every single day!

Facebook users love liking, commenting on, and sharing photos more than any other type of content on Facebook. So posting photos automatically gives you an advantage in the EdgeRank game.

Here are six ideas to help you get more from the photos you post on your Facebook Page.

Post big photos

1Make sure your photos are at least 851 x 403 pixels to accommodate highlighting or possible use as Facebook cover images by others. That said, you should also consider posting sizes even larger so that when users view photos in fullscreen, they’ll see the image at the highest resolution. This varies depending on screen size, but as an example, a 17-inch Macbook Pro is 1920×1200 (iPhone photos are 2592 x 1936 pixels).

Use Reddit

2Reddit, like Craigslist, is probably one of the ugliest but most useful websites on the Internet. You can easily search for photos related to your cause and sort them by recency or popularity. And if your photo gets a lot of attention on Reddit, chances are it will do well with your Facebook page.

Inject virality

3One common factor that helps content go viral is the ability for users to make it their own. Americans Against The Tea Party created an image (shown above) that allowed users to point an arrow at their profile pic once they shared the photo. Make sure you mention your organization in small print at the bottom of the image.)

You can see how that works by sharing on of these more politically neutral images.

Create covers for fans

4You’ve been busy focusing on your Facebook page over the past month, which is understandable given the switch to Timeline. But don’t forget that your fans are looking for ways to make their profiles look great, too! One way to help them, and promote your cause in the process, is to create cover images. Check out the batch that Best Friends Animal Society created to promote their Spring Pet Super Adoption campaign.

Post photos as links

5Because photos have a huge EdgeRank advantage over other types of content, why not post photos as links on your Facebook page?

Here’s how to do it:

1. Select an awesome photo within a recent blog post (I hope you have a blog).
2. Post this photo on your Facebook page.
3. In the “Say something about this” field, post a short description about the article along with a link (as shown above).

Users will be more likely to share, comment on and like an amazing photo than they would a link to an article containing that same amazing photo. A better means to the same end.

Use Pinterest

6If you use Pinterest, you’ll love this approach to amping up engagement on your Facebook page. When you post photos to Pinterest, you have an option of including a URL users can click on in the image. Try reposting a few photos from your Facebook Page onto Pinterest and link back to the photo on Facebook. Eventually, you can use Facebook Insights to find out how much traffic Pinterest is sending to your Facebook page.

Do you use photos to spark engagement? Please share your ideas in the comments below.

The post 6 creative ways to use photos to increase engagement on your Facebook page appeared first on Socialbrite.