Thinking Beyond the 'Like'
10 tips for engaging and retaining your Facebook fans.
10 tips for engaging and retaining your Facebook fans.
How can you retain and engage fans on Facebook? My colleague and business partner, Ty Velde, shared somes tips in an interview.
Harry Gold: Ty, please tell us a bit about yourself.
Ty Velde: I am SVP, director of client services and a founding member at Overdrive Interactive. My role is to provide strategic and tactical oversight to a wide range of digital and social media programs for our clients and measure the results of our campaigns and efforts. Before Overdrive I served on the account side of agencies that included Interactive Promotions, A&G, and Digitas. I have overseen digital and social media programs for many top brand including Harley-Davidson, GE, John Hancock, Samsonite, Delta Airlines, AAA, and Dow Jones.
HG: What do you see as the primary focus of the social media programs you take over for different clients?
TV: Ask any social media marketer about the success of their efforts and one of the first qualifying metrics they will espouse is the size and growth of their fan base. This has always been a primary social key performance indicator, as a sizable fan base is equated to community, and developing a community is critical to social media success. As a result, companies spend a lot of time strategizing about ways to acquire new fans and spend countless dollars on fan acquisition programs based around everything from advertising, contests, promotions, giveaways, and more.
HG: OK, so what is missing?
TV: Typically missing from many big fan acquisition campaigns are plans to engage and retain fans once they have been acquired. It’s almost as if there is an assumption that if someone takes the time to “Like” you, they will undoubtedly stick around. However, in many cases, often once a promotionally-based fan acquisition campaign has concluded, fan numbers start to decline; people actually “un-Like” you. Of course, if you are running a contest, part of this attrition will be due to “contest junkies” who sign up for anything and everything, but this attrition may also be due to the fact that you have not clearly demonstrated the value of forming an ongoing relationship with your organization or brand via the social channel to your newly acquired fans.
HG: So what can you do to engage and retain those who have decided to “Like” your brand and page?
TV: The first thing you have to ask is “Why would anyone want to be my friend?” I mean, why would anyone want to stay in a relationship with you? Are you interesting, funny, nice, or offering anything of value? The key is to think about the kind of relationship you want to have with your base and also, what kind of relationship they may want to have with you. In short, if you want to retain your base and insure that they listen to you, you need to think “beyond the ‘Like.'”
HG: OK, can you give us more tactics tips?
TV: Well here are 10 tips I can give you that my team has found to be effective:
HG: Any closing thoughts?
TV: Getting people to “Like” you is easy, but getting someone to become a real “fan” – well, that’s much more of a challenge. Remember, a fan is only worth their willingness to engage with you. So ultimately, success in social media is not just about how many people “Like” you. It’s about converting the connections from that initial “Like” into an ongoing consumer relationship and creating a groundswell of support for your brand. This is not something that is built overnight or by focusing on just getting people to click “Like.” It’s about focusing on what you’re going to do with your fans after they click “Like.”
HG: Thanks Ty – great advice!
OK readers, as always please tweet and post your tips in the comments section!