6 Facebook Marketing Tips For The Holidays
If Facebook isn't already, it should be part of your companies marketing plan. If you want your business' content to reach consumers, having a presence on Facebook is a given. Although some of the younger demographics are passing up Facebook in favor of other social networks like Instagram and Snapchat, Facebook still dominates the market.
#1: Create a Content Calendar
Looking to increase holiday sales? Make sure you know the key dates. Note the shopping holidays following Thanksgiving: Black Friday, Small Business Saturday, and Cyber Monday, as well as Christmas, Chanukah, and other celebrations.
Create a word document or spreadsheet, or use a project management tool to keep track of what holidays you want to cover on social media.
Remember, you can play off of all of the holidays, not just the traditional ones.
Once you decide which holidays your company will celebrate and highlight with your content, work backward to ensure timely, relevant content is created, tested, and scheduled.
#2: Emphasize Strong Visual Elements in Your Content
When planning your holiday posts, keep in mind that Facebook is a visual platform. Use videos and images to grab attention.
As it gets closer to the end of the year, users’ news feeds will be bombarded with a lot of holiday content. Facebook recommends using motion to grab attention during the holidays. Use visuals to stand out, catch eyes, and stop your readers’ thumbs.
#3: Share Your Brand’s Story
Use the end of the year as a time for your fans to get to know your business and the people behind it.
Invite people into your business’s world. Take the opportunity to share a milestone with your audience, do a series of posts showcasing your employees, or both. It’s all about storytelling, and doing it in a personal way.
#4: Connect Emotionally Through Content
There’s a reason Facebook added reactions (love, laugh, wow, cry, and angry) to the Like button. People want to express their emotions when a story evokes different feelings. Your business content has to compete with posts from your audience’s friends and family.
Engage your audience by creating highly relatable, emotional, human-interest content that will tug at people’s heartstrings, draw them in, evoke sentiment, or make them laugh. You want your audience to see a post and think, “Hey, that’s me, too!”
#5: Craft Content for Maximum Shares
The goal of any post is to get a lot of engagement since engagement (especially shares) leads to even more comments, likes, and shares. Be intentional with the content you create.
Ideally, I recommend you craft content that’s worthy of amplifying with paid reach. In other words, whether you choose to put budget into a post or not, each piece of content you publish should pass your “boost-worthy” test. Before publishing, ask yourself these questions:
- Is this post potentially “thumb-stopping” for my audience?
- Does it capture their attention sufficiently to want to stop, read/watch, engage, and/or share the post?
- Is this post in context within the news feed? In other words, while Facebook users’ friends are sharing warm personal stories and fun videos, does this post fit in, yet still stand out?
- Does it offer educational and/or entertaining content?
- Does it meet the needs of your audience and their audience?
#6: Cater to Mobile Audiences With Facebook Ads and Posts
Most people are on mobile so be sure your ads, posts, and any related landing pages are optimized for it.
Mobile ads are important for targeting people shopping on the go. However, they’re also valuable for directing people to your brick-and-mortar business. Use the Local Awareness feature to target audiences when they’re near your business. You can even give them directions to your location right on their phones.
Facebook ad units that tend to perform well on mobile include video, slideshow, carousel, and canvas. Make sure the web page your audience lands on after clicking your ad is fast-loading and quick and easy to understand.
Remember, mobile-friendly does not apply only to Facebook ads. Make sure all of your content is designed for people browsing Facebook on their mobile devices.