Facebook is a bit of a conundrum for businesses. There are 6 million users who are spending a significant amount of time on the site. Facebook is also making a bit of revenue from ads. But just because a site has people, doesn’t mean that those people care about what you have to say. People are on Facebook to interact with their friends and family, and also to waste time (play games). Very few people care very much about most brands that are on Facebook (especially ones that just are promoting themselves). Visibli recently did a study that shows that engagement with Facebook pages also depends quite a bit on timing, which isn’t surprising since most people only see brand posts on their Facebook homepage (not on the actual brand pages).
Timing is Important
Visibli’s study shows that “Facebook posts receive 50% of their Likes in the first 1h20m, 80% in the first 7 hours, and 95% within 22 hours.” This makes sense if you’re only viewing brand content on your homepage stream. Posts quickly fall down the page as they age. However, if the post is quickly liked, it may stay at the top of the page if people view their homepage with the “Top News” (the default) showing instead of “Most Recent.” This also means that there are some tactics that may include liking your own posts (or getting your friends to like them) to get them to show up as Top News.
Tactics vs. Image
Unfortunately Facebook is a cross between Twitter and a blog (or fortunately). While most people may view a brand’s posts in their homepage stream, if you post things multiple times, they’ll show up that way on your Facebook fan page (unless you delete them). They’ll also show up multiple times for fans who may be paying more attention. So you’ll have to consider whether it’s worth it to annoy some people in favor of reaching more — keeping in mind that the people that you are annoying are probably more important than the wider audience.
Is Facebook Worth it?
Having some sort of presence on Facebook probably makes sense, due mostly to the huge audience. But it may not make sense for every company and industry, especially if you’re specific audience just isn’t there. It may also make more sense to interact as a person rather than a brand (especially if you’ve tied your name to your brand). One thing is for sure: just having a Facebook page for your company isn’t enough. You either need to spend time engaging and conversing with people (and providing great content) or just write-off Facebook as another directory listing (like the phone book).
Thoughts?
(photo by Dawn Huczek, on Flickr)