While there are many ways to build your personal brand online, one of the best ways to do so is by marketing on Facebook. As of right now, Facebook has more than 1 billion active daily users. It’s safe to say that the people you’re trying to reach are part of that group. It was also reported in 2015 that about a quarter of all social media referrals came from Facebook.
Here are some of the best ways to build your personal brand using Facebook.
Be a Weekend Warrior
A BuzzSumo study offered digital marketers some surprising results: Status updates receive the most engagement when posted on weekends. According to the research, Sunday is the best day to post, with 401.75 interactions. That’s followed by Saturday, with 365.3 interactions.
The reason isn’t too hard to see: People have more free time on weekends and devote quite a bit of that time to social media. But the whole “best time to post isn’t when you think it is” story doesn’t stop there. BuzzSumo also found that updates posted between 9:00 p.m. and 11:00 p.m. receive high engagement too.
I’ve seen similar trends from my own experience with clients. Generally, Monday and Tuesday are the slowest days of the week for content marketing on Facebook. The later it gets in the week, the more it picks up. On the weekend, engagement finally peaks.
When looking at five client accounts, we saw an average of 26 percent more Facebook traffic on Sunday as opposed to Monday.
Curate Content That Will Help Others
It’s not likely that you’ll be able to come up with a wealth of valuable information for your network all by yourself. Sometimes, you have to share the great work of others. For that, you’ll need a content curator.
Pick up tools like Feedly, Content Gems and Pocket. Use them to help you locate content that people will find valuable.
Also, don’t neglect to use Twitter lists from media sources, as this is a great way to find breaking news. One of the best ways to create shareable content is to be the first in your space to post news that hasn’t gone viral yet. When it comes to marketing your personal brand on Facebook, you’ll need either breaking news or unique, quality content that you have created on your own.
Use Visuals
One of the greatest achievements of the Information Age is that it has become incredibly easy to share photos and images online. Most people at our agency use Canva, or they create custom designs in Photoshop.
If you’re interested in promoting your personal brand on Facebook, make sure that you share plenty of images. Unlike simple text updates, they’ll likely yield greater engagement.
Use Attention-Grabbing Headlines
Whenever you share a link on Facebook, you have the opportunity to “say something” about the link. Many people leave that field blank, thinking that the headline of the content says everything that needs to be said.
That’s simply not the case: you’re more likely to increase engagement if you write something that appeals to the appetites of your friends and followers, even if the link already has a powerful headline.
Don’t Skip the Small Stuff
There is a lot to know about marketing a personal brand on Facebook. From personal experience, I’ve seen most people skip these next few points, even though they matter.
- Create an artist, band, or public figure Facebook page. These are the types of pages you need for a personal brand.
- Fill out your page completely so that it ranks well on Google. You want your Facebook page to rank when people search for you. This leads to more traffic and more people liking your page organically. So make sure to fill it out as completely as possible.
- Use your name as your username and page URL. Don’t use your company name. This will make you more discoverable on Facebook and Google. If someone has already taken your name, add in your middle initial or add an “official” at the end (i.e., JohnLincolnOfficial).
- Update your page at least a few times a week. If your page goes stale, you risk losing community support and likes. You also want to keep up with interaction, as it builds on itself.
- Run “page like” ads to grow your community quickly. This is a mistake almost all first-timers make. You should be investing at least a few hundred dollars to jumpstart your progress. Once you have a few thousand likes, you can reduce spending.
- Run Facebook promoted posts around each update. If you don’t run Facebook promoted posts, you will have significantly less interaction. Make sure to spend $5 to $50 on each post.
- Suggest your page to friends. When you get started, recommending your page to friends will give you a quick boost.
- Cross-promote. Link to your Facebook page on your website, blog, email newsletter, etc.
Building a personal Facebook brand won’t happen overnight, but if you follow these steps, you will eventually create a marketing channel that is well worth it for your business.
Read more about boosting your personal brand on TechCo
