New Facebook Tips and Tricks

Monday, February 16, 2015

How to Spend a Facebook Ads Budget Effectively

Facebook Budget

The number one complaint about Facebook ads is that they can be very expensive in exchange for very little return, very easily. Even if you’re getting a lot of clicks on your ads, those clicks might be meaningless. Either you’re wasting your ad budget on clicks and not actions, or you’re getting new followers who don’t do anything for you.

What are some of the most common issues with Facebook advertising?

Boosting posts instead of promoting them.

Failing to target the right audiences.

Failing to exclude the wrong audiences.

Failing to use the right objective.

Attempting to target too broad an audience.

Attempting to target too narrow an audience.

There’s also the chance that, once you’ve solved all of these issues, Facebook ads will still perform poorly. It’s always possible that Facebook simply isn’t the right channel for your marketing efforts.

The Problem with Boosted Posts

Facebook offers the boost post button as a quick and easy way to convert an organic post into an advertisement, specifically in the news feed. This works, but it has a number of issues. It’s very easy, it allows you to spend a few dollars to reach thousands of people you otherwise wouldn’t, and it gives you social metrics. What’s not to like?

The biggest complaint with the boost post button is how poorly it targets users. It doesn’t have any of the deep targeting options that make Facebook ads a hugely beneficial endeavor.

The button is also great for driving engagement to certain types of posts, but it’s not so great at turning that engagement into conversions. In the end, you’re spending a few dollars to get a few low-quality comments and a handful of likes on your post, but likely no clicks to your website and no conversions.

The cost-efficient alternative to the boost post button is promoting posts using the Facebook Power Editor. This extension for Chrome gives you a wide range of options through Facebook’s actual ads system. With a bit of knowledge – which you’ll learn later in this post – you can stretch your money farther and drive better engagement. Instead of a handful of comments and likes, you’ll get those plus site clicks and conversions. Of course, that’s only if the rest of your funnel is set up properly.

Which Audiences to Exclude?

Imagine you’re running an ad with the intention of getting people to like your page. Using a Facebook default audience, you may be running that ad to people who already like your page. They click your ad and you lose money, even though they can’t perform the action you wanted.

Imagine you’re running an ad for a product, and you’re getting a lot of clicks from China. The kicker is, you only sell your product to the continental US. What good are those clicks from China, if they can’t buy your product?

Imagine you want to run an ad to target everyone who matches the demographics of your current audience. Once again, why would you want to advertise to the people who already follow you?

These are all situations where audience exclusions are beneficial. You can exclude your own audience, or a lookalike audience. You can exclude certain interests or certain geographic regions.

Exclusions kick up the value of each action obtained through an ad, because you’re minimizing the number of people who you know won’t be valuable. The most common exclusions are based on geographic location, blocking out non-US countries or non-English countries. Using lookalikes is a more advanced solution.

How to Pick the Right Objective

Facebook offers ten different objectives for their ads, which is very different from what you see on other PPC networks. Google, for example, only offers one; a click through to the destination of the ad. Facebook’s are all various measurable metrics. The idea is that you pick the objective you want with your ad, you optimize your ad for that objective, and you’re only charged when a user completes that objective. Thus, in order to further optimize your ad spend, you need to pick the right objective.

What are the objectives?

Clicks. This is the most basic objective of all. Pay up each time a user clicks through to your website, as specified on the ad.

Conversions. Using a Facebook tracking pixel, you follow a user when they click through your ad and see if they convert. You’re charged when they do.

Page post engagement. Rather than send users off-site, you keep them on Facebook, sending them to a specific post. You’re charged when they click your link, comment, like or share your post.

Likes. Send users to your Page and encourage them to like it. If they do, you pay. This type of ad also has a like box built in, which users can click from the sidebar without ever visiting your page. This still counts and will still charge you.

App installs. You send users to your app page and encourage them to download and install. If they do, you pay.

App engagement. Similar to app install, only requires an action within the app.

Offer claim. A specialized type of app engagement, given that offers are run through apps.

Local awareness. A broad paid reach ad that specifically targets geo-local users.

Event responses. Similar to page post engagement, only specific for an event page.

Video views. Pay for people to load and watch a video you post on Facebook. Does not work with off-site videos.

Targeting, Broad and Narrow

When you create an ad through the power editor, you have a lot of options available for targeting. If you leave them all blank, you run your ad to everyone on Facebook worldwide. Obviously, this is a bad idea; a huge number of those people don’t care about you or your ad, and it only burns through your ad budget to show your ad to them. What can you target, and how should you target each factor?

Location. Be as specific as necessary. If you only sell in a certain state of the US, limit your location to that state. Likewise for country if you’re a larger business. Global businesses should still limit to specific countries, to refine individual campaigns for each area.

Age. You should know the most likely age ranges for buyers of your product; target them preferentially.

Interests. This one is highly variable and is best used via a custom audience.

Gender. You don’t necessarily have to set this, but you might want to for gendered products.

Languages. Typically limiting your ads to an English speaking audience is a good idea.

Education level. Fully optional, useful for certain types of products.

Relationship status. Same as the above, useful for couples or singles-specific products.

Political views. Typically not very useful unless you’re a politically charged cause or product, angling for a specific party affiliation.

Connection. Basic ads run to only people following your page, and are most effective that way. You can also advertise to friends of connections, for a broader audience. You can be as broad as “everyone” as well, though it’s not recommended without other filters.

When you add targeting factors, Facebook displays a meter indicating the reach of the ad. On one hand, you very rarely will reach everyone Facebook claims you will reach. On the other hand, the meter is still a good visual indicator of how well you’re targeting. Avoid targeting too broad an audience, because you’ll end up spending money on lower quality leads. Conversely, avoid using too many targeting factors and narrowing your audience too much. It will be cheap, but it won’t get you much.

The post How to Spend a Facebook Ads Budget Effectively appeared first on Boostlikes.com.

How to Grow Your Page Likes as Fast as Possible

RPM gauge

If you’re just launching a new Facebook page, for an event or a business, you’re going to have a lot of catching up to do. Other businesses are probably established in your niche. If they aren’t, and you’ve found a new niche to occupy, you need to act fast to assert your dominance. Either way, the result is the same; you need as many fans as possible as quickly as possible.

Before we begin, there’s one thing you should pay attention to above all else; fan quality. Many older Facebook pages have an issue with low quality fans. Bad fans decrease organic reach, dilute your message and make it harder to succeed in general.

If you start early, you can keep an eye on your fans and prune out any bad fans that follow you. This keeps your reach as high as possible just on the basis of your audience quality, plus it helps avoid skewing your Insights.

Invite Email Contacts

You probably have a mailing list. Import it using Facebook’s “build audience” button on your page dashboard. This will allow you to hook in any mail service, or import a CSV file full of email addresses. Anyone whose address matches a Facebook account will receive an invite to like your page.

While you’re at it, invite your friends. Most of your friends probably won’t bother to like the page, either through disinterest or ignorance of the invite, but those who do are a nice early boost.

Partner and Cross Promote

This is difficult for new businesses, but if you can find a few larger companies to partner with, you can use their influence to reach a broad audience right off the bat. A pre-existing relationship with a prominent business boosts your reputation and gets more users to follow your page on principle alone.

Learn Your Audience

As your audience grows, you will gain more and more insight into their demographics and personalities. You will also gain more and more information in Facebook’s Insights panel, which will quickly become indispensible.

Much of the information you learn through Insights will be useful for other means of fast growth.

Tailor Your Language

In particular, Insight data will allow you to identify the types of people following your page. This will in turn allow you to customize the language you use to communicate. On Facebook, you have to avoid advertising language outside of ads. However, that still leaves you with plenty of tonal range. You could post like a valley girl, a stodgy businessman or a schizophrenic.

With those options come hazards. If the majority of your followers are age 50+ middle-class white men, posting like a valley girl is just going to get you removed from their feeds. If your audience is primarily teenage girls, posting like a robotic businessman from the future isn’t going to get you anywhere.

Post Great Images

Your cover photo and your profile picture are highly visible indicators of how seriously you take the platform. Always use both spaces for branded content, particularly content that plays well together. You don’t want two embedded pictures to clash, do you?

While you’re at it, make sure you’re using Facebook’s graph elements to customize the preview image for each post you make. Additionally, upload images for use in your tab apps, if and when you use a tab app.

Post Your Link Everywhere

Do you have a newsletter? Mention your Facebook page in that newsletter and add a link in the footer of your template. Do you have an email account? Add your link to your signature. Do you run a website? Add a Facebook Like box to the sidebar of every page. Anywhere you can possibly mention your Facebook page, drop a link.

Consider Purchased Likes

It’s possible to buy likes from a third party advertiser, but you have to be aware of what you’re getting. Make sure the business you use is reputable and trustworthy, and monitor the quality of the fans that come in. Avoid shady businesses that sell fake likes; only buy the real stuff.

Run Paid Ads

This is an extension of both of the previous tips. Posting your link everywhere can also mean posting it through various advertising platforms, including Facebook PPC and Google AdWords. It’s also another way of buying likes; using the Page Like objective on Facebook ads, for example, directly converts your ad budget into page likes.

Use Facebook Comments

If your website has a blog and you have comments natively through WordPress, through a stand-alone CMS or through a third party service like Disqus, change them up. Rather than rely on one of those services, integrate Facebook comments. That way, whenever someone posts a comment on your blog, they’ll be sharing your post on Facebook as well.

Use Facebook Video

Facebook’s native video service is rivaling YouTube for largest video host on the web. It’s also fairly robust, and Facebook has been making a lot of money through video advertising, so they’re going to be pushing the system in the coming years. Get in early and you can capitalize on the trend.

Respond to Users

When you post a link, don’t just walk away. Facebook is social media, which means that shared link will attract comments. When a user comments, respond! It might just be a simple thanks, it might be a response to a question, it might be a pun to play off a pun. Whatever the case, engage with your fans and they’ll stick around.

Post Frequently

Every business and every audience is different. That said, as a general rule you should always post at minimum once every day, even weekends. This gives you a constant presence in the minds of your followers. As you grow, you can increase your post frequency to several times each day.

Run Contests

A simple contest can attract a lot of users, but you need to do it right. None of that “free iPad to our 10,000^th follower!” bullshit. Give away something meaningful, something important to your business. Give a discount, a product, an office tour, a free lunch. Give away something that encourages the winner to investigate your business a little more.

The post How to Grow Your Page Likes as Fast as Possible appeared first on Boostlikes.com.

The Ultimate Guide to Facebook Ads Best Practices

Guide to Facebook Ads

Facebook ads can be a complex business. You need to consider targeting, copy, images, landing pages, audience demographics, display location and much more.

If you do it right, you can spend mere dollars a day to bring in thousands of people to the location of your choice.

If you do it wrong, you’ll end up with hundreds of low-quality visitors eating up your budget with no benefit in sight.

What can you do to stack the odds in your favor? What general rules can you follow to make sure you’re always on the profitable site of the equation? What best practices exist to follow?

Know Your Ad Types

There are a number of different objectives you can use for each individual ad. These significantly change the behavior of the users you’re reaching, and they have different points at which an action is considered successful and your budget is used. They are:

Post Engagement. This is useful to reach your existing audience to boost the likes, shares and comments on a given post. This is what happens when you click to boost a post, which you should never do. Instead, use the Facebook Power Editor to run a promoted post.

Page Likes. This is the type of ad you’ll want to run in order to get more people to follow your page. Typically, you will want to target very specifically in order to minimize the number of clickfarm-level followers you attract. Remember, one good follower is worth 100 disinterested followers.

Website Clicks. This is the traditional, link-to-off-side ad style that funnels people from Facebook to your landing page. A good landing page is essential here; linking to a blog post just won’t cut it most of the time. It’s also a good idea to use a tracking pixel to keep track of the users you funnel in and what they do.

Website Conversions. This is a more expensive version of website clicks, but it only counts as an action when the user actually converts. This applies regardless of what you consider a conversion, whether it’s an opt-in or a product sale. Tracking pixels are required to use this objective.

App Installs/Engagement. These are only useful if you’re running a Facebook app, and you want to promote it to Facebook users. Pick the right one for the action you want to accomplish.

Event Responses. Typically best used by Pages that center on events, you can also use it for business events you want to promote. Don’t forget to use this for branding as well.

Offer Claims. When using a tab app to promote a special offer, you can run this PPC ad in order to get users to claim your offer in higher volumes.

Optimize Your Images

Facebook ads all include images, which isn’t something you get with most other PPC networks, specifically networks like AdWords. Picking the right images and optimizing them properly is critical to visual success.

Keep within Facebook’s 20% text rule. You don’t want to have to fight with them to get your ad through.

Use images of the proper size and shape. Portrait-style images don’t utilize all of the space available to you.

Scale your images down. When Facebook gives you 144×72 pixels for an ad, you don’t need to upload a 1200×600 image for that space. It just gets downscaled and looks identical, or perhaps worse, than if you sized it yourself.

Use a color scheme that stands out. Avoid the same blues, blacks, whites and grays that Facebook uses. Something bright and colorful will draw the eye naturally.

Show what the user is getting, or the results of what they would be getting if your product is more abstract. Happy people work well here. You can also use a logo, if your logo carries the cachet you want to portray.

Test different images with the same targeting options, copy and landing page, to see which works better. There’s no shame in changing up your image to something a little more pandering, if it makes you a profit.

Use UTM

UTM parameters are variables you can add to a URL. You’ll see something like www.example.com/blog-post-title/?utm_mediuim=link&utm_source=facebookadgroup1&utm_campaign=blogpostpromotion. It looks messy, but it gives Google Analytics a bunch of data to track the people who click that ad. By using parameters, you can track who comes to your ad from which sources, using which ads, and what they do on your site.

There’s a lot to learn about properly using UTM parameters, but it mostly comes down to actually using them. Specify each variable, add the parameters to the URL using Google’s URL builder, and share the URL with the parameters rather than a bare URL.

Use (Or Test) Optimize CPM

Facebook offers a unique type of optimized CPM, which allows you to spread your ad budget around in the most effective way possible. Rather than trusting yourself to choose all of your targeting options optimally, Facebook’s OCPM gives Facebook that control. You still control all the targeting options you normally do, but within the audience you choose, Facebook then steps in and choose the most likely people to convert first and displays the ad to them preferentially. Used properly, it can dramatically increase your conversion rate with the same budget.

Segment Mobile and Desktop

People browsing on mobile and people browsing on desktop behave differently. Mobile users tend to click links and ads more often, but less intentionally. This means that desktop clicks tend to be more valuable. Try to run two different campaigns, to segment them.

The primary reason for this is when using OCPM. Facebook will see that you receive a lot of clicks from mobile users and will preferentially spend your budget on mobile viewers, even when those clicks are comparatively less valuable.

Avoid Common Mistakes

There are a number of mistakes people make constantly with Facebook ads, and they can cost you money. Rather than make those mistakes yourself, learn from the experiences of others and skip the wasted time, effort and money.

Mistake #1: Targeting non-fans. Unless you’re specifically targeting your ads with a lookalike audience to get more Facebook followers, you’re not doing yourself a favor when you target non-fans. Fans are already interested and are as much as four times more likely to convert.

Mistake #2: Not testing. Always be testing, whether it’s a change in image, a change in copy, a change in landing page, a change in headline or a change in audience targeting. Testing is what makes the advertising world go ‘round.

The post The Ultimate Guide to Facebook Ads Best Practices appeared first on Boostlikes.com.

How to Create or Request a FOR SALE Facebook Group

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If this is the first time you’ve heard of a For Sale Facebook group I wouldn’t blame ya. I just found out about them myself after a recent title="Buy and Sell Groups" href="http://newsroom.fb.com/news/2015/02/introducing-new-features-in-facebook-groups-to-improve-the-way-people-buy-and-sell/" target="_blank">Facebook announcement introducing new features designed to improve the way people buy and sell within groups.

This week’s #SocialMediaMinute will cover how to create a For Sale Facebook Group to sell your stuff on Facebook just like a yard or garage sale.

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The new “Sell” feature will allow members to create a post where you can add a description of the item for sale, set a price and set a pick-up or delivery location. Think Craigslist or eBay but on Facebook.

style="text-align: center;">See Also: title="How to Add a Facebook Group Cover Photo" href="http://www.jacobcurtis.com/2012/12/11/how-to-add-a-facebook-group-cover-photo/" target="_blank">How to add a Cover Photo to a Facebook Group

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Learn more by watching the tutorial video below.

Video Tutorial

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How to Create a For Sale Facebook Group

So it turns out you can’t just create a garage sale on Facebook and set up a For Sale Group by default. Members and groups admins will have to submit a request to Facebook nominating their current group to be converted into a For Sale Group.

To request a For Sale Group on Facebook navigate to Facebook’s official page title="Facebook For Sale Group" href="https://www.facebook.com/help/contact/317809975082848" target="_blank">here. You’ll then be brought to this form:

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While Facebook has not detailed the requirements for converting a regular group into a For Sale Group, they did give a few examples of groups that have already been approved.

One group had 4,500 members and the other example had 34,000 members before they were converted and provided the new item selling features. Keep this in mind before you request your 10 member group as it will likely not make the cut.

For sale groups have grown in popularity but have never been officially acknowledged by Facebook. This meant the groups admin would have to monitor members posts, transactions, and wether or not the listing was still relevant. No easy task but that’s all changed now.

Benefits for Admins

The addition of the “Sell” feature will make filling out the necessary item information so much easier than before. Now group admins will no longer have to remind members that they’re required to list a price, for example, or that they need to specify their general location or neighborhood.

Benefits for Members

Group members will also benefit from the addition, as they’ll no longer need to comment or message the item’s owner in order to get basic information about the listing.

Sellers can also mark posts as Available or Sold and easily view their catalog of items previously sold.

Before you Buy or Sell

class="_3p8">Remember, both buyers and sellers are responsible for things sold in a Facebook Group.

class="_3p8">Buyers: Any transaction made through a Facebook Group is between you and the seller. Keep in mind Facebook doesn’t own or possess any items a seller lists, so use your best judgment.

class="_3p8">Sellers: Please describe the items you’re selling clearly and make sure you’re following both our href="https://www.facebook.com/legal/terms" target="blank">Statement of Rights and Responsibilities and href="https://www.facebook.com/communitystandards" target="blank">Community Standards.

Takeaway

Unfortunately the option for listing items for sale will not be rolled out further to public Pages, for example, which is where a lot of more professional selling takes place today from a number of e-commerce retailers of varying sizes. Facebook says that it will continue adding more features that will enhance these For Sale Groups in the months ahead that will make it easier for members to connect with each other, browse and search.

Are you a member of any For Sale Facebook Groups? Do you admin a group that would make sense to be converted? Do you even trust making a purchase from a Facebook user? Let me know in the comments below and make sure to come back next week for more title="SOCIAL MEDIA TUTORIALS" href="http://www.jacobcurtis.com/social-media-tutorials/" target="_blank">social media tutorials.

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How to Make a Facebook Video Go Viral

Facebook Videos go Viral

I like to think of the phenomenon of “going viral” akin to being struck by lightning. In the past, it was a completely random event, an act of god or the whims of fate. In recent history, understanding of lightning allowed you to make certain choices to change the chances of being struck. You could go outside during a thunderstorm, climb on your roof, and raise a metal pole into the air.

Now, with modern technology, you can harness the lightning. You can direct it with batteries and wires, generators and arcs. You can even play with it, like a tesla coil.

Facebook videos – to bring this back to a topic that makes sense and isn’t an abstract metaphor – are the “you” in this analogy. The lightning is going viral, and you want to do everything you can to make it strike. You may not be able to harness your very own viral tesla coil, but you can at least get your metal pole and start climbing.

Step 1: Define Viral

What is “viral” to you? If your videos get an average of 100 views each, posting a video that pulls in 1,000 in the first week is a very good viral response. For a business that routinely posts videos with 100,000 views per day, an increase of 900 is hardly noticeable. Before you can make a video go viral, you need to decide what viral means to you. Realistic goals are the best, here. You can always exceed them and feel pleased, but reaching for the stars only to land in the next back yard is supremely disappointing.

Step 2: Consider the Math

One interesting essay to read is Dan Zarella’s hierarchy of contagiousness. It’s a bit of mathematical thought experimentation that helps you figure out what you need in order to go viral with a given piece of content.

By using this math, you can get a decent idea of how many people need to see your posts – and by extension how many people you need to have following your Facebook page – in order to receive a certain number of shares. While this isn’t necessarily useful in a practical sense, it can tell you whether your goals are reasonable or not.

Step 3: Promote Sharing

Every video you post needs to be sharable in order to go viral. If your video is behind a wall, even the lowest of the low, it won’t go viral. At all. It’s like a bit of strewn rubble in a video game making a wide hallway impassible.

We’re talking about Facebook videos specifically, here, which means one thing. When you post the video, it needs global targeting. You can’t restrict it to just your followers. You can’t target it to certain demographics. You need it to be as broadly exposed as possible, with a few barriers to re-sharing as possible. Ideally, the amused user will only have to do one thing to share your post; click the “Share” button and click “ok.”

Step 4: Length

How long should your video be, if you want it to go viral? Some great viral videos are only seconds long. Just look at Vine or Instagram Video for examples. On the other hand, some great emotional viral videos stretch five or more minutes long. What works best, though? What length is ideal for the highest chance at viral success?

Studies performed by StumbleUpon indicate that videos of length are actually better. A video longer than four minutes has as many as five times more shares than videos of shorter durations. The hook to this, though is that you need to make use of that length to tell a narrative. That lengthy video needs to catch the user’s attention and make them watch it all.

Step 5: Market

Marketing makes the world go round. Facebook specifically has a Video Views objective in their PPC ads. Run those, with specific targeting, with oCPM to keep your budget optimized.

In this case, you very likely want to run several ads, each of which targets a small, narrow demographic. The reason for this is a study Buzzfeed performed, mentioned in the link above. Buzzfeed determined that single influencers are not the best way to get a video to go viral. That is, getting a celebrity to retweet it will give a burst of activity, but not true virality.

True virality comes from small circles of people acting as seeds for sharing the post. Have you ever seen three different people share the same video on Facebook, even though none of them know each other? It’s the same theory, only widespread around the world.

Put your video in front of as many different circles of people as possible, with as many vectors as possible. If you’re promoting your own video to Mashable and HuffPo, they’ll look at it and shrug. If you and six other potentially unrelated people give them the video, they’ll be more likely to look at it. If one of your “seeds” happens to include influential contributors to those sites – hint: Reddit is a great seed – you’re set for a viral explosion.

Step 6: Make a Good Video

Your video needs to be good. It needs to be great. It needs to have emotional power behind it, even if that emotion is pure comedy. Cat videos are popular because cats are adorable, and they squeeze out feline emotions of love. Drama videos are great because they forge an emotional connection that people want to share with their friends.

Avoid bad emotions. Don’t make everyone content. Don’t make them angry, except in a “so angry I want to do something about it” kind of way. Don’t make them sad, unless you’re going all out, like Sarah McLachlan.

Step 7: Repeat

Your first video probably won’t go viral. Neither will your second, or your third. Maybe not even your tenth or your twentieth.

Believe it or not, this is a good thing. It means that when a video does go viral, everyone coming in to watch it will have plenty more to watch from your feed. This gives other videos a second chance to go viral, possibly even more so than the first one. Just keep trying, keep at it, and your videos will explode. Eventually.

The post How to Make a Facebook Video Go Viral appeared first on Boostlikes.com.

6 Ways to Embed Facebook on Your Website

You might not have always approached your Facebook strategy with your website in mind, but there’s no time like the present. Although the social network is appearing in search results more often, many consumers will stumble upon your website before your Facebook page.

A great way to bridge the gap between your site and social presence is by taking advantage of Facebook’s embedding functionality. From buttons and posts to feeds and recommendations, you can introduce visitors to your more social side without them ever having to leave your site.

Here are six ways you can embed Facebook on your website.

1. Sidebar Plugins and Widgets

A simple way to display your Facebook on your website is through a plugin or widget. Depending on your content management system, different options will be available to you. We’ve focused on WordPress, since it’s used by more than 23 percent of the top 10 million websites as of January 2015. Here are a few of our favorite tools.

The Official Facebook Plugin for WordPress

Developed by Facebook, this plugin offers a wide range of helpful features. Starting with the most basic, it adds “like,” “send,” and “follow” buttons to every post to help your site’s readers share your content. (For more advanced users, you can integrate Open Graph protocol and Facebook Insights into your site.)

Although you’ll be able to use the social buttons right away, you’ll need to enter your Facebook developer credentials to unlock additional features, such as publishing posts to an author timeline or Facebook page.

Recent Facebook Posts

The Recent Facebook Posts plugin is similar to a native option offered by Facebook — the Like Box — in that it displays a list of your most recent posts. What’s different with this tool is that there’s more room for customization, which is especially important if you want your Facebook updates to blend in with your site’s theme. Everything is customizable through smart CSS selectors.

In addition to more visual flexibility, Recent Facebook Posts is SEO-friendly since posts are rendered as plain HTML. Additionally, your Facebook posts are cached for a customizable period of time to help improve performance.

The plugin requires a Facebook app in order to fetch posts from the social network, so you’ll need to be registered as a Facebook developer. We should note that this plugin works best with Facebook pages, so if you’re trying to pull from a profile, you might run into issues.

Custom Facebook Feed

This plugin enables you to display a customizable, responsive, and search-friendly version of your Facebook feed on your website. With countless options, you can make the feed match the look and feel of your site.

Custom Facebook Feed supports multiple feeds of different Facebook pages. This can be achieved by specifying a page ID directly in the shortcode. Best of all, setup is extremely simple – a Facebook developer account isn’t required.

2. Facebook Buttons

Another easy way to connect your website visitors with your Facebook content is by adding buttons. These buttons can live on your homepage, in headers and/or footers, or on each individual page or blog post.

There are currently four options to choose from: like, share, send, or follow.

Like

The “like” button is the quickest way for people to share your content with their friends. You can choose from four different layout options:

Regardless of which button you use, you’ll have the option of including the “share” button and displaying friends’ faces. You can also change the color scheme from light (default) to dark, the width of the plugin (standard layout only), and restrictions if your site is directed to children under 13.

You’ll notice there’s an option to change “like” to “recommend.” Functionally, these buttons are identical. What’s different is the intent behind a user’s action. Liking something represents a personal investment, while recommending a piece of content is slightly less emotional.

If you’d like to see the number of likes on your domain each day and the demographics of who is clicking the button, register your domain through Facebook Insights. Be sure to read through the FAQ before starting to configure your “‘like” button.

The “share” button is similar to the “like” button, but it gives people the option to add a personalized message to links before sharing to their timeline. Share dialog can be configured for iOS, Android, and the web, the latter of which supports Open Graph actions.

There are six different layout options to choose from:

It’s recommended that you include both the “like” and “share” buttons on your website to let people choose the way that they want to share your content. You should read through the different settings and FAQ before you configure your own “share” button.

Send

The “send” button lets people privately share content on your site with friends through a Facebook message, to an email address, or with a Facebook group. Not only can you configure the height and width of the “send” button, but you can also adjust the color scheme (light or dark), the absolute URL, the children under 13 restrictions, and the referral tracking.

It’s worth noting that the story created by the action of sending your page can be enriched using meta tags to turn a simple HTML page into an Open Graph object. As with the previous two options, it’s recommended that you read through the settings and FAQ before creating your own “send” button.

Follow

The “follow” button lets people subscribe to your public updates on Facebook. Generally, if people are interested in keeping up with a page, they will like it. But if you have more public-facing figures on your team, such as your community managers, you can promote their Facebook profiles with a “follow” button on your website.

Similar to the “like” and “share” buttons, there are four different layouts to choose from:

Many of the same settings that can be configured with the other buttons apply here as well. Check the FAQ for more information on specific setting and sizing options before creating your “follow” button.

3. Facebook Like Box

The Like Box is a special version of the “like” button designed only for Facebook pages. It allows you to promote your page and embed a simple feed of content from it into other sites.

In terms of customization, you can tweak design elements, such as height, width, color scheme, and border. Other configurations include the ability to display friends’ faces, the “find us on Facebook” header, and posts from the page.

Because this can only be used for pages, you’ll want use the more traditional “like” button if you’re linking to a Facebook profile.

4. Feeds

In addition to buttons and boxes, there are two types of embeddable feeds that you can add to your website or blog. The Activity Feed displays the most interesting recent activity taking place on your site, using actions (such as likes) by other people. The Recommendations Feed displays the most recommended content on your site based on those same actions.

Functionally, the two feeds are very similar. Each one requires an app or page ID (located on your “about” tab) to begin the creation process. You’ll also be able to define which Open Graph actions (such as likes and recommends) you want to show as well as the maximum age of articles shown in the feed.

Both are great visual representations of what’s taking place on your page, but they do rely on actions from other people. If engagement is low, feeds might not be the best way to promote your page on your site.

5. Facebook Badges

Facebook Badges have been around for years. Although the name might not ring a bell, you’ve probably seen a variation of the widget in use before.

For businesses, the most logical choice is the Page Badge that can be customized to display your page name, profile image, latest status update, and number of fans. The widget can be displayed vertically or horizontally for the best fit for your site. Once your badge has been configured, just copy and paste the code onto your site.

Badges don’t look as stylized as the rest of Facebook’s embeddable offerings. Not only that, but many of the other options provide you with more customization and some sort of social component. They’re fine as a backup, but it’s worth looking into the other embeddables first.

6. Embedded Posts

A great way to showcase your content, expand your reach, and grow your social community is through Embedded Posts. These fully functional posts are displayed on your website or blog and only require a few simple steps.

Locate the post you want to embed.

Click on the drop-down arrow icon in the top right corner of the post and select “embed post.”

Adjust the pixel width of the post (between 350 and 750).

Copy and paste the embed code onto your website or blog post.

The same steps apply whether you’re looking at a post in the timeline, news feed, or direct URL. If the “embed post” option doesn’t appear, the post you’re looking at is not public and can’t be shared this way.

An embedded post will display any media attached to it, along with the number of likes, shares, and comments that it has. Keep in mind that very long posts will be truncated with a “see more” option, which will display the full post on your website when clicked.

Each of the embedding options above can be used with one another; there’s no right or wrong way to implement them. For example, you can add a Like Box to your homepage and embed Facebook posts throughout your site. Just ensure that you’re providing relevant and interesting information for your readers and use embeds in moderation so you don’t overwhelm your audience.

For more Facebook inspiration and a roundup of lesser-known features, read our earlier article, 5 Overlooked Facebook Features Marketers Should Be Using. Once you’ve got your feature set established, read more about the Facebook metrics you should be tracking to ensure that your business goals are being met.

The post 6 Ways to Embed Facebook on Your Website appeared first on Sprout Social.

How to Improve Your Facebook Page with Free Templates

Facebook Page Template

Here’s something I’ve done, and it’s something I’d wager a number of people who haven’t looked up specific information have done as well. In an attempt to create a new cover photo for my business page, I took a screenshot of Facebook and normal zoom, pasted that screenshot into Photoshop, and fiddled around with pictures until I got something precisely the right size. Then, when I went to upload it to Facebook, I discovered I got something wrong and the whole thing – meant to tie in with my profile picture – was off by a few pixels and looked awful.

I am not what you might call the most talented of graphic designers, some days.

Facebook Pages

What I eventually did was look up a Facebook Page template, and it has made my live about a million times easier. Why should I bother doing all of that work myself, when I can draw on the experience and effort of someone else? In this case, one great template is the one produced by Shortstack.

What does this template cover?

Height and width of the cover photo.

Height of the name and description of your business above the bottom of the cover photo.

Height and width of the profile picture.

Width of the border around the profile picture and the gutter to the left.

Position of the various like/CTA/activity buttons that hover over the cover photo.

Sizes for all the various sorts of images that can be found on a page, including newsfeed previews, timeline images, mobile images and link previews.

Sizes of videos in various positions.

Height and width of the app preview image.

This is an incredibly useful little document, and you can easily convert it into a Photoshop file to keep on hand for when you want to quickly size and position images on the fly. You can use this to help you update your cover photo on a regular basis, without uploading files only to find your text is hidden behind a button or your nice little link between cover photo and profile picture is skewed. Trust me, that border around the profile picture will cause you no end to trouble if you let it.

Protip: when you upload new photos, whether they’re for your cover photo or your profile picture, make sure you fill out the description. Not everyone is going to click your pictures to see it, but it will be a nice surprise for those who do. You can plug in a link and a call to action if you like. One trick I used to great effect once was to put a minor coupon link in the description for a new cover photo. Those who found it treated it like a cool little Easter egg, and got a 5% discount out of it.

Facebook Ads

There’s more to Facebook than just your page, though, right? What about all of those ads? Sidebar ads, news feed ads, mobile ads, video ads, mobile video ads… everything has a different set of dimensions, and let me tell you. Facebook LOVES their weird, non-rounded numbers. I mean, really, who the heck decided that the ideal size for a sidebar ad is 254 by 133 pixels?

Thankfully, here’s another template for you, courtesy of Jon Loomer, Facebook guru extraordinaire. It has dimensions for so many different types of images on Facebook you’ll be left wondering how you can even use all of them.

It’s worth bookmarking that page, by the way, because as much as Facebook loves their uneven numbers, they love changing them even more. It seems like every three months, Facebook is rolling out a change to their layout, their ads or their feed, and it always skews the sizes of everything. Sure, it keeps businesses on their toes, but it’s damn annoying to have to deal with like clockwork.

Facebook Apps

As a business, running a business page, you have a top bar and a sidebar box, both of which show apps. These apps can be customized in a huge number of ways. The apps themselves are essentially just web pages in an iframe, loading from off-site. Facebook puts a few restrictions on what can be loaded, so they aren’t always very dynamic or filled with multimedia, but they’re insanely useful for contests, opt-ins and other user interactions.

Of course, you need to be a web designer to make one from scratch. That’s where more templates come in. Here, since tab apps are so widely variable, you can find templates all over the place. For example, you can buy templates directly from sites like this one. These happen to costs $50 a piece, though they aren’t otherwise limited.

You can also use third-party sites like ShortStack, PageModo, Heyo, Wishpond or any of a thousand other services to make apps. These typically cost money, but they also come with internal templates you can customize for your business. Just be aware that most of these sites, when they give you a service for free, tend to watermark or brand your app unless you buy a full version of the suite.

Beyond that, there are sites like Canva, which offer very basic templates for all sorts of different uses, all for free. The caveat is that you draw from their library of images and stock photos, all of which cost some money. When you create an image you like out of their stock library, you pay for the rights to use the images when all is said and done.

The potency of templates cannot be overstated. Between a tab app suite, a .psd template and a site like Canva, you’re covered in just about every way imaginable. Well, right up until Facebook changes they way they operate once again. When that happens, you have to hope your template updates. Loomer, ShortStack and the other services will; individual purchased templates may not.

The post How to Improve Your Facebook Page with Free Templates appeared first on Boostlikes.com.

3 Examples of Perfectly Optimized Facebook Pages

Perfect SEO Facebook Page

All the theory in the world is worthless if you can’t put it into practice. Unfortunately, so much of SEO writing is theory and so little of it is backed with examples and hard evidence. That’s what I’m here for; to show you some of the best Facebook business pages alive today, and to explain what they’re doing right.

Facebook Page Optimizations

Before we get to the specific examples, let’s look at the lesson plan. In order to tell if a Facebook page is optimized, you need to know what goes into optimization. Here are the guidelines to look for in the pages I’ll display below.

1) A great custom URL. The ideal custom URL is just your brand name. If you can’t get a hold of that, get something evocative of your brand, like an iconic slogan, abbreviation, or assertion of your reality.

2) Use of keywords in various descriptive text. Ideally, product listings and various demographic information will appear, to appeal to people searching for those sorts of items.

3) Links to other channels, including other social media sites and websites.

4) Large, robust images. A compelling banner app, a compelling profile picture, and images that take full advantage of the width of the news feed are all essential for a vibrant page presence.

5) App Optimizations. Tab apps are a bit out of the way compared to their top bar prominence before last year’s redesign. That said, they can still be very compelling, if used properly. A featured tab is important, as are tab app images. These are really tricky to get right.

6) Links (Without Links). One great thing you can do on Facebook is create a link that generates a preview, and then remove the text link. This creates a large graphical link, but doesn’t clutter up your text post with the link a second time.

The Examples

Example 1: Old Spice

The deodorant brand has gone whole-hog into branding with a unique twist in recent years. That twist is insanely macho charisma. Their page has it in spades. Let’s look at the list of optimizations and check them off.

Custom URL: Check. Nothing much to say about it.

Keywords in text: Check. The About section lists various products in a simply descriptive line. Their long description is a little lacking, just full of links and a disclaimer.

External links: Check. Their long description is full of them.

Images: Check in spades. Old Spice has a very unique type of imagery, and it’s everywhere on their page. Even their tab apps have crazy pictures backing them up.

Tabs: Check, barely. They have an interesting tab app image, but it’s not really descriptive. “Downloads” doesn’t mean much.

Links: Unknown. Old Spice actually posts all of their content directly to Facebook, primarily in the form of videos. You actually have to scroll quite far to get away from on-site posts. This isn’t necessarily a bad thing, but it means it’s hard to judge the success of this metric.

Example 2: Skullcandy

Skullcandy is everything you’d want out of hip, x-treme lifestyle accessories. They appeal to youth, they make high-end equipment and they’re designed to meet a certain demographic. But what about the checklist?

Custom URL: Check. Nothing much to say about it.

Keywords in text: Check. Their short on-page description is lacking, but their longer description is nicely filled out with both product keywords and demographic keywords.

External links: Check. Their website is prominently displayed, and they have an Instagram tab at the top.

Images: Check. Skullcandy promotes a certain type of culture, and they have numerous high-res pictures of that culture. The only gripe I have is the slight lack of pictures of their actual hardware, but the pictures they do have are beautiful so I’ll forgive them. This time.

Tabs: Check. The Instagram app feature is a good touch. My gripe is that the other two apps on their sidebar aren’t nearly as descriptive, but then, I don’t know a lot about the brand. Maybe they make perfect sense to a fan.

Links: Unknown. Unlike Old Spice, Skullcandy does link externally relatively often. They use Bit.ly shortened links, but they attach them to images in the description. This actually gives them a larger preview, but at the detriment of eliminating the click-image-to-link aspect of link previews. Not ideal.

Example 3: Threadless

Threadless is an apparel manufacturer that’s all about graphics. Everything from cute graphics to weird mashups of culture is within their area of expertise. But how do they stand up to the checklist?

Custom URL: Check. Nothing much to say about it.

Keywords in text: Check. Both their short on-page and long descriptions are robust and fleshed out with mission and keywords.

External links: Check. Just like Skullcandy, their Instagram is linked up top and their actual website is linked everywhere.

Images: Check, check, check. Threadless is 100% focused on the creative artistry of their apparel, so every post they made has some cutesy graphic attached.

Tabs: Check, and the winner of this trio. Their featured Instagram app is good, as is their support tab, which even features an interesting design for the app image.

Links: Check. Threadless uses both methods, the shortened link in image found on Skullcandy and the linkless preview that’s most recommended. Overall, they make excellent use of the format.

The post 3 Examples of Perfectly Optimized Facebook Pages appeared first on Boostlikes.com.

3 New Facebook Marketing Trends in 2015

2015 Facebook Trends

By now, you’ve surely heard some of the more major trends for marketing in the coming year. Mobile, of course, is the biggest. You’ve been hearing about the importance of mobile for the past five years, and it finally reached the tipping point where more mobile users are browsing than desktop users on average. It’s not a mobile-optional world or a mobile-acceptable world; it’s a mobile-first world.

Another trend you’ve likely heard of is the increasing nature of pay to play advertising. Facebook is continually cutting back on brand reach and promotional posting without an infusion of cash. Whether you believe this is a moneymaking scheme on Facebook’s part or a legitimate leaning to improve user feeds doesn’t matter; the facts are the facts. Facebook is moving ever-forward towards a pay-only marketing platform.

1. The Content Singularity

The last four years have been something of a promised land for long-oppressed content writers. They spent decades seeing their valuable content lose out to over-optimized pages, until Panda came along. Finally! Good content was the way to go, at long last.

Since then, millions of words worth of content are published every hour online. Every possible subject has been done to death. The only ways to write valuable content are to either dig as deep as possible into something, plumbing depths no writer has visited before, or do cover something so fresh and new that no one else has heard of it.

The bar has been raised to such a height that it’s hard to maintain the level of content quality necessary to stand out. Are you writing seven blog posts per week about a wide range of subjects, complete with actionable advice? Good, that’s par for the course.

The coming year may not be the breaking point, but it’s a trend that is going to continue. The bar rises ever higher. Valuable content must be ever more valuable to receive any notice at all.

It’s going to be a year of focusing less on the production of content, less on the volume, and more on the quality. It will be all about Ideas. Powerful ideas, motivational ideas, expansive ideas – ideas to drive thought and engagement. Information is good; ideas are compulsive.

Further, video in all shapes and forms will continue to grow, to some extent replacing traditional blog content. The written word will never go away, but video may become a bit closer to required for many marketers. This includes both short Vine-style clips and longer-form Facebook and YouTube videos.

2. Measurement

Traffic Stats

2014 was a year where video exploded, between Vine, Instagram, and Facebook’s video everything. Yet so little of video is truly utilized to its fullest.

2015 should see two major aspects of video hit the limelight. The first will be video SEO. Google is undoubtedly aware of the profusion of video, and the push for more video content in the future. In order to more fully index the Internet, they are very likely pushing for some kind of way to monitor and analyze video.

This might mean that Google pushes for everyone to post a video transcript. It might mean they work on their automatic parsing technology. It might mean a lot of things. It’s all also somewhat tertiary to the other trend in the coming year.

This other trend will be the expansion of the breadth and depth of video analytics and monitoring. Between video content and mobile devices, there’s a dearth of good analytics. You can piece together a lot of information, but it’s patchwork and it’s not as detailed as what you get from a good old desktop Google Analytics install.

Expect in 2015, not just more video, but more ways to analyze video. Not just more mobile, but more ways to analyze mobile.

3. Diversification

How many social networks do you think a brand should have a presence on, moving forward? Some will say just one: Facebook. Others will list off the big few: Facebook, Google+, Twitter, YouTube. Others add in Instagram, Pinterest, Tumblr and Reddit. Some remind you that LinkedIn and even MySpace have their roles. That’s not even counting foreign social networks big in other countries, or forums dedicated to specific subjects rather than general everything like Reddit.

According to Global Web Index, 92% of adult Internet users aged 16-64 have an account on at least one social network. On average, believe it or not, the typical online adult has a profile on 5 different social networks. That means when you bring yourself to marketing on a social network, even one as large as Facebook, you’re only occupying one fifth of the user’s social attention.

Moving forward, one thing brands will be doing is diversifying their social profiles. Those that only have a presence on Facebook will expand to others, like Twitter, Google+ and Instagram. Those who already have accounts on those sites will likely expand to yet others, like Reddit, Pinterest and Tumblr.

This is what I envision. Brands will spend the next six to twelve months expanding to various social media platforms. They will then work to establish a presence on those sites and determine which of them are worth the time investment. They will then dial back and focus on the 3-5 networks that bring them the most engagement and the most conversions overall.

Some brands will, in the coming year, very likely abandon Facebook. There’s already been a lot of discussion about the death of Facebook as early as two years from now, and the way Facebook has been making itself increasingly hostile to marketers will help support that theory. I doubt that Facebook will be truly as dead as these predictions within two years, but it’s certainly already losing appeal.

All it will take to cause a mass exodus from Facebook is a new social killer app, a site that will take its place, just like Facebook took over from MySpace. Many have tried, of course. Those that succeed in sticking around end up the Twitter, the Instagram, the Tumblr. Those that don’t end up like Ello – a brief fad that fades out.

The post 3 New Facebook Marketing Trends in 2015 appeared first on Boostlikes.com.

Tips From #SproutChat on Creating Successful Hashtags

We’ve already covered the basics and there’s no arguing that hashtags, when used strategically, play a vital role on social media. Today hashtags appear in everything from daily online conversations to national commercials and billboards. They provide you with an easy way to reach people you aren’t directly connected to and help to deliver content to groups of people who may not be actively looking for it.

With useful benefits and virtually no barrier to entry, it’s not surprising that nearly everyone is using hashtags. But for every hashtag that takes off and makes the trending list, there are literally thousands of others that fall flat. So what gives? What defines good hashtags, and what factors decide whether they trend or flop?

During a recent #SproutChat, we asked our community to weigh in on good hashtags and we’ve collected some of their feedback and key takeaways for you below.

Developing a New Hashtag

Creating a new hashtag is as simple as placing the # symbol in front of any word, but creating a successful hashtag requires a lot more work.

The first thing you’ll want to consider is whether a new hashtag is necessary. There are times when it will make sense to craft content around existing hashtags — for example, #SB49, #SDCC, or #Oscars. While often a few variations of popular hashtags exist (#Oscars2015, for instance), if everyone tried to create a unique version of it, then social networks would be over-saturated and too cluttered for productive conversations.

When crafting an original hashtag is the way to go, there are a few best practices you’ll want to observe. For starters, you’ll need to make sure that the hashtag you have in mind isn’t already being used by another person or brand. Hashtag hijacking shows that you didn’t put much thought or effort into developing the campaign and can direct unnecessary negativity toward your brand.

A1 Always research it first check their is no existing use and it can’t be misread, like susanalbumparty #SproutChat @SproutSocial

— Stephen ‘Paddy’Dyson (@SDXcreative) February 4, 2015

And while you’re researching the originality of your hashtag, try to anticipate your community’s reaction. Does the term you’re using have any other connotations? Does it mean something else to different age groups or cultures? If you’re using a phrase, do all the words make sense together? These are simple elements that are easily overlooked, so plan to have another person (or two) review the hashtag before it goes live.

A1: Your hashtag should be unique enough to not be co-opted by other orgs. The more generic, the more likely to be confused. #SproutChat — Adam T. Music (@MusicAdamT) February 4, 2015

When you’re creating a new hashtag, make sure that it stands out from existing ones to avoid confusion. If you’re a home improvement brand and you have a new kitchen DIY series coming up, but someone is already using #KitchenDIY, adding a few more characters to it won’t make the hashtag unique enough for you to use successfully. Mistakes are made with hashtags all the time. A customer might tweet using #BrandXKitchenDIY and think that they’re responding to the other company and vice versa.

At the same time, don’t choose a term that’s so generic anyone can join the conversation and end up leading it. #Kitchen or #DIY, while both great terms to tag for search and discovery, shouldn’t be the primary drivers behind your hashtag campaign.

A1 Always use a hashtag that can relate back to your brand in some way. It makes the hashtag easier to remember and relevant #SproutChat

— Christine Chen (@Christine_Chen6) February 4, 2015

You’ll also want to settle on using a hashtag that relates back to your brand in some way, shape, or form. #TaylorSwift might be trending, but unless you are Taylor Swift, work for her, or referenced her in a valuable way, there’s no relevant reason to tag her in your post. Not only are you misleading audiences who come across your post, but most people will view it as deceiving and sneaky. Some other hashtag do’s and don’ts that you should consider include:

Keep it short, especially on Twitter where you’re limited to 140 characters. If your hashtag takes up one-third of your tweet it’ll be too easy for people to leave out for the sake of space.

Make sure that your community knows the story behind the hashtag, especially if it’s related to a specific campaign or based on an industry term.

While maintaining relevance and originality, you should also try to create hashtags that your audience will find relatable.

Keep your username out of it. It’s redundant and takes up valuable space.

Try to avoid referencing inside jokes. Building a hashtag around an internal joke only works if your community is in on it.

Recovering From a Hashtags Gone Wrong

While you have absolute control over creating a hashtag, you lose a lot of that once it hits the Internet. If you applied the tips above then you should be in good shape, but every once in a while things still go wrong.

A3: Be humble, recognize/acknowledge your mistake – it gives a human feel to your company personality – we all make mistakes #SproutChat — Erin Miller (@eemiller08) February 4, 2015

One example of this was a hashtag created by JP Morgan which was intended to inspire a positive image for the brand. Unfortunately, it backfired and attracted snarky tweets and hostile questions. Although this is only one example, it’s not the only time that a social network’s members have turned the tables on a hashtag campaign’s original intent.

So while you can’t control what people do or say using your hashtag, you can control how you react and respond. The worst thing you can do is ignore the situation, so the best course of action is to own up to the mistake.

A3 Honesty and grace always wins over avoidance and not taking responsibility. #SproutChat

— Kristen ∞ Runvik (@missrunvik) February 4, 2015

A3. Own up to it and start again. You should never be too big to own up to a misstep. #SproutChat — Aly Schweigert (@AlySchweigert) February 4, 2015

Depending on the severity of the blunder, sometimes it can be remedied with a simple apology and well-timed humor. In some cases, especially those involving insensitivity (regardless of how intentional or unintentional it was), you’ll want to provide more transparency around what you’re doing to remedy the situation.

Next steps will vary depending on your company and the type of plan you have set in place for a social media crisis. That said, remember to be humble and sincere in your response. Additionally, don’t let one bad egg ruin the whole thing. So this hashtag didn’t work out. Learn from the experience and apply those lessons to your next campaign.

Hashtag Overload: Is There Such a Thing?

The short answer: Yes.

Although there aren’t any set rules regarding hashtags on social platforms, using too many can actually hurt your engagement. At least that’s the case on Facebook. The social network recommends using no more than two hashtags per post in order to receive optimal engagement. In a 2014 study, brands using two hashtags received an average of 593 interactions per post, while that number dropped to 416 for those using three to five.

On the other hand, a different study found that Instagram posts with 11 hashtags received the most interactions. The two platforms, of course, work very differently. Hashtags on Instagram are great if you want to see photos similar to the ones that you’ve taken, whereas on Facebook, hashtags are used to categorize topics and identify trends.

A4 Be intentional w hashtags. Say what you mean, infuse personality + use to create cmnty. Don’t need 2962 hashtags for that. #SproutChat

— Kristen ∞ Runvik (@missrunvik) February 4, 2015

As a rule of thumb, only include hashtags that are relevant to your message. Like we said earlier, #TaylorSwift will stand out — and not in a good way — if worked into a tweet about the latest tech innovations from Intel. The only way that hashtag would make sense is if Taylor Swift influenced or inspired the new tech, or was spotted using it.

A4: Too many hashtags can make messages hard to read unless you can weave them into the #socialmedia conversation naturally #SproutChat — Simon Dunant (@NewRiseDigital) February 4, 2015

And even if there are 27 terms that you feel are relevant for your message and brand, choose the top three. Too many hashtags can make your post feel cluttered or spammy. Consider the people who will be searching for those terms as well. Are they part of the audience that you’re trying to reach? Will gaining them as followers help you achieve your goals? If you’re looking to pad your follower count, hashtag away. But if you want to grow an engaged community, be selective and strategic.

For more tips on creating good hashtags, check out the recap from the #SproutChat. You can join us every Wednesday from 2 p.m. to 3 p.m. Central on Twitter. For more topics and follow-up discussions, visit the #SproutChat community on Google+.

The post Tips From #SproutChat on Creating Successful Hashtags appeared first on Sprout Social.

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