Get paid by customers from Facebook even with a few followers!
The primary motive of listing a local business on Facebook is to generate sales and not to only gain social proof. Social proof of course is still important, but may work best for those who operate nation-wide or at multinational level.
As such, the strategies suggested in this article are for people who operate in one location whilst giving services or products that require customers who are in proximity.
Quick examples are, salons and barber shops, medical centers, small grocery stores, and local pubs among others.
Of course there is always an exception to what I am saying. A local restaurant that operates in a tourist area may benefit by being known worldwide so that when people visit that area they look for it, because of the stories around it. I intend to do a seperate article on the best approach for tourist resorts, or businesses that find themselves in big road networks or high ways.
Now back to Facebook.
Whilst organic reach is observably back on Facebook, in recent times it’s not enough to just rely on organic reach because it lacks precision.
With organic reach you may be happy that 3000 people saw your post, but if you are advertising barber shop in Pretoria, that post is irrelevant to someone who follows the page from East London. Unless they are willing to buy air tickets just to get a haircut.
Even if you are one of the best at your craft. It is more likely that the people that will respond to such an advert are people who find it convenient to choose you.
The same applies for people who I see selling handbags online or clothing items, which are not unique in any way. Why would someone incur a courier fee to buy something that’s already available at a local mall they can walk to?
The first thing is don’t invite your friends to a local business page, unless they live in or around that area!
Think about it. You might have some followers on your Facebook page, but are they actually in your area? Are they actually potential customers?
A good rule of thumb is ensure your page name includes your location. For instance, if you own photo studio in Bulawayo, call yourself “Tikkies Photostudio in Bulawayo”. That way, when people search for photo studios in Bulawayo, you’ll come up.
Also, people who see your promotional posts whether organic or paid will immediately know if you are in their area or not. So you will be followed by the people who need to follow you.
Help the Facebook algorithm identify your target by not mixing it up
Don’t just invite all your friends to like your page. That won’t do you any good if they’re all scattered across the country or even the world. Instead, use location targeted invites. A quicker way is to use targeted ads in your radius to show Facebook that your page is mostly followed by people in your area.
What If you don’t have any money to sponsor adverts yet?
Well you can start a fresh Facebook profile with no friends. Make sure you set your location to the location you want to target. Usually this causes you to be suggested in “people you may know”.
Next join Facebook groups, preferably that have members of the demographic you are targeting. On the right side of the screen, you should find a slot that says members.
Facebook will sort the members by location.
Go on to request only the people in a certain location of course don’t do this at once, continue to exhibit other normal behaviour on social pages but decline requests from people who are not from target location. Avoid getting flagged by Facebook for “suspicious behaviour”.
What do I mean by “members of the demographic you are targeting”
Now do not make the mistake of getting into a group about people who are selling the same products as you or selling in general.
When I say “members of the demographic you are targeting” I mean go where your customers congregate.
If your customers are women go into their groups about women, where they share tips, socialize or share hot gossip. Also contribute in those groups, make friends. Of course implement the location invite strategy.
At some point you should have above a thousand friends and all of them from pretty much your area. Even if you are targeting one gender, it’s okay to have a mixed friend-list so that you look as natural as possible.
Now you can go on to invite all friends, knowing that they are all from the same place!
Again the quickest route is to sponsor an advert, the above strategy relies on people taking time to approve your request and has risks of you getting locked out of your account if Facebook figures out what you are doing. Also the above does not factor in age, where as with an advert age and other interests (other than the group you found them in) can be factored in.
Now that you have your target market!
Create compelling content to build trust
All business is about trust and as such you should consistently create content that addresses the pain points of your prospects and how you offer a solution. Here is a free shortcut to copy-writing frameworks you can use to know the structure.
You should also read this , so that you learn an ad copy technique that even Nike uses.
(Boost Your Marketing WINS with AIDA: Attention, Interest, Desire, Action)
In the modern age of AI , you can use chat-bots such as ChatGPT (you can click the link) or the magic wand in Canva docs to help with good copy. Of course you will still need to feed it with specifics of what you want.
Canva can also help you with making great graphics, videos and so on.
You can join Canva for free by clicking this link.
Use both organic and paid reach. Some people that find you from a paid advert may get curious and browse the page, thus coming across even the unsponsored posts.
In all posts make sure you exhibit things that establish solid trust.
Automation for mundane tasks
Make sure you have automated price-lists and FAQs in Messenger, and consider getting a second SIM card connected to Whats App for Business so you can keep your personal and business messages separate. Create products and price them, and link your Google My Business page to your Facebook page.
Even after automating, as a gesture of common sense. You should manually check if clients may have unique questions. In certain instances the automations don’t work as planned but at least they get a large chunk of the job out of the way.
Remind happy clients to review you (don’t remind unhappy ones)
If you know a customer is happy, send them a link to review you. And take advantage of free classified ads directories to get your business details out there.
(Hopefully you don’t have any unhappy customers)
You benefit nothing in reminding people that will drop your rating to do just that.
Likewise on a sponsored or non-sponsored post, don’t hesitate to delete or ban negative people. You cannot be pumping thousands on marketing for one person to come
Whenever you have time on your hands, build as much rapport with your customers.
Use Whats App for Business to ask for their name and recommend they save your business name in their contacts.
That way, they’ll always see your status updates, which you can use to educate, ask questions, or even give links to blog articles and stay top-of-mind with your customers.
If you need help with implementing any of these strategies. You can reach out to me via mcpotar600@gmail.com
