3 Ways to Boost Your Brand Without Facebook

If you’ve been thinking that Facebook is not worth your time and efforts, here are three ways to boost your brand without it

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3 Ways to Boost Your Brand Without Facebook

While reading a piece from Jay Baer’s blog, I was reminded that Facebook is slowly but surely adjusting their algorithm to require brands to pay for exposure to their own fans Recently, a blog piece from Weber Shandwick mentioned that a Facebook vice president had announced that the free ride for brands is over Frustrated by the lack of reach Facebook was allowing on the Dallas Mavericks Facebook page, owner Mark Cuban tweeted that he was looking for another alternative for the popular giant

This has been a long time coming, and I’ve been hearing the rumblings of smaller brands talking about leaving the platform for a while now Many just don’t have the budget to invest in promoted posts and Facebook ads, nor do they want to take a chance on investing in something that so many claim don’t show a measurable return What’s a small brand to do? If you’ve been thinking that Facebook is not worth your time and efforts, here are three ways to boost your brand

without it

1 Step up your brand advocacy strategies on and offline Most small brands thrive on word-of-mouth Companies such as Zuberance are dedicated to the message that spending time finding and cultivating people who already love your brand has a much higher pay-off than broadcast or reach strategies Learn about advocacy strategies and implement the mindset into your marketing strategy

Data indicates that the vast majority of people never visit your Facebook page after they like you Brands are struggling to build effective online communities on Facebook How proactive are you at encouraging good customers to talk about you? People can talk about you to their

Facebook friends whether you’re on Facebook or not You can embed a “like” button on your website that will allow people to share your website content on their Facebook page The protocol isn’t drag and drop, but it’s doable Encourage loyal customers to post positive reviews about your business on third party review sites (but do not offer incentives)

2 Concentrate on making your website more advocacy- and engagement-oriented Your website should already have a social look and feel If it doesn’t, there is your first disconnect Do you have

a photo gallery that shows happy customers using your products? Do you have positive customer testimonials on your website? Make sure you temper the promotional aspect of these by having customers talk about how your product solved a problem for them Have you got a video player on your website? It doesn’t need to feature videos that you have produced It could include how-to or informational videos that revolve around your product sector You can run polls, contests, guest

blogs, story-telling micro sites, and many other customer-oriented features on your website The more you can get people coming to your website engaging and sharing with others the less you need to worry about Facebook

3 Experiment and engage more with other social media channels If you have a walk-up storefront, have you tried geo-location social media yet such as Foursquare? Have you claimed all your online business profiles? How about adding a blog to your website? If you don’t have a website, how about putting up a free “website” on a platform such as Wordpress.com or Tumblr that has the interactive look and feel of Facebook? Do some research on other social media channels like Twitter, YouTube, Pinterest, or Google Plus Experiment and see where you get some traction Make sure you apply good engagement strategies wherever you go Take some time to school yourself on engagement strategies

Even though Facebook claims to have a billion users, getting the attention of the fans you need

to reach is a difficult task, and now, possibly an expensive one Brands have alternatives You can

be successful at creating loyal brand advocates without Facebook Maybe it’s time to consider the alternatives What do you think? Do you need Facebook to thrive?

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Authored by:

Chris Syme

Consultant in crisis communications and social media strategy Specializing in higher ed,

organizations, nonprofits, and small business Author of Listen, Engage, Respond available

on amazon.com

Chris has 25+ years in the communications industry and has authored research for the

Council for Advancement of Education (CASE) and the College Sports Information Directors

of Americs (CoSIDA) She is

See complete profile

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