Groups give you the chance to showcase your expertise and dedication to your customers. Many members ask questions that are extremely visible to other group members. Answering these questions, encouraging and requesting feedback, and generating networking opportunities is the advantage of having a Group.
Since you don’t just want people to purchase only once, you want to move them through loyalty and to advocacy and this brings new members and thus new customers. The Facebook group helps in addressing these needs for a brand/ company or non-profit group.
The effectiveness and the perceived importance can be gauged by the fact that “Out of the 2.13 billion users on Facebook as of December 31st, 2017 – over 1 billion have Facebook groups.
In January 2018, Facebook announced that it would start prioritizing content from family, friends, and groups. In Groups, local businesses connect with their communities by posting relevant updates and creating events.
Facebook’s new algorithm for promoting posts in the news feed lowered the reach of most Pages but simultaneously gave more importance from family, friends, and groups’ postings more priority.
So this is a good time to promote your group’s page. While your business Page’s reach might go down exponentially, your business’s group postings now have a greater chance to rise to the top of your members’ feeds.
By paying attention to increasing interaction in your groups, now is the time to consistently get your content higher in the newsfeed than you have been in years.
Let’s discover the various strategies that will help promote your Facebook group far and wide!
#1 Invite your Blog readers/Advertise your group on your website
If you’ve created a Facebook group that is cohesive with your blog, your website is an outstanding place to advertise your new Facebook group Since people tend to have a presence on possible mediums, most of your blog readers are on Facebook. Invite them to join your group, and provide a link for easy access.
Your blog readers are close to your target audience because they read your blog already. Provide a link where you can write “community” or “Facebook group” in your menu.
#2 Your personal Facebook page.
Announce your group on your personal Facebook page- Tell your friends you’ve started a group and see if they want to join.
Invite the right friends- You have the option to invite those you assume that they might be interested from the list of your existing friends to the group.
Ask existing group members to invite other members- if you have a small but loyal group of members, ask them to invite their friends to join. Explain exactly how they can do this and
ask group members to invite only friends whom they think will be interested in the group.
Send a mass message- Check through your friend’s list on Facebook to find people who might be interested in the purpose of the group. Adding all of those people to a new message on Facebook Messenger, invite them to your Facebook group by informing them briefly about the purpose of the group and how they can benefit from it.
It’s the good alternative to adding people without their permission. Soon there will be requests to join your group and your group will slowly gain traction.
#3 Twitter
Pinon Twitter- If you’re not utilizing Twitter to promote your content, products, and services – you’re majorly missing out. And the same goes for your Facebook group.
With 500 million tweets go out every day, not utilizing Twitter to promote your content, products, and services is missing out of Twitter reach. Now it is challenging to make your content stick around long enough to be seen but you can ‘Pin It ‘with an eye-catching graphic to the top of your feed so that it’s the first thing seen when someone visits your account.
#4 Instagram
Post it on Instagram Bio- to advertise your Facebook group- On Instagram, you only have one tiny spot to make a big first impression.
Give your group a Billboard on Instagram as well. An attractive picture – your group logo or cover image and attractive— and announce your group to the Instagram world. With “Link in profile” or #linkinprofile on the photo, you can try people tapping to your profile and then going to the group.
#5 Active participation in Other Groups of similar nature
Become a member in the groups with sizeable members who are similar in nature, content and purpose to your group. Instead of directly promoting or advertising your group, participate in the comment’s section or other interactional activities with a useful contribution. Other members might send you Friend’s Request and then you can introduce them to your group.
Respect each thread’s rules and you can start promoting your Facebook group. This works well in groups that have a similar audience. Be creative to captivate your target audience’s attention by writing a sentence or two with the link.
#6 Facebook group link in your email signature
A time-tested strategy to gain new members is to put your Facebook group link in your email signature. Most of the emails you send out will be on track to gain a new member.
#7 Share it on your YouTube Channel
Video content is the Buzzword of the day. All the social mediums are promoting video content and a staggering 80% of all consumer internet traffic will be video content by 2020.
To prompt viewers to join your group, use text overlays in your videos. Provide a link to your Facebook group in every video in the description and mention your group as a CTA at the end of your video.
Making an account with your group name on YouTube is a perfect platform to promote your growing Facebook group.
#8 Improving Engagement with Interactive Content
Through polls, quizzes, lists try to add pieces of interactive content to get the members excited which they might share and bring you new group members.
Asking questions to offer our followers a chance to share their thoughts at Group’s page – Share the relevant news or blog post and ask our followers for their opinions. Choice of questions depends upon the audience like If you have a professional audience, you might want to ask their opinion on industry news or articles.
#9 Pay for Facebook Ads
You can grow your Facebook group with ads. One of the easiest ways to get people to join your group is to run some targeted Facebook Ads.
Be careful of the following limitations while going for Facebook Ads for groups.
There is no way you can target specific groups, it is Facebook who will decide where to place the ads in groups it thinks are in line with the interests you are targeting. At the most, with paid Ads, you can target people who like certain pages and have particular interests
Some groups don’t allow external content to be posted on their pages, so the best bet is to share something valuable to the group owner actually appreciates, accepts and promotes your content in the group.