Reaching your audience with the best Facebook content
Posted by Chris Tarango on Fri, Dec 23, 2011 @ 09:02 AM
One of the most common questions we hear from businesses new to social media is, "how do we reach our customers?" Setting up a Facebook account is easy, but companies want to know how to use the social network to grab their audiences with effective, influential messaging. As long as the internet has been a tool for branding, companies have used flashy graphics and techniques to reach audiences. Now we are learning that perhaps connecting with audiences online is much more simple.
Recently Mashable, a leading internet and digital media news site, found where exactly users focus their attention when browsing Facebook brand pages. The group worked with EyeTrackShop to study the eye movements of 30 users viewing the top Facebook brand pages, included Coca-Cola, Victoria's Secret, and PlayStation among others. The key takeaways are:
- The Wall is king. Most users in the study looked at the profile wall first and spent at least four times longer viewing this area than any other part of the page. For businesses, this means an emphasis on posting content your audience will find most compelling. What your users find interesting will change depending on industry. For example, a recording studio might post updates related to local concerts next to self-promotion for recording services.
- Pictures matter. The eye-tracking study found that users paid little attention to brand pages with traditional logos, while those with faces retained users for longer periods of time. Of all the brand pages in the study, users spent the longest time on the PlayStation page, which had pictures prominently displayed on the wall. Businesses should consider this and try to post new pictures regularly in order to keep users on their pages long enough to read other compelling content. (New pictures automatically post to your profile wall after uploading.)
Facebook announced this week that beginning in January 2012, the social network will begin showing 'sponsored stories' in the main user news feed. While these targeted ads will not show up on individual profile walls, they will show up alongside status updates and new pics from their friends. Because sponsored stories reflect their friends' interests, this is a great opportunity for inbound marketing - without the air of unwanted advertising.
The eye-tracking study and this week's Facebook announcement are big news for businesses using the social network to reach audiences where they play. Areas like profile walls and news feeds are prime real-estate on Facebook. Now business will have even more opportunities to reach audiences with the assurance their efforts will have an impact.
Marketing on Facebook is ever-changing. How will the eye-tracking study and Facebook's decision to allow ads on news feeds affect your marketing approach?