October is the perfect month to talk about nightmares and horror stories so that is just what we’re going to do. Today we are starting with Facebook. These are things that people are still doing in 2021 that need to stop. They’re bad for business and bad for you.

 

Using Your Profile Instead of a Page

 

You have to have a business page. You can’t just use your profile. That’s not how things work on Facebook. Aside from the fact that it’s a direct violation of Facebook’s rules and regulations, people won’t see it. If you are a business owner and you’re putting all of your work stuff on your profile, you are missing out on all the benefits of having a business page and people are missing out on your posts. You can get analytics that you can’t get from a profile. You can direct message people from your business. It allows you to run ads. Most of all it gives your business legitimacy. There are so many things you can do through a page that you can’t do through a profile and Facebook doesn’t like it when you try to do business from your profile. They can actually shut down your profile altogether, which is a real nightmare. You could lose access to Facebook entirely. 

 

Now, can you share some of your business page posts to your personal profile? Sure. Facebook actually loves that. They want you to share and let people know what you do. You just can’t use your personal profile as your business page. 

Having Multiple Accounts

 

It’s hard to believe that we still see this. Again, this is a Facebook violation. They don’t like that. I understand that there are areas of your life you may want to keep private but Facebook has ways to do that already. You can make posts where they are private or only show up to certain people on your friends list. How do you even keep up with all that? It’s hard enough to keep up with one profile. Why burden yourself with multiples? 

 

Ignoring Engagements

 

When you ignore comments, messages, reviews, and more you are missing out on a huge opportunity. You must respond. You have to let people know that you see them. It costs so much time, effort, energy, and money to get people to your page and to get them to interact with you. When you ignore them, that’s not good. Also, statistically, the younger the audience, if you don’t engage with them they won’t come back. If they leave you an awesome review and you don’t say anything or if they ask you a question and you don’t respond, they’re done. They’ll go find a company that will respond to them.

Ignoring or Deleting Negative Comments

 

Now we are dealing specifically with negative comments only. It’s surprising how many businesses get a bad comment and just want to delete it. If you get a negative comment and it’s valid, deleting it is the worst thing you can do. Most people just want to be heard. They want you to know the experience they had with your business. 9 times out of 10 what you are willing to offer them is more than what they are expecting to get. If it’s a real comment or complaint that pertains to you, you need to address it. If you delete it, they will just take their comments to their own profile where you have no control over it and no say in the conversation.

 

If it’s fake, someone is mad because you sent them the wrong shirt and you don’t even sell shirts, that’s when you talk to Facebook about getting it removed. 

 

Posting a URL without Deleting the Address

 

When you post a URL on Facebook, all you have to do is wait until the preview populates then you can actually delete the URL. Don’t leave a long, messy URL on your posts. It looks unpolished and unprofessional. People may also mistake that for carelessness or laziness. You don’t want to come across as careless or lazy. Delete the URL then write your own caption as it pertains to you and your audience. 

 

Not Using Video

Only 17% of content on Facebook right now is video. Think about how many videos you’ve seen on your feed. This means using video can really help you stand out. You may not want to get in front of the camera. It may be no fun but you have to put yourself out there. It doesn’t always have to be your face. You can demonstrate something with a voiceover. It can be a member of your team. You can highlight your community. It’s great if you can get in front of the camera but it’s not a necessity. 

 

Video works and the shorter the video the better. People are really interested in these 1 minute or 30-second videos. They’ll watch them over and over which is great for your statistics and analytics. If you haven’t put video into your marketing plan, now is the time.

 

Using Bad Images

 

Pixelated images? The horror. Images with a watermark? Why? Copyrighted images? Only if you want to get sued. There are so many sites where you can get free stock images that are high quality. Check out this blog post for a free list of resources for stock images. If you’re looking for a great site to create your own graphics, Canva is awesome. It gives you access to thousands of images and templates to make your graphics look polished. In this day and age, there is no excuse for having bad images. You need to make sure your images look good. 

 

Writing Too Much

 

Some people treat a Facebook post as their own personal blog space. Statistically, posts with around 40 characters get better engagement than posts with over that. Sometimes you have to go over and that’s ok. Sometimes your captions can be one or two words and that’s also ok. However, you don’t want to just rattle on in every post you make on your page. 

 

Overposting and Underposting

 

The fastest way to get rid of your audience is to overpost. If you post more than once a day on an account with less than 10,000 super-engaged followers, you are running your audience off. Underposting makes it looks like you’ve abandoned your page. If your last post was from August, it’s October. Where are you? What’s happening? “I’m busy” is not an excuse anymore. There are too many social media companies out there (like Social U) that you can hire to keep your audience engaged. There’s no excuse to have an empty or naked page. 

 

Making it About You

 

Surprise! It’s not about you. So many business pages get wrapped up in their message, their products, and their story that they forget the person they are selling to is the objective. It’s never about you. It’s always what’s in it for them. Focus on what’s in it for your client and what you bring to the table. How can you solve their problem and make their life better? Tell them why they want to hire you. 

 

On the other side of that, there are some business owners who refuse to engage on their own business page. That’s just as bad. You have to sometimes have your image available. You do at some point need video of yourself. Think like your followers when you are posting. There are times when it’s appropriate to post yourself and times when it’s not. 

Wake Up From the Nightmare

Don’t make these mistakes! You don’t have to have these social media nightmares.