On Facebook? Avoid These 5 Mistakes

Being on Facebook is really important for people who have small businesses. It’s free advertising. Because of that, though, the kind of information you put on Facebook and how you present yourself is very important in order to build your business in a way that you want. If you provide the wrong kind of information or don’t use Facebook the “right” way, you can end up hurting your business and losing out on clients instead of using the social media sites to make your business stronger. There are five main mistakes that people and small businesses make on Facebook, and avoiding them can really help you be successful.

1. Don’t ignore your Facebook page. If you don’t spend time on your page, posting information for others to find and read, you won’t get (or keep) followers. It’s going to take some time to build up a Facebook page, too, so don’t expect followers to flock to you right away. You have to make time to post frequently – ideally, several times per day. Then people will start to notice you and they’ll follow you if you provide them with interesting information.

2. When you post, be sure you follow Facebook’s rules. If you don’t you could lose your page, which would reflect badly on your business.

3. Another issue to address is not to become a spammer. It can be easy to keep posting about what you want to sell or offer to others, but if that’s all you have to say you’ll alienate people very quickly. In order to avoid upsetting customers and potential customers, it’s a good idea to make sure that you post about other things besides what you’re trying to sell. If you’re careful to do that, and you’re careful about how you provide information when you are trying to sell something, you’ll keep more clients.

4. Don’t choose the wrong person to manage your page, or you could end up with serious regrets about what’s said and how the page is handled.

5. Always respond to feedback. If you don’t manage the page yourself or you don’t have a good manager for your page, it’s possible you’ll upset and anger clients without even realizing it. You have to make sure that any feedback you get is being addressed the right way, or clients will feel as though you don’t care about them and aren’t interested in what they have to say. That can quickly be the kiss of death for a small business.