I'm looking at our Facebook page, and noticing that we've been pretty stagnant lately as far as fan growth goes so I wrote down these ideas that I think might help us reach more people without spending money. I already know we can basically buy fans at $0.50-$1.00 each using Facebook ads.
Free ways to get more fans.
- Post the workout (or maybe just a video) each day and pose a question with it. Why? comments and likes increase post quality. Posts with higher post quality are more likely to show up in people's news feeds and be seen by their friends. Also, Facebook may suggest the page directly to friends of people who like us.
- Tag other pages, people, and businesses in wall posts. For example, " [Dave] from [business] setting a deadlift PR today". To tag people or pages, make sure you are friends with them or like their page, then type @ followed by their name (it will autofill and allow you to choose the right person or page). Why? This will make your post show up on their wall. So people that visit the X facebook page will see the post and be able to click right through to our page. Think of businesses that have a lot of traffic and see if you can find a creative way to mention them.
- Take pictures/videos during a workout and tag people in them. Why? These will show up on their wall, exposing their friends to us.
- Create events in Facebook. For any event we are having at the gym, create an event for it. Post this event on other relevant pages, inviting them. Invite all fans or send all fans an update. Why? as people RSVP, it will show up on people's wall that they are attending an event. It may also show up in their friends news feed. Make sure any updates you send to all fans are relevant and not too frequent. If people feel like they are being spammed, you'll quickly lose fans.
- Invite friends to become fans. You may have done this when you created your page but it doesn't hurt to go through you friends list once in a while and send invites to your new friends. Why? Once they are fans, they are more likely to see your posts.
Free ways to get more traffic to your website
- Write interesting articles and post interesting videos. Why? People will share things they find really useful or entertaining.
- Encourage people to sign up for the daily emails (burn your feed using feedburner to create daily email digests). Why? the more people that are subscribed the more people will know about the current events at the gym.
- Pose questions in the blog encouraging feedback. Why? People will spend more time on our site
- Add links to other sites, especially blogs. Why? This will create a backlink on their blog. These usually show up in or around the comments on their site and provide a link back to your site.
- Post interesting comments on the main site and on other blogs. Why? When you post, there is almost always a place to enter your website. If people read your comments and think you are interesting, they'll likely click through to your site.
It sometimes seems like a popularity contest with no real objective to drive fan and page view numbers up. But if you believe you have a product or information that can truly help people, I think it makes sense to take some of these steps to get your message out. We'll see if they work. We are at 269 fans right now.
Comments welcome.
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