- How do you feel about your business growth online?
- Are you struggling with getting more viewers on Facebook?
- Do you feel like ads are a waste of money because they never work anyway?
Facebook is the great democratizer of small business. It made it possible for fashionable and entrepreneurial-minded women all over the country to set up a business page, throw up a camera to go live, and start selling.
Though some see success right out of the gate, many face an uphill social media battle. And despite their best efforts, they’re not gaining traction or getting any closer to their goals.
What I’ve observed over the years is that your level of success on social media depends on a variety of factors, most of which aren’t what you think. It has nothing to do with lives, shares, number of followers, or your ads.
You Don’t Know Who You’re Selling To
One of the main problems that business owners have on Facebook is that they aren’t marketing to their target audience. There is so much variety out there in the fashion world, but many business owners are scared to place their flag on their particular style. They opt to buy from the same drop shippers and vendors they see everyone else using.
This generally isn’t a problem, except for the fact that these boutiques are all using the same imagery, the same language, and the same posts. What this looks like to a customer is 30 boutiques who all look the same, selling the same thing, with the same fashion point of view.
You have an opinion about fashion and style, it’s why you started your boutique in the first place, don’t be afraid to find products that truly showcase your unique fashion perspective. And, if you want to use the same drop shippers – no problem! But make sure that you’re taking your own photos, creating fit videos, and modifying the text so that it sounds like you.
Why this is Important
What many business owners don’t know is that the more an image or a certain segment of text is used on Facebook, the less original the content is. With each subsequent posting, the content gets lower and lower reach, because overall it’s been used too many times on the platform, and Facebook knows you didn’t write it. Eventually, that image or text gets marked as spam. Boutique owners then wonder why their posts have no engagement, no reach, and no sales. It’s because that content isn’t new, original, or engaging anymore.
You’re Missing the “Social Part of Social Selling”
You’ve got a great vibe, a fantastic logo, and a good brand. What you’re missing is the “social” part of social selling. To identify if that’s your problem, head over to your business page (or group, this applies to both) and scroll. If most (or all) of your posts are sales related, then you’re not using the actual tool that makes social media work. The “social” part.
What that Means
For most business owners, there are two ways to market a business, using money or social media. Money means you have a huge marketing budget where you have huge campaigns with billboards, ads, articles, etc. When you grow that way, you can have a page that just sells and does nothing else, because you’re using that bigger budget to build brand awareness, familiarity, and trust. As a social seller, you don’t have that budget to hire a big marketing agency to put together this whole thing for you to be able to just post-sales. (We may want to also say that when you spend that kind of money on ads, you need the product to support the customers that come with it. So it’s not just about the ad money you now also need the money to stock product for that many buyers)
So you have to use the 2nd option. Social media. And for social media, you have to be social. It’s critical that you work on building relationships, talk about your life, let your audience get to know you. You have to use your personality, point of view, and style to distinguish yourself from the 9 thousand other boutiques and pages out there.
Most boutiques have pages that look the same as everyone else’s, and that’s why they see low engagement and sales – they blend into the wallpaper. This is very common, almost 100% of business owners do this, it’s VERY rare to see someone not build their page like this.
Action: Prioritize building relationships with your audience, don’t focus so much on the sale. You can do that by first determining exactly who your target audience is and what their interests are. Talk to them about your life, your kids, what you’re doing next week, your favorite TV show, or tell them about your new workout regimen. Ask them for advice on waTalk to them like they’re your friends, and they’ll talk back.
Caveat: You may see that some bigger shops ONLY post-sales and nothing else and they do great and make a ton of money. If you’re a bigger page with lots of activity, then it may not impact you. However, if you’re a newer or smaller business owner, it can be devastating.
You’re not Using Keywords
Keywords are the descriptive words that Facebook uses to match your content to users on the platform. It works kinda like matchmaking. If a random stranger walked up to you today and asked you to set them up with one of your friends, you would ask them, ok, well, tell me a bit about yourself. Let’s say the stranger says, “Well, I dunno, I mean. I’m a woman? I breathe?” Would you know who to match them up with? Would you even want to match them up with someone? If you did, do you think you’d do a good job finding the right match for her based on this information?
What if instead, she said, “Well, I love sci-fi shows, I don’t really like movies. I play a lot of video games, right now I am really into Mortal Kombat. I never miss an episode of Game of Thrones, and I hate dancing” Now you know who to match her up with. The same thing is true for your content. If you write a post that says, “Hey guys, come buy my products, showing skirts and tops, click on my face to join.” Facebook is going to search the personal profiles of all your followers to see if any of them would be matches based on the content they post. Chances are, the only people who actually talk about the products in this way are other sellers of those products. So now your content is being shown to people who have no need for your product.
To match content with people who have the same interests that you do, who are likely to have something in common with you, use nouns and adjectives. Talk about specifics. Instead of saying “OMG great day, #lovemylife” talk about “OMG today was fantastic, I went to go see Avengers: Endgame, and it was amazing! Took the entire family! #lovemylife” Now you have a keyword in there – Avengers. Which means now the people that see the content are people who are actually interested in interacting with it.
How it Works
You may be wondering – great, I can use this to get to know my audience and get them talking, but how does that help with selling. It’s a great question.
What happens when you write posts with keywords is that you activate a new set of your audience. Prior to this time, the only “activated” audience members are likely your 4% die-hard fans, and possibly your friends and family. It’s why you often find the same 10 people show up on your lives or comment on your content over and over. Because they’re the only activated ones. Once you start writing posts with keywords, you’re activating different parts of your audience. The result is that when you post a sale later, those people will now get added to the group notified, which grows your audience.
How the Algorithm Works:
Click here to watch the video!
Though social media can feel like a minefield, these are 3 fundamental truths about growing a business online. Even prioritizing one of these pillars will have an enormous impact on your business, and putting all three in place – you’ll knock it out of the park.
Author: Minessa Konecky
Minessa Konecky is a transformation coach, writer, founder of the Social Strategy Squad, co-host of the Friends in our Phone podcast, and creator of the Roadmap to Success bootcamp.
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