If you’re looking to develop your personal brand or take your business to the next level, Facebook is the first place to start. With over two billion monthly users, cheap advertising and the opportunity to reach your target audience, it seems like a no-brainer for most businesses. Facebook Business Page is a free public profile, similar to your personal Facebook account.

You might think that it’s easy enough to slap a few photos, background design and posts together and expect visitors to come rolling in. However, you’ll need a comprehensive strategy and probably the help of a web designer to create an enticing page that gets noticed, liked and generates leads.

The pictures you choose must represent your brand, have the right dimensions and should be high resolution. Here are some tips to help you create an engaging business page that takes advantage of all the unique benefits offered by Facebook.


Use a recognisable Profile picture: Your Facebook Profile picture should be easily identifiable by your target audience. Examples include a headshot of yourself (for a freelancer), brand logo or relatable image. Your image is what’s displayed in search results, so choose wisely. The picture dimensions frequently change for desktop and smartphones, so monitor both profiles to stay on top of any changes.

Your cover photo must engage: After choosing a profile picture, select an engaging cover photo. As it’s the most important real estate, pick a high-quality image. Read through Facebook’s current guidelines to ensure your images are within the official stipulations for computers and smartphones.

Your cover photo is also a great advertising space. It’s positioned at the top of the page and is the first thing your visitors will see. A cover photo updates to your timeline, so you can add a message by editing the photo description. You can also add the date, location and tags to your photo before updating your timeline.

Include a Call-to-Action (CTA) Button: Facebook launched this feature in 2014 and it’s popular amongst all brands. Examples include “Click Here”, “Sign up Now”, “Watch Video”, and more. Entrepreneurs are advised to customise the CTA with a preferred content or destination URL that leads to your website. It provides a great way to offer free content and attract more traffic to your website.

Create a landing page to encourage users to take your CTA:  A customised landing page is the most common way to nudge your audience to click your CTA. For instance, if you just launched a cloud hosting page, you can embed a url under the anchor text “click here for more on Umbrellar Cloud hosting”. This encourages users to follow your lead. LeadPages is a tool you could try out.

Add a Description of your brand: This description should be short and precise. It should clearly state what your company is about in just a few sentences.

List more information in the ‘About’ Section: It’s important to fill the ‘About’ Section when creating your Facebook page, as this is where customers go to find detailed information about your brand. Relevant information should include address, phone number, email, links to other social media platforms, operating hours and customer care telephone number. There is also a screen where you can add a longer bio for your brand. Meanwhile, “Edit Story” allows you to enter a detailed description of what customers should expect from your brand and why they should follow your page.

Add a Video Profile: Facebook is competing with Google-owned YouTube for video content generated by users. If you’re targeting older generations, focus your video content on Facebook. 90% of ‘boomers’ prefer Facebook content that carries both a video and written post. Video content is a good way to increase engagement on your profile and boost your follower count. The videos must be 20 to 90 seconds long and cropped to 820 x 462 pixels.

Create your own custom tabs: This is an easy task to accomplish. It’s also a great way to control the experience your audience has when they visit your page. Woobox is a popular, free tool that allows you to fangate your content, name your custom tabs and get visitor analytics.

Grow your brand with Facebook Live: Your Facebook business page isn’t effective until you use all the latest features. Facebook Live is a popular tool that digital marketers use to grow their brands. It’s a great way to partner with other brands within your niche and delivers premium content to your followers. People who are watching your video can ask questions and have them answered immediately. Research by Facebook and Medikix shows that top influencers enjoyed more shares, views and likes when they started using Facebook Live.

Add collaborators to your page: Since it’s a business page, you’ll have to grant access to some members of your team. You’ll need an editor to edit the page, as well as send messages and publish posts; a moderator to respond to comments or delete comments on the page; an advertiser to analyse insights and create ads; and finally, you’re the administrator with complete control. You can add collaborators under “Page Roles” in the Page Settings.

Create visually appealing posts: Here’s another area where a web designer can help. A post with a video or graphic content performs better than written content.  A Buzzsumo study found that Facebook posts with images had 2.3 times more engagement.

Branded images get more attention: It’s not enough to simply add photos to your posts. A web designer or online tool can help you create a perfectly-sized image that creates a cohesive look by staying with the same colour story. Images should represent your brand and make it easier for people to recognise your content anywhere.

Offer exclusive content and incentives: Give people a reason to return to your business page or to click your CTA. If people don’t have an incentive – such as a free download or content – they won’t click your CTA. Create useful posts that your followers won’t find anywhere else. Don’t forget to reward your fans for loyalty with giveaways or contests.

Pin, Star or Hide: A recent study by Designhill revealed that posts with less than 80 characters got 60% more engagement. ‘Star’ or ‘pin’ posts that are concise and interesting. This feature displays your intended post above other posts on your timeline. Putting a star to a post highlights it for seven days.

Conclusion

Over 900 million people log into Facebook on a daily basis. Even large brands and corporate organisations are battling for new customers online and spending less on traditional forms of advertising. A website is important for branding an online business, but Facebook can improve your online marketing strategy by generating valuable leads that convert.