Engaging Brands With Facebook Message

Facebook has made it very simple for fans to communicate with many brands. Of course, the brands have to be willing and able to do so. Facebook Message allows a way for brands to interact with their customers one-on-one.

The brand has a direct connection to the clients  and you, as the business owner, are able to strengthen your relationship by building trust and credibility between you.

The way that Facebook Message works

The way that Facebook Message works is when a visitor lands on your page, that visitor clicks on the Message button, which will start the process and the conversation between the business owner and the client can begin. Interestingly, if there is to be any interaction between the business owner and the client, the client must be the one to initiate it.  Hopefully, some future iteration of Facebook Message will allow the business owner to initiate interactions with the clients also.

How will Facebook Message impact businesses?

The business owner has the ability to disable the functionality of the tool, if they choose to do so. The reason that some business owners may choose to disable the tool is that not every business has the resources to handle that type and volume of communication. However, if the business owner chooses not to enable that feature, he or she may be making fans feel like they don’t want to interact with him or her. The last impression that you want to give your fans is that you aren’t interested in what they have to say and how they feel. In fact, you should be bending over backwards to try and make sure that they feel valued and loved by you as a business owner. Lack of approachability may be the kiss of death for your business. Because social media and technology are so important when it comes to the success of your business, as a business owner, you can’t afford not to indulge. You need to be involved on a regular basis and you need to make sure that you keep up with the constantly changing technologies.

Facebook Message exposes a whole new set of opportunities for businesses, as long as the businesses are equipped with what they need in order to interact effectively with their clients and fans. Because of the fact that the fans are the only people who are able to reach out to the business owners, a great deal of the interactions are positive in nature. Many of the fans become loyal to the brand and they are often happy to share information about that brand with their friends and colleagues. A great deal of valuable information and insight can be gained from the fans, such as being able to pick out advocates for their brand, doing market research, and being able to use information that will allow them to understand exactly which direction they should take their brand and offerings based on the feedback and opinions of their fans. Another advantage is that because the people with whom the business owners are interacting are fans, they will definitely open communications when they see that they are from the business owners.

How does the business owner gather fans in the first place?

There are several possible ways in which the business owner can start to gather fans using Facebook Message.

• Use Facebook’s wall: Business owners can use the wall to encourage people to give their opinions about the business’s offerings, give their contact information, review products and/or services and offer ideas that they may have.
• An effective call-to-action: Including an effective call-to-action in the wall post will encourage the fans to share interesting information about the brand.
• After receiving the message: Once a message is received from the fan, the business owner is obligated to thank the fan in the name of their brand. Manners are critical in this situation.

What sort of strategy should you use?

Your strategy should be direct messaging to your fans, which includes your entire marketing, communications and social approach. It is very important that you don’t approach your fans only once but that you are persistent and consistent with your interactions. It is also very important to be organized when it comes to the information that you gather from your fans. You should categorize and arrange the data in a way that makes sense and that allows you to have the information at your fingertips.

Conclusion

Facebook Message is a powerful tool that will help you to get a firm hold on what you fans think and that will allow you to continue to improve upon your products and services more and more. Interacting with your fans on a regular basis will do wonders for your relationship with them and the closer you get to your fans, the more you will understand what they want and need. Facebook is very encouraging about allowing business owners and fans to communicate openly and easily. Facebook helps you to organize your communications and get the most out of the features that they offer.

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