Leveraging Facebook Stories for Audience Engagement
Facebook stories are a wonderful way to share content with your community and grow your reach. If you’re not sure how to get started, here’s what you need to know…
- Decide between picture and video. Stories can have either pictures and text or video. But you can’t have both in the same story, so you want to decide in advance what you plan to do.
- Choose your content topic. The next thing you need to decide is what you’ll cover in your story. You can choose to make a story announcing a new product, sharing a behind-the-scenes moment, or a glimpse into your business.
- Don’t start from scratch. You can create images for your Facebook Stories using Canva. This tool makes it simple and easy to design beautiful graphics that will catch your audience’s eyes.
- Introduce yourself. Use a Facebook story to introduce yourself and your brand by putting together a few photos that capture the essence of who you are and what you do.
- Show off your team. Let your audience see the faces behind your brand by showing off your team members in a Facebook story.
- Let your personality shine. Some brands worry that they have to be sterile and uninteresting in their content. But audiences prefer Facebook stories where you shine your personality proudly.
- Use filters. Stories with filters get more views and more engagement so be sure to use filters when you post image driven stories.
- Add overlays. Overlays create visual interest and capture the attention of your viewers. But don’t go overboard or you’ll overwhelm your audience. Instead, pick one or two overlays at the most.
- Create a style guide. Once you have a few stories under your belt, try to use the same filters and overlays on each video. This is a way to subtly brand your content, so your audience begins to recognize your format.
- Celebrate a milestone. The next time your business hits an important milestone, invite your community into the celebration by using a Facebook story to mark the occasion.
- Share a tutorial. Show your audience how to do a task related to your niche. For example, if you’re in the beauty industry, then a tutorial on how to create a killer cat-eye is sure to engage your community.
- Post about an event. If you’re attending an event that’s relevant to your audience, share it in your Facebook stories. Not only is this great content, it gives you something new to post.
- Welcome influencers. Get an influencer to take over your Facebook stories for a day. This can result in hundreds of new followers and create a valuable, professional alliance.
- Showcase a special sale. If you really want to show your Facebook fans they’re special, create a sale just for them. Make a coupon code or discount they can only access if they watch your Facebook story.
- Be a tease. Before a new product drops, let your audience have a sneak peek by sharing a shot of it in your Facebook story.
- Post an interview. Sharing good feedback and reviews of your product makes your audience associate positive feelings with your brand and entices them to buy from you.
Good luck with your stories!
Using Live Video for Audience Growth and Engagement
One of the best ways to engage your audience and grow it consistently is to use Facebook Live video. However, Facebook Live can feel intimidating to some people. If that describes, never fear. Here are some tips to help…
- Login to Facebook. You’ll want to login to the account where you have the Facebook page you’ll be broadcasting from.
- Navigate to your page. This is usually found on the left side of the screen.
- Create live. Once you’re on your Facebook page, you should see the option to create a
live right above your status updater.
- Allow camera. Depending on your browser’s settings, you may see a blank screen prompting you to allow camera access. This can usually be remedied by clicking a small icon near your address bar and choosing “allow access”.
- Click ‘retry’. Once you’ve allowed access to your camera, you’ll need to hit Facebook’s retry button so it can connect to your camera.
- Say something about your Live video. This is a small description area that fans will see when deciding whether to tune in for your show. So, make your description entertaining and enticing.
- Choose your video settings. Facebook allows you to share from your webcam or you can share your screen which can be useful if you plan to do tech tutorials or gaming walkthroughs.
- Check your microphone. Speak a few words and see if a blue bar goes up. If it does, then the right microphone is selected, and your viewers will most likely be able to hear you.
- Add a title for your live broadcast. Make sure you know what you plan to speak about because no one wants to tune in for “my ramblings”. Instead, create a title that promises value to your watchers.
- Add tags. Choose tags that are relevant to your niche and to the video topic you’re covering.
- Go interactive. Click the interactive tab to add polls or trivia questions to your live video. This can be a great way to boost engagement during your Live.
- Click Go Live. When everything looks good in your preview, click “Go Live” and you’ll instantly be live on Facebook.
- Try to stay active on your Live for a while. Facebook prefers live videos that are 15-40 minutes in length.
- Ask questions about your viewers. Don’t turn the discussion into a monologue all about you or your brand.
- Greet new viewers as they enter. Nothing’s more awkward than going to a party where the host ignores you. Be cool and greet everyone as they enter.
- Invite viewers to share your Live. Some brands will give away a small item to a random fan who shares the video. This boosts engagement because more people will see your video in their feed.
- Have a colleague monitor comments. Sometimes comment streams can be distracting during a Live and it’s easy to miss an important point. Get a good colleague to monitor your comment stream so your focus won’t be divided.
- Stick around. Don’t jump off the moment you hit the end of your show. Instead, stick around and encourage users to share any questions they have.