Facebook Marketing – Facebook Graph Search and Facebook Nearby
With over 1 billion users worldwide and over 2 million in Ireland alone Facebook is an incredibly powerful marketing tool. It allows businesses large and small to open their doors to a world-wide captive audience. However now, Facebook marketing has just become a whole lot more interesting with the introduction of Facebook Graph Search and Facebook Nearby.
Here’s the low down…
Facebook Graph Search
Graph search is in essence a ‘Google-esque’ search bar operating within the Facebook framework. However unlike Google it allows users to instantly find what your friends have recommended and liked. Whilst friend recommendations and likes can be carried out manually, you no longer have to sift through endless material to find the answer. For instance, if you keyed in ‘restaurants my friends liked in Dublin’ it will throw back a plethora of information on restaurants recommended by your friends.
Click here for more information on Facebook Graph Search
So how can businesses take advantage of this?
Facebook marketing for graph search capability will be of benefit if you take action on the following steps…
Confirmation of correct classification
It’s more important now to make sure that you have the correct business classification. For instance, are you a restaurant, consultant, service business etc? This way you’re more likely to be picked up when somebody recommends you.
Correct details
Make sure that your details are correct such as address, contact details and hours of business. Again this impinges on your chances of getting picked up on the search.
Grow an audience
Now more so than ever, Facebook fans and indeed friends of fans matter. By regular interaction on your business page and by posting relevant and appealing offers, you can grow your audience and get the most from your Facebook Marketing.
Always add value
If you constantly create valuable content you’ll continue to generate interest and start to grow your fan base.
Facebook Nearby
Nearby is a local business discovery feature within Facebook which directly challenges FourSquare and Yelp. It’s been noted that every month around 250 million FB users will tag their posts with a location. Now Facebook have taken this one step further and allow users to have access to information on local businesses, eateries, cinemas, hotels etc. The difference is that these lists will all be based on relevancy – presenting a great opportunity for Facebook Marketing.
For example, if you wanted to search for a hotel in Cork using the Nearby application it would throw up hotels in order of how many of your friends have ‘liked’ that particular hotel. The idea behind the concept is that people are far more likely to trust the opinions of friends and acquaintances as opposed to reviews from complete outsiders. Facebook say that Nearby is the new ‘word of mouth’.
Both of the above changes will have a huge effect for local businesses and as a result continued Facebook marketing is going to be key if you really want to succeed.
