Nonprofit managers were told for too long that Facebook was strictly for “building awareness.” Today, everyone recognizes how silly it is to think that awareness alone could somehow have a real impact on mission.
Impact is the result of action, whether it’s supporters lending their voice or time to a campaign or donating to the cause, according to Drew Bernard, founder of social networking firm ActionSprout in Portland, Ore., during a session titled Facebook Strategies: Finding Your Supporters Among Your Fans.
Regardless of your fan page size, to drive real impact from your Facebook page you must accomplish three things: REACH a meaningful number of people; CULTIVATE and engage them in productive relationships; and, DATA capture, such as names and email address so you can reach back out and continue to build deeper relationships.
REACH is the goal that measures how many people receive your message. Don’t confuse reach with fan count (page likes). For some pages, reach is much less than fan count, while others far exceed the number of page fans. You can increase reach on Facebook by posting highly engaging content that captivates your audience and gets them clicking like, share or commenting, said Bernard.
Facebook provides insight into the overall reach of pages and individual posts. However, it’s also helpful to know which content performs the best on your own page, as well as others on Facebook.
CULTIVATING real relationships with supporters remains key to any communications’ efforts. Engagement is a term that gets thrown around a lot these days. It’s used to describe action — how people become “engaged,” not just “aware.” Each post you push out should be designed to get people clicking. But cultivating real relationships requires more than just having someone click like, share and comment. Whether it’s to sign a petition or congratulate a close ally of your work, giving people further ways to engage is key to building deeper, more productive relationships that transcend Facebook.
DATA is essential. At the end of the day, the most important pieces of data that you can capture on Facebook are names and email addresses of your supporters. Although, you should really be capturing every piece of information you can get about every person that clicks like, comment or share.
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