Facebook’s Latest Bid to Promote Your Business

Written by Maree De Iulio

• Posted on August 14, 2012
• • News
• No Comments »

Social media giant offers new feature for businesses

If you own a Facebook account (and in this day and age, who doesn’t?) you may have recently noticed that directly underneath the status update bar or any post, there is a little link called ‘Promote.’ This new feature, incorporated into Facebook just last month in Australia, allows page owners to highlight a status update or post on the news-feeds of the people who have ‘liked’ your page.

Sitting at the top of the feed, the number of fans you can reach via your post varies according to your page and fan count. Your reach can even be extended further if your fans interact with your post by ‘liking’ it or commenting on it – sequentially, their friends will also see your publication on their newsfeed. For Australian businesses with a Facebook page, this could be an incredibly effective marketing tool.

How can Australian businesses benefit from the ‘Promote’ button?

Now, Australian businesses can ‘promote’ a post or status from their Timeline in order to gain more exposure. However, it does come with a price tag. From as little as $5.00 and upwards to $300.00, you can promote an individual post, which will stretch across a three-day period from when the post was first created, according to Facebook.

This paid post will be seen on the news feed of all your fans.

How to use promoted posts on Facebook:

• To use the promoted post on Facebook, you need to create a new status.
• Click on promote at the bottom of the status form

• Select the price and number of fans to be promoted to
• Finally, click save and post. Over the next three days the post will be promoted to a larger selection of your Facebook fans.

You have now successfully activated the ‘promote’ feature.

Best of all, Facebook provides full ad analytics so you can also see the effectiveness of your post. From measuring the metrics such as clicks, budget spent, total budget, end date, to the number of people who saw the post via organic, viral and paid; actions, optimised CPM equivalent and more, you can have more control over your social media marketing.

Potential drawbacks of the ‘promote’ tool for businesses

While the benefits of the’ promote’ feature can be seen, it has left many businesses and Facebook users with a bad taste in their mouth. From some accusing Facebook of trying to create more revenue, to the question of whether organic page updates will see lower and lower results as the newsfeed gets more crowded with paid posts, it is clear that this feature is still in its infancy and will need some ironing out.

By employing it earlier than your competitors, you can take full advantage of the exposure for your business.

Posted on August 14, 2012