We humans tend to stick to what we know. In social media marketing, that can be dangerous. Social media is evolving. There are new platforms rising and shining – and the established social networks evolve and come up with new features all the time. As marketers we all have to know what is happening – and make educated decisions on what features to use and how.
Here are 9 Facebook marketing features you need to know for 2017:
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Facebook is a place where people talk. And they also talk about products. And they do not stop at talking; many people find customers for their products via the communication that goes on on Facebook.
Facebook now offers a way to directly sell products on Facebook with the Facebook Marketplace App.
(Note: As of November 2016 Marketplace is not available in every country. Marketplace started in English speaking countries US, UK, Australia and Newzealand – more countries will follow)
If Marketplace is already available in your country, you can go to Marketplace by clicking on the Shop icon at the bottom of your Facebook app.
The Marketplace allows you to discover items for sale near you or you can put up items for sale with a few clicks.
More about the Facebook Marketplace on the Facebook newsroom.
2. Crossposting Videos
Currently, video is one of the most engaging content formats on social media. Several of the major social networks including Facebook are pushing this video hype even further by adding new features for this content format.
Since some businesses are using several Fanpages to engage different audiences, Facebook introduced features to crosspost videos to different Fanpages via the same Business Manager.
- Allow your other pages in your business manager to reuse your videos
- create a post using the already existing video
- Check insights for performance of the video in individual posts and aggregated data
It is also possible to crosspost videos to business pages with different owners. Both parties have to agree to a crossposting relationship.
Facebook Messenger is an instant messaging service that allows you to have conversations with friends and other groups of people. The Facebook Messenger works similar to SMS or other mobile notifications apps and allows you to reach people on their mobile phone.
Facebook messenger is going to replace other messaging systems on Facebook. You have to install the app. You can have 1 on 1 conversations or group chats.
In the messenger app, you can also add people to conversations that are not friends with you on Facebook.
The Facebook Messanger also allows you to have secret conversations. These conversations are encrypted end-to-end and will only exist on the device where you received the message.
Facebook also allows businesses to set up chat bots for the messenger app that allow automated responses to increasingly complicated customer questions and demands.
Facebook Live videos allow you to live stream a video directly from your phone to your Facebook community. This way you can directly respond to comments and interact with your audience while live streaming.
- You can start your live video if you go to your Facebook profile as if you would create a post. Click on the Video camera symbol and make sure to give Facebook access to your camera and microphone when asked for.
- Choose the „Continue Button“ (this is a little confusing, but you are not going live at this moment.
- Choose the privacy settings for your video
- Write a description for your video
- Set your camera view
- Now, you can choose to go live!
- Save the video to your camera roll
- You can test the feature by selecting „only me“ in the privacy settings.
- You can invite your friends to watch your video directly from the live video. Simply click the invite icon and select the friends you want to invite.
Live videos are your chance to engage with your audience, make sure you watch for comments and react.
Facebook also offers a Live map on your desktop where you can see all the live broadcasts happening around the world.
Instead of using an image as an avatar you can also use a short (7 sec) video. This video then appears where otherwise would be your profile pic.
You can use one of the following apps for your profile expression kit: Boomerang by Instagram, BeautyPlus, Cinemagraph Pro by Flixel, Lollicam, MSQRD
Facebook 360 videos offer a captivating way to share places with fans. By simply turning the device or dragging your finger you can discover a place with video from every angle.
With one camera you can more or less capture 170 degrees in one direction. Facebook 360 is 6 cameras (front, back, left, right, up, down) catching all directions from one central point. Facebook 360 puts these six videos put together by smart algorithms to form one seamless video. For viewers, that looks like being a central point able to discover any direction.
Have you ever come across an interesting piece of content shared by one of your Facebook friends but did not have the time to check it out at the time? Often it is a hassle to find that piece of content again after a while. Facebook solves this problem with the Save button. Basically, this works like the Pocket App that allows you to save content for later consumption.
And what is more: The save button works seamlessly on all devices, so you can save an article on your mobile to read later on your desktop or tablet.
Facebook instant articles have been around for publishers since 2015 but only were opened to everyone in April 2016.
The goal for instant articles is to avoid slow loading times for content on mobile. In reality, when someone tries to open the link to the content instead of uploading the content it is rather opened as an Instant article – which significantly reduces load times.
First studies show that Instant articles receive 20% clicks, 30% more shares and are 70% less likely to be abandoned before reading than mobile web articles.
To take part in instant articles, you have to signup first which you can do here. Make sure you have a Facebook page and have admin or editor rights to that Fanpage.
Next, you have to select the page that you for which you want to activate instant articles.
Now you have to claim your URL. In most cases, this URL will be your blog or website.
Now, you can create articles. You can publish your existing articles to Facebook from your content management system. For WordPress Facebook provides a plugin that makes this very easy.
If you are not using WordPress or another supported CMS you can also use an RSS feed to connect your content to Facebook
You are almost done now: You can now customize the style of your articles – and submit them for review.
For Twitter, there is a plugin around called ClickToTwet. This allows you to set up ready-made tweets with quotes from an article.
On Facebook, you can now set up your blog or website so that readers can mark a paragraph or short excerpt from your text and share this quote to Facebook.
Every social network that has been around for a while has to adapt to new trends, features and user preferences. Facebook is a perfect example of a social network that constantly adapts, adds new features and evolves together with their users. For maximum success you as a marketers have to keep up with trends and new developments and adapt what makes the most sense for you!
Which of the new Facebook features are you using? What are your favorites?
The Original Article can be found at: https://blog.thesocialms.com/9-facebook-marketing-features-need-know-2017/?utm_source=drip&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=broadcast
