10 Simple Ways to Increase Your Facebook Reach

I see many, many business owners complaining about reach, posting content that creates “fake” engagement or worse yet, giving up on Facebook altogether. Many are just throwing their hands in the air and claiming, “It doesn’t work unless you pay.” I call BS.

I am a Facebook Community Creator and manage a number of Facebook Business Pages. All of my pages have above average engagement and reach, without paying for FB ads.

In this blog post, I thought I would share some of my secrets to success. 

I promise: If you put even half of these into practice, you will notice an immediate uptake in your Business Page activity. Honestly, what have you got to lose?

• Post more often. I hear from business owners all the time who say they post 2-3 times per week. (And, unfortunately, that is also what a lot of social media managers so as well.) Reach improves with more posts instead of less. I post 10-21 times per week on Facebook. If you are among those who have been posting twice per week, try posting every day.
• Post during “prime time” for YOUR audience. For most businesses I have ever worked with, that has been 9 a.m. – noon. Test and adjust. Try posting at different times during the day, and then use your insights to help determine the best times. Also be aware of what is going on in the world. If it’s Superbowl Sunday, you can probably lay off the business posts for the day – unless it’s relevant to your business.
• Use variety of posts. There should be different TYPES of posts…links, videos, text only, and pictures. Why? The algorithm Facebook uses to determine who sees what likes it! That means your posts are more likely to get served up to more people! This one is so important, I wrote a whole blog post about it! 
• Don’t use third party posting tools. Study after study has shown that using tools hurts reach. On top of that, almost all third party tools can be blocked – which means less visibility as well. Solution: Facebook allows you to schedule directly on the platform. Those posts don’t hurt reach.
• Stay compliant with Facebook Terms of Service. There are a few things business people do to violate the Terms that can hurt reach.    – They have a business, but don’t have a business page. Not cool – and you are likely alienating friends with your business-y posts.  – They post a link to their website on their personal page with every (or nearly every) post.  – Yes, Facebook does pay attention to this and YES, they will delete your profile. If they do, there is NO recourse as you violated the Terms of Service.
• Be courteous. Ask people before you add them to your groups. Don’t just pounce on them with your offer or product when they are asking a simple question. Relationship first!
• Be of service. It’s a SOCIAL platform and there are so many opportunities to give. It could be you have a resource, a referral, etc. for one of your connections. It could also be that you saw something that made you think of someone. It’s a simple way to Nurture Your Network.
• Share not just what you do, but who you are. People want to do business with people – but often times, because it’s social media, we focus on the marketing messages. Just be a human! Share the culture and personality of your company.
• Stop promoting! Only about 1 in every 10 posts should be promotional. Create community, build relationships, invite engagement. All those things will increase reach. Get your fans involved in a conversation! And, when it comes to promoting, be aware of how you are using Facebook groups. When you post the same exact message to multiple groups at the same time, your friends will all see it multiple times and it starts to look like spam.
• For the love of all things holy, USE FACEBOOK LIVE!! I have never seen something increase reach so quickly like Facebook live. Yes, there are other live streaming platforms – but I would guess that most of you have much larger audiences on Facebook. Plus, the video gets to live on Facebook, so it’s an easy way for someone to check you out!  – I had a client try Facebook Live for the first time last week. Within the first 18 hours, the video had 537 views. 

Here is the other thing I have found. After teaching tactics EXACTLY like these is most of you won’t do anything. If you are anything like me, I hope that got your blood going a little. Like Veruca Salt in Willy Wonka when told she can’t have something, she replied, “Who says I can’t?”

I really DO want you to do these things. Take a screen shot of your numbers now, put some of these into practice in the next couple weeks – and then watch your numbers.

If after a few weeks, you aren’t seeing the needle move, reach out to me. Let’s schedule a complimentary consultation to see what might be holding you back from the results YOU deserve!

Take a step in the right direction to grow your reach! 

What’s stopping you?

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Tracey is a social media superhero, able to establish reputations online, create communities and build relationships. She believes that one of the worst things to be on social media is forgettable. She wants to improve the way we as entrepreneurs show up to be seen and heard, so we are not just memorable but unforgettable.  She is the author of Six-Word Lessons for Successful Social Media.

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