The purpose of marketing on Facebook can be forfeited when wrong tactics are used. IFE ADEDAPO writes
Experts note that digital marketing on Facebook can be time-consuming, expensive and tricky. Moreover, they say it can be discouraging when the overall purpose of marketing is not achieved.
This, according to them, happens when strategies used to gain followership are misleading and short-lived.
The Founder, Marvella Digital, Chinonso Anyeaehie, observes that people spend a lot of money and time on Facebook trying to market using the wrong strategies.
According to him, most marketers use phrases such as ‘Share and Win’ or the ‘the fifth person to comment wins’, to gain followership, which are unoriginal.
He adds that the over 1.5 billion people found on Facebook cannot be reached with these practices, but most organisations want to be active on the platform because their competitors are on Facebook.
Anyeaehie explains, “In fact, 80 per cent of the brands in Nigeria go about this wrongly. They spend huge amounts of money paying for likes on Facebook and end up just posting ideas on the platform. This is not the way social media is meant to be used.
“This is a huge waste of time and resources. There are other ways to leverage this wonderful platform to yield the result you need. If you are an active digital marketer, you will remember how Facebook decreased their reach and several brands went down for that.”
He says that Facebook is meant to be used as a tool to drive traffic to the business website and capture emails of the target audience, but not to post ideas and beg for shares and comment.
The digital marketer highlights some incorrect tactics that should be avoided on Facebook.
Focusing on Facebook likes
Anyeaehie notes that the main reason why people post on Facebook is to get a large number of likes from followers using the wrong strategies that are not sustainable.
According to him, the number of likes received from such posts is not the same as the number of people the message reached.
He says, “Most brands in Nigeria are just concerned about the number of Facebook likes they can get. They measure their success by the quantity of likes they have. I once worked in a company in which my boss blew away millions of naira weekly just to hit the top five brands in Nigeria with the highest Facebook likes. He derived the value of his brand by boasting about the amount of likes on Facebook. Well enough, he managed to hit over 1.2million likes. Then what? Facebook decreases their reach. That hurts. What a huge waste of time and resources.”
Focusing on reach
Anyeaehie explains that the purpose of engagement is forfeited when the content of a Facebook post is poor.
According to him, drawing the attention of people by making promises that are not fulfilled will only weaken the engagement and defeats the purpose of the post, which is to market.
He explains, “Most marketers focus on metrics. I can remember one of my past boss saying “Chinonso, don’t show me the comments, show me the reach”. They are just after how much reach a post gets, and they fall in to the trap of posting meme like “Share and win Friday”, “Share and win a recharge card” and when they see the reach from this kind of posts they get all excited.
“The followers are sharing because they want to win something, not that they want to buy something or they have learnt something. So the whole effort of engagement amounts to zero. The most important thing is the action that follows after the share.”
Focusing on engagement
Anyeaehie says that brands with values should neither deviate from it nor move away from the products which they intend to market.
Doing this, he says, will build followership of people who are interested in what the brand represents and will attract a lasting engagement, not just a brief one.
He explains, “Congrats! You have built a fan base of people who just want to win something from your page. Then you focus on metrics to justify your act. Then you start to share pictures of celebrities or shoes and bags asking your audience to choose one. If your brand is not in entertainment or fashion, this strategy is totally useless.
“With memes like ‘Iyanaya and Flavour which one of them is hotter?’ just to seek for engagements. Truth be told, you just build a followership of people who don’t care about your brand and you are gradually deviating from the values of your brand. You are not on Facebook to share memes or post celebrity gossips. You are there to build followership that connects with your brand and buys your products.”
Focusing on sales
In addition to other wrong strategies, Anyeaehie says that offering products to the wrong people with the aim of selling is not likely to work.
He adds that people who have just started following a brand on Facebook will be disappointed when they are asked to buy products immediately.
He notes, “Most brands just focus on sales. They just care about the bottom line which is sales. This can be likened like proposing to a girl on the first date, you don’t just care to build the relationship. I think that’s weird, don’t you? Believe me when I say this people hate being sold to especially when it’s constant and if you are selling to the wrong people. They likely wouldn’t buy. They rather wait for your freebies.”
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