Facebook has been making me crazy lately! Yes I have information overload! Since about last December, Facebook has also been controlling what posts show in your news feed. Have you been wondering what has happened to all those hundreds of pages that you have liked have gone? You are not getting the info that you requested! That also means that the fans on your Massage Business Page are not getting your message either!
I have found this out mainly because my posts are not getting out to the same amount of people as they have in the past. I have seen a gradual and continual reduction in my results which is traffic on my website and ebook sales.
Then there was this viral video on Ads on Facebook that got me started thinking more:
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But with most anything – there is another side to it all as explained by Jon Loomer (another Facebook Guru) Facebook Fraud Response
Those two things are about ads on Facebook though but it just makes you think – what is really going on here.
Facebook is in business to make money. The way they make money with ads so it is expected that they will want people to pay for more ads to get their message out.
So now hint, hint….Facebook wants you to pay to get the posts out to your Fans! Rut Ro. (Scooby voice)
What is a massage therapist on a marketing budget to do? And it is frustrating because they have been giving it all away for free since the beginning.
The thing is that you have to learn how the news feed works and how Facebook works.
I did this little informal study on my Facebook page back at the end of Jan. The more people that liked the post, the more people saw it in their feeds. I had many comments from people saying that they had not been seeing posts from me in their news feed. They keep changing the settings on how your news feed shows up. You have the choice to view Recent Activity or Top Stories but Facebook keeps changing it on their own without you knowing it. So the more people that like it, the more it shows up in everyone else’s news feed.
The only option they currently have is this little option to like a page and then get a notification from that page like this:
Well that works if you look at your Notifications! Even the Notifications are getting to be too much!
And how to you tell your latest ‘likers’ that if they don’t already do that?
See Facebook isn’t making it easy at all.
What you can do is create lists. Lists are ways to organize your pages that you like to get information from. When you create a list, you can just refer to it by clicking on where it is listed. Heck, you don’t even have to like the page for them to show their news feed on your interest list. (That is probably not good for the owners of the pages but maybe they will be seen more when there isn’t so much unwanted buzz going on in the news feed. And right now there are hardly any ads in the list of interest feeds! Here are a few lists I created: Massage Business and Marketing, Massage Therapy Resources. and AMTA Chapters. I also follow a list of Facebook Gurus.
Another way to get more of what you want in your news feed is to change to using Facebook as your Massage Business Page and go through and like the pages that you want to see. When you have time you can just change to using Facebook as your page to view the feeds from the pages you like.
You get a much nicer news feed! With no ads! See Image on how to use Facebook as your Page.
Once I started viewing the newsfeed in though lists and through my page, I felt such a sigh of relief! No Ads! I could also just focus on the massage related feeds.
As you learn how the Facebook feed works and how to get what you want in your own feed, you can apply that to getting your message out to your own fans. Watch what others are doing too.
Getting Your Message into the News feed.
So how do you get your posts to show up in more in your fans news feeds? You have to really create engaging content. Content can be anything from text, links to blog posts or pages on your website with something that makes people want to click, photos and videos. The latest info is that like posts work best – that is putting a link to your website along with a photo and then delete the actual text for the link and FB will pull up the photo or you can post your own photo and then click
People love to click like on cute photos, heart warming stories and things that they can relate to.
Remember the more that people click or comment, the more your post will show up everywhere!
Here is my favorite post on how to get more likes, shares, comments – From Post Planner (no I haven’t tried their app yet!)
Basically you have to engage people more than ever. It is also a good idea to go back to your post and like people’s replies or post another comment back to them.
There is also the other side to this all – there are also fans that do click a lot and they see most all of your posts and are probably getting sick of hearing from you!
There isn’t any right number of posts to be making each day but you do have to post more because of this news feed being controlled by Facebook.
So getting people to interact with your page by liking, sharing, commenting are the keys to getting more of your fans (clients/potential clients) to see your posts.
You have to be really direct and even ask people directly to like or share. Posts with pictures that have a saying on them are great for that. Find some good quotes to put on pictures. (See this Massage Quotes on Pinterest. ) Also put your website address on the picture so when it is shared, people will know where it came from. See more on how to use Photos on Facebook
You can also ask them specific questions that will make them want to comment. You do have to beware of privacy issues though especially when getting people to comment. If they make a comment and say something like – did my wife come in to see you or that spot on my back is still bothering me – take the responses off Facebook. Even though people are willingly commenting, it just puts you at more risk.
Ask questions like:
- If I won the lottery, I would get a massage ______________
- When was the last time you got a massage?
- Caption this picture.
The main goals of a Facebook Business page are to get people to call or make the appointment and if they aren’t doing that, you want them to sign up for your newsletter. There are many newsletter systems that integrate directly with the page like www.mailchimp.com The best way to get subscribers is to offer them a free report. If you work in a downtown area with many people working at the computer then a short report on posture at the computer will work. If you work with women who are pregnant, an ebook on some massage and pregnancy might be of interest.
You need to have a call to action in some of the posts and ask people to make the call or make the appointment and have a clear way to direct them to do so.
Another great way is to actually post times that you have open that day and if you really need to fill it give it a time or money incentive – like say “$10 off if you schedule this time today and make your appointment before 10 am” or whatever.
And last but not least – what about HIPAA and basic Privacy Issues on Facebook.
Most massage therapists don’t have to be HIPAA compliant but you should be aware of clients privacy.
No one is really talking about this. The Attorney for AMTA WA went as far to say – turn off the comments on Facebook – but that defeats the whole purpose of Facebook – engagement.
It should be obvious that any mention of anything related to working with a client needs to be kept between you and the client – Everything. What happens when that client posts on your page and says something innocent like “Great Massage – My shoulder is doing so much better”. Well then their friends see it and co-workers if they are friends or if they follow your page and are clients to. Did they just take time off to get the massage but said they were sick and going home? Did they not tell their wife/husband/partner they were going? Yes even if they are willingly posting it could become a problem.
You have to also be careful not to share stories of recovery about clients. Say you just worked with a client with a difficult injury and you posted about the great results that you got. If that person can recognize them, even if you didn’t mention their name – it is a violation of HIPAA or it could be a privacy issue that could cause you trouble in your massage business. I will be writing much more on HIPAA later but I just wanted to bring it up here for now to get you thinking about it.
For now though – if you want to use Facebook to get you more clients, you just need to learn how it works and how to get the most out of it. I have been studying the top Facebook Leaders and have been implementing it on my Facebook page. It is a bit different though for me as my page is for massage therapists but I hope it will give you some ideas.
PS. Personally, I don’t use Facebook for my massage business. It is very hit and miss and a big time commitment. I just have a really good, highly optimized, content rich website that does all the work of getting clients for me! But I did this research and learning to help get more info out to my massage therapists followers on Facebook at Massage Practice Builder so just thought I would share! (See : Get More Clients With a Website that Works)