Facebook live could be a new tool for marketing your business. What follows is how you can use it to increase sales and retain customers.

Let’s get the elephant in the room out straight away; Facebook is a business, and as such look to increase their revenue every year.

Their tried and tested system is to come up with creative ideas for marketers to influence people on the platform. Historically this has been the case with Facebook business pages, events, and videos.

Facebook controls your “reach” (the number of people exposed to your business) through their software. When they monetise a new product, your organic reach drops like a stone in a pond.

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I joined Facebook in July 2009, and since then I have created more Facebook pages for clients than I care to count. I have marketed pages, through engagement and Facebook advertising (current organic reach on a Facebook page is on average under 2%).

Facebook Live

Facebook Live is the new addition to the toolbox that marketers are all over like bees on honey. And so they should, early adopters get the best bang for their buck (as per above, Facebook live is getting high organic reach so that marketers use it); however, it’s going to drop like a stone soon.

Is Facebook live worth the trouble?

The simple answer is yes; there are very few businesses that will not benefit from actively creating Facebook Live videos.

What’s the secret to Facebook Live?

It’s quite simple really, social media and Facebook, in particular, are fantastic places to connect and engage with potential customers whether they are B2C or B2B.

Facebook live allows you the opportunity to connect on a personal level “live.” But hold back from just clicking on the button and starting, some things need to be in place first.

Believe it or not, doing the Facebook live “event” is only 10% of what you need to do to have success.

Preparation is the key

Be prepared to commit to regular and consistent Facebook live sessions (it’s no good doing one on a Tuesday and then not again for six weeks on a Wednesday).
What is the overall objective of doing Facebook live sessions (what do you ultimately want to achieve)?
What will your Facebook live “loose script” be about (if you have a product or service it should ultimately be about the customer and the solution you provide to their problem)?
What is the soundbite you need to repeat through the session (to get your most important message across at different times in different ways)?
Are you going to post about the meeting in advance and remind your followers when it is going to be live (you may want to boost that Facebook post to reach a bigger audience)?
Always be you.

Facebook Live Case Study/Scenario 1

One of my clients runs an adventure play and farm park. The target market is the mums of children between 2 and 12 years old. The purpose of Facebook live is to show that the park will be a fantastic experience for the family.

Their employees are young people with an emphasis on “presenters,” and we have given a face to the business “The Whacky Squad.”

We started by creating a series of subjects to talk about on Facebook live sessions, introducing each member of the whacky squad, also each member of the animal keepers, and what they do for the children to make their visit special.

We also created little shows for the kids to the farm park and developed Facebook live sessions around the shows.

We created sessions on each animal at the farm with some information about the animals, showing each animal’s character, and what they like to eat.

We did this every week at a particular time and posted about it on the Facebook page, and sent emails to a database directing them to the Facebook page.

So you can see how we used Facebook live to create a story that more and more people wanted to watch, that was informative, gave them a vision of what they could expect and a call to action.

Facebook Live Case Study/Scenario 2

Another client is a business consultant and using the system above we presented the problems that companies and entrepreneurs face and spoke about the solutions to the problem.

The client gained authority and showed his understanding of their issues and that he had solutions to help them move forward.

To grow your audience remember to:

Ask your viewers to follow you and receive notifications when you go live.
Say hello to commenters by name and to respond to their comments.
Broadcast for longer periods of time to reach more people.
Be creative and go live often.

So what is your experience of Facebook live, and can you see a benefit to your business?

Let me know in the comments below.