This biweekly series is dedicated to sharing real life examples of social media marketing. It’s an in-depth review of a business’s social platform with suggestions on how to optimize it. This series is not meant to criticize, but to offer insight into the complex world of social media marketing. But as the series name suggests, I will speak frankly. To have your business reviewed, click here and send me a message.
Zaire Kacz is an incredible photographer. We have never met in person, but I was blown away by the photo set she did with my sister several years ago, and then the photos she took of my parent’s French restaurant.
But when it comes to Facebook marketing, like many business owners, Zaire doesn’t have the right social media strategies working for her. She produces and shares gorgeous photos, but Facebook marketing takes a lot more than beautiful photography to successful reproduce viable income for a business.
However, because she does have unlimited amounts of visual content, she’s ahead of many business owners.
Let’s dive into Zaire’s business Facebook page and talk about what is and isn’t working for her.
1. Profile photo
For artists and creatives, deciding on what kind of picture to use for the profile can be a daunting task, especially for someone like Zaire who wants to share her work. But a clear, crisp and easy to recognize logo or personal photo is best.
Suggestions: A logo is a huge asset to brand building and can be easily noticed when flowing down the Facebook Newsfeed. But because Zaire’s business uses her name in the title, a personal photo will immediately make the brand personal and human – two things that a logo struggles to do.
Constantly changing the profile picture is counterproductive because it doesn’t allow people to get used to it, so when an update appears in their Newsfeed, they may or may not recognize it. And that can be dangerous because a person may Unfollow or Unlike the page because they don’t recognize it.
2. Cover photo
The cover photo is a huge landscape of free advertising space, so showcasing one of Zaire’s photography shows is a great way to build credibility and trust. When a new fan lands on the page they automatically see that Zaire is good enough to have her work featured in a show. Where this falls short is that the photo itself doesn’t include a caption detailing the where and when of this show, so if it’s current – fans wouldn’t know where to find it.
Suggestions: Use the caption portion of the cover photo to include any and all details of the photo, tell a story, and include links to the website or in this case, show information.
In addition, update the photo at least one a month with new content. Since Zaire has lots of photos to share, choose photos that showcase the best project from the month, highlight holiday information, or promote a sitting session or photo package special.
3. About
The About page was entirely missed, which is unfortunate because new fans have no idea what her photography business specializes in, how much it costs, etc. so they don’t have specific reasons to contact her.
Suggestions: Fill out the About page deeply. List out all photo specialties, information regarding sessions, packages, and include as many links back to the website as possible throughout the description. The links give an added SEO boost to the website and fans are more likely to go if the link is presented in an easy to find place.
4. Post to Pages
This empty space is full of missed opportunities to build the credibility of the business. This page is set up to receive reviews, but comments are another way to build trust among fans who aren’t familiar with her work.
Suggestions: Send out a personal email to old and current clients and ask them to leave a comment or review on the page. People are generally more than willing to do what they can to help out a person build their business, and more comments and reviews will only be advantageous for Zaire’s schedule book.
5. Timeline Content
The Timeline is the area where Zaire falls short the most. But it’s not her fault, it’s where most business owners lack in their Facebook marketing strategies. They don’t view it as a fan/possible client does, they view it as a business owner.
If you don’t know any better, then it makes sense to offer nothing but content directly related to a brand, but that is misguided. For instance, Zaire has an excellent opportunity to create a community of local people that come to her page for local information/news, learn about photography – tips and tricks, and in addition, get to know her work better.
Suggestions: Implement the 80/20 rule that says to share 80 percent of content not directly related to the brand and 20 percent that is. Because Zaire is a local photographer, the 80 percent should be very easy. Asheville is a haven of creative and artistic events, offerings and talents. She can share art shows, gallery events, dance recitals, restaurant openings, etc – anything that relates to the things her brand stands for.
In addition, she care share articles from a wide range of photography blogs and websites, videos, and tutorials on the best practices for photography.
By sharing information and education, she’s sharing her art inadvertently and giving value to the people following her on Facebook. Zaire will attract a wide variety of people – photographers, people who love her work, or are interested in hiring her at some point. But if it’s all promotion or biz shares, then it will be difficult to start a conversation which is what Facebook is all about.
Think about it this way – if you want to talk to someone, you don’t just talk about yourself, right? It’s the same with social media marketing, you must ask questions, give them content to be interested in, and then nurture engagement.
Finally, for Zaire’s direct promotions, the 20 percent, she should be very clear about what is the purpose of the content. Simply sharing her work? Is she talking about an event? Is there a clear call to action?
There’s no reason for Zaire to feel bad about letting people know she’s a business who needs clientele. But the promotional posts should be thought out in advance and have a purpose attached to them.
Overall Page Suggestions:
1. Consistency
Consistency is the most underrated strategy for any undertaking in life, and especially with social media marketing. Zaire must decide what she can consistently commit to in terms of when to post, and make sure to do it.
Personally, I recommend a minimum of 3-4x/day, but once a day is a fantastic start.
2. Replies
There are many areas on this Page where people are commenting and taking the time to express love and appreciation for her work. EVERY comment must be replied to – say thanks, let them know they matter or are special.
They didn’t need to take the time to share compliments, so we must always respect that and let them know it’s appreciated.
3. Get creative with the photos.
Honestly, there’s no reason to post a gallery of 34 pictures at one time.
Break the photo albums down into 7-9 pieces so they can be spread out, tag people in the photo album when possible, INVITE people to tag themselves, and include information about the event/reason behind the photo galleries.
4. Interact and engage.
Zaire was proactive when it came to finding other local businesses on Facebook and Liking their pages, but the backend work must be done on a daily basis.
This is a minimum of 10-15 minutes spent interacting and engaging with their content by commenting, liking and sharing where appropriate. The awesome news is that these pages should give her a wealth of great content for her page, so she just needs to take advantage of it.
Key takeaways from this review:
Zaire is like most business owners in that she’s offering an incredible service, but doesn’t know how to market herself. The most important keys are consistency, relationship building, and promotions. Don’t be afraid to promote yourself as a business owner, but make sure you’re balancing it out by adding value to the fans, and make you let them know how special they are as often as possible.