In today’s social media-obsessed world, gaining traction online without a consistent digital presence is almost impossible. And if you want to know where you should focus your digital marketing efforts, look no further than Facebook. 

While TikTok, Pinterest, Instagram, and the other notable social media platforms are also worth your time and attention, there’s arguably no bigger platform in the world than Facebook. 

With almost three billion active monthly users, it is the single largest network of potential customers you’ll find anywhere in the world. And despite an ever-shifting digital and marketing landscape, marketing on Facebook continues to be a must-have in any business’s marketing plan.

A Step-By-Step Guide to Marketing on Facebook for Beginners

Of course, if you’ve never marketed your business on Facebook and aren’t sure how to get started, So, without further ado, here is the quintessential beginner’s guide to Facebook marketing in 2023.

Step One: Set Up Your Facebook Business Page

While this might seem like it goes without saying, it’s likely the most important step in this process. So, we couldn’t leave it out. As Germany Kent once said, “If you never try, you’ll never know.” And, like all things, your journey to understanding Facebook marketing has to start somewhere. 

Facebook actually created a how-to article with a step-by-step walkthrough for setting up a Facebook business page, so be sure to check that out before you start building your profile. Here are the primary steps for having a top-notch Facebook business page:

Optimize Your Profile

Once you’ve created your Facebook business page, your job isn’t quite done – now, you have to optimize your profile. There are many things you can do to optimize your page, but for this step, we’ll stick with the basics.

1. Choose a name that represents your company or brand and matches your name on every other social platform.
2. Choose a profile image that best represents your brand and industry. We highly recommend using a high-quality logo.
3. Choose a banner image that best represents your brand and industry. This image can be anything from an eye-catching graphic to a promotional piece and anything in between. 
4. Fill out your profile information with keywords, hashtags, and all the relevant information that a visitor will need to work with your business. 
5. Include your contact information and links to your company website, Google business profile, and other social media platforms, plus any additional information they might need (menus for restaurants, brochures for agencies, etc.).
6. Fill out the category options to clearly list your services and products. That way, your business will come up when people search.

Step Two: Create a Content Strategy with High-Quality, Sharable Content

After your profile is completely set up and ready for visitors, it’s time to create your content strategy. Your content is going to be the bread and butter of your Facebook marketing presence, so it’s important to create high-quality, sharable content that best represents your brand.

If you want people to like and comment on your posts or follow and interact with your page (or, preferably, both), then the content you put out there has to be worth follows, likes, comments, and interactions. 

Also, try to be consistent. No brand can succeed without consistency, no matter how popular they once were. In this marketing and social climate, consumers move fast, and it’s in your best interest to keep up with them. If you disappear for even a moment, they might not even notice – they’ll just move on. 

Facebook recommends posting at least once per week, but other marketing experts agree that you should try to aim for four to seven times per week, depending on your niche and market reach.

Utilize Facebook Reels and Stories

And while much of your content strategy should center around sharable graphics, memes, industry news, and product-related posts, you should also invest a lot of time and energy in Facebook Reels and Stories. If you’re already posting videos and stories on Instagram or TikTok, you can just repurpose those videos on Facebook. 

If you don’t have a strategy already in place for creating videos and stories, you should take some time to put one together. Stories give your followers an opportunity to get to know the people behind the brand, showing a more behind-the-scenes look at your business. And based on expert marketing data, videos are better for garnering views and engagement than images, while images are better for garnering clicks.

Step Three: Interact with Your Audience

If you want to foster a sense of community and build strong relationships with your target audience, you must interact with them. Respond to comments and direct messages. Host contests and giveaways. If someone tags your page in a post, like, comment, and reshare it.

These methods not only enable you to show your audience some love, but they also reward and encourage further interactions. No matter your online voice or brand persona, your business will benefit from interacting with your follower base.

Step Four: Create and Manage Groups Relevant to Your Industry

If you want opportunities to interact with people in your niche, you should also create and manage your own Facebook Groups. It’s not only an excellent way to boost your content and get more eyes on your page, but it also creates a direct line to your target demographic. 

Any group you create and manage should be relevant to your industry. Naturally, these groups will attract potential customers more likely to engage in your content. But these groups also enable you to start conversations and strengthen your customer relationships. 

Step Five: Research Hashtags and Keywords

You might think that hashtags don’t apply to Facebook marketing, but that couldn’t be further from the truth. With billions of daily searches, you should treat Facebook like any other search engine. Use keywords and hashtags to help the Facebook algorithm identify and catalog your content, and your page will pop up for people when they’re searching.

Simply put, hashtags and keywords make your profile and content more visible. But like other social platforms, millions of hashtags and keywords are in play at all times, so it can be challenging to know which ones you should use. Take time to research popular hashtags and keywords and incorporate them into your content strategy.

Step Six: Follow Your Competition

If you’re unsure what content to create or just want to stay hip to what your competition is doing, you should follow them. There’s no shame in that. In fact, if you don’t follow them, you might miss important news that could be critical to your business.

Of course, there’s more to it than that. Following your competition allows you to gain insight into the industry. Plus, you get a bird’s eye view of their marketing efforts. By watching them, you can learn what works and what doesn’t, allowing you to tailor your content for the best possible results.

Step Seven: Learn and Utilize Facebook Ads Manager

Learning, understanding, and using Facebook ads is possibly the most important step in this bunch, and here’s why. No matter how many followers you gain or how many likes and interactions you receive from your target demographic, you will never reach more of your audience than when you use the Facebook Ads Manager. 

In fact, Facebook makes it relatively hard for business pages to get much organic traffic. As a result, you’ll want to rely pretty heavily on ads to get meaningful traction on Facebook. 

Ad campaigns are designed to reach specific people (followers, demographics, niches, etc.) when they’re most likely to convert. And while you can still reach many of those people with normal posts, ad campaigns are an invaluable tool with features designed to make the advertising process as simple and lucrative as possible. When you’re just getting started, remember these tips:

• Create a clear list of objectives and goals for your ad campaigns.
• Track your ads via analytics, and alter the ads that aren’t working. 
• Take advantage of audience targeting, but don’t limit yourself. You should want your ads to hit as many people as possible. 
• Test out different posts, formats, copy, images, and videos until you find the ones that perform best in your niche.
• Utilize the analytics to enhance your ad campaigns.

For a full guide to creating a killer Facebook ad campaign, check out our complete Facebook ads guide - 7 Insider Tips for an Effective Facebook Ads Campaign. 

Take Your Company to the Next Level with Facebook Marketing in 2023

Everything listed in this guide might feel a bit like information overload. And truthfully, it’s a lot to synthesize all at once, but understanding how to market on Facebook is absolutely critical to creating a successful business or brand in today’s highly competitive market. 

If you put together the right combination of intensive research, high-quality content, and thoughtful interactions with your audience, you will greatly benefit from the nearly 3 billion active monthly users that call Facebook home.

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