10 Easy & Free Ways to Get 50,000 Facebook Fans in 2016

B y C h r i s t i n e D y e r ,

S o c i a l M e d i a E x p e r t &

F o u n d e r o f B r i d a l T w e e t . c o m

About Christine Dyer & BridalTweet.com Christine has spent the past six years using social media to grow the BridalTweet wedding community. BridalTweet is a free wedding community that 20,000 people have joined. Anyone can browse around but only the 20,000 members of our wedding community can ask questions & share inspiration. Our members are extremely active - they've already submitted over 60,000 photos, blog posts, and discussions. Come join in on the fun! At BridalTweet...

Brides find:

stylish wedding ideas

local vendors & events

contests & giveaways

Wedding Professionals find:

free marketing tips

free ways to promote your business

helpful vendor discussions

JOIN NOW FOR FREE!

At first, I didn’t have any fans.

I launched BridalTweet.com without any fans on April 10, 2009. At that time, all I had was a BIG idea - to create a more open wedding community where vendors could have complete editorial freedom to write about their businesses and post photos for free. That would lead to a place that brides could turn to for free advice, planning ideas, giveaways, local events and more. I also wanted to offer free marketing tips as well as affordable advertising opportunities for wedding vendors because I knew there was a huge need for that.

Five years later, BridalTweet is a thriving community with 20,000 members, 55,000 Twitter followers, 50,000 Facebook fans and 5,000 Pinterest followers. It’s turned into a dream come true. And I’m truly blown away each day by BridalTweet’s members. Thank you for all of your inspiring contributions. You motivate me to continue to keep this community alive and thriving. And hopefully you've noticed that I've put my heart and soul into this. It has been a ton of work but well worth it.

Do fans really lead to more revenue? Fans and followers are nice but they need to lead to a sustainable business model. And in my case, they've helped me to attract 600 advertisers who currently participate in BridalTweet’s Preferred Vendor Program. So yes, I’m living proof that fans really do lead to more revenue. Here’s a snapshot of some of BridalTweet’s advertisers:

Wedding Venues Photographers

DJs & Bands Invitations

Officiants

So, how did I do it?

I attracted the attention of brides and wedding vendors by consistently writing engaging posts on Facebook. I consider Facebook posts to be engaging ONLY IF they deliver helpful information to your fans and if they encourage your fans to Like or Comment on the content. Posting helpful information will increase your chances of rising to the top of hundreds of newly engaged couples (and their friends’) News Feeds.

Why should you care? Becoming influential on Facebook is bound to help your business too. It will create more opportunities for you and it will drive referrals for you. And it’s something that anyone can achieve.

But here's the BIG challenge…

You keep hitting the refresh button. You're certain that your latest Facebook post would inspire fans to Like, respond and share. Yet there’s been little-to-no response. You wonder why no one's listening.

So, here's what you're doing wrong.

According to the article Top 10 Reasons People Don’t Like Your Facebook Posts, here are 10 Facebook faux pas that will turn brides away:

1. Asking questions that are too broad or too personal. Open-ended questions come across as rhetorical, and if they’re personal, they’re easily misunderstood. Instead, ask specific or multiple choice questions that reflect your audience’s connection to your business.

2. The tone is uninspiring. Sure, this is your business, but that doesn’t mean you can’t be conversational or inspiring. Share some anecdotes or customer success stories that also show your human side.

3. Every post is pure text. Break up those pure text posts by adding pictures featuring the latest contest winners, happy employees or any image that's visually appealing and relates to your post or company. It's too easy to do, not to do it.

4. There’s too much focus on selling. While an occasional post about a product is fine, especially if it’s new or was recently featured in the news, don’t use Facebook as an overt sales vehicle. Remember, people go to Facebook to catch up and connect—when they want to buy, they’ll go to your website.

5. You only talk about your business. Fans expect news, tips and photos that go beyond your business. For example, a health club may share recipes and workout tips that show its commitment to helping members stay healthy, so keep the bigger picture in mind when you’re posting.

6. The message isn't in sync with your audience or business. Before you post, ask yourself if the message serves the interests of your audience in terms of being interesting, helpful or funny.

7. You’re not responding. Fans should know their feedback is appreciated, so be sure to respond to their likes, comments and questions.

8. Your page has an identity crisis. To avoid a cluttered page and create a steady stream of engaging posts, develop an editorial calendar. Along with providing structure, it lets your fans easily learn more about your business and the type of content they can expect to see. Just make sure you build in flexibility so you can quickly respond to current news and fan feedback.

9. You’re not offering anything. Let’s face it, one of the reasons people become fans is for the perks. Reward them with exclusive contests, deals and insider offers.

10. You give up too easily. If you place the same amount of patience and perseverance on engaging your Facebook audience that you applied to building your business, you’ll achieve success in social media.

And here's what you can do right!

These are just a few of my own Facebook tips to create REALLY engaging posts:

1. Create an attractive Facebook business page. Your page needs to give people a reason to become a fan, showcase your work and link to your website.

2. Build your Facebook fan base. To do this, add a Facebook icon to all of your marketing materials. This should include all of your website pages and your email signature. The icon should link directly to your Facebook business page. And why not send an email to your friends and family inviting them to 'Like' your Facebook business page.

3. Act like a magazine. To understand what I mean, check out BridalTweet's Facebook page. As you can see, I have gotten into a habit of creating regular posts that include: one inspiring wedding photo, with one compelling headline or question, with one link back to the source of the photo (usually on my website). This formula works. It attracts brides and is easily share-able.

4. Remember that brides don’t read. Ok, yes they do but they also LOVE photos. I recommend that you include at least one wedding photo in each of your blog posts. This will make your blog posts more interesting and attractive to brides. If you are using wedding images or content from a third party, be sure to give credit to those sources.

5. Consistently post about one specific theme or niche. Having a theme will create a perception that you are an expert on that particular subject. More importantly, it will signal to fans as to what they can expect from your Facebook page. If it is a theme that they are interested in, then they will likely respond to your page often. To choose a theme, think about what you are passionate about and what you are good at. For example, wedding photographers can publish a ‘wedding photo of the day’. Wedding planners can publish a wedding planning tip of the day. Or consider posting about celebrity weddings - brides love that stuff. Whatever your big ideas are, they will help distinguish you and your business. And they will attract attention.

6. Keep it short. Never create a Facebook post that is more than 140 characters. That is simply too long and it will be ignored.

7. Ask yourself one really important question. To determine if this post will be 'good enough' to publish, ask yourself, "Is this something that I would share with my friends?" If the answer is no, then don't publish it!

8. Save time! Spend only 10 minutes a day on Facebook by automating your posts. I use Facebook’s free scheduling tool. This service is invaluable to me because it frees up my time during the day and helps me to focus on what's most important - my customers.

9. Measure what's working. Turn to Facebook Insights, the free service that Facebook offers to show you how many people are interacting with each of your

posts. If a certain type of post is doing really well and getting a lot of Likes, Comments or Shares, then try to create more posts like that one!

10. Don’t become guilty of these Facebook fauxpas:

Don’t focus on selling. While an occasional post about a product is fine, especially if it’s new or was recently featured in the news, don’t use Facebook as an overt sales vehicle. Remember, people go to Facebook to catch up and connect—when they want to buy, they’ll go to your website.

Don’t just talk about your business. Fans expect news, tips and photos that go beyond your business. For example, a health club may share recipes and workout tips that show its commitment to helping members stay healthy, so keep the bigger picture in mind when you’re posting.

Don’t ignore your audience. Fans should know their feedback is appreciated, so be sure to respond to their likes, comments and questions.

Don’t give up easily. If you place the same amount of patience and perseverance on engaging your Facebook audience that you applied to building your business, you’ll achieve success in social media.

My Viral Post that Got 4.5 Million People Talking. Something crazy happened to me during February of 2015. One of my Facebook posts went VIRAL. I mean - really viral. Here's the magnitude of it all --> 6.6 million people saw my post and over 997,000 people clicked on it. I joked to my friends that The Knot must have been wondering where ALL of the engaged people went because clearly they were ALL hanging out on my BridalTweet Facebook page! It was really unbelievable. So, what was everyone buzzing about?

The Facebook post that went viral was:

Stressing over who to invite (or NOT invite) to your wedding? Here's a great guide... http://www.bridaltweet.com/profiles/blogs/5-must-read-wedding-stati...

(On the next page, you’ll see that image that was attached to this Facebook post).

So, why was this post so successful?

It solved a REAL problem. One of the biggest stresses of planning a wedding is creating a guest list. And this infographic helped many people with that problem. It was so helpful, that millions of people were compelled to share it. That is the secret to a successful post. Create content that solves problems and is both compelling and easy to share.

Summary The great thing about Facebook is that ANYONE can achieve these results. The other great thing is that Facebook is free. It offers an effective channel to build your reputation, humanize your brand, network and attract new wedding leads. So, here are my last words of wisdom: Your Facebook posts shouldn't be hard sales tools but instead they should be a mix of marketing and education to build your audience's trust. The whole point here is to build trust and to encourage brides and other wedding professionals to want to work with you.

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