Facebook likes

[Bob Kenney]

Hello All,

I got an interesting call the other day, despite the fact that they were trying to sell me something, as usual. The idea was that they could promote my facebook page by designing a banner, supplying me with likes, etc. One time fee.

I have great sales resistance, however it sounded like a great idea and I had never considered facebook as a marketing tool. I had started a page but never did much with it.

Well I've done a little more with it now but I need likes to promote it, so I'm asking any of those reading this who are so inclined to visit my facebook page and click like to give it a boost.

http://www.facebook.com/MDHomeInspector

Thanks for the help

Bob Kenney
Independent Home Inspection
Maryland Independent Home Inspection (http://www.independenthomeinspectionmd.com)
www.facebook.com/MDHomeInspector
rkenney74@comcast.net

[Nathan Thornberry]

DO NOT pay for likes!!! Posting this so it emails you and I'll be writing a detailed response over the next few minutes!

[Nathan Thornberry]

Alright Bob, here's the long form explanation-

The whole point of a Facebook professional page is to get to those who either can bring you business, or know someone who can. Encouraging interaction is good, advertising is better.

I run a $%&!load of ads, over 100 million since we started doing so over 2 years ago, and one of the advantages to running ads on Facebook is that you can advertise to particular groups, education levels, geographical areas, and much more but you can also advertise to "Fans" or "Friends of Fans"- which is probably one of the most powerful thing we've implemented for ourselves and our clients that we manage Facebook presence for.

Think about this, in your business for example. Let's say an agent you knew well or a client you did an inspection for "liked" your page by clicking a link on an email you sent them or you invited them to like the page once you were friends on Facebook. Later, you ran an ad campaign to "Friends of Fans". Now you're advertising to clients currently working with that agent, or friends of the past client who might be looking to buy a house and there you are, right on their home screen, with a notation below your ad that their friend from high school "likes" your inspection company.

You lose all of that when you "buy" fans, and frankly other inspectors liking your page doesn't help much either. In fact, both can hurt a lot, because when your posts go ignored (as they will), Facebook will stop showing them on people's newsfeeds. When your ads don't get clicked (as they won't in that scenario), Facebook won't run them. Your Facebook page you worked so hard on will be the Facebook equivalent of "SPAM" email.

As for the banner, that's easy stuff and hardly worth paying for. It's just a picture! If you're going to pay for something, pay for an application like this one:

Advanced Home Awareness Home Inspections - Professional Services - West Henrietta, NY - The AHA Difference | Facebook (http://www.facebook.com/pages/Advanced-Home-Awareness-Home-Inspections/389132977771776?sk=app_388589804505870)

This is a new page, we run around 400 inspection company pages, run daily postings, create landing pages, update the banners, and run 10,000 ads monthly to real estate agents within 25 miles of the inspector's office. We do it cheap, too.

But you can do it yourself- feel free to look at what we do and copy the concepts. A simple Google search will reveal to you how to create landing pages/apps, the picture (banner) is easy, there's plenty of resources for creating posts that inspire interaction, and Facebook advertising is cheap, but you want to make sure you do it with a purpose. You should have a landing page that visitors can do something with- sign up for something, order an inspection, etc.

Hope this helps!

[Nathan Thornberry]

Also, I checked out your page and your posts are fine, your picture at the top is good. No need to spend money on that- promote your page to your agents/clients until you get to 50+ then post here again and I'll give you the next step.