Facebook Marketing: What’s New?
Facebook might be crowded with businesses, but it's far from oversaturated. Startups, entrepreneurs, and established businesses alike have joined the platform’s wave of constant change—taking up new tools of the trade in the form of social media management software, micro-influencers, and agency provider networks.Paid social media marketing management solutions aren’t new, but some of their advancements are newly recognized. For this reason, it’s important to focus on social media management software—those capable of leveraging user reviews, clickthrough rates, and advertisement management.
Facebook Marketing Changes in 2020
One of the biggest marketing-related changes on the platform is a higher chance of visibility—regardless of a company’s size. With over 169 billion users—13 billion, alone, using Messenger—those able to stay in touch with their brand’s fans can make big breaks.But how exactly can a growing business engage the social media giant’s ebb and flow? At the core of most successful Facebook strategies is a rapid, in-depth response to customers—as 80 percent prefer direct inquiry responses. Trust matters, particularly trust fostered through actionable business representatives.At the same time, automated services are also effective—and even a necessity. To get the most out of today’s top tech improvements, Facebook’s evolving culture, and your business’s social media presence, check out this year’s most significant platform shifts.
One: A Need for Better Investment
In the past, managing one’s Facebook marketing costs was relatively simple: Invest in Facebook’s supported ads, analytics, and featured posts. Things are a little different, these days, requiring a nuanced, “pay to play” platform approach not readily apparent to digital marketers.An advertising budget mismanaged, after all, can be a significant loss. More than ever, Facebook ad posts are unpredictable. As such, investing in linear cost-per-post strategies is unwise. Spending $15 per long-form post to garner a 100-person audience increase, for example, might not assure such results. While Facebook still has a firm handle on its audience’s dynamics, the recent Facebook activity spike has made business visibility a little more hectic.The best approach, then, is to target predictable factors—such as external audience advertisement. Rather than invest hefty sums in a constantly shifting environment, consider enhancing your boosted posts with visibility options beyond the platform. The tools provided by Facebook Developers are a great collection to start with, assisting website owners in their quest for cross-channel visibility.
Two: A Need for More Investment, In General
Content marketers have increased their ad spend—93 percent of their social-media-related funds being placed into Facebook ads. The social media giant is a top-dollar-rated advertisement platform—accounting for over $9.16 billion a couple of years ago. Studies suggest that social-based advertisements hold about a 74-percent effectiveness rate. This assumes, however, that the advertisements are correctly marketed.For this trend, the takeaway is relevance—which isn’t surprising. Relevance is a quality garnered through new directions these days, however, as pre-purchase decisions are more digital-based than ever. Currently, two-thirds of brands are paying for promoted posts on Facebook. Many of them consider this investment to be an integral element of their entire strategies, keeping consumers not only interested—but actively interested.To keep up the pace, it’s a good idea to align your brand’s interests with its customers from new angles as well. We’ll cover this in more detail, below, but keep this in mind before creating your next post-centric Facebook campaign.
Three: The Evolution of Chatbots
Because customers prefer direct responses from their chosen businesses, being available for on-the-fly feedback can quickly become difficult. While businesses capable of managing such a feat thrive, those unable to invest properly tend to take a dive.Using chatbots has become a viable solution, helping digital marketers fine-tune their focus on a brand-to-consumer level. Chatbots retain audience interest, eventually assisting in conversion rates. In some cases, these rates can even outpace those of email conversions. This is because modern chatbots aren’t limited to simple message responses. They have a collection of robust features, such as purchase history recall, checkout assistance, and product recommendations.To get started with your own chatbot-sourced feedback buffer, consider implementing the technology in Facebook Messenger. Providers like MobileMonkey let marketers create a single tech-driven funnel across multiple platforms—which is an immediate, manageable data source one shouldn’t pass up.
Four: A Preference for Long-Form Video Content
Bitesize video content is normally a surefire way to gain conversions, but Internet-goers’ YouTube preferences have changed. While a picture is worth a thousand words, a video is worth even more. In e-commerce, over half of today’s shoppers tend to see product-featured videos before they set out for a purchase.The major difference posited by 2020’s multimedia viewership trends is the length of featured multimedia, itself. Long-form content tends to be lacking in the retention department, but Facebook’s recent abundance in video-bound posts has boosted the intent to view. YouTube is still a great online video marketing platform—both for established and growing brands. This said, Instagram is quickening the pace—and livestreams are, too.As 2021 approaches, showcasing products via live video is a solid approach: It’s a resource-saving tactic, and it also displays a business’s personality efficiently. So, if you haven’t yet, take a closer look at livestreaming—as it could become your winning strategy.
Five: Micro-Influencer Marketing
Many have sung praises about influencer marketing, but micro-influencer marketing is quickly becoming a reasonable alternative. At every turn, making the most of your network is a good idea: Few approaches can boost a new business’s signal like the words of another trusted brand provider.These days, however, a massive chunk of social-media-goers prefer the advice of popular YouTubers. Generation Z has come of age as consumers, and it’s contributed to over 50,000 yearsin viewed product review hours. These are the ‘micro-influencers’ many marketers are turning to: The daily entertainers who cultivate meaningful relationships with viewers. They’re major proponents of marketing visibility, catering to an expanding security-centric population. Facebook’s checkout feature offers evidence of such a trend’s reality—as many of its processed orders were driven from YouTube-based sponsorships.
Six: A New Approach to Facebook Stories
Instagram is typically the go-to platform for in-the-moment user videos, but Facebook isn’t doing so bad itself. The platform has hosted over one billion live stories, and Mark Zuckerberg predicts that Facebook Stories may very well become Facebook’s primary engagement factor in a couple of years.The big factor to focus on, here, is the spontaneity of Facebook stories. While Instagram is certainly a spontaneous environment, Facebook Stories are believed to have reached new heights due to the platform’s middle-road content consumption environment: The Instagram experience is expected to be simple, neat, and digestible. Facebook is expected to take a little more time to enjoy—as status updates frequently introduce discussions.Because social media users are preferring long-form video content in general, their interest in longer user-created stories has grown. And yet, the spontaneity survives. When approached from this angle, marketers can bolster their authenticity as they encounter new audiences. Viewers will pay close attention to your brand if it’s worth watching—and doubly so if it’s viewable at the top of their News Feeds.
Marketing on 2020 Time
To remain effective as a content marketer, one could do worse than prioritize retargeting this year. Promoted ads will always be reliable—making them an awesome foundation of safety. While Facebook’s trends are experiencing more change than ever, it’s still possible to map out your journey for maximum effectiveness. When done correctly, your brand can even understand its custom-base on entirely new levels—and in entirely unexpected markets.Facebook’s attribution tools allow us to track the customer’s journey between platforms, too, examining the way Facebook users engage Instagram and YouTube in particular. Because this lens is still a relatively fresh one, it can be used competitively when the sales channels become a major consideration. Tracking the customer’s journey can close the gap between social media and branded website experiences—but you’ll need to spruce up your landing pages for perfect alignment.At the end of the day, the true picture to be gleaned isn’t one of shifting user values—but the enforcement of them: A lot of marketers are looking to new horizons, expecting a wide array of new behavioral insights from the world’s leading social media platform. It pays well, however, to acknowledge the current horizon’s hidden potential. 2020 has seen its fair share of unpredictable events, but Facebook has proven itself to be anything but. So, as you craft your newest campaign, don’t forget to retarget towards established audiences, too: Your brand’s biggest fans are experiencing social media’s changes—and they could use a little more predictability, themselves.
