Archives for June 2010

Today I sat in on a webinar presented by Dan Zarrella.  I met Dan on Twitter during the early days when it was less crowded than now.  He is a self-described – social media scientist. This basically means he is a geek among geeks!

Seriously, as a non-practicing scientist myself who suffered through four years of college chemistry, I really appreciate the research that goes into Dan's work.  He likes to quantify things relative to social media, and not a day goes by that I don't hear someone asking for more ways to do that.

This particular webinar focused on Facebook.  So, here are some insights about Facebook as supported by the data that Dan collected, analyzed, and interpreted (along with some interpretations of my own) that will help you enhance your effectiveness with it.

Know Your Community -  Notwithstanding the fact that everyone comes to Facebook to socialize, it is clear that the younger crowd in their twenties is there for purely that reason, while baby boomers like me are more likely to respond to information.  So, if you are using Facebook to connect with either of these demographics, you will want to be sure to respect their primary reason for being there.

Business Buzzwords Fall Flat – This one should not be a surprise to anyone.  Even on LinkedIn I have a low tolerance for this business-speak.  What are some of the words that caused Facebook users to tune out?  Optimization, leverage, consulting, SEO, and implement.  Sounds like work, doesn't it?

Topics that are Most Often LIKED – If you have a Facebook page, it is most likely to be LIKED if you deal with such topics as food and sex.  Since most of us aren't dealing with sex in our small businesses, I suppose it helps to work food into your conversations once in a while (as I happened to do two days ago on this blog).

It's a Numbers Game – As we all know, people like lists.  Dan proved that having digits (numbers) in your posts will dramatically increase the likelihood that they will be shared.  Along these same lines, a few words that tend to elicit a favorable response are ..why, how, most, and top.  This makes sense, as we are curious to learn more.

What Always Works – Three things jumped out at me that deserve mentioning as the most effective means for encouraging more engagement on Facebook:

• Be Positive
• Be Entertaining
• Help Your Friends Look Cool

There was a lot more covered, but this is the low hanging fruit that you can easily apply to make your Facebook experience more rewarding, and your social media marketing more productive.

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until Tomorrow,  Jeff

Photo Credit: Ben Stein