Imagine growing a Facebook Group and having thousands of active members. Many of these members are on your email list and some of them have already bought your products.
This is what can happen if you commit to growing a Facebook Group.
It’s a very helpful asset to get more traffic from your social media marketing efforts.
My Facebook Group is approaching 1,000 members, but just because of a change I recently implemented, that group has allowed me to add 100s of people to my email list.
For every new 1,000 members added to the group, I can expect to get an extra 700-800 subscribers to my email list.
How is this possible? I’ll explain shortly, but first I’m going to share some strategies you can use to grow your Facebook Group.
Strategy #1: Provide Exclusive Interviews
Bringing guests into the Facebook Group and interviewing them is a great value add for existing members.
However, these interviews can also get more people in the group.
One strategy I utilize is asking each guest to promote the upcoming interview to their audiences. That way, not only do I promote the interview to my audience, but someone else is promoting the interview as well.
You have two options for growing your Facebook Group and email list.
The first option is to lead people to a landing page where they subscribe to get notified about the interview.
In the welcome email, you proceed to tell them to join your Facebook Group because that’s where the interview will be.
The benefit with this strategy is that you can have better email copy with those new subscribers through your autoresponder. You can adapt your email copy based on who the speaker is and what subject material will be covered.
In other words, it’s more than just a generic autoresponder sequence.
The second option is to lead people to your Facebook Group. This will grow your Facebook Group more than the previous method because some people who join your email list will forget to join your Facebook Group.
The boost in new members and engagement will also help you rank better in Facebook’s algorithm which will help you attract new members.
So there are benefits to each.
But how do we get new members to join our email list? The answer is by asking new members a few questions.
If you ask too many questions, pending members won’t bother to fill them out.
That’s why I only ask three questions. You can ask more questions later on by following-up with new members (Facebook doesn’t let you automate this part).
These are the three questions you should ask:
- Why do you want to join [your group]?
- What is your email address?
- Are you interested in receiving a free income spreadsheet you can use to track your income and expenses?
You could also finish question #3 with “If so, please enter your email address below,” and change or remove Question 2, but this method works for me right now.
I may A/B Split Test it to see if changing Question 3 gets different results.
In any event, asking these types of questions will allow you to grow your email list. All you then do is copy and paste the individual emails into ConvertKit or your equivalent.
Most of the people who join the group are also interested in the Free Income Spreadsheet. As a result, they join my email list.
This is the secret to getting new members to join your email list. You can post something in the group asking current members if they are interested in the resource, but it works better once you have the questions set up for each person who wants to join your group.
Strategy #2: Optimize Your Group For The Facebook Algorithm
How many people are really searching “Breakthrough Success” in Facebook’s algorithm. If they are, it’s likely people who already know, like, and trust me.
For a long time, my group was just named Breakthrough Success. I recently changed the name to hit on a few keywords people would actually type into Facebook’s search engine.
The new name of the group is Breakthrough Success – Entrepreneurship I Digital Marketing I Grow Your Biz. Those are some of the keywords people type into Facebook to find different groups to join.
People who search “Breakthrough Success” likely know who I am. People who search “Entrepreneurship” may come across my brand for the first time.
You can also work more keywords into your description to get that extra SEO juice.
It’s important to note that Facebook only lets you change your group’s name once every 28 days. Do your research to make sure you’re picking the right keywords to rank for in your title because you’re stuck with them for almost a month.
Strategy #3: Boost Group Engagement
Facebook wants to promote groups that will keep people on their site longer. If you get good engagement in your group, Facebook interprets that as a positive sign and pushes out your group to more people.
You can start the process by posting into your group at least 3 times per week. I aim for daily posts to get in front of more of my members more often.
When I increased my frequency to daily posts, I got more likes and comments for my posts. Open ended questions such as “What’s one goal you want to achieve in 2020?” tend to get the most comments.
When someone comments on one of your posts, put that person on a list of people to continue reaching out to. Some people will leave a comment on one of your Facebook Group posts and then never leave a comment again.
This happens because people forget about you or spend the rest of the time in your group lurking and seeing what others are posting.
To avoid this, get into more individual conversations with people who have commented on past posts. Reach out to them using Facebook Messenger and continue the dialogue. If they have a birthday, wish them a Happy Birthday. Like their posts and leave a comment.
This is especially important to do in the early stages of the group when it is growing and gaining momentum.
To boost engagement even more, I use the cover photo for my Facebook Group to encourage people to click the notifications button.
People who click on notifications will get notified each time something new gets posted in the group.
This increases the likelihood these people continue to participate in the Breakthrough Success Group and leave comments on future posts.
In Conclusion
If you want to use Facebook to grow your business, you need to start your own Facebook Group. Facebook Pages get more pay-to-play as the years roll by and a personal account is great for business relationships.
However, a group helps you build relationships while growing your email list and revenue.
Facebook Groups continue to be an under utilized opportunity with everyone rushing to Facebook Ads and thinking that’s the only way to make money on Facebook.
What are your thoughts on Facebook Groups? Do you have any questions for me? Sound off in the comments section below.