Manage Your Facebook Page Better! Here Are Some Tips!

Facebook frequently updates its platform with new tools, apps, and features. The constant flux can make it difficult for social media managers to keep up.

During last week’s PR Daily Twitter chat—dubbed #RaganSocial—we asked participants which features they think people should know about. Here are some of the responses:

Schedule posts

Facebook rolled out a scheduling feature that enables brands to schedule posts directly from Facebook. People have complained that this feature is difficult to locate (among other criticisms). You can find it by spotting a small clock in the left hand corner of the box where you post—that’s your scheduling feature.

Among the benefits of this feature, you can backdate posts to create milestones for your company’s Timeline.

Edit posts

Next time you make a mistake in a Facebook post, don’t panic. You’re now able to edit them by clicking on the pencil icon above the post. To edit older ones, you can click on the time stamp and go to “edit” under the post. From what we’ve seen, you can edit posts with pictures attached (photo captions) but not those that contain only text.

Promote individual wall posts

As you may have heard, you now have the ability to promote your Facebook posts—for a cost—to a specified audience. #RaganSocial participants went back and forth on the effectiveness of using this Facebook feature and generally agreed that advertising won’t work if your content isn’t great.

Focus on strategy and creating great content that is relevant to your target audience and then consider advertising.

Sponsor search ads

 With this feature, brands can pay to appear first in the search results for a particular topic. For example, when you enter the term “music” into a Facebook search, the drop down menu first suggests a sponsored result for a music events calendar called Thrillcall.

Advertisers can use this function to target entities related to their search. As Facebook’s developer page says, “Ads can be targeted against Facebook entities, include Pages, Places, Apps, and subscribe-enabled users.”

Share video with friends

The app Broadcast with Friends, or BFF, from Ustream enables you to broadcast from your iPhone to your Facebook feed and share live videos with your friends or the public. As a chat member noted, it’s like Instagram for videos.

Rearrange apps

To rearrange where an app appears on your Facebook page, simply click on the pencil icon in the top right-hand corner of the app and go to ‘swap position with [app of your choice].”

For example, you can move the app that prompts your audience to subscribe to your blog or showcases your YouTube channel so it’s among the things people see first when they visit your page.

Designate other managers

Don’t go it alone. You can allow others to help manage your page. To designate other managers, simply go into your settings and change the admin roles.

Measure your Facebook activity

Facebook Insights is the social network’s built-in analytics tool. Through Insights, you can determine which posts are most popular, whom they’re reaching and when, and how your apps are performing, among other data points. To access Facebook insights, go to the admin panel and you’ll find the analytics for your page.