In Facebook’s recent Global State of Small-Businesses Report, the social media giant has taken the time to interview small business owners from all around the world to get a better picture of how their businesses are going. And most importantly, where they need more support. The data collected clearly shows that calling 2020 a crazy and difficult year for small businesses worldwide is an understatement!
In this survey, Facebook found that 55% of SMB have invested some of their marketing dollars and efforts on social media, meaning that digital tools play an important role in how businesses conduct their operations, communicate with their clients, and most importantly… generate sales.
In fact, the data collected and analyzed from this survey clearly indicate that businesses that already had a higher share of digital sales are more likely to have reported more robust sales.
Sounds like all of the tools that Facebook offers to small businesses are helping them out just fine, right?
They surely are, but there’s still a lot of room for Facebook to further improve their tools and help out these small businesses, and they know it. So, what tricks do Facebook have up their sleeve? What can we expect them to launch this year that will help small businesses not just survive, but thrive?
The answer to these questions is a whoooole lot of new features that aim to make the small business experience on Facebook more fulfilling and impactful. Here’s a list of all the features that Facebook announced not too long ago and that will be rolled out before the end of the year!
Community Involvement: New Explore Feature
See some content that you like? Facebook knows that and they are doing something about it.
This new feature presents you never-seen-before posts and/or different pages altogether that resemble those that you’ve interacted with and have shown that you LOVE. This feature kind of acts like the explore page on Instagram, but a bit more precise in terms of what content and which pages are presented in this section.
Having this will TREMENDOUSLY help small businesses' visibility that may be of interest to users, but that they would never be able to discover without this simple suggestion from Facebook. It's also a fantastic new method that will allow small businesses to reach an audience that has shown a strong interest in their products or services, organically.
This new feature is simply a win-win for both businesses and users!
Conversion Optimization for Lead Generation Ads: Generate Better Leads
While there were some tricks that a specialist like me could pull to make sure that leads generated in a lead generation campaign are as qualified as possible, the algorithm still shows your advertisements to an audience who, maybe, won’t ever take action or speak to you again after giving their information to your lead gen ad. Yes, that happens often!
To help businesses get the most bang for their buck when it comes to their advertising budget, Facebook will be introducing conversion optimization for lead generation ads.
This way, your ads will only be shown to users who Facebook can anticipate, based on their past behaviors, as being a quality lead, and that you will likely be able to continue the conversation with outside of Facebook. This way, you can push them further down your sales funnel!
Scheduling in the Business Suite: New for Stories
This one is THE TEA! Social media marketing specialists and small business owners alike have been asking this for years now, and the day has finally come! While most scheduling tools such as Later or Hootsuite don’t offer this possibility yet due to API restrictions, the Facebook Business Suite will now allow businesses to create, post, and schedule not only posts but STORIES too! You have no idea how excited I truly am for this feature! Or... Maybe you do!
You and I can now officially say buh-bye to the days of setting reminders on our phones to post stories at specific times. Now, you can simply create your graphics, schedule them, and move on to the next thing on your to-do list! *crying happy tears*
Facebook is always coming out with new features, but I believe that the ones that are rolling out in the next few months will definitely be some game-changers for any small business that relies on digital marketing for consistent exposure and sales.
Have a question? Need help implementing or navigating some of these new Facebook features? Get in touch with me here!