Successful Facebook Marketing - Get fans, build your brand, get results! - Skellie

As manager of the Tuts+ Network, I spend a lot of time poring over traffic charts in Google Analytics. On the 19th of April 2011, I noticed a strange spike in Psdtuts+ traffic. In amidst our normal traffic levels, that day stood head and shoulders above the rest.

Where was all this traffic coming from?

When I dug into traffic sources for that day, I discovered that Facebook had sent a whopping 12,638 visits... in 24 hours! A post linking to one of our tutorials had gone viral.

And yet, I wasn't too surprised. This kind of thing had happened before. In fact, whenever I see a record-breaking traffic day, Facebook is usually the cause.

I want you to see these same spikes of traffic, sales, or clients. Successful Facebook Marketing will teach you the same strategies me and my team have used to break our own records with a Facebook Page.

Get traffic.

If you know how to use it, Facebook can bring more traffic to your website or store than any other source.

Since we started tracking data on Psdtuts+, Facebook has sent 607,058 visits... with more Facebook visitors arriving every day. This is more than 4x the amount of Twitter visitors in the same period, even though we have a well-established Twitter account with more than 41,000 followers!

I've learned that for many websites, Facebook out-performs other common top traffic sources. Even with a relatively small fan base, Facebook Pages punch above their weight in their ability to send you active and engaged traffic.

The strategies in the book don't rely on tricky or devious methods. Instead, you'll learn how to drive traffic back to your website by publishing quality, community-building content on Facebook, and using a small set of official Facebook tools.

You'll also learn how to create fan-only incentives that boost your fan count like crazy.

Make sales.

If you sell products, Facebook is the perfect place to build brand loyalty, spread awareness about your products, and most importantly, make sales!

There's a reason why cutting-edge brands are making it a first priority to build a following on Facebook. They know just how powerful it can be.

When a person 'Likes' a brand publicly on their Facebook Page, it becomes part of their public identity. It creates an emotional link to your brand. When it comes to making sales, there's nothing more powerful than this.

Facebook also makes it easy to access detailed information about your target market. In the past, companies had to pay thousands of dollars to learn how old their customers were, whether they were men or women, and where they were from. Now, Facebook makes this information available to you for free. Finally, you can learn exactly who buys your products... and who doesn't! Successful Facebook Marketing will give you step by step instructions on how to access this vital data on your customers.

Get hired.

Did you know that there are more than 500 million active Facebook accounts? If there's one thing that your potential clients have in common, it's that they're probably using Facebook!

Many freelancers and firms focus their social media efforts only on Twitter, but in doing so, they're limiting themselves to a small subset of potential clients who are tech savvy and see the need to have a Twitter account. In truth, many of your potential clients are probably everyday people who either don't 'get' Twitter, or don't see the need to have a Twitter account. These people can be reached most effectively through a Facebook Page.

Once you've given potential clients a reason to 'Like' your Facebook Page, they'll continue to receive updates and new content from you. Since the average person spends 1 in every 8 minutes online using Facebook , having a connection to your Page makes it easy to stay at the forefront of people's minds. When it comes time to hire a service like yours, do you think your prospects will undertake the painful task of filtering through bids or looking for recommendations, or will they hire you, the freelancer or firm they already know and trust through Facebook?

When you hear about a group of 11 Facebook Pages with 100,000 fans, you're likely to assume that they became successful after hundreds of hours of work.

In reality, we built this network by posting unique updates to Facebook just a few times a week. On each Page, we spend an average of 15 minutes a day adding new content and responding to comments. Most of our content is pulled from an RSS feed that requires zero ongoing work to maintain.

Facebook provides a number of tools that take the pain out of running a successful Facebook Page. You just need to know how to use them.

In Successful Facebook Marketing, you'll learn how to build an impressive Facebook Page even if you only have time to post updates a few times a week. The key is to post the right kind of updates, coupled with using Facebook's official tools to make your life easier.

Using the methods in Successful Facebook Marketing, 1 - 2 hours a week of work is enough to create a Facebook Page that is thriving with activity and a huge magnet for fans.

Successful Facebook Marketing is directed equally at bloggers and website owners, freelancers, firms, consultants, business people, entrepreneurs, marketers and thought leaders.

You don't need to worry that the information in the book won't be relevant to your situation. It applies equally, regardless of your industry or goals. The book draws on examples from dozens of successful Facebook Pages, from big companies, to blogs, to brands, and freelance firms.

Whether you're trying to build your freelance business, build your personal brand, sell your product or forge a community, the tips and strategies in Successful Facebook Marketing will still be useful to you.

Because the skills you'll learn apply to any kind of Facebook Page, you can re-use them again and again. They're never going to stop working.

If you're like me and end up directing strategy for multiple Facebook Pages, this book will help you with all of them.

Each strategy is designed to scale. They'll work equally well when you have 100 fans as when you have 10,000 fans... or even 100,000 fans.

Facebook isn't going anywhere. Knowing how to use the platform for your benefit is a skill that will be extremely useful to you, not only today, but in years to come.