Facebook foundations

Facebookfoundations

–back to basics

With borders no barrier, social media is at the forefront of global communications. Love it or loathe it, it’s here to stay. Lawrence Hardcastle, MD of UK web agency Larrytech, offers a ‘back to basics’ approach to harnessing the power of facebook, and explains how to maximise the rugby club’s marketing potential using this powerful tool.

Facebook was launched in 2004. This Social Networking website is now used for everything from catching up with old friends to gaining leads for business.

For clubs of all sizes, Facebook provides an extremely effective marketing tool and an excellent way of integrating with members. By using their Facebook page as a marketing tool, clubs are exposing themselves to a whole new customer base as well as cementing their relationship with existing members.

When launching a presence for your club on Facebook, the most important thing to do is to make sure you have the page ready to go once it is launched. The worst thing you can do is launch a new Facebook page that is underdeveloped. Consider a website; you would not launch a website without relevant text and images so why launch a Facebook page without relevant information?

Top tips to get your Facebook page started

• Make sure you have a profile picture – a big question mark is not going to make users want to visit your page. • Include plenty of relevant information about your club on Facebook without bombarding your visitors with too much. Definitely include a strapline about your club, contact details and a link to your website as a starting point and an absolute minimum. • If you have tabs that are empty then delete them. The last thing people want to see is a tab that has no relevance to it. • Post links and interesting stories on your wall initially to ensure there is some content on there. Once people start interacting you will not need to do as much, but initially it is important otherwise you just have a big blank wall with nothing on it which will not inspire people to interact and certainly will not encourage people to come back to your page. • Make sure the content you add to the info tab is useful, as this is where users will likely look when trying to find out what a page is about.

The better the information here, the more chance you have of people reading more about you – and consequently the more likely they are to Like and interact with you.

When you have a Facebook page that is primed and ready to go, launch it and then make sure you are promoting as much interaction as possible on your page. Whilst it is important to post about special offers to more actively promote these, you may also want to post about interesting, relevant topics. For example, a rugby club may want to post regularly about recent results. A good post about a relevant topic may result in people commenting on the post which in turn would promote interaction.

Having a presence is necessary even if it is there more for informational purposes than anything else. There is likely to be a good deal of information written about your club round the web that you have no control over, no matter how helpful or detrimental it is to your image. As a result, it is important for you to have your say and show how the club is really run. By keeping an eye out for any negative publicity you may see on the internet, you can be aware of what is being said about your club and respond accordingly.

Think carefully about who has access to your account and who can post on behalf of your club. The last thing you want is for one of your staff who has access to your account to write either negative or incorrect comments about your club that could be detrimental to your club’s image.

And they’re off...

So now you have everything in place on your Facebook page and are raring to go, looking forward to turning your page into more business. Now you need traffic to your Facebook page and to encourage people to Like you. Here are a few tips to increase the amount of users on your Facebook page. • Add all your friends. By adding all your personal friends on Facebook (and getting your staff to do the same) you will be amazed at how many ‘Likes’ and visits your Facebook page will get. The ‘snowball effect’ will then begin to gather speed as friends of friends start to Like you. This is a simple but very under-used way of gaining visibility for your Facebook page. • Add a Like button on your website as this will encourage visitors to your website to visit and consequently Like your Facebook page. • Integrate with other social media platforms (e.g. Twitter). By using other forms of Social

Media, you are exposing yourself to a whole new wave of potential business and traffic to your Facebook page that is likely to result in new business in the future. If you use both

Twitter and Facebook effectively, you could open a lot of potentially untapped doors into your potential membership base. • Like other businesses in your local area. This can be a fantastic method of gaining interaction and, therefore, business to your club.

When you Like other local businesses, they are likely to at least look on your page even if they don’t Like it straight away. On the back of this they may Like your page, refer it to one of your friends or better still, visit the club. • Promote special offers/events on your

Facebook page as this will give visitors an incentive to come back to your page. If you promote a 10% discount for all users who Like your page, for example, they may come to the club and sign up, or look on your page again in the future to see if you are doing similar activities that they could benefit from. • Email your subscriber list about your Facebook page. Keeping a database of members is a must now for any club –big or small. Sending an email promoting your Facebook page to your whole subscriber list will offer the benefit of increased traffic to your Facebook page. That will then facilitate the ‘snowball effect’ or ‘virtual cycle’ to help your Facebook page gain additional Likes, recognition and, most importantly, interaction.

Maximise success

Once you have your page up and running and you have your traffic and Likes to your page, the next step is to maximise your success by making your page as fun and interactive as possible –encouraging Likers to return. Here are a few suggestions to promote interaction: •Upload photos of quiz nights, theme nights, events etc. that you have hosted and make sure you tag people who you know or Like your page. By doing this and encouraging people to tag their friends, you will increase the level of interaction and consequent interest in your club’s page even more. • We all have the one club whose page we signed up to once and we then receive an invite to an event every week. Do invite Facebook users to visit the club and keep them informed of all your events –but don’t hound them. Once a week may be too much if you don’t have new and exciting things to talk about. • Updating your status is an excellent way of getting on people’s news feeds and if your statuses are interesting enough people may start to Like and comment on your status –again promoting interaction. • Think about when is the best time to update your status. If you’re trying to attract the

Saturday night crowd, for example, perhaps update your status with a special offer for anyone who Likes your page on a Saturday at 9pm.

That way, people may see this update on their smart phones and decide to choose your club over a local competitor.

So there you have it, a guide to getting started on Facebook and then how to maximise your return in the time you will invest in it.

CONTACT DETAILS

Larrytech Ltd Calverley House, 55 Calverley Road, Tunbridge Wells, TN1 2TU t. +44 (0) 1892 888 011 f.+ 44 (0) 1892 888 012 e. info@larrytech.com

Planning for a newwebsite

We’ve seen a lot of specifications for new websites over the years, some fantastic and some... well, not so fantastic! If you’re after a new website for your club, you will want to ensure that it fulfils all your requirements and more. Larrytech offers the following advice.

An internal meeting with all the key people within your club to discuss your new website is always a good starting point. What is its purpose? What do you need it to do for the club? The following list provides good discussion points.

• Club overview Your website needs to outline who you are and your club’s ethos.

• Website objectives What is wrong with your current website? For example, are current members after more information or are you trying to attract more prospective members to come and try your club out? Is your site visually out-of date and in need of a fresh look? Does it look terrible on mobile devices?

• Target market This is a vitally important point. Of course you will want to target both current and prospective members, but what is your focus? Do you need/want to attract more members or do you just want to keep current members better informed?

• Design Think about the message your club is trying to send via your website, look at other websites, draw inspiration from them and tell your web designer what you like or don’t like about them. The site will need to build on and enhance your club’s brand.

• Website functionality How do you want the website to appear? What functions do you want for users? Are there any particular/specific features you want included.?

• Long term strategy Have a think about your club’s long-term plans. For example, you may want a new basic site quickly because you don’t currently have the budget for a large, feature-rich site. However, you may want it set up with a view to developing it further down the line.

• Budget Your short-term budget as well as your long-term one over, say, the next three years, is an important point to think about to help build the most effective web solution over a period of time.

• Project specification In our experience most efficiency is achieved by setting dates for work to start and for a launch date. It’s important to work with your suppliers to create a realistic time frame.

CONTACT DETAILS

Larrytech Ltd, Calverley House, 55 Calverley Road, Tunbridge Wells TN1 2TU t.+ 44 (0)1892 888 011 e. lawrence.hardcastle@larrytech.com www.larrytech.com