By Giselle Aguiar

hen I first started my business, social media marketing was, in my opinion, fairly easy. Today, however, it’s not hard, not complicated per se, but more complex and challenging. Nevertheless, it can be conquered!

In business-to-consumer (B2C) marketing, your main target is the average consumer who would need to rent storage space rather than a corporate or businessperson who would be business to business (B2B).

For B2C marketing, nothing beats Facebook and Instagram. Facebook and Instagram are owned by Meta. That’s the parent company formerly known as “Facebook.” Since Mark Zuckerberg was expanding into virtual reality and other apps, they changed the name. If you want to do paid advertising on either Facebook or Instagram, you have to go through the Meta Business Suite.

In all honesty, paid ads are not my forte. I focus on showing businesses how to do organic or non-paid marketing online. Thus, that’s what I’ll be explaining.

Love it or hate it, Facebook is still the No. 1 social media network in the world. According to Backlinko, “Right now, 2.09 billion daily active users access Facebook’s platform, a 5.09 percent increase year-over-year.”

But why is Facebook so difficult? Because of an algorithm change in March of 2018, it’s increasingly difficult to grow a following on Facebook organically—that is, without paying for advertising to get extra reach and clicks to your website. Besides that, there is more and more censorship. Unfortunately, they don’t always tell you why your ad was declined, why your post was removed, or why your account was suspended.

The algorithm change was enacted to alter how you see content on Facebook. Zuckerberg wants you to see more posts from your friends rather than posts from the business pages you follow.

Facebook does want you to spend money advertising. That’s how they keep the lights on. However, Facebook also wants to keep users on its platform rather than having them click off to another site.

Facebook’s vision is to be a “discovery engine” by giving more reach to videos. In other words, they are competing with YouTube, TikTok, and their sister app, Instagram.

Facebook’s discovery engine means they recommend more content from accounts users aren’t connected to. Have you noticed that on Instagram you see “suggested” posts from accounts that you don’t follow? That’s their AI (artificial intelligence). It’s pulling content that it thinks you may be interested in. This may help the challenge if you’re starting or struggling. It’s fairly easy to build a following organically on Facebook, especially if you’re just starting. If you have a B2B side to your business, concentrate on LinkedIn. Still post on Facebook to help with SEO, but don’t expect miracles unless you do paid ads. Here are some tips to reach the consumer:

• Use Native Videos – Upload videos directly. Don’t just share a YouTube or Vimeo link. Remember, keep the user on Facebook. However, don’t upload the same video over and over again.
• Go Live – Facebook wants its users to stay on their site. Thus, they will give more reach and exposure to live broadcasts and streaming videos. The trick is to engage your customers and followers. Plan it out and promote it well before the event. For instance, broadcast your auctions live.
• Post Two To Three Times A Day – Alternate the types of posts between your blog articles offering news, tips, and advice; a live video; a couple of articles from relevant or related sources, like local events; and one promotional post a day with a call-to-action link back to your website. Use a scheduling tool like Sendible to save time and plan your posts.
• Encourage User-Generated Content (UGC) – UGC is when happy customers post pictures or videos of themselves using your facility, services, or products on their accounts so all their friends can see them. They will tag the location and/or your company account.
• Join Groups – Some groups on Facebook allow pages to join. However, be aware of each group’s rules and respect them. Do not spam the groups. They will kick you out. Look for regional or industry groups.
• Post Good Quality Content – Go for quality over quantity always. Your content should also be helpful.
• Make Likes Easy – Have a “Like us on Facebook” button and/or widget on several pages of your website, especially your blog, to make it easy for people to like your page.
• Be Active – Like and comment on other people’s business pages as your page. Long comments carry more weight than short comments. Comments are more valuable than if someone just likes a post.
• Invite People To Like Your Page – Invite your personal contacts and friends to like your page. Furthermore, be alert to those who will only like it because it’s you and have no interest or need for your products or services. They do, however, make good referral sources.
• Know Your Audience – Your strategy should be based on who you’re trying to reach.

Because of U.S. elections and Facebook’s increased censoring of content, even doing paid advertising on Facebook is difficult. This is one of the reasons I don’t provide the service. Instead, I encourage organic (non-paid) content marketing. However, I recently helped a client set up a Facebook ad. She relaunched a nonprofit and wanted to reach a new market. When she had the nonprofit before, she grew her Facebook likes to over 2,000. Unfortunately, since it’s been dormant for several years, we needed to reach those followers again.

We noticed that organic posts were only getting a reach of nine. Yes, nine out of 2,000! That’s why she wanted to do an ad. We went through Facebook’s Business Suite and built a carousel ad with several graphics in a slide show. We picked the audience and sent it off to be approved. It was rejected.

Of course, they don’t tell us why it was rejected. They just said it violated its usage terms and gave us a link for more information. We looked at the audience and the text in the ad, adjusted the audience, removed text that might offend their sensitive algorithm, and resent it. It was rejected again.

At that point, it’s useless trying to argue with their computer. You can drive yourself crazy trying to figure out what word or phrase is offending it.

Now we were stuck. After some thought, I suggested that she create a post introducing the organization and then boost the post to her fans and their friends. That ad was approved and she did get some click-throughs to the website.

Boosting a post is the easiest way to do paid ads on Facebook. No matter the frustrations, it’s Facebook, and you can’t deny its usage statistics. Nevertheless, keep in mind that Facebook is not the only game in town! You can advertise on Instagram without going through Facebook.

The most important piece of setting up your Facebook page is including your location. You may think “Duh,” but I’ve seen some local brick-and-mortar businesses skip this vital step. You’ll also need to include your phone number and email address. For the phone number, designate whether it’s a mobile or office line; for email, make sure it’s current and checked frequently. Here are a few other important considerations:

• Messaging – You can have people message your business through Facebook Messenger. However, you must respond quickly, at least within 15 minutes during business hours. If you’re not going to monitor Facebook Messenger, don’t add this feature. You can set up notification preferences if you do want to add this.
• About – Here is where you can put details about your facility. Include special features like RV storage, wine storage, climate-control features, etc. You have a lot of space, so use it! Add all the relevant keywords.
• Cover Graphic – This should be a picture of your facility. Make sure it’s a quality photo and 820-by-312 pixels in size.
• Logo/Icon/Avatar – This is a square image that is converted into a circle. Be careful that any text is not cut off or too small to read. Create a 400-by-400 square graphic that you can use on the other networks to keep your branding consistent.

When looking through Facebook for a self-storage facility with its Facebook act together, I found a good example in the Greater Phoenix Area. Check out www.facebook.com/AZSSLitchfield. They have an intro that tells me what kind of storage spaces they offer, as well as amenities for RVs. Additionally, they post regularly on Facebook. In fact, I discovered on their Facebook feed that they were named the 2023 Overall Facility of the Year by the Messenger!

Arizona Self-Storage is a fairly large chain with several locations in Arizona. If you’re a smaller outfit, you may be thinking, “They probably have a staff.” More than likely, they do. On the other hand, with a little sweat equity time upfront in setting everything up properly, all you have to do is plan your posts and campaigns every month. Then, spend about 15 minutes a day checking your feed and interacting with people. (That’s the “social” part of social media.)

Monthly, check your insights and analytics to see what worked and what didn’t, then adjust your plan for the next month accordingly.

First, let me cover the differences between Facebook and Instagram. Links do not work in Instagram posts at all. On Facebook, you can share links on posts that help drive traffic to your website and help with SEO. Links do work in Instagram stories, but they do not work in Facebook stories. When creating a story on Instagram, add a link from the stickers icon. Remember: Stories only last 24 hours. Make sure you have them set to save to your device so you can reuse them later. However, you have to add the link again. Instagram is mostly graphics and videos, though Facebook has added reels to their abilities.

Instagram is about 95 percent mobile. In other words, it works better on the mobile app. Make sure that you create a business account and connect it to your Facebook business page. You can then send your posts and stories to both accounts at the same time.

Grow your following by following and tagging people, but don’t be too aggressive. You can even do fundraisers for nonprofits.

BIO AND BRANDING
You have only 160 characters for the bio; don’t fill it with fluff. Make it keyword-centric so people know what you offer. Don’t forget your website URL in the bio. Additionally, put your street address. Use the same icon/logo/avatar that you used for Facebook to keep your branding consistent.

USER-GENERATED CONTENT
Get happy customers to post videos or pictures of themselves at your facility or using your products and services (that’s user-generated content). Make sure they tag your business account and location.

POSTING
At first, you should post three times a day (morning, noon, and evening). That way you cover the balance of the day. After 30 days, and if you have at least 100 followers, check your insights to see when your followers are on. Each audience is different; do your research.

Use hashtags regularly and consistently. Their limit is 30 hashtags (the same applies to Facebook). Hashtag your major keywords, create your own brand hashtag, and use hashtags in your posts that are popular, relevant, and trending. As a local brick-and-mortar business, tag your location in all your posts. You have 2,200 characters in a caption, so use them! Balance educational posts with entertaining ones. Remember, links don’t work in captions; they only work in the bio and as a sticker in stories.

Instagram continuously crawls posts to determine how popular, valuable, and relevant they are. Then it presents content to users based on their interests. For instance, it takes into consideration liked, saved, and shared posts; searches; and which accounts users follow or unfollow. Here is what works:

• Speed – This is the number of actions immediately after publishing. Add a comment right after posting like, “BTW” or “Did you know … ?”
• Shares – This is the number of people who feature your content on their feeds or stories. Ask people to share a story by adding a sticker. On reels, put the call to action in the caption. Add a “Read Caption” sticker to the bottom of the reel. Links don’t work in reels either. Usually, “see link in bio” works. Instagram users know to visit someone’s bio to get a website link.
• Sends – This is the number of people who send your post to their friends. If you send it to people, hopefully they’ll send it to friends.
• Saves – This takes into account the number of people who save your post to their boards.
• Engagement – These are comments, replies, and likes. Ask: “What do you think?” “What would you do?” Or “Yes or No?” Reply to comments. Start conversations.

There are several other actions that their algorithm takes into consideration, like zooming in to see an image better, taking screenshots, extending comments to read the thread, clicking anywhere from the post area to view a bio or guides, and tapping to see who else liked your post.

Believe it or not, how long someone stays on a post matters! That’s where the carousels come in (posting up to 10 images in one post).

Finally, check your insights every month. Sendible provides great analytics, like the best time to post, when to get the most engagement, and which were your most popular posts.

Recently, several people have contacted me regarding suspended or deactivated Facebook and Instagram accounts. Unfortunately, that is happening all too often. You don’t have to be a politician voicing your opinion to be “canceled.”

Facebook and Instagram’s parent company, Meta, has censors—both using artificial intelligence (AI) and humans. They have certain keywords, phrases, and hashtags that they monitor. Mostly, these come to their attention when a user reports an account because they deem it offensive somehow. The problem is that we, the general public, have no idea what these keywords, phrases, and hashtags are.

So, what can the average small business person do to avoid getting “canceled”? Here are a few tips:

• Keep business and personal separate.
• If you see a post that angers you and you’re on the business account, refrain from commenting, posting, or sharing. Switch to your personal account.
• Be careful how you word your posts, even what images you use. Any wording may be misconstrued or labeled “misinformation.”
• Think before you post!

If you receive a warning letter from the platform, read it carefully. They should give you a link to appeal. If you feel you’ve been wrongly targeted, then go ahead and appeal. Keep in mind that it may take a while to hear back from them.

If it was a post that was rejected or taken down, delete it. Even if you want to take a stand, this is not the place. You won’t win.

If, after appealing, and after several tries, you don’t hear back from them, you may want to give up and start over again. I know that’s a hassle, but fighting with these big entities ends up being a waste of time. If you have only a few followers, then it’s not a problem to start over. If you have a few thousand, maybe it’s worth appealing and fighting for the account.

Remember: You are using their platforms. They make the rules and they can change the rules whenever they want. I’m sure you’ve received those emails saying, “Our terms of service have been updated;” like me, you likely quickly delete them.

Post equally on the major ones to start. Overall, your website analytics will tell you where your visitors are coming from. If Facebook or Instagram is generating business for you, by all means, continue using them. If you find that either is more of a hassle than it’s worth, drop one of them. Stick with what works.

Facebook takes less effort and is more helpful with SEO when sharing links to your website. Again, it depends on who you’re trying to reach. You can visit my YouTube channel (www.youtube.com/@Azsocialmediawiz) for webinars on Instagram, using hashtags, and much more.