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18 Ideas to Grow Your Facebook Fanbase

In order to get anything out of your social media campaigns, you have to have a fanbase to work with.

If you have 10 fans, it simply isn’t enough to engage, no matter how many questions you ask or pictures you share, you just won’t reach enough people.

Growing isn’t easy, but it is necessary, so I encourage clients to do two things:

1- Have a budget for growing your fanbase

2- Have patience

Don’t argue with a budget for Facebook. You can hire someone to do social media management for you, and pay them $700 a month, but not have anything allocated for growth, and see no results.

WHy? Because they will spend their time crafting content, sharing great information, etc, with a very small fanbase that won’t bring results. Instead, you should spend that $700 to pay them for managing a growth campaign.

The most difficult social media platform to grow on organically is Facebook. You almost have to have a paid advertising budget to get any traction at all.

Granted, we all know Facebook wants to make money, it’s just making it difficult for small businesses to want to stay on the platform, even with HUGE audiences (that they can’t access).

That all said, there are some things you can do to grow on Facebook, so let’s jump in.

Facebook advertising campaign– The easiest way to increase likes, but also more expensive. If you decide to go with this method make sure you have done some serious research on how to use Facebook advertising best, their system seems user friendly, but it’s easy to get lost fast in the backend.

Contests– The second most popular way to increase likes is to hold a contest. You need a good following of some sort, somewhere to jump start your contest/giveaway, but you can get some great results.

You’ll want to offer a prize that makes entering worth users’ while, something they will want to win, and give them a reason to share the giveaway. Then you need a plan to promote the giveaway extensively to see results.

Here are other suggestions for growing your Facebook fanbase:

Use your personal account to engage in groups
Run an all online Event, like a chat or party
Invite users (friends) to your page
Like other Fanpages
Like fanpage comments by others
Comment on other fanpages posts
Post to other fanpages- the more popular the better (no spamming)
Promoted posts (advertising) remember to tag your page into the text of the post to get more likes
Notifications of new updates (personal account), to respond immediately as your fanpage
Ask Linkedin connections to like your business page
Promote your fanpage on Twitter
Join a Like exchange on Linkedin
Ask communities to like your fanpage on G+ (if you are a contributing member)
Contribute in a related forum and use your Facebook link as your signature
Tag your fanpage into posts with Pics that may go Viral
Post to your fanpage often (up to 10x/day – every couple of hours)

Facebook Fanbase Growth- It’s a Time or Money Investment

All of these suggestions do take time (social media can be a huge time suck), but if you do not have the budget this might be the only way to go. If you can afford paid advertising, it will go much further.

However, each of these options can be very useful, such as group engagement, if you participate in a lot of groups and consistently provide value, you will increase your likes and make real connections with people who can use your products and services.

Expectations for a No-Money Investment Growth Plan

On average, if you put in 10 minutes a day, you will probably see a few new likes a week. I would greatly encourage you to spend up to an hour if you have no budget, because an average fanpage will gain and lose a few likes each week and you want to outweigh that.

It Is Worth It

While growing your fanbase may seem like a big feat, it is worth it, and you’ll be glad to have access to your fans on Facebook. Managing fanpages is fun, and the engagement through Facebook is unmatched on other platforms, so give it a shot and stick to it. Every like counts. And, if you have any questions, feel free to ask, we love helping.