There are still some people out there using Facebook groups rather than setting up a business page. For organizations with a small budget and the goal to grow and inform, shifting your approach can make a big difference.
A few months ago, I had a chat with a pastor of a local church about what he could do to make more of an impact on social media. After taking a look at their assets, I quickly realized the church was using a group to get messages across. I explained to the pastor that building a Facebook page was free and fairly simple to set up and that it came along with a lot more benefits than using a group. Since our chat, the church has created a growing Facebook page.
Group Vs. Business Page: What’s the Difference?
Facebook pages allow a business or organization to share content that can be seen by anyone and everyone on Facebook. A group limits you to sharing content only with your members. For a non-profit like a church, typical goals include growing the following or support both online and offline, providing information about events such as fundraisers and signups for things such as newsletters, volunteer efforts, and sharing a message with as many people as possible. Facebook pages make it much easier to work toward specific objectives.
Content can be shared to pages with organic (free) posts and promoted (paid) posts. The difference between free posts and paid posts is the number of people Facebook will deliver your post to. With promoted posts, the content will have an organic reach as well as a promoted reach.
The below example of a free post reached 111 people (which means 111 people saw the post on their news feed).
In a promoted post, Facebook is going to deliver the post to more people, which will encourage more engagement. This can be targeted by location, age, interests, etc. With promoted posts, insights show how many people were reached organically and how many people were paid reach.
The church I mentioned still uses the group for more member-specific news, but they have expanded their social presence to a Facebook page with general messaging and paid promotion. The promoted post below post reached 9,593 people.
Facebook paid promotion is inexpensive and can be used to target very specific audiences. Outside of boosted posts, there’s an entire section called “Ads Manager” full of options such gaining fans, sending people to your website, or raising attendance at an event.
There are many other features offered through Facebook pages, including a full information section of your organization or business, call-to-action buttons that can be customized, insights about all activity on your page, a review section, publishing tools that allow you to schedule posts for the future and more.
Click here to read more on best practices to promote messaging on social media for your brand or business.