Understanding how your customer base use Facebook
Understanding who your customers are and how they use Facebook can be extremely beneficial, when it comes to targeting your audience and delivering the content that they want. This knowledge will be of great use when developing and nurturing your brand image and business overall.
Different ways of using Facebook
How different people use Facebook and the frequency of their usage can vary hugely, even amongst what might seem to be a similar group of people. Usage can range from the extremely sporadic to the virtually compulsive, but there is generally a common aim of being connected. This can mean connecting with colleagues and old and new friends, or linking with educational contacts and professional connections.
The network itself also offers different ways to use it. Visibility and privacy settings, for example, can be tailored to suit the individual, ranging from the people who want everything they post to be visible to everyone, to those whose Facebook presence barely leaves a trace.
Beyond individual pages
Facebook users can also choose to make use of features that take them beyond their individual pages into the realm of groups, events, business pages and Facebook messenger.
Groups
These are created by users and have varying degrees of security and privacy, in a similar way to individual profiles. Groups can be focused on a topic or event and range from special interest groups to professionally-relevant pages.
Events
Events allow Facebook users to organise themselves around a specific point in time, and security can be customised to allow for private, public and combination events. Users can effectively blend their professional and personal lives, thanks to an ability to export events into other calendars for convenience.
Business pages
These have evolved greatly over the years, and continue to adapt to meet marketers’ needs. Facebook also continues to add features to boost its business appeal, in terms of advertising, access, security, reporting and analytics.
Messenger
This allows users to combine Facebook messages, instant messenger and email, as part of a stand-alone service which arrived on the scene during 2010 and 2011 when Facebook acquired the popular Beluga group messaging app and rebranded it as Facebook Messenger.
Overall appeal
Facebook is renowned for the way in which it responds to its users’ preferences and their increasing reliance on social platforms. It is also known for its ability to offer the widest choice for its users, in terms of relevance to different areas of their lives, and the flexibility it provides as a result of its privacy and visibility settings.
Of course, Facebook will need to continually adapt in order to maintain its position of social networking supremacy, meaning that change and evolution will always be on the cards. This will usually be viewed as necessary and beneficial, although it can be frustrating for you if you are using the network as a marketing platform.