Deeper Dive: Becoming Friends with Facebook
Part Two

What makes a good Facebook post?

Social media is about building genuine relationships through authentic interactions. These can be through sharing information, encouraging feedback, soliciting opinions and joining in community conversations. Each Facebook post should be written with these things in mind.

Do not post just the headlines of stories with links back to your website. Instead, include personalized, conversational messages with the links. Posts without this personalization receive fewer clicks and responses. Also, include photos or videos whenever possible, because visually appealing posts receive more clicks than plain text. For most multimedia links, simply place the URL into the body of your post and Facebook will automatically embed the content.

If there are particular community members related to the content you’re posting, such as reporters, feature subjects, or quoted experts, include their names in the post with a mention. You can do this easily by typing the @ sign before entering their name. This simple addition can provide a boost both to your page and your mention’s page.

Facebook and your content strategy

Facebook has little value unless it’s dynamic. For your page to be effective, you need to populate it with content throughout the day. While you can simply arrange to use an RSS tool, like RSS Social, to post headlines to your page as they go live on your own website, you will have a much greater impact—and something closer to a conversation—if you supplement any automated postings with hand-curated, personal posts and commentary.

Consider adding custom “Facebook only” content that could range from photos and videos to ticket giveaways and marketing initiatives. At the end of posts occasionally ask followers to click the Like and Share buttons on the posts.

Some things to keep in mind:

• Facebook is a place to share what you read. Don’t hesitate to promote what others write.
• Support and facilitate interaction: Ask questions, comment, respond—that’s the real way to build community around your brand.
• Keep it flowing. Dead pages = no audience.

The best way to promote your page is to produce regular, high-quality content. Give followers a reason to come back and share your work.

Managing your page

Just like with other platforms, it’s a good idea for your newsroom to have a general set of Facebook rules. While these can be loose or rigid, the point is to come to a general set of operating procedures, especially if the site will be maintained by multiple administrators.

Discuss what kinds of content will be posted to Facebook, when and how much. Will you be posting every story from your website or only selected pieces? Will the page be updated once a day or continually as stories break? Who’s going to be responding to comments and checking the page’s analytics? What types of posts will there be in addition to your stories?

Consider a social media policy that includes interaction protocols for employees who post to the site and then reply to comments with their own accounts. When interacting with your page, employees are representing the company and should conduct themselves accordingly.

Encourage dialogue and open discussion but remind everyone to keep it professional.

If the page is going to be administered by several people, decide on the voice. Will posts include signatures to identify each administrator (often just initials or a Mention will do), or be published as a collective?

These standards can be updated as the page develops but having a policy or guiding principles spelled out can help ease the editorial process and may help settle any issues that arise.

Give followers a reason to come back and share your work.

Interacting with the Facebook community

The purpose of a Facebook presence is to create a community around your organization. Content should be engaging and varied, including:

• links to stories
• follow-ups asking for reader opinions and thoughts
• questions around specific topics
• reposts of followers’ information or announcements
• multimedia content associated with stories
• promotions for upcoming projects, contests and live chat sessions

Live chats can be great ways to draw traffic and engage your followers. These chats can be done directly on your wall or using Facebook’s Live Streaming service.

During the 2009 presidential race, CNN used Facebook’s Live Streaming social plugin to broadcast debates and speeches in real time, while Facebook users commented and offered opinions on the content. The site attracted millions of viewers and, according to CNN, up to 8,500 comments were posted every minute during the peak times.

Asking for feedback and suggestions from your audience is one of the best ways to create a loyal following and can provide excellent insight into your community. A news organization that is focused on regular beats or is always looking for story ideas should consider asking its Facebook community what it would like to see covered and who journalists should be talking to. Crowd input can often offer a refreshing angle on existing coverage or unearth sources that wouldn’t have been considered before.

It is likely that your news organization’s online following will be larger than your personal followers. Just like traditional newsrooms receive regular press releases, news organizations on Facebook will begin to see posts on their walls from promoters and community members hoping to gain attention for their projects.

Page admins can also post information from other outlets on the page. This can include posts from your organization’s staff, events by partner organizations and information relative to your audience.

In general, this a good thing and shows that your organization is willing to support local initiatives. Each page’s wall should be set to allow posts from followers and the default wall setting should show all posts from users and the site administrators.

Another part of the administrator’s job is to moderate conversations. It is important that admins encourage participation and respond to comments and questions. Admins set the tone for the site and will also have to respond if users use inappropriate language or are being generally disruptive.

This encourages participation and a sense of community. Administrators should be aware of the content that followers post on the page.

Posts that are offensive or out of line with your organization’s mission should be addressed as soon as possible. It may be as simple as replying to address an issue of fact, or may involve a personal email to the offender. You can also remove offensive posts. Here again, having a well-defined strategy can be useful.

The general rule of social media: the more you give, the more you receive.