Step 2 - Facebook. There are so many words I could use to describe my descent into insanity (commonly called creating a Facebook account), however this is a clean blog and words that aren't really rude completely escape me at the moment.
It may surprise you to learn that prior to starting a business I had never had a Facebook account, and I thought I might just end up being the last person on the planet not to have one. I've mentioned that so you can appreciated what a monumental moment this actually was! At the least, it deserves either a drum roll or a fanfare of trumpets.
In a technical, how-the-hell-does-this-work sense, Facebook has been by far the biggest challenge. The help file is like most help files - of no use whatsoever if you are clueless (frightening that someone who can knit a website can be completely clueless when it comes to sharing, tagging, poking, shouting, and any other "ing" you can think of).
And what's with the extremely annoying survey question at the end of each paragraph in the help file "Was this helpful" and "Why not?" - hey, too confusing Facebook people, way too confusing. Really, how many times do I need to answer you before you get the message!
And why do they call it "social" media? We all sit by ourselves on a computer, or with a mobile phone in our hands typing or texting to a machine - I may be wrong (hard to believe, but it has happened once before) but doesn't that make it anti-social media?
And why do all these different 'things' insist on having their own private terminology? What's wrong with the language we already have (in my case that's English)? To be honest, every time I think I have a handle on something to do with Facebook, it seems to be the very thing that they change the next day. I've spent hours trying to find something again, only to discover quite by accident that they've moved or changed the damn thing.
So many questions, and so very few answers (check the box that says too confusing again).
So, you may recall the plan was to convert my thousands of, as yet unknown, Facebook fans into online buyers. Here's the bit I didn't plan - it's actually sort of difficult to know how to get people to like you when no one knows who you are. Also difficult for them to tell their friends how fantastic MinzBeadz might be too - as no fans equals no friends of fans. I realise now how ridiculous that sounds, but colour me social media ignorant (which is an attractive shade of blush), it truly didn't occur to me.
I'll give you an example of how daft Facebook has sent me - I actually wished for one of my children to be 14 years old again! OMG - see??? But if they were, they would wake up just knowing how it all worked and I could get them to explain it in easy to understand "talk to the silly mum" language and, abracadabra, I would know it too.
For those who don't yet have a teenager, "talk to the silly mum" means in words of one syllable or less - less being a sort of grunting noise which can be deciphered depending on the facial expression accompanying the grunt i.e eyebrows raised, the grunt is a question, usually something like "Can I have a lift or money?". If the eyebrows frown into a point above the nose, then the grunt means either "Don't talk to me in public, my friends think I was grown in a test tube" or "What do you mean you won't get me those thousand dollar plastic shoes that everyone else is wearing and will think I'm a complete no-hoper for not having, and looking just like them. You're stifling my individuality!".
And while we're on the subject, how do teenagers just know all this stuff as it comes along? None of them seem to actually learn it and pass the knowledge along to others, it's more like they breathe technology air (see, I thought it was stale socks and held my breath) and it's just there - part of their DNA.
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| The aroma of technology...or is it socks? |
However, despite many sniffs (just in case some technology air lingered in our home long after my teenagers have departed) I've had to learn it the old fashioned way - yup, had to read things. And no, I don't have thousands of fans - at the time of writing this, I have less than 100, but they are (nearly) all people who wish to engage with MinzBeadz in some manner, so my less than 100 terrific followers trump those pages with 2000 "likes" that were bought through some dodgy "get liked quick" scheme.
Part of the learning has been to figure out what makes a page engaging. To that end, I have skimmed through thousands of pages belonging to others to see what makes a page enjoyable (somewhere along the way, I did figure out that it's the percentage of people 'talking about' you that determines engagement, not the number of likes). I am steadily trying to apply these same principals of engagement and enjoyment for MinzBeadz. Hopefully I succeed on some occasions, and people will be patient until the enjoyment factor outweighs the boredom factor on my page.
The good thing about all the skimming and reading was that I found lots to linger over and enjoy - none of which I would ever have known about without Facebook (and that's the only "thumbs up" they will get from me!).
Something I found very difficult to start with, was to randomly like a page and wonder if someone would like me back! Who would have thought an unknown entity would have so much power over whether I feel accepted or rejected? Luckily those feelings have passed. Now it's lovely if someone likes MinzBeadz back, but because I'm genuine about who I've liked in the first place, I'm already enjoying their posts and not particularly caring about whether they return the love or not.
That's just a blatant lie - underneath it all, I still care - please...like me.
So, has Facebook been successful as a marketing venture? Yes, a number of people who came across MinzBeadz on Facebook have gone on to become customers, and hopefully as I become more engaging with my content that number will grow.
Step 2 - complete but ongoing (if that makes sense). Now to word of mouth conversions...but that's a story for next time.
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