Facebook Groups – Friend or Foe?

Are Facebook Groups a necessary evil?

Nope.

I wanted to end this article on that note, but figured I owe you more of an explanation.

Let’s begin with understanding the difference between a Facebook Page and a Group.

A Facebook Page is like your shop window where you create and post the content and others comment, like or share. You need a business page in order to advertise on Facebook or Instagram, which is a pretty compelling reason. In terms of using a page to build community and an engaged audience, it’s pretty thin pickings now without an ad budget but the great news is, it’s really inexpensive to use Facebook ads as a way to warm up and retarget an audience.

I consider it basic maintenance to keep a page updated regularly with fresh content so that when people check out your page (they will as part of their info gathering process) they will see you are relevant and present. By using a third party app like buffer (more below) it doesn’t have to be that time consuming to keep your page up to date with fresh content.

A Facebook Group is a community driven by you, but where a lot of the content is posted by members that drives conversation and connection – it’s like inviting everyone inside for a chat. Groups can be open, private or a little bit of both. 

Facebook is pushing hard on groups so we are already seeing lots of interesting features that can be used to initiate sales – including paid memberships for access, advertising to the group and posting as a business page inside of a group, which helps to provide exposure for your page and keeps your personal profile more private. 

The Argument for Facebook Groups

Facebook groups are a very attractive way to build a tribe of ambassadors for your brand. They are a powerful audience building tool, and a successful way to create a community around your business or service and many businesses do just that.

What’s the Problem with Facebook Groups?

Facebook groups require a lot bit of time investment – they have to be moderated all the time to ensure content remains on topic and people don’t get too ‘keyboard warrior’ on each other. It is your responsibility to ensure that these conversations remain respectful and on topic. There is, in my opinion, way too much ‘democracy’ in a group – members feel that their opinions carry equal weight to the group owner and often assert themselves in a pretty forthright way, this attracts equally vociferous responses. It can all quickly become very toxic.

Asserting Your Authority

Additionally, if you do not regularly (at least 2-3 times a day) make an appearance in your group through posts and even live streams, then it can be easy for members to forget the group’s purpose and know who is in charge. After all there is no point in creating a group at all if it is not ultimately to develop your audience into customers. People have to know it’s your group.

If you are planning to run a Facebook group you need to commit to owning it and showing up to maintain your authority within the group (see previous paragraph as to why…). If you must have a group – make sure your name is in the group name, for example “Upcycling Tips by Michelle Purse” or something similar. Put your photo as the profile image – literally stamp your authority ALL OVER IT!

As you can tell, I’m not exactly a fan of groups, and I certainly don’t advocate it as the only method to build audience and promote your business. It puts too much power into a platform that you have very little control over – if Facebook decides to change the rules, or the algorithm (which is frequent) then you have to react. Additionally there are a number of regulatory clashes on the horizon between governments and Facebook too, which means more changes and (hopefully) a reduction of their reach and power.

On a personal level, I do not belong to ANY Facebook groups – they are downright toxic and detrimental to my daily zen. Poisonous threads can cause feelings of anger, anxiety and despair. I belong to one or two groups for work but have all notifications switched off. My preferred method is to allocate 15 mins a couple of times a week to check in with these groups to see if there are any topics of interest or that I can assist with. That’s more than enough for me.