How to Effectively Use Facebook Live for Your Business

Unless you’ve been living under a rock, you’re likely aware of the notion that visual content is king. Long gone are the days when a Tweet or Facebook post could perform well without an image. Now, we’ve arrived in a digital world full of memes, gifs and live videos- basically, social is filled with anything that’s more eye catching than a few words strewn across a digital platform.

In fact, 80% of users would rather watch a live video from a brand than read a blog and 82% would rather watch a live video from a brand than see a social post from them (livestream.com). This makes live video a trend your business needs to participate in sooner rather than later. Here are a few tips for how to effectively use Facebook Live for your business.

 

1. Prepare.

This may be obvious, but it is seriously the best way to succeed ESPECIALLY if you’re camera shy. A week prior to the video write a brief list of the topics you want to cover, take a few days to think the topics over, then a day before the video dive deep into what you want to say. Ask yourself, “what do I want the audience to take away from my video?”

 

2. Promote, promote, promote.

To get the best audience, you’re going to want to let users know ahead of time about your live video. When promoting, don’t just generate lackluster content like, “We’re doing a live video Monday at 8pm”. Users aren’t going to take the time out of their day to watch your live video just because you asked them nicely. Instead give users a reason to tune in. Are you offering advice? Will there be a giveaway announced? Interviewing someone awesome?

 

3. Engage honestly.

While doing the live video you’ll likely get a few questions from users. Answer those questions honestly and genuinely! Users will know if you’re just trying to give them a sales pitch or if you’re just trying to give a profound answer that will make you seem better than you actually are. Be real and don’t be afraid to add your personality to the video. After all, you’re the personality behind your business and that personality will end up being one of the main things users look for when deciding whether or not to partner with your business.

 

4. End with gratitude and a call to action.

In sticking to the genuine theme, genuinely thank your audience for watching your live feed. After all, they did take the time to drop everything they were doing to watch you talk. In addition to kind words, you could also take it a step further and offer something like a free guide or a promo code as a thank you.

After you spend some time saying thank you, end your video with a call to action. Here are some call to action statements you may like to use:

• Please head over to my website to view all of the different services I offer.
• Subscribe to my email newsletter to receive awesome business tips about “(fill in the blank)”.
• Tune in next week at the same time to ask questions about, “(fill in the blank)”.