Facebook & Instagram Shops
Facebook & Instagram Shops
Facebook have introduced a major new feature and opportunity for your online business with the launch of Shops on Facebook and Instagram. With Shops, you can set up a FREE storefront for your business and extend your use of social media into an intelligent online shop! This isn’t just an important step for businesses due to social distancing regulations but it opens a world of new opportunities to business large and small.
E-commerce goes social!
Balancing the blend of social community and commercials are something businesses and teams can be challenged with; converting social attention into commercial results. Facebook have now given businesses the tools to socially engage and sell online within social media activity!
Your posts can be tagged with your products, linking users straight through to your Shop where they can view, order and pay for the products quickly and easily.
Even better, this all integrates with Facebook and Instagram Live and customers can even integrate with WhatsApp, Messenger or Instagram Direct to ask questions, get support, track deliveries and more.
Your online shop
Facebook and Instagram Shops can be setup in a few ways depending on your current setup and needs wether you already have an online shop already or you are new to the world of e-commerce. No matter your current position, getting setup or integrating your current website shop is simple.
New to e-commerce?
Facebook Shops is all you need to get setup with an online shop. From listing your products to processing fee’s and receiving delivering orders, it can all be process through Facebook Shops with no need for you to think about the technical setup.
E-commerce Businesses
For Small Businesses with an online shop already in place, there’s a few paths to get going quickly.
If your current online shop is powered by Shopify, BigCommerce, WooCommerce, ChannelAdvisor, CedCommerce, Cafe24, Tienda Nube or Freedonomics, chances are you can integrate your current online shop to Facebook Shops! This means your products can all be connected with little setup and you can continue to work and offer products across your website, Facebook and Instagram!
Payments and Fee’s
Shops for Facebook and Instagram are FREE, however if your Shop processes the order payment on Facebook or Instagram, there are some standard processing fee’s which will apply. Check your Commerce Manager for the latest fee details.
Loyalty Program, WhatsApp and more’s to come!
A loyalty program scheme is also in development to offer earned rewards for your customers along with Shop integration into WhatsApp, Messenger and Instagram Direct for customers to buy direct there too!
Where to start
Head over to your Facebook Page and check if you Page is eligible. For more details, check out the Business Help pages here.
Messenger Rooms by Facebook
Messenger Rooms by Facebook
Facebook have launched a new feature to it’s Messenger platform and it’s arrived at the perfect time. Messenger Rooms is a new group video chat feature and is placed to compete with services like Zoom, Skype, Google Meet and Microsoft Teams that enables up to 50 people to join a video call with NO time limit – even if they don’t have a Facebook account!
With the increased need for video communication in our lives due to the Coronavirus epidemic, new ways for teams, friends and families to connect is definitely welcome and with some platforms requiring additional software to run, Facebook’s decision to offer Messenger Rooms to users with NO Facebook account is refreshing to say the least.
Facebook have also stated that they plan to offer ways to create Rooms from Instagram Direct, WhatsApp and the Portal smart display and include 14 camera filters and changeable backgrounds.
How to create a Messenger Room
Creating a Messenger Room from your mobile device is fairly straight forward:
- Ensure sure you have the latest version of the Facebook and Messenger apps
- Open the Messenger app.
- Tap the People tab at the bottom right of the screen.
- Tap Create a Room, and select the people who you want to join.
To share a Messenger Room with people who don’t have a Facebook account, share the link with them.
Top Tip: You can also share the room in your News Feed, Groups and Events!
Rooms Vs The Competition
Although the release of Messenger Rooms and that users don’t need a Facebook account to join a Room it is very welcome, but this doesn’t make Messenger Rooms the all out winner.
Firstly, for some there’s still the idea that Facebook Messenger is a personal tool and have concerns about mixing their Facebook account with business activity. Whilst these users are right to draw lines between work and personal life, there are NO real reasons to be concerned here, imo.
Secondly, platforms like Zoom offer an incredibly fast video platform with an incredibly low delay between users video feeds. You can also integrate computer screen and additional software services to really power a rich, professional video / webinar experience.
How any platform fits your goals ultimately depends on the conversation.
In reality, Messenger Rooms places itself in amongst a variety of group video platforms at a time when we most definitely need it, be it at home or work.
What do you think? Have you used it already at work or at home?
Fundraising on Instagram
Fundraising on instagram
Fundraising is always a challenge for 3rd sector organisations and as the world changes towards one of more online for engagement, it’s important to not just reach and engage audiences about fundraising events but to turn attention into immediate fundraising opportunities.
To help, Instagram have launched some incredible new features to help fundraisers use their social media channels and LIVE events to drive immediate fundraising opportunities!
Donation Stickers
Create an Instagram sticker for your charity for people to tap and donate!
? https://help.instagram.com/2031680250470701
Livestream Donations
Run an Instagram Live “Fundraiser” and have viewers donate live!
? https://help.instagram.com/524668988444724
Profile Donation Button
Don’t forget to add a “Donate” button to your Instagram Profile!
Please share far and wide and as always, if you have any questions please contact me, hit the chat button or reach out on social media.
Top Tips: Working From Home *Updated*
TopTips: Working from Home *Updated*
With a whole host of radical measures put in place to help our country and world tackle the outbreak of COVID-19, working from home has become a new thing for many and even a must for some working to keep their business afloat.
As a bit of a digital nomad, I’m used to working in several environments. From the office, to home and even in a remote location in the Scottish Cairngorms; technology enables me to work almost anywhere.
Don’t worry if you are finding the change difficult, you are not alone. It isn’t always easy and keeping spirits up at this time can also be a challenge.
To help, I have put together my top tips to help you work from home.
Please share far and wide and as always, if you have any questions please contact me, hit the chat button or reach out on social media.
I hope these tips helps working from home by giving a little guidance and comfort. It can be challenging and new habits will form, but that’s all okay. I recommend you use this as a start and find your way of working from home effectively during this time.
– Kevin Mitchell
Additional WFH Resources
Updated 11th May 2020
Instagram launch 'Threads' Messaging App
Instagram Launch ‘Threads’ Messaging App
After lots of rumours and even more mentions from myself that “It’s coming…”, Instagram have launched their own messaging app, designed to help you stay better connected to your close friends. Welcome, Threads from Instagram!
Threads is a standalone app by Instagram, available on both Apple and Android devices with “privacy, speed and close connections in mind”. Threads enables you to share photos, videos, messages, Stories and more with your own custom close friends list, keeping conversations and engagements in threads a more private affair.
An almost familiar experience
The app itself overall feels very familiar. It unsurprisingly takes the Stories and Direct service from Instagram and wraps it up together in a simpler user experience. Sending messages and creating Stories works just like it used to, only I am noticing several Stories features missing at this time.
The first thing you do after installing Threads is prepare your close friends list and begin to engage with your close friends separately. You are encouraged to use the Stories features of Instagram more in your conversations and interactions and makes you accustom to the whole idea of close friends groups. Almost like having you set this up is some sort of behaviour preparation for future integrations and developments with Facebook Messenger and WhatsApp – Have I mentioned this is coming already…?
What about business?
Instagram Business Accounts can use Threads too in the same way as personal accounts can. Your Business Account can connect and engage with close group and individuals within Threads in an even more focussed manner than on Instagram itself. Nice.
If as a business, messaging has parity with your products or service(s), this really is reminder to seriously look at how social media and messaging aligns and supports your business. There’s already huge opportunities available to business with messaging and chatbots and every step forward in this space is opportunity to increase service, retention, sentiment and sales / results!
I could go on and on about this from a place of business, so I will be covering more in an upcoming post!
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LinkedIn | Events now available!
Linkedin | Events now available!
There’s no shortage of professional events available today, but reaching and inviting individuals from within your network has been a labour of love and one only effectively supported at a social media level by Facebook Events. Thankfully, this has now changed with the introduction of LinkedIn Events!
LinkedIn Events is a very welcome additional to LinkedIn, a platform designed for professional relationships and networking. Now you can create and manage your own event, join other active events, invite connections, engage in conversations with attendees and even continue conversations long after the event ends.
LinkedIn Events
This is an important introduction by LinkedIn not only because it’s a continuation of the professional-level feature parody it’s been building of Facebook, but because networking is key to the LinkedIn platform. LinkedIn Events now amplifies those external engagements and networking opportunities for you before, during and after events from within the platform itself. That’s pretty exciting and very powerful as you can also use LinkedIn Events to search for relevant professional events that you can attend, engage and network.
Getting Started
LinkedIn Events is available to all members (if you don’t h ave access already, give it a day or two and then try again). To start, open LinkedIn and view your ‘newsfeed’ (Home). On the left hand side you will see a collection of panels. Look down these panels for the ‘Events‘ label and click ‘+’. Here you can set the details of your professional event and publish it to your network!
There’s even an ‘External URL’ option where you can navigate users to a website or webpage with further information – perfect to build interest and signups for your event, your business and power those retargeting campaigns!!!
Whilst we are talking about LinkedIn, you can connect with Border.Digital on LinkedIn or myself, Kevin Mitchell on LinkedIn. If you are having trouble with LinkedIn Events or you are looking for some guidance with your business approach to online, contact me today and together we can empower your business and activity online!
Instagram | You can now schedule & post to Instagram from Facebook!
Instagram “ You can now schedule & post to Instagram from Facebook!
It’s always been a little harder than it should be to schedule posts on Instagram with few services actually posting and most only reminding you to post manually. But those days are now over thanks to a new update from Facebook!
That’s right, Page Admins can now schedule and publish posts to Instagram and IGTV via their Creator Studio! Finally something of real value from all of the Facebook > Instagram integrations of late with an update from Facebook that’s a must for anyone publishing to Instagram – You can now schedule and publish to Instagram and IGTV via Facebook Creator Studio!
Facebook Creator Studio
The Facebook Creator Studio is already a fantastic tool for marketers, social media managers and content creators and has been getting strong and steady updates since its launch. But this feature is perhaps the most useful update in a long time!
Now, Page Admins can schedule and publish posts to both Instagram and IGTV directly from Facebook Creator Studio.
If you haven’t got your business setup on Facebook correctly and are looking for some guidance, contact me today and together we can get your organisations accounts all safely setup on Facebook as a business!
LinkedIn | Company Page Invites Now Available!
LinkedIn | Company Page Invites Now Available!
After a long focus away from Company Pages, LinkedIn has introduced a new feature to help organisations grow page follows and engagement – Company Page Invites and it’s coming to ALL LinkedIn Company Pages.
Growing LinkedIn Page follows and engagement has required a real investment of time in the past, especially smaller organisations who would see real engagement on their personal LinkedIn Profiles but not their Company Pages. LinkedIn Company Page Invites has been designed to change that, to help companies grow their connections easily by sending people an invitation to follow their page via the LinkedIn inbox. Importantly this will help organisations of all sizes to build a following and bring back organisational focus on posting quality content and building quality, worthwhile engagement on their LinkedIn Company Pages.
LinkedIn Growth Opportunity or Inbox Spam?
Providing a feature that enables, no, encourages users to send messages to people asking for something primarily that benefits the sender tends to be considered spam but this isn’t the case here – probably.
If your LinkedIn network is a quality network, not just one with multitude of connections you’ve built over time in the hope of extracting opportunity (hint: don’t do this) then yes this probably will be seen a spam and a negative experience that you are going to pass over to your companions brand.
But if you have quality LinkedIn network, one built from authentic connections and engagement, then this is an excellent feature and an extension of those relationships you’ve already built – “… Company Page is over here, why not follow, find out more and join in the conversation.”. Nice.
Let’s Get To It!
Woah, just a second… This feature is an enabler but also one that could punish you if you push to early for a very particular reason – At present, you can only invite someone once.
The goal here is to make sure your LinkedIn Company Page is up to date and has a few new, relevant, quality pieces of content on it. This will showcase positively to your connections that following is worthwhile. Additionally, make sure you have content calendar in play and quality content being published in the coming weeks.
Now, taking the time to go through the process of content and sending follow invites is important. LinkedIn has now provided organisations with real motivation to maximise followers and engagement with an easy-to-use feature.
How To Send Company Page Invites on LinkedIn
- Sign in to your company page admin centre
- Click Admin tools and select Invite connections from the ‘Grow your page audience’ list in the right-hand column.
- Select members you want to invite or search from them in bar at the top
- Click Invite connections. The blue button in the bottom right will become active after you have selected people to invite.
That’s it! Once your invitation has been received, it will appear in the recipients’ LinkedIn inbox where they can review and follow your Company Page!
Reminder:
- Have you posted on your LinkedIn Page recently? If not, update prior to sending.
- Now you can send some invites
- Remember to regularly post relevant and quality content on LinkedIn Page!
This is a new feature with some users having it and others not. If you don’t have it yet, check back in a few days as this may still be rolling out / tweaked by the team at LinkedIn.
Local Influencer Marketing Sign Up – Let’s Level Up!
Local Inbfluencer Marketing Sign-Up - Let’s Level Up!
There’s no denying the growth in influencer marketing on social media, but it can be challenging for organisations to seek valuable relationships with influencers at a local level. Equally as an influencer, it can be challenging for some to outline the value proposition to organisations and the opportunities you and your community present as an influencer. Let’s try and change that for both parties!
For some time now I have had more conversations than I can count with people about the value and relationships on offer between organisations and social media influencers. These haven’t been easy conversations because the understanding of value of a social media influencer at a local level is not as clear as it could be. This is on both sides of the topic…
With a wealth of experience in creating both business focussed content for local and international organisations along with audience targeting and influencing I felt it was time to approach the subject and make a change for good.
A change to support both local influencers and businesses pave the way to work together and unlock the exciting opportunities ahead for all.
Social Media Influencers – Join In!
Initially, the following signup site has been created and I encourage anyone involved or looking to get involved in social media at a hobby or commercial level to sign up.
This is only the beginning with lots more insight, ideas and perhaps even some open workshops ahead that bring about the first key steps in building a social media influencers activity at a local level.
Be part of the change – sign up now and share with friends!
Facebook, Messenger, Instagram & WhatsApp - The Next Chapter
Facebook, Messenger, Instagram & WhatsApp - The Next Chapter
This years keynote delivered by Facebook founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg, not only heavily references the new approach to privacy being embedded at Facebook (topic for another time), but introduced the next chapter in Facebook; the new direction that Facebook, Instagram, Messenger and WhatsApp are taking as Facebook evolves to remain on top.
A New Chapter
There’s been plenty change at Facebook over the years, non so big at F8 2019. With privacy concerns plaguing the company and new negative fallouts happening regularly, it was clear the company needed to make a change. Social media is not just about it’s users, it seriously BIG business and remaining relevant and trustworthy is important.
Over the last few years, Facebook and Instagram has been a huge opportunity for businesses prepared to invest. Over time the gap between those businesses winning on Social Media and not has gotten wider and wider with some businesses complaining that their reach was gone and others embracing ad platforms and quality, engaging content to reach prospects and audiences like never before.
But user behaviour has been changing. With the growth of messaging platforms like WhatsApp and Telegram, users were engaging elsewhere and not on their social media timelines.
THIS is where Facebook have pointed their sights, pointing the company and all of their social media properties towards the next chapter of user interaction and engagement on social media and online.
Let’s Talk Business
Whilst the big statements and coverage at F8 was around changes to design and features of Facebook and Messenger, it was clear to me that Facebook have aligned their properties very carefully and in a way that very much supports business. For simplicity, let’s split this into three pillars:
In order to build a success social media platform, you have to support these three principles. Facebook has always done this in one way or another on the services but their announcements at F8 change everything. Instead of covering these areas as appropriately as possible within each service, they are updating how each service operates to better focus and fit like never before.
To put it in a way that’s easier to follow, let’s take those three pillars in a different way...
THIS is what I was hearing during Mark’s F8 Keynote and I haven’t been more excited by this since Facebook introduced the Ad platform. This seriously is a new chapter for Facebook, and also for business!
Facebook - Wide Community
Messenger - Close Circle
WhatsApp - Business Engagement