This is based on an answer offered on Episode 14 of Hustleburg.
Question: Is there any benefit to using Facebook stories? Or should I just stick to Instagram for that? What about Facebook Live or Watch Party? These are kind of confusing and seem like they could overlap and I’m just not sure how to use them.
Facebook Stories
There is absolutely a benefit to Facebook Stories. The first benefit of using Facebook stories is that it’s a great way to connect with the younger users on the platform. As we’ve discussed on Hustleburg, the fastest-growing demographic on Facebook are over 60 years old. Utilizing Facebook stories is going to be a good way to get your content in front of the eyes of Facebook’s younger demographics. Regardless of the age demographic of what you do, reaching younger users plants seeds with them for the future, when they’ll be looking for what you do. You can build your brand identity with them now. Also, you’d be surprised how many buying decisions are driven by interactions between the teenaged sons and daughters and their mothers and fathers.
Stories are also a better way to promote your “Me” content, the links to your website, promotional content, and short videos documenting your business. Because of the quality recording possible with your handheld device, you get two wins here. You are able to produce less polished and more frequent content for both Facebook and its sister platform Instagram. Rather than posting these types of content in your feed as frequently, you can share things in a “Me” way and more “sales-y” in nature, and leave your feed to build your brand. That’s not a hard and fast rule, but generally, that’s kind of how I can segregate the content that I put out that goes there.
An interview I’ve referenced recently with Adam Mossari, Instagram CEO, lends itself to this as well. In it, he discussed the addition of stories as a way of giving people a “behind the scenes” glimpse, a peek into your life, business, or brand. It gives you a way to offer “insider access” to what it is that you do. These looks are a great way to engage with the community you’re building online. As such, these stories shouldn’t feel as polished or produced as some of the things as some of the other videos or images that you see in the feed.
You’ve likely noticed that some of your more “off the cuff” and less polished content offers some great engagement. That’s because we’re seeing communities respond to what they view as more authentic rather than highly produced content anyway. This is akin to how, about a decade ago, we saw a huge rise in reality and competition TV over traditionally scripted TV. Survivor kicked off the trend, followed up by shows like America’s Got Talent, The Voice, American Idol, all those kind of overtook the scripted television for the most part on network TV. Even The Office and Parks and Recreation took that documentary feel into the world of scripted television. Now that our phones offer HD-quality video and a billion megapixels, we’re seeing that kind of authentic content that doesn’t have that same polish or production value as your general feed content be more engaging with our audience.
Don’t Auto-Post
You’ve probably noticed if you are using the Instagram Story features, you have the ability to auto post to Facebook stories as well, if you’ve connected your business page on Facebook. The temptation to put out two pieces of content on different platforms is great, but it should be resisted. First, you can’t swipe up on the Instagram Story, unless you are paying for it via advertising or you are a mega account. Facebook Stories allow you to have all of the same features as Instagram, but they also allow you to have the “Swipe up.” I definitely discourage the auto-posting from Instagram to Facebook Stories, because you don’t have as many features available to you. It isn’t as feature-rich.
Second, if you cross-post from one platform to another, this flies in the face of putting out content that has context to each platform’s audience. You have different audiences on each platform, because your content there resonates differently on each. Generally, what you’re going to see is that something you say to your Instagram audience isn’t necessarily going to be received the same way that you say it to your Facebook audience. When you cross-post, you’re not providing adequate context for the communities that you’ve built in both of the places it’s tempting to cross-post to and from.
Facebook Live
So, if you have a good reason to offer video content, especially live, streaming video content, Facebook Live is a great avenue to do so. Newer features, allow you to create an event (both on the platform and in real life) around your business or your brand. Events like this give your community an opportunity to instantly connect and interact with you.
Facebook Live gives you the ability to build up your livestream as you schedule that Live, alerting your community about the upcoming interaction. With these new features, Facebook Live can now be used as a souped-up version of Reddit’s AMAs and other platform’s Ask Me Anythings, even if you don’t have an immediate offering for live video content. You get real-time interaction with the brand as a member of their community, and your business gets to create a deeper connection with your true fans in that community. The video component makes it feel more like an in-person interaction that you’ve created, so it truly is a win-win for you and your community. There’s an extra bonus for you if you have video content that will add value to your audience that can be live-streamed, as they engage with your brand in a deeper way.
Facebook Watch Party
If you don’t have the ability or desire to go live with a video to engage the community, Facebook Watch Party offers part of the same value that is possible with Facebook Live. Watching the same content simultaneously gives you the instant connection and interaction capability with the community, surrounding content offered by your brand. It also gives you the opportunity to share more polished, edited video content to your audience, while also giving you the direct interaction with them over it. If you’re 35 or older or have ever had a long-distance relationship, you probably remember calling your friends or significant other on the phone to watch a TV show or a movie together when we were in separate homes. This ability to watch something together but separately, especially in the era of COVID-19 isolation, is a way to connect instantly when you can’t be in the same room to watch the same thing physically together. Watch Party brings us that same ability and feeling to connect and engage with our brand and the community instantly and deeper in the digital space, specifically on the Facebook platform.
As we’ve mentioned before, Facebook is the most important social media platform right now in 2020, and these newer features give you a way to connect in a more personal way going forward.