Five Things You Should Know About Facebook Messages

If a client chooses Facebook to send you a message there’s a strong likelihood they are A) Unhappy or B) Lazy (which can also make them unhappy). After almost five years of managing a wide variety of Facebook pages, we’ve found that it doesn’t matter what type of industry you are in, if someone wants to get in touch with you - they’re going to turn to social media.

Here are the five things we tell every client, no matter who they are or what they do.

Don’t be frustrated! This is one part of your business you can (somewhat) control!

1) Set Up Automatic Responses: It only takes about 10 minutes and it will save you a headache later. If someone is unhappy and they reach out to you about your service or product, they are going to become MORE unhappy if you don’t respond in a timely manner. An automatic response can be a placeholder until you check your Facebook messages, or it can include the email and phone number where they can reach you/your team directly.

2) Bring the Conversation Into Your Space: The best way to know if someone is really looking for help versus just a troll (or even a fake profile) is to ask them to reach out to you via email or phone. We say it a lot, “Social media is rented space.” If a platform goes down, or data becomes lost at some point and you need to reference old conversations with this person, you could be in a pickle. Move the conversation off the platform and onto your turf as soon as you can.

3) Messages are Private, Comments are Public: If someone leaves a negative comment on an ad you are running where potentially hundreds of customers can see it, and you decide to respond to the person privately via messenger, consider also making a public comment to them directly so that others know you are responsive to your clients. I have seen this on ads before. The company will post, “Thanks for the comment, <NAME>. We have reached out to you directly via Messenger! Please check your messages so we can connect.” If it’s just a troll, they’re not going to bother following up with you. if they’re really an unhappy client, you have an opportunity to re-connect with them and make things right.

4) Messages Should Be Handled by a Client-Facing Employee: Don’t forget that Facebook is essentially a public forum for customers to talk about your brand. It’s becoming more commonplace now for clients to reach out to a company’s Facebook page on their time versus calling during business hours or sending a message through a website that could go unanswered for weeks. Make sure that the person responding to your Facebook messages is someone qualified to answer basic questions about your business. This is why, as a social media agency, we don’t answer Facebook messages for our clients. (However, we will set up automatic responses to help people get to the right contact. )

5) And, finally, Keep Your Facebook Page Up to Date: Yes, Facebook changes its profile settings every so often, so it’s important to do a quick run-through and refresh your business page to make sure all of the data and information is correct. By doing so, you’re helping yourself later when the lazy Facebook user asks you a question such as “When are you open on Saturday?” you can just point them back to your profile page.

At the end of the day, the good news is also the bad news: clients have multiple ways of getting in touch with your business. But if you’re proactive in making sure your information is up to date and establishing automated responses early on, this will be one part of your business you can manage very easily!

If you still have questions on the ins and outs of Facebook, contact us today! We’d be glad to help.