4 Facebook Tips for Nonprofits

You know your cause. You know your supporters. But how to reach them? Facebook is an authentic and simple way to connect directly with your audience. This February, Facebook launched a brand-new site aimed at nonprofits. We’ve rounded up the top 4 tips from Facebook to take your nonprofit’s page to the next level.

1. Optimize Your Page

If your audience can’t find you on Facebook, then you’ll never see any engagement. Position your page to be found by as many relevant people as possible.

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  Make sure you’ve selected the right category. Choose Company, Organization or Institution. From there, you can tighten your scope by choosing the appropriate sub-category (Non-Profit Organization, NGO, Education, Political Organization, etc.).
• Fill out every section of your profile. The more details on your page, the better.
• Choose high-quality photos for your profile picture and cover photo. Tip: use your logo as your profile picture and use a picture that captures what you do as your cover photo.
• Use the preferred page audience section to zero in on your target audience. You’ll want to get specific, this will give you the best chance of reaching relevant people.

Want more details? Check out Facebook’s guide for setting up an effective nonprofit page.

2. Be Authentic and Interesting

Why should people care about your cause if you don’t give them a reason to care? All your posts should sound unique and be in your voice. A conversational tone works best on Facebook. Compare these two statuses:

We would like to thank everyone who attended our fundraising seminar last week. We were able to exceed our goal of $6,000.

Polite, but not very effective. The language is so vague and business-like that it could come from anyone.

We did it! Last week’s fundraiser generated over $10,000 dollars! That was almost twice our goal. A big thank you to all of our lovely volunteers who made this possible. 

This status is much more laid-back and inviting. Your followers on Facebook value content that seems like it’s speaking to them, not at them. 

3. Create a Posting Strategy

is critical to Facebook success. Typically, you should try and post on Facebook 2-3 times a week. Don’t have time to sit down every week and post on Facebook? Don’t worry. That’s what a strategy is for.

Creating a content calendar is a fantastic way to strategize and keep on top of your posting schedule. This will also let you structure posts around a theme or campaign to pinpoint target your audience. Plan out all your posts for the month in advance.

Facebook allows you to write posts in advance and schedule them out to be posted at a later time. Instead of spending an hour every week writing Facebook posts, set aside time during the month to schedule out all your Facebook posts for the month according to your calendar.

For even more tips on how to save time when posting, check out our webinar on Social Media Timesavers.

4. Use Ads to Drive Engagement

Want to extend your reach? Facebook Ads are an easy and cost-effective way to increase your audience. Setting up an ad on Facebook is simple:

• Define your objective: Facebook gives you the options, all you need to do is select the correct objective and it’ll automatically recommend the ad strategy for that goal.
• Target your audience: Dial in on the specific people you want to see your ad.
• Plan out a budget: Ads start at just $5.
• Make it pretty: Import text, images, video, links and posts to make your ad pop
• Define success: Use Facebook’s built-in metrics tool to analyze how your results stack up to your objective.

You can also use ads to drive engagement to your events and to encourage people to donate to your cause.

Now you can supercharge your nonprofit’s Facebook. Want to ramp it up even more? Check out our Facebook tips and our social media BizzyWebinars.

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Ready to take your nonprofit’s Facebook to the next level?

BizzyWeb can help you create a social media plan to get REAL results! Check out our Buzz Builders online marketing programs.