Facebook is evolving to focus more on building communities, and groups are the natural tools to help forge those new kinds of connections. One billion people already belong to Facebook groups. About 10 percent of those belong to groups that Facebook has identified as “very meaningful”—communities that “quickly become the most important part of someone’s experience on Facebook.”
Since people who love a brand want opportunities to get more interactive than is possible through a Facebook Page, Facebook has recently made it easier for businesses to create their own Facebook groups. Groups for Pages allows businesses to set up “fan clubs and groups centered around your super-fans.”
“Super-fans” are a group any business should be keen to target. By giving those extra-keen brand loyalists a chance to interact with each other as well as with the brand itself, groups create a powerful ecosystem in which members forge meaningful connections with your business.
Going into 2018, those connections among customers and fans are more important than ever. The 2017 Edelman Trust Barometer shows that people are far more likely to trust someone like themselves (60 percent) for company information that they are the company CEO (37 percent).
Facebook groups vs. Facebook Pages
A Facebook Page is essentially a Facebook profile for your business. As Facebook puts it, “Facebook Pages enable public figures, businesses, organizations and other entities to create an authentic and public presence on Facebook.” Only official brand representatives can create a Facebook Page for that business.
Groups, on the other hand, “allow people to come together around a common cause, issue or activity to organize, express objectives, discuss issues, post photos and share related content.”
Anyone can create a group, which means that even if you have not created a Facebook group yourself, there might already be a group related to your brand. For example, fans of Hallmark movies created and manage the group called Fans of Hallmark Channel, Hallmark Movies & Mysteries and Hallmark Drama, which currently has more than 21,000 members.
If groups related to your business already exist, you should definitely get involved to keep an eye on the conversation, learn from what people are saying about you, and help provide the brand’s perspective. You might even uncover some potential ideas for new product development. (We’ll get into more detail about finding and joining existing groups below.) But you should also create your own official group as the brand-endorsed meeting place for fans on Facebook, so that you can grow those relationships in a context that gives you greater control.
How to create a Facebook group
The actual process of creating a Facebook group takes just a few clicks. The harder work is making decisions about the purpose of your group and how best to support it through the various options available. Here’s how to get started.
1. Open the Create a group window
Log into your brand’s Facebook Page and click the more icon (…) at the far right of the menu bar under your cover photo, then choose Create group.
2. Choose a name for your group
You’ll want this to be something that’s easily recognizable as connected to your business and conveys what group members will get from the group that they can’t get by following your Facebook Page.
Keep in mind that you can create multiple groups to cover different aspects of your business or different customer groups, so you don’t need to try to make your first group a catch-all. For example, HBO has a group specifically for fans of its Big Little Liars series.
3. Invite some members
Just like no one wants to be first to arrive at a party, no one want to be the first person to join a Facebook group. Invite some colleagues, employees, or friends to get the ball rolling. You may also want to reach out to some of the more active participants on your Facebook Page and let them know you’re creating a group you’d love them to be a part of.
You can choose to customize your invitation with a note—this is a good way to let people know why you are inviting them to the group, and how they can expect to benefit from participating. Click the paper icon in the bottom right corner of the invite box to add your note, which will go out to all invitees.
4. Select the privacy level for your group
You have three privacy options: public, closed, or secret.
A public group is exactly what it sounds like. It’s fully visible to everyone, and anyone can join without being approved. All members’ posts are fully visible to all other Facebook users, so this type of group does not offer the sense of privacy and security that comes with the more restricted group types. However, it is the easiest group type for users to join, and can therefore grow quickly.
In a closed group, posts are only visible to members, so there’s a sense of being involved in an exclusive community. The group itself appears in Facebook searches, and the description and member list are visible to anyone on Facebook. It doesn’t offer complete privacy, but members can feel comfortable knowing that the posts they share are visible only to members of the group. All new membership requests must be approved by an existing member or administrator of the group.
A secret group offers the same post privacy as a closed group, with an added level of stealth: the group does not show up in Facebook searches. The only way to find and join a secret group is to be invited by an existing member.
There’s no right type of group for all businesses. If you want to encourage lots of public discussion, a public group might be your best bet. If your business deals with an area of life that people consider to be personal or private, you might want to consider a closed group so that people feel comfortable sharing thoughts that they might not want to be publicly visible. A secret group could even be a fit, if your goal is to offer a super-exclusive online meeting place—for premium members of your subscription site, for example.
Once you’ve selected your privacy level, click Create.
5. Personalize your group
Your Facebook group is now up and running, but it’s pretty bare bones. You’ll need to do some customizing to make it an appealing place for potential group members to gather online, and to give it some credibility. Here’s how:
- Add a cover photo: Choose something that highlights the unique purpose of this specific group, rather than a generic image for your business. And make sure you’re using the recommended image size dimensions.
- Add a description: Create a catchy explanation of what the group is all about. Remember that this information is publicly visible for public and closed groups.
- Add some tags: These tags function as keywords that will help your group appear in search.
- Add locations: If your group is tied to…
