Key Features of an Effective Facebook Group
When we think of large Facebook groups, the funny and unusual groups are usually the first to come to mind. For example: “When I was your age, Pluto was a planet” or “Enough with the poking, lets just have sex.” As somebody who helped created a group with roughly 34,000 members, I realized that there aren’t many popular groups that serve a purpose. Few (if any) of the popular groups serve as a discussion or forum board where people who are interested in a particular topic can join the group and discuss relevant issues.
My group on Web 2.0 has seen many fans, young entrepreneurs, and individuals interested in learning about the space. Because of this people who are interested in web 2.0 have been learning a lot through the discussions and the group has been growing at a rapid pace. Now, when I first started my Facebook group it was much easier to promote because the activities showed up in feeds and user profiles, but since then the rules have changed. Although it may be difficult to promote a meaningful group, it is not impossible if you use the following tactics:
1. When creating or going groups, pick a topic you are interested in yourself. If you are not interested in the topic, you probably will not spend much time promoting the group after a few weeks.
2. Once you have a group, you need to actively invite others to the group that you know are interested in the topic. For example with the Web 2.0 group I invited individuals like Michael Arrington because he was well known in the web 2.0 space and had a lot of followers.
3. While you are inviting people and growing your group, you need to keep the content updated and fresh by personally replying to any comments or messages posted in the group. If you don’t do this, there is chance that your group will die off.
4. Lastly you need to constantly help others that want to reach out to the people in your group. If you think about it, your network is limited so by helping others you can tap into their networking circles and grow your group.
These are the 4 main tactics I have been using and for me at least, they work well. Does anyone know of any more ways to effectively promote Facebook groups?
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Facebook groups are currently not much different then “fan” pages and not very useful at the same time. They will obviously get more powerful and more spam ridden once Facebook turns on messaging for groups that have more than 1000 members. I am sure that many users, including myself will start removing groups once the new messaging system is in place. I hope they have plans to do control group messaging to prevent people from getting annoyed.
I run a group which has just hit 1000 members.
I run club nights, and can create events linked to the group, which you can then invite your entire group too with only 1 click.
now we have hit 1000 members, facebook have removed this option….
i’m actually outraged, as the whole point of the group is now completely pointless!
@Hiten
Yes, I can’t wait until they allow me to message the group members.
I wont spam, I promise.
Well put Hiten. Facebook handicapped groups a while back by imposing “spam blocking” rules. One being the 1000 user limit that Hiten pointed out.
They also made it harder to invite friends to a group. At first you could easily select all your friends and shoot them off an invite. Now, you have to click each friend and wait for the invite to send before you can invite someone else. Unless I’m mistaken, I think the cap the number of invites.
Facebook seems to concentrate their efforts on the news feed, profile and images.
Personally, I think it’s the name. People read the name of the group, add it and then never return.
1. “If 100,000 join this group..I will….
2. “1,000,000 strong for whoever”
3. “Chuck Norris’ Tears Cure Cancer..Too Bad He Never Cries”
Maybe a bit offtopic, but I want to compliment you on the very nice design of this blog. Jonno really did a good job on this one.
Good observation. I think my next group will be, “Russell Peters isn’t Indian, he’s Canadian!”
This is an interesting topic. Good analysis Krutal.
Thanks. Join my facebook group OurWorldTalks
http://www.facebook.com/home.php?ref=logo#/group.php?gid=18901177694
Would appreciate any advice you can give me on getting more members to the following groups.
http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=13376332113
http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=26276012488
Thanks!