Social Media Content 5 things you didn’t know you could do on Facebook Apr 6th, 2018 So you thought you knew everything about Facebook? Think again. You may not be using it to its full potential to promote your business, connect with your audience and increase sales. Here are five tips many businesses are underutilising on the platform and which could give yours the edge… 1. Share long form content Facebook Notes is simple word processing feature for Facebook users. While status updates that you post to your Wall have a limited character length and no HTML capability, Notes lets you write full-length posts with formatting, tagging and pictures. Think of them like a way to blog on your Facebook page. Here are some examples: To enable Notes on your company page, click Settings at the top of your page, then Edit Page in the left column. Scroll down and click Add a Tab, then next to Notes, click Add Tab. The Notes tab will appear on the left side of your page. You can click the tab to create new notes and manage drafts. People who visit your page can click Notes to see notes you’ve published. You could use this feature to: Provide visitors with an extended bio about yourself or your business. Publish FAQs. Introduce or summarise a new piece of content you’ve published (like a blog post, eBook, infographic, etc) and link it back to your site. Publish a weekly round-up of all your Facebook posts. Pin it to the top to maximise visibility. You can also embed Notes on your website. 2. Explore and filter all of your activity, ever Need to find a photo you posted sometime last year? Want to check how many times you’ve been tagged? Want to review a list of all your posts in a given timeframe? Your Activity Log is a mine of information. It’s a list of your posts and activity from when you first created you page. You’ll also see stories and photos you’ve been tagged in, as well as the connections you’ve made – like when you liked a page or added someone as a friend. Your Activity Log can be found under the Settings button: From here, you can click the Filters on the left to review a specific type of story (ie, your posts or photos). You can also search for stories and click a year on the right to see stories from a specific year: 3. Reshare videos quickly One of the best ways to extend the reach of your content is to reshare it. This especially applies to video, a format that drives significantly higher shares on Facebook. But, unlike when resharing links or photos, you can’t attach a video to a new post to reshare and it can seem like the only option is to reupload it and add the description, tags etc again. Altogether a bit of a faff! However, there is a way around it: Select the Videos tab on the left hand side of your page Scroll down to select the Video Library button Click on the video you want to repost You’ll see a ‘create post with video’ button 4. Turn photos and videos into a virtual experience Hundreds of millions of photos are shared on Facebook each day and it offers a way you can make them more immersive and engaging. But you also have the opportunity to upload your own 360 images and video. This could be used to give viewers a virtual tour of your store or office, offer them a look ‘behind the scenes’ the scenes, or allow them a closer look at new products. You don’t need a 360 camera to take advantage of this feature for photos, as you can use your smartphone to capture a panorama and upload it to your Facebook page. On the desktop version, viewers can pan and rotate in all directions using their mouse or keyboard. On mobile, users can pivot their device to look all around. For videos, though, the process is a tiny bit more complicated… If the video was recorded with a 360 or spherical camera, then you can upload a 360 video the same way you’d upload any other video to a page. If you recorded it with a camera system that doesn’t add 360 meta data to the video file or if you want to set your video’s initial orientation and field of view, follow these steps: Follow the same steps as you would to add any other video to a page. Before publishing your video, click the Advanced tab. Then click to check the box next to ‘This video was recorded in 360° format’ to make the 360 Controls tab appear. Click the 360 Controls tab to be able to set the initial camera orientation and field of view for your video. Publish. Here’s Star Wars’ 360 video, which allowed viewers to zoom across the Jakku Desert to mark the launch of The Force Awakens: 5. Sell directly from your page You can showcase and promote your products via Facebook (an option to manage orders and complete the sale directly from your page is currently being rolled out in the US – otherwise customers will be transferred to another website to pay) adding a Shop section. It’s free to use and there’s no limit on how many products you can add. It also offers integration options if you alreayd use a third party eCommerce partner such as Shopify, BigCommerce or WooCommerce. Here are a few examples: Your Shop section will have different features that depend on your geographic location. The Shop section lets you: Add products and product information. Include content to help your products stand out. Customise your Shop’s inventory by dividing your products into different collections to make it easier for customers browsing your shop. Communicate with customers directly from your page, and encourage them to leave ratings and reviews. Widen the visibility your products as products from your Shop may appear in Marketplace, allowing more people to discover them. The Shop option is in the left hand side of your page. If you don’t see the Shop tab on your page, you can add it by clicking Settings and Edit Page, as below: Download our Marketer’s Guide to Facebook, or find out about our award-winning social campaigns services.