When I visit Facebook, photos are the first thing to catch my attention. Images tell a story and evoke emotions in an instant. Photos compel people to share it with their friends. Do a search for articles on how to make the most of your Facebook page and most advise using use photos. With photos taking more space than written statuses, people can’t help but see it first.
A few studies reported that photos on Facebook get the most interaction and sharing. Although Zuum’s analysis identified video as the most popular sharing tool, photos came in second. Jeff Bullas did an experiment of five content types on Facebook. His results showed photos as the winner for reach and engaged users.
Photos are easy to do. At its simplest, snap a picture with your camera and upload it straight to Facebook.
Retailers can put photos on Facebook right to work with these ideas.
- Products. What’s new in the store? Snap and share. What are little known items people may not know about? What’s hot? What’s on clearance? Show and tell.
- Events. Got a sale? Post sale-related announcements as soon as possible to give people time to visit the store or shop online during the sale. Celebrating an employee’s birthday or upcoming arrival? Share. Did an employee attend a conference? Share event photos to give fans a look behind-the-scenes.
- Customers. Who better than your customers to speak for you? Take a picture of a customer (with permission, of course) and ask for a quote or testimonial to post with the photo. Be sure to get the customer’s name.
- Quotes. This takes a little more doing, but people love good quotes. Find a quote and post it on a photo of your product, store or brand. This is a winning combination as quotes are also popular on Facebook. Many free apps are available to help you add text to photos.
- Contest. Hold a contest that involves customers submitting a picture of them using your stuff. Engage people with a vote selecting the winner.
- Local scene. Show people around town. Attend town events and share photos. Bonus points if you include your employees in the photos. People connect with faces.
- Share photos from other pages. You’ll make someone’s day when you share a photo from their Facebook page that you deem worthy of sharing with your audience. Sharing other people’s content spreads goodwill.
- Humor. Post humorous (clean and profanity-free) comics and images that your audience will like.
- Articles. Find an interesting article that includes an image? Link to that article and its image should appear with the title and short description from the article.
- Tips. Have insider tips for products, recipes and whatnot? Share a photo and add a tip.
- Captions. Post a photo and ask people to submit captions. Photo can be anything that screams “Caption me!”
- Other social networks. Drive traffic to your Pinterest, Instagram, blog and other social network pages with a photo of the page, a link to it and text explaining what people would get out of visiting it. Instead of “Follow us on Pinterest,” say “Take a tour of the latest fashions on our Pinterest page.”
- Partners. Another business may have a complementary product or service that it would benefit both companies to team up. Post photos from the partner. The partner may do the same for your business.
- Coupons. Create an image of a coupon and include details. Remember people can’t copy and paste images.
What other ways can you use photos on Facebook?