Best Ways to Make Money on Facebook
Whether you are marketing, selling, or advertising on Facebook you need to know how to make money on Facebook with your efforts. Everybody uses Facebook. Okay, slight exaggeration. But with over two billion users worldwide, including more than 214 million in the United States alone, it is very, very widespread. It’s revolutionized news, culture, social interaction, and more. But it’s not just a way for you to keep in touch with old high school friends, share your funny dog photos, or post videos from your beach vacation. And the reality is that no matter what business or market you are in, chances are you can reach a segment of your audience on Facebook. Facebook is also a powerful money-making platform. In fact, there are many ways you could potentially make money on Facebook. Let's take a look at the various ways you can use Facebook to market, advertise, and promote your business - or just make some money on the side.
1. The Facebook Marketplace
This is one of the simplest ways to make money on Facebook. Essentially, Facebook allows you to sell items on a special section of the site. Many towns, cities, and communities have set up buy/sell pages or you can simply search by geographic location, product name, or category. That way buyers can quickly see a wide range of choices in the surrounding area. You can post used or new items to sell, everything from laptops to cell phones to cars to furniture. It’s like Craigslist on steroids. Here are some tips when it comes to selling on the Facebook Marketplace: Make sure to include clear pictures of what you’re selling. Provide details like model number, condition (be honest), etc.
Make sure you are selling it for the right price. Check what the same or similar items are selling for from other Marketplace sellers or on other sites like eBay or Craigslist.
Keep in mind there is some negotiation with potential buyers and many will try to low-ball you. If you don’t think it’s a fair price you’re under no obligation to take the offer.
Chances are you're not going to create a full-time business buying or selling items on Facebook, but this is a quick way to make some extra cash. If you're already selling items on eBay or Craigslist this is another avenue for you to reach more people and expand your potential audience of buyers.
2. Facebook as a Traffic Driver
The great thing about Facebook is that its algorithms examine where you go online, what you click on the site, what videos you watch, etc. Then it brings more of those types of posts to your attention. Facebook is also, of course, a way to connect like-minded people, organizations, and companies.
You can take advantage of this to make money on Facebook. You’ll do it not by selling to people directly on the platform as with the Marketplace but rather by compelling people to click on links on your Facebook page that takes them to your e-commerce site, landing page, or other website connected to your online business.
This is often referred to as two-step marketing. You're not trying to make a sale on Facebook (because people generally aren't there to buy), rather you're trying to get their attention and interest and get them off of Facebook by clicking over to your website.
There you can sell them products or ask them to sign up to your email list (we’ll cover that in depth in the next section). This Facebook traffic is very qualified—these are people interested in your product offers. When you run ads on Facebook you can target by demographics, interests, and even people who have already expressed interest in your product, business, and brand so the traffic is very qualified.
To boost your traffic, you need to post regularly to your Facebook page. You can post sales pitches, product launches, and other related things to your business. Strong copy and compelling offers can bring in a lot of traffic. But you should also have useful content on your page that engages the prospect—that’s what’ll keep them coming back. You could post industry news, funny stories, etc. Photos and videos are very important these days—people want to watch them. And they don’t have to be professionally produced.
If you have a blog, you should also post a link to every new post on your Facebook page. Same with any new YouTube videos or any other content you post elsewhere online. It’s all about driving as much traffic as possible. You may even consider paying for ads just to have people see your free content and go back to your website as well. This way you can build a retargeting audience and run ads to them in the future.
The idea is to include content that gets people to like your Facebook page, so it shows up in their news feed and they send it to friends too.
3. Using Facebook to Generate Leads
This goes right along with #2 but we wanted to focus on this way to make money on Facebook because it’s very effective, although it is more of a gradual way to earn income.
Basically, all the Facebook users out there are potential leads for your business. Not everybody, of course, just those folks who are interested in your products. The cool thing is that Facebook makes it easy to find these folks… and for them to find you. Again, you need a Facebook page for your business.
You’ll include useful content to engage the users. And then you’ll also include links to your website or a landing page asking them to sign up to your list to get a newsletter or updates, as well as special offers. You must give them some incentive to sign up, like a free ebook or special report related to your niche.
With Facebook, you can also include an email opt-in form directly on your Facebook
You should also go out to fan pages or Facebook groups that are in the same industry or niche and start posting—this networking can bring more people to your page or directly to your website or landing page.
Once these people are on your email list you can continue to send them offers, as well as useful content like a newsletter. This is a great way to warm them up to the idea of buying from you. And you can offer them increasingly more expensive products over time as they buy the lower cost products first and then are ready for higher ticket items.
Another strategy that is working well is to post links that simply go to content pieces or blog posts on your website. You're simply running ads to good quality content you've created. Once they arrive at your content, there you can offer a content upgrade by way of getting onto your email list. This is a less direct method but can make your ads more cost-effective.
4. Facebook Ads
The old saying goes, “You have to spend money to make money.” And that’s certainly the case with running paid ads on Facebook. You’ve seen these ads, they’re the little banners on the right side of the page, as well as the sponsored posts that show up directly in the news feed.
Again, cookies that follow you around online, follow you to Facebook. So that ads that appear are something you might be interested in and you’re more likely to click and even buy the product. When you’re an advertiser that’s great news because your ads are getting in front of the eyeballs of the right people.
One note of caution. Like any type of online advertising, Facebook ads can be pricey and it’s quite easy to spend a lot of money with no return if you don’t know what you’re doing.
So before you use this method to make money on Facebook, you should have all your systems in place, you should have been in business for a while, and you should have some cash in reserve because there will be some trial and error before you find ad copy and an offer that works. You should also have good tracking in place so you know exactly which ads are working and which ones are not; that way you're not wasting money on ads that don't work and can pump more money into the ads that are working.
A related method to this is boosting posts. When you find a post on Facebook that is working well and engaging your prospects, you can “boost” it by paying some extra money. Boosting puts it in front of more people.
Boosting posts is the simplest way to do a Facebook ad; once you find a boosted post that works well you should use Facebook's more advanced ad options to promote those posts that do well.
5. Bringing Customers to Your Bricks-and-Mortar Business
Customers expect every business they interact with to have a Facebook page. This includes businesses with physical locations like shops, retail stores, restaurants, and more. So it’s important that you have a Facebook page that clearly shows your location, what your place is all about, what products or services you offer, etc.
You can also include news of sales and discount offers or special events. For example, you can post about the weekly happy hour at your restaurant. And if somebody posts a question or comment – be sure to respond promptly. Get a conversation going with your fans.
The goal here is to have people like your page so your new posts are in their newsfeed. Then when they see a special offer they like, they come into your physical location. You want to keep your place of the business top of mind with your prospects so they come to visit you.
Admittedly this strategy only really works if you have a physical business, but it’s worth mentioning here. Also, you should encourage all of your customers to like your page and have them follow you on Facebook for news, specials, coupons, and updates. A simple sign at the register encouraging people to follow you on Facebook can work or you may even incentivize people to follow you by offering something.
Another important note: you can only run paid ads to a business page; not your personal profile.
6. Sell Affiliate Products
Affiliate marketing is one of the quickest ways to get started doing business online. And the cool thing is that Facebook is a great way to get into this type of venture. It makes it so easy.
The basic model works like this:
You sign up for an affiliate program. There are dozens out there but a great place to start is ClickBank, CJ Affiliate, and Amazon.
You promote products from those sites on a Facebook page centered all around a specific hot niche.
Whenever somebody clicks on the link and buys the product, you get a commission – generally from 5 percent to 25 percent.
As with any strategy to make money on Facebook, it’s important to post regularly and engages with your audience. That creates trust and makes it more likely people will buy. Also, be sure to track those numbers so you know which campaigns are working and which ones are not.