There’s a reason why Facebook is such a popular social media platform; because it’s the best at what it does. Sure, you can use other platforms like Twitter and Instagram to promote your organization’s work, but you’ll never get as engaged with your followers as you can on Facebook.

Why? Because on Facebook you can run ads, set up event invitations, and track the success of your online marketing efforts all in one place. For non-profits, which is the primary focus of this blog post, Facebook is a goldmine of opportunities to spread the word about your organization and its work. Here are just 10 effective ways that you can use Facebook to promote your non-profit.

1. Create awareness.

The first and most obvious thing you can do with Facebook is to create awareness about your organization. After all, if no one knows about your organization or its work, then how can they possibly support it or even find it useful? With Facebook, you can post regularly to continue raising awareness about your organization and its initiatives in the community. Just remember not to abuse the platform by posting multiple times per day, as this will likely turn off potential supporters rather than engaging them!

Along with posting regularly, you can also engage with your followers on a deeper level by using various methods of content, from videos to infographics, to tell your story. The more you engage with your followers, the more they will associate your organization with truth, honesty, and integrity – all of which are essential to fundraising.

2. Establish credibility.

Raising awareness about your organization is important, but so is establishing credibility. After all, you can’t expect people to believe in or support your organization if you don’t actually believe in it yourself! One way to gain credibility is to establish a social media presence, as Facebook is a bit of a minefield when it comes to making sure your content is legitimate. So, if you want people to take you seriously, then you need to do your research and make sure your Facebook page is accurately representing your organization. This means creating brand guidelines and sticking to them – as well as ensuring all your content complies with them. You can also hire a digital marketing expert to help you establish an online presence and provide you with the tools you need to ensure everything is done legally and thoroughly.

3. Generate leads.

Leads are incredibly valuable – especially for non-profits that rely heavily on donations and grants to fund their work. Leads allow you to connect with people who are already interested in what your organization has to offer, which saves you the time and effort of having to market to people who aren’t already aware of your work. That’s why leads are so important – they allow you to target your market and find the people who can most benefit from your organization.

To generate leads for your organization, you can use a variety of tactics, from creating awareness to establishing credibility, from engaging with your followers to posting regularly. Just remember, all of these things will take time – and as a non-profit, you probably don’t have the luxury of waiting for things to happen.

4. Build trust.

Now that you’ve created awareness and credibility among potential supporters, you can start to build trust. This is an important step towards raising funds and securing grants for your organization. Once you’ve established credibility and trust with your followers, you can start to discuss more sensitive topics, such as the need for your organization’s services, what makes your organization unique, and how you can best help your followers.

You can use various methods to build trust, from generating leads, to posting regularly, to creating awareness. Just remember to be consistent – trust takes time to build, and you can’t expect people to instantly trust you.

5. Monetise content.

Even if you’ve established trust with your followers, you might not yet be able to generate revenue. At least not directly. But you can use your content to attract sponsorships and partnerships, which can then be monetized. This is why content marketing is so important – you’re not just sharing your story, you’re sharing the opportunity to make money from your story. While you might not yet have the direct revenue streams, you can still generate significant value for your organization.

6. Improve customer experience (CX).

Last but not least, let’s talk about improving your customer experience (or CX as it’s often abbreviated). Your CX is how a customer interacts with your organization, from the moment they decide to engage with you, to the way you deliver your value, and everything in between. So, in other words, your CX is how you provide your customers with value and then follow up on that value with additional, personalized interactions – which might include providing more relevant content, offering additional discounts, or getting feedback from your customers.

One aspect of CX that you can improve on is the way you follow up with customers. You can use various methods to follow up with your customers, from emails to handwritten letters, but none of these things will matter if your customers don’t feel that you’ve understood or valued their input. To ensure you’re understanding their needs and needs in mind when creating follow-up communications, you can ask customers for feedback and even use tools like response rate optimizers – which help you ensure you’re reaching out to people at the right time and using the right methods – such as email or text messages.

7. Measure the results.

Last but not least, you’re going to want to measure the results of all these things you’ve been doing. Just because you’ve established a Facebook account for your organization and started sharing content about your organization doesn’t mean that you’re automatically going to see increased engagement or revenue. There is a right way to use Facebook, and as you’ve probably guessed, it doesn’t involve just putting up a bunch of posts and assuming things will work out fine. You need to take the time to measure the results of what you’re doing and adjust your strategy as needed – based on what you’ve learned.

For example, if you’ve seen an engagement rate of 3% on your posts, and you want to see that increase to 5%, then you might decide to either increase the amount of content you’re putting out, or find a way to make your posts more exciting.

To keep things simple, let’s say you want to see an increase in the number of people who click on your ads – how would you go about doing that? You could run ads that tell your followers exactly what they want to hear, or you could create ads that inspire curiosity and hopefully, a click. The important thing is to measure the results of your efforts and adjust your strategy accordingly.

And remember, this is all about results. Just because you had the good ideas to begin with, and you’re trying to implement them, doesn’t mean that you’re going to succeed overnight. You’re going to have to put in the time and effort to really figure this out – and that’s a lot to expect from a non-profit, especially given how much is already on your to-do list. But if you want to change the world, you’ve got to start somewhere. And as far as I’m concerned, with a little creativity and a whole lot of effort, you can definitely start somewhere nice and peaceful, like your home 🙂