Nowadays, it is common for small businesses to have a Facebook page as well as a web business site. These are essential business components in today’s modern business environment to stay ahead of the competition. But small business owners should also consider optimizing their Facebook pages as well as their web business sites for greater effects and returns to business.

Social media options

The emergence of social media networking sites transformed the business arena for all businesses; especially small business owners. As more and more consumers climbed onto the social media platform to stay connected, small and big businesses are also capitalizing on the benefits of social media avenues. Many small businesses are enjoying great success when Facebook marketing is incorporated into their online marketing strategies and campaigns.

A small business must manipulate the best of social media sites such as Facebook to boost its market presence and bottom lines. The full potential of social media networking features must be capitalized effectively to bring about the desired business outcomes. There is a plethora of dynamic Facebook features that are powerful in enhancing the small business enterprise’s sales and profit. A small business owner must learn to take advantage of these features to impact its online marketing strategy.

One of the best forms of Facebook manipulations is to generate a high number of ‘likes’ on the web business page. This would draw the attention of popular search engines to generate a high ranking to the web page which augurs well for the web business. More web traffic is expected to come through with a higher page rank.

There are many tips and tricks to grow the number of Likes on the web business page. Six are suggested below.

1. Generate an attractive welcome page

It is crucial to create a custom welcome page that represents the small business professionally. This page may be simple but crucial in introducing the small business with its plethora of products, services and brand to visitors. It must be well designed and structured to facilitate easy navigation that would encourage more visitors as well as a frequent return of visitors.

A well designed web business site is commonly ‘like’ and shared with others which is an excellent form of free promotion for the business while establishing the brand name in the marketplace. There can also be some inclusions of promotional components that encourage visitors to ‘like’ the web page as they navigate through the site. It could be a discount voucher or freebies with every ‘like’ of the webpage. Hence, the number of ‘likes’ on the small web business site would increase faster to capture the attention of top search engines for a higher page ranking.

2. Inclusions of Videos and Photos

Modern consumers like to view videos and photos than just reading text on any web page. Hence, the web business site that incorporates interesting videos and colorful photos that are relevant to the topic of discussion would stand to enjoy more likes from visitors.

The innovative small business owners need to think out of the box to gain an unfair advantage over their competitors by including components that their competitors do not have to make their web page stand out in the crowd. Well executed videos are great advertising tools that allow an effective dissemination of product or service information that would compel viewers to make a purchase immediately or establish the brand power in the market as more visitors view the video. These videos or photos about the business, product or service can be shared along the circle of influence’s network of the consumer.

Video inclusions are simple creations which can also be used on self introduction with regards to the business, headshots of staff and owners who are serving the consumers as well as clear demos of business products and services to convince viewers of the dynamism of the business offerings.

Modern consumers enjoy business websites that have pictures or photos of the staff, especially customer services to link a face to a name and services rendered. When good services are rendered such as fair recommendations and tips or caution on the suggested products, consumers are more likely to ‘like’ the webpage for the professional services experienced.

3. Proactive services

A small business website can garner more ‘likes’ than its competitors with a high dose of proactive services compared to a lackadaisical attitude by business owners. It is important to make every web visitor feel like a VIP when visiting the web business site regardless of status and purchase capacity.

Proactive services to every visitor to the web business site make the visitor feel important to generate a positive response such as a ‘like’ on the webpage. There is a status update feature that can be manipulated to garner relevant information on potential leads with open options for visitors and fans to participate in any update activity. Small business owners can make use of relevant Facebook apps such as Contact Me to create the relevant contact form for a quick contact option by visitors.

Quality blogs can be posted regularly and directly to the web business’s Facebook to entertain web visitors. Sponsored web events or quick updates on relevant market happenings via Facebook event features are proactive services by a small business to garner more ‘likes’ on its web page.

4. Inclusion of a ‘Like’ Gate

Web visitors would more like to click the ‘Like’ button on the web business page if there is an obvious ‘Like’ gate staring in their face. Clicking the ‘Like’ button opens to another space of more interesting contents that would captivate readers.

5. ‘Like’ Maintenance

More visitors would ‘Like’ the webpage if the proper web maintenance is exercised. It is necessary for a small business to track its page activities professionally with quick responses to customers’ mail while cleaning up the mail list to keep the website always professional in appearance and contents.

6. Request for ‘Like’

A direct request to ‘like’ the page is very effective when the request is posted professionally. Most web visitors would comply if there is nothing negative about the website or pages.