Small business owners all over the world are ga-ga over Facebook, and particularly Facebook Likes. But what’s the big deal? Are they really worth that much?
According to one marketer, if someone “Likes” your Facebook page, then they are over 90% likely to never look at it again. But what if that number is exaggerated and it’s only 45%? That’s still a lot.
Imagine getting 1,000 Likes to your Facebook page. That’s a lot of Likes by small business standards. If only 100 of those people ever return a second time, you’ve got a pretty small pool of potential customers. Does that put a Like in a whole new perspective for you?
But hold the phone. Anyone who has ever done any direct marketing knows that if you get a 2% response rate, then you’ve accomplished something. In other words, if only 20 out of 1,000 recipients to your direct mail campaign respond, then you’re making out like a bandit. So what’s so wrong with a 10% success rate?
Well, here’s the deal – that 10% isn’t actually doing anything. They’re just visiting your page again. And if you use the same 2% that you’d measure your success in direct mail by to your Facebook page, then you should measure it by positive outcomes like newsletter subscriptions, purchases, and visits to your website, not by Likes.
The bottom line is this … if you get a 2% positive outcome from among your Likes and you have 1,000 Likes, then that’s 20 new subscribers, or 20 new sales. Now cut it half – 10 new sales vs. 20. And what did it cost you? Nothing but your time. Measure that ROI against your direct mail ROI. Which one wins?
