Week 6

The term post reach refers at anyone who has seen your post, while post engagement signifies that someone has clicked, responded, liked, etc. your post. When I think about these two terms it reminds me of the early days of the internet and chat rooms. Anyone could enter or “reach” a chat room but that did not mean that they participated in the conversation they could just “lurk”. That’s what I did for the most part in chat rooms back in the day. However, every now and again someone would say something in one of these chat rooms that would get my attention and I would participate or “engage” in the conversation.

I think the whole point of having an online presence for businesses is to engage existing and hopefully new customers. Post engagement seems critical to that goal. Meanwhile, post reach alone is better than nothing but probably means little to a successful social media campaign for a business. I cannot count how many times messaging reaches me each day on the internet. It all tends to be background noise, part of the experience of being online.

Going back to my chat room analogy, I would enter chat rooms just to have something in the background while I did other things on the computer. It would take something of real interest to get me to engage in the chat room conversation and it’s the same way today on social media. Someone (or entity) really has to post something of personal interest to get me to stop what I am doing and engage. Additionally, there is also a timeliness factor involved when trying to bridge the gap from just reaching someone to getting engagement. In general, I do not always need a product or service but when I do if your business has a relevant message and I have a good experience, I’ll likely come back.

Being able to distinguish what messages work and when they work is important for understanding how to communicate with customers via social media. Facebook Insights is a tool that can provide a business with the data to understand how their messaging is being consumed. Facebook Insights provides you with the days and times your customers are online, which is important for a business to know. Additionally, Facebook Insights provides demographic, location, and numbers for people who liked your page. Using this data a business can begin to craft timely messages for the customers who have engaged with their Facebook page. If I know that I have a following of customers who is online after work, I can focus my messaging during that timeframe. Additionally, if I find most of my customers are under 30, I’ll refine my message for that age group. By using the tools available in Facebook Insights, a business can learn to produce that timely message that catches customers’ attention and hopefully results in engagement.