If you haven't heard, Facebook rolled out a major revamp to their "Like" system worldwide, after months of testing in a handful of regional markets, called Facebook Reactions. Now, if a user holds\hovers over the Like button in a Facebook post, they're given six emoji to choose from: Like, Love, Laugh, Wow, Sad, and Angry.
Since users had been clamoring for a Like upgrade for years, they've embraced this new functionality. In the first few weeks they've already seen heavy use and increased engagement. This is great news for Facebook marketers, because it opens up new ways of creating and measuring engagement among fans.
All Aboard: Making Facebook Reactions Part of Your Marketing
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1 - Create a post specifically using Reactions.
To get your fans comfortable with Reactions, try a post with the general theme of "Do you LIKE this or do you LOVE this?" This will show the new feature to any fans who haven't used it yet, and establish you'll be using them in the future. -
2 - Track emotional Reactions to posts.
Facebook will report Reactions in the same way they previously reported likes, so you'll now be able to get a more detailed look at how your fans are reacting to posts you make. This will allow you to optimize topics which invite love or laugh reactions, for example, with metrics backing these choices. -
3 - Create anger honeypots.
Got an announcement you know won't be popular? Is there an unavoidable service outage occurring? Pre-emptively create a post about it that's stickied at the top, and openly invite people to be angry at that one post. This should help prevent your page from getting angry posts from users\fans. -
4 - Research your competition.
Since Reactions are public data, you can easily see how your competitors are doing with their own posts. This can help you fine-tune your strategies to appeal in areas they aren't hitting. Ie, if they are getting a lot of likes and loves, you might look to focus on posts that inspire Funny and Wow emojis to differentiate yourself. -
5 - Don't be afraid to be Sad or Angry sometimes.
"Outrage Culture" is very much a thing online, and posts intended to make people sad or angry can still gain significant traction. Obviously, you wouldn't want to make this the focus, but the occasional post with 'negative' emotions attached can add spice and variety to your online postings. Especially if it involves a topic you know your audience feels passionately about.
Facebook Reactions: A Great Opportunity
There's little downside to embracing Facebook Reactions and there's a lot of opportunity. Learn more about your fans, inspire a wider range of emotions, and more-accurately gauge the effectiveness of your posts.