In June, my Facebook group reached 500 members, and during this time I have learned a lot. To celebrate, I’m going to share five things that I’ve learned about creating a Facebook group.
Takeaway #1: Creating A Facebook Group SUCKS
Creating a Facebook group sucks and the reason I say that is because when you first create a group, there is maybe only a couple people in the group. For about a month and a half, it was pretty much my business partner, my mom and a few of my friends. But, it was really important that I went through this period because I learned how to talk on camera and how to create content.
I got used to creating content, and the reality is that most of my content sucked at the beginning, but because nobody was watching it, it didn’t matter. Then I got more comfortable, and by the time I was comfortable with it, my content became much better.
I’m still not the best, and I mess up all the time but you kind of get over that and start not to care so much. The key is to focus on providing value and not necessarily about getting everything perfect.
Takeaway #2: Provide Value
So many people create these communities and Facebook groups, and all they do is they try to sell their stuff to you over and over again. The reason that I’ve been able to do so well and thrive in an environment where lawyers are bombarded by marketing companies left and right. A lot of lawyers have been burned by marketing companies, and I’m able to provide value and become an authority figure, which is something you can do that as well.
If you create a community, don’t try to sell every time you talk to the community. You need to provide value because the biggest thing is that if you can provide value for someone else, then they’re going to trust you and eventually when they do want to hire you for something they’re going to reach out and hire you.
Takeaway #3: People ACTUALLY Watch My Content
What I’ve also learned is that people actually watch my content. Almost every single day I put a video up or send an email, and I’ll just get crickets. No emails back, no messages, no comments, etc. Some of the times I don’t even get likes, but I always eventually hear people say, “oh I watch all your videos, I love them,” or, “I saw that video about this or that and it was great and, you really helped me with my firm’s marketing” and I think, “wow, I didn’t think anybody actually watch this.”
Just because you don’t get immediate feedback, doesn’t mean people aren’t watching.
Takeaway #4: Authority Is Power
When I say I’m an authority, what I mean is that because I’ve put out a lot of really high-quality content and people understand that I know what I’m talking about with law firm marketing, they associate with me for law firm marketing.
This means that a lot of people trust me because I put a lot of great content out there, making me an authority. People trust me and if someone’s getting all of their marketing advice from my videos, why would they hire anybody else if I’m available?
You can do that for your law firm as well. If you’re an expert on construction accidents for example, and you create content talking about how construction workers can stay safe and what you should do in a construction accident. When someone in your group gets into an accident, why would they call anybody else? You’re the expert on construction accidents, and you can apply this to any field and any practice area of law, and it works well.
That’s the amazing part about this whole thing is when you become the authority, people are trying to convince you to work with them. I’ve had a lot of attorneys who view me as this authority, reach out, and almost try to sell me on why I should work with them.
Takeaway #5: Engagement Is Key
Whenever I create a post or even if somebody else will create a post, and it gets a lot of engagement. What I noticed is that people were joining the group organically, that number really spiked up. What I’m going to start doing is creating a lot more content where I’m asking questions from members. This is important because I rely on pay per click advertising on Facebook ads to grow my group.
If I can get it to where I’m not necessarily having to pay to per click and or Facebook ads, and I can keep it growing through engagement, then I don’t have to pay to grow my group, and that’s something that’s very important.
These are the five things I’ve learned about growing a Facebook group to over 500 members. The other thing I should have added as number six is patience and that’s something that a lot of people don’t necessarily have. I know I’m horrible when it comes to having patience, but what you have to understand is that it just takes a little bit of time, it doesn’t happen overnight.
I started this group back in November, and I didn’t hit 100 members until February, and then it just kind of snowballed from there. By March, I was at 200 members, and then by April, I was at 400 members. I think this last 100 only took me two or three weeks, and I think it will keep growing even faster than this.
If you’re working on building a group or community, just give it a little bit of time. Let me ask you a question, do any of you have your own Facebook groups? Have you wanted to start one? If you don’t have one, do you want to start one? And if not, why don’t you have your own group? I’ve been preaching about the power of Facebook groups and building your own community for a while, but I’m just curious what’s stopping you, what’s holding you back?