As you build out a social presence for your community (whether you are a yoga studio or a product) on Facebook, think about who your community is and what they care about. It is important to know who your target audience is and what they want to talk about. If you have a yoga studio or a product aimed at the yoga market, keep in mind what you are thinking about as well as what your community is talking about. The conversation may start in our bodies and heads (yoga, meditation, etc) and evolve into our hearts (what we think and why whether it is yoga related or not). You are a Teacher, a Leader and a Mentor – guide the conversations with passion and intelligence.

When you start a Page on Facebook it may be exclusively made up of your friends and the friends of your employees/co-workers. This is a great way to create a foundation for your community and share your professional life with a group of people who care about you. Just like when you settle into Warrior I, you start with your foundation and make sure your feet are pulling the floor into your core as your energy moves your hips and chest forward and up as your body eases into your legs. You can create a shift in your body! This same process applies to your Facebook community, you have to feed and nourish your community with quality content, growing with clients and eventually potential clients as people who Like your Page on Facebook and Share your content. Nobody can do this better than you!!! Do NOT let anybody post status updates for you, you are a teacher who has been blessed with a voice, use it!

As you build out your community keep an eye on the Insights in the back end of your Facebook Page. These insights will tell you the gender and age of your community as well as what cities they live in. This will help you target your content, even if it is only by gender and age! Keep an eye on how much activity your content is getting, when people view your pictures and Share your content you are getting referral business!!!  If you have trouble focusing in and understanding the insights, look at them with a friend or member of your community and discuss what they mean. Sometimes talking thru something like statistics and traffic makes it very clear and easy to understand what is going on. Still stuck, email me and we can walk thru it together. Your community loves to talk, are you making it easy for them to get into the conversation? Give them good status updates that motivate them to talk with you!!!

Last but not least, consider Facebook Advertising. You should start with a Sponsored Story focused on Likes. As new people Like your Facebook Page, an ad will be shown to their friends. This is a purely social advertisement focused on your second degree network, friends of friends. Sponsored Stories have a high success rate of Clicks per Like, this builds out a community of people who already now each other or could/should know each other. If you have the budget for it, don’t be shy – run a normal Facebook Ad, make sure this points at your yoga studios or products Facebook Page, most traffic that leaves Facebook by clicking on an Ad is going to bounce immediately (remember they are on Facebook for a reason), get that traffic to engage with your Page and you can communicate and interact with your community over time. Set a goal of doubling the size of your yoga community thru Facebook advertising – this will benefit your community as well as the greater society as we continue to share yoga with more people.

Facebook has over 350 million people accessing Facebook from their mobile phone, this population is twice as engaged and wants to Like and Comment on your content. Make sure your community gets to know each other, it is easier to talk when you know the members of your community! We like to talk about everything! Whether it is politics, food, or the current events of the day, let people in. The debate will have to be moderated and encouraged by leadership, when we discuss issues we all learn. When you get your community talking you will find they have a lot to say, make sure they know you are listening and engaging (this is what we have comments for). It has never been easier to talk with your community, what do you want to talk about?