It is estimated that almost two billion messages are sent using Facebook Messenger by users every month. If you own a business, you should realize how big an opportunity it represents. While earlier there were no options to target these users for business, Facebook has introduced Messenger Ads to resolve this problem. With this feature, you can now invite potential customers to message your business while also targeting each of them individually by connecting with them on Messenger.
When venturing into Messenger Ads, you first need to understand that there are two types of Ads on offer – Destination Ads and Sponsored Messages. Destination Ads appear in the newsfeed of the user and look like any other normal ad. However, there is one big difference. Instead of the usual ‘Shop Now’ button, you will be able to display a ‘Send Message’ button. Sponsored Messages can be directly sent to the Messenger inbox of users. The only condition is that you are limited to sending messages to those who have messaged you previously.
Whether you opt for Sponsored Messages or Destination Ads, you need to have a clear understanding of how to use Facebook Messenger efficiently in order to take full advantage of this opportunity. And below, we list out seven ways a business can use Facebook Messenger profitably.
Table of Contents
1.Use Chatbots
One of the most important features of Messenger Ads is its chatbot option. Thanks to this feature, you can now create and store responses that will be automatically shown to people who initiate conversation with you. When they type in any specific question, your Messenger will interact with them automatically based on your stored responses.
You can either use a Live Chat or a Content Promotion approach. In the Live Chat approach, the chatbot will ask certain questions to the users. Only when the user responds will they be able to talk with a live agent. In Content Promotion approach, the chatbot will send useful content to the user for a brief period of time before sending a unique offer. Knowing which approach to use is critical in determining your company’s success in using chatbots.
2. Swift Response
When a user messages you, make sure that you respond as quickly as possible. As per various studies, it is estimated that the ideal response time is about five hours. This essentially means that when someone messages your business, you need to reply them within 5 hours in order to maintain their interest and have a chance of converting their interest into a sale.
Unfortunately, this is not what happens in the real world. Only less than 10% of businesses are believed to respond within 5 hours. Most businesses can take up to a day to reply. There are organizations that even take more than five days to just reply to a prospective customer. Obviously, their track record of converting leads into sales is accordingly affected.
As such, you must always be ready to respond to potential customers swiftly. Ideally, you should check your Messenger inbox every one hour and reply to all the received messages.
3. Show Response Time On Profile Page
It is also recommended that you display your response time on your social media profile page. This will give the users a rough idea of when to expect a reply thereby increasing the chances of people messaging you.
The shorter the response time, the better. Facebook will check all the replies you’ve made to the users and then display the average response time on your profile page. However, you will have to respond to at least 90% of your received messages. Otherwise, Facebook might not display the response time.
4. Website Messenger
Remember to enable the Messenger on your Facebook profile page as Facebook users can message you only if it is enabled. If you fail to do so, then you might potentially lose thousands of interested customers. Just click on the General Settings of your Facebook page and enable the checkbox that allows people to contact you through messaging.
5. Local Awareness
If you aim to develop your company’s brand awareness in a particular location, then the Messenger Ads offer an excellent solution. Its ‘Local Awareness’ option enables you to target your ads in specific areas.
For example, if you wish to develop your company’s reach in New York City, you can simply select that region in the ‘Local Awareness’ option and send users in that area special offers they can use within that location. By helping you direct messages to people in a locality, Messenger Ads enables you to create targeted campaigns that have the highest chance of conversions.
6. Saved Replies
Messenger Ads also offers a very helpful feature called ‘Saved Replies’. As the name suggests, this option allows you to write and store pre-decided replies. And when a user contacts your business, you can instantly send a suitable reply from the numerous replies you have stored on the Messenger.
While being a quick way to respond to interested users, the ‘Saved Replies’ feature also allows you to avoid having to type the same reply over and over again. You can create a saved reply through the Manage Replies option. Once done, you can access the stored replies by first choosing the message to which you wish to respond and then clicking the dialog bubble.
7. Keywords
When your business starts to deal with hundreds of customers, then managing every one of their conversations becomes a difficult task. This is why Facebook has a Keywords feature built into its Messenger. You can add as many keywords as you want to specific conversations. As such, you only need to type in those keywords to bring up that specific conversation. This will help you immensely when trying to manage multiple messages with numerous clients. As a result, the users also receive prompt replies which will make them happy with your customer service and also increase the chances of customer conversions.
