Facebook’s popularity with seniors provides a great opportunity for you to connect with your clients throughout the year using a network they enjoy. But your Facebook efforts will be wasted if your clients are not made aware of your business page and the content you provide.

Geoff Evans, founder of the Social Media Coach in London, Ont., offers three ways to make sure your clients and their friends know about your Facebook page:

1. Spread the word
Don’t wait for your clients to find you on Facebook. Tell them about it.

At the end of a meeting, say: “If you are on Facebook, look up my business page. I want to stay connected to my clients throughout the year.”

Also, let your clients know what they can find on your page. Tell them that while you will share reminders about your services, you’re really interested in connecting with them on a more personal level. This is why there will be information meant to help them in their everyday lives, such as ways to stay active and stories promoting community events.

2. Entice your clients to interact with you
Evans calls Facebook a “manipulated space.” Even if someone “likes” your page (thereby making you a part of his or her Facebook network), that person still might not see your content.

Facebook’s algorithm demands that your content be popular before it can have a space on the news feeds of those who have liked your page. So, you would want your clients and their friends to be commenting on your posts and sharing your content on their own profile pages.

A way to help you determine what is striking a chord with your readers is to use Facebook’s free analytical tool, Insights. It tells you how many people have clicked on individual posts and how many have liked, shared and commented on those posts. It is available only for business pages.

But don’t solely rely on numbers to learn what works, says Evans. Your timing could also be an issue.

So, experiment with your posts. When do items receive the most engagement? For example, you might have noticed that your community event photos receive more comments when you post them right after the event as opposed to a week later. This would tell you that these events engage more discussion when they are fresh in your clients’ minds.

3. Invest in a “sponsored story”
You can pay Facebook to improve the visibility of a post by making it a “sponsored story.” Once someone has liked your page or one of your posts, a notification appears on their friends’ newsfeeds informing them of this positive response. A sponsored story is one way to get yourself noticed by people who don’t yet follow you.

You can set your own budget and pay only for the number of clicks on your story or impressions (when your post is displayed on someone’s newsfeed).

For more information, Evans says, contact Facebook. Contact information and further details on advertising on the site can be found by clicking on the “Create Advert” button, which you will find at the bottom of your Facebook page.

This is the second instalment in a two-part series on using Facebook to reach older clients.