Facebook for Local Business: Creative Ways to Grow

Is your local business on Facebook?

Wondering how to market your business more effectively?

To explore how to use Facebook in creative ways, I interview Anissa Holmes.
More About This Show
The Social Media Marketing podcast is an on-demand talk radio show from Social Media Examiner. It's designed to help busy marketers and business owners discover what works with social media marketing.

In this episode, I interview Dr. Anissa Holmes, the author of Delivering WOW: How Dentists Can Build a Fascinating Brand and Achieve More, While Working Less! Her podcast is the Delivering WOW Dental podcast. She's a practicing dentist and teaches Facebook marketing courses for dentists.

Anissa explores how local businesses can grow using Facebook.

You'll discover why Facebook is more valuable for local businesses than review websites.

Share your feedback, read the show notes, and get the links mentioned in this episode below.
Listen Now

You can also subscribe via iTunes, RSS, or Stitcher.

Here are some of the things you'll discover in this show:
Facebook Marketing for Local Businesses
Anissa's Story

After practicing dentistry in the U.S. for several years, Anissa moved to her husband's home country of Jamaica in 2010 and started a new dental practice from scratch. She knew most dentists typically get 10 to 15 new patients per month through referrals, but with a startup practice in a totally different country, she decided to try promoting her new practice on Facebook.

In early 2010, Anissa set up a Facebook business page and began sharing what happened in the practice each day, including behind-the-scenes snapshots and stories about how the practice's dental services were changing people's lives.

Anissa's strategy worked. Her practice began getting 5 to 10 new patients a month. Anissa figured she was onto something and began buying Facebook ads. As the Facebook algorithm changed, she made adjustments. Her practice now spends about $500 a month on Facebook and those marketing efforts attract about 50 new patients every month.

With such outstanding growth, the practice's revenue tripled, and Anissa's practice was able to pay for a new office with three times the space totally out of profits. The practice is debt-free and so is Anissa. She shares that this financial success and security is a result of the business growth she achieved through Facebook marketing.

After dentists started asking Anissa how her practice was achieving those crazy results, last year Anissa created a Facebook course and began lecturing to dentists all over the world about Facebook.

The journey has been interesting, Anissa says, and she attributes the success to Facebook. When new customers come in, they already know the practice and how it can solve their problems. They're already connected and ready to make a purchase.

Listen to the show to learn more about Anissa's background.

Why Local Businesses Need to Go Beyond Review Sites

If your new customers hang out on Facebook, Anissa says, that's where you need to be. People aren't hanging out on Yelp or Google. Most people (including Anissa) check Facebook first thing in the morning, between daily tasks, and in the evening. That's why Facebook marketing needs to be your focus.

Anissa says creating the right content is important. A lot of businesses post information about how great they are and share a lot of stock content, but Anissa says that really doesn't work. She stresses that local businesses need to share their story and what makes their business unique. For example, if you have a plumbing company, what are you offering that's different from everyone else?

To compete with photos of kids, community happenings, and articles, Anissa creates engaging posts that connect with people and make them want to click, including content about community impact and what her practice does to change patients' lives.

Anissa also shares testimonials.