Whether your Facebook Group is just getting started or is well established, you can post to it via Agorapulse. You can then be more strategic and targeted as you manage your groups.
(If you don’t have one, we highly recommend you consider creating a Facebook Group.)
Running a Facebook Group is very different from running a Facebook Page. A Page is for broadcasting, and a Group is for discussions.
Benefits of a Facebook Group for Business
Before we get into posting to Facebook Groups with Agorapulse, let’s recap some of the benefits, so you know it’s worth doing right!
Groups can be gated
Unlike a Facebook Page, Private Groups are gated. That means admins must approve any new members. This makes them ideal as part of a paid membership or subscription package. For example, a gym, nutritionist, or affiliate network.
This adds a VIP level to the package allowing members to communicate directly with their company contacts. It also means you can remove past members or non-payers.
Get real insights
In a Facebook Group, members are likely to talk more candidly. They will swap tips, suggestions, complaints, and real-life examples.
A main reason for this is that if you write in a private Facebook Group, your Facebook friends won’t see what you wrote. This is different from a Page, where comments are visible.
If you are running a company that is sensitive in nature (that could be anything from medical to financial), you’re more likely to see real comments in a private group.
I often ask questions in Matt Navarra’s awesome Social Media Geekout Group. This is a community of social media professionals looking to help each other out by answering questions and engaging in discussion. I wouldn’t necessarily ask the questions publicly, so a private group works well in this case.
You have a pool of loyal fans
Group fans are the most loyal and engaged of all. And for a business, this is such a huge win. You can ask them questions, send them free samples and trials, and engage potential ambassadors, partners and affiliates.
You can also utilize the oldest or most knowledgeable members as your Group admins.
Increase organic reach
Facebook prioritizes content with high engagement. That means content that people talk about, share, or like. Bad news for Facebook Pages with low engagement but good news for busy Groups. Your newsfeed reach will be high if your Group is busy, meaning you show up easily on searches.
How Do You Post to Facebook Groups Using Agorapulse?
Now you know the benefits of consistently posting to Groups, how can you do it easily with Agorapulse?
Let’s run through the basics before delving into some cool post scheduling techniques!
Add your Facebook Group to your Agorapulse dashboard
Select Facebook Groups. If you’re logged into your Facebook profile, Agorapulse will automatically find any groups you are an admin of.
Then just add the one you want to manage with Agorapulse. You will get a prompt to add the Agorapulse app to your group itself. Accept this, and you’re good to go. If you don’t get the popup then scroll to the bottom of your settings page to “Advanced Settings.”
Click on the pencil to edit your apps.
Now click on “Add Apps” in the window that pops up, search for Agorapulse, and add the app.
And you’re done!
The prompts for this process are easy and quick to follow. I took fewer than 2 minutes to add a new group to my Agorapulse dashboard.
Remember: You must already be an admin on the Facebook group to link the group to your Agorapulse dashboard. If you’re not, ask a teammate to make you an admin on the native Facebook group platform.
Now that you have your Facebook group added to your dashboard, let’s take a quick look around to see what you can do with your Group on the dashboard.
First, get comfortable with your Group being on the Agorapulse platform. You can reorder your tabs in a way that makes more sense to you by dragging it into position like this. I like to keep “batches” of profiles together for each client, but that’s just me!
Head over to your calendar tab and you will see that you can schedule, and view Groups posts just as you can with pages and profiles. You will also be able to see at a glance how many Group posts you have scheduled for each day.
Agorapulse also includes any posts you published natively on the Group, so it’s easy to get a good overview of your content.
You can see from the helpful warning that Mentions are not available for Facebook Groups. So, avoid using @ to tag groups or people in your posts.
Another thing to note is that unlike Pages and Profiles, the Inbox, Reports and Listening Tabs do not support Groups. So, for Facebook Groups, Agorapulse will predominantly act as your scheduling tool.
Add a team member or two for better collaboration. If you manage a Facebook Group for a client or co-lead one with a business partner, you can add other admins to your dashboard.
With Agorapulse, all group admins can schedule content, but remember that the other person managing the page needs to be an admin on the Facebook Group itself before you can add them to the Agorapulse dashboard. It’s all about safety and permissions, and it makes perfect sense.
How Do You Schedule to Groups Using Agorapulse?
Let’s look at some scheduling techniques and tips you can try out for your Group.
1. Create categories and queues for your content
Queue categories are perfect for groups. You can use them to create predictable posting patterns, such as theme days, so members know what to expect. You can easily see your schedule immediately.
If you are not using content queue categories for your social media posts (including Twitter, Instagram, and LinkedIn), you could be missing out.
Agorapulse has publishing categories (“queue categories” or “category queues”). Here’s how you can utilize them for Groups.
Create a queue category name. This might be something like “marketing tips” “animated videos,” or “digital outlooks“ depending on your industry and the type of content you post. To access this magical portal, hit Publishing Lists on your left hand menu and then Queued at the top.
Make your queue visual and choose a color. If you’re familiar with tools like Trello (digital note organizers) then this will be familiar.
Create queue rules. Set guidelines about how frequently you want the same content posted. If you don’t have enough content in the queue, it means a time on your content calendar will get skipped.
Drop in your content. You can add content to different categories in several ways. Manually if you prefer. Or via an import from a CSV file. You can also bulk upload from an RSS or add images.
Assign posts to other admins. Not sure about a post or an offer? Agorapulse allows you to assign posts to other admins for approval or review. This is a tidy way of streamlining communication over posts and making sure everyone is on the same page before things go live.
Still not sure if scheduling is best for you? Trying to better understand queues? Learn more about the differences between queue vs. schedule.
2. Republish evergreen content important to your members
Remember that when you’re running a group, new members will be joining who perhaps won’t have viewed important information. Republishing evergreen content important to your Group members is a good way of ensuring everyone has seen your great content.
You can do this in two ways. Either duplicate popular posts manually. Or schedule in advance for a repeat every 30 days (or however often you want).
Examples of evergreen content to republish
- Group Rules and terms
- Group ethos and purpose
- Popular blog posts that are evergreen (meaning they didn’t date)
- Success stories from other members
- Opening hours, holiday times and support contacts
- Reshare a photo album that members are adding their photos to. (This could be photos of their success journey, tips or intros)
Examples of “schedule once” content
- Upcoming event notices
- Welcome new members by name and invite them to comment
- Upload a photo of an event
- Reiterate a new rule or a reminder of rules being broken
- A reminder that a deadline is coming up
- A post about a sale on your products or services
- Wishes for a holiday or member birthdays (if you’re a small group and doing that!)
3. Keep your Facebook Group engaged
Being a group admin is all about keeping the group engaged with posts. Some groups are quite self-sufficient. By that I mean the members behave well, post regularly and answer each other’s questions.
You can also give admin access to trusted members if you want to. However, if you’re pivotal to the group then you will need to plan content to keep members engaged.
Here are some ideas …
- Horror stories. Share a horror story from your sector and invite your members to contribute theirs in the comments. This is usually a hilarious thread that engages members nicely.
- Get together in Facebook Rooms. We recently talked about the benefits of Facebook Rooms, and you can utilize them on Groups, too. Invite members to a monthly (or however often you want) catch up, party or FAQ session.
- Show & Tell Mondays. Have your group members share something that inspires them or things they like. Think Show and Tell, but for groups.
- Tuesday Tips. Invite your group members to share tips from their area of expertise or share a tip with them to build credibility.
- Fun Friday. Fridays need to be lighter as people are winding down for the weekend. Share funny GIFs, jokes, or special offers they can shop.
- Goal setting. It can be a powerful thing to encourage your group members to set goals within the group and then hold one another accountable. Consider doing this on a set day of the week or the month.
- Challenges. Set a group goal, give them step-by-step instructions on how to get there and have them report back to the group when they are done.
- Poll of the Week. Ask a question to help you better understand your audience or get them to connect with each other. You can grab some real insights here so don’t abuse it with meaningless polls.
- Check-in Day. If you are goal setting you can also include days for people to report back how they are doing.
You could easily set posts like this in your queue categories. Keep adding to them and edit them as you go. If something gets a ton of engagement, then reuse it or adapt it for later. If something falls flat and doesn’t garner engagement, drop it from your queue. When you have your content organized in the group, it will help you grow.
In Conclusion
Whether you’re managing one or multiple Facebook Groups, it’s so much easier with a scheduling tool and content calendar. With Agorapulse, you can have all your pages, profiles, and groups in one dashboard accessible to your crew.
Get started on saving time and energy on your own social media management! Check out our free trial of Agorapulse to help you schedule, track, and measure all your social media efforts.
