If you follow me on instagram (which you probably should lovencphotography or personally nicolemodde) you will see me gripe a bit about Facebook. I often put up screen shots of how many people my posts are reaching…or should I say AREN’T reaching. So instead of griping about it I thought I would think about the big picture and remember why I (personally) still LOVE Facebook and why it works for MY business.

But first…let me give you some examples of my gripes…

This post below I posted at 1 in the afternoon on a Monday. Out of 10,000+ fans it reached 400 people. 10 likes and 3 comments

 This post below was posted around 9 at night on a Sunday. It was an album full of a hundred photos. It reached 1500 people. 62 likes. 12 comments

This post was put up at 8 at night. It reached over 3500 people. 118 likes. 7 comments and it was a single photo (of a beautiful family of course)

And I definitely had to share this one…This was a wedding that I thought I had blogged and shared. It reached 19,000 people on Facebook!

WHAAAAAT??!!

That is insane. It also received 150 likes on the blog and 1500 clicks on the blog. By far my most reached post ever!

So…as you can see Facebook is no fun some days. And trust me I have tried everything. I have put up blog posts only to see it get viewed by 100 people. So I delete it and put up a picture with the same blog link on it instead and it gets viewed by thousands. I have literally tried and tested so many things. I thought I had it all figured out.

What time to post. What things it was allowing people to see. What was working.

Gone.Facebook is just too good and sneaky. All my hard work and they just keep changing it.

Those things are no longer working anymore. Being a part of a photography community, this is a huge topic and lots of people are talking about giving up on Facebook and how “useless” it has become.

Okay, well let me just step back a bit.

Facebook is a free tool that we use to share our work. It is so good for small businesses in so many ways. It allows us to share our work with so many people. It is out there and everyone knows about it. Yes, there is an option to pay and boost posts, but if you look at the statistics and do the math it would actually cost a fortune to reach a whole fan base. I think I looked one day and to reach all of my fans it would cost me like $500 a post or something insane like that. It’s just literally not an option. I honestly wish Facebook would charge me a reasonable yearly fee and let me be. I am sure they would make way more money off of businesses then how they are doing it now. (hint hint Facebook).

Anyway, back on track. Why I personally STILL love Facebook.

It is a free marketing tool that allows me to share my work and it displays it beautifully. Aside from that, it excites my clients. I literally get texts within hours of sessions and weddings asking when I am putting a sneak peek up.  I put up sneak peeks the very next day for every client so it is a part of my workflow and I get just as excited as my clients do. I cannot wait for them to tag themselves and to see their friends and family comment and click that LIKE button.  I also really love when I see them put these photos as their profile picture and timeline cover.  It literally makes me blush. It is like taking my art and putting it out there for everyone to see. It is them bragging that they love their photos, and to me, that is what it’s all about.

Aside from that sharing capabilities and how much I love that, I ask all of my clients how they find me. I have booked only 1 wedding from Google EVER(even after paying a fortune for an SEO wizard to boost my site, womp womp). The rest of my inquiries and clients come from word of mouth and Facebook. It works for my business but I know so many that it just isn’t as powerful. Call me lucky, but I absolutely love everything about it!

It may be such a small little gesture but it assures me that they love their photos just as much as I do and that they want to share them with the world.

So, thank you to my amazing clients for sharing and helping me share my work with the world. I also want to thank anyone that has referred me or sent anyone my way. I honestly book 99% of my clients from referrals or from Facebook. So for me…I still love ya Facebook! Oh and a big thank you to those of you who let me creep on your profiles 🙂

Xo

Nicole