How to Use Facebook as an Effective Sales Tool

At 2017 Summer NAMM, Rob Mestric of Port Mac Guitars in Australia shared how Facebook has been key to his company’s business survival and growth. He described his store as a small specialty guitar shop in a small town. Mestric wanted to expand from a regional store to an online market across Australia. Facebook was the most effective way to tell his company’s story, get new customers and sell a lot of guitars, according to Mestric.

He started with a few ideas—some that worked well and others that didn’t. He encouraged music retailers to get started and keep using Facebook for everyday marketing. Here are Mestric’s best Facebook tips. (Watch the video for examples of Facebook posts.)

ESTABLISH BEST PRACTICES FOR YOUR FACEBOOK PHOTOS
• If you wouldn’t do it in your store, don’t do it online. Try to bring the in-store experience to Facebook and your online presence. Don’t take floor shots of product.

• Make sure the product is clean before taking your photo.

• Try to avoid glaring light reflections, or edit them out.

• Take hang tags off for photos. To present the best image, remove them for the photo and put them back on later.

• Be careful to frame your photo correctly, and avoid having unsightly items in view.

• Try to light your subject or product well, or correct the lighting through editing. Simple editing with affordable software can help.

• Always watermark your photo with your logo. Push for consistency in the size, look and style of your photography, so your Facebook audience knows it’s you.

• Use inexpensive hardware and software to get great results. Try to avoid changing the actual color and finish of the guitar or product when you’re editing your photos, so the customer knows what to expect.

Mestric uses a black backdrop when taking in-store photos to make the product pop. You can sometimes use a single product shot side-by-side with three smaller pics in a vertical column. Use no more than four pics total per post.

In cases where a black background doesn’t work, use your store environment. It helps draw people into your business. These types of posts let you sell more than one product at a time. You get more bang for your buck, such as a combo photo of a guitar with an amp. Use stylistic effects, such as focus, blur, light and shadow, to make products stand out.

WHAT NOT TO DO IN YOUR POSTS
• Don’t use memes in your posts. You have four or five posts a day before you flood your audience and lose them. Mestric remarked that the time spent viewing a meme could be used to sell a guitar or product instead.

• Don’t do the same thing as everyone else. Examples include cartoon posts with hashtags (#straturday, #gibsunday and so forth).

• Don’t do birthday posts, such as, “Happy birthday, Jimi Hendrix.” Have a look around your store, find items you can take nice photos of and put them up instead.

• Don’t share content. Mestric stated he doesn’t share from manufacturers and other posts because he wants to use his airtime effectively.

WHAT TO DO IN YOUR POSTS
• Post individual items that you have in stock. Mestric stated that he focuses posts on selling a particular guitar, and once it’s sold, he moves on to the next one. In its posts, Port Mac Guitars mentions that you can get the exact guitar pictured. The copy is direct: “This can be your new instrument.”

• Discuss some point of value or feature about the instrument. Give a little information.

• Present your store’s unique value proposition. Mestric mentions free insured shipping Australia-wide and the Genius Guitar Enhancement System—a checkpoint system his company does on every guitar, which takes about two hours and sets Port Mac Guitars apart.

• Post a link to your store, every time. Without the link, you won’t have through traffic to your website, and people can’t get more information.

• Never discuss price on your posts. Once they come to your website, they can see more photos and the price.

USE FACEBOOK AUDIENCE TARGETING
• Figure out whom you’re selling to. Pull up the Boost feature on Facebook, and create an audience for a particular instrument. Mestric walked the audience through an example (with screenshots) of the process for a Steve Vai guitar he wanted to sell. You have to take your best guess.

• Create an audience aimed at people interested in your product.

• Target age limits according to the product pricing, and be discriminatory.

• Don’t include a link on Instagram. If you put a link on Instagram, it does nothing for you. Unclick the option to post to Instagram because you may get Likes about the post, but they can’t click through to you—and you can’t sell that guitar.

• Set your budget in relation to product pricing. Budget is up to you and how long you want to promote a product. In Mestric’s experience, the shorter period works better to get greater engagement. They go hard and fast with the budget and time frame to get the sale quickly. If it’s a high-end guitar, Mestric stated he’ll spend more money to get it sold.

• If you’re going to post something, make sure it’s something you can sell. If it’s a product that’s priced low, don’t boost it. Otherwise, consider boosting all of your posts.