How to Turn Facebook 'Likes' Into Sales

:( Sorry! Your browser cannot play this video either because javascript is disabled or your browser is not HTML5 compatible. Try Chrome or Firefox.

In just two years, Hello Music built a Facebook musician community of 400,000-plus members. This drives 25 percent of the company's sales, according to Hello Music President Rick Camino. At Summer NAMM 2013, he shared proven tricks, tips and tactics for getting more Facebook "likes" and turning those "likes" into sales. Highlights from the video: Generate More 'Likes' "One of the most powerful tools that we have in terms of recruiting members on Facebook is sweepstakes," Camino said. "We actually promote sweepstakes within unique tribes of musicians. "We give away aspirational products essentially in trade for social endorsement. So if you want to enter in the sweepstakes, you've got to 'like' Hello Music. And often, we actually ask you to 'share' Hello Music. What that results in is somewhere between 400 and 500 new members a day, all through viral marketing. "The next step in the process to becoming a member of Hello Music is [we] will actually incentivize you to invite your friends. So through the Facebook API, we can actually serve up a little modal that says, 'Would you like to invite your Facebook friends?' … And in doing so, for every three members that actually sign up, we give you a $5 credit that you can use anywhere on the site." Keep Users Engaged "The call to action is not necessarily only to purchase, but it's also to engage. You can tell us if you like it. You can make comments on it. We get plenty of, 'I love this,' and plenty of, 'I would not buy this.' And it's an open forum for people to tell us what they like. And, in fact, our members become our most powerful salesmen in most cases. "Once our members become customers, we actually ask if it's OK that we share their purchases on their social media wall. In most cases, it's a form of social status to actually share what you've purchased, especially if it's an aspirational buy. And most [customers] allow us to actually share their purchases on the social wall, which then results in inquiries and more members." Design Considerations "The platform is visual. I would say the power of visual to copy is probably 10 to one, so make sure that you're posting really quality, hot pictures. "Make the guitar look hot. Put it in the lifestyle setting. Take your own photos. Whatever your presentation is, make it unique, special and different, and you'll see a 10x response rate." Convert 'Likes' Into Sales "One of the things we do is presales. So we give them early access to some of the hottest products and services that we have. "We do exclusives. We actually buy products or curate services specifically for the Facebook community that are only available for those on Facebook. "We do polls and surveys to our community. If we're debating what color guitar we should buy, if we should buy a particular drum set, if there's a new piece of electronics that's come out, sometimes we'll just engage the community behind the scenes. We recently did a behind-the-scenes survey and had 1,500 people participate in less than 48 hours. Pretty powerful information. "Coupons and promotions—incredibly powerful. If you're going to have a weekend sale, you can start promoting on Thursday night through Facebook. "We've also had a tremendous amount of success with trivia. Featuring fans, making your customers heroes of the products is important. "Respond to any and all constructive feedback online. I would say that half of what we get is not necessarily what we want to hear. But you've got to respond to it. You've got to engage it. It's an open forum. It gives you authenticity, and it gives you credibility."