Facebook-sharing is caring

I love Facebook! Before I was ever a blogger, I was a facebook junky. I love seeing what everyone's up to and it's allowed me to keep tabs on friends and family that, well, I probably wouldn't just pick up the phone to call on a regular basis. As a blogger, Facebook is an invaluable resource for me. And it's FREE.

Hopefully you're reading my tips and finding a few things you can do to make facebook work for you. I wrote about setting up your page and sharing your photos here. Before we move on to Sharing, I just want to restate when you share your posts-SHARE A PHOTO! I did a test, just to verify what I already knew. I shared a link of my Homemade Nutella-just the link with a nice little comment.

Woohoo, 16 people liked it and it was shared by someone one time. I posted this at my prime time-7:30pm.
I scrolled back to when I posted this same post but as a photo with a link in the comments.

Do you see how many likes it got? 133 people liked it. But whats even better is this photo was shared 114 times!!! And this photo isn't even that great, it was rejected by all the photo sites, but that's another post.

Share a Photo people!

So now that I've convinced you to share photos, it's time to talk about sharing. Not your posts but other stuff.  The cute picture of a puppy, the funny saying, another page's post. Reminder, this is what works for me, so don't shoot me. Take the position of your reader. Why did they come to like your page in the first place? Probably because of the delicious food you post. (or whatever your blog is about) After liking a zillion other pages to make sure they'd come "like" me back, I now had a wall full of posts. I love when my food friends share more food. It's how I get ideas, find more friends and when I go visit, I know that we have something in common. Sharing things on your page just to fill space will annoy your readers. Sharing things on your page that have no relevance to what your page is about will annoy your readers. I'm a food blog, so if I start sharing photos about dinosaurs, I'm going to annoy my readers, and after a while they will probably start to "unlike" me.

Decide what you are about and stick with it. I'm a sweet, nothing healthy about me, food blog. So guess what I try to share with my readers. Sweet, yummy treats! That's what my readers expect. This doesn't mean don't ever share the cute photo of your kids on the first day of school, just don't make it an everyday habit unless you blog about kids. This also doesn't mean you shouldn't share the cute sayings. Just know that it's what the readers will learn to expect from you.

Sweet Tea and Cornbread is always sharing cute photos and sayings

 It works for her. And posts like this are great for getting your page name out there. Two things I want to note on this post. First, it won't take people to her blog, just her facebook page. And second, Make sure when you share a photo, if you did not take the picture then don't share it with out sharing the love (photo credit.)

When I share on Facebook I try to share photos that will either take the reader to my blog or to someone else's blog. There is so much good stuff out there, I don't need to use "filler" to clog up my wall and my reader's.

Think of it as paying it forward. Find something someone else has posted

In your comments tag the page you got it from (to tag on facebook, use the @ sign then with no spaces type in the page name,  @the cooking actress)  say something nice and hit the share button. Also when I share I leave a comment on the original post "this is so yummy I just have to share" or something like that. I honestly love this Cinnamon Streusel Coffee Cake from the Cooking Actress so I'm pretty sure my readers will too. And Kayla put the link to her post in her comments so my readers can either go to her facebook page (because I tagged her) or go straight to the coffee cake post. Win, win.

We used to be able to do "shout outs" on Facebook. you know how those went

These used to be great when we could see who "tagged" us. But honestly, I don't think most fans took the time to go like all my friends. Those likes and comments were from the pages I tagged. I'm kinda glad facebook took the tagging notification away from us. It has cut down on these type of posts. If you want me to like someone's page, show me why I should. Share a photo from the page with a tag and nice comment in the caption.

Here's why you should share other pages yummy stuff. We can still see who is sharing from our pages. And we check it, at least I do. And if you're a nice person, you'll probably return the favor. Pay it forward, Share it first! Remember that Nutella up above?

My Imperfect Kitchen shared it and 20 more people shared it from her post!

Now I do occasionally do a mini shout out but hopefully my readers don't get annoyed by it. I disguise it. Don't cut out the middle man you found the post from.

There's a trend on facebook, having a party on your page. There's usually a theme. Above, you see Mom, What's for Dinner? was having a dessert party. Everyone heads over to her page and shares a dessert photo with the link and then Mom will share the posts with her fans. Big win for all of us going to the party. But pay it back. Don't just post and run. If it's good enough for you to share to them, then share it back. I try to find something posted by someone else at the party and share it with my fans, tagging both the host of the party and the owner of what I'm sharing. In this case it was The Fountain Avenue Kitchen's Blueberry Crisp.

Facebook Parties can be huge for both the host and the attendees. But they are a ton of work for the host. Sumptuous Spoonfuls Did an A-Z challenge about a month ago. Each Day she would take the letter of the day, choose an ingredient, give the health benefits of it then invite everyone to share their appropriate photos and links on her page. She then shared them with all her readers. Any time I was able to participate, my likes would go nuts. I'll never be able to pay Ann back for all the good she brought to me but any time I can share something of hers, that I know my readers will like, I try to. I loved this Chocolate Oatmeal she posted for Xocolatl (Chocolate.) Ann's starting a new party series on Facebook. Fit and Fun Fridays. I can't wait to see everything that gets shared from that party!

I say this about blogging and I'll say it about facebook. Your readers have already found you! Share the love and help them find others through sharing on facebook, links on your blog posts. It will come back to you eventually. Just like growing your blog takes time, so does developing social media. It won't happen over night but it will happen. And the more your Facebook page grows, the more people will see your photo with a link, from your blog, and click over to read more.

Think quality not quantity. Remember to keep your readers in mind. After all, I'm a blogger but I'm also a reader, aren't you? How do you use Facebook?

You can find my posts on Pinterest here- How I use Pinterest and How I Pin. Next week, we'll start on Twitter and since I'm such a twit that I don't know how to Tweet, I've asked my friend Carla from Chocolate Moosey to hold our hands in the land of Twitter.

Also, in case you haven't heard, I finally found the perfect blogging conference. Online Blogcon. No travel, only $15.00 for the entire conference and they're doing a giveaway for a Kindle Fire! I'm even going to buy new pajamas for the conference, maybe slippers too. Want to look my best while attending the conference!

I'm linking up at some of these great parties.