How to Leverage Your Facebook Business Pages: Insights from Emeric Ernoult of AgoraPulse

It’s been almost a year since I first became a social media manager, and I admit, one of the major problems I’ve encountered with the pages I’ve handled is their lackluster performance. While the figures say that they do have good engagement, they still seemed boring. But later on I’ve realized that there’s more than just the numbers that count; rather, it’s more about utilizing the features of Facebook that makes brands functional and productive on social media.

These are basically the things I’ve learned in my interview with Emeric Ernoult, CEO and founder of AgoraPulse, one of the most talked about Facebook CRM platforms present today. He is also the founder of affinitiz.com, a social media agency that initially focused on creating niche-targeted social networks for businesses.

The Real Problems of Brands on Facebook

1. Some brands are just not sexy.

“There are brands are just not sexy to be on Facebook,” says Emeric. “Sure, there are brands that have the better advantage to be on Facebook because a majority of their audience already has the interests related to their line of business. It is easier for them to conduct their campaigns because audiences can immediately interact with them.”

“However, there are brands, such as those in the B2B industry, are not in line with the marketing strategies being used on Facebook,” he continues. “Hence, Facebook isn’t for them. But there are other platforms, like LinkedIn, where they can better connect and do business with the right audiences.”

2. Clients don’t have a plan.

“You may already know this, but still, most clients still don’t have a plan for their brands when they enter social media.” he recalls. “They simply join the bandwagon without really knowing what to do once they’re there. “

“They still rely on the basic misconception that Facebook is the end goal, which is not the case. So once they have their fans, driven traffic to their sites, they don’t know what to do next.”

3. Clients don’t understand the metrics.

“Most clients do not understand Facebook metrics,” Emeric admits. “But this is understandable. For one, Facebook insights are not optimized, and there are a lot of metrics to look at. They don’t know which metrics are relevant for their current campaign.”

OpenGraph: The Underutilized Facebook Feature

When I asked Emeric about the features of Facebook that brands should utilize, he introduced me to a relatively new word: OpenGraph. Although I’ve already seen OpenGraph in another social media marketing presentation, the concept is still fresh in my head. However, I was surprised when he told me that OpenGraph has been in existence since 2010.

“OpenGraph is a tool on Facebook that allows brands to have a social media layer on their website.” He explains. “It allows visitors of a website to do many things on the site itself using Facebook, without necessarily going to the Facebook page. These include logging in to the site via Facebook, or liking and commenting the brand’s site features, and these activities will be published on the user’s Facebook profile.”

“There are many things that you can with OpenGraph, because it practically integrates Facebook with the brand’s direct products and services and other on-site features. You’re more kept in the loop regardless if you’re on Facebook or not.”

“The main problem with OpenGraph is that it is a rather complex feature, as of course compared to simpy setting up a Facebook page for the brand.”

Understanding Facebook Metrics via AgoraPulse

As Emeric mentioned earlier, Facebook metrics can be difficult to understand. Hence, AgoraPulse was designed to serve the purpose of presenting Facebook metrics in a more user-friendly manner, for clients to view the relevant metrics of their brands without taking extra effort.

But what makes AgoraPulse stand out?

“Apart from being a more affordable CRM platform for Facebook brands, we in AgoraPulse present Facebook metrics in a way that clients could find opportunities for leverage,” explains Emeric while at the same time being candid. “As you can see, Facebook’s insights are not optimized. And metrics change, like within 6 months or 1 year. The metrics that you use today may not be the same metrics that can gauge your brand’s performance on Facebook in the next few months. We then make it a point to keep up with the changes to provide the important figures that may help our clients’ current marketing campaigns.”

“AgoraPulse also offers the ‘qualification metric,’” he adds. “The qualification metric helps clients identify their most important fans, those that are always active in their pages, and this is something not present in other CRM platforms.”

“We not only provide CRM, but also apps integration, and other tools that can make Facebook marketing much easier. Right now we have tools for moderation, scheduled third party content posting, and many other apps.”

Solutions to Improve Social Media Campaigns

As we reached the end of the conversation, Emeric only gave me one important piece of advice that I surely treasure from that day forward. It is to continue learning.

“For page owners,” Emeric begins his final words. “Don’t stop learning. You have to learn the Facebook ecosystem so you can find areas to boost your brand’s marketing goals. Attend webinars, and take part of conferences, like the Social Media Success Summit. These events may cost a fee, but you are able to learn vital information from the experts, the people who have learned and mastered the ins and outs of social media the hard way. You can learn not only from the concepts they’ve developed, but more importantly from their experiences in discovering more n what social media has to offer.”

In the effort to provide better business solutions to brand owners and other related clients, AgoraPulse is on the works of extending their trial period from 14 days to 2 months, no credit card check-in required.