Do you have a Facebook Group?

Or have you wanted to start a Facebook Group?

One thing that stopped me from having a Facebook Group for the LONGEST time is that I felt like I didn’t have time to run one because I see admins of Groups being inside their community ALL THE TIME.

I don’t have time for that!

But one day, I was talking with my friend, Laura Pence Atencio from Social Savvy Geek, where she told me, “Monica, you don’t have to be in your Group all the time. Just go Live in it once a week and post something once a week.”

And as I began to think about that, I thought, “I could do that!”

That is why I interviewed Laura inside my Facebook Group, The 6-Figure Momma, and sharing with you through this blog! The blog will only contain a portion of the interview, so be sure to check out the video to watch the entirety of it.

Laura go ahead and introduce yourself.

Hello, I’m Laura Pence Atencio, and I have been helping speakers authors and podcasters to increase their income and impact without sacrificing their time freedom, which is a really big deal and kind of relevant to the conversation we’re going to have today.

Myths of Being a Facebook Group Admin

I’m going to address a couple of minutes about Facebook groups that make people not want to have one and not want to be in one, and one of those myths is that you have to be as the administrator, you have to be super active personally within the group.

You have to share every day or multiple times a day, and you’ve got to have all these posts in there.

And that is a method, but I don’t like it, because then you have people saying, “There are 1000 Facebook groups that I’m in and I’m not joining them. People are adding me to them and I didn’t join them and now I’m previewing 1000 groups, and they’re also busy busy busy, and it’s just a time suck.”

It can be, so that’s not the kind of group that we’re setting up, so my group is really low-key, really low-key.

What does Low-Key mean for you in your Facebook Group?

So what that means for me is, there are no engagement posts.

I’m not going to ask you what you had for a meal or if you like broccoli, I don’t care and you’re busy, we’re all busy professionals, and I don’t want you spending any time within my group that isn’t actually serving you with something that’s going to improve your life.

Nobody cares.

And there’s, there’s literally 1000 other groups every day that are doing that stuff. So it wastes time.

With that being said, what I do within my group is typically I post when I have something important to say.

I answer group questions so people ask questions to me privately and then I’ll go and do a live video and answer questions and people can bring questions to that as well.

And I do two live trainings per month where I bring people in to teach.

And as you know, when you come in to teach in my group, you only mention your services or program one time.

You can mention them once, but it’s not going to be a thinly veiled sales pitch it has to be value-driven.

Everything is about building a community and helping them, and serving them. And some people think if you’re not posting every day, the algorithm won’t like it (which isn’t true).

So Laura, how do we have a low-key, high-converting Facebook Group?

I’ll tell you exactly what to do, is that okay? Literally you could download this video do it. Although I do have a checklist.

Anyway, so first you got to set your group up, obviously, keep it super simple and if you already have a group and it’s not relevant to what you’re doing, just make a new one.

I made a new [group at] the end of December, first week of January, and I think I’ve got somewhere around 400 members, and I’m not trying to grow it to huge numbers.

I would like for it to be around 1000 people, because I don’t need numbers, it’s not a numbers game.

Pick a name that’s relevant, don’t overthink it, it really doesn’t matter what it is as long as it makes sense to the people who are in it.

Create an image banner from the top, obviously, add a group description, and then it’s very important that you create a pinned announcement post that includes a welcome video.

In that video, you tell people who you are, what you’re doing, what the group is about, and offer them something that they can get.

Whether that’s a demo or a call, or a cheat sheet or it doesn’t matter, offer them something and then link to that something in the description.

Then create three posts and post them about whatever topics are relevant to your group, that’s it.

That’s all you have to do before you start inviting people in.

The second key to this is, aside from having a group, you will need to be messaging people to invite them into your group through Facebook Messenger.

Before you start, you’re gonna want to create scripts, and then you really want to want to be scripted.

If you don’t have a script, you can’t test, you can’t see what’s working and what’s not working, plus, and this is critical.

You’re not gonna want to do this for yourself forever. I don’t do this myself, I have a Virtual Assistant who handles 95% of these tasks that I’m talking about on my behalf.

I answer questions that she doesn’t already have my answer, pre-recorded to, and I come in, and I do my own calls if somebody gets on my calendar, I speak to them obviously.

Most of the messages that are going out are from a script. It’s copy and paste, but the key is it has to feel super personal so you need to make sure that your scripts are yours.

You need to write them, they need to be in your words and they need to make sense that people are sending them to.

But if you’re looking for your ideal client and you know your ideal client and you’re talking to them all the time, then you are going to need to say the same thing to everybody because that’s the thing that works.

So, what you need to say is “Hi, I have a group, here’s who it’s for. Here’s what it’s about. Is it okay if I add you?”

Don’t you dare add someone without asking them first. It is so rude!

Ask somebody if you could invite them, and then they’ll either say “Yes thank you for asking” which is what people say to me all the time, or “No thanks I’m in too many groups”.

In which case you could say, “I totally get that, this one is super low key, but no hard feelings”, or whatever you say.

That’s what I say about mine, it’s super low key, and then you, assuming they come into the group, accept them into the group.

I like to ask three questions in order to join the group and one of them is, “What is the one question you need to have answered or what do you need from the group?”

Because then I know what they want and I can actually give it to them and answer those questions in the group. It’s free-market research people.

Second question, “Please introduce yourself, how do you like to be introduced in a group?”

My Virtual Assistant will copy and paste that into the group to introduce them, which we’ll get to in a minute.

The third question is, “If you would like tips and tricks, or information about strategy, put your email.”

It is not required that they add an email, but about a third of people do put it, even though it’s not required.

And then once they’re accepted now, you have to grab that information. Once you hit Accept it’s gone.

So you got to copy it and put it in a spreadsheet or use a CRM tool to get the information, accept them, then you message them in Messenger and say, “Thank you for being in the group. I really appreciate you being there, so awesome to have you.”

Then you go back to the group, and you take the snippet they gave you about how they like to be introduced and you introduce them.

But you don’t do it in one of those group posts where it’s like 50 people who just joined.

You take that snippet, and you put it on your welcome video, and then another post, and that makes your group look super active and busy, even if it’s not.

And the algorithms like this and then people come in and they like and comment and you welcome them, which is engagement.

So you don’t have to do fake engagement you create real engagement.

After your welcome video’s got about 50 comments on it, then you can start alternating between other posts.

So then you go back to messenger and you say, whatever it is that you say to people.

It’s a relationship, these are real humans so you have to say something to them that makes sense, like, “Hey, you know, I’ve seen what you’re doing. I’m really impressed with you and what can I help you with? What’s going on in your life that I can help you with?”

It depends on who you are and your industry is what you would say at that point, but it’s basically saying, “Hey I see you. I can help you. Can I help you?”

So then you’re keeping track of who joins and who doesn’t join.

How do we monetize our groups?

Okay so the next thing is after you say, “Hey, can I help you”, you send them an invitation to get on your phone or zoom with a calendar link, use a schedule.

You do not want to go back and forth with people about when they can talk to when they can’t talk.

You can use Acuity, you can use Calendly and use Book Like a Boss, just have a system and stick to it.

And then in your group, you know, post two or three times a week do video or write long-form, or what your audience likes.

I only do really a few lives because I like written posts, but I’ll do long written posts and I’ll ask questions and you can run your content however you run the content that is completely up to you.

But make sure that every comment within your group always gets a like and a comment back.

Don’t ignore anyone ever. Somebody said something you reply to that.

You send requests using your scripts, you welcome people, and you invite them to a call.

And it sounds ridiculously simple, and it sounds ridiculously easy. It kinda is.

I consistently get between three calls on my calendar on slow weeks to 6-10 calls a week on my calendar.

The call is a connection call and you do pivot a connection call from a sales call when it makes sense to do so but you ask upfront, at the beginning of the call, you set the rules, and let them know if there’s a way we can work together I’ll let you know at the end.

And if you don’t feel comfortable doing the sales call on the same connection call you can always schedule another one.

What is the conversion rate from those calls Laura?

Right now it’s about 30%, which just so that you know, if I get somebody like referred to me by a person my conversion rate is usually 70 to 90%.

The conversion rate is lower, but this is free, aside from I pay my virtual assistant.

But let’s say it costs me $350 a month for a virtual assistant and the programs that I’m selling are between $3,000-$5,000.

So I really, really don’t mind paying a virtual assistant to do this.

What is going on with you and your business right now?

So I’m Social Savvy Geek everywhere, and in that link you’ll see my website, my email list, and my Coaches Compass Inner Circle Facebook Group if you want to see how I run my group come on in.

Watch the full interview below!