The Secret Words that generate the biggest interaction from your Facebook posts.
Which secret word hits the spot when it comes to inspiring your Facebook followers to engage with your latest status update?
And which hugely popular word doesn’t seem to do much good at all, despite getting used millions of times every day by business page owners?
It’s very tempting to kick off this new article from the Martin Print Blog with a dramatic Call-to-Action which urges you to “READ THIS NOW!!!”
But would that really encourage you to read further, or is it much more likely to put you off completely?
Let’s take a look at How to craft the perfect Call-to-Action in a Facebook post…
Down at Smokey Joe’s Business Bar this week, I was having an intriguing chat with Sharp Simon.
He expressed his total bafflement at the results he was getting from his Facebook business page posts.
Sharp Simon generally publishes around two to three status updates every working day, but he seems to generate wildly differing results from them.
“I’ve come to the conclusion that it’s all just totally random,” he admitted in a defeated tone.
“There are times when I write a fairly low-key post which takes me by surprise and attracts a whole stack of Likes, Comments, and Shares.
“Then there are other times when I feel as if I’ve written a really strong and powerful status update…which ends up doing absolutely nothing!”
Taking the prickly issue of Promoted Posts out of the equation for now (although you might like to read my article on Pay to Play Facebook for further insight on this topic), it appeared to me that Sharp Simon’s hit-and-miss results were simply a matter of wordplay.
In particular, the success or failure of his Facebook posts largely depended on the choice of language he was using in his Calls-to-Action.
A recent report from TrackMaven has examined over a million and a half posts from Facebook business pages to assess which secret words were working wonders and generating real interaction.
It also revealed which types of Calls-to-Action were falling flat and driving readers away in droves.
So what exactly is the best secret word of all to use in a Facebook status update?
READ THIS RIGHT NOW TO….sorry, hang on, I lost my concentration there for a second. I’m sure there’s no need to be quite so pushy.
Ahem. Why not take a look at some of the findings below?
Get Rid of the ‘Now’…NOW!!!
When you’re hoping to create a sense of urgency within your posts and you’re trying to get your readers to respond immediately, it’s perfectly natural for the word NOW to creep into a Facebook status update.
More often than not, it will be accompanied by a dramatic exclamation mark or three.
I’m sure you’ve already seen hundreds or thousands of promotional pieces which include NOW in the Call-to-Action.
For example;
“RING THIS NUMBER NOW TO CLAIM YOUR SUPER-SAVER SOFA DEAL WITH FREE COFFEE CUP STAIN! OFFER MUST END TOMORROW! DO IT NOW! NOOOOOW!!!!”
Here’s the thing, though.
It doesn’t really work.
The report from TrackMaven suggests that the word ‘Now’ is actually one of the weakest Call-to-Action words of all, generating very few results in comparison to some of the other words that business owners have been using with far more success…
The Number One Secret Word
So what’s the most powerful word of all to use in a Facebook status update?
What’s the strongest possible word to throw into a Call-to-Action and give yourself a better chance of generating a response?
Hold onto your hats, you may be surprised by the answer.
I’m delighted to report that the top-scoring word is…
Please.
Yup. It would appear that we all appreciate gentle politeness much more than pushy demands.
The report found that Facebook posts containing the word Please generated almost double the user engagement of posts that did not.
So, instead of aggressively insisting that your audience must immediately click on your link or give you a call, it seems to work out much better if you just ask them nicely.
Hooray for the power of good manners!
My faith in humanity is restored.
Ask to Share?
If you’re keen to get readers to pass on your content using the power of the Facebook Share button, one popular strategy is to simply ask them somewhere in the status update!
For example;
“Please share this post this with your friends and pass on my amazing marketing news which will help me to make more money!”
It’s a tactic which I’ve never felt comfortable using very often on the Martin Print Facebook page.
To me, it almost seems a little bit…cheeky.
I’ve always felt that the decision to share a post should come from the individual user, and prompting them to share may do more harm than good.
There is a big part of me that still feels this way.
However, the figures from the report speak for themselves.
Posts that contained the word Share attracted almost twice as much interaction than posts that did not.
So, it’s certainly a strategy worth considering.
Of course, if you put the top two powerful words Please and Share together, you could be onto a real winner…
A Point about Punctuation
Finally, here’s the result which I found to be the most surprising of all.
Would you say that exclamation marks would help or hinder the impact of a Facebook status update?
I’ve always believed that exclamation marks are a particularly powerful form of punctuation when used sparingly.
On a personal level, I can’t help but get a little bit annoyed when people go completely overboard with way too many exclamation marks.
For example;
Our Novelty Giraffe-Shaped Pencil Sharpeners are Half Price This Week Only!!! Half Price!!!!!! Half!!!!!!!Price!!!!!!! Aaaaaaargh!!!!!!!!!
However, the report findings have again confounded my own expectations.
It turns out that exclamation marks aren’t quite as universally annoying as I thought.
In fact, the study found that there was a direct positive connection between the number of exclamation marks used in a status update and the overall effectiveness of the post.
Over 70% of the posts in the study did not include an exclamation mark at all, whilst over 20% of the posts contained just one.
Only 2% of the posts contained four or more.
Yet the biggest results came from those posts with multiple exclamation marks. In fact, the highest interaction success rate was generated from the tiny number of posts that dared to include a whopping seven exclamation marks in total!
Similar results were found in relation to the use of Question Marks.
This is perhaps much more understandable, as posts that ask a question are naturally more likely to generate responses.
Would you agree?
But I’m still surprised by those findings on the exclamation marks.
Seven exclamation marks is the optimum number for a Facebook post!!!!!!!
It would seem that more really is more.
So, how much importance do you place on the Call-to-Action contained in a Facebook post?
Are there any types of words, phrases, or punctuation which you find to be particularly annoying?
And are you more likely to make a dramatic demand or a polite request?
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