A client asked me this week how he could ban someone from commenting on his business page. This person was continually posting comments on his page that were not helpful to those who were there trying to learn more about his services and the industry. The comments were bordering on rude, since they were off topic and distracting to those who were commenting with real questions.
Facebook is such an amazing tool to help you build and promote your brand and community. And accessible communication is one of the things that makes social media so powerful and so different than traditional marketing and old school customer service management. You get to communicate with your customers and potential customers, and they get to communicate with you. When it’s good, it can be like winning the lottery. When it’s bad, it can feel like you are on stage being heckled and lobbed with tomatoes.
Your Facebook business page is a crucial part of your social media strategy. But like anything on the web, you need to moderate the activity on your page in order for you to be able to build good relationships with your customers and successfully manage your brand, image and messages. So how do you do that?
Be an active Facebook user.
You need to log on regularly and peruse any new notifications listed for your business page. Facebook makes this very easy for you. The business pages for which you are an administrator will be listed on your left menu bar on your page. There will be red flags next to them if new things have been posted since you last logged on. And when you click “use Facebook as Your Business,” you will see all the new notifications listed on the top menu bar just like when you log in to your personal profile.
Rally the troops.
You don’t have to shoulder all the responsibility. Assign administrator status to additional members of your social media team, so you can all post and moderate. Make sure you trust and have trained all your administrators on the message and image you wish to convey at all times, so you don’t undermine your efforts.
Set up safety nets.
Multiple admins is one safety net. In addition, Facebook makes it easy for you to know when something is posted even if you are not currently logged on. Administrators can choose to be emailed every time something new is posted to the page. That means when someone sneaks a comment in on the weekend when you are out of the office, you and your team will know about it.
Be responsive.
Respond to positive comments and participate. Be humble, grateful and enthusiastic about your business. And don’t automatically delete a negative comment. When someone posts a negative or scathing comment, you have an opportunity to show all who like your page that you are reasonable and care about customer feedback. Put your pride aside and be objective, instead of just being angry that someone posted something negative. Acknowledge valid customer opinions and concerns.
Remove inappropriate comments.
Sometimes, in spite of your best efforts, people are just mean and inappropriate with their opinions. You can remove any comment or post by clicking on the “x” in the upper right of the comment box. You will have a choice to remove it, hide it (which puts it in your hidden posts folder and you can unhide later, if you wish) or report the comment as abuse.
Ban repeat offenders.
If someone is consistently ridiculous, you will wonder why he bothers being a fan if he is just going to continually beat you to the ground. But some people love to stir the pot. If you just can’t seem to get this person to leave rational comments, you can either ban him entirely or just remove him from the page. Banning a person means he cannot “like” you again and cannot, of course, comment. It also removes any of his previous posts. Removing a person will allow him to “like” you again. It removes your activity from his newsfeed for a while, though, and he may not realize it for quite some time. And that is sometimes enough to stop the shenanigans.
-- Click “like this” under the number of likes you have on the left page.
-- Click “see likes” on the upper right of the Insights page. A list of all your fans will appear.
-- To remove, click the “x” and you will be be given the choice to remove that person or ban him entirely.