Facebook is constantly making it easier to run your business on Facebook and one of my favorite ways they are doing this is through their Facebook apps – including Groups, Pages, Messenger, and Facebook Ads.

So today, I’m gonna cover the basics of these different Facebook apps and how you can use them to do business on-the-go.

I spend most of my time running my businesses from my laptop, some time on my desktop, and some time on mobile.  I don’t use these apps every day, but for when I don’t have access to wifi with my laptop, (like on long  car trips or at all-day events) these apps have been invaluable.

How to Find the Facebook Apps

(Please Note: I have an iPhone, so this will be slightly different from other types of phones.)

1. Go to your app store. 
   
2. Search “Facebook Groups,” “Facebook Pages,”  “Facebook Messenger,” or “Facebook Ads”
3. These should pop up fairly easily. Click install, enter your password and then open the app! 

Facebook Groups

If you run or are active in any Facebook Groups, this app is great for keeping up to date, posting, and commenting.

Your favorite groups will be on top and the rest of your groups can be found below that in order of the most recent ones you’ve visited.

The Notifications tab will let you see all recent notifications from your groups.

The Discover tab will help you find groups based on other groups you’re a member of and your location.

Setting will show how many groups you’re a member of, how many you admin, and allow you to change setting, like your notifications of  posts.

Once inside a group, you can easily post, scroll through the posts, and comment.

This tab lets you see all group photos.

 The middle tab lets you begin a group chat, even to members who are not your Facebook friends.

This tab lets you see and create events for the group.

 This tab lets you edit your settings in the group.

Facebook Pages

I check comments on our Facebook Fan Pages almost every day.  I will either like or respond to comments in order to have more interaction with our fans  and grow the know, like, and trust factor. 

While I don’t think it’s critical to ‘like’ every comment that comes in, with my family’s business, we spend A LOT of money on our Facebook ads (as you’ll see in a bit).  Responding to questions on our ads in a timely way is the perfect way to turn a lead into a customer.  And ignoring comments literally means we are wasting our money.  Because of this, the Facebook Pages app has saved me multiple times.

 From the main tab, you can check you page, look at engagement and respond to posts, and easily write a new post.

 This tab shows you your insights, not as completely as from  a desktop, but it still gives some good information.

 This tab lets you check and respond to your fan page messages.

This tab lets you check your page notifications, which also lets you respond to comments. 

 This tab shows your settings and activity on your page.

 Clicking the 3 bars on the top, opens to let you select from the pages you manage.

Facebook Messenger

Okay, you probably know about this one. Most people have messenger more for personal reasons than for business.  But for me, it’s been great for both. 

 The Recent tab shows your messages in the most recent order.

 When  you select “New Message Request,” this is what will open.  While it’s mostly spam, it’s worth clicking “See Filtered Requests.”  When I did this I found a wonderful 2-month-old message from a parent of an old student of mine, that definitely should have been in my inbox.

 The Groups tab shows group texts.

 The People tab shows your contacts.

 The Settings tab shows your settings.

Facebook Ads

Ah, we have come to my favorite of the Facebook apps – Facebook Ads. While I would NEVER recommend creating an ad from your phone, this is great for checking in to see how your ads are performing.  Just as I check comments almost daily, I check on my ads and my ad costs just about daily.  If an ad isn’t performing how I’d like it to, I will either edit or stop the ad, and checking on them through this app is simple and quick.

One thing that’s important to know with Facebook ads – there are 3 parts to an ad, the over-arching Campaigns, the Ad Sets going to different audiences, and then the Ad itself, which includes the graphics and text.

 Under the Home tab is a ton of information about all of your Campaigns.  You can check to see info from 1 day, 7 days, 14 days, 30 days, or the lifetime of your ads.

 Scrolling down the Home tab, it’ll also show your campaign results.  In this case, it’s showing the number of conversions, since the ads I’m running right now on this account are all ads for conversions.

When you scroll further down the Home tab, you can also find info on how your ads are doing based on age, gender, and location.

 You can create ads by clicking on the + tab, but I 100% do not recommend this.  Similar to clicking the ‘Boost Post’ button on your page, starting ads from here do not give nearly enough options for setting up your ad.  Instead, I recommend starting ads from ads manager (or Power Editor) on a desktop.

 Under this tab it will show all ad notifications, including if and when ads are approved or not approved.

 When you click on a Campaign, it will open into the Ad Set, to show more analytics for your ads. such as number of conversions, cost per conversions, and reach.  Click on each ad, like where it says “HHIA lookalike Kare” for even more analytics.

There you have it  Let me know, (in the comments or in my Facebook Group) have you been using any of these Facebook apps? Which one is your favorite?