Is Hosting a Watch Party Actually Beneficial for Business? | Part Two
If you have not had a chance to check out our blog earlier this week ‘Network Marketers and Facebook Watch Parties | Part One‘ make sure you do that. This is where we dove into what a watch party actually is – and ways you can use it.
Based on some of the responses we received …
The primary questions remains;
Is a Watch Party Actually Beneficial for Business?
(from a customer or prospect perspective)
And what’s interesting is that although this platform launched earlier in 2018, there is still little information about its benefits. However, what we do believe is that there is enough ‘proof’ that in Facebook Groups – they are absolutely beneficial.
Presently, the jury is still out on why a personal page would benefit from this feature specifically for business. We will keep you posted though!
In today’s post, we want to dive a little deeper.
Focusing on how network marketing professionals can truly benefit from the watch party feature. And in our opinion, you want to be using them correctly otherwise it’s possible you will be doing more harm than good.
Facebook started testing Watch Party back in January, beginning with its Groups, before expanding it to selected Pages and personal profiles.
And according to Facebook, Watch Parties do indeed boost video engagement (we like this stat!);
“Since launch, there have been more than 12 million Watch Parties in Groups, and Watch Parties garner eight times as many comments than non-live videos in Groups. The number of daily Watch Parties in Groups has continued to grow, increasing 7x since July.”
After all, we all crave more video engagement, right?
Since Facebook continues to be the go-to social media platform including all generations with over 2 billion users …
… network marketers need to be strategic. Really think about how to create content. And includes content that educates, inspires, and moves the target audience on the platform to make buying decisions.
Currently, there are many ways to utilize Facebook Marketing including advertising on the platform, posting video content, sharing relevant articles to their product, sharing infographics and much more.
Now, Facebook has thought of a new way to build community. And they’ve done so through launching the Watch Party feature for Facebook Groups.
As described by their press team, a Watch Party is a ‘new way for people to watch videos on Facebook together in real time’.
So, once a Watch Party is started, people can watch videos, live or recorded, and interact with one another around them in the same moment focused on building new ways to bring people together around video, create connections, and spark conversations.
Brilliant.
Now, in relation to business …
Here are 2 ways that network marketers can be maximizing the Watch Party feature;
#1 Making Q & A’s Interactive
This primary reason is beneficial in 2 ways;
- To the audience who can receive answers to their questions and,
- For the professional who can gather a TON of user-generated content.
People love to be heard.
So, offering a training, tutorial or testimonial are all ways you can help facilitate a valuable Q & A through the watch party platform. This allows you to be truly present during the session instead of trying to multi-task when creating the content and answering questions. Those asking questions, will feel heard even more so than when you do your best on a live session or otherwise.
For the network marketing professional, user-generated content is always the best kind. Throughout the watch party (and your engagement) it can help you give you some solid ideas for creating content in the future.
It could be based on the questions people are asking, the feedback being received, commentary, etc. Take notes! Jot down what matters to your audience – this will help you continue to deliver some incredible nuggets in the future for them.
#2 Product, Service or Company Announcements
Did your company just release an excellent product video?
Has someone on your team created an incredible tutorial with your new product?
Do you have some exciting news from your company?
Using the watch party feature to create excitement around these sorts of announcements are a great tool. Essentially, they allow you to tap directly into your engaged customer. Think about it … Those who take the time to tune into your watch party may have just moved from warm to hot market.
Why?
Because they want to know!
Now given, some people are just curious individuals, and that’s OK too. Because the watch parties are typically smaller doses of content, and not specifically your content either – they are a great addition to your existing efforts.
In fact, sharing a third party resource can in fact edify you better than you ever could do on your own. Overall, like the Q & A benefits, the commentary out of these watch parties can be equally as beneficial for future delivery of content.
Additional Thoughts on using the Watch Party Feature for Business
As we know, Facebook is always looking towards new ways to tap into communities big and small, network marketers can use these new tools to strengthen their audiences. By taking action on Facebook Watch Party’s, they can take traditional marketing tactics and produce them on the social media platform that can bring together customers and prospects alike to better the product and business goals.
Lastly, a Watch Party opens up a range of new options for promotion and group ‘bonding’, while expanding the real time engagement of live content to all other video formats. Used creatively, it could be a great way to help build audience and brand recognition, and increase engagement and reach (huge pluses!)
How has Facebook Watch Party helped your business? Let us know in the comments if this is something you intend to add to your marketing efforts! In our next blog we will dive more into the team benefits of having the Watch Party implemented into your business growth.
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