If you’re the admin of a popular Facebook group, it may be time to put that group to work earning money for you. There’s no one-size-fits-all approach to monetization, as a lot of what will work for you depends on your niche, level of engagement, and group size. To attract major brands, it’s safe to say you’ll need at least 10,000 members in your group, but if you have a highly engaged audience willing to spend on high-ticket items, you can get by with 3,000 to 5,000 members.
Let’s look at how to get your Facebook group ready to earn money, and some of the ways you can bring in cash.
Overview
Prepare the Group for Monetization Opportunities
Create a Website Filled with Value-Driven Content
While your Facebook Group is where the action is, it’s important to have a website that’s similarly branded because building your business on rented land, since the Facebook platform doesn’t belong to you, leaves you susceptible to losing your audience at any given time. Your website needs to define your target audience and show the value your brand brings. Set up the Facebook tracking pixel to allow for remarketing to people who’ve visited your website, as this can help you grow your group faster.
Develop Downloadable Assets
These will make it easier to build an email list of people you can reach out to over time. Email marketing helps improve your ability to deliver sales for brand partners and earn more money at the same time. Create assets, such as checklists, guides, resource lists, and other things your audience is interested in. Giving these things away for free to get people to join your list makes it easier to sell to them later.
Use Search Engine Optimization
Take time to learn about SEO. You’ll need to create targeted content for your website and work on generating organic traffic to grow your brand and your Facebook group. Doing so will give you even more affiliate marketing potential and add to your passive income stream.
Generate Media Coverage
Media coverage helps you build backlinks and referral traffic, which are essential for SEO. It also helps spread the word about your group to boost your membership, and may even help you get on the radar of some brands you’d like to work with. Start with Help a Reporter Out (HARO), and look for
Create a Media Kit
This is essential to helping you land sponsorships and advertising campaigns, and will even allow you to command a higher rate. Include your group stats, website traffic stats, member demographics, rate card outlining the packages you offer, and case studies of past partnerships.
Ways to Monetize Your Facebook Group
There are many ways to monetize your Facebook group that could easily expand into a series of blog posts all on their own, but we’re going to cover three of the most popular options here today.
Affiliate Marketing
Affiliate marketing is a great way to earn money from your group because no matter what niche or industry you’re in, there are products and services you can promote to your members. You’ll get paid when members make a purchase. You can search for your industry/group interest + affiliate and see what comes up. Or you can join a platform like ShareASale or Commission Junction and see what brands and programs are there. Experiment with various products and services to see what your audience responds to the most, and go from there. You can also use the Amazon Associates affiliate program because these days, most everyone buys products at Amazon.
Brand Sponsorships
Marketers are starting to see the potential of using Facebook Groups, since the organic reach of the Facebook Page has meant the number of fans someone has doesn’t really matter anymore. As the group admin, you’re the primary influencer, and this where your media kit will work for you.
Think about the brands and services you use and love, and what members of your group can get value out of. Contact the companies and let them know you’re brand-friendly and would be willing to work with them to share their products and services with your group members who are part of their target audience with a sponsored post campaign.
Charge a Membership Fee for Premium Content
Facebook now offers Subscription Groups, which lets group admins charge anywhere from $4.99 to $29.99 per month to get access to special sub-groups that contain exclusive posts that are not available to members of the main group. The content can be live videos, mentorship, or expertise – or any combination. You choose what to offer, based on what you believe your members will pay for, bearing in mind that you will always have some members who will not pay to upgrade their group experience.
Members will pay via Facebook Payments, Apple Pay, or Google Pay. Apple Pay and Google Pay will be managed through the iTunes Store or the Google Play store, if members choose one of those payment methods. The app stores will take a portion of the subscription fees, and Facebook will likely eventually take a cut, as well.
This monetization approach will require some kind of premium exclusive content on your part – and it needs to be on-going to justify members keeping their memberships, so take time to plan your offerings in advance to be sure they’re ready when you need them, and offer the value your audience expects.
No matter which path you choose to use for Facebook group monetization, if your business benefits from the group interaction, you can use it to generate additional revenue. Whether you’re using it to sell your own products and services, affiliate products and services, or something else entirely, the key is not to over do the sales. If your group becomes nothing but a sales pitch or sponsored posts, you’ll lose members and engagement. Remain true to the purpose of your group – community and interaction. The money should be a bonus – not the main focus.
