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you're finally ready. You're going to get that Facebook group going. But how do you give it the best start possible? We're going to talk about all the steps you'll want to take today. So teacher authors, go ahead and reheat that cup of coffee, because I'm your host, Cassandra Foster. And we're about to get schooled in socials. Welcome back to school and socials. We are going strong this month focusing on Facebook groups for your teacher business. But before we dive in too far, we really should chat about how to get that group set up in the first place. So today, I'm sharing each of the steps you should take to set your Facebook group up for success right from the beginning. The first thing that you have to do before you even hit that create new group button on Facebook is decide what your Facebook group will be about. What kind of community will you be creating. And I want to know, there is an important distinction here when it comes to Facebook groups, versus pretty much all of the other social media platforms you use to market your business. When it comes to Instagram, or tic tock or even Facebook business pages, people come there to follow you. But when it comes to Facebook groups, they come for the community. So even though you're creating a Facebook group in order to help up level your teacher author business, you don't want the group to just be about your store or resources. So how do you decide what kind of community you want to create? Here's a few guidelines you can follow what subjects grade levels and or topics do the majority of your resources cover? Creating a community around these will allow you to more easily suggest your resources as solutions for your community members. What are you passionate about when it comes to education, there's no reason to make this community feel like a lot of work. So cultivating one around your educational passions is key. Plus people who will recognize that passion and expertise, and you will quickly position yourself as an expert. And then finally, what kind of community could you have used as an early teacher of insert your grade level or subject here. If there was support you were looking for, you can bet that there are other teachers out there looking for that same support and a community to help them. Now once you've decided on the community you want to create, you can finally go ahead and hit that create new group button and begin setting up your Facebook group. The first thing you'll need to do is name your group. Some things to keep in mind here is that you want the name of your group to clearly tell potential community members what you're all about. Cute group names are cool, but as you know by now, we only have people's attention for a short time, so we want to make sure they know exactly what your group is about from the get go. Also, make sure to use some keywords in the title of your Facebook group. You can do some searches on Facebook using terms related to the kind of community you want to create to see what's popular. Or you can even use a keyword finder like Uber suggests to see what keywords around your topic are trending. Incorporating keywords in the title will help teachers easily find and hopefully join your group. Once you have inputted your name, you're going to want to choose Private as the group setting. This will allow you to vet potential members and not allow everyone and their mother to start conversations in your group. But make sure you choose to make the group visible. This will allow people to find the group and search. So enter your title, choose Private and then choose visible. Once you hit that create button, you're going to want to start setting parameters for your group such as your description, your group rules and your membership questions. When it comes to your Facebook group description, again, you want to be very clear on what your group is about as potential members can read that group description when they're searching for groups. You want them to know what they're going to get, and if they are a good fit for this community right away. And I've actually got a whole episode about how to write an effective Facebook group description and I'm gonna link that in the show notes for you. So you can make sure that yours is top notch when you get your group going. Then you're gonna want to review and create your group rules. So Facebook starts you out with four rules and you can tweak them tweak the wording of them. You can even add rules or you can delete rules that Facebook gave you that just don't line up with your community. But you want Want to make it clear to your community members what they can and can't do within your group? One big thing I find when working with teacher authors is they want to make sure that other teacher sellers are not joining their group and promoting their resources within that group. And so they make sure that no self promotion is really part of those rules. So that's just something to think about as you are writing and figuring out those group rules for your community. Finally, you're going to create membership questions. If you start a Facebook group and do nothing else, make sure you do this step. Because those questions are how you will decide who gets to join your community, and who doesn't. So before you run off to Canva, to make that really cute Facebook group cover, or you start writing out a lovely welcome post, make sure you have those membership questions in there and ready to go. Now, when it comes to your membership questions, you are able to create three questions as well as require people to agree to the rules before joining, I would utilize all three and make sure you have them agree to the group rules. Some potential questions you could ask could be about their teaching position. If you only want a certain subset of teachers, for example, only fifth grade teachers as part of your group, you can ask them why they want to join the community or what kind of support they're looking for. This can easily help you figure out who is truly a teacher and who isn't. For example, if you're running a special education Facebook group and ask what kind of support they are looking for, and the answer was something like I need help with writing effective IEP goals and individualizing instruction. That gives you a good indication that they are who they say they are because they know the terms and what a special educator does. And I'm way more likely to let that person into a group versus someone who just says something like any and all support would be great. So just making sure that you are asking them to give you specific information so that they can give you that specific information in return that you can use to help figure out who they really are, and if they're a good fit for your group. And you may also elect to use one of the questions to help you promote your business to incoming members. You could ask them if they have joined your email list. You can ask them if they visited your store, etc. Just letting people know who you are what you offer, and that the group is run by you. And you can set membership questions to be answered simply with like a checkbox or a poll. So that could be one that you could set up that way versus a short answer question. Now once you have these parameters in place, you can really get the ball rolling on your group. 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By simply adding a few finishing touches such as a cover photo and a welcome post, you will round out the setting up of your Facebook group But once it's all set up, what should you do? Okay, here's what I suggest. Step one, let people know you have a group, post about it on your other social media platforms, send it out to your email list. include it in your contact info and your TPT resources, or even your email signature. Just get the word out there. Let people know about you. Don't just wait for people to find your group. Step two. Make a posting schedule for yourself. So decide what kind of information you'll post about educational posts based on your long form content work great, as well as freebies, just to help you get started. Once the ball gets rolling in your group, you can tailor your content to your group's needs to help support them. And also decide how often you'll post within the group. There's no magic number of posts. The groups I helped run we typically post a few times a week, but work within your capacity so you don't burn out. Finally, decide how often you will do community management. How often will you pop into the group to vet new members and review posts and comments to make sure people are following the guidelines. I suggest at least a few times a week. But as your group grows, you might find it helpful to pop in once a day. And then step three. Enjoy your community. Yes, this group is here to help you with your business. But don't forget to enjoy connecting with other educators and learning from them because that is truly the magic of a Facebook group. So when it comes down to it, setting up a Facebook group for your teacher business is fairly simple, honing in on a topic and completing a few well thought through steps. Setting up those membership questions. You are on your way to create a community of teachers that you can quickly build know like and trust with who need your resources as a solution. And that is a big and easy win for your business. Now it's actually time to go and do the thing. So set a task on your calendar and get that group setup. And once you do, make sure to share this episode to your stories tag me and link your brand new Facebook group. I can't wait to see what amazing communities you all will create. Alright, cool coffee friends. Thanks so much for listening. If you're loving getting schooled in socials, make sure to subscribe so you don't miss an episode. Also, I would love it if you left a review so that other teacher authors like you can start getting schooled in socials too. All right, I'll see you in the next episode.