In our modern age, we are already spending more time online than we are with any other media. To add to that fact, we are spending a lot of that digital time with our mobile devices–and, most of our mobile device time is spent using apps.
So, why don’t you have an app for your business yet? If you focus on just the U.S. market, Americans are spending over five hours per day in the digital world–around two hours of that time is spent on mobile devices. This is up 575% from 2010. This shows that customers want and need the simplicity and focus which apps provide. And, with Facebook being the largest social media site to date, it makes sense to build a Facebook app. We will share the benefits below
What is a Facebook app?
The Facebook App Center is where you can find apps and games. All you have to do is search for a specific game or app by entering its name into the search box. You can also use the search box to find the app’s website and send the app to your phone or tablet. Facebook apps are designed to utilize the core technologies of the Facebook platform. They also integrate Facebook’s notifications, news feed, social channels and other features to help generate interest among Facebook users.
Building a Facebook app
To create a Facebook app, you need an account. You then need to add the Developer application to your Facebook profile and click “Set Up New Application.” After that, you will name it, agree to the terms and load your logo. The good news is you don’t need extensive coding skills to create a Facebook app. However, you do need to have some basic knowledge of PHP and MySQL.
Also, all apps are written in HTML, Javascript and CSS. Plus, you can use any What You See Is What You Get (WYSIWYG) HTML editor to write the content you want displayed in your Facebook application. The Graph API is the core of the Facebook platform. It uniformly represents objects in a graph, as well as the connections between them such as relationships, shared content and photo tags. Once you’ve created your app, anyone can add it to their profiles. Of course, you can always get help.
Benefits of Facebook apps
- Increased engagement. There are many reasons to create a Facebook app such as using it to promote competitions, special offers, events and contests. This helps to involve people with your brand and to build relationships. In addition, it encourages people to interact with your brand.
- It increases web traffic. If you promote your app through Facebook, you can then increase web traffic to your site.
- Improves customer retention. Your app can add value to your existing customers by making it easy to interact with your brand. They also want to know that you are active and engaged. By ensuring a steady stream of relevant content, you create more opportunities for customer retention and up-selling.
- Enhance brand awareness. The whole world uses Facebook. If you showcase a well-designed app, it can elevate the image and profile of your company with your target market. It shows you have technological and business savvy. Plus, you make it convenient for your prospects to find you.
- New customer acquisition. By creating an app on Facebook, you can find customers that you might not have found through other means such as online advertising. It can also be used as a lead generation tool for reviewing potential prospects’ profiles as a means of qualifying leads.
- It’s cool. Having an app on Facebook is deemed as exciting. You can never tell who is using Facebook. To illustrate, a prospect may be doing research on your company and check Facebook to see if you have a presence there. They see your app and a few positive posts about your brand. This could be one of the deciding factors over whether or not they utilize your goods and services. The fact is, Facebook continues to gain in popularity and that isn’t not going to decline significantly any time soon.
- A viral effect. Facebook has the leverage to make content go viral. One post or one app can be shared millions of times. This takes word-of-mouth to an entirely different level. Crowds attract more crowds. When prospects see their friends using and liking your app, that will influence their decision.
Some of the most popular and successful Facebook apps include Buffer and Glassdoor.
Facebook continues to break down walls and expand in ways no one ever expected. It is a social media giant in every sense of the word. This is why, you need to have an app on Facebook and the sooner, the better.
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