A Facebook Page is a public platform which can be used to advertise your club and your diving experience to potential members, whether they are already a diver, trained with another agency, or looking to learn to dive. It's also a great place to share club news, events and photos from dive trips!
Facebook is a powerful tool
Your Facebook Page could help your club achieve a variety of goals including:
- Increase participation in trips, training and events
- Generating new member enquiries
- Celebrating and sharing successes
- Build and strengthen relationships
- Increasing membership
- Keeping people up to date
Is Facebook right for your club?
Not every club needs to be on Facebook, although we strongly recommend it. To go in with your eyes open, here are the pros and cons.
What's great about Facebook
- It could help recruit new members and help you keep the ones you’ve got
- It's quick to set up and a club page can be easily customised with your logo, details, etc.
- Facebook users (including existing and potential members/volunteers) can easily find key information and contact details for your club
- Creates conversation about your club, promotes events and updates members
- Allows your club to be more easily found in search engines, such as Google
Things to consider when using Facebook
- Information must be relevant and updated regularly - random posts or not posting at all can leave a negative impression with your club members or those who 'Like' your page.
- Can you manage potentially negative public comments about your club? We’ve all seen posts on social media that can be negative. We have some guidance on this topic here and are always available at BSAC HQ to advise on any issues you may encounter.
- ‘Likes’ don’t necessarily equal new members, but it does mean that the information you are posting is reaching a wider audience.
If you’ve decided your club should use Facebook, remember to consider a few key things…
Who do you want to reach by being on Facebook?
Do you want to attract new members? Engage existing members? Probably both, right? The trouble can be when you start to try to make it meaningful to ALL people, the page can start to become confusing and cluttered. You’ll find that people will then ‘switch off’ when they see your posts, assuming it’s not relevant to them.
Focus on tailoring your posts and updates to make it relevant and interesting to the people you want to communicate with (such as members/volunteers).
Set up a Facebook Page rather than a Facebook Group
If you are looking to recruit fresh blood to your club and utilise Facebook as a marketing tool, then you need a Facebook Page. A page is more accessible and your content will reach more Facebook users. Get someone to 'manage' your club's Facebook Page. They should have the passion and interest to keep your Facebook page updated regularly. Follow the instructions and process on Facebook.
Tip: Giving more than one person ‘administrator’ status creates more opportunities for content be added and posts/comments/messages could be responded to more swiftly.
Use and share content from the main BSAC Facebook page
This page now has more than 33,000 ‘Likes’ and we try to get content out most days. Utilise this resource and reshare our posts - your club members may be interested. All BSAC Regions have their own Facebook Page too, so be sure to check them out as well!
Nominate a social media officer
This person should have responsibility for the set-up, management and moderation of your social media. Ensure they are aware of online safeguarding issues, and support them by making sure the rest of your club are aware of your Social media policy and their responsibilities online.
Need advice on growing your club?
Please email BSAC marketing support or call us on 0151 350 6224
