What's up? I'm Rachel Spewak and this is Rock Your Tribe Radio where community, fun, social media and business collide. I firmly believe that parties are the answer to all of life's problems. Seriously. Building a community, bringing people together for a common purpose and serving them, that's your mission as a business owner. Let's make it happen. It's time to rock your tribe.
Has this ever happened to you? You're in a Facebook group and somebody posts something relevant to your life. So you comment, and then the original poster sends you a friend request. So you accept it. And then bam, they hit you with an invitation to join their group. Ill. Nobody likes this. Nobody likes feeling like they're being poached from a group and Facebook group owners. We don't like it. When people come into our groups to mine, it for members for their group, there's got to be a better way to do this.
(01:02): And there's gotta be a magical moment and critical mass that you can reach with your group, where it grows on autopilot. And there is, and that's what we're going to talk about in this episode. How did it get to critical mass in your Facebook group? So what's critical mass critical mass is the point in which you've got enough of whatever that thing is that it's just going to attract more of whatever it is. That's critical mass. You can also think of it like the tipping point. How many members do you need in your group? So your group just grows. So let me tell you about another critical mass. I used to participate in a bike ride, a global movement called critical mass critical mass was when everybody in cities around the world would get on their bikes for a group ride on the last Friday of every month.
(01:56): And so I did this when I lived in Atlanta, we met around six o'clock on the last Friday of every month to go on this big bike ride, to jam up the streets with bikes and to make a statement that this city is where people ride bicycles. And at the time it really was not critical. Mass was the first time in my adult life. If you can call it my twenties, my adult life, it was the first time I felt like I really belonged somewhere. It gave me the sense of community that I needed. And it made me feel like I was part of something bigger than me that I really cared about that I chose. You know, it wasn't something I had to do. It was something I wanted and something I believed in and it changed my life, this bike ride, and this cultural experience inspired me so much that I helped to co-found and became the executive director of a pay.
(02:50): What you want nonprofit bicycle repair shop in Atlanta, Georgia in the early two thousands when Atlanta was not a city for cycling. In fact, bicycling magazine in 1999, named it the worst city for cycling in America. And just a few years later, my friends and I launched this nonprofit bicycle repair shop. These days I help digital entrepreneurs create engaged and profitable Facebook groups. And it's all built on my experience of community in real life, not just in the bicycle world, but as a DJ too. So this isn't a random analogy, bicycle ride Facebook groups. This is my life. This is how I got to where I am today. And I think about it all the time. And now that I've got a critical mass of people in my Facebook group and my group grows on autopilot. I want to put these concepts together for you.
(03:46): So your group grows on autopilot. And so you're not poaching people and annoying people by being an owner of a Facebook group because Facebook groups are so powerful for your business. So let's get into it. When it comes to growing your Facebook group. The first thing you need to know is that you don't need a giant group. You just, don't not in the beginning and possibly not ever. You can have an engaged group of the exactly right? People. It can be a tiny group and it can be highly monetized and a lot of fun. And your group will be more successful than it would be if it had thousands of people who didn't really belong there. So let me give you an example from critical mass, the bike ride, a giant ride was awesome. It was, but a smaller ride was way more efficient. Agile.
(04:39): You can have more personal conversations. There was less of a focus on keeping a giant group together and blocking traffic lights through many cycles of green lights, where cars really had the right of way. It was easier to guide a smaller group and keep us together. There are more people on the same page and fewer people acting out in ways that ran counter to the culture that we were creating there. This is important for growing your group because while you do want steady growth, that's important. The priority, the focus is on serving your tribe and also converting, right? Because remember you're running a business and your Facebook group is the top of your funnel. And the growth element is going to follow Facebook groups thrive on engagement. You don't want a lot of people in your group who don't care and don't belong and aren't going to engage.
(05:36): So here are some examples from clients that I work with Nathan and Jacob, both of them with less than a hundred people in their groups monetized their groups less than a hundred people because their groups are so focused and so tailored to the right people. And with Judy and Leah's groups, they have between 200 and 300 members in their groups, their coaches in different ways, and their coaching programs are booked out from their groups with less than 300 members. You just don't need a giant group to have an active and profitable group. You've heard the same advice about Facebook groups everywhere. Ask questions, add value. But what does that mean? Let me show you what a profitable engaged and a fun Facebook group looks like. And I'll pop the hood for you so you can see exactly how I do it. Join my Facebook group, rock your tribe, community. Building for entrepreneurs at rock, your tribe.com forward slash Facebook.
(06:40): You might think that growth and having a lot of followers on any social media platform, you might think that's, what's going to make you a lot of money, but it's just not true. It's about targeting the right people as we've seen in Jacobs Nathan's Judy's and Leo's groups. And another mistake I see people making with Facebook groups is not leveraging your group for new opportunities and to meet people who can open doors for you. So if you want to create an engaged and profitable Facebook group, it's not about giant numbers, at least not in the beginning, your focus needs to be on creating the right environment for the right group of people. So this brings us to topic, number two, for how to get to critical mass with your Facebook group, just do the thing inside your group and outside. So with critical mass, the bike ride, the event occurred same time, same day of every month with or without you.
(07:38): There's no leader. There's no one sending out invitations to strangers. And that's what makes it cool. If somebody was desperately trying to grow it by hassling people who didn't even ride bikes or care about bikes, it would lose all credibility. So when you're growing your Facebook group or trying to get a sale, you can't be working from the place where you have a problem and a new member or a new client solves that problem for you. That comes off as desperate, your Facebook group, just like critical mass. The bike ride needs to operate consistently to nurture a community of a specific group of people in order to be attractive to more of those specific people, which means that you need to be active outside of your group, promoting the same concepts and ideas and linking your audience back to your group without a hint of desperation, this group rocks with, or without you consider this, what do you have to offer by running your group?
(08:37): I'll give you an example from mine. I hosted a live video mini challenge where members were welcomed to go live for five minutes over a particular weekend to introduce themselves and their business. So this is like gold for a group of business owners. And I promoted this event outside of the group, too. It was so simple and it required very little work on my end. I simply invited everybody else to do something. And by promoting it outside of my group, it grew my group by 16%. The last time I ran this. So by offering something of value to my group, that's going to happen. Whether or not you join it, it's happening anyway. But by putting it out there to the rest of my network, that this is going on, and it's an awesome opportunity and it's happening with, or without you, it brought people right into my group.
(09:29): At big mistake. I see Facebook group owners making is they're not clear about who the group is for, and they're not clear about the group's purpose. The purpose is much easier to determine once you've clarified who your group is really for. And I don't mean female entrepreneurs scaling from six to seven figures. I'm talking about what flavor do they come in? Who are they really? How do they see themselves reflected in you? This is going to tell you who your tribe really is. And I have a workbook to help you get to critical mass with your group that specifically walks you through defining who your tribe is. I developed this workbook through my grow your Facebook group five day challenge. And I tested it out on the 200 people who participated and for the people who hardcore implemented their businesses and groups were transformed. You can grab my rock, your Facebook group workbook right now off of my website for a no-brainer price.
(10:26): Go get it at www dot rock, your tribe.com forward slash workbook. Okay, we've come a long way in this episode. So far, just to recap, we're going to get you to critical mass with your Facebook group, where it grows on autopilot. But the first thing you need to realize is you don't need a giant group. And the next thing you need to do after you realize this is just do the thing inside your group, outside of your group, rock your group, whether somebody joins it or not. Now I'm going to tell you something that you probably already know, but we got to talk about this. People want what they can't have, and this is really important for your Facebook group, but let's talk about critical mass, the bike ride for a second. We wanted a city where everyone rides a bike, where you're surrounded by people who care about the same things you do, where by virtue of just being there on this bike ride, you're all connected.
(11:21): And you're all friends. It felt like democracy and action. For those of us who came into it as activists, and when something is exclusive, people want it more, it appears more valuable. It seems cooler. And the reverse is true too. And this is so important for your Facebook group, because it's the top of your funnel or a part of your sales funnel. And some of your members should become clients. You want to work with people who are motivated, who have money to spend on working with you and who are take action type. And those people, your dream clients, they're not interested in a cookie cutter invitation from a person they barely know to anything, not just a Facebook group. They're smarter than that. They're savvier than that. They're looking for the right answer from the right person in the right community. And that doesn't come from a complete stranger who just fires off an invitation.
(12:18): The second you connect. So it's your job as a Facebook group owner, to put in the work, to create a community for a specific group of people. It's not field of dreams. You know that baseball movie from back in the day, if you build it, they will come. No, there are more than 10 million Facebook groups at last count and, and probably way more. Now you're in a fight for attention and then typical strategies for growing your group. Don't cut it anymore. People have caught on and they're annoyed, but there is a magical moment when your group starts to grow on autopilot. When you do get to a critical mass, and that's how my group grows. I don't invite people to my group and I don't have to. I have new members asking to join every single day because I've put in the work to make a great group.
(13:09): That's a benefit to a specific tribe of people. And for my members who are already inside my group, I've mobilized them and I've engaged them to the point that they're excited to tell their friends about my group. And when I do go to other groups and tell people about my group, it does a guest expert. I'm doing something that builds up my authority and my credibility, rather than chipping away at it. By poaching people from those groups growing and leveraging my Facebook group. It's just a part of my business. It's a part of who I am. I talk about it all the time. In fact, I have a whole podcast about it. Now, point being, I never have to go find complete strangers and tap them on the shoulder and go, Hey, get in my group because nobody likes that. Anyway, let's wrap this up.
(14:01): If you want to get your group to critical mass, here's what you got to do. Don't worry about growing a giant group. That's not your top priority. Your top priority is to do the thing. Whether somebody joins it or not, and you're going to attract the right people by being very clear about who your group is for and why they should join. And remember people want what they can't have. Did you get all of that? I have a workbook that will walk you through all of this and a little bit more. So go grab it@rockiertribe.com forward slash workbook. Thanks for being here next time. We're going to talk about why you shouldn't eliminate inactive Facebook group members from your group.
(14:40): It's going to be a good one. And remember you rock.
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