If managing your small business’s Facebook presence has become the bane of your existence, Facebook Business Suite promises a solution—but does it deliver? Let’s take a deep dive into the ins and outs of this relatively new app and see how it can help your business.
Facebook Business Suite Features
Facebook Business Suite streamlines the management of your Facebook and Instagram profiles by allowing you access to both in a single place (business.facebook.com on desktop or a standalone app on mobile). From here, you can:
• Draft posts for Facebook and Instagram
• Schedule posts in advance for both platforms
• View insights to understand what’s working and what isn’t • Create and run ad campaigns
• Boost posts
• Manage messaging
• Stay up-to-date with policy and terms of service changes • Engage with commenters and followers
• View notifications and alerts
• Use the Commerce Manager tool
• Edit page settings
If you’ve tried to manage your business’s social media activity on each individual channel or app, you’re well aware of the challenges involved, but most third-party apps leave a lot to be desired. Facebook Business Suite allows you to manage the two most popular social media platforms in one place, with an app designed by and for these services for a more seamless integration.
Even better, if Facebook and Instagram are the only channels you use for your business, ditching a third-party social media management tool for Facebook Business Suite can save you money on hefty subscription fees, freeing up more of your budget for advertising.
Facebook Business Suite Highlights
Facebook developed Facebook Business Suite to meet the needs of small businesses that were impacted by the pandemic; this mission is apparent in many of its features, like setting up personalized saved replies to common questions and messages.
On the Home screen, you’ll find notifications and updates from your Facebook page and Instagram account, including likes and comments. You’ll see insights on posts and data from your recent ads on this page as well. Jump to Activity to see a list of interactions on both social media channels.
Perhaps our favorite feature is the unified Inbox, which lets you manage messages from your Facebook page, Instagram account, and Facebook Messenger all in one place. You can set up autoresponders and filters here, too. If your business receives a lot of private messages, this feature alone makes Facebook Business Suite worth the download.
When creating and scheduling posts, you can choose whether to post on Facebook, Instagram, or both, then view insights for each channel after your post is published.
Facebook Business Suite Downfalls
There’s a lot to love about Facebook Business Suite, but there are some significant downfalls to be aware of.
Facebook Business Suite is glitchy. A quick glance at reviews for the app show a number of complaints regarding glitches, poor design, and malfunctioning features. While we like the idea behind Facebook Business Suite, the execution has been frustrating for many small businesses.
A one-stop-shop…or is it? The idea is that Facebook Business Suite allows you to completely manage your Instagram and Facebook presences in one place, but there are still separate apps for Facebook Analytics, Creator Studio, and Facebook Adverts Manager, which means you still have to toggle back and forth. It’s also hard for someone running a small business and doing their own social media to understand which app to use for any given task.
Facebook and Instagram aren’t the same. But with Facebook Business Suite, many small businesses that are short on time will create a single post to share on both Facebook and Instagram. This is convenient, but strategically, it’s not ideal! There’s a way of wording a post and call-to-action on Facebook that’s different on Instagram, and vice versa. Your posts may fall flat on one or both channels if they’re not tailored to the platform they’re being viewed on.
Elevate Your Facebook Presence with Jus B Media
Jus B Media offers social media training to help you get up to speed with both Facebook and Instagram. Too overwhelmed to manage your business’s social media presence? We’ve got you covered there, too—we provide social media management packages so you can focus on what you do best while we boost engagement and generate buzz. Contact us today to learn more about our services.
