People generally start a Facebook group to build their branding by increasing their audience and therefore increasing potential sales.   So, with that in mind, you need to know a bit about the group you are joining.

Here are a few tips when joining groups and how to behave when in the group.

• Before joining the group read and understand the rules and be sure to follow them.
• Record on your calendar what days they allow what and take advantage of it.  I suggest a spreadsheet of all the groups you are on and what day you are going to post what. This way you don’t have to spend time every day trying to see where you can post, it will be right in front you.
• Read the announcements or intro so that you know what the group is about.
• Stalk the admin – by knowing who the admin is and what they do you will get an understating of why the group was created. For example, if one of the admin were in the same line of work as me then it would be unlikely that they will allow me to promote what I do.
• Some groups do not allow outside posts but they do allow comments on admin posts.
• If your business is location-based then only join groups that are relevant to that location. Some group admins are quite anal about allowing members from other areas.
• Check the activity on the group, you don’t want to waste your time on a group that has only 20 members and gets 1 post a week.
• Some people take huge offence to being DM’d by someone who is not their friend.  Be cautious when DM’ing someone on a group even if they have commented or responded to a post or comment of yours.   It is generally not against the rules but it is bad etiquette.  And do not do a hard sell to someone who is not a friend of your personal page or a member of your business page.
• Use the search function within the group to find persons looking for what you offer so that you can add to the conversation.  You can also use this function to find posts that you have been tagged or mentioned in.
• Follow up on responses. If you are tagged or mentioned in a post you need to follow up on it. In the notifications tab you can see who has tagged you or commented on a post you are following and you need to keep up to date with responding to those.
• #into – this is your time to promote yourself and your service to the group, use the opportunity.