What’s In A Name?: Crafting a Winning Facebook Group Name

Unlocking The Power Of Your Facebook Group

In the ever-evolving landscape of digital marketing, finding organic ways to drive customers to your points of sale is essential. If you’re like most social sellers, you set up a Facebook group pretty early on when you joined your company. It’s a great idea to have one, but the last thing any of us needs is one more thing to manage – especially if that thing isn’t generating traffic, leads, or turning our efforts into $$$.

If your current group isn’t working for you as well as you’d hoped, there are a few small tweaks that can make a big impact.

When you embark on the journey of creating and nurturing your very own Facebook group, you gain immediate access to a substantial community of potential clients. The people who join your group are there because they share a common interest in the topics you discuss, and these topics are directly related to your business. This built-in relevance ensures that you are starting off on the right foot with an interested audience.

Your Facebook group becomes the stage where you can shine as an expert in your field. By sharing valuable content, engaging in meaningful discussions, and offering insights, you are demonstrating your knowledge and competence. Over time, this consistent effort helps you build trust among your group members, which is a critical step toward turning them into paying clients.

Having your own Facebook group instantly enhances your credibility, even to potential clients who haven’t yet joined. When a potential client comes across your group and sees a thriving community of loyal fans and followers, it sends a powerful message. It tells them that you are not just in the business but that you’ve also earned the trust and respect of a significant number of people. This can go a long way in persuading potential clients to entrust you with their time and money.

What’s In A Name

With all the potential benefits a Facebook group can bring to your business, it’s easy to underestimate seemingly minor details. One such detail is the name of your group. It might appear insignificant, but it can have a profound impact on your results. Your group’s name should be clear, concise, and reflective of its purpose. It should attract your target audience and give them a glimpse of what your group is all about. After all, it’s your group’s name that often serves as the first point of contact between you and your potential clients.

So how do we get unstuck and craft a simple name that will attract and keep the right people? First of all, you are allowed to experiment. Test out your ideas and play a little. Make it fun and keep the following in mind.

1. Get to Know Your Audience

Your Facebook group is more than just a place for random discussions; it should be a source of new clients for your business. To start, define your ideal client – the people you want to serve with your products or services. If you don’t exactly know who your target audience is yet, it’s okay to start broad (i.e. Moms) and as you get to know the people in your group, you’ll begin to create a Persona and narrow in a little (e.g., Working Moms who don’t have time to cook healthy meals).

2. Uncover Common Ground

While your ideal audience may come from diverse backgrounds, they likely share common characteristics, such as goals, dreams, or passions. Consider what unites them, what drives them to achieve certain objectives. Using the example from above, why don’t these working moms have time to cook healthy meals? Are they 2 jobs working? Always at soccer practice? Is their child struggling academically, so do they spend more time on homework? Maybe they work nights, share custody, or have a medical condition of their own that interferes. What, on the positive side, do they share in common with each other and with you?

3. Foster a Sense of Belonging

People are naturally drawn to communities they feel proud of, including Facebook groups. Your group’s name is crucial in creating positive associations in the minds of your ideal clients.

4. Brand or Outcome-Oriented?

Here’s a critical decision: should you name your Facebook group after yourself, your business, or your products and services? The key is to make the group primarily about THEM, not just your brand. Rarely do I recommend using your own name in the title of your Facebook groups. Unless you’re JLo, your name likely won’t create a draw and it could work to your disadvantage. People want to feel like a space is created for them and their struggles. Centering their first impression on yourself may send the wrong message.

5. Speak Your Ideal Client’s Language

Your group’s name should resonate with your ideal clients. Use words or phrases they are familiar with or use regularly.

What to Avoid

These are suggestions based on observation and what I know to be best practices from a user and branding standpoint. You’re always free to break the rules. If you are going to break a rule, be sure that you can explain (to yourself) why.

1. Getting Clever with Spelling

You want your group to be something that is easily found. Using names like Klever & Krafty or Bee-utifully You may feel fun but they will never come up in a search, and if I’m honest, it comes off as a little bit “small-time”.

2. Creating a Name That’s Too Long

I get it. You want to cram everything into the name so that your target audience knows they’re in the right place, but a name that’s too long or unclear can make it difficult for potential members to understand the group’s purpose or remember it. Also, think about what it looks like when you get a notification from a group that you are in. There is a certain number of characters that will show up in your notifications, and if you’re lucky, a snip of your content may show up, enticing members to visit your page. If the name is too long, they’ll only get the notification that there is new content and no preview of what you posted.

3. Overly Promotional or Sales Focused Names

People tend to be more interested in groups that provide value or facilitate meaningful connections rather than groups that are solely about selling products or services. I’m looking at you VIP groups! Facebook users are savvy and they don’t want to join a group where the main focus is you selling at them. A title that uses sales-speak, like VIP, discounts, sales, new releases, shop, pop-up. Etc.

4. Using Vagues Titles

Help your potential group members make a decision to join you with words that are specific to the problem that you solve or the community where they’d like to belong. (i.e. Society for Women is just too vague) If it speaks to everyone, then it attracts no one!

5. Using the Company Name

This tip is specific for network marketing.  Hear me out! I know you love your company but I’d like to help you begin to think of your company as a supplier or a vendor rather than your entire business. You want to futureproof your business, and by crafting a name centered on your audience rather than a single company, you are free to pivot or change directions if you choose to go with a different company, join a second (or third) company, or sell something entirely different without having to start all over again with a new audience.

Using The Above, Here’s The Worst Example I Could Come Up With:

Social Selling with Jenifer VIP Pop Up! – I know this looks and feels awkward but I modeled this after several groups that I’ve actually seen.  This looks small time, like I’m playing at having a business and it’s all about me, not you. It’s also super vague.  Is it geared towards others in social selling or am I selling to consumers?  The words VIP and Pop Up make it clear that I intend to sell, sell, sell as the primary function of this group. Of course, I have something to sell and so do you but the primary function of a group is to share as much value as we can so that people naturally begin to ask to work with us.

Instead, I came up with (after some trial and error)  Social Selling CEOs – This tells who, that’s you the social seller, and the addition of CEO is suggestive of the ultimate in success as a social seller. If I wanted, I could add the word Academy or something similar to make it clear that this is a place to learn how to become the CEO of your social selling business. In this case, I opted to keep the name shorter, but the addition of the word Academy wouldn’t take anything away from the name either.

With all these factors in mind, you’re now ready to tackle the big question: What should you name your Facebook group? As a fundamental rule, aim to keep it simple. Opt for straightforward, searchable keywords that will enhance your discoverability among potential clients.

The name you choose for your Facebook group is the first interaction potential members have with your community. It’s not just a label; it’s an invitation. So, invest the time and thought into selecting a name that encapsulates your group’s purpose, appeals to your ideal audience, and sets the stage for a thriving, engaged community. Happy naming! 🌟

Here are a few of my favorite formulas for developing a group name. Use one or sample a little of two to get the result you want. And go ahead and experiment.

1. Hint at the End Result

That’s what I did in Social Selling CEOs. Most of the women in my group are not earning a full-time income in their social selling businesses (yet) and they are not running their day to day like a boss (yet). The name of my group suggests that the end result of joining me and consuming the resources I share, they can become the CEO of their own Social Selling Empire.

In a few words, can you describe the end result that someone who uses your products will achieve? That’s the beginning of your Group Name. Who will they become or what will they have?

2. Problem Solved

Describe what problem is solved by using your products or services. Weight Loss Made Easy, The Best Sleep of Your Life, Clutter-Free Society, Simple Style After 40…

3. Someone who __________ How ______________.

Fill in the blanks. Someone who struggles with losing weight, Someone who is too busy to exercise, Someone who is frustrated by the signs of aging. Someone who is a coffee drinker, Someone who loves fashion…

The How is a bit more flexible. How will they gain value from being in your group? Will it be Easy or Quick? Or maybe you want to describe a process like Academy (suggests how they’ll learn) or At Home (lets them know that they don’t have to leave the house to get the benefits).

Final Thoughts

I’ve seen advice out there that suggests that you have to get this right the first time for fear of setting the wrong tone. I think it’s important to settle on a name pretty quickly but not at the expense of starting. Facebook groups are casual, and a few name changes won’t hurt anything. You’re only stuck when you reach 5000 members. My personal thoughts are to have it set in stone for yourself before the first few hundred members.