It’s an exciting day, everyone—today, you’ll be walking away from this post with a handful of Facebook Messenger Marketing blueprints!
Last year was a big one for Messenger Marketing. ManyChat grew in leaps and bounds, and tens of thousands of companies took the plunge and began to use Facebook Messenger bots to acquire new customers, many of them with outstanding results.
For the average consumer, however, it was still pretty rare to actually see Facebook Messenger being done in practice and done well.
And if you’ve been paying attention to what I’ve been saying for the past 2 years or so, you know that THIS is the time to get started with Messenger Marketing. Not six months from now, or next year when the channel starts to become more saturated and competitive…
No, you want to get started TODAY. Right now. Trust me 🙂
The opportunity is bigger now than it will ever be. Costs and competition are only going to increase over time as more and more companies start jumping on the bandwagon.
So how should you get started? What’s the best strategy you can use right now to start connecting with your customers on Messenger?
That’s what the rest of this post is all about!
Here’s what we’ll cover in this post:
- Should You Use Messenger Marketing For Your Business?
- The 3 Best ManyChat Growth Tools
- The 5 Facebook Messenger Marketing Blueprints
Should You Use Messenger Marketing For Your Business?
If you’re new to Messenger Marketing and you’re reading this post, then I’m guessing your first questions will be along the lines of:
- Is this right for my business?
- Will it help me to actually sell more products?
- What if my customers aren’t on Messenger?
These are, of course, totally valid concerns and great questions to ask.
And to help answer these questions, I have a few recent statistics to share:
1.3 billion people actively use Facebook Messenger every month.
Not total users, guys. Active users.
That’s an INSANE amount of people using Messenger on a regular basis.
With an audience this big, you have to figure that just about every market is well-represented on Facebook Messenger. Sure, not all of your customers will be on Messenger…but a lot of them will be. Certainly enough to make Messenger Marketing worth your while.
There are 2 billion messages sent between people and businesses each month.
Again, notice that I’m not saying there are 2 billion total messages sent. This isn’t including messages sent from one person to another.
This are 2 billion messages sent between people and businesses—a sure sign that more and more people are using Messenger as a way to communicate with the brands they love.
53% of people who message businesses say they are more likely to shop with a business they can reach on Messenger.
And that makes sense, right? Once you’ve gotten used to being able to simply message a business in Messenger, you’re probably going to like it. It’s more convenient than writing an email or calling them on the phone. So of course you’re going to start preferring to shop at businesses who use Messenger.
There are over 300,000 monthly active chatbots on Messenger.
If I had to guess, I’d say that number has increased at least 10x from last year.
So what does all this mean?
In a nutshell, these are all different ways of pointing out just how quickly Messenger is exploding in popularity. And they’re all compelling reasons why any business that wants to grow online should really get started with Messenger Marketing sooner rather than later.
In this post, I’m sharing how to use my three favorite ManyChat growth tools and five favorite customer acquisition strategies for Messenger Marketing… pulled straight from the new course!
Think of them as five different funnels or “blueprints” you can use to generate new leads and customers for your business.
I know you’re eager, so let’s get to it!
The 3 Best ManyChat Growth Tools
What exactly is a growth tool?
In a nutshell, a growth tool is something that helps you grow your ManyChat list. Growth tool, grow you list, get it?
Remember that inside your ManyChat account, you’ll have a list of subscribers—just like you have a list of email subscribers in your email service provider.
And just as a big email list can be considered a business asset, a list of subscribers who are happy to engage with you on Messenger is another really valuable thing for your business to have.
At this writing, ManyChat has 13 growth tools available:
If you’re wondering what the blue “PRO” means, that’s an indication that you have to have a paid Pro plan in order to use that growth tool. But as you can see, that only applies to 3 growth tools—which means you can use just about every growth feature in ManyChat, even on a free account.
Now 13 tools is probably a little overwhelming, so I’m going to introduce you to the three tools that I think you should focus on. My three favorite ManyChat growth tools are:
- Facebook Comment-to-Message Growth Tool
- Messenger Ref URL Growth Tool
- Facebook JSON Ads Growth Tool
These are, I think, the most powerful growth tools that you’ll end up using time and time again.
ManyChat Growth Tool #1: Comment-to-Message
This is probably the most popular growth tool. It works like this:
First you create a Facebook post, then you set up the growth tool to integrate with that post.
Anytime someone leaves a comment on that post, they automatically receive a message from your Messenger bot. And as soon as they respond to that message or interact with your chatbot, they’ll be added to your ManyChat subscriber list and automatically enrolled in any sequence you specify.
My first experience using this growth tool was at DigitalMarketer, where we ran an ad that looked like this:
Anyone who commented on that post received a message in Messenger along with a link to download a free whitepaper:
This is really powerful for a couple reasons:
- First, it doesn’t require much on the user’s part. All they have to do is leave a comment on a post.
- Second, you’re sending a message to that user at a period of high engagement. They literally JUST commented on your post! So the odds of them interacting with your chatbot are very high.
- Third, it’s 100% free. You don’t have to spend a dime. Just create a Facebook post—preferably one that asks a polarizing question to really stir up some engagement—and integrate the growth tool with that post.
And voila! Sit back and watch your subscriber list grow.
ManyChat Growth Tool #2: Ref URL
This is a great growth tool you can use to drive traffic from somewhere else (say, from email marketing or YouTube) onto Messenger.
The way it works is really simple.
When you create the growth tool, you’ll choose which specific opt-in message and sequence you want the person to receive:
Then save your widget and ManyChat will provide you with a custom URL. When you send that URL to people and they click on it, it will open up Messenger and show them the opt-in message of your choice.
This is a really powerful way to start transitioning some of your audience onto Messenger so you’ll have more channels through which to contact them.
ManyChat Growth Tool #3: Facebook JSON Ads
The cool thing about this growth tool is that you can use it in a Facebook ad (which you can’t do for the first 2 growth tools). It works through a “Click to Message” ad, which looks the same as a normal ad except for the button:
Click to Message ads are pretty powerful in their own right. But when you integrate them with the JSON growth tool, it’s kind of like supercharging them.
When you use the JSON growth tool, everyone who clicks on the ad will bypass the default “get started” button that Facebook usually displays when you first interact with a bot. And because you’re integrating the ad with ManyChat, you’ll be able to set up the exact opt-in message and sequence that you want the person to see after they click.
To set it up, first go into ManyChat and create your JSON growth tool (it’s a pro-only feature, so you’ll need a paid account). When you’re done, ManyChat will give you a snippet of code that you need to paste into Facebook when you create your ad.
So next you just hop into Facebook and create your ad. Make sure to change the destination to Messenger:
Then click “Set up messages.” A lightbox will appear, and you just need to click “JSON” at the top and paste in your code:
The really cool thing about this growth tool is that it integrates with ads, which means you can use all the super-cool targeting options available inside Facebook to display your JSON ad in front of the exact right audience for your business.
5 Facebook Messenger Marketing Blueprints You Can Use To Generate New Leads
Now that you know how some of these growth tools work, you’re probably pretty eager to put them into practice. Right?
Well I hope so, because now I’m about to show you how to use these growth tools in a customer acquisition funnel!
These are five of my favorite ways to use ManyChat to acquire new leads and customers for your business:
Facebook Messenger Marketing Blueprint #1: Click-to-Message Ad + JSON Growth Tool
In this strategy, you’re going to use a Click-to-Message ad along with the JSON growth tool to generate leads by offering them some sort of Lead Magnet.
By “Lead Magnet” I mean any sort of useful content that you can give away for free in order to convince people to join your list. Examples would be free chatbot training videos, PDF ebooks, white papers, audio files of an interview, and so on.
Here’s what this funnel strategy looks like:
And here’s a quick walkthrough of each of the steps:
Step 1: The user sees your ad in Facebook and clicks on it.
Step 2: The JSON growth tool sends them a message inside Messenger.
In the message itself, you’ll want to thank them for their interest and have them click a button to download the Lead Magnet. As soon as they click a button or engage with your bot, they become a messenger subscriber and you can also subscribe them to a sequence.
Step 3: If you want, you can also use Zapier to connect ManyChat with your CRM.
This way you could ask people, “Do you want us to email this to you?”
And if they say yes, then you can ask for their email—and just like that, the person will be automatically added to your email list. Now you’ll have two ways of contacting them.
Step 4: Now that the person has interacted with your chatbot, you have 24 hours to send a promotional message—in other words, you have 24 hours to send them a link to your sales page or ask them to buy something.
(If this steps sounds a little confusing, keep reading—I explain this more in the section below on staying compliant with Facebook’s Terms of Service.)
Step 5: This person is now on your ManyChat subscriber list, so you can follow up with them using a non-promotional message anytime you want.
Facebook Messenger Marketing Blueprint #2: Messenger Ref URL for Lead Magnet Delivery
This funnel is the exact same as the first one, except we’re using a different growth tool—the Messenger Ref URL.
Here’s what it looks like:
This would be a good strategy to use if you have a big email list or a big following on YouTube/Twitter/Instagram/etc. and you want to start connecting with those people on Messenger, too.
(Quick note: If you’re using this funnel to connect with people via email, then you can probably skip step #3. Because those people will already be on your email list.)
Facebook Messenger Marketing Blueprint #3: Click-to-Messenger Ad for Free Online Training
This funnel is a great way to deliver free online training (in the form of a mini-class) that leads up to a promotion.
Basically what you do is prepare several pieces of free content (like training videos), and slowly drip those out over the course of several days.
At the end of the free training, you offer your new subscribers a product or service that’s relevant to the training they just went through.
Here’s what this funnel looks like:
We’re using the JSON Growth tool again, so that you can create a Facebook ad and get super precise in your targeting. (Ads also allow for great scalability, so when you find a funnel that’s profitable you can really dial it up and reach a lot of new customers.)
This time, instead of giving them a Lead Magnet, you ask the if they want to enroll in the free mini-class.
And here’s a quick walkthrough of each of the steps:
Step 1: The user sees your ad in Facebook and clicks on it.
Step 2: The JSON growth tool sends them a message inside Messenger.
In the message itself, you’ll want to thank them for their interest and have them click a button to download the Lead Magnet. As soon as they click a button or engage with your bot, they become a messenger subscriber and you can also subscribe them to a sequence.
Step 3: If you want, you can also use Zapier to connect ManyChat with your CRM.
This way you could ask people, “Do you want us to email this to you?”
And if they say yes, then you can ask for their email—and just like that, the person will be automatically added to your email list. Now you’ll have two ways of contacting them.
Step 4: Now that the person has interacted with your chatbot, you have 24 hours to send a promotional message—in other words, you have 24 hours to send them a link to your sales page or ask them to buy something.
(If this steps sounds a little confusing, keep reading—I explain this more in the section below on staying compliant with Facebook’s Terms of Service.)
Step 5: This person is now on your ManyChat subscriber list, so you can drip out your course over your chosen time period.
Now when you set this up inside ManyChat, the mini-class is created as part of the Sequence that you assign to the JSON ad. And as long as the person interacts with your bot, they’ll automatically be subscribed to it.
Then you proceed to deliver the mini-class over time. Each lesson in the mini-class is sent via a new message with the video attached. And just in case that sounds really hard to do (hint: it’s not), here’s a screenshot of how you would create that message inside ManyChat:
Just type your message, click “+ Video” and attach your video, and you’re done, or… you could link out to a web page that delivers the video.
(Told you it was easy!)
Finally, at the very end of the mini-class you send them a promotional message to sell your product or service.
Mini-class funnels like this are a GREAT way to sell a product or service because you’re delivering a lot of value to people up-front. And as long as you can keep them engaged and get them coming back again and again to watch those mini-class lessons, there’s a very good chance they’ll buy your product at the end.
Facebook Messenger Marketing Blueprint #4: Messenger Ref URL for Free Online Training
The next funnel strategy is exactly the same as the last one, except instead of using a JSON ad you just use the Ref URL growth tool.
It looks like this:
And all the same tips apply. The main difference here is going to be your traffic source.
Using the JSON ad (funnel #3), you generated traffic from a Facebook ad.
But this time, using the Ref URL growth tool, you can send traffic to this funnel from other sources like email or YouTube.
Facebook Messenger Marketing Blueprint #5: Facebook Live Broadcast
The last funnel I want to share is a little different than the others. This is a strategy you can use to send people to a Facebook Live Broadcast (or any other live event, like a webinar) using Messenger.
Here’s what it looks like:
Basically you send out a broadcast message to your subscribers telling them about your upcoming event, and asking if they’d like to join.
Everyone who says “yes” gets a reminder message shortly before the event starts, along with a link to the event.
Then after the event is over, you can send another message with the replay.
The cool thing about using Messenger like this is that it’s a great way to do kind of a soft sell. You aren’t actively promoting anything inside Messenger itself, but in the Facebook Live Broadcast you can promote products or services.
And if you tag everyone who said they wanted to attend the event, you’ll be able to follow up with them afterward to provide more information and answer any questions they have about the product you’re offering.
[READ MORE: 10Ways to Implement Messenger Marketing into Your Business Today]
The Important Thing is to Get Started
Ever heard the saying, “Ready, fire, aim?”
Messenger Marketing is a perfect example of when you should use that strategy.
Sign up now. Get started today. Put something out there, even if it isn’t perfect.
You can always make adjustments and improvements over time. But guess what? You can only optimize something you’ve already started.
So do yourself a favor and get started while the opportunity is the is the biggest it will ever be. I promise you’ll be glad you did.
The best way to dive right in? Go through ManyChat’s Messenger Marketing & Chatbot Mastery course! It’s free for all and packed with strategies, tactics, and 10 more blueprints!
Molly Pittman is a digital marketing expert and educator. She has certified thousands of marketers in paid traffic and customer acquisition, and is a co-host of the Perpetual Traffic podcast, which has grown to over three million downloads in two years. She is the Co-Founder of DigitalStrategyBootCamps.com, providing 1-on-1 coaching and consulting to help businesses grow through digital channels. Molly started her career as an intern at DigitalMarketer.com in 2012, excelling to VP of Marketing in 2014, a position she held until 2017 when she left to start her own consulting agency. At DigitalMarketer, Molly personally spent $8+ million on paid traffic channels like Facebook, Google, and Twitter while maintaining a positive return on investment.
