Strategies: Using Facebook to promote your business for free

— -- Want thousands of new Facebook fans for your small business?

How about posting a photo of a cake in the shape of a snake? That worked recently for Francesca Pitcher, owner of North Star Cakes of Maidstone, England.

She posted a picture of the birthday cake she made for her 6-year-old daughter. Overnight, the photo was forwarded by fans, tweeted, and noticed by Duff Goldman of the Food Network reality show "Ace of Cakes." Pitcher can't keep up with all the new customers.

That's every small-business owner's dream: Put something on Facebook and get deluged with customers. Of course, that's not how it normally works. Using Facebook effectively takes time and effort -- and sometimes money.

"It's a matter of trying to encourage your customers to communicate with their friends," explained Grady Burnett, Facebook's vice president of global sales and operations. "Facebook enables small businesses to build connections with their customers. Then, how do you inspire that fan to tell your story to their friends?"

In other words, work hard to post things fans will want to "like" or share. That endorsement gets sent in their news feed, to their family and friends. That's powerful stuff because your message comes from them, not you.

"Someone is 50% more likely to remember an ad when a friend is attached to it, when it's in a social context," says Burnett.

Now, you can do much of this free -- working hard to make your posts intriguing or useful so fans share it, such as the Snake Cake, which was posted July 31 and had 791 "likes" and had been shared 1,224 times as of Aug. 9. But you can also purchase "sponsored posts" to make sure more of your fans and their connections see it.

Here's how it works:

Let's say you own a sporting goods store in Boulder Colo. You sell bikes and skis. You're active on Facebook, posting useful content: tips, photos, videos, on topics like bike maintenance or ski skills. You announce sales and special events. You have a good following of people who've "liked" you and shared some of your posts. That information may be sent out to all or some of their contacts -- with words such as "Joe likes Boulder Sporting Goods."

You can do all this without paying Facebook a penny. You need staff, someone fairly savvy about marketing, to manage your Facebook presence, but you haven't spent money directly on ads.

You want to announce a preseason ski sale, making sure all your ski and snowboard fans -- and their contacts -- know about it. That won't necessarily happen for free, because not all your posts show up in all your fans' Facebook feeds.

To make sure this one does, click "promote your post" and turn your post into an "ad" that appears as part of someone's news feed. This costs, according to Facebook spokeswoman Elizabeth Diana, as little as $5 to $50 a day, depending on how many people you reach.

To reduce costs, you can target certain fans to get your post -- perhaps those interested in skiing (not paying for bike enthusiasts) or living in Boulder.

Now, of course, this has drawbacks. Joe may not be thrilled that his name is being used to promote your sale to his friends and family. But Joe "liked" your page, so he may not mind.

Besides paying for promoted posts, here are other tips for using Facebook to promote your business: