Facebook now claims more that 500 m users with 50% of active users logging on daily.
Apparently the average user has around 130 ‘friends’ and over 500 billion minutes are spent on Facebook each month and they interact with over 160 million objects on Facebook itself and become connected to around 60 pages, groups and events.
More than 25 billion pieces of content get shared on FaceBook every month. Wouldn’t you, as a business owner, like some of those to be your pieces of content? I know my clients would and that’s why I set up Facebook pages for them as part of their overall social media strategy.
Facebook began as a purely social interface but it’s morphed into so much more than that which is great for an SME. Now, Facebook is used widely by businesses and is widely acclaimed as part of their marketing strategy in conjunction with other social media tools.
As a user you can hold a personal and/or a business account on Facebook.
If you have a personal account, you can add a page in which you can outline your business offering if you don’t want to take a purely business account. These pages are known as ‘fan’ pages and are targeted at a business, an online store, a group, a celebrity or spokesperson instead of at an individual who uses Facebook for friend and family networking.
When you set up your page you’ll name it – normally a business oriented name – and you’ll insert your logo or emblem and a more business like photo (if you want). You’ll get the chance to add details of what your page is about and why people should read it and then you’ll notice that you have a variety of opportunities to talk to your audience or ‘friends’ in the ‘tabs’ eg: wall, discussions, info, etc.
The trick with your ‘fan’ page is to use it as an entity instead of as an individual i.e. promote it as a business and then invite your ‘friends’ to view it and comment or ‘like’ it. By offering consistent information and sharing, your ‘likers’ will pop back and read more and hopefully follow some of the links you’re offering on your page.
The nice thing about a page is that you can choose who sees it and it doesn’t affect your privacy settings on your personal profile for friends and family.
You can search for people you know in business and invite them to view your page and you can insert links to the posts on your blog for them to follow as well as anything else you want to promote such as your 3rd party affiliates or colleagues blogs. It’s a good way to recommend or endorse other’s online offerings too.
There are many ways to use Facebook pages and Facebook in general. Pay per click is just one of the many features offered. Others to use include instant chat, discussion groups, create a group and dropping in interesting bits from YouTube if you like. Your business page can be really enriched and help you drive traffic from Facebook to your website or blog.
In short, Facebook is a great way to enhance your business offering to people you know, in a ‘friendlier’ environment.
Do you use Facebook pages?
