In our previous post, we talked a bit about Twitter, what it is, and the basics of how to use it. Now, let’s explore Facebook for business. Facebook allows you to market your business and brand by providing you a place to post an wide variety of content on your Facebook Page. Unlike Twitter, you are not limited to 140-character length posts. Nor are you limited to links only for text, pictures, and websites. On Facebook, you can integrate long stories, embed videos, include large quality photographs, and add links that display attractive synopsis of articles or blog posts. Facebook for business also offers options that go way beyond a personal profile, which is designed to connect you with your Friends. For the business marketer, Facebook offers Business Pages, Fan Pages, Community Pages, etc. The personal profile deals with Friends. The Business/Fan/Community pages deal with Fans.
So what is the difference between Friends and Fans? On Facebook as a social media platform, its all about Friends and “Friending” people. This is essentially done by inviting people–typically people you know–to become your Friend, either by accepting someone’s request to be your Friend or requesting someone be yours. This relatively small group of people is your personal audience with whom you share your personal information and viewpoints, as well as to whom you post statuses about specific activities you are engaged in and things that interest you. This personal page is designed to “knit” your group of friends together in a social network, where friends (and friends of friends) can interact with you and each other.
A Facebook Business/Fan/Community Page is populated by “Fans” or those who admire your products, use your services or frequent your business establishment. These Fans are people who wish to follow your business and interact with your company or your brand. The Facebook for Business Fan Page looks quite similar to a personal page or profile but displays a logo and an associated branding image in the header. It is a far more advantageous approach for the professional marketer because it eliminates the need to expose personal information by working through a personal Facebook account/profile. This keeps the business marketer’s life completely separate from business promotional activities.
These Business Facebook pages are designed specifically for business. They offer all kinds of exciting options which you can use to promote your business in the most effective way possible. Some businesses have several pages, each promoting their various brands, or specifically targeting social demographic audiences within the social media membership of Facebook. And, Facebook offers loads of integration capabilities. You can post content from third party websites automatically to your Business Facebook page. A good example of this is WordPress, a popular blogging platform, which can be set up to automatically insert blog posts from your website/blog into your Fan Page. You can also export content from your Fan page and have it post to your Blog or website.
Setting up a Facebook page is a bit more involved and will take longer to set up than a Twitter account because its requires quite a bit of planning in order to properly branding the page. Also certain components are needed to get started, e.g., a profile picture/logo, a branded cover graphic for your business, marketing/sales text descriptions and search engine keywords. All of these components need to be well thought out and crafted as integrated pieces of your marketing plan for that specific product/service before they are input into the Business Fan Page in order to ensure it does it’s job to bring you more sales/business.
In summary, Facebook is the most popular and biggest social media platform. What makes it so powerful is that it is continually changing and evolving. Facebook’s innovative adaption to other business models means it is continually aiming to improve its member experiences. And, it’s constantly providing more and more options to maximize the ability of businesses to market and promote their products and service to their customer base.
Feel free to Contact Compass Marketing today so we can help get you started on Facebook, or better integrate your social media to provide the best results. Our market experts are available to provide an evaluation of your current social media mix to ensure it fits within your overall marketing strategy and plan.