The Facebook Business Page Series ~ No 1 ~ Why Facebook?

Over the next few weeks I’ll be providing a guide explaining how to set up a successful Facebook Business Page (or Fan Page) step-by-step and in simple, easy-to-understand language.

So why Facebook? Facebook is now considered to be the operating system of the social web and has, to date, not been outdone. Facebook has won the social networking war. If Facebook were a country, it would be the world’s third largest, surpassed in numbers only by the populations of China and India. There are 500,000 new Facebook users every single day and by December this year Facebook expects to have reached half a billion users. Users spend 5 billion minutes on Facebook each day, share 1 billion bits of information every week and make 40 million status updates daily. Think this might be significant to your business? You bet it is.

Business Pages are not the same as Facebook Profiles. Profiles are for individuals, but a business cannot have a Profile. Facebook does not allow individuals to advertise or promote their business on their Profiles, but does allow users to create dedicated Pages to promote businesses, products, brands, etc. Facebook Business Pages are a staggeringly powerful, yet remarkably simple way to generate targeted traffic to your website. And what’s more, they’re free to set up.  Businesses are now realizing the importance and power of social networking, and Facebook, as the king of social media, has cornered the market on successful connection with customers, allowing businesses to build more personal, more intimate relationships. The one-to-many approach to marketing has had its day. It’s now all about relating, listening and creating conversations.

Facebook Business Pages allow individuals, organizations and businesses to create free business profiles and share them with other Facebook users. They can be used in a multitude of ways to help grow your business, by including everything on your Page that is pertinent to your business; building brand awareness, featuring promotions and product launches; building subscriptions to email lists; building credibility and customer loyalty; broadcasting news; and generally staying connected. You can include a company overview, contact information, links to your website, press releases, videos, blog posts, news, RSS feeds, Twitter updates – pretty much whatever you can think of. You can also encourage and generate customer interaction through comments and discussion.

Facebook Business Pages make it possible to create a massive community around your brand, developing into a loyal following where your customers become a part of your business conversations, through discussion and sharing. The sense of community you build around you brand leads to consumer trust, and the obvious next step is a successful sale.

Unfortunately, though, many businesses don’t have the time or the knowledge to take full advantage of these benefits. This series of blog posts aims to assist you to get your Business Page up and running as quickly as possible, by following a simple step-by-step guide; as well as providing a series of tips to help you get the most out of your page and have those customers knocking down your door. Facebook Pages also require very little technical knowledge to set up or to keep updated, so take a deep breath and relax, and let’s get started.

Oh, and I do have some homework for you. You can’t start a Facebook Page without first setting up a personal Profile, so if you haven’t already got your Profile set up, it’s time to get started. Before we connect again, get your personal Profile up and running and start getting a feel for how Facebook works. You can set up your Profile by visting http://www.facebook.com entering your details and following the simple steps.

Stay tuned for the next in the series, which will discuss how to get your page set up easily and quickly.

Dedicated to your success,