Setting up Your Business on Facebook

Thursday, December 13, 2007

Recently, I discovered that I have more of my personal contact's information in Facebook, the popular social networking site, than I do in my email program, which has been my primary method of communication for the past 10 years. I have been using my Outlook for business communication, and my Facebook account (including the BlackBerry Facebook application, which lets me add new contacts and receive messages instantly) for communication with my personal contacts. With the addition of Facebook Pages for businesses, I imagine that this is about to change, as more business communication will start arriving in my Facebook inbox.

According to Facebook founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg, Facebook has grown to 50 million users at a rate of 50% in the last six months (May to Nov. 2007). These users have provided a massive amount of data which companies can use to strengthen their brand, reinforce loyalty, and gain new referrals and clients. Here are three ways for companies to use Facebook:

1. Facebook Pages

Facebook Pages for companies are set up much like individual user pages, with content such as images, photos, videos and other Facebook applications. Instead of 'friends', users become fans of your business. Your fans can make wall posts (your 'wall' is a public message board that everyone connected to you or even all users can view, depending on your privacy settings), and even provide referrals.

All the activity associated with your Facebook Page is displayed on user mini-feeds and news feeds, which is a history of actions taken by users – essentially making each action a small advertising plug for your company. When an individual becomes a fan of your company, the company's logo and a message are added to the user's profile in the form of a mini-feed message. This mini-feed message also appears on the user's friend's profile.  For example, if I become a fan of the ABC Company, my friend's mini-feeds would contain an item with the ABC Company logo that says "Chris has become a fan of the ABC Company". Not only is the user opting in to receive information from your company, but they are also letting their list of contacts know that they are a fan of your company. As mentioned previously, I have more personal contacts in Facebook than I do in my email program'so when I become a fan of a company, I'm letting a diverse and large population of contacts know.

In September, Facebook opened up access to many of its user's profiles (depending on specified privacy settings) to search engines–meaning that Facebook page content could be indexed by search engine spiders. For companies, this change could be particularly lucrative, providing an additional way to gain search engine ranking and increase their site's visibility on the Internet.

2. Facebook Ads

On November 6th, Zuckerberg introduced Facebook Ads as "an ad system for businesses to connect with users and target advertising to the exact audiences they want." Social Ads are part of Facebook Ads and are a new way to promote your business Facebook Page by targeting advertising to specific segments of Facebook users. Advanced Social Ad targeting lets you select the specific demographic that you would like to advertise to and specify things like age, gender, location, or interests. As an example, the Opus Hotel in Vancouver may want to advertise a special Valentine's Day package to females in Vancouver between the ages of 25 and 40 that are in a relationship. Facebook shows that there are 34,000+ registered Facebook users that match these specific demographic (as of Nov 15. 2007). An ad can be set up, paid for and targeted to this group quickly and easily through Facebook's online advertising purchasing system.

3. Facebook Beacon

A feature of Facebook Ads that I think is particularly unique is the Facebook Beacon. The Facebook Beacon is a web gadget (or widget ) that plugs into your company's website and interacts with Facebook. For example, the Opus Hotel in Vancouver is considering installing the Facebook Beacon into their online reservation system. When a customer makes an online booking at the Opus Hotel and is a Facebook user, a message will appear in that user's mini-feed, which will be available for all their friends to see. The message will read "I am staying at the uniquely stylish and fresh Opus Hotel when I am in Vancouver' and will link back to the Opus Hotel's Facebook page.

Does it make sense for all businesses to have a Facebook page? I think that we will see some companies migrate from 'traditional' blogs and email newsletters to Facebook Page-related communication. In my opinion, if your business has a website, it should also have a Facebook Page. Facebook is becoming that popular.

It's free for a business to set up a Facebook Page at http://www.facebook.com/ads.

Posted by Chris Breikss on 12/13 at 06:08 PM
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