Facebook Fan Pages — Why You MustUse Them To SupportYour Corporation

Facebook fan pages are a significant method to exploit social media to promoteyour organization, bond with your clientele, and draw prospects. When your business has a Facebook fan page, it opens up a whole new means of connecting and communicating with your clients.

You are most likely very familiar with Facebook profile pages, but Facebook fan pages are a whole different thing. Your Facebook fan page, unlike your profile page, is completely business related. It is similar to a profile, but for your firm. Fan pages were developed explicitly for firms to promote themselves, their services, and to give them a place to showcase themselves in the social media community.. On your fan page, clientele can connect directly with you, in a means that feels more direct and friendly than the contact form on your website. Your fans get updates, emails and such in the same method they do from their Facebook friends…so in effect, your corporation becomes one of their ‘friends’ too.

Getting started with a fan page is simple. Just log in, and scroll all the way to the bottom. Click on the ‘Advertising’ option, and select ‘Pages’, then ‘Create a Page’. After that, it’s as simple as setting up your profile was…just key in all the informationand then publish it!. Fill in as many details as you can…you can always add more later, but more is better with Facebook. Search engines love Facebook, and your fan page can rank for search terms, so keep that in mind.

Now, the applications. See which ones you could make use of on your page to benefit both you and your clients. You can add applications that carry a benefit to your organization and your advertising efforts, and also apps that are just plain fun and interesting for visitors. You can find apps that link your Twitter account to your fan page, that draw your blog’s RSS feed to your page, or gather and post customer testimonials. If you search for ‘Facebook business apps’ on Google, you will find oodles to choose from.

So you’ve got your fan page up…now you need some fans! You cannot send friend invites for your fan page, like you can for your profile page. Instead, you need to invite people to become fans. One method to achieve this is to have a Facebook badge on your website that links to your fan page, so visitors can click through and become a fan. If you have an email list, send out a announcement about your fan page and ask people to join up as fans. Likewise, you can do this via your Facebook profile, or by means of regular email.

The best way to sustain Facebook fan pages is to keep them updated regularly. Have a weekly topic of discussion in your on-page forum, post remarkable links, and offer some fun content that has a good chance of going viral…you just might get some more fans that way! Make updating your page and reaching out to new people a priority on your marketing list, and before you know it you’ll have a dedicated collection of fans who want to do business with you…because after all, you’re friends!

Bird and Co Creative are a Worcestershire based graphic and web design company, creating innovative marketing solutions for small businesses. If your business requires a website, visit www.birdandcocreative.co.uk for further information and to view our portfolio of work.