Archive for the ‘FanPage’ Category

15 Keys for Successful Facebook Use for Businesses

Thursday, January 13th, 2011

Facebook boasts more than 500 million users, half of which check in daily for a half-hour each. That’s why your business ought to be there. But you also need to not just set up the page, but use it effectively. Here are 15 insider tips to maximizing your page.

1. Build a Facebook page, not a Facebook Profile. Many businesses do use a Facebook profile, because it seems more useful. It isn’t in the long run.

Here’s why:

People who join your page are raising their hands publicly saying they like your business, and want to hear from you. You don’t know if that’s the case, if people are simply responding to you friending them.

Although I consider it unlikely, Facebook might one day shut down your account, because you’re breaking the rules by using a person, not a page.

2. Pages are packed with an ever rising amount of analytics, which is the key to tracking success on Facebook.

Let me share a few examples:

3. Each page needs to be connected to a real profile. We constantly see businesses fretting over having to attach a real person’s personal profile to a page. I’ll push the philosophical debate over keeping your personal and professional lives separate online to the side for now, except to say by default social media meshes the personal and business life together in new ways that require unique guidelines. If you as a business want to create a profile just to use to create a page for your business, feel free. Facebook doesn’t allow it, but we also haven’t seen anyone shut down because of it. But you can attach and detach people from pages at any time, so unless you hate the idea, just create a page using a real profile. No need to create a separate one just to manage a fan page.

4. You can start with a Facebook page, but if you really want to use online marketing to bring in sales over the long haul, you must create a blog, or some sort of way to display content you own. If you use Facebook and the site shuts down, or quashes your account, all your efforts are wasted. Facebook works best in concert with a blog. It’s just one part of an online ensemble of your efforts.

5. Content is key. If you’re not publishing interesting content and contests related to your business, why should anyone visit your page?

6. Use Involver.com, to showcase your YouTube and Twitter feeds, if you’re using those tools for business.

7. Create a unique welcome page. Early studies have shown it boosts “Likes” by 20 percent. This also allows you to reward people who Like your page with additional free content, like a coupon.

8. As a general rule post in the morning, and during the week for maximum benefit. This is doubly true if you depend on foot traffic during the day. Wednesday is the most popular day for Facebook. It is slowest on the weekends. It rises Monday and Tuesday, and slides down Thursday and Friday. If you’re scheduling your posts, send them at 11:00AM, 3:00 PM, and 8:00 PM. Post during these times to grab the attention of the largest slice of your target market.

9. Respond to every single comment left on your page, as soon as you can. This not only helps you connect with that customer, but more people see your store responding, and the more you interact with someone, the more likely your posts are to show up in their streams.

10. If you for example, gain 1000 “likes” or “friends” and then don’t interact or post normally, or you do post, but none of these individuals “like” your posts or visit your page, over time your posts will increasingly vanish from their streams. So you’ll be posting for zero people. This is a harsh and hidden reality for many businesses. This tool is like a muscle, either use it or lose it.

11. Provide some content specific just to Facebook, formulated more around the notion of building community and connecting with customers. Don’t just republish what you already post on your blog.

12. Use existing e-mail or direct mail lists to tell others about your Facebook page, and keep informing them about the content you’ve developed just for that channel.

13. If holding webinars, have people post questions on the Facebook page.

14. Promote your group’s upcoming events on the site.

15. Use @”name of a person” or @FanPage so it shows up on their wall as well.

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The Minimalist Guide to Facebook for Business

Thursday, November 11th, 2010

Set-up Facebook Business Page

The two questions I get most often at PureDriven are quite simple.

What kind of Facebook site do I set up, and how do I use it effectively?

There are a lot of answers to these questions, but I’ve often found it difficult to point someone to what I believe is a simple, yet clear blog post on the topic. So I thought I’d write it myself.

In the following blog post I’m going to explain the basics of how to get set up on the site with more than 500 million users, and how to use it efficiently for your business.

The four types of tools are:

A Facebook Personal Profile:

http://www.facebook.com/patrickgarmoe

This is what you typically sign up for first.

Key attributes:

  • For individuals
  • Allows you to talk publicly or privately with friends
  • People who aren’t signed into Facebook can’t view your profile, and you can have it hidden from search results entirely
  • In order to launch a business page, you have to create a profile to attach it to (a profile “owns” a business page)
  • A profile also “owns” a groups page and a cause page

Facebook Page

Businesses often mistake a personal profile with a page:

http://www.facebook.com/PureDriven

Key attributes:

  • A page allows a business to showcase itself, and is the only official way businesses can use Facebook.
  • It should include all relevant information about the business; the owner or an employee should respond to all comments on the page, and post interesting topic-relevant information.
  • The secret to this page is getting fans to “Like” you, by publishing information relevant to your potential buyers. (If you sell lawn mowers, don’t tell me how great your lawnmowers are; teach me how to best take care of my lawn. Over time, I’ll start liking your business, and then I’ll buy your stuff. Get it?)
  • Getting people to “Like” a page has become so critical, that a whole industry has sprung up designing custom landing pages that increase the amount of people who click “like.”
  • Example: http://www.facebook.com/redbull
  • Here are some options for creating a custom Facebook tab: http://www.convinceandconvert.com/facebook/5-staggeringly-simple-ways-to-create-custom-facebook-landing-tabs/
  • The reason you need someone to Like your page, is so when you post, your posts sometimes get into their streams, because most people never will return to your company’s page a second time.
  • Choose a search-friendly headline as the page name, so it ranks high in Google not for your name, but for someone looking for a business like yours.
  • Example: like “Duluth Health Club Name Here” not just “Name Of Business.”
  • Businesses often don’t like having to use a page, because they can’t private-message individuals, but the point of the page, is to get people to voluntarily like your brand or business, not feel obliged to be your business “friend.”
  • The page contains Facebook Insights, which is analytics for your page. It shows how many people interacted with your page, and demographics of who is on your page
  • Post as many links as possible that you think is valuable to your audience, in order to get them “liking” and commenting, because the more time that passes between when they “liked” your page, and most recently commented on a post on your page, the more your posts vanish from their news streams.
  • Many companies worry about a page being connected to an employee. The answer is to have at least two administrators on a Facebook page, and when one employee leaves, just remove that person’s administrative privileges, and add them to the next employee.
  • Some companies create a “company profile” instead of or in addition to a page, which isn’t allowed, and is not recommended.
  • A page shows up in Google, Bing and Yahoo! search results, and a prospective customer can visit the page without having a Facebook account, which is critical.

Facebook Group

Groups formed around specific topics, where the goal isn’t primarily to get more people to notice the group, but for members to easily communicate

http://www.facebook.com/patrickgarmoe#!/home.php?sk=group_169786319702790&ap=1

Key attributes:

  • Members can talk to each other easily, and get an e-mail every time someone posts an item, if they wish
  • Organizations can be hidden, members-only, or open
  • Administrators don’t get the group’s logo attached to their comments, so it feels like a community, without one person “leading” the group
  • People can easily be invited to the group by anyone within the group, so long as it’s open

Facebook Cause Page:

http://www.causes.com/causes/72-save-darfur/about?m=e7368a5c

Designed for Nonprofit 501C(3) charities trying to raise money for a specific good cause

Key attributes

  • Designed for groups actually trying to raise money
  • Only available for those with 501C(3) status, so you can’t use it instead of doing a car wash for the high school band trip to Florida
  • Allows for people to donate directly, without having to visit a different website

Photo Credit: Phil Sexton

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Posted in Facebook, FanPage | View Comments

Facebook Even Beats Paid Local Newspaper Advertisements

Friday, October 1st, 2010

facebookIn analyzing a client’s website recently, I noticed Facebook was bringing in more than double the traffic that the local newspaper was sending.

Makes sense, you argue. Facebook is now visited more often than Google.

True, but in this case, the company was paying for an advertisement on the local newspaper’s online site. It not only wasn’t paying for advertising on Facebook, but my client also didn’t and currently doesn’t have a Facebook page for the business. Because of the kind of industry it’s in – real estate – the reason the online giant is still driving twice the traffic the advertisement is, stems from the fact that people are friending real estate agents (either because they’re actual friends of the Realtor, or networking professionally), and then clicking through to the company’s website.

It’s an astounding thought that no organized effort or money is going toward Facebook, but it’s out performing the online paid advertisement by more than two to one. In this particular case between July and September, the social networking site drove 412 visits, while the newspaper drove 192. Organic search was still far bigger a chunk of the traffic, but Facebook and the newspaper made up two of the three top referral sites.

In a way, not having an organized Facebook strategy is best, because it’s genuine word of mouth online that has produced these visitors through Facebook. In the natural course of every day life, Realtors have been building relationships with people interested in buying a home from that real estate agent, or company. Unfortunately since there was no analytics goal set up, there’s no way to know how many of the Facebook leads converted, versus those who came from the newspaper, but one would think the percentage of conversions on the news side would be slightly higher, considering they clicked on an advertisement to look at homes.

So what’s your thought? Anything for newspapers to worry about here? Or am I misinterpreting this completely? I’d love to hear your feedback.

Photo by: benstein

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How to get on Page One of Google in 10 Minutes

Thursday, August 26th, 2010

I just wanted to share how easy it was for me to get a Facebook page for a new class I’m offering on not just page one of Google’s search results, but the top slot of page one of Google. It’s not as hard as you think, and it should always work, so long as a little thought is put into what you’re naming your Facebook page.

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Posted in Facebook, FanPage, SEO, search engine optimization | View Comments

A Google Fiber Tip: If You Can’t Be Yourself, Be Someone Else

Friday, May 7th, 2010

Google Fiber Twin Ports

This is the sixth installment in a series titled, How to Get Your Client on the Front Page of the New York Times, explaining how PureDriven helped vault the Google Twin Ports initiative (focused on Duluth, MN and Superior Wis.) to national prominence in its effort to win Google’s attention and become one of the few sites where Google will build an ultra-high speed fiber network. I’ve written this series in hopes of sharing with businesses, politicians and grassroots organizers how to best gain offline and online attention for your cause, event or organization.

Lesson 6: If you can’t be yourself, someone else, literally
Meet my good friend, Speedie Gigabit,
This little man was created by local designer Brian Barber, and it was possibly one of the most successful ideas of the campaign, which I initially balked at.

Luckily, PureDriven as a whole and the rest of the volunteers at Google Twin Ports loved the idea of the character. My main complaint was that it served as yet another project our staff didn’t have the time or resources to manage. In fact however, it turned out to be a fantastic way to rally our supports and speak to them on Facebook. Here’s why it worked so well for us, and you might want to consider having a mascot or single person represent your business online.

1. It gave our volunteers a unified voice online. Right now, if your business uses a Facebook Fan page that you are an administrator of, every time you make a comment, it’s like the company logo responding. If you’d rather respond as an individual, you have to remove your administrative privileges from the Fan Page, and then get someone to make you an administrator again, when you want to change the page in some way. Here’s an example of when I post something on our company’s Facebook page.

Even though I’d like the person to know who I am, responding as the page’s owner, makes the logo appear, where ideally, I’d like my face to be.

In some cases, an employee might also want to respond to a customer. But if he or she responds as an individual, an introduction explaining he or she works for the company would have to preface every comment.

But a mascot, or even one person creating a personal profile on behalf of the company, solves that dilemma.

Whether it’s a person or a mascot, the personal profile can respond to comments and take part in conversations, with a clear, singular voice, instead of multiple individuals respond to comments, or having the company’s logo appear by each answer.

But in the world of Facebook and sites like it, real pictures of real people are preferred. And people do business with people. So having a picture of a real person on Facebook and especially Twitter to represent you, is ideal.

Because our campaign was a regional effort, we went with the mascot. It provided a “person” yet didn’t identify the entire campaign around one real face, as would be best for solo-entrepreneurs and candidates for office.

On a Facebook Groups page there is no company logo issue, but you still want that unique person or logo people can latch on to. And even if you’re a private individual with your own business, having two private accounts – one as you, and one as your public persona – is often most effective on Facebook.

A friend of mine runs a new business called Sgt. Steve, for weight loss and coaching. His real name is Steve, but when he responds to a customer or potential customer, he uses a separate Sgt. Steve account, to go along with the persona, and to keep people from wondering, “Is this someone named Steve, or THE Sgt. Steve?”

So how do you create a second private account?

All that’s required is a second e-mail address. If you don’t have one, just sign up for a free one at Yahoo, Gmail or Hotmail.

So Remember: Having an additional private Facebook account to speak to customers either with a picture of a person or a mascot, can give your business or organization more of a voice online, and it’s more personal than a logo talking to a customer.

To read the first post in this series, visit “Google called, so we vaulted our client to Page 1 of the New York Times”

To read the second, visit “In Campaigns, Little or No Money Sometimes An Advantage”

To read the third, visit “When Running Big Projects, Simple Tools Work Best”

To read the fourth, visit “Steer – Don’t Order – Volunteers For Best Results”

To read the fifth, visit “My Mistake Was Not Viewing E-mail as Critical“

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The Facebook Fan Page Conundrum

Tuesday, December 29th, 2009

With more than 350 million Facebook users worldwide, we at PureDriven are increasingly discovering that our new clients often are already on Facebook. The trouble is, when many of our clients initially signed up for Facebook, they used their private account. Now that they’re realizing that Facebook demands their business have what’s called a fan page, it creates a lot of angst, because they’ve already put a lot of effort into making a personal page for their business, and in some cases have hundreds of fans. So here are 9 good reasons to use a fan page for your business, even if it means having to tell 400 people you’re switching.  
1) Facebook could shut down your business page at any time, because it is in violation of Facebook policy.  

2) The personal pages of Facebook are not found in Google search.  

3) Fan pages are completely public, so anyone could see your fan page. He or she doesn’t need to already have a Facebook account.

4) Having a personal page seems better, because you can “friend” others. On a fan page, people must actively seek you out and become a “fan.” While some might consider it a detriment, this method means that those who will actually become a fan are more likely to be actual customers, not those who have accepted a friend request from your business out of politeness. 

5) When sending an e-mail with a link announcing the new site, most customers will immediately join the new page. While it’s not ideal, moving people to the new site isn’t as big a problem as you might think.  

6) The site’s administrator can send bulk messages out as a fan page administrator, rather than to just 20 at a time on a personal page.  

7) You don’t have to approve each new person to join a fan page, as you do a personal page.  

8) A fan page would be an easy and quick way to post daily or weekly events or specials.  

9) Video testimonials could easily be shot and uploaded onto the fan page. So now that you’re convinced a fan page is what you need, here are five tips that can help you build relevant traffic for you business on a Facebook Fan Page.

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