Why I set up a Facebook page for my Business

Posted 19 Aug 2010 - 7 Gratefully received comments

When it comes to social networking I’m not what you’d call a trendsetter. I’m not the first to try something new and plough the furrow for others to follow. I hang back to see if something works well for others before jumping in myself.

This might seem cowardly, but it makes perfect sense to me. I like to know what I’m getting myself into before deciding whether I can commit to it or not. After much deliberation I’ve finally decided to set up a facebook page for my little freelance business.

You may ask why I had to think about it? This is quite simple. I’m quite a busy person, so before I decide to commit slices of my time to something I need to assess if it will be beneficial to me or if it will offer something different to my readers & clients.

Generally, a facebook page will repeat a lot of the content I have on my website, and any updates and notifications I would usually make can be handled by twitter, so what’s the point?

1. Repetition isn’t a bad thing as long as you don’t overdo it.

2. Repetition isn’t a bad thing as long as you don’t overdo it.

3. As unusual as it may seem, not everyone in the world uses twitter. There are plenty of people I know on facebook that don’t, so it’s important to give them an easier way to keep up to date with what I’m up to if they choose to ‘like’ my page.
Not everyone uses the internet in the same way, so it’s important to give people multiple methods of interacting with me online.

4. I can link my facebook page to twitter and streamline how I interact with my online network.

5. A facebook page adds a new element to how I can interact with my readers. At the moment I have a short dialogue with my readers via the comments section. My facebook page has a discussions forum that is open to anyone to start a conversation with me and anyone else that is interested in the page. I like the fact that one of my favourite things about running my blog, interacting with readers, can be taken a step further via facebook.

There are plenty of other reasons why running a facebook page for your business just makes good sense!

1. Facebook is a massive database! If one of your friends likes your page, this is shown to their friends and their friends, friends etc Your page is part of a vast worldwide network that includes people that might never visit your actual website but there is a chance they will find out about it via FB.

2. Facebook pages are public and accessible to search engines. It’s a useful extra front in your online promotion.

3. You target your updates to the people that are interested. Each update you post on your facebook page appears in the news feed of those that have registered an interest. It’s not blind promotion.

4. It’s free! You can invest money in facebook advertising, but for now setting up a page is free, so why not set one up?

The only concerns I have are making sure that I keep the page lively and interesting. I’m running it on a trial basis for now to see if it’s a useful new front for my online marketing.

I hope you’ll take the time to give it a look and ‘like’ the page. Hopefully it will become a new and interesting aspect of my online presence.

Do you have a facebook page for your business? What were the reasons for starting one? Do you find it useful/complimentary to your other online activities?

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7 Comments

  • Johnny says:
    August 19, 2010 at 10:37 am

    You seem kind of like me where I’ve been resisting the need to set up a FB account for so long but know the time has to come soon (obviously you took the jump).

    Were you really turned off by FB before you decided it would beneficial for your business?

    [Reply]

    Ken Reynolds Reply:
    August 19th, 2010 at 10:45 am

    Hi Johnny, thanks for commenting.

    I’ve had a personal FB account for years, which I have been using less and less for a while now, so I didn’t have anything against FB in principle.

    The only questions I had in my mind before setting up the page involved if it would add anything to my self-promotion or give anything extra to my readers.

    The sort of questions that will never be answered until I give it a go.

    So far it’s meshed quite well with my normal blogging/promotion etc, and there is still plenty of exploration to go.

    I don’t think it’s a necessity or stand alone solution, but I think it adds a new facet to my online presence and opens up my activities to an audience that were mostly unaware of me previously.

    The main reason I put it off for so long was making sure I had enough time to give it a proper go before I set it up.

    [Reply]

  • Mart says:
    August 19, 2010 at 4:58 pm

    I’m quite suprised it took you that long to join to be honest.
    Ive had my facebook photography site for a while now due to many reasons,
    1. Its FREE!
    2. Millions of people use it, even if your not a member you can still type the URL address and look at the page (set your URL up Ken if you haven’t) mine is http://www.facebook.com/mwphotography.co.uk
    3. I can display all of my work and still look organised.
    4. Its easier to update as I haven’t got Dreamweaver and its over my business budget.
    5. When you update your page it updates all your fans.

    [Reply]

  • Tara says:
    August 20, 2010 at 11:38 am

    Hi Keith, I have just set up a page for my blog too. If you don’t mind me asking how did you get your blog posts into your fanbook page with clickable headings – a plugin maybe? I tried using the notes in Facebook and importing RSS but the headings weren’t clickable. Have you taken a look at posterous – pretty interesting idea too.

    [Reply]

    Ken Reynolds Reply:
    August 20th, 2010 at 3:36 pm

    Hi Tara, hopefully you mean me! My name’s Ken BTW :)

    I post my articles on the FB page by filling out the update line with the name of the article etc The line under that says attatch and gives you a number of icons.
    Click link, then paste in the url to your article.

    Hope this helps.

    [Reply]

  • Tara says:
    August 20, 2010 at 4:16 pm

    oops Ken so sorry – call me teresa or toni …or something worse if you want ;)

    Thanks for the info about how to post to facebook I will give that a go.

    [Reply]

    Ken Reynolds Reply:
    August 23rd, 2010 at 7:44 am

    No worries, people have called me much worse in the past! ;)

    Hope the info helps.

    [Reply]

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Who's Ken?

Picture of Ken I'm a freelance graphic designer living and working in Suffolk. I've been using Illustrator, Photoshop, InDesign & Quark Xpress since 1999 but I've been using pens, pencils, paper and most importantly my imagination for a lot longer. I'm always looking for new clients to work with and interesting projects to work on.

 

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