Tag: Facebook Fan Pages

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Facebook Business Pages Demystified for Business Owners

I have just published earlier this week my most recent white paper. This one is called Facebook Business Pages Demystified for Business Owners. You can download or read this white paper online from our website.

This interesting white paper will help you to get started reaching new business prospects on Facebook fast and understand why Facebook is the new place for businesses to be. With Facebook being more popular than Google.com and the place where 50% of registered users login every day, Facebook is the place to be for your business too.

Here are some fun facts from Facebook:

  1. Facebook has more than 500 million active users.
  2. 50% of the active users login once a day.
  3. The average user has 130 friends.
  4. People spend over 700 billion minutes a month on Facebook.
  5. The average user creates 90 pieces of content each month.
  6. More than one million websites have integrated with the Facebook Platform.
  7. Two-thirds of comScore’s U.S. Top 100 websites and half of comScore’s Global Top 100 websites have integrated with Facebook.
  8. There are more than 150 million active users currently accessing Facebook through their mobile devices.
  9. Average user is connected to 80 community pages, groups and events.
  10. More than 30 billion pieces of content (web links, news stories, blog posts, notes, photo albums, etc.) shared each month.

That is 10 super reasons your business should be on Facebook. 

I have another white paper, a longer and more detailed one that spells out how to use Welcome pages and FBML which is Facebook’s simple code. You can download it, “Facebook Business Page How-To Guide”, now. To get the PDF you will need to subscribe to our monthly e-newsletter.

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How to Create a Facebook Fan Welcome Page

What a Great Idea!

I’m sure you’ve seen them – Facebook Fan Page Welcome Pages; specially created pages with images and links to your website the first time you hit someone else’s Facebook Fan page. Well, here’s how to create one for your own Facebook Fan Page.

First off, this is for your Fan Page and not your personal profile. The welcome page you create will only be visible to people who are not your fans yet. When they fan you, or now “like” you as Facebook has changed the descriptor from “fan me” to “like”, they will be directed to your wall and won’t see your welcome page again on entry.

Welcome pages can be great to give an overview of your business, link to important information about you, showcase products or services, or even direct customers to your online store.

Here are the steps to follow to set up your own Welcome Page.

1. Make sure you are logged into your Facebook account and are on your Fan Page administration page. This page will start with Settings, Wall Settings, Mobile, and then Applications just to name a few. Under “More Applications” click the “Static FBML” Link. Follow the link and click on the new Facebook page that appears to add this to your page. 

2. Click back into the manage your page section again and look for a new item in your page management control panel that is called FBML. Click edit. A new screen opens that is titled FBML. Change this to a one word or two word header such as Shop Now or Welcome. This name will appear on your Facebook tab, so it has to be short.

3. In the page content enter your information. You can either create a line break between paragraphs by using simple html code such as <p> before each paragraph and ending with </p> after each paragraph or pushing enter to create the needed white space.

4. For web users who know their way around a bit of html you can link in images using html code and a complete URL from an image hosted on your own website’s server, and even link to pages or products using html code as well. If this part is over your head, you should get your webmaster involved. This page does not take complex html code only very simple elements such as images or links. That being said you can liven up the experience using html and image elements on this page.

 5. lick “save changes”. You are not done yet, but almost. Navigate back now to your edit fan page control panel and then “Wall Settings” go to view settings. Under “Default Landing Tab for Everyone Else” select your new Welcome or Shop Now page from the drop down. Voila, now when a new possible friend/fan comes to your Facebook Fan page for the first time, they will see your Welcome page.

 If this sounds too complicated for you, you may want to consider paying us to set this up for you. You can visit our Facebook Fan page for pricing and Fan page management levels.

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How to Create a Vanity URL for Your Facebook Fan Page

It is easy to do a vanity URL for your profile page, but how do you do one for your Fan Page and can you even do one. Yes you can! Here’s how.

1. Log into your Facebook account. Make sure you have set yourself up as an administrator for any Fan Page that you work on as well or you will need to login to each account as the owner separately to do the following.

2. Go to this URL: http://www.facebook.com/username/ Select your Fan Page name from the drop down if you have multiple pages your work on. If your fan page is not selectable you may not have 25 fans yet and so you will need to get a minimum of 25 friends first to be able to have a vanity URL. If your page name shows up, enter your desired easy to remember name in the field and then click check availability.

3. Confirm that this is the URL you want and then update your Facebook Fan Page badges and links on your website.

Sometimes the name that matches your business is not available. There could be several reasons why.

  1. Facebook may not be allowing this name.
  2. Someone may have tagged this name but not published the Fan Page yet.
  3. The name is too generic.
  4. The name selected may be a recognizable trademarked name.
  5. The name or combination of words may be considered offensive.
  6. Some other unknown Facebook criteria has prevented you taking the name.

If this happens to you, you can visit the Facebook Fan Page support center: http://www.facebook.com/FanpageHelpCenter where you may be able to get additional help with your problem.

Have fun with this tip and leave a comment with your new Facebook Fan Page vanity URL below! Mine is facebook.com/mccordweb

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What Do You Really Need When It Comes to Facebook Interaction?

Okay so you have a Facebook Fan page, now what kind of interaction do you really need in order to grow your visibility? From personal experience, I have found that fans will typically not jump into discussion or forum-like interactions. They will however share your video links from YouTube and even comment on interesting status updates.

It is important when you set up your own Facebook Fan Page to try different things to see what your own fans like and don’t like. I have found for myself that Fans won’t take the time to join in heavy discussions on industry specific topics. My fans like YouTube videos and small informational snippets.

When you set up your own Facebook Fan Page, I recommend that you try out different approaches for about 30 days to see what your fans like. I even recommend asking them. Running contests and doing polls are just a few ways you can elicit a response from your own fans.

Facebook makes it easy for you to know what your fans like by sending you a weekly activity update so you can identify how many times fans have interacted with your page and how many new fans you have gotten.

I feel that it is important for a business to have a Facebook Fan page with the strong acceptance and use of Facebook. Facebook is a mainstream application and another great and fun way to share information with customers, prospects, and business colleagues.