How to use Facebook for business?

Face book is a Social Utility that connects you with the people around you. Originally it was started in 2004 as a closed community for college students. Today there are over 120 million active users. Face book has been adding 250,000 new users each day since January 2007. It is the 4^th most trafficked website and the most trafficked social media site. It is also considered the Top Social Search Engine. There are over 55,000 networks on Face book and more than half are outside of college and the fastest demographic is 25 years and older. There are two kinds of marketing Outbound and Inbound Marketing. Typically Outbound Marketing would be TV ads, Newspaper, Radio, direct mail, Email blasts etc, but overtime these methods have become ineffective, these are old school methods that rely heavily upon buying time to get someone’s attention, But these days almost everyone has Tivo, or Satellite radios or subscribe to RSS Feeds and have spam filters that are keeping away from delivering your messages as an advertiser. In bound marketing involves a much more effective approach of delivering your message through Blogs, SEO, Social Media, PR groups and Online reviews to get your audience interested in you and your products and services.

Outbound marketing methods like trade shows, direct mail, email blasts really interrupt your users. It is like hitting someone with a hammer on the head. Inbound marketing is permission based and draws people to you, to your website and product creating interesting content and getting to know your user and what they are looking for.

Social media is about connecting with people and Face book allows you to do that very easily.

Marketing yourself and your company on Face book takes a special approach. Social networks are designed to foster human interaction not to just promote products.

Here are some great tips from industry professionals. These may require you to invest some time but would be well worth the effort.

#1 Create and Build a Business Page: Enter as much as information as you can, you must have a personal profile in order to do this. Which means all you need is a valid e mail id. Add a photo, Basic information about your company, Interests, Join as many groups as you can and add tons of applications. Building a relationship is easier when people know more about you. Be a Fan of other relevant groups. After you are done creating a business page you can publish a page. Also you must start by becoming a fan of your page. That way all of the pages you are a fan of will show up on your profile. Here is a link to create a page: http://www.facebook.com/pages/create.php

Join groups: Next, join a group to start networking with interesting people. There are thousands of groups on Face book in two categories:

a. Global

b. Network

You can browse for different groups to join. Check your network categories by looking at users profiles. If for instance you are interested in the automobile industry join the global and the network specific auto groups and then check which groups other members belong to. Face book allows you to join up to 200 groups. After you join a group you can send other members emails or text messages or even comment on their profiles or use a third party application.

 #2. Create an Engaging Page: Once your profile is what you want it to be, start building your credibility by adding content to the site. Anything that establishes your company or product should be used. Events, Videos, Discussions, Photos and blog articles
This can also include:
o Links to articles you have on your website
o Product photos and information
o Incorporating your Company blog
o Host an events or start discussions
o Having many “friends” from the industry specific to our company

#4 Draw on your Network: Don’t forget your existing network. Include a link on your email signature. Blog about your facebook page or post a link or badge on your website or blog.

 #5 Optimize your Facebook:  This will depend upon how many fans that your page has. Let people know you are out there. The name of your page also plays a great factor. Include keywords on your title. This would mean having a commitment. Also make sure you do not keyword stuff it. On the public search side of things facebook pages are getting indexed by search engines as well this depends on how you set up your privacy settings.

 #6 Advertise on Facebook: You need to decide what you are going to advertise. A website or a group or a specific product. After that you can start creating your ad. It is somewhat similar to Google Adwords. You can put in a title , a text. Please check out their website for guidelines as facebook is quiet strict with what they will allow. Be sure to ad an image as it will increase your click through rate. You can also add social actions. Facebook will add to the connections with any page or groups that you are connected to. You can also target your audience to only be shown say in a particular geographic location or a specific age group this also includes job titles and keywords to further target your ad. This way you can profile your ad to fit the right target audience. Lastly you can set the budget. Pay per click is the best as facebook has a notoriously low click through rate.

#7 Measure and Track through Facebook Insights: Finally you can track the number of friends and fans overtime and also the level of activity, page views and fans can be measured . On the ad side the ad manager lets you track how your ad has been performing so you can track the ROI that you get from it.