When Facebook announced the Fan pages, there were a number of mixed reviews. Some where hailing it and its integration to the new advertising platform and some hated it – claiming it was turning Facebook into Myspace. Whatever your stance is, here are 6 reasons you need to make a Facebook page for your website or company now.
1. Pages are public. Most of Facebook is behind a login, preventing search engines from indexing. However, some Fan pages are not behind a login and thus search engines can index the page. Hopefully, people will stumble on the result in SERPs, visit the Facebook page, and then get to your site via the link (see reason #2).
2. Pages include links. Because the pages are public, you can get some nice facebook.com link credit. You can’t use an anchor text, but hey, it’s free.
3. Send “updates to fans”. One of the greatest features is that you can send “updates” to fans whenever you want. It’s a nice way of building a database of interested users. Send messages about new products, updated website, etc.
4. You control the page. Making the page before a Fan or a competitor is critical. You want to be able to send the messages, edit or remove sections, and control the information to an extent.
5. News feed. When a someone joins a Fan page, it’s published in their News feed for all their to read (unless they have turned this off). It makes someone joining your Fan page somewhat viral.
6. It’s free and easy. Making a Fan page takes just a few minutes – add some information, URL, and upload the logo and you’re done. You can make your page
here.
Dave Rigotti is the owner of Freezing Hot, an internet marketing company which specializes in seo and paid search management for small businesses.
good post, we are discussing it on (where else?!) the FacebookEconomy.com fan page:
http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=8431870131&ref=mf
Links are link condomed which is like having pagerank flirtations with a plastic Google Babe.
Thanks for pointing out this feature as I hadn’t noticed it yet but I sure will be glad when marketers “get” facebook. Maybe one day they will but for now I’ll just sit back, watch, and shake my head.
Excellent idea, I took your advice and started my profile. It was a simple process that took 5 minutes.
Darn, I might just have to break down and do something on Facebook. Too many social sites, not enough time.
Great idea. I just set one up for my site.
http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=6870683599
I have to flesh it out a little bit, but I think it will be helpful.
Great news! This seems like it’s an excellent opportunity to promote a blog. I have set up a page for mine, DotSauce Domain News:
http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=20233591656
I don’t really like the link text “Add to My Products” as a way of being a fan on my page… but hopefully people will catch on.
With a little help of my friend Mark,…I made it through the setup process and started my own. http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=6284308996
Great idea thanks for the tips. already setup mine at
http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=14198525061
Thanks for posting this article, have created mine
http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=5731108429
What’s better though? A group or a fan page? I went the group route, because I’d like the people who write for my weblog-fiction-type-thing to also be able to writer their own content over there-
http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=5350508753
Wow, thanks for the great response everyone.
I think pages and groups need to be ran together. Group is well, a group and a page is an endorsement/testimonial.
wow! thats awesome, thanks for the info, gone making one for my blog :)
Dave,
Interesting thoughts. Personally I believe that the most powerful aspect of Fan Pages is to create conversation conduits with consumers. Although, I agree with some of your points I feel that you are still taking a destination stance vs. a conversation hub.
Here are my thoughts more fleshed out:
http://senithomas.wordpress.com/2007/11/13/facebook-fan-pages-guide-destinations-vs-collaborative-conversation-spaces/
Working with the development of free, open source software brings challenges in community building. I wasn’t convinced that facebook would be a useful tool, but got talked into it.
Mambo, the CMS, has created its page (http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=14050715716) and now also has a group. It will be interesting to see if the work involved in upkeep is outweighed by the advantages to facilitating community building. Of course, SE benefits are nice to have too!
Thanks for the advice, when I set up the company page, I wasn’t sure if it was the thing to do or not. Now I know it was.
Also, I wasn’t sure to make a company group page or product page, since we are manufacturers, so I did both.
Group: http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=5917908183
Product/Service: http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=5820397374
I’ve updated with photos of our products and links to downloads of free white papers. Great advice!
Great article, but are you sure you get link love or does facebook no a No Follow on their code like Craigslist.
Rob
http://www.essayforcollege.com
Nice catch Rob. I had forgotten to check, but after doing so it is attributed “nofollow”.
To keep positive, hopefully someone will click the link or maybe the FB page will get indexed and ranked.
check out mine at http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=5681154300
i have got few fans now but no commercial gain so far :) anyways i love facebook and will keep adding more and more to this page
Can you please tell me how to have a url for my facebook artist page. For example Dave Matthews Band are http://www.facebook.com/davematthewsband
Aaron,
Thank you for the comment. I’m not sure, but if I had to guess, it’s something you have to pay for.
There is a major drawback of these pages as they cannot be connected to existing groups. A lot of organizations already have groups and networks at Facebook but how can they be linked to their new profile pages?
Alexey,
Just have both!
ChrisBrown is my number one fan.He is the fan above of every fan.
From
2cute
I’ve started a fan page for my environment portal and they offer some nice features but promoting it is quite tricky. With groups you can invite all of your friends but with pages this feature is disabled.
How are people promoting their pages?
I set up a fan page for my camping blog on Blogger – Mungo Says Bah! This is excellent, hoping to see some traffic to it…
Mungo Says Bah Fan Page
Thanks for this excellent post!
Mungo
I can’t say that I see a compelling reason anywhere in that list.
I’d say the only compelling reason I can think of to make a fanpage for your web site is to continually remind your ‘friends’ that you are a fan (of your own page) and that way when they sign up, it spreads the word.
Mungo
Fan pages could bring a lot of traffic to your site or genearlly raise awareness. However from an SEO point of view, the links in Facebook are “not followed”.
Great post! thanks :)
This is almost the same conversation that I found on the other site. Ah well, too bad about all that Facebook stuff, but I like what this guy said:
also has a group. It will be interesting to see if the work involved in upkeep is outweighed by the advantages to facilitating community building. Of course, SE benefits are nice to have too! http://www.blowjob-milf.com
http://www.facebook.com/pages/San-Francisco-CA/Optical-Tactics/6066518765
Is it legal to start a fan page about a brand that isn’t yours? ie: i’m a fan of Nike, can i start one?
(hypothetically speaking)
Cool, I’m going to setup a fan page for my website. Thanks:)
cool.i have learnt quite alot aftr using facebook.and have caught up with many of my near and dear ones…….
we love 2 rock !!!
Thanks–just set up a page!
Thanks!
I hate the new layout D:
http://nihonomaru.com
http://hentairu.com
Awesome article, thank you very much! I’ve set mine up as well:
http://www.new.facebook.com/pages/Aperion-Audio/40024999400
Thanks for writing this post – I’m now the proud owner of a Facebook fan page, thanks to you! :-)
http://www.new.facebook.com/pages/Matt-OReilly/32966230403
This is exactly the type of information I have been looking for. Thanks for the post.
http://www.facebook.com/pages/Wichita-KS/1FreeCart-Free-Hosted-Shopping-Cart/30530827716
http://www.1freecart.com
Great post. It is very important to have a presence online, and its even better when you can do it for free!
facebook marketing services at http://www.tradimax.ocm
How do you make a nice icon on your site, that links to facebook?
Is there a way to add a ‘Become a Fan link’ to our current corp website, and when clicked and logged in they become a Facebook page fan, or do you just have to send them to the FB page and have them click’ Become a Fan’ manually?
Thanks.
this better work
this is bullshit! it doesn’t even work! stop wasting people’s time on the net putting up stupid things!!!!!
Nice post. Was searching for something like this.
this feature is great!. we used this feature after we created our myspace page. we love the ability to notify everyone when we have special event. Great Tool!!!
Check it out!
http://www.facebook.com/business/dashboard/?ref=sb#/pages/edit/?id=8641048309
To:Club Providence Atlantic City
That Facebook link doesn’t go anywhere. What is the name of the application?
http://www.facebook.com/pages/Holy-Bible-Trivia/37437252709?ref=mf
Check out http://www.holybibletrivia.org for free Bible games.
good info we just started one for the place i work for.
http://www.facebook.com/pages/Richardson-TX/BWC-Creative/36602021545
a good way to add all your contacts to your fan page is to create an event page, invite all your friends and link the fan site on it. Our first single is going to be released on radio in ten days so a couple of days before hand, we will create the event page.
you are welcome!
Started mine too:
http://www.facebook.com/pages/SewDragonDesigns-Machine-Embroidery/40551523870
If I am on Facebook already and want to become a Public Figure, is there a way to link the two pages, do they have to stay separate or should I get rid of my page and just become a Public Figure since the site is not really being used on a *personal* level? I amactually doing this for a firend who is an author and going to be hosting a radio show beginning January.
awesome! I didn’t know that the results are indexed!
i’m a fan of fan pages now!
thanks for the blog post!
David
I didn’t know Facebook pages are sooooo easy to create! Thanks for the heads up. I really love these Facebook pages.
I just set one up for my music and such. I agree, having a page on facebook really helps your online exposure no matter what the subject matter is. Facebook is already really big and the fact that feeds are displayed to everyone on your friend list is great for keeping people up to date. Peep my page:
http://www.facebook.com/pages/Garrett-Grimm/54917277817
I was just looking on the internet for the way to expose my website on the internet in many social networks. I found that great article, anyone has an idea how to do something like this on MySpace, Sonico, Hi5, etc.
My profile:
http://www.facebook.com/people/Santiago_Pastorino/539853310
Great suggestions, thanks! I’d just started this new website in the UK and was looking for ways to promote it. I think you’re right, you definately NEED a Facebook page whether you’re a celebrity or just a business. Thanks again. I’ve not done much with the page yet, but in case anyone’s interested, here it is:
http://www.facebook.com/home.php#/pages/Caravan-Searcher/42812184385
Great Idea! I just put up a group for my company. Now, how do I add a link/button on my site that lets my visitors become a fan on Facebook!?
Great post on pages, helped me make some tweaks to my page.
I work in SEO and figured there has to be a way to gain SEO benefit from these pages, so i did some research –
http://www.noporkpies.com/seo/seo-links-from-facebook-part-2
Basically the way it works is to set up an XML feed with optimised links on it. Using a RSS app in Facebook you can then pull this feed into the facebook page. The RSS app i used didn’t add nofollows so offers SEO optimised direct links and followed links.
“Facebook for Dummies” is really a helpful book and includes chapters relating to Facebook for businesses and Facebook pages.
I just set up my page. I’m still learning, so any tips are much appreciated (as are new fans):
http://www.facebook.com/pages/puci/71234733824
We are setting up a Facebook Fan page for Foreclosures.com. I like the idea of pulling in RSS content, but what are you pulling from – an existing blog? Is this a dupe content problem, or is that not worth worrying about anymore?