Facebook for Small Business

Facebook is an excellent way to promote your business regardless of size, and it is free to set up! Facebook allows the opportunity to link to other people in your local area looking for your services, as well as other businesses for an easy way to network with lower investment in time & cost.

At the time of writing Facebook has more than 175 million active users worldwide with the fastest growing user group being over 30 years old. As of February 25, 2008 there are nearly 5 million active Facebook users in Australia. Facebook allows businesses to set up their own page to use to promote to all users. It also has a significant role in being an easy to use promotional tool for your business - whether it be online or offline.

Below is a step by step guide on getting started with setting up a Facebook account for a business. Instead of the normal process for signing up as an individual, there is a different process to set up a page for your business.

If you require a more in depth tutorial Facebook have provided an excellent tutorial on setting up Facebook pages.

Plan

Think about what you want to say & who you want to say it to

Prepare

Collect the information you will use on your business Facebook page.

* Email
* Password
* Business Name
* Date of Birth
* Picture - a business logo in JPG, GIF or PNG format
* Address & phone number details
* Business opening hours
* Website URL
* Depending on the business type you select there may be a variety of different questions eg. whether parking is available or public transport details to your location
* General information about your business - make sure this is informative and keyword rich - containing words people searching for your business will use

Step by Step

* Go to Create New Facebook Page, enter your details and click on Create Page
* Fill out the details on the next page to set up a new Facebook account or link to an existing personal Facebook account - I prefer to keep my personal and business account identities separate on the internet but the choice is wholly yours. If you choose to set up a new account, make sure to click on Create an account and set up an individual account after you have set up your profile.
* Check the email account used for Facebook for a registration confirmation link & click on the link within the email - this step stops people falsely setting up accounts using your email address.
* You will then be taken to the page, to add information & upload a page. Fill out the information as completely as possible to increase the ways potential customers can connect with you.
* Set up basic & detailed info, then view the page to make sure it all looks correct
* Add any photos, videos, links or events you may have
* Click on view your page to see how it will look to the public
* If your information looks good, then click on Publish your page.

Use Facebook’s email, instant messenger and join your country’s network to start connecting your business to other Facebook users. There are also tools such as Friend Finder and the search bar to locate other people. Search People, Groups, Events and Pages for your business type or local area depending on what is most relevant for your business.

Now that your page is set up, you need to add content you have planned out previously - an excellent example is Facebook’s own business page

Keep visitor’s coming back to your page by updating it regularly.

This is part of a series on how to set up Social Media accounts to promote your business, if you have any questions or requests please feel free to drop me a line below.

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