Paul Dunay is author of the marketing blog Buzz Marketing for Technology and Facebook Marketing for Dummies. He is sharing with us his tips for marketing your business on Facebook.
What’s the difference between a Facebook Fan page and a Facebook group?
So some of the key differences between Facebook Groups and Facebook Fan Pages are that they are not indexable by the search engines since they are not public. Which means they are only visible to Facebook members. As the owner of a Facebook Group you can dictate how open you want your membership to be. You can chose to make your Group; “Open” to all Facebook members, “Closed” meaning Facebook members can see it but they need to have their membership approved by the owner or “Secret” meaning by invitation only and not visible to a search on Facebook for Groups. Another major difference is you cannot add applications to a Group like you can to a Page.
Groups have it a easier when it comes to recruiting other members to the Group. You can quickly and easily send out an invite to all your personal Friends in your profile to join your Group. And in turn its easy for your friends to send out an invite to all their friends to join your Group – giving Groups a leg up on some viral aspect where Pages have a more difficult time. It is also easier to send message to every group member which will appear in the members Inbox. Inviting the group to an Event is also easier but creating an ad for a group doesn’t exist like it does for a page.
When should you start a Fan page and when should you start a group?
So you may want to consider a Facebook Group if you want to have a serious discussion where members can really get involved, perhaps around a cause or a topical media issue that you want to enlist support on (a petition or human rights issue or something). You might be better off at the start to join a few groups and see how it is done before jumping in to start your own. Bottom line is for almost any business you want to have a Facebook Page think of the Group as an Association you would join or start to support your business.
For a new entrepreneur who doesn’t have much of an audience, how would you suggest building a targeted audience for your Facebook fan page?
I would absolutely start a page as a budding entrepreneur; which frankly is almost easier than building a website. The real question is should you build a website or a Facebook Fan page and which would you build first. For now, I would build the website but I can see a day when some firms will only have their Facebook page and no website.
The first tactic to consider is syndicating your existing content to create a steady stream of rich content and using Facebook as an outpost for that content. If you already have a blog, podcast series or video series you can effectively use Facebook to attract another audience to interact with those assets.
Another tactic is Facebook Events which are a great way of getting people together virtually or in person in support of your local business, brand or product. They are also a very economical way of getting the word out beyond your normal in-house marketing list by inviting the Fans of your Page. Fans can also help you promote your Facebook Event to their friends by sharing the event if it seems of value to a group of their friends.
You can also consider advertising on Facebook to build your fan base as well as more advanced tactics like creating a branded application like FedEx or Best Buy have done.
Many B2B companies dismiss Facebook as a marketing tool. Why is this a mistake?
Any company B2B or B2C can have a fan page. I think wherever you have sales of a product or service in either B2B or B2C you have the opportunity to create a Facebook Page and start having a dialog with your customers. I know a company that makes solder (clearly B2B) and they maintain 7 blogs, a twitter feed and a Facebook page. They engage their audience in how to use solder, best practices, ideal conditions to store and use their solder etc… If you have customers you have a potential audience to speak with socially and Facebook should be a staple of anyone’s social strategy because there is such a large audience there.
Where do you see Facebook marketing trends moving in the next two years?
Wow this is a big question - one which I blog about on my blog often (http://pauldunay.com).
First of all I think Facebook Advertising will take off – Last year Facebook saw their advertiser base triple! Facebook ads today remind me of Google AdWords in 2001 with low CPC’s on topics and segments many marketers will want to reach. I believe Facebook Ads will become the close “cousin” of Google AdWords – just with a more targeted and behavioral way to dial in your ads. BtoB Marketers should try it out for recruiting or even brand advertising – also don’t forget my book Facebook Marketing for Dummies comes with a credit for $50 Free Facebook ads
Second Facebook announced their Project Titan to the market on February 5th and it is candidly thought to be a Google Gmail killer. But what does that really mean. Well first that means that Facebook will issue 400 Million email accounts – which is no small feat. Second those email accounts will be tied to your Facebook profile Vanity URL in my case [email protected]. Third, Facebook says they will enable this feature for Pages (the business version of your Profile). And fourth those Page email addresses will be tied your Page Vanity URL such as [email protected] (which by the way they significantly lowered the minimum number of the Fans you need to get a Vanity URL from 1000 down to just 25!)
The point here for B2C and B2B Marketers is that as Facebook makes their platform rich in interaction and captures more users and hence more conversations about your brand – you will need to be there and engage with their user base. I still get questions from firms asking if they should start a presence in Facebook and the answer is unequivocally YES. Facebook should be your social media hub of everything you have from company news, announcing events, offer tutorials, highlight videos, conduct polls and create community around discussions. But now with this new email feature you can upload your email lists and invite them to truly engage with you on Facebook.
Lastly if Facebook can create this type of rich interaction with their Fan Pages and now their email systems – then why would you need an external email vendor? Did I forget to mention all of this is FREE!
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