Facebook Biz
You may already be familiar with the fact that Facebook is no longer just for connecting with friends and family, but did you know that it can provide dramatic benefits to a small business that are seeking to engage with their target market online.
For many small businesses in this difficult economy, it can be tough to spend enough money to create a successful advertising campaign. In fact, with the large number of new startup websites online, you have to be a savvy Internet marketer in order to get noticed whatsoever. Luckily, social media provides a free advertising venue for your small business, and when used correctly, it can help to level the playing field between your small company and a larger corporation.
Creating a Facebook Fan Page
Start out the process of social media engagement by creating a Facebook fan page. This will help you potentially reach hundreds or potentially thousands of new customers. This can be done easily by clicking on "Advertising" at the bottom of your Facebook profile page. From there, click on "Pages", and then click on "Create a Page". You will be guided through the process, and it is important to take the time to provide as much detailed information as you can for your current and potential customers. The more information that you add, the more professional that your page will look, so take the opportunity to upload graphics, videos, tutorials, and especially your company logo.
Of course, this page will not become visible until you hit the button to publish, and after publishing, it is simple to keep your fan page edited and updated. In fact, make it a priority for your company to continue to go back and revamp this page as often as possible so that it stays current, fresh, and attractive!
From there, it is time to get down to promotion so that people on Facebook can know that your fan page exists. You can post this fan page link to your own personal status so that your immediate friends will know about your page and become fans. If you also have a Twitter profile (check out mine at http://twitter.com/offshoreally), make sure to tweet every time you update your company’s Facebook page with some awesome news.
Synchronize
Just as I mentioned above about promoting your Facebook fan page on Twitter, it is important to now include all information about your Facebook fan page for your small business in your e-mail signature, on your business cards, on your website - you name it. This is your opportunity to sync all of your marketing attempts together, and it is incredibly vital to make your Facebook fan page visible so that people can go to Facebook to find out more about your company. If you don't tell people, they won't know, so make sure that information about finding your company on Facebook is clear to everyone.
The Like Button
So how do people continue to circulate your Facebook fan page to their own circle of friends? The simple answer is in the Like Button created by Facebook where any user can give a thumbs up to something that they like on the website. This means that if your friends "like" your business fan page, that information will be made visible to all of their friends that you may not be friends with. This simple tactic means instant marketing for your company on Facebook, so make sure to encourage your own friends to "like" and circulate your business fan page to their own inner circle!
Branding on Facebook
Branding your small business on Facebook is, in one word, invaluable. Recent studies have proven that the biggest influences for customers when making purchase decisions are friends and family. Any advertising that can be done within these social media venues will be incredibly significant in boosting your customer base and increasing your sales online. As a quick tip: much of this social media marketing can be done through outsourcing to trusted professionals. If you don't have the time, resources, or knowledge to do it yourself then you can hire a trained virtual assistant to do it all for you.
As an example, take the recent Old Spice social media campaign. Old Spice has been a product on the market for many years, yet when they took their campaign to social media websites, it exploded. This has become one of the most popular viral campaigns created in the past several years using personalized videos that the Old Spice Guy made for fans, which were put into mass circulation through a multitude of social media sites online. To break it down, Old Spice made 180 videos, which received 5.9 million views with 22,500 comments in a matter of a few days.
The numbers don't lie when it comes to branding your company on Facebook...
This article was written by Nitin Aggarwal from Offshore Ally. If you are looking for trained virtual assistant or internet marketing assistants, just contact him on his website or through his twitter link above.
