As a standard part of our website design service Amherst Partners will create a Facebook Business Page for our client's business. What exactly does this mean and is it a good idea? In this article I will attempt  to answer both of these questions.

The first part is easy. What is a Facebook Business Page? Facebook offers a service whereby you can create a separate page that acts much like a personal page except it is intended for promoting a business or organization. Up until recently (it appears) Facebook would prevent you from creating a personal account using a business name. Exactly how Facebook determined during the registration process that a name was a business and not a person is something I have yet to understand. I noticed recently however that people are beginning to create accounts using a form of their business name as the first name and last name required during account creation. Did Facebook relax their policy on account creation? Or is this a temporary bug. I've got to do a bit more research before I know the answer to that one.

Now the second part of my two part question. Is creating a Facebook page for your business a good idea? My answer at this time is... who knows? Actually, all joking aside, I believe it is. And, if you trust the marketing directors at companies like NBC, General Motors, and United Airlines to know what they are doing then you'll have to agree that there is something to this social networking phenomenon. Almost every major corporation and brand, national and international, have created Facebook pages and linked them to their websites. Check it out. Browse around and look for the Big F on your favorite company's website, then click on it to view their page. An of course, become a "Fan" or indicate that you "Like" it. After all, the name of the game on Facebook is to see who can collect the most fans and likes right?

So, once you have a Facebook page for your company what do you do with it? Well, the whole idea behind having a Facebook business page is to use it to keep your fans informed of the latest happenings at your company. Think of it as a real-time news ticker. If your company offers interesting and compelling products and/or services then it would follow that there may be a few existing (or potential) customers out there that would like to be kept informed of the latest news about those products and services. With all the electronic media that is available these days many people look for ways to not have to go looking for the latest news. Instead they want it delivered to them in a form and on a device that they control. Facebook fits this model well. (Oh, by the way, I am not ignoring Twitter - that is the subject of an upcoming article. Twitter, like Facebook, has it's place in corporate America as well.)

Ok, I've convinced you that having a Facebook business page for your company is a good idea. But, you say "I don't have the time to update my website, update Facebook (and other social media like Twitter), and run my business. It's just too much to deal with". Well, I have the answer for you. At Amherst Partners we design and develop websites using the Joomla CMS ("Content Management System"). We install and configure RSS ("Real Simple Syndication") capabilities into every website we develop. The Joomla RSS extensions we use allow us to selectively choose articles (site pages) for publishing via the RSS standard. Consequently, Facebook has an Application (an extension to their base services) that will take an RSS feed as input and place the content on your Businesses Wall. With this capability all you need to do is keep your website up to date - the publishing to Facebook is automatic. Of course, you can also add anything you like directly to your Facebook business page via your Facebook account if you choose.

Below you will see a view of our Amherst Partners Facebook business page. This view, along with a number of other views, is generated and provided by Facebook directly. It shows and up to date snapshot of our (or your) Facebook wall.

Oh, and before I forget - please click on the Facebook icon to the left and "Like" our business page. Many thanks!

Last Updated on Monday, 11 October 2010 10:06