Saturday, March 26, 2011

facebook pages simplified for SMEs

For Small and Medium Enterprises Social Media is a boon. Social networks have opened up many avenues for businesses. Especially the small enterprises have gained much from social networking. Businesses are connecting with prospects globally and hence scaling up to the next level of growth, while keeping the outreach costs as low as possible.

The facebook revolution: what SMEs are confused about?!
Almost everyone reading this blog post will be having a personal facebook profile and many of you must be having facebook profiles/ pages for your business/ company/ personal promotion etc. Many small businesses till date are confused with facebook, especially the part that how should they effectively leverage the power of facebook?

I am XYZ company and have a profile on facebook, what should I do next?
Many of our partner SMEs have previously come to us and asked about what should they really do on facebook. Many of them already have created "profiles" on facebook for their businesses, like they have their own personal profile and that is where it all starts getting confusing.

What should a business have: facebook profile OR a business fan page?
A business (small/ large) should have a facebook fan page. Facebook fan pages allow you to connect with "fans" (people who find your proposition relevant and like it). Profiles on facebook are meant to be personal profiles of individuals. A business entity making friends on facebook through a profile is not a logically good move.

Okay, got it, how do I create a facebook fan page?
Creating facebook fan pages is easy, but we recommend if you are a first timer, you take help from a professional who has created facebook fan pages before and has the updated know how of facebook and the fan pages.

If you want to go ahead by your own self, some of the pre-requisites you must be aware of are:

  1. Know fbml (facebook markup language): this is the coding language which helps you design interactive facebook fan pages.
  2. Have a good designer on board: good designs always attract your target audience
  3. Have your target audience marked clearly: your facebook fan page must be attractive for your target audience and hence you must design the same with your audience in mind

To create your first facebook fan page click here! Once you reach on this page, click on the Create Page button on the top right section of the page.

As shown in the screen capture above, facebook allows you to categorize your fan page as: 
  • Local business Or Place
  • Company Organization Or Institution
  • Brand Or Product
  • Artist, Band Or Public Figure
  • Entertainment
  • Cause Or Community
Once you decide upon the category, click on the button and you are on your way to creating your first facebook fan page. For an example, here we select Company, Organization Or Institution. 

Once you enter the name of the company as the name of the fan page, you are good to go. Facebook will make you land on your facebook fan page, which will be empty and fresh as of now and like an empty HTML page on the web/ your website, your facebook fan page will need to be built upon.

So now that I have the fan page, what next?
Now that the facebook fan page is ready in its basic structural element, we need to make the fan page interactive and graphically appealing. One of the easiest ways to increase interactivity is by using facebook applications.

Now once your company's facebook fan page is existing and you have an official presence, you will have to create a powerful and engaging outreach with your prospective customers. This will happen only with the messaging you will propagate on your facebook fan page which will engage your prospective target audience. For this you have to have a proper plan which will help you manage and monitor the fan page.

Will every fan on the fan page be relevant to your business?
May not be. A 100% relevant community may not be possible, but sure it depends upon how you build and manage the community. The relevance also depends upon your messaging, interactivity and engagement. Though you must work towards increasing the engagement amongst the target audience.

How can I check on the relevancy of the fans?
Being the manager on the page, facebook allows you to see "Page Insights". These are statistics which help you understand the demographics of the facebook fans your business page has. Once you have the demographics you can keep evolving throughout the lifespan of the fan page and increase relevancy.

How does it help SMEs?
Reducing down the cost of outreach and marketing and engaging prospective customers, facebook fan pages help SMEs engage the target audience while taking the business to the next level. For SMEs facebook fan pages is a low cost way to marketing and engaging the prospective target audience.

Team IndiaMART Knowledge Services is committed to help SMEs grow to the next level. For more on facebook drop in your comments to this post and our team of experts will be happy to help!

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