While my company, SamsonMedia.net, builds custom Facebook pages for various clients and is heavily involved in social media marketing for both our own business and on behalf of our clients, I can honestly say that creating a Facebook presence for business purposes is NOT for everyone.
Here’s why:
For most small and medium-sized businesses I find Facebook to be more effective as a business to consumer medium and less as a business to business medium. Yes, of course, there are exceptions but in general I find that businesses on Facebook are not that interested in “liking” other businesses unless there’s some sort of partnership or strategic alliance in place.
And unless you’re a large company doing business with hundreds or thousands of other businesses around the country and even the world, like Cisco, which just topped 203,000 likes on their Facebook page, it’s unlikely that you’ll get enough leads and traction to make the effort worthwhile. A possible exception would be using Facebook as a customer service tool to answer questions and act in a customer support role. But as a lead generating and enagement tool, not so much.
IS YOUR BUSINESS MISSING THE BOAT BY NOT BEING ON FACEBOOK?
Not a day goes by that all the hype surrounding Facebook ratchets up the feeling among the local businesspeople I know who feel that they’re missing out by not jumping on the Facebook bandwagon.
I even had a potential client recently say to me that they thought that they no longer needed a website at all, that all they needed was a Facebook page for their public relations consulting business. Uh, no. Websites aren’t going anywhere although they are evolving. But that’s another story for another blog post. But that’s been the power of the Facebook illusion on business.
So back to Facebook and whether or not YOU should have a Facebook page for your business.
HERE’S THREE THINGS TO CONSIDER BEFORE TAKING THE PLUNGE:
- Will you have the time to post content nearly every day…forever?
- What will you post?
- Who will “tend the fires”? Do you have the time and/or staffing resources to keep it going?
We give frequent webinars on using Facebook and we usually present a list of nearly a dozen other questions to consider like what “voice” will you use and other fine points about types of content, etc., but the three questions listed above are really the Big Three that you should answer first and foremost before taking the plunge.
Because if the answers are “no” or “don’t know” to any one of the three questions then you’ll want to seriously reconsider taking the plunge down the social media rabbit hole. Because the only thing worse than a half-baked social media strategy is one that soon gets abandoned after a few months and that just lays there letting the digital tumbleweeds roll by.
Good point, with Facebook you have to devote time to it. Is there a way to set up a FB page that does not focus on the wall, ie. status updates? Then they could direct people to their website?
agree with the point of a business account being a business to consumer medium to be more effective. i am sure business owners would soon realize after a very short while that ‘liking’ other businesses is not going to be worth the time and effort in most cases.
for anyone thinking of starting a facebook business account then they should ask themselves the three questions you have posed. this will immediately help them decide if it all will be worthwhile for them and if people will be interested
A lot of business owners do not understand the point of having a business facebook. They think it is a waste of time because they fail to understand just how they are going to see profits.
It is important to understand that the goal of social media is to gain exposure and not direct sales. Offering existing customers discounts for using FB ads and coupons is also very effective.
True indeed! I always wanted to create a Facebook page for one of my business but then it’s not a big company like Coco Cola or Pepsi so I was worried, especially with the new timeline thing that which actually meant to make users to be more active on posting stuff into their page to make it look updated. My worries was on if I can post content nearly every day forever? It is something that I really can’t do. Well, even blogging sometimes takes me days to find inspiration to write… 🙂
I sometimes think of social media as a book marking service for my followers and for me. If I read something interesting and relevant to my audience, I can always tweet it or Facebook it and refer back to it later myself. A win-win.
It is absolutely critical that you have a facebook account these days for any businesses. Great article my friend!
We all love to use facebook. Nowadays its like part and parcel of our daily life to check new notification, friends requests in facebook. Facebook made this big world into a little ball which you can hold in your hand. I think facebook made a revolution in Social networking. Everyday its adding new features to attract its users and to give its users new taste of socialism. I love almost every features of facebook except the new timeline tweak. I don’t know I just feel annoyed when I see someone timeline. Maybe its awkward for me but many users still like it. But I decided to take it out of my facebook account and I found this Facebook Timeline Remove 0.8.2 !. Its really working and I feel great with it. I’d recommend it to all the facebook users who don’t like facebook time. Thanks.
I agree with you that nowadays if you have a business, you also need to have a facebook page. This will help you and your business earn more and be more popular online.