TV, radio, and newspapers are no longer the best advertising options. On the other hand, we are starting to realize the power of social media. Big brands are talking about social media. Great ways of advertising on it, quick and easy targeting, and of course the personalized relationship with their customers through these channels. We talk about marketing on social media. Why television is not what it used to be. Why people don’t buy newspapers anymore and inform themselves through social media. However, we all skip the basics. And that is why I decided to write this text.
In the social media world, Facebook is in the lead. Therefore, today we will talk about the one basic thing that is necessary in order to advertise your brand on Facebook. A Facebook page.
What is a Facebook page, and why you should market through a page and not a profile?
Most of us know what is a Facebook profile and how to use one. However, it often happens that people get lost when they want to present the company, an organization or a cause that they believe is important. How to accesses Facebook then?
A huge number of people don’t quite realize the difference between a Facebook page and profile. And I am sure that even those who “know” the differences, don’t know the very basic characteristics of using a profile and a page.
So let’s repeat what we already think we know and learn something new 🙂
Facebook profile
Facebook profile is personalized. Anyone who wants to join Facebook must have their own profile. Your profile on Facebook is a place where you can connect with friends. Here you can share your personal information. For example, your birthday, where you are from, who your family members are, which schools you attended, what you had for lunch today, pretty much anything you want. Through that profile you communicate with your friends on a personal level, posting pictures, videos and everything you would like to share about your life.
You can only have one profile under one e-mail address. On your profile, you can also decide whether to like or follow specific pages whose content you are interested in. Or join a particular group. I know that you are all aware of this, but it is important to really see the differences.
For example, a Facebook profile has certain options that Facebook page doesn’t, such as chat and gaming options. On the Facebook page, you don’t have chat like on your profile, in the right down angle, where you can see who is online, but you have an option to receive messages that you can answer. So, it doesn’t go by the name of “chat”, but it pretty much works the same.
Facebook Page
Facebook page is a public profile. Its purpose is to market a certain product or service.
If you are a public figure, have a company, organization or a goal that you think is worthy of attention, you have the opportunity to market it to a wider audience through a Facebook page.
It is important to know that without a profile you can’t have a page. Still, if you want to manage multiple pages, you do not have to open multiple profiles. You can run as many pages as you want through one profile.
What 99 percent of people skip when they are creating a Facebook page is reading Facebook Terms and Conditions. In order to run your business on any social network, you have to be introduced with their Terms and Conditions. One of the main Facebook rules is that you can’t represent a business through a profile. So, if you create a profile instead of a page in business purpose, Facebook will shut it down.
How to create a Facebook Page?
To make a Facebook page you have to own a profile. You can create a Facebook page by clicking on the “Create Page” option. Then Facebook guides you through the steps. Or, the second option is to convert an existing profile into a page. That way you will have a profile and a page under the same name.
To manage the page you have to have a certain role on it, and different people (profiles) can manage one page (which roles exist and what are their permissions, we will leave for another post). Also, under page settings, you have tabs that can be changed and positioned. So, depending on your business you can choose your primary options. Be sure to put all important information on your page, but try to avoid unnecessary one. And don’t worry if you type something wrong, everything can be fixed 🙂
Friends vs Fans
Unlike a Facebook profile, on Facebook pages you don’t make friends, you get fans. Fans are people who are interested in your content (or they know you personally, and they are showing their support). Your fans can decide whether to like your page, and they don’t need your approval to do that. It is important to know that you can’t invite fans to like your page if they are not on your friend list on your personal profile. However, there is an option to invite strangers who liked any of your posts to like your page (this can be done by entering the likes on your post, and clicking “invite”). If you converted your profile into a page, all your friends automatically become your fans.
To resume: you can’t invite people to like your page if they are not on your Facebook friends list and you can’t forbid anyone to like your page. If someone is bothering you or you don’t want them on your page, there is an option for that too, under “ban”. Anyone who undermines your brand or spams you (or you simply don’t like them), can be easily removed from your page!
What is the difference between someone liking your page and someone following you?
As on a profile – same on a page, if you are friends with someone it doesn’t necessarily mean they follow you. On each page, you have an option to follow or like. Of course, when you hit like you will be following automatically, but you can manually turn that off. Also, if someone is particularly interesting, you can choose to see them first on News Feed.
When it comes to your own Timeline, it is not associated with a Timeline of your page. What you have on your personal profile is only seen on your personal profile. And vice versa – content you put on your page goes only on your page Timeline.
If you manage a specific page (or several pages) there is an option to like or comment a post from your personal profile or as one of the other pages you manage – below each post in the right corner you will see a drop menu where you can choose how to present yourself.
How to use a profile and how to use a page?
First of all, a Facebook page is where you present your business, brand or certain goal. It is not designed for your personal content. Purpose of a Facebook page is to market your services, products, etc. So try not to mix chalk and cheese by showing something profoundly unrelated (that is right, nobody cares what you ate and when). If you want to know more about how to manage a page, stay tuned and find out in some future articles.
Facebook page has statistics and analytics to measure and track the results.
On the Facebook page, you can see who is your audience and when they’re online. You can also create paid ads to help you reach a wider audience. Paid ads are under Ads Manager that is associated with your profile. And, if someone has a particular role on your page it doesn’t mean they have the same one on your Ads Manager account. So if you want someone to have access to your campaigns, you will have to add them separately on your Ads Manager account.
Facebook is the only social network that offers scheduling posts option on pages. You don’t have this option on the Facebook profile and in order to schedule posts on any other social media network, you have to use some tool, like Later for example.
You can schedule an endless number of posts in advance. This helps your work because when you set a number of posts in advance you can schedule them right away. Facebook also offers you an option to backdate posts: if you forgot to post something important, Facebook gives you an option to “backdate” your post and fix everything 🙂
As you can see, the very form of a Facebook page and a profile is different, so I hope you found this article helpful in order to understand these basic differences. How and what to put on your page, different roles that you can use, what kind of posts to post on your page and more useful tips you will be able to read soon 🙂