Creating a Business Facebook Page

By Nathan Lyle (Web Maestro) - April 25th, 2010

Whether or not you're already using Facebook, there's many reasons you should create a Facebook page for your business or organization. It's free, it creates one more place people can find out you even exist, it gives you a place to announce events, it provides a way for people to easily tell others about you, it helps keep you in touch with your clients, etc. and so on. (I wouldn't recommend doing it just because all the other successful businesses are doing it, but they are.) This article is a general summary of creating a Facebook page. Some links are provided at the end where you can find more detail.

If you're not familiar with Facebook, there's basically a few different types of "pages" that exist. When you sign up for an account, you are given a personal profile which is your main Facebook identity. Once that profile exists, you can create as many other "pages" as you'd like for anything from your business, to your favorite flavor of jello. There's also something called a "group" which is more limited in features, and is typically best used for event related things like festivals, or products that have a large cultish fan base, like the iPod.

To create a page for your business, go to facebook.com/pages/create.php. If you don't already have a personal profile, this process will create one. (Note: you won't necessarily need to do anything with your profile, but a page has to be associated with a profile, and logging in to your profile is how you'll manage your page in the future.)

The next step is to choose a category and a name for your page. Put some thought into these, because you can't change them later. If your focus is local business, choose "Local" and then the option that best matches you. If you're promoting a brand, product or organization, then choose that along with the best option to match. The name will most likely be your business or organization name, but use the friendly version that you might use in casual conversation—don't worry about the llc or inc. Hit the "Create Page" button, and there you go. You've created your page. You'll probably find yourself tinkering with it off and on over time, but you should do a few basic things right away.

First thing to do is upload a photo. You can change your photo at any time, but you should use something that helps identify your business. You might choose a photo of your storefront, your logo, or even a picture of yourself if you're what all the customers see when they do business with you. Just move your mouse over the image of the question mark and click on "change picture" to see some options. (Once you have a photo in place, you can use this same menu to edit your thumbnail—your thumbnail is what's shown next to updates and postings. You edit it by dragging a square around the provided smaller version of your photo until it's enclosing the part of your image you'd like to use.)

Underneath your photo, there's a link to "Edit Page" where you can fill in more details about your business. A bit lower underneath that, there will be a box that says "write something about..." that you can insert text into. Just click on the pencil icon, and then type into the box. If you want to include a link, just use the full version of it with the http:// and it will become a clickable link. We recommend that you include a link to your main website here.

At this stage, your page has not yet been published. When you feel there's enough there to go live, click on "Edit Page" and then "View Page". You'll see a message in a box that says "This Page has not been published. To make this Page public, publish this Page." Just click on the link at the end of that statement and you're live. (If you don't see the message there, that means you're already live.)

You should now post at least one message on your "wall" (other people will be able to comment and post to your wall as well, though you retain the ability to remove inappropriate comments.) You could do an announcement as simple as "Hi, we're on Facebook!" or you can be as creative as you like. When you have time, you should experiment with the other options and applications available and continue to develop your page. If you're not the computer friendly type, you may consider delegating this to someone that works for you that you can trust.

Once your page is live, people will be able to "like" your page (it used to be called becoming a "fan") which means they would see every update you post to your page. Once you have at least 25 people connected to your page, you can choose a username for your page which will give you smaller address for the page. For example, if your page name is Michigan Paints, you would ideally want the username michiganpaints. To set a username for your page, go to facebook.com/username and click on "set a username for your pages" if not immediately shown the option for choosing a name. It would mean the difference between facebook.com/pages/Michigan-Paints/121541364526740 and facebook.com/michiganpaints and makes it much easier to fit into marketing materials you might print.

Since it appears that Facebook is here to stay, at least for a good while, take advantage of it. It's hard to argue with free!

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About the author:

Nathan Lyle is the owner of Web Maestro. He has been building websites since the mid 1990's and enjoys any chance to be creative. When he's not immersed in computers, science fiction or music, he's spending time with his wife, four kids, and three dogs.