Tips on using Facebook for Business

Facebook has surpassed a 500 million users mark and is proving to be a powerful tool for Social Networking. As part of a series of articles on how Facebook can prove to be of help to businesses, here are some tips on how to use your Facebook profile for marketing your business:

• Read the Facebook rules and regulations first before starting. This would help to understand how a business profile can be used to market your business.
• Install appropriate applications to integrate feeds from your blog and other social media accounts into your Facebook profile. For example, you can integrate your Twitter account with Facebook to display the Tweets as part of the feed.
• Ensure your profile privacy. To ensure a nice grained control, start by creating groups and sorting your friends in these groups list. For example, create a group list called “Business” and put all your business related contacts under this list. Create a list called “Friends” and put all your personal friends in this list. Further, you can now apply privacy settings to these lists to ensure who see’s what.
• Post a professional or business photo to reinforce your brand. Limit business contacts’ access to personal photos in your profile.
• Post your newsletter subscription information and archives somewhere in your profile. This could be an external link to your blog our website too.
• Connect and share with others. Obtain a Facebook vanity URL so that people can find you easily. This also makes them remember you profile page easily.
• Add your Facebook URL to your email signature and any marketing collateral (business cards, etc.) so prospects can learn more about you.
• Post regular business updates on your wall. Focus on business activities, such as “Working on web site redesign for ACME Company.”
• Share useful articles and links to presentation and valuable resources that interest customers and prospects on your wall, to establish credibility.
• Market your products by posting discounts, package deals or exhibition events. Post upcoming events including webinars, conferences and other programs where you or someone from your company will be present. Facebook provides the facility of setting up a Events tab with the facility of RSVP. 
• Use Network, Group and Fan Pages Start a group or fan page for product, brand or business.
• Unless you or your business is already a household name, a group is usually the better choice. Add basic information to the group or fan page such as links to company site, newsletter subscription information and newsletter archives.
• Update your group or fan page on a regular basis with helpful information and answers to questions. Join network, industry and alumni groups related to your business. Use search to find groups and fan pages related to your business by industry, location and career.