I’m sure we’ve all heard all the incredible statistics about facebook:

• More than 400 million active users
• 50% of these users visit the web site every day
• More than 35 million users update their status every day
• If Facebook was a country, it would be the world’s 4th largest

Amazing statistics, sure.  But, the question is how do our businesses, our causes, capture this traffic?  How do we take advantage of this incredible opportunity?

Well, there are a lot of answers.  But, one that might be the most powerful is creating a facebook fan page.

Recently, I set up a facebook fan page for my church and wanted to use it as an example of the power of a facebook fan page.

What is a fan page?

When it comes to networking with other members, facebook allows to basic tools – a group, and a fan page.  A fan page, unlike typical facebook pages, is viewable by anyone (including Google).  So, anyone who visits facebook can see this page.  People don’t become “friends” with a fan page.  Instead they become a “fan”.  Once they become a fan, they will now receive updates in their news feed – in much the same way that they receive updates from their friends.

But, this ability to be seen by anyone (including search engine robots) is a big deal.  It means that links from a facebook fan page back to a web site can often help with Search Engine rankings (although links typically have the “nofollow” parameter).

Also, facebook fan pages do not have the limit of 5,000 friends that normal account have.  Fan pages can have an unlimited number of fans.

Finally, fan pages can have “pretty” urls – while facebook groups can not.  For example, for the fan page I set up for my church, I was able to make the URL: http://www.facebook.com/blackhawkmin (for Blackhawk Ministries).  This makes it much easier to remember the URL.

How Blackhawk uses its fan page
(and how you can)

Within two weeks of setting up its fan page, Blackhawk had almost 420 fans (it has continued to grow).

This means that, with just a little bit of time invested, they now have 420 people who regularly (daily?) see there “brand”, their events, their updates, etc.  It is an incredibly simple way to get a lot of people looking at your cause or business without any investment of money.

In addition,  as a result of the facebook fan page, facebook has become the second leading referrer to blackhawk’s regular web site.  That means that these 420 people are clicking on links in the updates and visiting the Blackhawk web site.  Here’s a simple graph from Google Analytics showing how much the traffic coming from facebook has grown:

So, not only are the hundreds of people seeing updates on their own facebook news feeds, they are also clicking on links and visiting the main Blackhawk page.  And, best of all, all of this is free.

That means Blackhawk has over 400 people (now almost 450) who regularly, daily, interact with their brand and visit their web-site.  What a great tool!

Here’s a few ways Blackhawk has continued to use its facebook fan page…

Advertise Upcoming Events

Blackhawk posts upcoming events and specials on the facebook fan page EVENTS page.  People can then ask questions, RSVP, view others who have RSVP’ed, etc.  All the event have links back to the Blackhawk Ministries web page with more information about the event.

Add Photos and Videos

By posting videos and photos, Blackhawk is able to tag people – thereby encouraging them to visit the page and possibly to visit the blackhawk site.  Photos and videos also provide another reason for fans to return to the page.  And, as a result, see other items – including events, posts, etc.

Add links back to Blackhawk’s site

This is where things get really powerful.  Every time something of note is added to the website, Blackhawk adds a new update to its facebook fan page.  This means that Blackhawk has a built in way to let almost 450 people know about web site updates.  And, many of these people click on the links and visit the site!

Imagine as a business being able to have an easy way to let people know about a new blog post, a new product addition to the store, a new event scheduled, etc.  By using your facebook fan page as a method to let people know about web changes, you have a simple, effective, and free method to let people who are truly fans know about what is new on your site.

This is really just the beginning of many powerful ways to use a facebook fan page.  There literally are many, many more great ways to take advantage of this incredible opportunity.

Got questions, want to explore how a facebook fan page could benefit your business, just want to talk more about social media and your company????  CONTACT US today