Setting up a Facebook business page is a great way to advertise your business. Let’s talk about Facebook and Social Media Marketing for a minute. Now, this post isn’t going to generate millions of dollars in revenue for you tomorrow but it is going to give you a better understanding of Facebook and how a Facebook business page fits into the social media marketing plan.

Facebook is the largest social media platform out there. It wears the crown. The potential to reach customers is HUGE. A Facebook business page builds community and a sense that customers know you and your business through interaction, which in turn creates customer loyalty and makes it more likely they will purchase from you and recommend you to others.

To start here are some pretty amazing Facebook statistics.

• As of January 2016 there were 1.4 billion daily active users
• 934 million active daily users on average were on mobile.
• 16 % of those users are in the U.S. and Canada
• Of those that use the internet between the ages of 18 and 30, 87% have a Facebook profile.
• Age 65+ is the fastest growing age demographic in 2015

That’s 230 million people in the US and Canada logging into Facebook everyday! That’s a very large and diverse audience. It’s safe to say if you create a Facebook business page you can make new customer connections and if you don’t have a Facebook business page you’re definitely missing out. A Facebook business page is also indexed by the search engines and helps to get your business found online.

Who uses Facebook and how?

There are two types of Facebook users.

1.  Personal Profile – These are non-commercial individuals signing up for Facebook and creating a personal profile. Only this individual can manage their personal profile preferences, information, posts, and images. They can friend or follow other personal users as well as “like” pages to keep up-to-date with those they have connected with by viewing, commenting and sharing posts.
2. Page – A page is setup by a business or organization to create their social media presence on Facebook. Multiple personal profile users can manage and be administrators of a page. This group of users can manage preferences, information, posts and images as the page.

Creating your Facebook Business Page

What you will need:

• A personal Facebook profile
• Your business address and telephone number
• Contact email for visitors
• Your business hours
• A brief description of your business
• A profile image (180 x 180 pixels is the recommended size)
• A cover image (851 x 315 pixels is the recommended size)

Steps to setup a Facebook business page:

1. While logged into your personal Facebook profile select “Pages” from the navigation options in the left sidebar.
2. Choose a Business Category for your page from one of 6 available options:
   1. Local Business or Place
   2. Company, Organization or Institution
   3. Brand or Product
   4. Artist, Band or Public Figure
   5. Entertainment
   6. Cause or Community
3.  Choose an Industry Specific Category and fill in some basic business information. You’ll be asked to accept the Facebook Pages Terms.
4. Click Get Started

There you go you’ve created a Facebook business page! You’re engaging in social media marketing for your business.

Facebook will walk you through the rest of the setup step-by-step. You’ll be asked to enter more information about your business, add a cover photo, create a post, setup an ad, and invite your friends to “like” your page. Hold off on creating ads and inviting your friends until you’ve gotten all your information squared away, make sure you have no typos, and create a few posts. You don’t want to showcase an empty page do you?

Posts with images generate the most engagement, create a few. (1200 x 628 pixels is the recommended post image size.) When you’re done proofing and are satisfied that the first impression you’ll be making is a good one then invite your friends to like your Facebook business page and ask them for honest feedback.

Managing your Facebook Business Page

• Keep it PG. Unless your business is of a specific type. If you wouldn’t say it in a particular way or shout it out to a room full of customers, don’t post it.
• Be responsive. Someone took time out of their day to interact with you, be courteous and acknowledge them.
• Handle complaints. We’ve all been there, sometimes it’s a legitimate and sometimes we’re having a bad day. Handle it. Specifically acknowledge the issue and offer an apology and solution. If you’ve made a mistake own it and fix it.
• Post at least once or twice a week to your Facebook business page. Your effort will pay off.

Looking for more? Facebook has created a great overview of Facebook Business Pages for beginners check it out. Facebook for Business Basics. Well also be posting more articles about social media marketing specific to Facebook but also Twitter, Instagram, Pinterest and Google+ in the next few weeks.

If you found this article useful and informative please join us and subscribe to our newsletter below. Don’t worry we won’t flood your inbox with email or send you spam, we don’t like that either and don’t want to lose you.