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Every non-profit organization, company, group, or band should have a Facebook Page, period.  Here's the why & how, hope you enjoy.

Step 1: Why?
It's free! Ok, besides that, it allows for a natural extension of any marketing plan or strategy. The current Facebook usage, membership and market penetration is something that just can't be ignored.  Leveraging the tools that Facebook provides with a captive and responsive audience should be reason enough to just try a simple fan page.


Step 2: Create it
In a few simple steps you can create a Facebook fan page, the key to the page will be interaction, news and keeping folks informed and engaged.

- Just click on the create link:
http://www.facebook.com/pages/create.php


- Then select the categories that your organization, company or self are in and populate the key areas, that’s it!

Ok, that’s not it, you’ll need to add your logo, picture, or icons that will show up on fan’s news stream and should be representative of your efforts, company or organization.  Then you can play around with options, settings and enabling features.


Step 3: Customize it
There are several key areas in a fan page: the Wall, Info, Photos, Discussions, Links, Events, Notes, and Video.  Each is specifically designed to help you organize and fill each of the marketing or engagement points.


Each panel has a Settings button below the Share section and button which allows you to tweak what can be posted and how things are displayed.



Nice tip: Here’s a nice one; once you’ve gained 25 or more fans you’re eligible for a custom vanity username/link.  Once you’ve reached this milestone visit the username customization section and you’ll be able to apply for a custom fan page name:
http://www.facebook.com/username/

Once there you’ll see a link for “Set username for your Pages.”, click that, select your page and carefully assign it a name, once created it can’t be changed….



Step 4: Get more fans:
The Facebook fan pages are designed to naturally and virally market and support efforts, there are several ways to do this:

• The first way is absolutely to send "Suggest to Friends" requests, this begins raising awareness
• Posting links, news, events, photos, videos or related articles on the page will show up on fans news stream and again raise awareness,
• When articles are posted and they show up on your Facebook page additionally sharing them will show it on the fans wall, again naturally promoting the page and efforts with that fan's friends.
• With events, photos and videos you allow users to interact by accepting event invitations, viewing the gallery of photos and/or videos, this is a great way to showcase all the good deeds and partnerships that you’re involved with.
• Discussions are also a great way to engage users, by creating a topic and building a dialog you help users by getting feedback, answering questions or offering ideas.  This could start with something as simple as "Does anyone want tickets to see the Yankees?" or "How do you plan to give back in 2010?", etc, questions that can spark responses, etc.

The key to continuous awareness is in the delivery of updates and related news.

Step 5: Now what?

• Finding or seeking testimonials from donation recipients and donators that can be posted as either text or video to cross post on Facebook and the site.
• Updating the site to reference Facebook and possibly a redesign and reorganization of content to reflect the new video, photos or fan page content
• Posting related articles or news on the site as well as Facebook
• Engaging users with questions and offers on the Facebook Donate A discussion groups
• Posting events and reminders on the Facebook Events page
• Posting videos and photos from events, games or participants
• Announcing or posting sponsorships, partnerships and cross-promotions items helps get he word out too.

The idea here is to help others visualize, engage and interact with supporters, donors, recipients, customers, and co-workers so that awareness is grown naturally.

I hope I haven't overloaded but that would be my approach.

« Last Edit: February 25, 2010, 08:23:10 PM by mrtech »

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February 12, 2010, 06:53:48 PM