Monday, July 11, 2011

Facebook: Importance

Facebook is the mother of all Social Media networks. Building a presence there is harder than on other platforms because Facebook utilizes all of the content that you might put on other platforms: pictures, blog-like notes, and tweet-like status updates.

Facebook has also really blossomed in the last little while. E-commerce through Facebook is starting to pick up (Facebook as another online retailer?? You want to be there). With one-in-every-eight online minutes spent on Facebook, some are saying that Facebook is the internet. It's the new "mall." A one-stop shop for shopping, news, friends' updates, and entertainment.

But isn't Facebook just for the kids? I mean isn't just for college students to post, then untag that pic of them doing a kegstand?

No.

Here're some stats to illustrate:
  • Facebook has 750,000,000 users worldwide, 350,000,000 (50%) of which log in every day.
  • The average user has about 130 friends. That means that if you have a Fan Page with 50 fans, you're actually reaching, on average, about 5000 people every time you post.
  • Facebook is second only to Google in terms of daily traffic.
  • Over 50% of Facebook users are over the age of 35. There are about 30 million users in that age range just in the US.
  • Books are the third most-liked products on Facebook, after Movies and TV shows (wompwomp)

Most shockingly:
57% of people--all people--say that they talk more to their friends/family members online than they do in real life.

Bottom line, get on Facebook. But know, before you do, that Facebook isn't magic, any more than anything else online. You have to be smart about planning a strategy.

In the next post, we address how you should get on Facebook. Posting schedules, types of content, and the like.

Anyone out there already on Facebook as a Fan Page, not a personal Profile?

Sources:

8 comments:

  1. My fan page is about a year old. LOVE it. http://facebook.com/WestofMarsFans

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  2. Woot for social media blog posts like this one. Thank you!

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  3. Right now, I have fan page (http://www.facebook.com/pages/Heidi-Hormel-Author/115921748474619) that serves as my author page. I also have a "private" personal profile. I'm struggling (as I know many others are) on what to do with two pages. Do they get merged? Do I keep both running and try to more everyone but family to the fan page? I haven't come up with a good solution.

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  4. I don't have a fan page, but I've liked a few to support other writers and people I've met online. Other than the first 'like' I've never visited a fan page. I wonder if this is the case with most 'likes'. I will get a fan page once I have a publisher and the title finalised. I was thinking I should perhaps one for my work, but then I'd have another one for the book. Seems like a lot of work. I guess I could use an app to update all my social media sites at once, but that seems a little impersonal. Twitter, FB and google +. It's going to get busy.

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  5. Simon, you're right on track. There's no reason to put up a page until you have an audience to build--meaning you have to have a product tailored to that audience to promote.

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  6. Heidi,

    No, you don't (and shouldn't!) have to merge your personal and professional pages. Your readers shouldn't be privvy to your personal photos and friends' news.

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  7. I don't have a fan page, and maybe I'm dumb and/or stubborn (no maybes about it) but I don't want one. I limit what I post somewhat as my profile page is for clients, professional colleagues, and well, fans who want to interact with me...and that's the key for me.

    I love the interaction and feel it helps with all the aforementioned people to relate to me; also, I really despise the thought of asking people to be a "fan" or "like" me on facebook when they already interact with me on a daily/weekly/monthly basis.

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  8. Several writers I know had to delete their personal pages in order to put up a fan page. They didn't want to, and of course I lost them as "friends." This happened last month. Has the policy changed back since then? It seems as if some people are getting away with two and others aren't.

    What do you think of Google+? I've just joined and I'm underwhelmed. There's no place to post anything and there's lots of weirdness in trying to post a profile picture. Maybe just tech glitches they'll iron out, but it was very annoying.

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