Andrea Vahl

Article / Updated 03-15-2022

There are good marketing reasons to have a Facebook profile with the Follow button activated. If you already have lots of Facebook friends who are more like potential customers or clients, and you haven’t taken the time to create a business page (and probably won’t), this approach is for you! Here’s how to turn on the Follow button on your personal profile: Click the down arrow in the upper-right corner of Facebook. A drop-down menu appears. Select Settings. Click Followers on the left sidebar. Select Everybody from the drop-down menu next to the Who Can Follow Me section. Adjust the settings to your liking for Follower Comments and Notifications. Enabling the Follow button is optional. You can enjoy a profile and share with only friends and family; you don’t have to turn on the Follow button. But a profile’s Follow system offers these benefits: After someone follows you, that person sees your Public updates in their News Feed. People may also discover your profile through the People to Follow box on the right side of their News Feed or through their friends’ News Feed stories. Followers can share your Public posts, which broadcasts your post and profile to a larger audience. You can have an unlimited number of followers (no more 5,000-friend limit). You're still able to block potential followers by adjusting your Privacy Settings Block List. You can connect with people on Facebook who prefer subscribing to a business page to liking it. When your Follow button is open, anyone who requests to be your friend automatically becomes a follower unless you block them. You know they’re getting your public updates; you don’t have to friend them unless you want to also get their updates. When you unfriend someone, they remain a follower unless you block them. You can unfollow a friend. You are still friends, but you do not receive their updates in your News Feed. Personal profiles get more exposure in the News Feed due to Facebook’s News Feed algorithm. You have a better chance of being seen if you’re also using your personal profile to post about your business. For more information about the Follow features, see Facebook’s Help section.

Article / Updated 02-03-2022

When you have a Facebook business page, you have two separate profiles with Facebook: your personal profile and your business page profile. Each profile allows you to view Facebook, post status updates, and comment on other posts. But depending on which profile you’re using, you show up as either your personal profile (you) or your business page profile. In addition, each profile has its own news feed: Your personal profile news feed: Based on your friends’ status updates and the business pages you’ve liked as your personal profile Your business page profile news feed: Based solely on the pages you’ve liked as your page Switch your profile view Start by changing your profile view from personal profile to page profile. To do that, follow these steps: Log in to Facebook as you normally do. Click the Account drop-down arrow in the top-right corner of the page. From the drop-down menu, choose the business page link that you want to use. This menu is where you toggle among your personal and page profiles. If you’re an Admin of several pages, you need to select the correct page. After you click the preferred page link, you’re taken directly to that page. Now you’re viewing your business page “as” your page, not as your personal account with admin privileges for the page. This point is an important one to understand, and you may need to switch between your personal profile and your page profile to see the differences. When you change over to working as your page, you should see your page’s Admin panel expanded to include these sections: Notifications, Messages, New Likes, Insights, and Page Tips. Your business page news feed We’re sure that you’re used to seeing your personal account news feed. Well, a business page can have a news feed, too! Your page profile news feed is based solely on the pages you’ve liked as your page. To see that news feed, click the link in the top-right of the page called Home. This feed functions just the same as your personal profile news feed, except that it’s filled with posts from other Facebook pages that you have liked. If you haven’t liked any pages yet as your page, you won’t have anything in this news feed. You can’t like a personal account as a page, so this feed shows only page updates. To switch back to your personal profile, follow these steps: Click the Account link in the top-right corner of the page. From the drop-down menu, choose Use Facebook as your personal account name. This menu is where you toggle your personal and page profiles. There’s one more little view that you need to understand. When you’re on Facebook as yourself, and you go to your page, you see a notification bar at the top of the page. Notice the word Voice and the link to change to yourself. But wait! You might say, “But I am myself!” This Voice notification and link replace what was previously called Posting Preference and was part of the editing dashboard. Facebook pulled it out to make it very obvious “who” you are while you’re on your page: your personal account or your page. Tips for switching between personal and business pages Now that you’ve had a chance to see your profile options and are comfortable switching between them, here are a few tips: If you’re viewing Facebook with your page profile, and you go to another business page for which you’re an Admin, you won’t be able to do any Admin stuff (editing, posting as that page, and so on) until you switch back to your personal profile. You can’t post as your page on anyone’s personal Facebook profile, but you can post as your page on another page. Try not to be too spammy by posting as your page all the time. Yes, this option is a great way to promote your page, but remember that Facebook is a social network, not a place to go dropping your business name everywhere! How to link to your profiles If your Facebook business page is a service that you offer, go back to your personal Facebook profile, and add a little bit to your About tab about your new page’s location. If your business is something that you want to keep completely separate from your personal profile on Facebook, skip these steps. To link to your business page from your personal profile, follow these steps: Click your name in the top right corner of any page on Facebook. This step takes you to your personal timeline. Find the About link below your picture, and click it. This brings you to an interface in which you can edit all the bits and pieces of your personal account. Click the Work and Education Edit button. You can use the Work and Education section to add your new page address. Type the name of your new business page. When you see the page come up in the suggestions, click it to add it to your Work section. Fill in your position and any other important information (address and so on). Click the Add Job button. Click the Done Editing button. Make sure that the viewing option is set to Public so that people will be able to see your page linked and be able to click through to it. You can change the icon by clicking the drop-down arrow while you’re in Editing view and selecting the world icon (public). Another creative idea is to put your business page URL on your personal profile’s cover photo. You have to do a little photo editing, but the result will help move people over to your page. Or you can put your website address on the image.

Step by Step / Updated 04-07-2017

It’s easy to cancel your business’s Facebook Event if you need to. Keep in mind that you can edit the Event information if you need to. However, Facebook is aware that sometimes the unexpected happens and your event needs to be cancelled. If you accidentally created multiple events or need to cancel an event, however, follow these steps:

Step by Step / Updated 03-23-2017

Advertising an external website differs slightly from advertising something internal to Facebook, in that you choose your own title — and you need to upload a picture. To get started, log into Facebook as your personal Profile, and take the following steps:

Article / Updated 02-09-2017

Facebook has a set of apps built for Pages that you can use in your marketing campaign: Photos, Events, Notes, and Video. These apps are available as soon as you create a Page, but they may not show up in the featured app space. You need to add them first. Here’s how to do that: Go to your Admin Panel, and click Edit Page. A drop-down panel will appear. Click the Update Info link. Your main Page dashboard appears, and you can see more choices in your left sidebar, including an Apps link. Click Apps. This link shows you all the apps that are available to add to your Page. If this Page is brand new, you see only Photos, Events, Notes, and Video. If you want to add any of these apps, click the Edit Settings link next to it. In the Edit Notes Settings dialog box that appears, you see two tabs: Profile and Additional Permissions. On the Profile tab, click Add (next to Available, to the right of Tab). The app is added to your featured apps area. Click the Additional Permissions tab, and decide whether you want to have this app post to your Timeline, too. All of the Facebook-built apps have this additional permission check box. If you select it, whatever happens through this app, it creates a post on your Page. In most cases, you want to select this check box. Click Okay. After you add any of these Facebook-built apps, you need to go back to your Timeline to see them. You do that by clicking the View Page button in the top-right corner of the Page. Facebook doesn’t give you the ability to change the image or the hyperlinked text at the bottom of these apps. The image is connected to the last item created with that app. The Photo app shows the latest uploaded or tagged image; the Notes app shows a lined paper image with some of the words on the note; the Video app shows a screen shot of your latest video upload; and the Events app shows the image you’ve uploaded to the latest event listing. The hyperlinked text below these boxes is only Photos, Events, Notes, or Video. You can change the image for any custom apps you add, and you can change the hyperlinked text, too.

Step by Step / Updated 03-27-2016

You can add an Admin to your Facebook Ads account so that someone else can have access to the ad campaigns (General User) or access to the Ad Reports alone (Reports Only). This setting can be helpful if you want someone else to be able to change your ads, manage your campaign, or just view the reports. To add an Admin, follow these steps:

Article / Updated 03-26-2016

One of the new features that Facebook has rolled out to both a personal and business Page is the ability to add a Milestone to the Timeline. This means you can add a status update and date it for anytime in the past. Those of you who like to think ahead, be aware, you can’t add a Milestone to a future date! The tips for creating engagement are the same for Milestones as they are for regular posts. In the text; try to add a question that has a simple answer, use fill in the blanks, ask for opinions, reply to every comment, and tag people that have an important connection to the Milestone. It doesn’t matter if your company is old or new, add a few Milestones and see how it adds to the overall quality of your Page. The nice thing about a Milestone is how Facebook formats it immediately as a Highlighted post spanning the whole space left to right with a little flag icon to mark it as a special post. If you don’t want it to span the whole way you can make it span half the page, as Coca-Cola did on these two Milestones. Facebook’s first required Milestone If you haven’t added a Milestone to your business page, Facebook asks that the very first Milestone is about your Page itself. They want you to post the date the business was founded, started, opened, created, or launched. Here’s the caveat. If you are going to be adding Milestones that date back farther than when you opened the business, make the first Milestone date as far back as you can. Otherwise, if you create the first Milestone as the page launched in 2010 and then try to add a Milestone in 1990 you won’t be able to. But don’t worry; if you’ve already added your first Milestone you can edit the date to give you room to add new ones. For this first post Facebook only gives you these verbs; founded, started, opened, created and launched. But after you’ve created this first Milestone you will not have to stick to those words. Instead you will have a field called Event where you can add your text about the Milestone. Once you have acknowledged the launch of the business, you can add as many Milestones as you want. Here are a few ideas for different types of businesses: Product-type businesses: You can create a Milestone for the launch of each new product. Make sure you add images (or historical video) to each of these Milestones. Create a Milestone for new people added to your business, or people who have made a great contribution to your business. Everyone uses the Coca-Cola page as a great example (and it is), as their history goes all the way back to 1886! Most small businesses I know don’t go that far back, but some started in the 50’s and 60’s. I would imagine there would a lot of Milestones that could be added. Here’s a tip: don’t add them all at the same time! Make sure you read the upcoming section about Timing Your Milestone Posts. Service-type businesses: You can create a Milestone for each new service you created through time. For example, maybe you started out as a writer, but then became a public speaker. Add those two things to your Timeline as Milestones. Maybe your service business moved into a different building, or to a different city. Add those, too. Did you change your marketing tagline? Did you retire a service that was no longer needed (like typewriter repair…)? Food-type businesses: This type of business probably has all the different kinds of Milestones that the product and service types would have and more! How wonderful to scan through a food business and see lots of images of food! Timing your Milestone posts You might be thinking to organize all your Milestones and post them all at once, but stop that thought! When you post a Milestone, it goes out as a status update to everyone connected to your Page. Imagine having 20 posts from a Page post one after another in your news feed. Multiple posts might create a little curiosity — but they also get to be a bit annoying after the tenth Milestone. It’s great to organize what you will be posting as your historical Milestones, but think about creating a little strategy around the timing of these posts. Most research shows that people are little more attentive to Facebook on the weekends. Maybe you can spread out these posts over the next few months posting them on Saturdays, starting with the oldest to the newest, or visa versa! If you know the exact times when your Page connections are most likely to be on Facebook, post at those times. Some businesses post right before lunch and right before dinner, as those are the times they see the most engagement. Creating a storyline around Milestones Create a storyline around your Milestones. In the text of the post, refer to the last Milestone you posted to keep the story going. Weave the historical with the current. In other words, as you post an historical event refer to why this event becomes something even more important in the future. “The red roof restaurant design makes its debut. Variations of this iconic shape would later become part of the company’s logo.” -- Pizza Hut

Article / Updated 03-26-2016

If you have a bricks-and-mortar store, you need to claim your Places Page as it shows up in mobile Facebook. Then you have the opportunity to merge your Places information with your official business Page on Facebook. A good process would be to create your Official Business Page first and then go and claim your Places Page. To claim your Place, follow these steps: Go to Facebook and search for your business name. You don’t need to be on a smartphone to do this step. Also, you can use the Search bar at the top of every Facebook screen. If your business’s Place already exists on Facebook, click or tap it to visit its page. If it’s a Facebook Places Page, it’s listed below the Places heading. Click or tap the link titled Know the Owner? in the left column. You also have the option to click the gear icon under the Timeline Cover photo and choose Is This Your Business? A pop-up window asks you to verify that you’re an official representative of the physical location. Click or tap the verification check box and then click or tap the Proceed with Verification button. You see a claiming-process page. Enter your business information, and click or tap Continue. To claim your business, Facebook asks you to provide the following information: Official name of business Business address Business phone number Business website Third-party listing (such as a Yelp! or Better Business Bureau listing) Your relationship with the location (such as Owner) Verify your business by providing additional information. You’re asked to verify that you’re the owner of the business through an e-mail or a document-verification process. Your e-mail address must be a business address (one that has your business name in the domain name). If you choose document verification, you have to provide scanned images of a phone or utility bill that includes the business’s name and address. Click or tap Submit. After your claim is confirmed, you own your Place on Facebook. Even though you already have all the information that a Places Page contains on your regular business Page Info tab, by claiming your Place, you can manage your Place’s address, contact information, business hours, Profile picture, Admins, and other settings that people see in their Facebook mobile application. Now you can go back to your computer, search for your Places Page, and edit the settings or provide more information. Facebook may ask you whether you want to merge your Places Page with your official business Page. Merging your business Page with your Places page is a good idea because it retains everything from your business Page (photos, posts, events, video, ads) and adds a map, check-ins, and a place on the Page Timeline for recommendations. You can see that the number of check-ins (shown as were here) appears in the data beneath the business’s name on this merged Page. If you see a number here when viewing from a non-mobile device, you know that the Pages have been merged. Notice the addition of the Check In button on this view of the same Page from a mobile device. When you create a Place or merge a Place and a Page, you have the option to add a Recommend This Place button that appears on the right sidebar of the Page for users who live near that business. This feature is a great opportunity for your business, because users can write a recommendation of the business, which goes out into the News Feed and is shown to those users’ Friends when they visit the Page. It’s fantastic exposure! If you don't see the Recommend This Place button, follow these steps: From your Pages/Places Page, click Admin Panel. Click Edit Page. Click Update Info. Select the Show This Map on the Page check box. Facebook allows Recommendations only for Pages that have not only provided a physical location but chose to display a map within their applications. If you deselect the check box to display the map, the Recommendations box disappears.

Article / Updated 03-26-2016

Once you understand how a consumer interacts with Facebook Places, you will want to set up your own Places Page for your business so your customers can tell all their Friends that they’re at your location. Getting your Facebook Place up and running involves two steps: Your Facebook Place must be created, either by you or a customer. You must claim your Facebook Place to gain control of it. If you create a Facebook Page and select the category Local Business or Place, Facebook automatically makes it a Facebook Place, meaning that you don’t have to create a Place separate from your Page. Locate your Place on Facebook Your Facebook Place is created when someone is physically at your location and attempts to check in. (Or, if you have a Page that’s categorized as Local Business or Place, your Page automatically becomes a Place.) If this check-in is the first one that’s been attempted at your location, the person who’s checking in can search for your location and tap Add on his or her mobile device; then your Place is created automatically. After your Place has been created, you can claim it as your business. Multiple Places may have been created for your Page, so you may need to claim multiple Places. Once you claim your multiple places, you can delete the irrelevant ones and keep the Pages you want to focus on. If your business name doesn’t have a listing on Places yet, you can create your own. The easiest way to create a Place is to use the mobile interface to add your business, check in there, and then go back to the computer and claim your Places Page. Alternatively, categorize your Page as Local Business or Place, and you’re ready to go. If you use your smartphone to create your Place, you need to be physically present at your business location. This program is a geolocation program, so your phone’s location is what Facebook puts on your Places page. To locate your Place, follow these steps: From a GPS-enabled mobile device, go to Facebook and search for your business name. The Search bar appears at the top of every Facebook screen. If you don’t see your Places Page, create it. If your business name doesn’t have a listing on Places, no one has tried to check in to it. Use your Facebook mobile app to add your Place. Tap Check In, and type in the name of your Place. If the Place hasn’t yet been created, you’re prompted to add it by tapping the name you just typed. When you see a screen with a map of your location and an Add button in the right corner, tap the Add button. You’ve now created your Place. Claim your Place on Facebook If you have a bricks-and-mortar store, you need to claim your Places Page as it shows up in mobile Facebook. Then you have the opportunity to merge your Places information with your official business Page on Facebook. A good process would be to create your Official Business Page first and then go and claim your Places Page. To claim your Place, follow these steps: Go to Facebook and search for your business name. You don’t need to be on a smartphone to do this step. Also, you can use the Search bar at the top of every Facebook screen. If your business’s Place already exists on Facebook, click or tap it to visit its page. If it’s a Facebook Places Page, it’s listed below the Places heading. Click or tap the link titled Know the Owner? in the left column. You also have the option to click the gear icon under the Timeline Cover photo and choose Is This Your Business? A pop-up window asks you to verify that you’re an official representative of the physical location. Click or tap the verification check box and then click or tap the Proceed with Verification button. You see a claiming-process page. Enter your business information, and click or tap Continue. To claim your business, Facebook asks you to provide the following information: Official name of business Business address Business phone number Business website Third-party listing (such as a Yelp! or Better Business Bureau listing) Your relationship with the location (such as Owner) Verify your business by providing additional information. You’re asked to verify that you’re the owner of the business through an e-mail or a document-verification process. Your e-mail address must be a business address (one that has your business name in the domain name). If you choose document verification, you have to provide scanned images of a phone or utility bill that includes the business’s name and address. Click or tap Submit. After your claim is confirmed, you own your Place on Facebook. Even though you already have all the information that a Places Page contains on your regular business Page Info tab, by claiming your Place, you can manage your Place’s address, contact information, business hours, Profile picture, Admins, and other settings that people see in their Facebook mobile application. Now you can go back to your computer, search for your Places Page, and edit the settings or provide more information. Facebook may ask you whether you want to merge your Places Page with your official business Page. Merging your business Page with your Places page is a good idea because it retains everything from your business Page (photos, posts, events, video, ads) and adds a map, check-ins, and a place on the Page Timeline for recommendations.

Article / Updated 03-26-2016

Facebook offers six types of Facebook Pages so that you can choose the one that best fits with your product, service, brand, or business marketing needs. When you go to www.facebook.com/pages/create.php, you see the business Page options. We know that you’re probably wondering which type you should use for your own business Page. To help you, the following list gives you the skinny on what each Page type offers and when you should choose a particular Page type over another: Local Business or Place: This Page type is for bricks-and-mortar businesses. Choose this type only if you truly have a local, open-to-the-public type of business. When you click the Local Business or Place option, you see a drop-down menu with 39 category choices. You can choose one of these categories to create a Page, or if none of the categories fits your business, you can choose the Local Business category and go from there. The Info Profile for this type of business Page is very detailed, with editing fields for hours of operation, parking options, and price ranges. Company, Organization, or Institution: This Page type is for a company that isn’t necessarily open to the public the way a local business would be. Many of the categories in the drop-down menu are the same as those for the Local Business or Place type, but the resulting Info Page won’t have the same detailed interface to fill in for prices, parking, and so on. If you have multiple stores in the same city, you need to sit down and decide on a company policy about Facebook Pages. Do you or your store managers want to manage one Page or a Page for each store? Starbucks runs one company Page, for example; Aveda has a custom link that helps you find a local store. Obviously, these are large corporations, but other companies give managers the option to open a Page as long as they adhere to company social media policies. Brand or Product: If you sell an actual physical product, this is the Page type to consider. Facebook offers many categories: cars, clothing, computers, pet supplies, and a generic product/service category. Artist, Band or Public Figure: Obviously, if you’re a band or artist, this type is the one to choose, but this Page type also includes politicians, businesspeople, chefs, dancers, and actors. You may think that the actor category would be in Entertainment, but it isn’t! It is under the Artist, Band or Public Figure type. Notice that you use this type for your band, but if you’re only promoting your CD on Facebook, you can use the Entertainment type with the category Album. Just keep in mind that you must be the official, recognized, and authorized representative of whatever type and category of Page you create on Facebook. Entertainment: If you have a TV show or a magazine, or are creating a Page just for your music CD, select this Page type. There are close to 30 different categories listed here. We’re still trying to figure out why Library is listed as a category under Entertainment. Is your library entertaining? Cause or Community: If you’ve been on Facebook for a while, don’t confuse this type of Page with the Causes application. If you’re new to Facebook and are creating a Page for a nonprofit or community organization, don’t select this Page type! Select Company, Organization, or Institution, and select the category of Non-Profit. Every Page type has an Info section. Also, many categories have specific fields in that Info section that are used when someone shares your Page with his or her Friends. Anyone can share your Page by using a Share link located after clicking the gear icon in the top-right corner of the Page. Most Page categories use the Company Overview text to populate the Share invitation. Clicking that Share link autopopulates a post that goes on your personal account Timeline and is visible in the News Feed. Because you’re the Admin of the Page, you also have the option to use the Invite Your Friends function. This particular function is available only to Admins of the Page. Everyone else can only use the Share This Page option. You can share to your own Timeline, someone else’s Timeline, to a group, or in a private message. You can add personal text with a share post but not with an Invite Your Friends function. You can adjust the Page type and category setting later, if you need to.