Linda posted on March 17, 2010 12:53
Suddenly it seems that many more businesses are creating information pages on facebook - and that is a good thing. But many seem to blunder a bit and risk putting time and effort into something that may not last long.
Facebook has three different types of pages. The first type is a personal profile page. These are intended for people, not groups or businesses. You become a friend of a personal page. Depending on the security settings you have chosen, friends probably have access to information that others cannot see. You may also allow friends of friends to see information about you that you don't want everyone on facebook to see.
The second type of page is a group. You can set up a group for any type of cause you are involved with. These can be serious or frivolous. You become a member of a group. Fellow group members do not have to be friends and don't have the same access to your information that your friends do. If you are the creator of a group or have been granted administrator access, you can send messages to all of the group members. Groups can be open and public, or the administrator may have to approve your membership and content can be only available to members.
Lastly, facebook has fan or company pages. These can be set up for companies, products, organizations or public figures. You become a fan of these pages. In terms of privacy, these operate much like groups in that your information isn't viewable by other fans of the page. Pages are public and, once you become a fan, you see posts from the page in your news feed - a feature that is not available with groups. Page administrators can see demographic information for their fans and can send updates to all fans. Pages can be promoted with a facebook ad as well.
Setting up a personal page for your business is a violation of facebook guidelines. If these pages are reported, the team at facebook can remove your page without warning. If that happens, you will have to start over with a group or a fan page.
Personally, I will not become a friend of a page that represents a business or a group. I am happy to join groups for causes I believe in and become a fan of businesses that I believe are reputable or products that are useful and innovative.
If you are thinking about setting up your page, take a few minutes to understand the different types of pages and setup the one that fits your situation. Don't pour effort into something that may be reported and removed.
And when you set up that company page or group, make sure that it is setup by the business owner, not an employee or intern. The person who creates the page cannot be removed as an administrator and you don't want to risk having an unhappy former employee with administrator access to your company page!