You bet it can, and today I am going to give you some pointers that will help you set up your Facebook Fan Page to assist you in better utilizing the power that these Social Media services can provide.
The first thing we need to understand is that social media is a great supplementary solution to ranking in the search engines, but it does not replace Article Marketing. However, if it is used correctly, it will definitely assist in your site’s rankings 
For this series of blog posts, we will be reviewing at a high level and drilling down into subsequent parts in a series over the coming weeks and months.
So, without further adieu, let’s get started!
The Big 5 primary outlets for social promotion are: Google+, Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn and Tumblr. For the purposes of this post, we will only focus on Facebook. We realize Google+ is up and rising, however that will be covered in depth in a subsequent post as it is still in Beta. But a beta with an astounding 250 million + users!
First, what is Social Media?
“The term social media refers to the use of web-based and mobile technologies to turn communication into interactive dialogue. Andreas Kaplan and Michael Haenlein define social media as “a group of Internet-based applications that build on the ideological and technological foundations of Web 2.0, and that allow the creation and exchange of user-generated content.”[1] Social media are media for social interaction, as a set of methods to enhance social communication, using ubiquitously accessible and scalable communication techniques.” – Wikipedia
So which Social Media outlet deserves the majority of our attention?
As we all know, Facebook is the most popular means of direct social interaction thus far and abounds with activity from its followers and fans. There are approximately 750+ Million users of Facebook which continues to grow on a daily basis. It can contain not only your homepage (profile), but also fan pages and groups. All which vary slightly in their behavior and interaction with friends and fans such as:
Fan Pages
These are visible to everyone by default; meaning everyone can connect with your page by becoming a fan. When they become a fan, your page updates will populate in their news feeds, which means you can directly interact with them. You can also view statistics of your members, however you cannot directly email your fan base.
Fan Pages are designed to be official profiles for businesses, websites or other entities.
If you don’t already have a Fan Page, here is a step by step guide on how you can set up your very own Fan Page today!
1. Create Your Fan Page
Go to facebook.com/pages and click “Create Page” in the upper right hand corner.
As you can see from the above, you have categories that you need to chose from to classify your page, chose one that best suites your website, it can always be changed later!
2. Fill In Information
Now that you have selected the category for your business, fill in the pertinent information about your business/site. When you are complete, just check the “I agree” and then the “Get Started” and when you are all done, you will be redirected to your new Fan Page:
3. Add a Photo to your Page
Every Fan Page needs a Photo or a logo. There is a size limit of 4MB with a orientation of being either rectangle or square. When you make posts, this image will always show so you want to ensure that people can see this in their news feeds therefore I recommend using a square image.
4. Suggest Your Fan Page to Friends
When you get started you will want to get some likes from your friends, click your friends and add them to your invite. And when your ready simply hit “Send Recommendations” and it will be sent to everyone that is highlighted.
5. Import Your Contacts
Click “Import Contacts” to email your contacts about your Fan Page. You can upload a file (Outlook, Constant Contact, .csv) or you can enter your email login info so Facebook can access people in your email contact list.
Check the box next to the names you’d like to invite, and you can preview the invitation to see what it’ll look like.
6. Start Writing Content
Once you have done all the above steps, start engaging by writing content on your page. You can share this information with everyone or you can highly target your posts. If you have multiple locations or are Geo Targeting, this is a very handy tool.
When you are adding URL’s to your updates, don’t just type or paste the URL into a status update rather click “Link” and past the URL. Click “Attach” and once attached you will see text and images from the page your link is pointing to. You can modify this according to your look and feel with the options provided by Facebook.
You can modify this accordingly prior to posting, it is the cleanest way and most effective way of sharing links to your Fans!
7. Use the Tools That Are Available
Since we are all aware of other tools for measuring success, Insights will come as no surprise when viewing. From the information, you can see when the best times of day/week are the best for you to engage your fans.
8. Assign Other Admins
You can assign various “Admins” to help you manage your page. To make someone an admin, in the “Admins” section of the sidebar (on the right side of the page) you can click “See All” and add new ones by typing names and they will show up in real time.
Now that you have a fan page up and running, you can then start promoting your page on your blog, emails and Web 2.0 profiles etc. Encourage readers to “like” your page through organic means and communications. Alternatively, there are other various ways of promoting your page through campaigns or contests. However, please read Facebook’s promotion’s guidelines prior to running your campaign, as your account could be suspended if you violate them.
Just as our marketing efforts are based on long term planning, so should our social media strategy be as well. Growing fans is an art, not a race. Google and Bing now look at the influence of your fans and the interactions that they have with you. So if you just buy a bunch of “fans” that aren’t real, then you run the risk of being penalized (from our research); and lessening or negating the overall positive impact that you would otherwise have if these fans were indeed “real”. When organic users like your fan page, it instills confidence in others and you thereby gain trust among social group(s). Heed our warning, grow organically
Time Saver Tip: A great free tool that can be used to auto post to your Facebook page is http://wordpress.org/extend/plugins/add-link-to-facebook/ This plugin is kept current with frequent updates to ensure that it remains highly effective with new functions and features to enhance your posting experience. It is easy to set up with good information available on connecting your WordPress installation to your Facebook Fan Page so that you include thumbnail pictures to your newsfeeds drawing more attention to your articles.
Of course there are pros and cons to autoposting. If you are not supporting your Fan Page newsfeed with information other than that of your autopostings, your followers will find the information uninteresting or just decide that you are automated and not real. This is to be avoided! Don’t just auto post!
Autoposting tools such as this are a good alternative to manually posting your link to your article on your Fan Page however, what about the other 23 hours of the day? This is where engaging your Fans with snippets of useful information, tips, tricks or questions comes into effect.
In short, auto posting is a great solution for connecting your WordPress site to your Fan Page however you must perform real interactions on your Fan Page. By doing so, you will maintain a healthy relationship with your Fans to keep them engaged & sharing your pages information with others. This will come in the form of your fans making recommendations to their friends to like your page, hence growing your fan base.
Happy Marketing!
Coutsey : UAW
