Fan Pages

You NEED a fan page. If you don't have one, you are missing out on a fantastic business opportunity on many levels! Here are a few advantages to having a Facebook Fan Page:

I had lots of comments on this set of beads... which can be both good for sales and bad for fans...

• Sell right off your page - I often list photos of new works on my fan page and frequently make sales before I even list my item on my site or Etsy and Artfire. I save listing time and commission fees. You can also set up apps that place your Etsy and Artfire items on their own page within your fan page!
• Fast communication with fans - I often go six months between newsletters. Mine are time consuming. But if I want to have a sale quickly, I announce it on the fan page.
• Frequent communication with fans - Say you post a sale on Thanksgiving... you can remind your fans frequently - and at more convenient times! By feeding your new listings, blog posts,  or even your tweets to your fan page, you should have something new for your fans to see DAILY whether you physically log on or not.
• Access to reasonable, super targeted advertising - Think about it... Facebook doesn't just know the basics of targeted marketing - gender, age and geographic location. Facebook  knows EVERYTHING!  What people are interested in, what they talk about, age and zip code specifics, other groups they like and frequent... Trust me, Google adwords should be VERY afraid. Facebook has SUPER reasonable ad rates and can tell you exactly how many people on their site your ad would target!
• Insights - Facebook gives you amazing data so that you can see what reach your posts have. You can tell that you get hits off your blog, that you get new fans when others talk about you and... that you lose fans when people talk about you a lot! 

 I lost 2 fans they day I showed off the beads above... with so many comments on one photo, my fan page may have bothered them! Insights allow you to see what's going on from day to day. What your fans like and what some don't!

• Expands your Google footprint - as we've talked about before, the more places Google finds you, the more legit you seem! And Facebook pages come up high in the Google rankings for keywords!
• It's FREE! - Speaks for itself!

Ready to start your own??? From any other fan page, scroll all the way to the bottom and click "Create a Page."

Before you do this, give some time and thought to your name!!! Facebook will get you some higher rankings if you can work your #1 keyword into your fan page name. Learn from my mistake! I walked away from a fan page with 275 fans and I'm struggling my way back! Why? My keywords were not a part of my fan page name! I sacrificed fans for Google rankings and would do it again tomorrow!

Facebook does allow you to tweak it a bit but after you get a certain (small) number of fans, you cannot change your name!

Once you get your page set up, you'll want to add your shop apps and feed your new listings to your wall. We'll go over that next week. In the meantime, be sure to invite your Facebook friends to fan your page!