Busting the top 10 myths of Facebook for business!

1. Top 10 Facebook Misconceptions As part of our latest series of posts, today we will break the myths held by the general public about Facebook and the ways that small business can use it as an extension of the marketing campaign.

2. “Facebook Takes Too Much Time” One of the most frequent concerns of businesses attempting to break into social networking, is that having a business Facebook takes too much time. This doesn’t have to be the case, although it can be addictive, you can allocate as little or as much time to your Facebook page as you want. Once decided on the time you can afford to spare it is essential that you maintain the reason and message as to why you are on Facebook clearly.

3. “Facebook is all I need to get customers” Wouldn’t we love it if that was the case? Set up your profile and then watch the money rolling in, but unfortunately, nothing is that easy! It’s really about consumers consuming what it is you are putting out there, which basically equates to your content. Steadily build momentum from relationships online starting the journey with your clients through, knowing, “liking” and eventually trusting.

4. “I’ve got a profile for myself, soIdon’t need one for my business” A Facebook page (formerly a fan page) is useful for a business of any size. A page opens up more options than a profile and it is advised that businesses use pages rather than profiles. Pages allow you to separate your personal information from your business details and give potential clients an outlet to communicate with you.

5. “On your Facebook page simply re-use your website material!” Your sales spiel that works well for those who have sought your website out, won’t fly on Facebook. It is essential that you create interesting and useful content that works for social media and speaks to the desired audience saying what they wish to hear. Focus on the benefits of your product and the problems that it solves, lead the customers to want your product without directly telling them to buy it.

6. “I’ve got a page, now I need an app, adverts and a full time Facebook development team.” You can easily use Facebook for free, you don’t necessarily need all theadded extras. As long as you have the time to spend setting the page up effectively and creating excellent and insightful content you don’t need extras. Large brands can out-spend you, but you need to out-smart them, focus on local angles and create personalized content that speaks to your desired customers.

7. “I’ve created a page and post every week, my sales should go up now!” Like any other marketing project, Facebook takes time. People come to Facebook to catch up with friends and communicate with family so to get them to take time for a brand, you’ve got to make it good.

8. “My welcome tab is the magic ticket to new fans.” Although popular, welcome tabs are not the only feature of Facebook marketing, you want to attract non-fans to visit your page in the first place. If your welcome tab has something important on it remember that your existing fans won’t be able to see it, and anyone else who has liked you from an email will also miss this page.

9. “Facebook isn’t for small businesses.” Obviously there are numerous large businesses on Facebook using fancy marketing campaigns but Facebook is not purely forthe larger business. Small businesses can be just as visible to their target market and generate quality interest in their brand through effective and targeted marketing.

10. “The audience on Facebook is much too broad.” Without doubt there are a lot of people on Facebook, approximately 400million, but there is no reason why you have to target them all at once. Identify your target market and create specific criteria for Facebook ads so that your communications can be targeted specifically to them.

11. “You can’t get leads from Facebook.” Just because you don’t click on adverts, doesn’t mean that others don’t! Facebook ads have been proven to be successful and ads can often create a successful links to websites. Facebook makes the top three most popular traffic source to websites and the number of leads generated from Facebook often matches the number generated by Google Adwords at a much lower price.

12. The Facebook myths are often off putting when considering your social network campaign, however the myths broken in this presentation willshed light on the useful and essential nature of Facebook for your business.