Facebook for marketing? You bet. If your demographic is women, Facebook is the place to be. The amount of women 20-55 years old grows leaps and bounds each month. They are hooking up with their favorite brands, friends, families - it is where they are bonding.
My thoughts on Facebook before I went to the workshop with Lela was to keep it small and to keep it tight. Just people I really knew. Just people I wanted to really see my stuff. I deleted a bunch of people. Sorry, I didn't mean to hurt your feelings, I was just reeling it in.
After the meeting I realized how wrong I was. Facebook is a tool for connecting and bringing it up a notch from Twitter. If I want to get to know you better I should add you to Facebook. If I want to share more of myself and learn more about you we need to connect there - you can just do more on Facebook.
For example, if you are hosting an event and you want to invite people - you can only invite people that you are friends with. Even from your business page. So if you only have connected with 30 people that is all the invites you can send. Sure, you can make it public and they can invite people, but really, who does that? So, your reach is only as good as the number of people you connect to.
Another example, let's say you are following a reporter on Twitter - and they cover the beat that your business is in. You can definitely send them an invite on Facebook and say, "hey, I just wanted to get to know you better. I really like your work." Chances are they are going to connect. And you have moved the relationship up a level.
My advice on Facebook is that you have a page for your busienss/blog and a personal page. You connect personally with your customers, friends, people you meet at conferences, etc and you start to include them in your world. It is ok if they see photos of you at the beach - you are becoming friends and that builds the relationship. Really, I promise.
Expand your relationships should be the mantra to growing your business - because, really, people do business with people they know. And people want to know you, the work you do, your ideas, and what makes you happy dance all over the place. Really.
Check out what EvolvedMommy has to say about making real connections online. She was in Lela's class too - and obviously we learned a lot! I know that Chris Brogan is dropping Facebook - but he's a guy and he markets to guys and they are all on Google+ right now... more about that another day.
Flickr Photo: David Domingo Creative Commons License
