It’s the “big debate” for businesses – do you need a group or a page on Facebook? When Facebook first started gaining popularity there didn’t seem to be a great difference between them, however now there are distinct differences, and these will define which is best for you to use.
What is a Facebook page?
A page is a public profile that enables you to share your business and products with Facebook users.
Why use a Facebook page?
If you want to interact with your customers, as a general rule a page is the route you should take.
All your posts show directly on the page, while posts made by others show in a section on the right. This means when a potential customer visits your page they see exactly what you are posting and sharing first.
When someone has “liked” your page, your updates will show in their newsfeed. Also, if they interact with your page – comment on a post, like a photo etc, this will show in their friends newsfeeds too, thus spreading your business name further.
It is now accepted as “the norm” for businesses to use a page if promoting themselves on Facebook. It is easy for people to follow the news of your business by clicking “like” and it is generally what your customer expects to see when they find you on Facebook.
What is a Facebook group?
If you want your staff, or a group of people to be able to interact with each other, then as a general rule you should set up a group.
A group is like a forum – you can set it to be closed, so that only members of the group can see what is being said, and people have to request to be added, or you can keep it open if you would prefer.
Why use a Facebook group?
The main reason to use a group is if you have a network of people who want to communicate with each other. Sometimes they are people who know each other – for example from a group of people who work together, or are working on a project together, and sometimes they don’t know each other – for example, you can set up a group to connect people with similar interests. This could be a group of people in the same physical area with similar interests, or perhaps people who used to belong to the same organisation – as a way of sharing thoughts and memories. With the second type of groups they work on the “six degrees of separation” theory, with each new member recommending it to other people they know.
Other information about Facebook groups
Members can “invite” friends to a group, or you can “request” to join, however you will usually have to be approved by the admin user.
Updates for groups are sent to people in the form of a notification, however this can easily be turned off (most people do) and once notifications are off, status updates do not appear in people’s newsfeeds.
All members of a group can post directly to the “wall” (although there are privacy settings you can change) and the latest post will show without any preference for the administrators posts. When someone comments on a post or image in a group it “bumps” it up to the top of the group.
Is there is something you would like to know about a social media site?
Email me & I’ll do my best to write a blog post about it.