At the beginning of November last year, Facebook unveiled their 'Pages' system, allowing companies, brands, organisations and individuals to create 'official' profile-like pages in order to interact with people on Facebook. This is similar to what brands could already do on MySpace, however in their own space rather than with a normal profile. However, they have some severe limitations compared to what can be done with applications and even groups. In this article I'll direct you to some relevant articles, and discuss the pros and cons of pages, and when I think they are suitable, and when they're not. Fill me in with your own experiences and what you think.
The Upsides to Pages
1. They are quick to produce, and easier than creating a full blown application
2. Anyone can see the page and interact with it without having to 'install it'
3. They are 'official' i.e. if someone makes a fake one for your company you can have it removed
The Downsides
1. You cannot search for people to add as a fan, unlike normal profiles, MySpace profiles, or groups
2. Fans of pages cannot invite their friend's to join, like in groups and even applications
3. Limited branding and personalisation, especially compared to apps (although much greater than standard groups, especially considering the ability to add HTML and app boxes).
4. Very limited user interaction - fans can't upload content like videos or pictures as in groups, although they can write on the wall and discussion forums.
5. No personalisation - unlike apps, in which pages can be unique to each user, every fan of a Page sees the same thing.
So, a few upsides and some more downsides. If you're looking to really engage in the long term with users on Facebook, then Pages aren't the way to go about this. Engagement requires interaction, and Pages by themselves simply do not have this ability.
However, if you want to give out general info about your brand or organisation on a regular basis, and are confident of your 'fan' base, then Pages are an effective way of doing this, as they are easy to set up and updates can easily be sent from within Facebook to all the fans. Likewise, if you're a band, and the main 'interaction' with fans will be them listening to your music, which you can easily add to a page, and you letting them know about gig dates etc, then they are also effective.
They can also be very useful for specific events or competitions, where a central information node is required for a limited period of time that will see a lot of traffic and conversation for the length of the competition. Last year, one of the most successful interactive marketing events on Facebook was the 02's "The battle for the UK's favourite university", using a (very expensive) sponsored group. A sponsored group is a bit like a mix between a group and a page, with added personalisation, but they do cost a lot of money.
We had a client who was interested in running a similar event, and we worked out a way to to do this using a central page with a simple application box, connected to normal Facebook groups. Once this goes public I'll share it with you, to see what you think of our strategy and any comments or ideas you might have.
Some links to take a look at:
11 comments:
So for brand interaction what's better than Facebook Fan pages? Groups? Sponsored Groups?
Hi Jeremiah,
Thanks for your question. In most cases, I believe that widgets are the best way forward, as they allow for full interaction in any way you want, with as many pages as you want - so ideal if you have a lot of quality content you want users to be able to interact with.
Although standard groups allow for great interaction between users, there is simply not enough control over their interface and design to make them worth any significant spend by a company. However, they can be of use in specific circumstances, for example to use them for time specific competitions.
Because of the ease in which groups can be virally spread (no daily limit on invites, unlike apps), if you have a good enough concept for the group then it could be a very cheap and effective marketing vehicle - the group "Six Degrees Of Separation - The Experiment" being a huge case in point. The author Steve Jackson started this group with the concept that everyone in the world is connected by a maximum of 6 people. Using the group as an experiment to see how many people he could find simply by inviting his friends, and inviting them to invite theirs, the group now has over 3.6m members. Moreover, he has kept the group relevant with a daily 'celebrity nomination' and other regularly updated features.
Obviously this has worked brilliantly for Steve, but it would be a very hard trick to pull off again.
Sponsored groups are great for specific marketing campaigns, as they combine the best elements of groups, pages and widgets - although you only have the one branded page, you have a lot of freedom on how that looks, and it is possible to build applications directly into the page, as if it were a page within a widget.
Sponsored groups are also ideal if the main reason for a brand's presence within Facebook is to create a sponsored discussion forum. The Apple Students sponsored group is a good example of this.
However, from what I know of the price for these groups, a company would have to be very confident in their rate of return, considering how much cheaper it is to develop and even promote a widget.
So, for companies not willing to go to that expense, widgets, or pages with widgets built into the page are the best way forward to achieve high branding and interaction in a cost effective manner.
It should also be remembered that of all the choices, widgets have the possibility of being transferable between platforms - both through the licensing of the Facebook API, and by tweaking them to fit Open Social. Of course, this has to be balanced against the differing demographics of different platforms, but as most widgets will be demographically targeted, this shouldn't be too much of an issue.
Widgets may have a good ROI, but they don't typically have great conversation features that groups are known for having.
Facebook pages (the new sponsored groups) have a discussion tool, so they may be used in conjunction. Also you can embed widgets on these pages.
Hi Jeremiah,
It's true what you say about the conversational features of apps: however, this is generally due to to the apps just not including forums - it is entirely possible to do so. The lovefootball app is a good example of an app with a dedicated Discussion Board that is very lively:
http://apps.facebook.com/lovefootball/
In this case the discussion forum is hosted separately within Facebook, however other apps do have forums built in, e.g Manchester United Supporter app:
http://apps.facebook.com/manchesterunitedfan/discuss.php
I think that they'll be a greater propensity towards apps with conversational features as people use them more and more as a primary form of interaction with each other on Facebook.
"(although much greater than standard groups, especially considering the ability to add HTML and app boxes)."
Is this true? If so, how does one do it? I've got a page which was created for my band, yet I can't seem to get HTML to work (in our bio, for example). Any ideas?
Matt Priest / Canasta
www.canastamusic.com
Hi Matt,
Thanks for your message. Facebook doesn't recognise HTML inside normal text boxes - however if you add a HTML or FBML application box to your page you can write HTML directly into there. You can also now write HTML, Flash and FBML into the main picture graphic for your page.
Cheers,
Josh
Hi Joshua,
Thanks for this post. Quick question...how does one create one of those "Find us on Facebook" badges? I created a Facebook page but can't seem to find anyway to create one of those generic badges for my web site. The badges that Facebook is prompting me to create are for my personal Facebook profile.
If you can steer me to the proper HTML code for that "Find us Facebook" badge, I'd really appreciate it.
Thanks!
Eleena
Hi Eleena,
The best bet for all things Facebook Pages is Facebook's own fan page for them - includes lots of notes and links to best practice docs and guidance, you should be able to find what you're looking for there: http://www.facebook.com/FacebookPages?ref=ts
Josh
Hi. Did you say that you can add application "boxes" to a Facebook page?
If so, do you know how to do so?
Hi Adam,
This is only applicable on a Facebook fan page (as opposed to a group or a profile page). Within the fan page settings, go to applications, add applications, and search for FBML box. This will allow you to add in HTML/FBML etc.
Josh
Hi Josh,
regarding your page/group mixture...
"We had a client who was interested in running a similar event, and we worked out a way to to do this using a central page with a simple application box, connected to normal Facebook groups. Once this goes public I'll share it with you..."
yet any link?
thanks,
werenfried
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