With all the hype about Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn these days, business owners are discovering a new way to build their brand name through the use of social media. There’s a whole passel of potential customers and clients that are just waiting for YOUR product or service to show up on the web; in fact, social media is becoming so rampant that if you’re not online, you’re probably missing out on some major profit!

Throughout the weeks ahead, we’ll be introducing a series of blog posts on how you can utilize social media sites to promote your business. If you’re not familiar with the use of such websites, you may want to spend some of your spare time learning how to use them as we explain the basics of setting up. Should you find yourself strapped for time, allot the work to someone else, like a secretary or family member who would be willing to manage and update the pages for you. There are also marketing companies available who can help you maintain and set up your social media sites without costing you a lot of money.

Since most folks already have a Facebook profile, that’s where we’ll start this series. If you don’t already have a personal account, you’ll want to set that up first by visiting http://facebook.com. This process is fairly simple and doesn’t require a lot of assistance on our end, and you will need to complete that step before proceeding with this article. If you’re already operating on Facebook and ready to start promoting your business, then let’s roll.

You may be familiar with the popular use of Facebook “Fan Pages” that are used to promote everything from a product or service to a famous actor or singer. Instead of people adding you as a friend, they instead “become a fan” and are able to see all of your business updates, much like on your personal profile.

To start your own Facebook fan page, visit any fan page and scroll down to the bottom. You will see a link on the left side bar that says “Create a page for my business.” Click that, or you can also visit http://www.facebook.com/pages/create.php where you will immediately be taken to the setup form. You will be required to fill out all information relating to your business, such as product or service type and your business name . Make sure you enter the name you want for your page correctly, because you won’t be able to change it later. (Tip: Capitalize your words appropriately and check the spelling before hitting the submit button.)

Once your page is started, you will want to upload a photo and add any additional pertinent information such as your main website link, contact phone and email, mission statement, and your location. Your company logo will usually make the best profile picture for your business page (don’t upload a photo of your cat for this one :).

When all of your information is added, it’s then time to start acquiring your fans. The best place to start is by using the “Suggest to Friends” option under the profile photo. Select all of your friends that may be interested in joining the page, then click submit. Your friends will receive a recommendation from Facebook to join your new business page. As they each join, an update will appear on their personal profile (i.e. “John Doe just joined Absolutely Business Magazine”) which will be visible to all of their friends as well, therefore promoting your page beyond your own personal contacts. This is how many pages take off and begin to see a big increase in their numbers.

As your Facebook fan page begins to accumulate fans, you need to be sure that you’re providing content that will be of interest to each person who has joined. Don’t just tell your fans to buy your product or service, ask them questions that are targeted to your specific market. For example, here at Absolutely Business magazine, we might ask our fans what businesses most interest them in northern New York, then use those responses to better serve our readers. If you focus more on what you can do for your fans, versus what they can do for you, you’ll always come out a winner.

Helpful hint: Want to promote your fan page to a specific audience? Check out Facebook Ads! You can typically place an ad with Facebook for less than $1 a day, which will help you gain fans even faster.

Follow Absolutely Business on Facebook and Twitter!

Coming soon:

• How to connect with professionals on LinkedIn
• What’s it mean to Twitter, anyway?

Article written by Mandee Widrick.