Facebook Fan Pages: Pros vs. Cons

Every day, more businesses create fan pages on Facebook. It’s not just the “in” thing to do.  In case you haven’t noticed, social media is influencing virtually every aspect of business life these days. Business fan pages are proving to be useful tools for companies to keep in touch with their customers, test consumer trends and even improve their SEO.

From a purely SEO standpoint, the advantages of putting up a Facebook fan page far outweigh the negatives. And the benefits to your business are more plentiful than you might imagine.
 

PROS:

• The search engines index your Facebook fan page. That’s right – when you set up a fan page for your business, it is seen and recorded by Google et al as a legitimate site that links back to your business’ website.  What’s more, since you’re indexed, people who aren’t even thinking about Facebook may come across your fan page in a search and click on it. This could ultimately result in an increase in ranking for both your homepage and your fan page.
• You can create as many fan pages as you like. Create one per product, per location, per subject, whatever works. Since Google recognizes them all, the ultimate SEO power of these pages can be amazing.
• The more fans you get, the better. There is no limit to the number of fans you can add to your fan page. Compare this to a Facebook personal profile, where the cut-off point is 5,000. Currently there are thousands of fan pages on Facebook with membership rosters in the millions. While your site may never reach that plateau, you don’t have to worry about missing a potential customer who wants to join your page.
• Fans spread what you post. Your Facebook fan page is an ideal place to post viral media and link bait. Put up something interesting and just watch how quickly your fans put it in their feeds.
• Message all your fans at once. Think of your fan base as a massive e-mail list. Which is precisely what it is! When you want to get a message out to everyone on your fan page list, it’s easy. Just write it and send it to the group.
• Get instant opinions from your target audience. Say, for example, that you’re president of the Red Shirt Company. After 100 years of selling red shirts, your board of directors suggests that maybe you should consider a line of blue shirts. A Facebook fan page is the perfect place to poll your customers as to whether there’s a market for blue shirts among your most avid clientele.

CONS:

To be honest, there really aren’t that many “cons” to putting up a Facebook fan page.  However, there are a few things you need to consider:

• You need to keep track of fan traffic yourself. While there’s probably some computer geek working on this problem, right now the only way to see if people are commenting on your fan page, or receiving messages from your page, is to track the activity by yourself. This can take time, which means you may have to hire an outside company to do it for you. A company such as ours, for example! Keep in mind, since your fan page is an open forum, you have to be able to take the bad comments with the good. Of course, it’s better to have someone complain on your own page where you can address the problem, instead of some outside consumer gripe page.

• Make sure you like the name of your fan page. Once you name the page, you can’t change it. So make sure you don’t commit until you double and triple check for spelling, message and attitude.

• These pages don’t draw attention to themselves. Don’t expect people to do a search for your company on Facebook to see if it has a page. Once you put one up, it’s up to you or someone in your company to draw attention to it. This can be as easy as mentioning the site in the footer of your stationery, or sending out a bulk email announcing the existence of your new fan page.

For the SEO advantages alone, you should already have a Facebook fan page. If you want one and don’t have the time to set up and maintain it, help is a phone call away at TextLinkBrokers.com.
 

Google’s Personalized Search is Still Frequently “Problemized” Search

It has been several months now, and you’ve probably noticed that the implementation of Google’s personalized results did not result in the end of SEO as we know it.

For those of you who don’t know – or maybe didn’t notice, Google Personalized Search is the latest advancement in search results added into the algorithm at the search giant. It literally “customizes” your search based upon past searches you’ve made in order to attempt to help you find what you’re looking for even faster.

What’s raising the hairs on the backs of many necks is Google’s latest revelation that it is now personalizing searches for people who aren’t even signed in.  This of course set off a maelstrom of concern regarding privacy, personal choice, etc.

For example, let’s say you enter a search for “link building”. The search results appear and you click on the link for TextLinkBrokers.com.  The next time you do a search for “link building,” Personalized Search will remember where you went last time, and rank TextLinkBrokers.com  (as well as any other pages you may have researched) on the first page. These are your “personalized” results.

However, those results are not necessarily the same results that your customers are seeing when they search for your business. To find out what your actual rankings are, you’re going to have to make sure that you have personalized searched turned off on your browser.  Here’s the easiest way to do it.

1. Sign out of Google.
2. Click “Web History” in the top right corner of your search results page.

1. On the next page, you should see an option called “Disable Cutomization.”  (This disables the personalized search cookie. Keep in mind that if anybody else is using your computer, their searches on your computer will be blocked, too.

Note: if you clear your browser cookies, you will automatically turn customized search back on. So anytime you clear your cookies, repeat this process again.
 

Talk To TLB!

It’s important for us to stay in touch with you. That’s why you can reach TextLinkBrokers.com any time of day, via one of these convenient methods!

Telephone: Call us toll-free at 866-489-8546, between 8:00 AM and 5:30 PM PST.

Live Chat: Talk to virtually any department at TextLinkBrokers.com during office hours with our live php line! Just log on to our website, TextLinkBrokers.com, and click the “Live Support & Sales” button or just click here.

Email: Send any questions or comments to clientservices@textlinkbrokers.com. We will answer you promptly, or fill out our Online Form.

Fax: 480-323-2446

Mail: 1580 N. Fiesta Blvd. #102, Gilbert, AZ 85233

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