Why your Business Should be on Facebook

For a while now, I’ve been watching Facebook become more popular for business use. LinkedIn has always been THE social media business site, while Facebook has been regarded as simply a social site. Using Facebook to communicate among family and friends is replacing telephone contact. Now this is spreading to the business community. Even mobile devices are using this platform.

If you own or operate a business, this is a trend that you need to pay attention to and get onboard with. It used to be that simply attaining a first page listing on Google was the online marketing target. Because Google has such a large percentage of the market share, ranking was, and still is very important. The traffic and visibility a business would get from being highly ranked easily translated into more customers.

However, that world of Google Domination is changing rapidly. As of March 13, Facebook has overtaken Google for the most popular site on the web, according to Hitwise. This is not the first time this momentous change has occurred. Facebook has beaten Google several days in the last few months. Looking at the trend, there is very real possibility that Facebook could permanently achieve this top spot.

Another interesting statistic is that Facebook users spend approximately six more times the amount of time on the site than Google users do. This is works out to be about six hours spent on Facebook for every hour on Google. That’s a pretty substantial difference and confirms the Facebook’s promise to overtake Google on a regular basis.

Relating to Your Audience

A critical aspect of online marketing success is relating to your audience or target market. Without this element in your campaign, you will not succeed in your business efforts. Because Facebook does have the social element to it, its use in business is a natural fit. Especially if you consider that Facebook has over 400 million active users. If you can’t find an audience within this population, I would be surprised.

Using Facebook in Your Business

Before you can use Facebook, you are required to set up your business profile. Keyword research is also critical to use here because Facebook’s Search feature results in suggestions very much like Google or Yahoo would provide.

Once this is done, you can use the Social Search Feature. Encourage your business contact to also set up a profile and connect with them.

Establishing a Fan Page for your business profile is another way to leverage this site. Fan pages are indexed, meaning they will be included in the search engines. It is just one more way your business can be found online.

In this changing environment, it is increasingly necessary to monitor what is happening in the online business world. Facebook is emerging as an important tool to use.