Why You Need to have a Strategy before you make a Facebook Fan Page NOW!

Categories: Facebook Strategy, Social Networking, Web TheoryPosted on November 13th, 2007

The good folks at Search Engine Journal have written an article demonstrating Why You Need to Make a Facebook Fan Page for Your Website NOW! This blog post is in response.

They see the SEO tactical benefits, (which are being debated) but aren’t looking at the bigger strategy.

[There are so many new social apps flying at every week, before we jump from tool to tool, let's first develop some objectives and a strategy. Your plan shouldn't waste time entering the market, but should set you up for long-term, holistic success]

I must caution you, that doing the ’shiny’ hop from product to product is dangerous, and the product has yet to be vetted by the market. Instead of jumping in right away, I suggest that each brand ask and answer the following questions before jumping in and creating a Facebook Fan page for their brand.

1) What’s your objective in joining social networks? Why are you doing this in the first place? Does it align with the direction your company is going?

2) Is Facebook the right network for you? Is your audience there? Do they speak and read English? Are you sure they’re not in Bebo, MySpace, Orkut, or other network? Do you know the Facebook demographics? (I do, and it’s not the right audience for every market)

3) Do you already have a social networking hub elsewhere? Maybe your company has already deployed a social network, or has a sponsored group in Facebook, would this canibalize it?

4) Once you send customers to this page, what’s in it for them? The features of Facebook pages are limited, it’s a discussion board (with oh so spartan features) a wall, and an affinity group (fans).

5) When do you stop? How will this amplify your web strategy? How does this integrate with the rest of your strategies?

6) How do you measure success? Nothing is free, nothing. Using free tools require time, which equals dollars. Unplugging a free system may cost far more than building it. How will you know when this is successful? Have you already dedicated resources to manage and maintain this site? What happens if your detractors flame your wall up? Do you have a plan?

7) How will you have a conversation with your community? Building a fan page is only step one, getting them to come, and actively being part of an ongoing dialog is another.

I was one of the very few briefed on this product and my analysis on the announcement is available.

If you can first answer these 7 questions and still feel confident to go forward, then do it, I just want to make sure you have a clear plan first. I”ll be discussing these strategies as the Keynote speaker at the upcoming Facebook Web Community conference in Seattle this Dec 5-6.

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This entry was posted on Tuesday, November 13th, 2007 at 1:00 am and is filed under Facebook Strategy, Social Networking, Web Theory. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

“Do they speak and read English?”
yes, this is always an important issue that should be addressed, as early on as possible!

Posted by Mark on November 13th, 2007 at 2:22 am

Heh, the reason I take this global perspective is that I’m blogging from gorgeous Barcelona, which always reminds me not to be so silicon valley insular.

Posted by jeremiah_owyang on November 13th, 2007 at 4:52 am

Thanks for this, Jeremiah. We’re having a lot of these conversations with our clients, and this very eloquently describes a lot of where we’re going with this (even if I put my own page up in a hurry just to test out the system). You’re making my job easier and you’re making me smarter, which is about as high praise as I can give to a blogger or any media source for that matter (certain publications, with all their hype, manage to make my job harder).

Posted by David Berkowitz on November 13th, 2007 at 7:40 am

[...] One of the big beginning issues was that if a fan page was public, and it can have URLs, then that must be great for SEO, right? Facebook pages have huge page rank. Well, no link love from Facebook - apparently, those links have the dreaded “rel=nofollow” qualifier. But is it still worth it for nonprofits to have a fan page? Many already have Causes set up. Jeremiah Owyang, who’s blog I read occasionally, has a good point: figure out what your strategy is, first! [...]

Posted by Facebook Ad Platform » Zen and the Art of Nonprofit Technology on November 13th, 2007 at 11:25 am

David, glad to help!

Posted by jeremiah_owyang on November 13th, 2007 at 11:35 am

Great post. I really believe that the true power of fan pages will not be in building more branded destinations, but in building conversation spaces for consumers to communicate with brands.

Here are my thoughts more fleshed out:

http://senithomas.wordpress.com/
2007/11/13/facebook-
fan-pages-guide-destinations
-vs-collaborative-
conversation-spaces/

Cheers,

Seni

Posted by Seni Thomas on November 13th, 2007 at 12:30 pm

Sorry the formatting got a little screwy. Here’s the link:

Posted by Seni Thomas on November 13th, 2007 at 12:31 pm

Hi - thanks for the posting. I think Facebook would definitely be wrong for certain companies and organisations (i.e the IRS). Also the company profiles are definitely very limiting at the moment. If RSS feeds could be added along with various applications then you could bring the page to life. At the moment I think you would need to be someone like Apple or Harley Davidson with hard core fans who want to associate themselves without getting any direct benefit or use themselves.

Posted by Ben S. on November 13th, 2007 at 12:52 pm

[...] How will you have a conversation with your community? (…)”Read the full post here.I fully agree with these points - and more: even though these new Facebook features are agreat [...]

Posted by Strategy first! « loudhail on November 13th, 2007 at 4:41 pm

[...] Rafe at webware, who has positioned this story as a solution for forums (I see it as much more than that), suggests that the $10k price tag is steep (not sure if a one time or monthly fee). As an analyst, clients are sending me proposals from vendors and I see monthly price tags for these community-in-box solutions comparable or even more per month. Big brands don’t want to deal with infrastructure problems and are willing to pay up that price tag, also Marketers may not want to deal with a confused or slow IT department. Lastly, brands have more important things to worry about, like building a strategy. [...]

Posted by Six Apart launches Community Platform (Moveable Type Community Solution or MTCS) on November 14th, 2007 at 12:14 am

Way to go, Jeremiah. I appreciate anyone who questions the herd rush mentality. Have you seen David Armano’s article on social media fragmentation? I link to it via the picture of his fragmentation graph in Sam Freedom: Social Medias Errant Knight!

Thanks for daring to question the established order,
Sam

Posted by Sam Freedoms Internet Marketing Controversy Blog on November 14th, 2007 at 5:58 am

Thanks for this. Hopefully it will stop brands that have no audience on Facebook from spending time and money unwisely. Myself, I am thinking about this exact question right now: is there any merit to putting our own brand (Stealthmode) on Facebook. You can tell by the name that this is a big decision I will be making with my business partner. Keep writing!

Posted by francine hardaway on November 14th, 2007 at 10:49 am

[...] I’d love to check them out but haven’t seen any just yet. If not, make sure you read Jeremiah’s post on making sure you have a strategy in place before creating one. Then drop me a line adn I’ll [...]

Posted by Movie Marketing Madness » What are you doing on Facebook? on November 14th, 2007 at 11:59 am

[...] make sure you have a strategy first… [?] Share This Date November 16th, 2007 Filed in [...]

Posted by Facebook Fan Page: A must have | WebSpaza.com on November 15th, 2007 at 11:04 pm

“Do they speak and read English?”
and what about marketers?

Just in case, I translated your post in Italian(!)
here:
http://marcobandini.blogspot.com/2007/11/perch-c-bisogno-di-una-strategia-prima.html

Posted by Marco on November 19th, 2007 at 4:56 pm

Marco!

That’s great, thanks.

Posted by jeremiah_owyang on November 19th, 2007 at 9:39 pm

[...] Take a deep breath. And then ask yourself a few questions. Like this one: How will you have a conversation with your community? Building a fan page is only [...]

Posted by Huntsinger & Jeffer Direct Mail Agency on November 20th, 2007 at 12:47 pm

[...] methodology that Charlene and Josh perscribe at Forrester. You may have read my previous rants that brands first need a strategy. Is Facebook really worth 100 Billion? On the second day, I’m really curious to hear Lee [...]

Posted by See you in Seattle’s at the Facebook Conference: Develop a Strategy and is it worth $100 Billion? on December 3rd, 2007 at 5:27 am

Hi Jeremiah,

Great post - I agree with you completely. I think pages are still at an early stage, and unless they are used properly can be damaging. I’ve written a post on the pros and cons and some examples of the best way to use them here:

http://socialmarketingstrategy.blogspot.com/2008/01/facebook-pages-are-they-or-arent-they.html

Thanks,

Josh

Posted by Josh on January 5th, 2008 at 1:23 am

[...] I look external to our members and customers, Jeremiah Owyang provides some great questions we really should be asking ourselves before jumping into Facebook too [...]

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Posted by first need on June 4th, 2008 at 4:18 pm

Great post. Even though it’s two years old, it’s fresh as ever and the questions you ask are critical before “jumping in”.