Facebook Pages vs. User Profiles

by Chetan Sharma on September 30, 2009

Anyone using Facebook has an individual user profile to navigate the site and communicate with friends, family and colleagues. For your protection, your personal log-in information should never be shared. After logging in to your user profile, you can create and administer a Facebook Page for your business you can easily invite colleagues to manage it with you. The differences between user profiles and Facebook Pages help you protect your own privacy as a user while maximizing publicity for your business:

1) Facebook Pages are visible to everyone
Even people who aren¡¦t logged in to Facebook can see Facebook Pages. A user profile, on the other hand, can only be seen by the users friends and others in her networks.

2) Facebook Pages can have an unlimited number of fans Regular users can have up to 5,000 friends.

3) Users can automatically support your Facebook Page without confirmation User profiles have to approve all incoming friend requests.

4) You can send Updates to all your fans User profiles cannot message all their friends at once. Although a person could never use a Facebook Page as the primary way to navigate Facebook (for instance, a Facebook Page can’t join Groups or attend events), Facebook Pages are the perfect solution for businesses, bands, films, sports teams, and other organizations seeking to reach Facebook’s 70 million active users.

Getting Started

If you don’t yet have one, the first step is to create a free user profile. Go to facebook.com and click sign Up. You’ll fill out some basic information, receive a confirmation email, and click the link in the e-mail congratulations! You now have a Facebook user profile. To create a Facebook Page, go to facebook.com/pages/create.php. Type the name of the Page exactly as you want it to appear and as you think users will search for it. You won’t be able to change the name later.

Select the category that’s best for your business. Selecting the correct Page type will make the features of the Page more relevant, so avoid using Other’s unless there’s truly no good alternative. Now you just need to add content and publish your Page.

Getting Help with Your Facebook Page
Many questions you may have about your Facebook Page are answered in this article series, so be sure to read it in full if you need help. For help with specific applications, check out facebook.com/help.php. Friends and family who are avid Facebook users are a great resource as well. You can email Facebook at info@facebook.com, but you may find your answer faster by referring to this guide.

Finding Your Facebook Page

There are several ways users can find your Facebook Page:
1) Name Search
Users can search for you by name using the Quick Search bar on any page, or by going to the main search page. Your Facebook Page will appear high in the search results if the user enters your name as it appears on your Facebook Page.

2) Fans’ Profiles
A link to your Facebook Page will appear in the profile of each of your fans in their Fan box.

3) News Feed & Mini-Feed
Users will see stories in their News Feed when their friends become fans of your Facebook Page or engage with the Page in various other ways. Similarly, these stories will be published in the friends’ Mini-Feeds. Every day, billions of potential stories are created on Facebook, but only the most interesting ones are published to News Feed; Social Ads, however, turbo-charge the distribution of these actions on your Facebook Page make it into users’ News Feeds.

4) Public View of Your Facebook Page
Your Facebook Page is visible to people who are not logged in to Facebook, so you can add links to your Facebook Page on other websites and blogs. Internet search engines will also index your Page and share it with their users.

5) Pages Dashboard
Users can browse through their own Pages, other Pages with recent activity, their friends’ favorite Pages, and lists of most popular Pages by category.

6) Events
When you create Events for your Page—like sales, happy hours, and concerts— your fans can invite their friends to come along with them.

7) Share
Fans who like your Page can permanently post it to their own profile and/or invite particular friends to check it out.

My next article will provid detailed information about how to build your Facebook Page and promote it with Social Ads. It’s important to add fresh content to your Page regularly to keep people coming back. And you’ll want to know how to take full advantage of all of your Page’s functionalities.