How is your company represented on Facebook?

Thursday, August 05, 2010

Facebook announced in July that the service has now reached over 500 millions users. 3.8 million of these are located in Sweden, which means that over 40% of the Swedish population have a Facebook account today. There has been a lot of critisism surrounding the topics of security and integrity on Facebook but no matter the opinions it has become one of the most important social web services of our times and as a company it is crucial to overview one’s presence on this platform.

Over one million web sites are currently integrated with the Facebook platform through Facebook Connect which means that the users log on to the website using their Facebook usernames. Among these are for example both Swedish and international news sites like dn.se and independent.co.uk. In addition Facebook launched earlier this year the Like-button functionality that any website can install and which facilitates for the users to share the content they like with their Facebook network.

Shortly Facebook will launch”Facebook Questions” which will help the users post questions directed not only to their own network but to their friends’ friends or to a larger part of the Facebook community. That way Facebook is stepping into Google’s domains when the users will start turning to their own network for answers as supposed to using a search engine.

The expansion of Facebook as a challenge

Facebook has become incredibly important when it comes to how we communicate, search for information and share experiences and news. For companies and organisations this means both challenges and possibilities as the platform grows larger, becomes more popular and increasingly integrated with the rest of the internet. The challenges come from the fact that negative publicity can have an enormous and fast spread. A disgruntled client will not only complain to his closest five friends over the phone but will do so to 100 online contacts. A really disgruntled client will start an “I hate your company” group on Facebook and possibly gain thousands of followers.

However, there are also enormous possibilities for active companies on Facebook. There is the possibility to get in close contact with stakeholders by means of company pages or engage the employees by creating a corporate group. Let Facebook be part of your customer service efforts and talk to your clients at the place of their choice. Allow students, trainees and job seekers to meet in a group to discuss you as a potential employer. Or why not start preparing today for the coming “Facebook Questions” functionality by forming a strategy for dealing with questions related to your company or brands.

Review you company’s presence on Facebook

It is high time to look over your company’s presence on Facebook. Are there groups or pages connected to your company name or brands which you don’t have control over? Is the content positive or negative? Is there automatically updated Wikipedia content about your company on Facebook and what does it say? Have you created your own business page and what does it look like, how many fans do you have and how do you communicate with these people? What kind of connection do you have between your corporate web site and your company page of Facebook? How will you define your future Facebook strategy?

Statistics from www.facebook.se and www.facebakers.com