The Complete Guide to Creating the Perfect Facebook Page for Your BusinessAs small business owners and brand managers, you’ve probably heard

that you need to be on Facebook.

Great! So where should you start? And is there an easy blueprint to

follow?

We’ve experimented a lot with various Facebook marketing tips  over the

past several months, and we’ve enjoyed figuring out the best way to

create and manage our Facebook page here at Buffer. I’d love to share

with you how the process has worked so far!

Since things continue to change regularly with Facebook and its

algorithm, consider this A to Z guide as a great jumping off point. Start

here, test what works for your individual business and brand, and make

changes as you learn.

Related: How to Effectively and Accurately Use Data to Inform Your

Social-Media Decisions (Infographic)

How to Create a Facebook Business Page in 5 Simple Steps

Step 1: Fill out your basic business info

Open the following URL to create a business page on Facebook:

https://www.facebook.com/pages/create.php

Once there, you’ll choose one of the following six categories for your

page:

1. Local business or place

2. Company, organization, or institution

3. Brand or product

4. Artist, band, or public figure

5. Entertainment

6. Cause or community

Keep in mind that you can change the category and name later on if

needed.

Also, at this stage, it might be helpful to know that a physical address

figures prominently in the setup of a local business or place, and the

actual Facebook page will appear differently as well.

Here’s the look for a local business:

Here’s the look for a company or brand:

It’s something to think about when choosing a category.

Following the category selection, the next setup screen will ask for a

descriptive sentence or two about your page, a URL, a Facebook page

URL, and a profile picture. If you’ve selected a local business, you’ll also

have the ability to select category tags to further define what your store

sells.

About your page - You get 155 characters to describe your page. This

description appears prominently near the top of your Facebook page on

both desktop and mobile. Be as descriptive and helpful as possible.

URL - The web address for your store, company, or brand.

Facebook URL / username - You may have the option to choose a

custom vanity URL for your page, i.e. facebook.com/yourbrandname.

(In some cases, Facebook will ask that you reach 25 fans first before

you can unlock a custom Facebook URL.)

Profile picture - Upload a main profile picture/icon for your page. This

photo will appear as your icon every time you comment on a post or

publish in a news feed. Square dimensions are best. Facebook will force

rectangular photos to be cropped to squares.

Profile pictures should be at least 180 pixels wide by 180 pixels

tall.Here is a full list of the sizes that Facebook uses for your profile

picture in various places around the site:

The main profile image on your page - 160 x 160

In a news feed - 100 x 100

In your timeline - 86 x 86

Next to comments - 43 x 43

The final two steps in the setup process include adding your page to

your main Facebook menu (so you can access it quickly and easy each

time you log in) and setting up a Facebook ad to promote your new

page. These options can be skipped for now.

Step 2: Create an awesome cover image in a snap (no designer required!)

By this point your page is live for all the world to visit. Let’s see if we can

make it look even snazzier.

First thing, add a cover photo. The cover photo appears across the top

of your page and is a great opportunity to deliver a visual element that

supports your branding, draws attention, or elicits emotion from your

visitors.

The dimensions for your cover image should be a minimum of 851

pixels wide by 315 pixels tall.

You can certainly hire a designer to make you something fabulous, or

you can go the DIY route. Many photo editing apps like Pic

Monkey orBeFunky can help with creating images of just the right

dimensions.Canva is another super helpful tool for Facebook cover

photos as it comes with several premade templates that look great right

out of the box.

Here’s an example of a Canva template you could choose. You can

upload your own image to use as the background, and you can edit the

text to say whatever you’d like.

Once you have created your cover image, upload it to your page by

clicking on the “Add a Cover” button.

If you happen to upload an image that isn’t quite the exact dimensions of

the Facebook cover, you’ll have a chance to move and edit the image to

fit the available window. When you’re happy with the final look, you can

click “Save Changes,” and you’ll be set!

Here’s a pro tip: When you upload a cover photo to your page, the

photo is added as an update to your timeline. If you edit the description

of the photo, you can add a message to the update. Click on the photo to

open up the photo viewer, and you’ll notice a link that says “Add a

description.”

You can add description, tags, location, and date to your photo. Once

you’ve finished, the update to your timeline will be changed to reflect

your edits.

Step 3: Fill out your profile completely

Next, you can fill out your profile even more by adding information to

your Page Info section. To access this section, click on Settings in the

top menu bar on your page, then click Page Info.

Your name and category will be filled in already. Some of the most

helpful bits of information to add next might be:

Start Info - You can choose when your company or product was

founded, created, started, or launched. This information will appear on

the history timeline to the right of your page’s feed and as an update at

the very bottom of your main feed.

Related: Ultimate Headline Formulas for Tweets, Posts, Articles and

Emails

Address - Enter this if you want people to be able to check in via

Facebook when they’re near your place.

Long description & Mission - Add additional details that explain your

business or brand even further. This is a great way to go beyond the 155

character description that appears on the main page.

Phone number / Email address - Add additional contact information.

All of these details will appear on the About tab of your Facebook page.

Step 4: Add collaborators to your page

If you plan on sharing your Facebook marketing duties with a team,

you’ll want to grant access for various folks and various roles.

Here are the roles that you can choose from:

Admin - Complete and total access to everything (you are an admin by

default)

Editor - Can edit the Page, send messages and post as the Page,

create ads, see which admin created a post or comment, and view

insights.

Moderator - Can respond to and delete comments on the Page, send

messages as the Page, see which admin created a post or comment,

create ads, and view insights.

Advertiser - Can see which admin created a post or comment, create

ads and view insights.

Analyst - Can see which admin created a post or comment and view

insights.

To add collaborators, go to your page settings and the “Page Roles”

section. You can type in the name of any Facebook friend or person who

has liked your page. Alternately, you can type in an email address

associated with a Facebook account.

Step 5: Publish your first post

Add content to your page by publishing a post--a status update, a link, a

photo, a video, an event, or a milestone. New, fresh content on your

page will make it look all the more enticing once new visitors come over

to check it out.

Keep in mind that visual content does exceedingly well on Facebook.

Facebook posts with photos receive 37 percent more engagement

than those without photos.

How to gain your first 100 fans to your Facebook page

The temptation might be to share your Facebook page right away with all

your Facebook friends. Not so fast. Take a moment to think strategically

about your plan and to seed your page with content so that it looks

inviting and engaging when visitors do stop by.

Publish three to five posts before you invite anyone.

Then try out one of these strategies to get to your first 100 fans.

Invite your Facebook friends

Facebook has a built-in feature to tell your Facebook friends about your

page. Click on the Build Audience link in the top right corner of your

page, and choose Invite Friends from the dropdown.

You can then pick and choose which friends you’d like to invite, and you

can drill down into specific sections of friends, filtered by location,

school, lists, and recent interactions.

Once invited, your friends will receive a direct message with an invitation

to your page. You won’t have a chance to edit the message they receive.

Invite your coworkers

One of the best sources of social media promotion for your company

could very well be your coworkers. Ask everyone who works with you to

like the page and--if willing--to recommend the page to any friends who

might be interested.

Promote your Facebook page on your website

Facebook offers a full complement of widgets and buttons that you can

add to your website to make it easy for website visitors to like your page.

One of the most ubiquitous plugins is the Facebook Like Box. With the

Like Box, you can show faces of those who like the page and even the

posts that you’ve recently published to your page.

Promote your Facebook page in your email signature

One of the most visible places you might find to promote your page is in

your inbox. Edit your email signature to include a call-to-action and link

to your Facebook page.

Hold a contest

Facebook contests can be huge for gaining likes on your page. One of

the best apps for creating a contest is ShortStack, which helps you

create custom campaigns to drive Likes to your page (or email capture

or fan engagement or any number of different ideas you might have).

What to post and when to post it

In general, there are three main types of posts you’re likely to publish on

your Facebook feed:

Photo/video

Text update

Links

As mentioned above, posts with photos garner 37 percent more

engagement than posts without photos.

Definitely make visual content a huge part of your Facebook strategy.

As far as the frequency with which to post, Facebook’s algorithm

changes have made research into the topic rather difficult. The

consensus seems to be to publish more often. An Edgerank Checker

study posted on the Moz blog determined that one way to counteract

algorithm changes might be to publish more frequently--as often as you

have fresh, compelling content to share.

Koby Conrad, a Facebook page manager who makes his living off

referral traffic from Facebook, has found a few additional tips that work

to combat the algorithm changes at Facebook. Here are some highlights:

Use admin tags. Sign off as your page. This is a

great way to increase how viral you are because it

increase the amount of places people have to click

on your post. This will mean your post gets more

clicks/interactions overall and you get ranked higher

on Facebook’s formula. The picture below shows an

example of an admin tag.

Ask questions. Create posts that are designed for

involvement--and by this I don’t mean “share if you

agree!” Ask actual questions, and give replies to

people’s responses.

Post more often, but don’t spam! Most business

pages hardly post one thing a day, and then if they

do that, it’s usually about themselves. You want to

post content every three hours, 24/7. Make sure this

content isn’t about yourself either.

Conrad’s last bit of advice--posting often, as much as every three hours--

might seem like a daunting task. You certainly don’t need to have the

same frequency as he suggests, but rather I think there’s value in his

advice to make your posting schedule consistent.

Social media scheduling apps like Buffer help make this easy by letting

you schedule posts ahead of time. You can add to a queue so that your

page always has fresh content being posted automatically on schedule.

Ideal length and timing of Facebook posts is another area you might

want to experiment with.

TrackMaven analyzed 5,804 Facebook pages and over 1.5 million posts

to determine the attributes of the most impactful Facebook posts. Their

takeaway for the best time was to post late in the day, after work hours.

 

Similarly, they also found that posting on off-peak days of the week was

best.Posts on Sundays receive 2.72 interactions and are 25% more

effective than a post on Wednesday.

Related: 189 Words That Get Your Customer's Attention Every Time

As far as ideal length, Jeff Bullas studied brands on Facebook and found

that shorter posts were better. He measured engagement of posts,

defined by “like” rate and comment rate, and the ultra-short 40-

character posts received 86 percent higher engagement than

others.

How to tell what’s worked and what hasn’t

After sharing posts, you’re likely to want to know how they did. Your

social media management tool would figure to have some built-in

analytics that can help you better understand how your posts performed.

Here’s a peek at what the Buffer for Business analytics look like:

You can also gain a huge number of stats and numbers from Facebook

Insights.

Once you’ve shared several pieces of content to your Facebook page,

you’ll see an Insights tab at the top of your Facebook menu, between

Activity and Settings.

At the top of the Insights page, you’ll see your Page Likes, Post Reach,

and Engagement stats for the week, along with a comparison to the

same stats from last week.

Another neat area to check is the demographic information on the

people who visit and engage with your page.

Click on People from the Insights menu, and you can drill down into

demographic information of your fans, the people reached by your posts,

the people who engage with your post, and the check-ins you receive at

your physical location.

Here’s an example from Buffer’s page insights about the people reached

by our posts.

One of the newest features of Insights is the “Pages to Watch” section at

the bottom of the page. You can add other pages that you want to

monitor--a great way to grab some competitor research and take

inspiration from the way that other pages market themselves.

To add a page, simply click on the Add Pages button at the top of the

section.

Search for the name of the page you want to watch, then click to add it

to your watch list. Once a page has been added, you can click on the

name of the page from your Insights dashboard, and you’ll see an

overview of their best posts from the week.

Even more tips - What would you recommend?

I came across so many great Facebook page tips while researching this

article. I couldn’t fit them all in! Here are just a couple more that slipped

through:

Reply to all comments with either a response or a

Like.

Tag other people and pages--especially your

community members--in your posts.

Consider adding your first name as a signature to

the posts you write.

Repost the evergreen content from your blog,

regardless of the original date of publication.

Now I’d love to turn it over to you! What Facebook page tips and

advice do you have? What have you learned along the way? Is

there any part of the Facebook page creation and management

process you’d like to know more about?

Excited to hear from you in the comments!

Oh, and by the way: Buffer can help you drive more Facebook traffic and

engagement in less time. Sign up for free and see how it works for you!

Related: An Expert Guide to Idea Curation: How to Get More Ideas

for Great Content

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PERRY MARSHALL, KEITH KRANCE, AND THOMAS MELOCHE

CONTRIBUTOR

Ultimate Guide to Facebook Advertising, 2nd EditionADD TO CART

Social Media Marketing

A Day in the Life of a Successful Social-Media StrategyERIC SIU

Facebook Marketing

What Facebook’s Crackdown on 'Click Bait' Means for BusinessesCHRIS BENNETT

OCTOBER 21, 2014

In their book Ultimate Guide to Facebook Advertising, online marketing

and Facebook ad experts Perry Marshall, Keith Krance and Thomas

Meloche explain the game-changing tactics of paid Facebook Ads and

how you can gain more on your investment—in clicks, customers and

profits. In this edited excerpt, Marshall describes the four types of

businesses that might do well advertising on Facebook.

Can every business benefit from advertising on Facebook? The truthful

answer is: Not really.

Is yours a local business with a physical location where consumers

regularly come to purchase your goods and services? If so, then

Facebook is for you. Dentists, doctors, lawyers, veterinarians, physical

trainers, gyms, specialty shops, cupcake stores, specialty groceries,

beer and wine shops, restaurants, mechanics, theaters and music

venues are highly likely to benefit from locally targeted Facebook

campaigns.

Facebook allows you to advertise to people who live within a few miles

of your location, to advertise directly to your known customers, and to

advertise directly to your customers’ friends who live nearby. These

features, and the nature of Facebook, make Facebook a great candidate

to fill your advertising needs if you have a local target market.

Some types of products or services are a natural fit for selling on

Facebook. So natural, you can set up a campaign and start finding new

customers in a few short minutes. Other types of products and services

will be a harder sale. The more the following four statements describe

your product or service, the more Facebook is for you.

1. Our stuff is unique. Facebook is the worldwide capital of individual

expression. It’s the perfect place for selling unique, customized and

personalized products, items that express a person’s own tastes and

preferences or engage potential customers on a human-to-human level.

You won't maximize Facebook’s marketing potential if you're selling

products that could be listed in the “commodity” category or if your

customer can easily find your product at big-box retailers and national

chains. If people can easily buy your product elsewhere or can compare

prices easily online, then selling your product profitably on Facebook will

be difficult. When you advertise on Facebook, always lead with those

products that are most unusual, unique and eye-catching.

2. We sell to consumers. Facebook is for you if you sell to consumers,

not businesses. Facebook is a place for individuals to connect with

friends and family. It's best used by businesses as a place to find and

connect to individuals and individual consumers. It's not a good place to

sell to other businesses. Although corporations have pages on

Facebook, their presence there is as a sales presence to market to

consumers, not as a purchasing presence to buy from your business.

3. We sell fun products. Facebook is a place where people go to

connect, to play, and to socialize. It's a great place to sell events,

memberships, experiences, personal improvement, travel and

entertainment.

Facebook is a great place to advertise products that are fun and appeal

to a person’s core identity, which is why a membership in a group or a

club is a great sales opportunity on Facebook. Events, travel and

entertainment are full of fun and positive emotions. These subjects are

naturally social, and people love to ask “Where have you been?” “What

have you seen?” and “Where do you want to go?”

If you provide personal improvement products, especially anything that’s

new, trendy, hip or cool, Facebook is also a great fit. If your product

involves some form of training, accent the social advantages more than

the academic aspects, such as how learning a new language can make

travel more fun.

On the flip side, if your product is technical, academic, complex or

requires deep thought, it may be hard to sell on Facebook. It can be

done, but you'll need to create additional materials outside of Facebook

to get your buyer educated on the benefits of your product.

4. We harmonize with identity, personal beliefs and

convictions.Facebook is for you if your business harmonizes with a

person’s identity—political affiliations, religious convictions, beliefs or

social movements. On Facebook, it’s a significant advantage if your

company and your target customer lean in a particular direction

religiously, politically or socially.

Regardless of which way your company leans, there are lots of people

who may be predisposed to do business with you for that particular

leaning. And you should take advantage of it. There are very simple

ways you can target your customers on Facebook and communicate

with them so that you connect to the things they care about.

If you appeal to a variety of such backgrounds, then you can design

specific marketing campaigns to cater to each of those preferences. You

may have different pockets of people within your customer database,

and the better you understand those pockets, the more you can target

your ads and the more you can sell.

If this isn’t immediately obvious, don’t give up. You might want to survey

your customers and see if you can identify any political, social or

religious preferences. Better yet, get your customers to “like” your

Facebook page, then review their profiles for “likes and interests” and

the summary reports that Facebook provides.