Marketers are debating how much effort to put into updating their web sites and blogs/email newsletters versus communicating via Facebook corporate pages and Twitter. Search is where Google is dominant – when someone is actively looking for your product online. However with 30% of internet time being spent on social media sites (3.6 hours a week on average in NZ), and Facebook being by far the number one social media site, having a corporate Facebook page with regular updates is increasingly important.
According to Adage several big brands’ Facebook Pages are seeing more activity than their websites. For example, Kraft Foods’ Oreo is the number 3 brand page on Facebook, with a fan base of over 10.1 million growing at a rate of 71,000 new fans each a day. Meanwhile, their branded website, NabiscoWorld.com, has seen U.S. traffic drop in the last year from 1.2 million in July, 2009, to just 321,000 in July this year.
Research by digital consultancy Beyond, found that “almost a quarter (23%) of consumers would prefer to receive information from brands via Facebook, rather than a brand’s website (21%) or company blog (3%).”
Not all products lend themselves to having a Facebook page or being “liked”. Facebook offers marketers the “word of mouth” factor since when people “like” a corporate page, their friends can see this on their wall. Many marketers are choosing to make the website the “corporate”, official voice, and Facebook the “fun”, “social”, less formal voice. One benefit of Facebook is that it is much more interactive; people are used to commenting so it makes it a valuable opportunity to get instant feedback.
Facebook can also drive traffic to your web site through posting interesting links and news items. Many email message systems now hook up with Facebook so when you send a newsletter, it automatically posts on Twitter and Facebook.
Our advice: if you think your friends or professional colleagues would find your site interesting, there is an entertainment or professional value factor, and it would not marr someone’s reputation for their friends to see they like this site or company, then a Facebook page should be built into your 2011 strategy. Or you can create a very specific professional group where non members cannot see the content. You control the privacy settings and membership, allowing a like-minded group to have a forum for conversation that you would not like to be publically visible. Contact Rachel for advice in how to go about this. We help with privacy settings, design of offers and visuals, and strategy to get Likes.
Tags: company facebook pages, corporate facebook strategy, Facebook