Facebook is no longer just a platform to post your holiday pictures and boast about your social life. The social media giant is now emerging as a go to destination for small businesses who are looking to expand their brand’s reach.
The number of active small business pages on Facebook has now gone up to 30 million, up 5 million from last November. And interestingly, nearly two thirds of those pages are now managed using mobile devices, which Facebook says is “a testament to the growing importance of a mobile marketing presence.”
This week saw Facebook kicking off its “Facebook Fit” summer small business bootcamp in New York. The campaign will tour the US this summer, stopping at Miami, Chicago, Austin and Menlo Park. Its purpose is to offer practical advice to small business owners and employees on how to best harness the powers of social media to promote their business, and how to use the platform effectively as a marketing tool.
With Facebook becoming ever more popular, having a Facebook page for your business is a practical step to reach more potential customers. Using accurate, informative content on your page will further your chance of winning support for your business and keeping customers loyal to your brand.
However, some small to medium size businesses are sceptical, believing that Facebook is lowering their organic reach in order to get business to pay for advertising.
Dan Levy, Facebook’s small business director, addressed this issue during the inaugural “Facebook Fit” event in New York: “The organic reach issue is not about us making more money,” he said. “The natural extension of Facebook becoming popular and people having more friends and liking more Pages is there’s just more and more stories to choose from every day. We have to choose which ones are going to keep them engaged on Facebook.”
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