Beautynet Blog

Facing Facebook

Working with social media: Facing Facebook

What do drunken college frat boys and your professional business image have in common? Yep, you guessed it. Facebook.

The basics:

A brilliant idea for connecting friends, family and old college chums, Facebook has a strong history of connecting people to one another. Business has taken to Facebook out of necessity simply because it’s a multi-million person party. Ya sorta hafta be there.

Whereas Facebook profiles are normally for individuals, there is the “pages” feature that lets you create a page for your business. You can add your logo, photos, a company bio and lots more. Other Facebook members can follow or “like” you or post comments on your page.

The pros:

Facebook is where practically everyone under the age of 87 has a presence - it’s like being on stage in front of the entire planet. You can quickly post photos, comments and updates from just about any phone, tablet or computer. You build a list of followers who can choose to see your updates on a feed they might look at several times per day. Plus, it’s free, unless you buy ads on Facebook.

The cons:

The look, feel and interface Facebook uses looks like every other business, so you kind of blend in. You have to agree to terms and conditions no lawyer would ever advise you to do, so your followers, content and comments are not yours but belong to Facebook. Normally, only your own customers follow your page, so it isn’t that useful for client acquisition. But most importantly, unless you disable the feature, people can post comments on your page leaving you out of control of what’s said about your business on your own page. Your followers can be seen, which may cause issues with your customers who can see one another’s profiles. Also, as of this writing, you can’t change the name of your facebook page if you change your company name, forcing your to delete your entire profile and start from scratch. 

How to make Facebook your friend:

Make a plan. Consider how you will use Facebook to your very best advantage. You can make your page as simple or as complex as you like. Facebook changes their capabilities almost weekly, so you’ll need to spend time figuring it out and then stay on top of how things evolve and adjust your settings.

Keep it updated: Nothing worse than a Facebook page with no updates but don’t over do it - that will flood your followers newsfeed and they’ll just remove you. Set a schedule and make it useful. Try “weekly offers” or “monthly fashion tips”.

Keep it clean: There’s a tendency to join the free-lovin’ ways of the Facebook scene and get a little risque with the photos. I’ve seen some salon page photo albums that sadly misrepresent the hard work owners put into their vision and branding. Avoid unflattering photos and keep the suggestive poses/groping/tongue shots in the camera. If staff follow your page, check their profiles to be sure their own photos and comments are in line with what you want your salon to represent.

Keep it accurate: If you change your opening hours or email, update it on Facebook too - some clients will use Facebook to arrange things with your salon.

Tune your team and marketing: If you begin to love Facebook (you can measure it’s increasing business), work it into your daily routine. Have your team tell customers to find offers on your page and add it to your ads, business cards and web site.

Got the Facebook blues?

If your Facebook page is turning out to be a hassle, not measuring up or just not your thing, consider keeping it to a minimum or removing yourself altogether.

If you’ve allowed comments and find you’re dealing with customers posting unflattering text, change your settings.

Facebook, like mySpace and Friendster, may soon be uncool. Be prepared to ride the Facebook page until it becomes unhip.