With over 27 million active members, 100,000 new members coming online every day, and over 40 billion monthly page views, Facebook has become the world’s largest social networking website and all signs point to its domination continuing.
The big question for entrepreneurs is: can Facebook help grow my business?
One of my readers put me on to this article from the Globe and Mail which discussed how a Toronto based entrepreneur was able to bring in an additional $3,200 in revenue for her fitness classes by using Facebook.
“I love it,” said Ms. Clapp, whose ad has been viewed about 127 times. “I’m completely fascinated with how I can create an online business without any overhead at all.”
The article and the suggestion from my reader was enough to push me over the edge – I decided to sign up for Facebook as a test to see how much it can actually help grow your business.
I posted a note on my profile asking how business owners could benefit from using Facebook. One response that I received from a friend, Jeremy, was:
I’m still a bit of a Facebook rookie (I’ve had a profile for two weeks). From what I can tell so far though, it is first and foremost a social networking site.
The best thing that I’ve taken away from Facebook so far is reconnecting with dozens of people I haven’t talked to in years (some as far back as grade 2). Seeing what friends from previous eras in my life are up to, makes the time I spend on the site totally worthwhile. From that I’ve had lots of people ask about my business and my clients who I’ve listed in my profile. I can’t say that it’s lead to any business for either of them yet–but we can all recognize the long term benefit of exposure to a warm audience.
I think that the Facebook culture looks down members who use their profile for purely commercial purposes–it’s like trolling a relationship website for a one night stand.
Is Jeremy correct? Over the coming weeks, I will update how my progress is coming along. In the meantime I would love to hear your success stories or tap into any resources you have come across on how to promote a business using Facebook.
Evan Carmichael
