7 ways to ‘work’ your Facebook Profile for online business

Saz Baileys' Facebook Profile

One of the easiest ways to build your seed online business is through connecting with likeminded people on Facebook. You can do this really easily through your Facebook personal profile. There are benefits to using Profile/Page/Groups – I’ll cover these in another post.

Many people find it difficult to separate the personal friend aspect of social networking from the wider use for business but once you get your head around correct implementation of privacy settings you can start to leverage the awesome potential of the most amazing networking environment you could hope for.

Working from your personal profile is a comfortable environment to get yourself started from. People will connect with you if you genuinely want to share your personal value with them. Once you have built a bit of a following, and your confidence, you can think about starting a Facebook Group or a Facebook Page to help you communicate in a more structured way.

So let’s get your Profile page up to scratch and get you connecting with people who want to here you……

Hint: don’t mix your message. Either do it properly or don’t bother using for business networking.

1. Image ::

RIght or wrong, your Profile image is the most immediate way that people will decide if they want to know you. You should think about the brand you are portraying. Is it professional, fun, quirky? People want to connect with people. The image should be of you – not a logo. You should look directly at the camera so they can see your eyes – it appears more genuine. Once you are established you should not change you Profile shot. People will be used to your picture and potentially ignore something they are not expecting.

2. Comment Box ::

Put a real friendly message here to connect with people. Be explicit about what you stand for. Be simple and direct – you only have a few words to make an impression.

If you have a web site or Blog put your URL in here. Make it a clickable link so that people are more likely to click through it by including the http:// before the domain. You can also drop the www and capitalise the individual words to make it cleaner and clearer to read. E.g. https://sazbailey.com

3. Friends ::

You should be networking with people who are going to support your business growth in terms of potential customers but also influencers and evangelists in your field. Now set your friends up to permanently display those who support your brand image to your visitors to re-enforce your commitment to what you are doing.

4. Opt-in ::

Your primary goal in creating a following – traffic to your Profile, Blog or Page must be to grow a list, a database of potential customers. You can set an Opt-in form underneath your friends list to capture Emails of visiting Facebookers.

5. Info tab ::

Create a really compelling Bio. This is your chance to let people hear what you are passionate about. Come alive. Let your voice be heard. Don’t be afraid to stand for something. You’ll be surprised that people want to be inspired. Your either about something….or your just not. You either know your own mind and have an opinion…. or you just don’t. Your either someone worth my attention….or I’ll just pass you by. Leap into my face and tell me why I should connect with you!

Make sure you complete the likes and interests to help people identify with you, making sure that plenty supports your brand. Facebook uses these as key words to find you if people are looking for what you are promoting.

6. Profile updates ::

If you have something quick to share or Tweet use this to keep yourself present in peoples news feeds. Remember profile updates cannot be ‘shared’ so your post won’t go any further. You can use a URL with http:// to enable people to click through to your Blog if you have one or other peoples content you’re syndicating.

7. Notes ::

If you want your content to be ‘shared’ across Facebook you should be creating Notes or if and when you get to Blogging, importing your Blog to your Notes. I have other posts that go further into the huge leverage potential of Notes.

Go now and action any of the things that you haven’t done. Come back and let me know if you changed anything and what difference you think it makes to connecting with people.

If this has helped you please share it with other Facebook users. Thanks so much.

Easy Peasy Ways To Maximise Facebook Time for Business

A checklist to bookmark:

Entrepreneurs are by nature creative people, easily distracted by new directions and ideas, so being an Internet Entrepreneur can be a nightmare – the internet is the worst place in the world for being distracted!! Now concentrate that to Facebook……if your not careful Facebook can take over hours in your day.

If your seriously wanting to leverage your social networking for maximum effect in your professional role then you really need to try and curb the fun stuff to maximise your time by connecting with people in the most productive way. Once you’ve got that out of the way – it’s our choice how you spend the rest of your day!

So here are my tips – my check list – for staying connected whilst being as productive as I can:

(If you find this useful then Bookmark it to use daily – like I have :))

1. Set a timer to 15 mins

2. UPDATE YOUR STATUS – let people know what your up to, include URL’s to click through to your Blog if you have something of real value to share (use Ping.fm or Socialoomph.com to update all your social media accounts together)

3. CLEAN UP YOUR PROFILE PAGE – delete posts that don’t support your brand. If you’re concentrating on building your friends network for a launch then leave your connections in view. Both will leave a positive influence on viewers of your wall.

4. Go to your Home Page

5. REVIEW YOUR EMAIL INBOX – look for 1-1 emails where you’ll have meaningful connections. Remember you also receive updates from Groups, many people miss these, scan them quickly to see if there is anything that grabs your attention.

6. SCAN YOUR NEWS FEED – stay connected with people and find Friends it’s great place to showcase your expertise and value through your whole network. If your really short on time then look for posts that have the largest number of commentaries because –

1) your addition and expertise will hit all of their walls

2) you can quickly Friend people who are active in your area of interest.

7. REVIEW NEWS FEEDS OF FRIENDS who are influencers & evangelists for you – you should have your friends segmented into lists that help you manage how you communicate with them. Select the most influential friends lists to connect with in the time you have and again concentrate on posts that have high commentaries.

8. REVIEW STATUS UPDATES of your friends (Most Recent tab) – Many feed their blog posts which make it easy for you to get to their Blog directly to comment. Remember to share the love my fellow entrepreneurs!

9. ACKNOWLEDGE BIRTHDAYS – it’s a great opportunity to show you pay attention and make a personal connection. Try and be a bit more original than ‘Happy Birthday’ – show you know something about them if you can or offer them a personal gift in terms of how you can help them. Ensure your gift is genuine, don’t use it as a sales pitch!

10. REVIEW FRIEND REQUESTS – I advise you set perimeters here to make quick decisions i.e. target market definition/influencers/evangelists – remember you are looking to build a business.

11. REVIEW FRIEND SUGGESTIONS – Facebook will suggest friends to you based on previous connections. Again, have a criteria and if you decide to be-friend include a personal note explaining the value in your connection so they know you are genuine and not randomly spamming.

12. RESPOND TO EVENT INVITATIONS – don’t feel obliged to attend but do respond. Select those where you will add value to others or yourself.

13. RESPOND TO GROUP INVITATIONS – again, don’t feel obliged, but you can always join a Group to see if you can genuinely contribute your expertise for the benefit of the community and leave if that doesn’t transpire to be the case.

14. REVIEW NOTIFICATIONS – this is a good tool for prompting you to connect with people who are within your sphere of influence.

All the above might be obvious things to as they are right there on your Home Page. But just having a SET TIME and an ACTION checklist can make a massive difference to they way you operate.

Well alrighty, now you’ve done all that in double quick time you can have a bit of fun! Reward yourself by connecting with your ‘Favourites’ (you know – one of the lists you should set up to connect with those in your closest circle, those who light up your life, with privacy settings that show you at that costume party dressed as Fred or Wilma Flintstone. Careful though – I’d set that timer again if I were you!)

Has this helped you ? Did you bookmark? ……..I’d love to know. If you have time please comment below and share with others who come to mind. Thanks, I appreciate your support.

Featured Services

Used & Recommended

Meet Saz