Companies have finally left the beta stage of incorporating social media marketing into their advertising strategy. Simply put, businesses are now in the process of fully
integrating social media marketing so much that budgets are allotted towards doing just social media and internet marketing. The end of the last quarter of each year means budget allocation and for 2011, and companies have begun to wonder how much they should spend for their Facebook Brand Pages.
Brand Pages on Facebook were previously known as fan pages but the corporate world has changed that. Creating a brand page for your business is considered an important arsenal for internet marketing. A few advantages brand pages offer are the unlimited number of fans, statistics, demographics, and unique landing page tabs through Facebook Markup Language. Some of the best known Facebook Brand Pages are A&F, Best Buy, BMW, Body Shop (USA), and Cadillac. Equipped with either simple or heavy landing pages, videos, and effective images, brand pages on Facebook can help increase sales, ecommerce and otherwise.
ExactTarget reveals that at least 38% of Facebook users have “liked” at least one brand while approximately 5% followed at least one brand on Twitter. DDB Worldwide, on the other hand, says that 27% of people who follows a brand on Facebook regularly click that little thumbs-up button and an additional 49% do so occasionally. This breaks the wide held belief that consumers just interact with friends on social media networks such as Facebook and Twitter. Apparently, they aren’t too busy to pay attention to brands while browsing social media.
Despite brand interactions growing, they still are not replacing interaction between friends. Approximately 25% of US Facebook users visit company or product pages, 54% of the users actually make comments about friends’ posts.
These surveys reveal that consumers are exerting more effort to interact with Facebook Brand Pages despite what others say. Brands and companies are no longer ignored on Facebook and
other social media networking sites. Facebook has become the center of social interaction on the web and businesses may benefit greatly from investing more time and resources on Facebook than on Twitter.
Additionally, brand page interactions are predicted to become a key metric in 2011. Users may “like” your page many times but do they interact enough to know more about the products and services your company offer? Actual interactions, and consequently, the effect of these interactions are more important than thousands of followers who just click on the “Like” button on your Facebook brand page.
Finally, maximize the “Like” button to your advantage. Create
promotions and email campaigns in exchange for products and prizes to gain more fans and followers. Not only does this increase your brand’s company visibility, but it also allows consumers and Facebook users to interact more with your brand page.
