You may have heard of Facebook Fan Pages–they are also referred to as “business pages” or “public pages.”
To give you some explanation of what these are, a Fan Page is just a public profile that allows you to share information about your services or products with other Facebook users. Facebook has two different kinds of profiles—personal profiles and public, aka Fan Page profiles.
So, why are there two different kinds of profiles? Well, Facebook states pretty clearly in their terms of service that a person is only allowed to have one personal profile and that it must be in a person’s first and last name only. For example, “Christine Gallagher.” Facebook has actually been known to disable people’s accounts if they’re named anything other than your full name or if you are using it to represent your business. So instead of using your personal profile for business, you can just use a Fan Page.
Let’s talk a bit about the benefits of using a Fan Page for your business over a personal profile.
First and foremost, Fan Pages are public. What this means is that in order for people to see your Page, they don’t have to login to Facebook or be your “friend” to have access to it—there’s no barrier there to keep from drawing people in. Pages are actually the only part of Facebook that are totally public. This is also great because the search engines are able to see and index Fan Pages.
This is important because Facebook is currently the #2 site on the entire Internet, so you can benefit from that high search engine ranking by having a Page. In other words, because Facebook ranks so highly, your business has a good chance of ranking highly.
Second, personal profiles have a limit of 5000 friends—although Facebook has said several times they are going to raise that limit, they haven’t yet. Now, that might seem like a really high number to you right now, but if you think about continuing to build your business on Facebook, reaching that number is actually not all that unrealistic. In comparison, Fan Pages allow you to have an unlimited number of Fans.
Third, you’re able to send a message—or as they’re called, “Updates”–to all of your Fans at one time, no matter how many you have. With personal profiles, Facebook only lets you message a small number of friends at a time–last I checked it was somewhere around 30 or 40 at once.
Lastly, there are a lot of people who use Facebook personal profiles for just that—personal. They might be using it for staying in touch with friends and family and may have NO interest in ever buying from you—plus, not everyone friends people they don’t know on Facebook. With Fan Pages, people who become a “fan” of your Page are expressly saying they want to find out more about your business, not just you the individual. They have shown their interest by “opting in” as it were.
Do you have a Fan Page for your business yet? I would love to see yours if you do, so let me know in the comments. Feel free to visit my Page and “fan” it as well too! 
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Hi Christine! We have a Facebook fan page, and it’s been our best and easiest marketing channel to date. In just one month, we’ve added over 1,100 fans, all of whom selected themselves to hear more about our products.
Andrew´s last blog ..Irish Sterling Silver Claddagh Round Link Bracelet
I like your nice, simple breakdown.
I’ll need to sweep my online social media presence, eventualy and this is a good way to frame how to think about personal vs. fan.
J.D. Meier´s last blog ..Road Trip 2009
Hi Christine,
Awesome article! I like the points you make about fan pages, I would like to hear more fan pages versus groups. There has been a lot going around about which one is better then the, I can one draw back with a fan page but it’s not much of one.
Here is the link for my fan page,
http://tiny.cc/FanpageLetItFlowAbundance
Gaylena Collins´s last blog ..Setting the stage to manifesting greatness
This article is timed perfectly! I have been wrestling with the idea of changing to a personal profile for the benefit of “inviting” friends and increasing our fan base. After reading your comments, I’m sold!!! I shall keep plugging away on our fan page knowing it’s the right thing. Thanks again!
@Andrew–Wow Andrew, great job! Would love to hear more about how you grew it as quickly as you did. Awesome!
@J.D.–Got a Fan Page up yet?
@Gaylena–Cool, I’ll be sure to check out your Page. Yes, there is always a lot of discussion/confusion about Pages vs. Groups–think I need to do a post on that!
@Kimberly–I’m glad I could help.
There are certain benefits to having a personal profile–but for business, you need to at a minimum have a Fan Page if you are going to dive into the world of Facebook!
I am trying to make a fan page for my business and cannot figure out how to post an event to the Wall of the page — I have seen fan pages where they have posted an upcoming event with a picture and copy next to it — How do you do this??? I know how to enter an event, but to post it to the wall with the photo and time, date, etc….how do you do that?????
@MA–To post an Event to your Page’s wall you need to click on the little Events icon underneath the box where you type in your status, fill in the details and then click “Share.” Hope that helps.