The simple answer to the question of how to set up a Facebook fan page for your business is: very carefully. Let’s discuss what this means:  
Facebook has been making changes to Facebook fan pages so that these pages – meant to promote your brand, book or business – have more power.
As Publicity Hound Joan Stewart said in her ezine, “Google is now indexing status updates on Fan Pages.”
This means that the status updates you write on Facebook – or send to your Facebook fan page from your Twitter or LinkedIn accounts – can be searched based on the keywords the updates contain.
What may be more important is that the title of your Facebook fan page can be searched internally on Facebook as well as externally. And that’s where you can really use to your advantage the 75 characters allowed for the fan page title. Use keywords that you want people to use to find you.
And this is the “very carefully” caution from the first paragraph of this post:
Once you save a title in the Facebook fan page set up, you cannot change it. You need to start a new fan page if you want a different title.
Recommendation for Facebook fan page title: Work on your title in a Word doc, checking the 75 characters (counting spaces), until you have an effective title.
My business partner, Yael K. Miller, and I spent considerable time on choosing our Facebook fan page title, eventually giving up our company title and our names in order to have a better keyword title.
Our Facebook fan page title is: “Internet Marketing Tips: Twitter, Book, Website, Blog, SEO, Video, Email” and, no, we’re not keyword stuffing. We actually do work in all these fields.
And, yes, it’s a mouthful. But we make it easy for people to become a fan of our page by putting a Facebook fan page widget on every page of our website (see widget below). People can become a fan of our page without ever leaving our website.
Take the time to plan and then set up a Facebook fan page for your business. It’s worth the investment.
© 2010 Miller Mosaic, LLC
If you want more information on setting up an effective Facebook fan page, see the Miller Mosaic video/workbook on this topic at www.millermosaicllc.com/facebook-fan-page. Or get the free report “Twitter, Facebook and Your Website: A Beginning Blueprint for Harnessing the Power of 3 for Your Business” at www.MillerMosaicPowerof3.com
Great post Phyllis. People think of Facebook as only a social media tool. But it’s becoming a major place where people search for information too. Two thumbs up!
Couldn’t agree more. The hardest thing in naming a company is to convince an owner not to name the business after him or herself. The hardest thing in naming a Facebook page is convincing an owner not to name it after the company. We get so attached to our names, even if they are the name of the business.
Doug –
Facebook as “a major place where people search for information” as you pointed out is going to become even more important as Facebook continues to grow. The sooner we take advantage of this opportunity the farther ahead we’ll be.
Rhona –
People need to understand that the title of a Facebook fan page has one purpose — to help people and search engines find your page. If your name is NOT something that people will search on, then your name doesn’t need to be in the title of your Facebook fan page.
On a somewhat related subject, I just wrote the blog post “Why People Are Wedded to Their Websites” — see http://budurl.com/wedded — when I finally realized why people would rather keep ineffective websites than get new effective ones.
Phyllis
It looks like the TBB Facebook Fan Page is going to need a change in this regard. I guess we’ll have to start from scratch! But this is good to know Phyllis!
I have really been surprised in the past month as I have picked up almost as many fans to my Facebook business page as I have to my ning site it promotes! Facebook is a great place to find some folks you might not otherwise reach.
Chris and Nils –
Thanks for leaving comments on this post. Yes, a Facebook fan page can be an important part of an outreach program.