In yesterday's post, Setting Up Your Facebook Page, I explained that you have the option of creating a Page that is tied to your personal profile or one that is independent of anyone's profile. Once you've made your decision and created your Page, there are a number of things you'll want to do before making your Page live. That's what this post will discuss.

Note: I'm not going to explain how to do something on a Page if it's exactly the same as how you would do it on your own profile like adding a profile pic. I'm going to focus on those settings that are unique to Pages. However, if you have questions about any aspects of setting yours up, please send me a note and I'll get back to you.

Tell people about yourself.

When we last left our intrepid heroine, she had just been greeted by this screen:

You'll notice that you're on the Info tab, and a good first step is to add info to it, so click the Edit Information link then click the arrow beside Basic Info.

Now, depending on what category you selected when you signed up, you'll get different fields in both the Basic and Detailed info sections. For example, if you selected music performer, the Basic section will include Genre, Hometown, and Record Label. A TV show will have Network and Season. Since I categorized this page as a Technology Product or Service, I only get a lonely little Founded field. :(

In this case, I don't actually want to fill in that field because, as you can see, it shows up in the left-hand panel of my Wall and Info tabs taking up valuable real estate for something I don't consider to be particularly valuable. However, if your company has been around for 100 years and that's part of your brand, you may want to give it a bigger presence.

Click on the Detailed Info arrow to see what options you have, again dependent on your category.

Unlike the Basic Info, this will not appear on the left-hand side of your Wall. Fans will only see it if the click on your Info tab.

Tip: Because the field for your website address is usually in the Detailed Info section, you may want to include it in the box in the left-hand panel that says, "Write something about [your Page]."

Set some basic parameters.

Once you've finished with that, click the Edit Page link on the left-hand side of your Page to specify some other settings. The two most important sections to address are Settings and Wall Settings. Click the pencil icon at the top right and choose Edit to expand those sections and see your options.

I think the fields in the Settings section are fairly self-explanatory. The Wall settings lets you choose what people see when they first come to the Page and what fans can do on it.

When your Page is published, it will offer visitors a chance to filter your Wall posts so they see only the ones made by the Page, only those by the Fans, or all of them.

So the "Default View for Wall" dropdown box allows you select which one your fans will see when they first come to the page. (Fans only is not an option because I guess they assume you're always going to want them to see your posts, unless they specifically filter them out.)

The next dropdown box, "Default Landing Tab for Everyone Else," just lets you set what content you want non-fans to see when they come to the Page. For example, you might want to set the Info tab as the default so those people will have a sense of what your organization is/does, before seeing all your Wall posts.

The Fan Permissions section is also pretty self-explanatory I think. My opinion is that you should start with letting fans do all those things, and only remove permissions if you're having a chronic problem with fans posting inappropriate things (knowing that you can remove individual posts at any time if necessary). After all, one of the main goals of having a Page is to engage with your fans and that's a lot harder to do if you prevent them from contributing themselves.

I'm not going to discuss the Mobile setting because I have no experience with it myself. Tomorrow I'll be discussing other applications—how to add and configure them for your Page.

Add some content.

You probably don't want to launch your Page until there's at least a little content to encourage people to become fans. You might want to start with a status update that just welcomes people to your Page. If your Page lends itself to having photos and videos, post a few to make your Page more dynamic. By adding interesting captions that explain the story behind them, you're also creating an example for the photos and videos your fans will upload themselves.

You can also start some discussion threads on the Discussion tab either for Q&A purposes or communication among fans. For example, I started a thread called "Got Tech Questions?" where people can post their own issues. (Nobody's actually done so yet, but the option is there...)

If there are other Facebook Pages that you think would be interesting to your fans, add them as favorites. When you go to the Page, you'll see a link at the top left that says Add to My Page's Favorites. When you click that, it will be added to your Boxes tab.

Events and Notes are also great to add to flesh out your Page. And there are plenty of third-party apps that will add value and, again, I'll be discussing those tomorrow.

Once you've got everything set up the way you want, you're ready to Publish your Page. This will make it available in the Pages directory and viewable by anyone on Facebook or off.

Find some fans.

Because Pages don't have their own "friends," they have no way of directly inviting people to become fans. So here are a few ideas on how you can start to attract some:

• Become a fan yourself and it will show up in your Recent Activities and on your Info page
• Update your personal status to announce the new Page
• Use the Suggest to Friends list on the left-hand side of the Page (from your personal account if it's not tied to the Page) to invite your own friends
• Write something on the Wall as you (not as the Page) and this will show up on your Wall so your friends will see a link to the Page
• Ask questions or offer assistance on the
  Facebook Pages Page, on the Discussion tab, where you can mention your own Page
• Add a notice on your organization's public website
• Tweet it on Twitter
• Write a status update on your LinkedIn profile
• Add it to your business cards and other stationery

Well, I think that's enough to get you up and running with your Page. Tomorrow I'll be discussing various applications that can further enhance it.

Posted in Facebook, How To, Social Media