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Gevril and Haurex Italia dinner during Baselworld in March 2011 with Larry Brauner standing in the background.
Baselworld 2013 is taking place April 25 to May 2 in Basel, Switzerland.
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Jun
13
10 Tips for Making Facebook Business Friends
Filed Under Business Networking, Facebook, Networking and Marketing Strategy, Social Media and Social Networking Sites, Targeting
You are using your Facebook personal profile for business despite 7 Issues to Consider About Doing Business on Facebook and despite advice dispensed in ONE Facebook Business Page, No More, No Fewer.
Alternatively, you’re preparing to convert your Facebook personal profile using the new Facebook personal profile to Facebook business page migration tool.
In either case, you’d benefit from acquiring additional Facebook friends who share an interest in your business niche. Here are 10 tips that will help you add Facebook business friends:
- Choosing Facebook Friends Wisely - Don’t invite random people. It’s a waste of time and a waste of your 5,000 Facebook friend quota.
- Staying out of Trouble - Don’t send invitations in rapid succession or invite people whose privacy settings are very restrictive. If there’s no message button, not much information or wall posts showing, or if Facebook questions whether you really know the person, move on.
- Introducing Yourself - Include a short message, such as “Hi. I’m a ballooning enthusiast and author of the book, “Avoiding Deflation.”
- People You Know in Real Life - Ask your business colleagues if they’re on Facebook or search for them.
- LinkedIn Connections - Do the same with LinkedIn networking connections who share an interest in your business niche.
- Twitter Profiles - Search Twitter accounts for interesting people. Then check whether they’re on Facebook. Start your conversations in 140 characters and then transfer them to Facebook.
- Facebook Research - Facebook groups, pages,your Home page, etc., are all places to find lots of potential friends.
- Friend Suggestions - Here’s the best part of all: If you add friends carefully, Facebook will reward you by recommending favorable choices for friends.
- Engage Your Facebook Friends - Engage your Facebook friends in conversations, and you’ll get to know those of their friends who join in.
- Don’t Be Afraid to Unfriend - If for any reason you’re questioning why someone is your Facebook friend, the Unfriend link on his or her profile is waiting impatiently for you to click on it. (If you do that to me, however, I won’t ever forgive you.)
I recently added many devoted watch enthusiasts and industry insiders to my roster of Facebook business friends using these ideas.
Don’t hesitate leave a comment — and if you’re new to my blog, I invite you to subscribe and like my Facebook page.
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19 Responses to “10 Tips for Making Facebook Business Friends”
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Larry,
Excellent article with ideas I had never thought of especially the one about asking Twitter followers to connect with you on Facebook. Such a simple, obvious use of Twitter but never occurred to me to put into practice. One way I’ve seen to automate this is to suggest a connection on Facebook in the direct message when someone follows you.
I hope all is going well with you in your position at the watch company. I would love to hear more about your experiences with social media in a corporate setting. I know it has to be different in many ways than doing it as a solo entrepreneur.
All the best,
Eunice
Having a profile page for both business and personal, what would be better? Would it make sense to keep two pages?
@Eunice Thank you for commenting and giving me an opportunity to share a couple of ideas about Twitter with you.
On Twitter, you’re not limited to communicating with followers. You can use @ to communicate with many if not most Twitter users.
As far as automating direct messages, I gave that up at least a year ago, because it alienates more people than it serves.
Life as Social Media Director for a business is very different than being a solo entrepreneur. I have to wear more “hats” and multitask more that I would prefer. There are also more distractions.
On the other hand, the company is able to throw more money and resources at projects and problems than I could on my own.
@Michael It’s generally best to use a business page for business and a profile page for personal networking. Please refer to the two articles I referenced above in the first paragraph.
As far a maintaining two Facebook profile pages is concerned, that’s a big no-no. Check out You Say I Can’t Have More than One Facebook Personal Profile.
Hi Larry,
Excellent tips and I especially love tip #9. It is unbelievable how many people promoting their business on Facebook forget the social part of social media. Thanks for sharing this very informational piece with all of us.
Some things I hadn’t thought of. Thanks Larry, great ideas. I will get to work on some of these!
I like the 10th tip. You gotta keep your house clean. Thanks Larry!
I learned the hard way that the Likes pages are also counted in the Friend count of 5000, so I had to go and delete some of the Likes pages I’d picked up. Most of them were through FB suggestions on the sidebar, which I’d automatically clicked if they seemed interesting, but not a help in my writing career.
Morgan Mandel
I love #10, lol! Who would ever unfriend you Larry? You are great
Social media is very powerful,, it can really help you in boosting your business,,, through Facebook and LinkedIn you can so easily reach big shots of larger corporations and if you play your cards right then for sure you will achieve your goal.
In the spirit of transparency, I have to admit that I paid Karla to say that.
You’ve got great insights about Facebook marketing tips, keep up the good work!
Hi Larry,
About your last point. Is the person you’re unfriending told that you have done so or are you just removed from his or her list?
Thanks
Maria
Hi Maria,
Facebook won’t tell the person, but there is a Firefox add-on that will.
Excellent points, especially number 1. I sure hope they lift that 5000 friend limit. I heard it was in the works, but haven’t checked into it in the last couple of weeks.
I appreciate the link to your 7 Issues to Consider About Doing Business on Facebook. I’m posting tomorrow about my experience with mixing personal and business on my Facebook profile and I’ll be linking to your post.
Well, for me, LinkedIn is still the best way to find, connect, and maintain business friends. Facebook is going that way - but it will take years before it can compete with LinkedIn.
Also, although Facebook Groups are gaining grounds, it is not totally geared towards businesses. Majority of the groups created in FB are related to recreational activities, celebrities, music bands, sports, and the likes…
I prefer to have a private account, and a professional account for my company. This suits me better, so that I can target the correct people.
And thanks for the article anyway
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Interesting post Larry. As some of the other guys a talking about, I think I’ll prefer to have two seperate accounts on Facebook. Think it will to “dangerous” to mix the two of them.
Maybe it’s just me
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