So, why should you have a Facebook Page for your business? How do you set up a Facebook Page? Isn’t it just a profile? What are people doing wrong? How can they fix it? Easy Answer: Go here and follow their prompts.

Disclaimer: These kinds of things change often.

“I have a Facebook account. Do I really need to be a Page?”

If you are a business, church, politician, service, organization, dog or anything resembling any of those, you will want to create a Page. It’s a violation of Facebook’s Terms of Service to use a “profile” as anything other than your true self. It protects the user’s privacy and that’s a good thing.

If you want to start using brand awareness campaigns, that’s great. You can get some traction for only $20 a post, if your audience is right. This is also another reason why you shouldn’t buy likes or followers, but that’s another blog post. Make sure your Facebook Page is optimized and that you’ve cultivated an organic following.

“The Brand Awareness objective is great for campaigns that target your top of the funnel – acquisition audiences, and mainly prospective customers. These are the coldest audiences, who have no idea who you are.” Madgicx

Sucessful Facebook Pages are Intentional

For your Facebook Page to be successful, you need to start with intent. There is more work to prepare than to actually set up the actual page. Like most things in life that are overwhelming, the best approach is to break them into small, achievable tasks. Think about a cooking show. What’s the sequence of events? What comes first? Who will do that task?

1. Who is going to manage the Facebook Page?

Decide beforehand who is going to manage the page. At least two people should be admins (to back one another up). Like I told my friend this weekend, it’s work, make no mistake. Often our friends will ask for our help without fully realizing what this new project entails.

Who will respond to requests? Who will be on standby for answers? It is a big responsibility. The Pages Manager App makes this a bit easier but won’t let you interact with other Pages you like (as of right now).

2. What kind of Facebook Page will it be?

If you’re an artist, choose “Artist, Band or Public Figure.” Choose the one that seems most reasonable to you. It can be changed later. If you want people to check in to your location choose “Local Business or Place.”

Depending upon what kind of Page you select, Facebook will prompt you to the next questions.

3. What are your Facebook Page’s details?

Just the deets, Jeets. All kidding aside, have a text file ready with your phone number, address, mailing address, website address, contact emails, bio, mission statement, and about all ready to go.

About will show under your page. Try for under 80 characters.

You could skip this part but then your friends wouldn’t understand why you’re inviting them to a Page they know nothing about.

4. Are your images ready for your Facebook Page?

* Disclaimer: Facebook changes a lot and the image sizes with it.

You will need two images to start: a profile photo (which is square if it’s a logo) and a cover photo. The profile photo needs to be square. The cover photo should be 851 x 315 pixels large. This changes a lot but the most recent, easy-to-read guide is by Jon Loomer.

Facebook really wants your cover photo to have very little text on it. For my Facebook Page, I just have an awesome photo I took of the Harbor which is the same image I’m using on my Blog and Twitter headers, too. (See The Twitter Set Up Guide to learn how to set that up.)

If your logo isn’t square, make one. Have your graphic artist make one. All of the social networks require a square photo. It’s nothing new.

5. Who will create content to share on your Facebook Page?

There is a big difference between creating content and managing a page. Many of us do both. But they are different responsibilities. You’ll want to have that conversation.

Creating content is writing, making a video, taking photos, and writing the text.

Curating content is finding articles, videos, and photos elsewhere to share. Beware of right-clicking on images from other Pages and sharing them as if you created it. That’s a big-time copyright infringement issue. SHARING the same photo from a page onto yours maintains their rights as owners. The technologies we use may have changed but plagiarism has not. But you learned this when you were turning in reports in 7th grade, right?

6. Do you still want to make a Facebook Page?

If you want to create a Facebook Page, follow Facebook’s step-by-step instructions. You’ll need 25 likes (from people, not pages) to get a custom url (go to facebook.com/username to customize) and 30 for insights (analytics). You may want to ask your peers privately, don’t spam your whole Facebook Friend List.

7. How do I get likes on my Facebook Page?

Ask your Facebook friends nicely and infrequently to like your Facebook Page and give them a reason why. Begging for likes is annoying. If you are starting a Page, there’s a reason. Surely, you have at least 25 people who will like it.

You could post, “Hey, I just started this page and I’d love your help to get to 25. Thank you.” with the link. People respond to that. But just post it once or twice.

If you use Twitter or another social network, post there, too. For sure, include a link to your new Facebook Page it on any blog or website.

8. What are Facebook Page best practices?

Don’t share the same content at the same time with other networks (automatic cross-posting). It’s poor form and shows that you’re not present. Resist the temptation. We will think you don’t know what you’re doing.

Do not connect Twitter to Facebook or vice versa. They are vastly different cultures. You’re playing with fire here.

How often should you post? People vary in opinion from 1-3 times a day to 3-4 times a week. Either way, the volume is a lot less than it is on Twitter.

Be helpful. Your posts should be a great resource.

Be humorous. Within reason, this is a good way to make your audience smile.

Share others’ content. It’s a social network, remember?

Find out when your audience is online. This is the tricky part and, depending on the type of Page you have, your audience will vary. Lunch customers would like to know things around 11 am. My audience is mostly business people who don’t care about anything unless it’s 9-5 M-F. Does it stop me from posting at 1 am on a Saturday? No, but I’m a rebel.

Oh. Don’t like your own posts. It’s tacky. (Word to mobile users. If you are a Page admin and you see a post while on FB mobile you will be liking it AS THE PAGE. Annoying, but that’s how it is now.)

Good luck and have fun.

Updated 10/29/2020

Ruby at Social Success Marketing made this infographic and included it in her post: