by Irene Lizarraga

Created on: October 16, 2009   Last Updated: April 20, 2010

According to Hitwise, as of October, 2009 Facebook draws over 50% of the U.S. traffic to social networking sites. Their users also spend on average over 23:00 minutes on the site and their audience share among older demographics is growing month after month. For this reason only, Facebook is a great platform for companies to market themselves and reach their audience, benefiting both from the popularity of this social networking platform and the great degree to which the ads can be targeted based on the profile information of each user. Facebook offers several marketing tools that can be used, depending on a company needs and target audience.

The first and most direct way of advertising in Facebook is by using its targeted ads feature. Facebook claims to reach over 300 million registered users, and you can choose between a Pay-Per-Click model or Pay-Per-Impression. You will also have analytics tools, to measure the effectiveness of your ads and modify your campaigns accordingly. In a way is similar to Google Adwords program, but instead of bidding for keywords you bid for a demographic (such as women, 25-30, married), which enables your ads to be displayed right to whom you want to. Considering the amount of information Facebook holds about a particular user, that's pretty fine tuned targeting. And you can set your budget very low on the first weeks just to see how the ads work for your company.

Another frequently used marketing tool in Facebook are the Facebook pages. They allow you to create a specific page in Facebook, with information and rich content about your company, and even with Facebook applications. Once your Page has been created, users can then "Become a fan" of it, and their networks will be notified when they do, generating in turn more fans in what is known as viral marketing. You can add events to it, and even send updates directly to your fans inbox.

Besides pages, Groups are a good tool for spreading a specific message. You can create a group around your company, or around a specific initiative and users will be able to join it. Groups also enable you to send messages and create events, so users can RVSP to them. As with anything else in Facebook, users will promote your groups to their networks and by doing so you will get new visitors that didn't know about your company previously.

Overall, Facebook is a great tool for marketing not only as a platform, but because it shows that your company keeps in touch with the most current trends in social networking, web 2.0 and what is cool on the Internet. Of course, not all types of products benefit equally from a Facebook presence. Facebook is a social networking platform, so users there might not be interested in some products due to not wearing their work hat. Also, Facebook users might not feel inclined to leave the page to go purchase your products. But they will see the ad and associate your brand with an enjoyable activity, which means that Facebook is a great tool for building a brand on the Internet.

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