The American Legion W.R.I.T.E.S

The American Legion Western Region Information & Technology Exchange Service.

This is a site is devoted to the free and open exchange of ideas and applications of pertinent information and technology to The American Legion.


Thursday, January 21, 2010

Make Facebook the Center Piece

Facebook is a large and diverse social networking Web site. While there is a public aspect to Facebook, Friends is the heart of Facebook. You interact with Friends, and only Friends. The major features of Facebook are:
  • The "What's on your mind?" block is a status message in Facebook terms, and a microblog in generic terms. It allows you to share short messages with your friends, which appear in their "News Feed," or "Live Feed," and on your Wall. You can also write a status message on a Friend's Wall. Friends can comment on your status messages. You have the ability to control who sees your status messages.
  • You can also send a Message to one or more Friends. These are longer and more like email. You can reply to a message, just as you reply to an email. Facebook allows Messages to be longer than Status messages.
  • You can write a Note, which can be very long. A Note is like a Blog, and you can import posts from another Blog. Like status messages, they can be shared with your Friends.
  • You can also Chat with Friends, who happen to be on-line at the same time as you.
While the above center on communication with Friends, the following two features go beyond Friends to larger communities.
  • You can create a Group. A member of Facebook does not need to be a Friend to join your group. The group page looks much like your personal page. You have status updates. Instead of Messages, you have Discussions. You need to keep groups active with regular updates, just like for your main page.
  • The latest addition is Pages, or Fan Pages. Much like groups, but with more features, including photos and YouTube videos.
I am going to focus on Pages for the remainder of this article, as they are the key to reaching out to a larger community. As mentioned in the previous article, you need to use an e-mail account that is specific to the organization, and not your personal e-mail account.

Facebook's policy strictly prohibits an individual from having multiple accounts. It is important to remember that the organization account is for the organization, and not for playing games. Keep the organization side separate from your personal side.

Establishing a Facebook account is not difficult. You just need to create a first name and last name that somehow identifies the organization. You can have a first name with two or words and a last name. I recommend using the date your organization was founded as the birthdate. When you see the company name field, this is a good place to enter the full name of the organization.

The hardest part of building a Facebook Fan Page is finding out how to do it. One way is to select the Help option under the Settings tab. In the help window, you will see a option for Fan Pages (don't select the one for businesses). This will open up a window with various articles on fan pages. Select the one that reference creating a fan page and follow its link. You can create any number of fan pages, but you should have one for the organization.

While we haven't discussed creating a Twitter acccount, you will notice that there is an option for linking Facebook to Twitter. If you have a Twitter account go ahead and create a link. Whenever you post a status message on the fan page, it will automatically post the same message on Twitter. This is an important part of building a network.

There is a difference between posting a status message on your profile page and a fan page. On the profile page, the message only goes to your friends. On the fan page it goes to your fans and to Twitter, if you created the link. If you post a status message on both your profile page and your fan page, then those friends, who are also fans, get the message twice.

To make finding your Facebook profile page easier, it helps to have a user name. Again place your mouse over settings and then click Account Settings. If your organization has a cell phone, then you can immediately verify your account and create a user name. Otherwise, you have to wait until Facebook decides that you are who you say you are.

Letting the world know that you exist is the next challenge. Here are a few suggestions:
  • If you have email address of members in your organization, you can use the Friend search to see if they have a Facebook account, and then invite them to be a Friend. The spread the word to their Friends.
  • If you have a Twitter account. Post a message to Twitter. You will need to use bit.ly to shorten the long URL.
  • For those who are part of The American Legion of Montana, just send an email to webmaster@mtlegion.org and ask to have your account added to the profile for your Post or Unit. Be sure to send the shortened URL from bit.ly.
The above works for both Fan pages and Profile pages. It take time to build a network of fans and friends, but the communication to them is fast and easy. Just remember to communicate. Messages are short, so there is no reason not to get the word out.
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