Are Facebook Pages Worth It?

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December 9, 2010 By 25 Comments

I‘m increasingly unconvinced that Facebook is the right place for B2Bs. Especially small-medium sized businesses.

A bit bored actually

It’s purely anecdotal, I know, but I just don’t see community interaction on bazillions of pages. I don’t see (much) engagement, communication or involvement.

Sure, there are plenty of exceptions to the rule. I’ve even talked about the über-smart Gini Dietrich’s Arment Dietrich page as a successful case in point. But so many places I look there is just dross. Utterly banal blah blah blah.

Back to the Blog

There’s been so much pro-Facebook waffle in 2010 that a lot of people have forgotten just how engaging blogs can be from a business perspective. Gini’s blog, Spin Sucks has oodles of community engagement as does my friend Mark Schaefer‘s. In fact, the comments and discussion that goes on at these blogs do as much to promote each company as a Facebook Page would.

Of course, you could argue that they don’t get the general exposure that a Facebook Wall post can lead to. But again, Dr Skepticism rears his ugly head again in me and I can’t help wondering how much lead generation and ultimately sales this leads to. Or is it just about improving your brand recognition? Image?

So OK. I’m asking you guys to comment here!

Mark: Just why doesn’t Schaefer Marketing Solutions have a Facebook Page?
And Gini: What does Facebook give you that Spin Sucks doesn’t?

So in the spirit of curve balls and debate, and a good dose of the Grinch who stole Christmas, here are:

8 Reasons Why Your B2B should Avoid Having a Facebook Page

  1. You just don’t have the time to spend energy (and resources) on yet another web presence.
  2. You’ve already got a business blog that works; where your content generates connections, leads and sales!
  3. You’re already using Twitter for customer service.
  4. You realise Twitter is better for customer service because it’s more instant and has a better smart phone app.
  5. You generate plenty of engagement and feedback on YouTube or Twitter already.
  6. You’ve got a podcast / vlogcast that shows customers a sense of who you and your team really are.
  7. You don’t want the ignominy of having less than 10 people “Like” your B2B; after all, who really loves accounting software.
  8. You’ve never tried using Google’s sponsored links for lead generation.

Or am I getting this wrong? Does a small-medium B2B really need a Facebook Page?

Filed Under: blogging, marketing Tagged With: , , ,
About Jon

Marketing and Communications Consultant. Head of Jontus Media. Podcaster. Life-long Liverpool FC supporter. Guarded by basset hounds.

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  • http://spinsucks.com Gini Dietrich

    Alright, alright. I’ll bite. Facebook does a couple of things: It allows us the ability to use social commerce for things like eBooks and webinars and it gives us access to a new and different audience. Not all of our Facebook fans read Spin Sucks. And not all of the Spin Sucks readers are Facebook fans. So we use it to really show the personality of everyone who works at Arment Dietrich and to inject a little more fun. The blog is more focused on me while Facebook is a mixture of all of us. And…we can have crazy contests there that we can’t have on the blog.

    As for other B2B…I think it works for some, but not all. We have a client who sells oxidizers. It makes zero sense for them to be on Facebook. But we have another client who sells insulation that protects the interior of car from all the external sounds and we have them on Facebook. They use it to develop relationships with their existing customers and it works really well.

  • http://twitter.com/JGoldsborough JGoldsborough

    Great question. I think any brand can win from being on Facebook because I think any brand can win from developing relationships. It boils down to how much time/resources you have to devote. Because doing it right takes a large chunk of both.

    Great personality, content and willingness to listen, engage and participate are crucial elements. If an org isn’t going in with eyes wide open and planning to provide those elements, then yes, you will probably have 10 fans.

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  • Mark Schaefer

    I do have a Facebook page, which is accessible from my blog. Obviously this is having a big impact on you Jon : )

    However, you are correct in that I spend very little effort in this venue and that I am highly skeptical of its value in a B2B campaign. I am a solo entrepreneur without the vast resources of say … Gini Dietrich. I have to choose where I spend my time wisely.

    For me, that means my blog, Twitter with a little LinkedIn thrown in for good measure. I can only do so much. All three of these platforms have created important business opportunities for me.

    Any meaningful conversation I could have on Facebook can take place on the Twitter/blog combo. I have seen some succcesses in this area but very few outside of restaurants and retail.

    Personally I thnk Facebook is fraught with peril (a recent theme on my blog). Of course there are the privacy issues and the fact that Facebook owns your stuff.

    But a bigger concernt to me as a marketer is that people go to Facebook to RELAX, see photos of the kids and play Farmville. They are sick of being marketed to, so why do we assume anybody would friend our company … unless we pay them to do it through a coupon or discount?

    Ironically, every hack starts their marketing campaign these days with “we must have a Facebook page” which is usually wrong, albeit relatively harmless.

    Coincidentally I also spend no time with SEO and this is not an exaggeration. I am my own experiment. I find that there is no SEO magic rabbit to pull out of your hat when it comes to attracting customers through a blog. The statistics show that SEO merely creates random visitors who don;t remain on the site and don’t come back — let alone generate business benefits. I have lived the marketer’s dream of having articles go viral with nothing to show for it except a meaningless blip in my statistics.

    The new buzz is the organic SEO that comes from social media activity and i think i am a living proof of the possibilities there.

    Thanks for the great post Jon!

  • http://www.jontusmedia.com/ Jon Buscall

    Great response! I’m actually with you on this one. I’ve got clients who believe in Facebook and so do we. It’s just that I’m trying to raise awareness to the dangers of not actually being strategic about your decision.

    There’s nothing worse than a brand being half-hearted about Facebook but the same goes for a blog, twitter account, etc.

    thanks for stopping by and adding to the conversation.

  • http://www.jontusmedia.com/ Jon Buscall

    Tack ska du ha, Gini! You know me, can’t resist playing devil’s advocate from time to time.

    You’re absolutely right. It comes down to aims and strategy, as well as a massive dose of resources. And naturally, if you’re worried about putting the time in you can always outsource to someone like Jontus Media or Arment Dietrich :)

    I’d be interested to see the insulation page just to see how it works!

    Oh, and thanks for sharing the point about not everyone reading one channel. Do you think there’s the same level of engagement though on a Facebook Page when it comes to B2B?

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  • http://www.skypulsemedia.com/ Howie at Sky Pulse Media

    This is something I have brought up many times. People are being snowed by the VC and Network Hype and all the Hucksters who include many so called Social Media Rock Stars who really only rock their own bank account.

    Square Peg Round Hole is what marketing is to Social Media. It is a people to people communications platform. Current versions allow Brands to invade our space but no one asked us if we wanted this. Its bad business models. I have dissected the numbers and Facebook has very low activity numbers. In fact only 60-90mil of the 250 mil who log in each day are actually doing a clickable recordable action (like updating status or clicking Like or commenting). This is from numbers Facebook had on their stats page (since cleansed).

    So of course when you base your whole business model on exploiting your users whom without which you have no network, is going to fail. The scale is not there nor will it ever be. The more things pushed into people’s feeds the more clutter the less value and more ignoring of things seen there such as Fan Page updates.

    I just view all these activities as an AND. Vs choosing one over the other. 90% of the stuff posted to people’s FB or Twitter feeds does not get seen if you are active and have 200+ connections. Lack of time and too much volume. But you can get great insights from what people post even if it is a small % of your customer base. Its a free feedback/improvement loop!

  • http://www.skypulsemedia.com/ Howie at Sky Pulse Media

    I have a client who has allowed me to do everything and anything I wish to try for social and general marketing and B2C is much different than B2B or making my own Brand. Nothing beats first hand experience. Waiting for your SEO White Paper btw.

  • http://www.skypulsemedia.com/ Howie at Sky Pulse Media

    Most B2B uses direct sales people so it would be rare for me to see FB as a place for a Fan page. Marketing normally handles creating catalogs, setting up ways to get leads, and supporting Trade Show efforts. I myself keep my Facebook separate from my work life which is on Twitter. But I have Fanned a few work related Pages like A-D and the Beancast. I think for B2C which in reality both A-D and the Beancast also are a Fan Page can have many uses.

    But here is something that I get aggro on all the time. The technology used for Facebook or Twitter would be hugely valuable as an intracorporate Comm platform that would allow some customers and vendors to be invited into to improve relationships, sharing ideas, improvements etc. And the fact they aren’t pursuing such markets to me is a big failure on their part. In fact it could be what saves them in the long run from whatever competitors loom on the horizon.

  • http://www.jontusmedia.com/ Jon Buscall

    Thanks for chipping in here Mark. Appreciate you taking the bait :)

    You’re in a very similar position to me. I don’t spend time on Facebook except for connecting with people personally and again I don’t really think it’s suited to B2B.

    Your comment: “every hack starts their marketing campaign these days with “we must have a Facebook page” which is usually wrong, albeit relatively harmless” would be my quote of the week ! Perfect.

    I seem to get approached by customers wanting this more than anything else at the moment and, quite frankly, most don’t need one. They’d be better off creating really valuable content for a blog, Youtube, etc, or connecting 1×1 on twitter.

    Thanks for your insight !!

  • http://www.jontusmedia.com/ Jon Buscall

    I agree there’s a massive difference between b2b and b2c. The integration of Facebook into Levi’s most recent campaigns has been excellent.

  • http://www.jontusmedia.com/ Jon Buscall

    I see what you mean about the feedback loop. But that exists on Twitter too (albeit to a lesser extent, I suspect).

    Volume is a major issue. As Mark said in his comments Facebook feels like a personal social site, rather than a place to whack people up for business. Then again, Gini seems to have a different approach that works for her and her clients.

  • http://www.skypulsemedia.com/ Howie at Sky Pulse Media

    I think anywhere you can get free feedback, especially since people feel more open to be frank via Social vs say if they call someone to complain. I fully agree with the redundancy issue. There is a reason both Mark and Gini (or You or I) aren’t hosting our blog on Facebook. I think anything Business proprietary that you own keep off that site.

    A company like Airbus or Lockheed Martin might have a Fan Page as a portal to their website for consumers to come visit. But customer or potential investors you want coming to your big site that fully displays your products that sell for millions each.

  • http://www.jontusmedia.com/ Jon Buscall

    That’s an interesting idea: just using a FB Page as a portal to your actual site. I.e. just a call to action to see the “real” site.
    Not sure how you’d get past the barrier of “it’s not very interesting” without investing a considerable amount of time, energy and resources into it though.

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  • http://suzannemcdonald.myopenid.com/ Suzanne McDonald

    It depends on whether your audience (customers, prospects, people you’d like to engage with) is already on Facebook. Also whether Facebook is appropriate for what you sell/provide.

    Every Facebook change, and it seems like there’s one a month, makes me wonder what’s happening behind the scenes and what it means. MySpace was the “it” platform at one point, too. AOL …

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