Why Do SoMe Evangelists Recommend Facebook Groups For Big Brands?

(In case you’re wondering, SoMe is twargon for Social Media).

If you know me at all you’ll know that I have many and varied pet peeves and it really gets my goat* when I see instances of them. Like working on a big screen monitor instead of a laptop**, having the toilet paper roll fall on the inside – as is customary - at home, bad text etiquette, people who repeat themselves and well…general stupidity.  My latest pet peeve is social media evangelists continuing to confuse Facebook Pages with Groups. I was at an after-work knowledge share last week where an expert actually suggested Groups as a good idea for large companies (yep, LARGE). And I came across something else today suggesting the same. So I’m laying down the law once and for all in this post. Well, at least till Facebook comes up with another solution for company/brand/product pages.

So, what is a Facebook Page?It’s a relatively new product added by Facebook in November ‘07 to make it easier for companies/brands/products to connect with their fans and vice versa, and is viral in nature. Page status updates and new wall posts show up on a fan’s home page – any fan comments will be posted on the fan’s wall and can be seen by all their friends as will any event RSVPs. And the Page will show up on the fan’s Info page. And lastly, a Page is a separate entity and does not in any way reflect back on the Administrator’s personal account – although there could be professional repercussions at work for truly terrible Administrators…

What then, is a Facebook Group?A Facebook Group is like a club (public or private) that you have to audition for. As an Administrator of a Group, you can only send an email to your members if the Group has fewer than 5,000 members – making it unsuitable for big brands. A Group is generally missing many of the viral benefits that a Page enjoys. And of course, unlike a Page, it reflects back on the Administrator’s personal profile(s). There are also some social advertising restrictions that I’m not going to go into as I’m not big on social ads. Today. Of course, tomorrow is a brand new sunshiny day

One final comparison point – a Page can host apps while a Group can’t. And that pretty much seals the deal for me.

So if you’re a big brand or a mid-to-large corporation trying to connect with customers and prospects – please pleeeeease consider a Facebook Page instead of a Group?

- Peeved Parneet

* From my pre-Hegira days, meaning makes Parneet very annoyed or angry.

** No one at work has questioned this (lovable but quirky) idiosyncrasy yet – something I thank both my wonderful work colleagues and the credit crisis for.