Bet Hannon Non-Profit Media

Three times in the last few weeks, I’ve ended up explaining  that organizations should not be using a Facebook personal profile, they should be using a Fan Page.  The Facebook “terms of service” (all that fine print that few of us read, but all click “ok” to) limit personal profiles to individuals.

Yes, I know that there are a good number of violations out there, but those terms of service also give FB the right to shut down the profiles of violators without warning!   I’m aware of at least two instances where this has happened.  Those organizations lost all their friends and all their posts– poof!  You don’t want to risk losing so much.

Additionally, lots of people intuitively know that organizations using profiles on FB isn’t how it’s “supposed” to work, and when you use a profile for your organization, you lose some social media credibility.  You might feel inept at this, but you certainly don’t want to convey that to your constituents and potential donors.

Facebook Pages are intended as an authorized online presence for offline businesses, brands, performers/celebrities and organizations.  I’ve written before about why non-profit organizations should choose a FB Page over a FB Group.   You’ll discover that while you lose the ability to personal message your friends, you gain a whole lot more functions on a Page.

Unfortunately, there is no place to easily make a switch from a personal profile to a Fan Page.  You will have to put out a little effort and migrate your friends into becoming fans of your Page.

The basic principles are:

• You should give the process 3-5 weeks.
• Create a new Fan Page for the organization.  Do this from a personal profile of a real person, not the profile you are going to shut down.  That real person becomes the admin of the Page– and their name & contact info are not visible to fans.
• Stop posting on the individual profile except to say “come to the Fan Page”, and start posting your interesting content on the Fan page.
• Announce on the profile that you are moved to a Page and invite folks there to become fans.  Tell them you will shut down this profile on (give date).
• If people post on the individual profile wall, remind them in a comment that you have moved, and ask them to repost it on the fan page.
• After the bulk of friends have become fans, you can optionally try to start sending private messages to those who have not migrated–sometimes I call these nagging little messages.  This is time consuming, but will probably result in larger numbers of migrations.
• At the end of the period, with plenty of repeated announcements (“this individual profile will be deleted on Oct. 1—join our Fan Page”), on the announced end date, delete the individual profile.

That’s it.  As always, if you have questions about your specific situation, feel free to leave a comment here on the blog or email me.