How to use Facebook Fan pages / Some ideas
Hi all,
I noticed Miladysa and Irk discussing what to do with their facebook pages and I tweeted them I think they need some facebook only extra's. Irk asked what I had in mind, but instead of tweeting 20 tweets back and forth I thought I'd share my ideas. Take a pen and note it down, because this is coming from a reader, no an author 
(Inserted after I finished typing. I got a little preachy, sorry for that. It's because I really want to help out, but I get opiniated about stuff like this. So sorry for the preachyness.) For those that want to skip all the backstory argumentation, the last line is my conclusion
Anyways, basic rule for all you people's different web presences is that each different one should have its own caveats. I understand that most of you prefer to have all action going on at one place (for most of you that would be the story website), but if you do decide to go somewhere else, make sure that you offer something special for that place too.
Some backstory philosophy behind my thinking here. Webfiction readers need to be converted. At the moment most of you seem to attract readers from other webfiction serials (all the cross-advertising on eachothers websites is a prime example of this). Most people don't read fiction online however (alas! because I vow it is a very fun way of reading+connecting), and thus these people, who read fiction, and probably read online all the time, need to be converted to read fiction online. I'm sure you all realise this, and that's one of the reasons this place was born, but sometimes I want to yell at you all that you should broaden your horizon a bit.
On to the Facebook Case Study. Facebook is a place where people socialize, and thus if you could make your readers who are already reading your story talking about it on facebook that should give you some more viewers.
Facebook is cluttered fast however, so making you're current readers fan your page probably won't be enough. This is because when only one of your friends fans something the chance is pretty low it will show up on your facebook feed.
The chance that you get seen thus increases the more interaction there is on the facebookfanpage. And here come the extra's on board.
As far as I see it you want to do two things with your facebook page. The main goal is you want to attract new readers to your webpage. To get this you need to get those facebook fans active, because that's how they'll attract new readers. Thus you need to get your current readers who are facebookmembers also active on the facebookpage. It's a vicious circle really. But if it works out it can be great. (Alexandra Erin even needed a non-her moderator if I remember correctly, and there's always loads of people reacting on lorldlikely's things.
Now on to the ideas how to increase all this facebook action.
1st: for those that use incentives. Make facebookfans one of them and give them an extra story/cookie/or whatever you give your audiences when incentives are reached.
2nd: Give you're facebook followers something they can only get there.
- A link to a bonusstory only for facebookfans.
- Some artwork that is only posted there.
- A podcast
- a video.
If you want to attract new readers through facebook, visual stuff will work best, because if they react, an image will show up in their friends feeds, which is easier for non-following people to click on to see what's happening.
3d: Try to reward people for responding on images/stories and so on.
I want to stress that simply having a feed crossposted on facebook which shows your storyupdates will probably make some of your followers happy, because facebook is where they hang out. However, I don't think this will gain you new readers. For facebook worth of mouth to happen, you need action on the page.
Some more ideas to do there:
- Give them a month of early updates (this seems ideal for me to get your facebook page started)
- Announce things there with some extra flair. (Lordlikely does this, the extra flair comes mostly from his nifty images, but also a very strong input from him reacting to the reactions) I know I referred at least 3 new readers to him, because I kept reacting to the same story announcement / image.
- Backstory info about the story, authors and so on work very well to.
- Also, since the new facebookfeature of linking to people in statusupdates, I'd prepare I nice little gift for whoever who mentions you like that (I'm assuming here that pages get noticed when this happens like people do).
The basic rule is that each new place where your story is present is that there should be a level of interaction, and of motive for that interaction. Don't treat Facebook as an RSS feed, because it isn't. It's a place where people talk. So if you don't have the time to be a little active on there wait a bit until you have.
Very good advice Janoda!
I don't have points, bonus stories etc. but I will concentrate on finding something different for facebook.
Thank you for this 
Really good points. I'm not sure how much you really have to offer something special for Facebook (and also for every other place you post?) but the idea of reaching beyond just passing each other's readers around is very sound and far-reaching.
One of the big things is: BE EVERYWHERE. and HOOK EVERYTHING UP.
You see people who are like here and on WFG and think that's enough (and very possibly it is for what their goals are)
But if you google really successful audience-builders you see that they are everywhere and linked up six ways from Sunday.
This is especially important on places like Facebook and Linked-In where contacts snowball. I don't think it's outlandish to say that everybody here, and everybody who has a story should be hooked up with the Facebook groups, and to each other's fan pages.
This is one reason I've been pushing that New Writing thing: it's another place to be, and hubs out to all the places where weblit is.
The more of a network that exists, the more readers will flow around as new readers enter the weblit universe. And the more attention it gets on searches and the general web surfing that people do.
Great post, JanOda
Great post indeed with lots of interesting points! I hadn't thought about using the Fan Pages as a way to give "behind the scene" glimpses at the story. Great idea. I'll get to work... tomorrow, after some sleep.
Thanks a lot for taking the time to put this post together!
Oooh! Good post, Jan.
I've got a fan page for KAT AND MOUSE set up but I've been trying to figure out what to do on it. The behind the scenes stuff could be a good one.
I will have to re-read you post, take notes, and do some figuring.
Now it's just a matter of making time to do those things... (heh)
Thanks JanOda. I was thinking for awhile that there was no point in investing time in getting a fanpage for PK up on Facebook unless I actually had something special to offer on it. This is helping me cook up some ideas. It's really appreciated, especially since you're speaking as a reader, which is our target audience!
All good points. Personally, I see FB as an extension of word of mouth. People don't go there to read, but many will click on something their friend commented on.
On a somewhat tangential note, I've had luck advertising (via Project Wonderful) on web comic sites. A few SLB readers have commented that they don't normally read anything but comics online, but they were intrigued by the ad enough to click through and give it a try.
That exactly is how I discovered webfiction at first. Through an ad on webcomics.
Glad you guys found the post useful, I feared I rambled too much without much valuable actual things you guys could do.
Great post, Jan. I made a Facebook fan page even though I had no idea what good it would do, and now I have some ideas! I'm not sure what I'll put there, but maybe a video... I think that would get people over there.
I hope this will be helpful to some of you: A Guide To Facebook Fan Pages for Weblit Writers. I cover the following: setting up your fan page, what does what, customizing your fan page with Static FBML, how to get fans, and more.
An excellent article Gabriel!
Thanks very much, Jan & Gabriel! This is very very helpful. I probably don't have enough fans to make a page viable (and I doubt it ever will), nor -- most importantly -- do I have a regular enough schedule. But I might dip my feet in someday.
Gabriel's article mentions that you can invite your fans to events, but every time I try to do something like that, it defaults to my regular facebook profile (a personal profile that I'd like to keep separate from my author self) and only lists my friends to send event invites, NOT my fans.
Is there something I'm missing here? Does anybody know how to access your fan list as opposed to your friend list for events?
Furthermore, I hate these things about fan pages:
1-Facebook does not email you when someone writes on your fan page wall or any other way interacts with you, and there is no way to change this within the settings.
2-You cannot send "fan requests"
3-Fans are not friends. While my stuff shows up on their newsfeeds, their stuff does not show up on my newsfeeds. Therefore it is difficult to interact with people in a personal way.
4-My regular facebook profile and my fanpage are not nearly separate enough. It drives me freaking crazy. I wish I'd known this before amassing 300 fans. I'd relocate to a completely separate profile if I knew that they'd all follow me. 
Valerie brings up some interesting points. I'll flesh out a full article addressing them later once I have more time to investigate, but here's my initial thoughts.
- Cannot invite fans to Events. It seems I need to edit my original article, because you've caught a huge design flaw in Facebook's functionality of the Event application. You can invite only individuals that are friends of your admin account to an Event. For the moment, the best work-around I can suggest would be to make an Open Event that doesn't require an invite to attend, and then link to the event in an Update to All Fans.
- Facebook does not notify you. Unfortunately, this is true. The closest thing would be to keep an eye on your Interactions, but even these aren't the greatest statistics, since they only check the past 7 days. I've not found a workaround yet.
- Cannot send "fan requests." I assume by this you mean that you cannot send requests to people to become fans. This is partially by intention, as Facebook doesn't want people making fan pages and sending out mass spamming requests to random users. You can send fan requests to anyone that is a Friend of your admin account, and any user that is your fan can also send fan requests to their friends.
- Fans are not friends Again, this is, in my opinion, by design. Fans are not friends (though friends may often become fans). I have 43 fans thus far on my fan page, but only a small portion of those are people I'd consider friends, and as my page becomes more popular and I accumulate more fans, I expect the pool of them that I consider friends will shrink. That doesn't make my friends less valid, and I'll certainly friend them on my personal account so I can follow their everyday lives, but I see it as a way to keep my life uncluttered (I don't have the time to keep up with the day-to-day lives of 300+ fans, but I can follow the ones that I've developed friendships with.)
- Personal page and fan page aren't separate enough. Facebook is kinda wonky like that, I'm afraid. Personally, I wish they would have made Fan pages have a completely separate login process from Friend pages. The best I can suggest is to do something like I do. I have a Profile account (under my real name) that I use for friends and family, and I have a second Profile account for my Gabriel Gadfly persona and both of these Profiles are set as admins for my Gabriel Gadfly fan page. Really, each account has its own purpose. My personal Profile is for keeping up with the daily goings-on of my real life friends and family. My GG Profile is for networking with other writers/bloggers on the net, while my Fan page is a conduit through which I connect with people who are, in fact, fans of my work.
I hope this was of some help. I'm going to do some more investigation into the issues Valerie brought up, and I'll see what workarounds and/or solutions I can come up with.
Gabriel--The open event idea with an update to fans is BRILLIANT. Thank you ever so much.
I was in kind of a bad mood yesterday. (I'm suffering from idea block and it's really frustrating me. I feel crazy motivated to write, but I don't have anything cool to write ABOUT. However, that has nothing to do with anything, except for the fact that it means I'm spending more time posting on sites like this instead of writing .) So while I was complaining about facebook, please don't think I'm bitter about it. It's a wonderful tool and your article and this post have been VERY helpful.
Thanks so much for your detailed reply.
Thanks so much for your detailed reply.
You didn't come across as bitter at all. You brought up a lot of valid points. Facebook Fan pages were intended for corporations and big business entities -- people with hundreds and thousands of fans. As such, they're a little awkward for small independent artists like us who may only have 20-100 fans.
I feel obliged to present everybody with an update here. MCM has found out that you can't have contest on Facebook (http://whyfacebook.com/2009/11/09/thinking-of-running-a-contest-on-faceb...), which is obviously a huge flaw.
Reading back my post I realize I might sound a little to positive about facebook, like it is the big perfect way to become famous, which it obviously isn't. Sometimes it's hard to send across the right tone when you write in a 2nd language.
In combination with the flaws Valerie mentioned it is obvious Facebook isn't perfect. However, if this is where your fans are I still think it can be a valid and useful way of promotion. It all depends on who your fans are, what you can come up with and how much time you have.
Also, someone urgently needs to write a refer this story application....
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