How to create a Facebook page for your blog

Facebook is the most popular social networking website in the world. Millions use it daily and millions more are becoming active members every month. What many of you might not know is that Facebook makes it incredibly easy for bloggers to connect to their readers and lets you update their profiles with your latest posts.

There are 2 ways you can do this. You can either connect to your readers by asking them to befriend you via your personal account or you can create a fan page for your blog and connect to users through that. In my opinion the latter is a better method, particularly if you don’t want lots of people you have never met seeing your personal details via your personal Facebook account.

How To Add The Latest Posts From Your Blog To Your Personal Account

If you only run one blog then you might want to connect to your readers using your regular Facebook account. You can connect with your blog readers by doing this but you can also promote your blog by placing your latest blog posts through your account.

Note, Facebook only allows you to add one RSS feed to your account and all posts are added using the Notes application.

Here is a step by step guide showing which shows you how you add an RSS feed to your Facebook profile:

1. Login to your Facebook account (you will need to register if you are not already a member).
2. Scroll up to the Settings tab at the top of the page and then select Application Settings from the drop down menu.
   
3. Scroll down to the Notes Application link and click on it.
   
4. You will be taken to the Notes page. On the right hand side you will see the Note Settings box. Click on the Import a blog link.
   
5. You will then be taken to the Import an External Blog page. Simply enter your blogs URL here.
   
6. You will then see a preview of your blogs feed.
   
   If you scroll down to the bottom of the preview page you will see the button to confirm the import of your feed. Click the Confirm button.
   
7. Any new posts will now be added to your profile wall. Below is an example of how posts from my personal blog appear on my Facebook account.
   

And that is all there is to it. All you need to do now is give your readers details of how they can add you to Facebook.

One way to promote your Facebook account is to create a Facebook Badge and place it on your blog footer or sidebar.

How to create a Facebook fan page for your blog

Although friending your blog readers directly is one way to connect with them, a much more suitable way to connect with readers and promote your blog is by creating a fan page. The fan page is a great Facebook feature which allows you to create a group on just about any subject. It also allows fans of your blog to create their own discussions amongst themselves using the Discussions tab.

I encourage you all to create a Facebook fan page for your blog as it’s easy way to promote your blog at no extra cost; all it takes is 5 minutes of your time!

Here is a step by step guide showing which shows you how you can create a fan page for your blog.

1. Login to your Facebook account (you will need to register if you are not already a member).
2. Go to the ‘Create New Facebook Page‘.
3. You will be presented with 3 options. Click on the middle box which says Brand, Product, or Organization and select Website from the drop down list. Then enter the name of your fan page, tick that you are authorised to create this page and enter your name in the Electronic Signature box.
   

Congratulations, you have just created your blogs fan page! Your new fan page will be completely blank so you will need to enter some details and set some things up.

First thing I recommend doing is adding a logo to your fan page. For BloggingTips I chose to use the Blogging Tips logo however you could use your blogs icon or something else which is related to your blog.

To add your default image you must first click on the photos tab. After you upload your image you will see a box at the right hand side of the page which has a link to Make Profile Picture For Page.

Next thing I recommend doing is updating the general info of your fan page. To do this simply click on the Info tab and click on the Edit Information tab.

Last but not least, you need to import posts from your blog.

1. Click on the + symbol at the end of your navigation tabs. a drop down list will appear. Click on the Notes tab.
   
2. Click on the Write a new note button.
   
3. On the next page you will see a list of icons at the top of the page. Click on the icon which looks like a notepad. This brings you to the Notes settings page.
   
4. You should now see Notes Setting box at the side of the page. Click on the import a blog link which is in this box.
   
5. From here you can add your blog details to your fan page. Please refer to the tutorial at the start of this article if you are unsure of this stage.

Some people may choose to view your posts via Facebook instead of your live blog but this is no different from people viewing your blog via their newsreader.

Ways to promote your blogs Facebook fan page

Now that your blogs fan page is set up on Facebook, you just need to promote it to your readers on your blog. I chose to promote the Blogging Tips Face Book page by placing a Facebook icon at the top of the sidebar.

You could also use a Facebook Badge to promote your fan page. You will see a link to get your badge in the Edit Page of your fan page. It’s located at the bottom of the sidebar on the right hand side of the page.

Blogging Tips

At the top left hand side of your page you should also see a link to add a fan box to your site. The fan box is more interactive than your badge and can show the latest entries to your fan page wall and your fans. Here is an example of a fan box:

Overview

I encourage you all to set up a fan page for your blog on Facebook. It’s free and only takes a few minutes to set up. Not only is it a great way to connect to your readers and extend your community, it also allows readers to read your blog posts within Facebook. This will undoubtedly promote your blog to Facebook users who do not actively use RSS newsreaders.

If you are unsure about any stage of this tutorial please let me know and I will clarify it for you

Good luck

Kevin

Written by Kevin Muldoon from Blog Themes Club
Posted on August 11th, 2009 and filed under Social Networking
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