I’ve noticed that many people still aren’t clear about two very important terms that should be in everyone’s “Facebook Lexicon”: Pages and Profiles. Back when Facebook first started the only type of content that people could browse through were personal profiles and groups. You knew that you could log in to edit your profile or visit your friend’s profile and write something on their wall. Soon, Facebook added Groups. Now, people could connect with each other and share messages even if they weren’t friends on the network. You were still required to have a personal profile if you wanted to join or start a group on Facebook.

Today there are actually four main types of presences on the Facebook network: Personal Profiles, Groups, Pages and Community Pages. In a later post I’ll explain Groups and Community Pages; while they are useful for some purposes, they aren’t very relevant for businesses that want an easy channel for communicating with clients and and potential customers.

A Facebook Page is a place on Facebook for promoting a specific cause, a brand (including celebrities and the well-known personal brands like Britney Spears or Brian Williams),  an organization or a for-profit business. A Facebook Page is by default visible to the entire internet. Pages can be set to be visible to only certain age-groups (18+, 21+, etc) or certain countries. Even though a Page is visible to most people, the key benefit of a Page is that any user of Facebook can choose to “Like” a Page. “Liking” a Page is Facebook lingo for “subscribing to updates.”

If a user decides to “Like” the Mexican beverage Jarritos they will receive updates several times a week in their newsfeed telling them about different marketing promotions, asking silly questions, or posting information about their sugary-sweet products. Any business, small or large, can use Facebook this way (although there are rules and guidelines about how a business can be promoted). Unwanted guests can have their comments removed by a Page administrator and they can even be banned from following that Page.

A Facebook Profile is how people tell others about themselves and manage personal relationships on Facebook (as an example, you can see my Facebook profile here). Anyone can create a profile on Facebook but there is a very strict policy against creating fake profiles (you have to be you…not Seinfeld or a parody account of a politician you dislike and even posing as a relative is frowned upon). The other major limit for profiles is that Facebook does not allow you to use your profile for promotional purposes (what this means is somewhat subjective). Even though many real-estate agents and insurance agents use their personal profiles as a marketing platform and try to gain new business through friend requests, this is not allowed by Facebook’s terms of service. Facebook has been known to shut people down for this type of behavior and they aren’t required to give any sort of warning.

Not only does your personal profile reflect you, but it also is your key for interacting with other people and businesses on Facebook. You have to personally approve of your closest connections, called Friends. This means that unless you have your updates set to “public,” people cannot follow your updates without your consent. Once you are Friends with someone you usually have the privilige of being able to message them, write on their wall, send them links, and invite them to applications and pages that you want them to be aware of on Facebook. Also, people who are friends with you will usually have access to more of your personal information like photos, any phone-numbers you have listed on your profile, your friends-list and other details.

So, which one do I need for my business? The truth is that you actually need both even though they serve very different purposes. Your business needs a Page because promoting your business through a personal profile is taboo (and confusing since many people don’t want to be “Friends” with a brand-name or organization). The reason that you need a personal Profile is because Facebook requires that real people with profiles are behind every Facebook Page. You can’t just create an account to use for business purposes. First you have to have a personal Profile, then you have to create a Page for your business. Once you have created a business Page you access it and control it simply by logging into your personal account.

Can people who “like” my Page see information about me on Facebook? The short answer to this is no. People who like your Page don’t even have to see your personal profile. The best way to stay safe on Facebook is to know what your privacy settings are and make sure that the public at large can’t see things that you would rather publish “for Friends only.” Check back here later to read more about how to modify your privacy settings on Facebook.

The “Share” button is an effective and simple first step. In order to use this feature you have to log in to your personal Facebook account and then find your business Page on Facebook. You don’t need to be an admin in order to use this feature. Follow the steps outlined below and you can very quickly spread the word about your new business Page to most of your Facebook contacts.

Go to your business Page on Facebook

Scroll down and click on the gray "Share" button

Click "Send as a message instead" to send a link to your Page through Facebook's internal messaging system

Start typing in the name of someone that you want to tell about your Page. Select the name. You can message up to 20 of your Facebook friends at a time this way. Once you have written a nice message asking people to "Like" your Page, hit the "Send Message" button.

That’s it! Check back here soon for more tips about how to use Facebook to promote your business and how to increase the size of your audience on this massive social network.