My next few blog posts will walk you through setting up your Facebook Page –- creating it and getting started with content. For today, though, I’m going off on a bit of a tangent. There seems to be a bit of concern about the connection between having a personal Facebook Account and being the administrator of a Page, so I’ll try to clear up some of that confusion.
To reiterate something I said in my webinar a few weeks ago: the first thing you need to do when creating your organization’s Facebook Page is sign in to Facebook.
If you’re accustomed to keeping “work” and “play” very separate in your life, you might be balking at the idea of using your personal Facebook account to administer your organization’s Facebook Page. The trouble is, you have to be a Facebook user to be a Page administrator.
"But Michelle, even when I’m not logged in to Facebook, it says right there at the bottom of the home page, 'To create a page for a celebrity, band or business, click here.'"
It's true -- you can click on that link and start the process of creating your page without logging in or even having an account. But once you get past the first screen of information, you'll be taken to a login screen and asked to sign in! This screen will also tell you that if you don't have a personal Facebook account already, you can enter your name and e-mail address and create something called a Business Account.
Huh. What’s a Business Account? A Business Account is a Facebook account with limited functionality, intended to be used by people who just want to administer Facebook Pages without actually "being on Facebook."
Sound goods, right? Does that mean you can create an extra throwaway account to administer your Page without linking it with your person account?
NO. Here’s the catch (and I'm pulling this straight from
Facebook's Help section):
"Please be aware that managing multiple accounts is a serious violation of Facebook’s Terms of Use. If we determine that an individual has more than one account, we reserve the right to terminate all of their accounts."
Yes,
maintaining your personal Facebook account ("look, pictures of my cat!")
and a separate Business Account ("nothing to see here, just running my organization's Page...")
COUNTS AS HAVING MULTIPLE ACCOUNTS.
Can you get away with it anyway? Possibly. I know that some people do. I just don't think it's worth the risk. If you're sneaking around with multiple accounts, and Facebook decides they don't like it, they'll probably delete BOTH of your accounts, and then you're out of luck in regard to administering your Page.
Now, that was a whole lot of words to talk about something that, frankly, I don’t think is a big deal.
First of all, I’m assuming that everyone reading this blog has a personal account on Facebook already. I can't imagine why you'd want the job of being a Page admin if you're not on Facebook yourself -- if you're not part of the community, you're going to have a tough time understanding how the community works.
This is just common sense: you wouldn't try to serve as the creator of your organization's e-mail newsletters without ever having read an e-mail, would you? (And, incidentally, this is the main point of my colleague Allison's
article about Twitter that came out last week – check it out if you missed it!)
Secondly, regarding the work/play separation: the actions you perform as a Page administrator are not linked to your personal account anyway! So even if you want privacy, you don't have to jump through hoops and try to game the system. Just keep these lists in mind:
Actions that will show up as Page actions:
* Posting pictures
* Creating events
* Posting on the Wall
* Sending Updates
Actions that will be linked to your personal account:
* Sending Event INVITATIONS
* “Sharing” things (directly inviting people to become fans, and reposting events)
As long as you stick to actions on that first list, you’re in the clear.
This post is already epically long, but I have one last thing to add: from my own perspective, all the things I've written here are not all that important. As you may have noticed, I'm all over the place already -- I’m Facebook friends with many people I've met only through work (hi!). Facebook's privacy settings work well enough that I feel very comfortable using my personal account for all sorts of work purposes, and letting people see that I'm a real person behind the blog and webinars.
I am interested to hear what you think, though. How do you manage your professional Facebook presence? Is the idea of work and play separate an important issue to you?
