Ah, Facebook. This is far more of a personal social network for me than a business one, though I do know people using it for business (and if you’re out there, I’d love to hear from you about your tips and suggestions).

But there’s no denying it’s popularity, and it can be a comfortable way to get acquainted with what it means to participate in social networks, so here’s my Facebook guide to getting started.

Your Profile. If you ever have any intention of allowing a business contact of any stripe into your Facebook realm, I strongly suggest you use a picture that doesn’t have you drinking, flashing body parts, or wandering around a beach in a bathing suit. Hey, candid shots are great and I’m a big fan, but remember. Social networks are searchable, and you just never know who might come knocking at your virtual door. Better to be fully clothed when you answer.

A good thing to note also is that other profile details – like your birthdate and relationship status – are by default visible on your public profile. That means if you don’t want people to know those details, don’t post them. Likewise with your contact information like email, phone numbers, and website. I post mine publicly, but consider how you want people to be able to find you before you do so. (You can change who can see what on your privacy settings).

Finding Friends. I tend to cross-polinate between my social networks, friends and business acquaintances alike. But it’s up to you how you want to use Facebook. You can search for people by name, and then you need to send them a friend request that they have to approve before you can view each other’s pages and send messages. It’s a pretty simple process.

I check in once a day or so to catch up with friend requests and peek at the “people you may know” sidebar, just to see who’s lurking out there that I should say hello to. Some people prefer to keep their connections to people they know personally. I’m a bit looser about my criteria since I’m not posting anything on there that I think would be crazy personal. Again, you need to decide what’s comfortable for you. There’s no “right” answer.

Communicating. Facebook offers myriad options for communicating with your friends, including live chat if they’re online (at the bottom of your profile), wall-writing (public), in-network messages (private), post items (public) and status updates.

As to the latter, Facebook gives you the option to cross post your Twitter updates to Facebook, but I choose not to do that. Why? I tweet a lot, and not only would I feel like my FB friends were flooded with irrelevant chatter, but it doesn’t afford me the opportunity to be present in all the places where conversation might be happening. Instead, I update my Facebook status manually with fun little quips or other comments about what I’m up to that might actually be of interest to my Facebook friends, but at a much more digestible pace.

Applications. I’m going to come right out and say that I think most Facebook applications are downright evil and annoying. There are two that I use with regularity, and that’s the birthday calendar (I like seeing when people’s birthdays are so I can drop them a note) and the Networked Blogs application so I can demonstrate support for my friends’ blogs in another way that’s visible to those that might be outside the social media sphere. It’s much more for introducing blogs to the rest of my network since I interact with those blogs through my reader and Twitter, mostly.

If you’re going to add a zillion applications to your profile, realize that when I see all the stuff you’ve got on there, it paints a picture of your personality to me. That could be a good thing, or not so much. What do your applications say about you, and what are you demonstrating to your connections when you ask them to participate in them with you?

Posting stuff. I’m not very good at this, but I’d like to be better. I see my friends posting interesting links all the time through Facebook, much like many of my connections do on Twitter. And I’d like to use it more to post links to great stuff on the web (not just my blog), because again, many of the people I know on Facebook have no idea about all this social media stuff in it’s business forms, and I come across tons of great resources every day. It’s better than emailing people a bunch of crap.

Groups. I belong to a bunch of Facebook groups, and some are better than others. The ones that engage me are the ones that provide information, interactivity, engagement on behalf of the organizers, and help me connect to other people more easily. If you’re thinking of starting a Facebook group, this is where I think business could make good use of it if they go about it well and tend it properly. But you can’t park it there and walk away, it has to be nurtured, and many businesses haven’t proven up to the challenge.

So again, I’ll put it to you: have you joined Facebook groups and found value? If so, how?

You can probably tell that I’m a bit on the fence about Facebook, but I’m still exploring and from a personal perspective, I think it can be fun (because not everything has to be about business, right)? What’s your take, and what tips would you offer someone new to the site?

This is a post from the Social Media Starter Kit Series. To see all the posts from the series, click here, or click here to download the PDF e-book version. Like this what you’ve read? Consider subscribing to the feed and never miss a post.

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