Facebook Personal Page vs. Business Page: Can They Be Combined?

Question. Hi…love your “Facebook Marketing Workbook”! I am rebuilding my horse business FB page using your suggestions. I have a personal FB page with about 650 friends, mostly horse owners/competitors. How do I connect my personal page with my FB page so both see my posts as I build my business? Thank you.

Answer. Here is a link to the Facebook help file on converting a personal profile into a business page: here. So it can be done. There are some “howevers” that are important to understand.

• A living “person” is supposed to have a profile on Facebook. This means a) that you have to “accept” friend requests to connect your “profile” to their “profile” (which is cumbersome). You are always “merging” your persona life / activity / updates with your “business interests,” and many times you do NOT want to share every personal update with your business contacts. HOWEVER, the “edgerank” of your personal profile is stronger – meaning that your “posts” or “updates” are MORE likely to show in the news feed of connections for a personal profile than for a business page.
• A business “page” has the advantage that interested persons do NOT have to wait for you to accept their “like” request. They just “like” your business page, and voila they are connected. You can also then separate your personal life from your business brand, and they would see only your business page updates on their own news feeds. HOWEVER, the edgerank of a business is much, much weaker than of a personal profile – in fact, these days it is VERY difficult to get your business updates to show in their news feed WITHOUT advertising. So, you may have to pay to play – pay to advertise on Facebook (e.g., boost your posts) for them to show in the news feeds of subscribers.

So, before you “merge” your personal profile with a business page and/or create one… make sure you understand the ramifications. Also, just be aware that in the long run, you are not supposed to use a personal profile for business usages. I have encountered instances in which Facebook FORCES you to move a personal profile into a business page.