San Francisco - Facebook has launched a free tool called Your Business Story, which allows company owners to create a short promotional video, involving a photo slideshow with music and text, and link it direct to their Facebook page. Firms can make as many videos as they want.
Meanwhile, the number of businesses paying to advertise on Facebook has hit three million, up 50 percent on last year, with more than 70 percent outside the US, the social network has said.
Facebook’s vice-president of small business, Dan Levy, has said that more than 1.5m small firms upload videos on Facebook every month already. There are more than 50m small companies with profiles on Facebook, and small firms make up the vast majority of Facebook advertisers, paying to put their posts on more people’s news feeds, a feature that was launched in 2012.
Many small firms opt for creating a free Facebook page before launching their own website. In the past year firms have also been able to send customers private messages. Levy said: “People are telling me that for them it has become the new phone.”
Videos are also expected to become more popular, with technology giant Cisco saying that by next year video will account for 69 percent of consumer internet traffic.
Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg said last year that the world was entering a ‘golden age of video’, while a report from Cass Business School and video group Imagen found that 79 percent of 1 000 firms polled, both big and small, plan to boost investment in video in the coming year. YouTube has more than a billion users.
Simply Business, a British insurance broker, has created a guide to help small firms set up a free Facebook page.
See: simplybusiness.co.uk/microsites/facebook-for-small-business.
Mail On Sunday