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Over the past 24 to 48 hours we’ve seen three new Facebook Page management tools roll out. On Tuesday Buddy Media rolled out a management platform for brands and then yesterday ContextOptional rolled out their Social Monitoring Console. Today theKbuzz announced their own product called “theFacelift”. All three of these packages are looking to provide something similar: a single resource for managing a brand’s Facebook presence.
Why More Software?
So why on earth do brands need Facebook page management software? Isn’t Facebook’s existing tools sufficient for brands? Ultimately the only circumstance under which Facebook’s existing platform makes sense is if you want the basics for your brand/company’s Facebook Page. If you want further customization, you’ll most likely need an in house developer or someone extremely familiar with HTML/FBML.
Large brands have greater needs which is why Buddy Media and ContextOptional are providing robust page management software. However for smaller businesses, you can use theFacelift platform which has been licensed from Buddy Media. The cost is $495 for setup and $195 for each of the following months you stay on. However if you use the discount code “ALLFACEBOOK” when you register, they’ll give you 20 percent off the first month.
Page Management Is Big Business
Facebook Pages have continued to evolve over the past year and now there is a massive ecosystem catering to Facebook Page administrators. Whether it’s other software packages like Involver, a more design focused service like Wildfire, or a full customization platform like Sprout publisher, there are solutions for just about every Page admin.
All of these businesses are banking on there being a large enough demand for Facebook Page customization. While I believe that there is at least $500 million at stake for Facebook Page customization, I’d imagine that many of these companies believe the opportunity is even greater. Whatever the size of the opportunity is, there are numerous companies now vying for a piece of the Facebook Page customization market.
Totally agree. The market is probably bigger than that!
We customize and administer Facebook Fan pages for our clients at Virtually Ready, Inc. and it is truly an affordable way to bring businesses large & small to the Facebook platform - whether we utilize these tools or not depends on the client’s budget, however.
Like Lisa’s company, my business Strategic Online Networking also developes and manages FaceBook Fan Pages for clients. I would like to add that I believe businesses should make a full strategic plan of how they could best use Social Media before they dive into any program.
I had a nice talk with one of Buddy Media’s representatives and it is something we’re looking at to extend the options to our clientele.
Like everyone on the page - I use a lot of different software to keep track and develop my clients Facebook Page. I am in talks with Buddy Media as well. Hopefully we know have a consistent business model from FB - that will allow us to really leverage their platform.
Interesting information and comments. Thank you. Fan pages are part of the strategy we develop with clients. Their business development model drives the relative importance of pages during initial stages of implementation.
What Facebook pages NEEDS is the ability to transfer the “creator” status to another person. A lot of us are waiting for this since March, cause we don´t work anymore in the company to which we created the page.