Lately I’ve seen a profusion of businesses and organizations showing up on Facebook as personal profile (individual) accounts. It may seem like a good idea, but here’s the thing: It’s not. It’s against Facebook’s Terms of Services and your account may be deleted. It has happened to folks I know.
Imagine you go through the trouble of creating and maintaining a personal account for Joe’s Pizza (instead of a fan page), accrue 1,000 friends and, one day, receive a note saying that this account has been found to be in violation and all your work has been obliterated.
It can happen. It has. Check out Facebook’s terms of service, including this part (bolding for emphasis):
Registration and Account Security
Facebook users provide their real names and information, and we need your help to keep it that way. Here are some commitments you make to us relating to registering and maintaining the security of your account:
- You will not provide any false personal information on Facebook, or create an account for anyone other than yourself without permission.
- You will not create more than one personal profile.
- If we disable your account, you will not create another one without our permission.
- You will not use your personal profile for your own commercial gain (such as selling your status update to an advertiser).
The good news is that, if you’ve started down this road, Facebook offers a quick guide to converting a personal profile into a page, which will also automatically turn your friends into fans.
Besides potential deletion, this post from Fresh Buzz Media lists other reasons a page is better for your business or organization: Fan pages are more findable on searches (better SEO), more customizable, offer analytics or Insights to learn about activity on your page, can have multiple administrators easily and (if you’re really popular) that personal accounts are limited to 5,000 friends while pages can have unlimited fans. Everyone from celebrities to roller derby participants can create pages for themselves or their alter egos, and it’s easy to do.
In addition, Facebook has added more functionality so that fan pages can Like other fan pages, RSVP to events and comment on some parts of Facebook. Your postings will still show up in your fans’ feeds. And did I mention YOUR ACCOUNT CAN BE DELETED because it’s against Facebook policy? OK. Just trying to be helpful.
EDIT/UPDATE: I learned my friend Alaina Wiens did an even better job of explaining this topic and why to convert to a page. Check out her excellent post for more.
InsideTimsHead 
I know a few businesses here in Oswego that use personal profiles as their page, where I work included. Thanks for the info, I’ll have to get on that and switch ours over!
I have one of these, too!
http://alainawiens.wordpress.com/2011/05/11/5-reasons-to-convert-your-businesss-facebook-profile-to-a-page/
I wish people would listen to us. 🙂
STEVEN: Thanks, and good luck!
ALAINA: I have to say … your blog post is better than mine. I’m posting it on the end as an update. Thanks!
Tim, I’m flattered that you’d share my post and that you referred to me as your friend. Thanks! I thought your post was great, too. 🙂
Okay, I don’t understand why people say a nonprofit’s personal page will be deleted. It clearly states – You will not use your personal profile for your own commercial gain (such as selling your status update to an advertiser).
This just simply does not pertain to a nonprofit. I feel like there would be room to dispute this if they tried to remove the account. And, I find the benefits of a personal page as a nonprofit to be much more than an org page – you can actively “friend” rather than waiting for a like, you show up more in the news feed, you can be tagged in pics, etc. Just seems more personal and dynamic than a page.
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