Top 10 Facebook Marketing Resources for Caribbean brands

In September 2007 I could count on my right hand, the amount of Jamaican Facebook groups that existed. Fast forward to now, just over a year later and they are now numbering in the high hundreds and Caribbean people at home and abroad have been pouring online in tens of thousands, to make this an exciting development to watch.
It’s great to see that the Group makers and Fan Page launchers are pretty diverse. They range from the party promoters to political organisations, non-profits to beverage, food and event brands and also general website owners. And what are they doing? They are creating groups, launching fan pages, to a much lesser extent launching their own Facebook applications and spending money running Facebook ad campaigns. All have the same goals in mind:
– Getting traffic and attention for a specific event, website, personality and brand.
– Promote and Spread ideas among targeted audiences.
– Nurture goodwill and feelings towards a specific event, website, personality andbrand.
The fact remains thought that Facebook is a single tactical tool in the Social Media Marketing arsenal. And what is Social Media Marketing? I’ve sourced three definitions from Wikipedia and doshdosh.com for you to chew on:

1. Social Media is the democratization of information, transforming people from content readers into content publishers. It is the shift from a broadcast mechanism to a many-to-many model, rooted in conversations between authors, people, and peers.
2. Social media uses the “wisdom of crowds” to connect information in a collaborative manner. Social media can take many different forms, including Internet forums, message boards, weblogs, wikis, podcasts, pictures, and video
3. Social media is made up of user-driven websites that are usually centered on a specific focus (Digg = news) or feature (del.icio.us = bookmarking). Sometimes, the community itself is the main attraction (Facebook and Myspace = networking). Doshdosh.com

Now, while this trend of Caribbean brands, both emerging and established moving online to where their customers are spending most of their time anyway is encouraging I wonder. I wonder if all of these Caribbean events, websites, personalities and brands are getting the full benefit of this type of social media marketing? Do they understand how to use Facebook for full marketing effect? I don’t know, but it led me to put together a list of Top 10 online resources that can help them to get some info and insight- because starting a Fan Page or a group is so easy my 8 year old nephew can do it, BUT, how to use them for maximum effect takes planning, strategy, smart execution and constant and never ending tweaking. So here’s a primer.

Top 10 resources
1. Social Networking: A Beginner’s Guide To Facebook
2. Social Media Marketing in a nutshell
3. A beginner’s guide to Facebook for non-profits
4. The Updated Unofficial And Smartass Guide To Using Facebook
5. The Top 5 Viral Facebook Techniques
6. Mashup Marketing on Facebook
7. Ways to Market on Facebook
8. 5 Money Making Opportunities on Facebook
9. Inside//Out: Facebook
10. The Facebook Marketing Toolbox: 100 Tools and Tips to Tap the Facebook Customer Base

Related Stories
JamaicanJokes.com the most successful Caribbean Facebook App to date
SPRAWL TEES: MY FACEBOOK SUCCESS STORY:SALES UP 80%
FACEBOOK FRIDAYS-HOW CARIBBEAN PEOPLE AND BUSINESS ARE USING THE SOCIAL NETWOR

If you liked this post, why not Subscribe and get Silicon Caribe Today by Email