What is the Difference Between a Facebook Fan Page and a Facebook Group?: RIA Journal

Facebook is one of the most popular social networking sites online and offers varied options for promoting yourself, your site, your business or your client.

Two of the best ways to go about marketing yourself through Facebook besides your main profile are Facebook Groups and Facebook Fan Pages. While both are similar in concept, there are some key differences to keep in mind when you’re setting them up.

I would advise you to create both a group and a fan page, because while they perform similar functions e.g. as outlets and communities for your like-minded fans/visitors/clients/friends to meet and share about whatever topic you’ve chosen for your page or group, they offer several different options.

Here’s a breakdown of what they offer side by side:

FB Fan Page Specific	FB Group Specific	Both
————————–	————————–	Invite members
————————–	————————–	Video/photo addition and exchanges
Bigger Logo	Smaller Logo	Logo addition
————————–	————————–	Discussion board
————————–	————————–	Message all members
Traffic/Visitor Stats (“Insights”)	————————–	————————–
Event posting (via notes, imports from blog, etc.)	Event Creation and Invitation (via built-in app)	————————–
————————–	————————–	Comment Wall
————————–	————————–	Add posts
Import posts from blogs as notes/ add notes	————————–	————————–
Mini Feed	————————–	————————–
Publicly Visible (because its public, the search engines can index it. They can’t index groups)	Private (must be a Facebook member to view, thus can’t be indexed by the search engines)	————————–
————————–	————————–	Main Facebook membership profile required before joining
Bulk updates to fans	Can send out bulk invites	————————–
	Members can send invites to others	————————–
You can add Facebook Applications	————————–	————————–
Better for long-lasting relationships with clients and creating an interactive community with them	Better for things like updates, quick discussions and etc.	————————–