Summary: Facebook provides several ways that you can invite people to attend an event you created on Facebook. This is the second of four articles about creating Facebook business events.

Before You Start: You created a Facebook business event and you are ready to invite people to attend.

Learning Level: 3 | Building Skills

Article Last Updated: Thursday, 9 July 2010

Facebook Business Events

The features of a Facebook event are different for individuals (with a Facebook profile) and businesses (with a Facebook page). Before going any further, make sure that you understand what kind of Facebook account you are using right now.

This is one of the most confusing things about Facebook.

If you are using a business account, you can’t invite your friends to your business event because as a business, you don’t have friends! However, if you are an event administrator and you have a personal profile, you have the option to invite your friends to your business event. In fact, anyone that you make an event administrator can invite their personal friends to your business event.

Facebook doesn’t allow you to invite your business page fans (the people who like your business page) to your event. While this does limit businesses who schedule business events, it fits with the Facebook emphasis on individual privacy. When someone becomes a fan of your business, Facebook keeps their personal information private from your business.

You do have many options for inviting people to your event using your Facebook event. You just have to think about your strategy for invitations and be prepared to reach out in unexpected ways. Don’t rely just on Facebook to send out your invitations. You need to use every communication method available to your business to invite people to attend your event. You can use your Facebook event to provide the event details and manage the RSVPs.

Invite People To Your Facebook Business Event

There are several ways you can notify people of your event on Facebook. You are not limited to people who are on Facebook.

The Event On Your Business Page

Unless you created an private event, Facebook automatically added your business event to your business page as a wall post. Anyone who sees your event can RSVP to your event.

• Everyone who is a fan of your business page sees your event in their news feed just like they see your wall posts. (There is no guarantee that Facebook displays your wall posts to every fan. It uses a fancy process to decide who sees your wall posts. That’s a topic for another article!)
• Anyone who has a Facebook account who lands on your business page sees your event on your wall.
• Depending on your Event application settings, you may have an Events tab or an Events box in the left column. To review your settings, click Edit Page, locate Events under Applications, and click Application Settings.

Update Your Page Fans

You can send an update to the fans of your business page. However, updates are not like messages and your fans may not know where to look for them. You can’t count on your fans reading your updates.

To send an update to the people who like your page:

1. Display your event page.
2. Click Update Fans of [your business page name].
3. You can send the update to all of your fans, or use the Target check box to focus your update to specific fans based on demographics.
4. Type the update message subject.
5. Type the update message text.
6. Click Send.

Your fans find your update in the Updates tab of their Messages inbox.

Invite People By Email Address

Use the Invite People to Come event option to provide the email addresses of your guest list. You can invite people who are not on Facebook to your event.

• Individual email invitations. You can type individual people to attend the event by typing their email address.
• Email import. You allow Facebook to import your email address book from a online email account (like Gmail, Hotmail, MSN, or Yahoo) or from Microsoft Outlook.
• Import an email invitation list. You export your contacts from your email program or another contact management program in comma-separated file format (.csv). This format should be an option for almost every email program and contact manager. Facebook provides instructions for most programs. You can use your LinkedIn connections contact information backup file for the invitations.

With the email import option, Facebook pulls in every contact and gives you the option to check which people you want to invite to your event. It doesn’t automatically invite every person.

Invite Your Personal Friends

If you have a Facebook profile and you are an event administrator, you can use the Invite People to Come event option to invite your personal Facebook friends to your business event. It is a best practice to not mix your business and personal contacts on Facebook. However, you may have a friend or two whom you would like to attend your event.

Ask Your Customers To Invite Their Friends

Anyone who visits your event page and has a Facebook personal profile can use the Invite People to Come event option to attend your event. This feature allows them to review a list of friends and select the appropriate friends to invite. The newly invited guests receive a personal invitation from the person who sent it, not an invitation from your business. (This only works with public events.)

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• Create a Facebook Event
• Backing Up Your LinkedIn Connections
• Should My Business Be On Facebook?
• Manage Your Facebook Event
• Keeping The “Social” In Social Media (members only)