Following on from my previous post about tools for building local community websites, I noticed William Perrin had a related piece yesterday on his Ultra Local Voice blog about how Facebook can be a good platform for bringing local people together online.
William makes a good point about ‘following your customer’ and choosing a platform based on what people are already using and familiar with. Given Facebook’s incredible popularity, it’s definitely a tool to consider.
6 Reasons to use Facebook for Local Community Networking
- Facebook has a huge membership (now over 14 million user accounts in the UK alone)
- Lots of members use it very regularly
- Facebook makes it easy for members to spread the word about your site to their friends living nearby
- 78% of users are aged 16-35, so it could be a good choice if you’re particularly interested in reaching that group
- It’s free to use
- It’s very easy to set up your own group
Potential Downsides in using Facebook for Local Community Networking
- Your group may be perceived as ‘for young people only’
- People who are not already using Facebook may have been put off from doing so by privacy concerns
- It might be hard to get people to sign up to Facebook just to join your local community group
- The options for customising the look and functionality of your group are quite limited
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