Continuing my trend of social media fixation, here comes a “Facebook for work” blog post. No really, Facebook is catering to businesses, associations, and colleges and universities for professional networking purposes now. It currently has over 200 million active users – are you listening yet?

Facebook started out as an application that only students with a valid college/university email address (.edu) could join. In order to compete with Myspace, they later opened registration to everyone, and introduced new features to protect member privacy.

It didn’t take long for businesses, associations, schools, celebrities and politicians use Facebook as a social networking tool. Their team vigilantly cracks down on impostor profiles and fraudulent activity. As a business using Facebook, you will want to learn more about creating fan pages.

This year, Facebook redesigned the user experience, with one of the major new features being the creation of “Fan” Pages. Over 4 million users become fans of Facebook Pages every day. You can find fan pages for businesses, clubs, and even occupations (ex:healthcare organizations). They allow businesses to brand themselves on the web, post status updates, buy and post advertisements, and monitor page activity. As an added bonus, Facebook will occasionally alert users about related fan pages that may be of interest to them.

Every Facebook fan page has a “wall” which allows members of the group to talk amongst themselves or comment on recent activity. When something changes on a fan page, its members are notified via Facebook’s newsfeed. For example, I am a Facebook Fan of my Alma Mater, University at Albany. When they announced the hiring of George Philip as Permanent University President, they mentioned it on their Facebook page and provided a link to its respective press release. They use their page to highlight news and events taking place at the school.

Facebook fan pages allow for a short bio, basic information section, and sections for posting photos, videos, and the ability to pull in RSS feeds and blog posts. As an example, check out SUNY Albany’s photo gallery for Fountain Day.

Facebook pages are interactive, allowing organizations and their members to connect through the platform. It’s easier than ever to communicate your message to your audience. For ideas on how to get your page started check out a few of these business Facebook Pages: Red Cross, UNICEF, or The New York Times.