Ben Shepherd of Talking Digital has recently reported that ‘Facebook has hit five million users in Australia. According to Nielsen Netview they hit 5.07 million users during the month of January.

These figures show Facebook is continuing to enjoy phenomenal growth in Australia – with over 300,000 new users in January alone. Users are returning over 12 times a month, spending over 3 hours a week on the site. Such engagement is astounding and would be seen as extremely positive to Facebook despite their mixed success in monetising the property.

To put this in perspective, according to Netview the average Internet user spends 15 hours online per month. Facebook users spend 3 hours. So the average Facebook user is spending 20% of their total Internet time on the site. It also means Facebook as a site has more users than the entire Yahoo!7 network, entire Fairfax Digital network, entire News Digital Media network, eBay, entire Bigpond/Sensis network, YouTube, Wikipedia and Fox Interactive Media.’ http://talkingdigital.wordpress.com/2009/02/17/facebook-tops-5m-users/

With that many people on Facebook – how do we make sure that as small business owners – that we project a professional image while using that media at all times?

The Benefits

Well first let’s look at the benefits. Just by checking up on my friend’s status I can see at a quick glance at what people, who are in my world, are doing at any given time. This is powerful. I get to know what they like, what they don’t like, where they shop, what they buy, where they go, who they talk to and so much more. This is a lot of great information for a business owner.

The Information Discretion

But discrete is the word. It’s so important that we use wisdom as to what we share in such an open medium. I’ve come across people who have declared their relationship breakdowns in this format and a whole lot of personal stuff that we just didn’t need to know.

Use the forum to share positive comments. And if you have to address something of a private nature then head for the inbox and communicate directly with whomever you need to connect with in private. The whole world just doesn’t need to know everything.

The Visual Discretion

Choose photos too that are discrete. The wrong photo will send the wrong message to people seeing it for the first time. I have actually had to delete a few of my friends – not for what they necessarily wrote, but for some of the photos that they have posted. I just don’t need that in my face or on my Facebook. A picture paints a thousand words. So make sure that you are painting the right words.

‘So use this powerful form of communication.’ Sarah encourages. ‘Build relationships. Build trust. And in time you will find that you will be doing business with a whole new group of individuals who have had time to get to know you on a more intimate basis.’