Bev Barnett has a great post, simple to execute on, that every band and business out there should immediately do. The new Facebook profile provides a link to your most recent employer. If you are a band or business this should be linking to your Facebook page… not to something like self employed, musician, performer or lead singer. Bev shows you what you don’t want to do, and what you should be doing.

… it’s about how YOUR AUDIENCE SEES YOU.

This has been a point of confusion since the new Facebook profile was rolled out late last year. Let’s be honest, a significant percentage of Facebook users are resistant to change. Here’s the thing: even if you delayed switching over yourself, everyone else has been seeing your profile in the new format all along. Why does that matter?

If you’re not paying attention, you’re not in control of how people see you online.

And that probably doesn’t matter so much to my cousin in Texas who logs on once in awhile to see pics of our family.But it matters very much to the millions on Facebook who are engaging fans, developing business relationships, connecting and networking in their fields whether its music, or spirituality, health and wellness, retail business or any other sector.

My husband Greg Newlon has what I think is the perfect explanation of Facebook: you’re sitting on your porch, and people walk by once in awhile. Sometimes they stay to chat, sometimes they just wave, and sometimes they see you even if you didn’t’ see them. Its all about connections, which is at the core of fan and customer engagement.

I just gave a workshop at the emPower Music and Arts Conference in Orlando Florida, to a group of mostly musicians.  There were many ah ha moments among the attendees, but this one resulted in a hug, collective, eye opening ah HAAAA.

Linking your Facebook Profile to your Facebook Music or Business Page

Facebook now automatically creates a business page for every single employer that anyone has ever indicated on their Info page. And it links to them. And it displays this link right up top on your profile page.

If you’ve indicated your employer is something generic, like Self Employed Musician, Facebook will create a Business Page called Self Employed Musician and the link to that page will be active on your profile. So what? This can send people away from you and to a page that is either blank, or if its a more general term like Musician, the page will aggregate posts from your connections regarding that term, as well as external content.

Above, you’ll see the Self Employed Musician page from Facebook. 372 people “Like” this page. And there is no content.

You can’t control how Facebook designs the site. There are myriad Facebook pages and groups where you can complain about the new Facebook profile if you’re into that.

On the other hand, you CAN learn to understand and make the most of it.

If you have a Facebook Page for your music or your business, edit your info section to make sure you are indicating your employer as that Facebook Page. For example, our Musician/Band page is Bev Barnett & Greg Newlon. If I type in Bev Barnett & Greg Newlon as my employer, Facebook links to our page. as you see here:

If you work for a company that has a Facebook Page and you want to link to it, just plug in the name and Facebook will recognize it as a page. If you work for a large company that doesn’t have a Facebook Page, go ahead and enter that name because the Facebook Business Page is probably active – it will aggregate content from around Facebook as well as external sites like Wikipedia.

If you don’t have a Facebook Music Page or Business Page and you don’t want one, I suggest leaving the employer field blank. There’s no sense offering up a link to nowhere when those who’ve stopped by may just want to hang out on your front porch for awhile.

via The new Facebook Profile: its not about YOU « Bev’s Blender Brain Blog.