understanding the rules: the CANs & CANNOTs of facebook
karen guntonupdated: may 13th.
i have posted a lot of this information in previous posts but i thought it might be handy to have it all in one spot. please note: if i have listed something as a CANNOT it means it is against facebook rules/guidelines and if you choose to do it anyways, you risk having both your user profile and your page(s) deleted by facebook.
in other words, i didn’t make these rules. i am just putting them in a handy list for you. i have linked to the actual rules down below, so you can read them for yourself. ok, here we go...
- user profiles:
you CAN have a user profile (also called a personal profile) that is really you, with your real name, for your personal stuff. you signed up for that when you started facebook.
you CANNOT have more than one user profile.
you CANNOT have a fake user profile – not a name that is not you, not your biz name, not a fake profile for running your biz page.
you CANNOT have a user profile that is your biz name or some combination of your name and your biz.
you CANNOT use your user profile for making money, advertising, promoting your biz. make a page for that.
- pages:
you CAN create as many pages as you like – for businesses, NPO’s, charities, tv shows you love. whatever.
you CAN choose the type of page you want to have - and now you CAN change the type of page you have set!
you CAN do business stuff on your page – sell, advertise, market, promote, discount, publicize... have at er. that's what pages are for!
you CAN give likers of your page special deals, prices, sales, etc.
you CAN customize your page.
you CAN add other admins to your page – add people you know and trust to help your run your page.
you CANNOT have fake user profiles be admins of your page.
you CAN create a username for your page – this allows you to have a nice, neat URL like facebook.com/buildalittlebiz instead of a bunch of numbers, letters & symbols.
you CANNOT infringe on another business’s copyrights with your biz name, username, logo image, or any other content on your page.
you CANNOT have a name for your page that has excessive capitalization, no captialization, or excessive use of symbols - as per the page guidelines
- promotions:
***note*** on may 11th 2011 facebook changed it's guidelines for promotions. this post has been updated to reflect the *new rules*.
note the following definitions:
administration = the operation of any element of the promotion, such as collecting entries, conducting a drawing, judging entries, or notifying winners.
communication = promoting, advertising or referencing a promotion in any way on Facebook, e.g., in ads, on a Page, or in a Wall post.
contest or competition= a promotion that includes a prize of monetary value and a winner determined on the basis of skill (i.e., through judging based on specific criteria).
sweepstakes = a promotion that includes a prize of monetary value and a winner selected on the basis of chance.
what do the rules mean?
you CAN communicate about or administer a promotion on your fb page.
you MUST administer your promotion with apps on facebook.com
- 'apps on facebook' seems to be a framework for developers to create applications. i imagine that you can still use 'paid for' promotion applications i such as wildfire or easypromos, as well as other 3rd party applications. as i learn more about 'apps on facebook' i will update this post...
you MUST be aware of the lawfulness of your promotion (check the rules in your geographic location)
you CAN require that people like your page, check into your place, or connect to your app before entering your promotion
you CANNOT automatically enter someone into your promotion just because the like your page
- this means you CANNOT have a promotion such as giving a way a prize to a random liker when you reach a certain goal. your likers must choose to and properly enter the promotion.
you CANNOT ask people to take any other action on facebook to enter a promotion
- this means you CANNOT as people to like a status update, tag photos, upload photos, update their status, leave a comment, or write on your page wall to enter a promotion.
you CANNOT ask people to take an action on facebook to vote as part of a promotion
- this means you CANNOT ask people to 'like' a status or image, or type vote or some other comment
you CANNOT use facebook to notify the winner of your promotion.
- this means you CANNOT notify the winner with a post on your page, a post on their page or profile or the use of the facebook messaging system
you CANNOT associate facebook with your promotion or use the facebook name, trademark, copyright etc and you MUST include the following:
- complete release of Facebook by each entrant or participant.
- acknowledgment that the promotion is in no way sponsored, endorsed or administered by, or associated with, Facebook.
- disclosure that the participant is providing information to [disclose recipient(s) of information] and not to Facebook.
so the bottom line is this: you can have a promotion. you can get people to like your page but cannot get them to do anything else on facebook. use an application or run your promo off of facebook. and make sure you include those 3 things listed above.
some other notes:
you CAN use a 3rd party application (for instance contact tab, newsletter tab, flickr etc.) to collect info or content from your entries
you CAN administer your promotion on your own site and communicate about it on facebook
you CAN ask likers to click on a link on your facebook page that will take them to your promotion on your website, email, newsletter, blog or twitter.
you CAN use fb to communicate the winner's name after they have been notified
you CAN use your page to SELL your stuff however you want. these rules are for promotions with a PRIZE AND A WINNER. if you want to get people to tag, vote, like, comment, post photos, share, refer etc. as a method of selling your thing, go for it.
- spam:
you CAN conduct your biz however you choose on your facebook page. but be careful – admins of pages can 'hide' your post which marks it as spam, or worse they can ban your page or report you to fb.
DON’T post too frequently – on fb 2-3 times a day is enough. anything more is spam-ish. (quality over quantity folks!!)
DON’T post unsolicited messages – unless i told you my page was for promoting your stuff (and there are pages for that) don’t use my page to sell your stuff. it’s rude. and spam-ish.
DON’T be impersonal – if you post the same message over and over while tagging multiple pages it looks like you have a robot running your biz. that’s feels spam-ish. try to be real. try to be genuine.
DON’T be indiscriminate – such as randomly tagging pages as you mention your stuff. totally spam-ish. try instead to match your post with the purpose of the page you are tagging or posting on. find people on fb who actually want to hear about your stuff.
- safety:
your fb profile CAN be hacked. and your hard work can disappear, not to mention the issue of your personal information being stolen.
DO have a strong password and change it often
DON’T add accept every friend request, indiscriminately. find out how they know you first. add people that you have connected with on pages and walls.
DON’T open every link that is sent to you. a lot of links, videos, messages, quizzes are malware. if something looks fishy don’t open it. if you open something and it looks fishy, stop clicking thru!
DON’T trust every email sent to you. facebook for instance is not going to send you an email or direct message asking you to enter a new password or other personal details.
there you have it! be aware of the rules. be smart about running your page. and be safe.
do you need further clarification on something here? please leave a comment, i will do my best to help you out! =)
further reading and links to resources:
- facebook user guidelines
- facebook promotion guidelines
- facebook page guidelines
- facebook advertising guidelines
- facebook copyright infringement
- facebook spam filter
- making the most of your facebook biz page
- running promotions/contests/giveaways
- what it means to be spam-ish
- how not to be spam-ish on facebook
- prevent your facebook profile from getting hacked
Reader Comments (95)
Brilliant summary Karen. As someone soon to venture into the world of business pages I am very grateful to have this to refer to. Thanks!
Thanks so much for this info! Very helpful!!
Just to clarify - if you did want to have a giveaway on your page, you would just have to randomly draw a winner from all of your 'likers' (without asking them to do anything) ? Also, I have seen a 'treasure hunt' done, where the page 'owner' puts $1 on an item (in their photos) and the first one to find it (comment underneath) wins - would this sort of competition be against FB rules?
kirralee - thanks for taking the time to post comments, on both of my blogs! i really do appreciate it. (comments are like gold to bloggers!)
lucy - the best think to do is hold the giveaway on an external site (email, blog, website, newsletter, etc.) and just publicise it on facebook. as long as you don't ask likers to take any action on facebook it would be fine. if you only have facebook as a place to do this sort of thing then yes, the only thing you can do is ask people to like your page. that is it. they could like your page and enter the giveaway by clicking on the contact tab, or yes you could do a random giveaway that is fine.
my instinct is that the treasure hunt would be against fb rules. it is a competition, there is a free prize involved, and they are asking people to take an action on facebook. (comment on the photo). i *think* if you did this as a way of doing a sale it would be ok. ie labeling a photo with $5 or %50 off or whatever and the first 3 people to find it can PURCHASE the item for that price.
or whate about a treasure hunt that gets people to comment on your blog, check out your made-it page, visit your twitter profile. those are all external to facebook. you could use facebook to publicize it but have people comment else where or send and email with their answers.
hope those ideas help!
Thanks for making this nice and simple to understand from FB's Million Word Rules hehe makes life that much simpler when some wonderful people post things like this in simple to read and understand form for everyone.
Thank you so much Karen - you make things so clear, unlike FB on their own guideline pages :) ~ Christine
Just wondering how you notify a winner of a prize then - if you can't use FB until AFTER you'd notified the winner? Would you have to run the comp through email, contact us etc?
So using random.org is not allowed?
Thanks for the reply! The treasure hunt was actually to purchase the item once you found it...just a fun way of doing a sale I guess - I just thought it was a great idea!
I don't have a blog - so I guess if I wanted to run a competition, I would have people email me?
Thanks again!
@ lucy - yes email would be super easy. you can even use the contact tab on fb. and that way you have the winners email address to notify them. i have seen this done as a way of submitting a quote to win a contest, and a photo to win a contest so i think it would work. the treasure hunt 'sale' on facebook would be fine. just not a treasure hunt 'contest'. =)
@ jess - you can't use fb to run a contest or notify a winner. you can use it to publicize the contest and publicize the winner's name after they have been notified. fb wants you to run the contest off of fb - so yes you could do it via email or if you have your own site or blog ppl could comment there and you can announce the winner there, or even on twitter. and yes, you can absolutely use random.org to choose a winner. no problems with that!
Very informative. Thanks for the information. Very helpful.
Thanks so much for this - we had no idea as we had seen heaps of companies running comps this way! Have just moved ours off facebook :)
Thank you!!! At this stage I think I'll use 'Contact Us' and email for any comps - will save the blogs for when I have more than 10 minutes a day free lol
Hi! I thought that you werent allowed to ask fans to join your page and do a giveaway when you reach X amount?
You cannot: Administer a promotion that users automatically enter by becoming a fan of your Page.
Thanks this is really informative!
FANTASTIC summary! I am going to share (with credit to you of course). The are rumblings that Facebook may be changing the requirement to have permission from them to hold a promotion on your page...which would be a HUGE and wonderful change!
Brilliant Post! That makes it heaps clearer.
@ tash - i am certainly not an expert at facebook. i jam just sharing what i have managed to figure out. all of the research i have done on this (ie asking people who know way more about facebook than me) points to being allowed to do that.
* you are allowed to ask people to like your page. you are allowed to ask people to refer people to like your page. you are allowed to post all over the place that your goal is to reach xxx likers.
* if you choose to give a gift to one of your likers to say thank you once you reach xxx likers or at any time go for it.
just don't ask people to take any action on facebook and don't use facebook to contact the winner of any prize.
@ heather - this is interesting. i would like to see that happen too! but remember - even if you DO have permission from facebook to run a contest these rules still stand. you still cannot ask anyone to take any action on facebook except like your page and ckick on a link or a third party tab. it would be nice if fb relaxed these rules too.
there are pages/little biz's out there that will set up a 3rd party app tab specifically for contests/promotions that fall within fb guidelines. if you are determined to run a comp using fb somehow then this might be the way to go. =)
these guys do this and they have been a good source of info for these fb rules: http://www.facebook.com/customfanpagehelp?v=app_11007063052
Here is a link with some more info about changes to come (maybe): http://www.allfacebook.com/facebook-promotions-no-longer-need-explicit-approval-from-facebook-2010-11
Fantastic advice and very helpful. Many thanks and will keep following the links etc to keep up to date.
Hells Bells
I was wondering - Are we allowed to ask people to take action on facebook if there is no prize
can we ask people to tag photos, upload photos, update their status, leave a comment, or write on your page wall just for the fun of it ?
Thanks for putting it in layman's terms ~ FB is SO confusing with their million or so guidelines!
Thanks for a great article - it's all a lot clearer now!
I have a facebook page for things I sew and sell. I have a question I am giving away a $30 voucher to some one randomly who makes a purchase for the next 20 day's. I have advised everyone of this and so all of my customers know what their number is for the raffle I have put it on my discussion tab. As I do not have wesite I have done it this way. And I am notifying the winner via email first them posting it on my page. Is this within the guidelines?
@ lee - those 'rules' are for promotions (contests, sweepstakes, competitions) only. you can do all of those things for fun. or, i believe, as a way of selling your stuff. just not if you are giving away a prize. here are the terms for pages: http://www.facebook.com/terms_pages.php
@ charlotte - sounds to me like you are publicizing (telling people about) a promotion you are holding off of facebook. once people make a purchase if you use those details (name, email etc.) to choose a random winner that has nothing to do with any action on facebook. i think you would be fine with this. (that is my take on it anyhow!)
Karen,
This is a great post very clear and concise. Most of this I did know. My problem with the set up and I hope you can give some insight...How do you you keep your personal and business life seperate.
I like to keep my personal profile private for me my friends and family, However because my personal profile is the one that appears anytime I post on another business I am constantly getting friend requests from people I don't know. It's the most frustrating part of this whole set up.. Also that my friends have to put up with my business chatter too I feel guilty for posting and liking and commenting in the business arena because all my friends get spammed with it. Any suggestions?
hi vicki
that is a great question and one i have had before. in fact you have given me an idea for a future post!
i have addressed this a little bit in this post: http://www.buildalittlebiz.com/blog/2010/10/6/making-the-most-of-your-little-biz-facebook-page.html
i hear what you are saying. when i first got into facebook and just had the page for my photography biz i was really concerned about keeping everything separate. i refused friend requests from clients (i didn't think they needed to see my posts talking about my tv obsessions, my love of beer and wine or my constant swearing!) and i worried about privacy and internet trolls. i had this idea that i would only friend people that i had invited over to my house.
as time went on i made a few 'online' friends through a common interest and i discovered that it was really cool to connect with folks this way. (i subsequently met some of those friends in real life and i will tell you they are true lifelong friends!) the more i read about social media, branding and building a little biz the more i realized that it wasn't necessary to keep everything separate. i now accept every friend request i get, i am more brave about connecting with strangers, and i don't care if people don't like it when i swear or mention beer. it is part of who i am so i figure if people don't like it they probably aren't my right people anyways.
anyhow - that is my story, perhaps it will help you find your way. i think if you are genuinely connecting with people on facebook (commenting, adding friends, liking pages) no one will see that as spam. i think you should do what you are comfortable with though - if you don't want to add people who you don't know, don't. you can still chat with them on fb without being friends. but try to grow comfortable letting your biz life and personal life online merge a little - be you, be genuine, be memorable. clients will love to know who you are and what you stand for and why you love what you do. =)
So can you hold games on your page the contact people afterwards with prize they win?
Hey thanks for that Karen. You've given me some food for thought. Will go read your other post now. :)
Thank you, thank you, thank you for compiling all of this information into 1 space!
you are very welcome ladies.
bec - as of right now you cannot actually hold any sort of contest/competition/sweepstakes/promotion on your page. you can play games for fun, you can absolutely sell your stuff and use games to generate buzz, but you cannot hold any sort of contest with a prize involved on fb. (you can hold it off of facebook and just use fb to tell people about it though! and yes you would not be able to use fb to contact the winner.)
there are rumours going around that fb is changing the rules for promotions, and that pages will be allowed to hold promotions without getting permission. when and if these changes take place (and are officially described by facebook on their guidelines page) i will come back her and update this post and repost it all over the place so we all know about the changes. =)
can you tell me can you do promotions on your business for all sales to go to nfp?
i am a little confused in regards to advertising and the other things you said you could do on a business page but can't do for competitions, promotions. when does it become a competition/promotion and not the other way?
this post has been updated to include the *new rules* for promotions. i will do my best to answer your questions =)
I'm only just starting out with my business and have seen and joined in as a buyer in many auctions. Does this fall into the area of having a winner?
Sorry if I sound really thick but facebook rules frazzle my brains sometimes as promotions and give aways generate alot of publicity.
Thanks in advance of your reply xx
hi alison - i think an auction winner (who then is making a purchase) would be different than a contest/competition winner who receives a prize. i have not seen anything specific to auctions in fb rules, but i don't think they fall under the category of promotions. =)
would i be able to make a "auction album" and have the fans comments bids underneath to sale all my stock inventory at discounted prices and putting them in gift packs??? Was wondering if I just posted it 1 if it would become spam because of the fans commenting their bids
what is the big deal if someone gives something away there is no proffit for anything free!!!! It was a contese we had to do something to win the prize>>>.facebook changed so much since itfirst started..
I have a page set up for items that i make. I dont have giveaways, raffles or anything like that. However i do have auctions monthly and have my items in different labeled albums. I dont promote to buy just if a person sees something that they like or want the let me know. Am I in violation of anything? Im so confused and dont want to be shut down since i have people that have ordered things that i need to contact them about
Oh i forgot to mention that my business it registered in the state of texas
Hi Karen
I am sooooooo glad i came across your page here. I have just found out about these new rules of FB and i am very confused, like everyone else.
I love to help people with their fundraising, by donating some of my craft items to their good cause, and i have been donating to some 'Charity Auctions' held on FB. One of the charity auctions is still to finish, and then i will need the auction winner's name and address to post my item to.
But now if we are not allowed to 'Private Message' the winner to ask for their name and address, how do i get this info needed?
Do i 'PM' the person who set up the 'Charity Auction', give them my 'Yahoo' email address and say that the winner must email me on my 'Yahoo' email address? Or is there another way?
I have committed to donating my item to this 'Charity Auction' now. I don't really want to cancel out of the 'Auction' but i don't want to get into any FB trouble when trying to get details for posting my won item!
Can you help me at all, please.
Thanks, Louise
thanks for your questions! i will do my best to answer =)
for those of you asking about charity auctions - i think an auction winner (who then is making a purchase) would be different than a contest/competition winner who receives a prize. i have not seen anything specific to auctions in fb rules, but i don't think they fall under the category of promotions. so if you are doing an auction where an item is purchased by the 'winning bid' this is not affected by promotions rules, as it is essentially a purchase.
louise - you should be able to contact the auction bidder on fb - they have purchased the item even if the $ goes to charity. i have not seen anything about auctions being a problem for pages. and if i ever do i will update this post for sure!
liz - same thing. you can use fb to sell your thing. totally allowed. if you do auctions, games etc. as a way to sell you item, that's fine. the rules for promotions are just applicable when a contest/competition/giveaway is happening with a winner and a prize involved. selling your item by whatever means on fb is not a promotion.
shys - this is the same for you. if people are making a purchase it is not a promotion in the sense of the definition fb is using: contest/competition/sweepstakes etc. no winner, no prize, no promotion. you are selling your item and that's totally allowed. the only concern, as you have mentioned, is if your likers find it spam-ish. lots of comments or updates. maybe something to just do once in a while? but it depends on the culture of your page and the types of likers you have. i know of pages that do this stuff all the time and their fans seem to love it. my fans don't seem to love it, so i don't do that sort of thing.
anna - the rules for promotions mostly exist because there are geographic rules for running contests/competitions/giveaways. your state/country etc may have rules, plus america has all sorts of regulations (and fb is an american company). so they are essentially just trying to protect their assess. also - fb didn't originate as a place for businesses to run their business. it was meant to be social. this biz page stuff has come after the fact so fb is adapting their rules now but still in a way that benefits them. if you want to give away stuff for free to your clients maybe don't rely on fb to do so. do it via newsletter, email or on your own website.
let me know if you have further questions. i am certainly no expert, but if i can help you make sense of this i will try! =)
Thank you so much for explaining this in normal talk rather than Lawyer talk. I finally have a better understanding now. Don't like it...but..... I know the rules. Hope this comment helps you out. :)Thanks again!
Thank you very much Karen, its very reassuring to get someone to actually answer some questions, (which FB doesn't seem to do, i am still waiting on some answer replies) and help me understand all the maddness!!!! You have really put my mind at rest about donating to Charity Auctions, thank you.
One more question you might be able to help me with. About three days ago one of my pages 'Enjoy Painting - Art Classes' (http://www.facebook.com/pages/Ballymena/Enjoy-Painting-Art-Classes/124719710876674?v=wall) just disappeared, when you click on it a blank screen comes up.
I have no idea what has happened to it. If it has been deleted by FB, i have no idea why as i can't think what i did wrong or broke any rules! I have tried emailing FB but have got no response yet. I haven't done any giveaways since the rule change on Dec 1st. I have hardly even posted anything on it since Dec 1st.
Very stumped!!
Any ideas would be greatly appreciated!
Thanks, Louise
yolanda - glad i could help you make sense of it all! i love comments, so thanks!
louise - a number of people have had pages disappear of late. i do not know the reason why, though i have been trying to find answers for people. some have said that it is due to hackers, others have said it is a glitch and pages have come back eventually. if you have followed fb guidelines/terms etc then i doubt fb took it down. i know how frustrating it is and if i find any concrete answer or help i will definitely share it on the facebook page.
Thank you so much Karen, at least i know it is not just me!! I will give it some time and see it my page re-appears, i hope it does!
Thanks again, you are doing a fantastic job here. Your comments are excellent, thanks!!!
What about comment games? Where I post an item for x amount and the 3rd comment gets it for that price?? And could I do it on my wall?
I want to start a like page but I don't want everyone to like it if that makes any sense. The reason for this is there are so many people that are in the same field as myself and tend to cause drama. Not only does it look bad for you when someone leaves a comment that is derogatory or if they post a link to their page.....it makes customers not want to buy from you due to the bashing of someone that does this out of pure meaness. I wish we could have a business page where we could filter who we want on there. I don't sell to the whole world, just to my close friends and locals. Could you start a group page for this? I do not want to sell my stuff on FB but I would not mind showing what I have available and then having them tell me so I can invoice them privately from my pp. Can anyone let me know what to do about this and how to handle it?
Thankyou for the information, it certainly changes things! :)
audrey - i *think* that if you are selling your item you could do games to do so. that doesn't involve a winner or a prize - people are making a purchase, so it wouldn't fall under the rules of promotions. (that is my interpretation anyhow - i am definitely not an expert! i just share what i have managed to figure out =) )
jolinda - your best bet probably is a group. with groups you can set the privacy level - so in your case make it a private group that people can join by invitation only. invite your loyal fans and clients. they look much like pages - a wall that you can comment on, a discussion board, photos etc. they are just not customizable the way pages are. but for your purpose it might be the right thing for your biz =)
Hi Karen
Just wanted to let you know, and anyone else who might have been experiencing the same problem, that my 'Enjoy Painting' Page that dissappeared for a week and a half has now come back again, by itself.
I have no idea what happened, but at least it has re-appeared, thank goodness!!
So, if someone else has the same problem, their page lose could just be temporary and suddenly re-appear.
Thanks so much for your advice Karen, and keep up the good work!
Best regards, Louise xx
thanks louise, that is really bizarre, but good to know. i hope others have the same reappearance of their page =)
Great blog Karen really helpful. What i want to know is can you run something like a caption competition or a guess who type photo/status on facebook if there isn't an actual prize? Basically i work for a fairly well known TV show and have a lot of fans that we like to interact with on facebook through different means. One is a caption competition where the prize is simply their name and caption on the photo in question, there is no physical prize and I can't seem to find an answer as to whether this is against the rules or not. Thanks