Setting up and maintenance issues aside, the most important element of your facebook fan page is getting people to like it.

If you already have a visible brand, then chances are you already have a following. If you do not, then purchasing facebook ads is a viable option in addition to leveraging your existing web presence with direct links to your facebook fan page.

Once they are at your fan page, what’s in it for them? What do they get out of being a fan? Will your detractors also come out of the woodwork? These are more great questions that should be addressed.

A great way to promote your product is to have some sort of photo competition whereby they take pictures of themselves holding your product and submit it to your fan page. These pictures will end up in their regular profiles, shared with friends and on other websites.

I’ve seen this for everything ranging from ice creams to health supplements and a cool twist is to have them take the picture at some famous landmark around the world.

Your facebook fan page is an opportunity for your loyal customers to band together and sing the praises of your product, so for this reason, quality is better than quantity. By focusing on building up fans who are already sold on your product and eager to join the conversation, you will optimize your facebook fan page returns.

Most people are familiar with fan pages and the concept of “liking” them. If I visit your fan page and “like” your page, all my friends will see that Matt Likes [your page title].

What you may not know is that these same like buttons can be added to your blog or static website with the Facebook social plugin.

Setting them up for a blog so they appear automatically requires the creation of an application, but in this article, I’ll describe the manual way using the web based Facebook developers tool.

Its very simple. Go to: http://developers.facebook.com/docs/reference/plugins/like, enter in the exact url you want people to like, i.e a domain name or the full url for a post/page.

Next, choose either like or recommend for your button and click “get code.” Copy the iframe box and simple paste it into the html for your page.

That’s all there is to it and now every time a person visits your site, if they choose to do so, they can “like” your website or article and share it with their friends.

Facebook fan pages are used by some of the largest and most successful companies in the world. Why? Because they allow their customers to interact with each other and to take their messages viral.

Here are 5 tips to make your fan page great.

#1 Have your page already finished and with a good amount of content before you suggest the page to your friends. Nothing will turn a person off quicker than an unfinished fan page. Have everything ready, so that when they see the invite, they will be interested to check it out and like the page. Don’t make the mistake of posting 70 links in a single day (which will appear all at once on the walls of the people who like your page).

#2 Have a great name. You’ve probably already seen some of them such as “i want to find 1 million people who love family guy!!” The first step to getting fans is to make your page sound interesting.

#3 Encourage people to interact by allowing them to post links, photos and images. As the admin, you can still remove things if required, but the key is to allow them the freedom to add things.

#4 Find the right balance between too many and too few updates. This will depend on your niche, but at the very least, you should be posting a new update every day.

#5 Select a relevant username, which contains your main keyword. This will make it easy for people to remember your page and for you to find places to link to it.

So there you have it, 5 tips for a great Facebook fan page. While the web helps connect people with a common enthusiasm, fan pages allow those people to connect and share with others.