When you’re a home inspector, you are your brand. And like every brand in the 21st century, you’re going to use social media to help market your brand.

A common mistake that smaller businesses make is that they don’t bother to do the common practices that bigger businesses are doing.

This includes creating and maintaining a facebook presence.

As a home inspector, you’re trying to create a connection between you, and your customers. There’s almost no easier way to do that than to regularly update your business facebook.

What’s The Difference Between My Normal Facebook And A Business Facebook?

In this day and age if you’re one of the few people who don’t have a facebook, you’re the odd man out. Even if you don’t have a facebook, you probably at least have some level of understanding what a facebook is.

It’s a social media platform where each person has their own “timeline” which hosts everything they wish to share with their friends. The newer posts being shared to all of your friends “dashboards”.

And on a normal facebook this is how most interactions proceed, everyone posts their pictures and statuses, and their friends will like or comment. And vice versa. The way you get more people to see your content is by adding people, known as friends.

Then you have pages. Pages are like normal facebook accounts, but geared towards supporting the business or person. Instead of adding friends, pages allow other users to “like” the page, which will then allow that pages update on the users dashboard.

A common mistake that some people make is trying to use a normal facebook account as the face of their business.

Besides looking unprofessional, this creates a lot of other problems, in most cases people who are not your “friends” on these types of pages cannot view your posts, interact with you, or do the things that would bring them to your facebook in the first place.

The Benefits Of A Facebook Business Page

Besides the alluded to facts that users can visit your page and automatically see all your posts, and interact with everything you have ever posted on your business page, facebook pages add a large amount of additional features that can help any home inspector.

When visiting a facebook business page you are hit with a lot of information. All extremely vital to a home inspection business.

Below you will find an overview for a facebook page, an explanation of what information should be in each section, and how this section can benefit you as a home inspector.

1. This is the profile picture. This is the image that will appear to the left of every post you make as well as to the left of your page. Choose something recognizable that represents your company such as your company logo.
2. This section features your cover photo, basically the header image of your facebook page. Different businesses use different types of images. In the home inspection field, a lot of common options are the home inspector hard at work, a larger banner of their logo, or a collage of photos.A smarter option may be to create a banner than includes your company’s name, logo, location and contact. Giving a visitor every ounce of information they need right from the get go.
3. This strip below your timeline photo have a lot of key features, options to like and follow your page, share you page, message the page, and you can even include a call to action button.The last two are extremely important to booking inspections, they are an easy space for a customer to get into contact with you. You can even change the call to action to go to your website to book an inspection if you have an online option to do so.
4. This is where the name of your page will be shown. When naming your page you want to be straightforward. Your title should be something like “Miami Home Inspections” assuming your business name is Miami Home Inspections. Short. Simple. And to the point.
5. When you upload photos to your page that will be here, featuring your most recent photos. If you continually post highly interesting and engaging photos you have a better chance of visitors staying on your page.
6. This will provide key information to a visitor. It should be one line about your business. It will also show an overall star rating based off of reviews, and whether or not you’re open. The content here should say something like “Number 1 Home Inspector In Miami”.
7. This is your navigation tool. If someone wants to see the videos you’ve posted without scrolling, here’s how. Same with posts, photos, etc.
8. This section should include a longer blurb about your business. It will also include some of the facebook metrics, how many people like your page, how many people follow your page (people who like the page and also receive your posts on their dashboard) and the number of check ins your business has (the amount of people who have posted that they were at your business, this metric isn’t that important for home inspectors).

   When it comes to the blurb about your business, you want to include as much information in the shortest amount of text. Something like this “Miamiinspections.com | The leading home inspector in the miami area for 12 years. Dedicated to making your house a home”.

9. This is where reviews will be shown, starting with a star meter and then followed by actual written reviews. It goes without saying that this is one of the most important parts of your facebook page. As this is one of the first things people who visit will see.A home inspector with many positive reviews can almost bank on getting more business, compared to one without any reviews. It may not be awful to start suggesting that people review your business while on facebook.
10. This is the location where people will find all the information about your hours of operation and location. While location may not be super important, having at least a city and state can be key pieces of information that someone will be looking for when visiting your page.The hours of operation also help a potential client, know when it’s appropriate to call, or to set up an inspection. This section will also host your website, phone number and another option to message you via facebook.
11. This is the video section, pretty self explanatory. If you have videos, they will pop up here. A good idea is if you have videos on your website or youtube, you should also upload them here. This is another great way to grab someone who may be interested in hiring you.
12. This is your posts section, one of the most important parts of your facebook page. This is where anything you post will be. A user may find themselves scrolling through this, and if you fill it with great content, pictures, status updates, etc that relate to home inspection and show your knowledge, this may be the deciding factor between snagging that client, or losing them.
13. This is the final section, and this is like a suggestions box. These are pages that your page has liked. Know a local carpenter that you would suggest to clients? Like their page and it will show up here, hopefully they will do the same in return.

Facebook while being a medium to connect with friends, has a lot of applications for the business owners of the world, and if used properly can greatly increase their lead generation, clientele base, and web presence.

A strong facebook may be the deciding factor between hiring you, or hiring someone else.