Q: Can I create a Facebook account for my business and keep my personal account separate? I don't want to mix the two.
A: Unfortunately, an individual can have only one account on Facebook. According to the Terms of Use, if you already have a personal account, you cannot create an additional business account. The Facebook Help Center states:
Maintaining multiple accounts, regardless of the purpose, is a violation of Facebook’s Terms of Use. If you already have a personal account, then we cannot allow you to create business accounts for any reason. You can manage all the Pages and Socials Ads that you create on your personal account.
So the good news is that if you already have a personal account, you can still fully participate in the Facebook Ad program, but it will always be associated with your personal account. You could also convert your personal Facebook account to a business account, but in the process, you would lose many of the Facebook features you have grown to love. A business accounts is a subset of a personal account and is limited to managing Facebook pages and ads.
You can also create additional "fan pages" (which are now called "business pages") for your local business, brand, band, or whatever -- that are connected to your existing personal account. Even though they're associated with your personal account, you can keep them separate, so your personal information doesn't get intermingled with the business information.
But here's a twist. You know how they say, "There's an exception to every rule?" Consider this: Because a corporation is legally considered to be an "artificial person" with many of the same rights as an individual, can't a corporation set up its own Facebook account, even though its officers and employees continue to have their own separate, personal Facebook accounts? I don't know what the answer to this is... I'm just posing a hypothetical question.
Does it seem reasonable that just because Starbucks, Adidas, Macy's, and Microsoft are on Facebook, that someone in their company had to sacrifice their own personal Facebook account to do so?
In fact, Callan Green of Bailey Gardiner reports in Mashable that many companies, including Coca Cola, are successfully using Facebook personal accounts -- rather than business accounts -- to promote their brands.
Which opens the door to many more questions... such as, what happens when that person leaves the company?
Have a question? Send it to Claire.
Q: I've noticed that some pages on my site jump to the left, and others jump to the right. Do you know what may be causing this?
A: Take a closer look and you'll notice that the jump is caused by the appearance of a vertical scrollbar on the second page.
To avoid this problem, make sure that all your pages have just enough content to trigger a vertical scrollbar. Although you don't want to put content unnecessarily "below the fold," sometimes an extra line break or two will do the trick.
Have a question? Send it to Claire.