After reading Mike Sansone’s blog about how he was inspired by my act to leave Facebook, but chose to convert his personal page to a fan page instead of deletion, I was inspired to create this how-to do it post. Facebook has what they call a “help section” on this, but as usual, it’s completely unhelpful. Before I dive into the few steps it takes to do this, see what you think (left):
So, as you can see, it never really answers the question on how to convert my personal account to a Facebook page. I don’t know about you but Help sections on websites that don’t actually answer the question, I find quite frustrating.
Anyway, enough of my rant, here’s how you do it:
1. Log into your personal Facebook account as normal
2. Go to your Account Settings and download your data to preserve your photos, links, posts, etc. This preserves them on your computer in a .ZIP file, but there are only a few things that will transfer over when you migrate your page.
- All your confirmed friends and subscribers will be converted to people who like your new Page.
- Your profile pictures will be migrated to your new Page.
- Your username will become your Page’s Facebook web address.
To download your data, in Account settings, you should see something that looks like this. Download your data by clicking on the link.
3. This is the important step that’s missing, go to the Facebook migration tool. https://www.facebook.com/pages/create.php?migrate. You should see a message like this:
4. Pick your page option and create your page (such as local business or place, artist, cause, etc). NOTE: This is where you can change the name of your page (like get rid of your maiden name or call it your company name.
5. Agree to the Terms and Conditions and then you will get a warning message:
6. When you’re sure – click Confirm and you are good to go. NOTE: This is NOT REVERSIBLE. So be VERY sure.
This is great for businesses or CEO’s who have not made the leap yet to Facebook Fan pages
Benefits:
- You get new fans instantly
- You can utilize the Timeline feature to make a kick-ass impression on your customers/clients
- You didn’t lose touch with anyone
- You only have to manage one Facebook entity
Cons:
- You just mashed your two worlds of business and personal
- You have to be careful how often you post business content so that your new fans won’t get annoyed and hide you or leave
- You will have to monitor your fan page a tad more closely to make sure extremely personal or sensitive information is not posted by your fans that you wouldn’t want posted
Well, what do you think? Was this useful? Will you try it?
Update 5/17/12: If you do this and decide you want to go back to your personal account, you can fill out this Facebook form: https://www.facebook.com/help/contact/?id=296078000410951
Great “How-To” – especially the downloading of your data. I did create a “stealth” page for personal family and friends (thanks to your previous tips) which helps separate biz and non-biz. Thanks for doing this, I’ll pass this to folks asking how.
Thanks Mike! I was definitely inspired by your post. I had thought about converting my page but I created my current fan page for my writing and I’m just not interested in the upkeep for a social media fan page too. Too much work.
Thank you for this information. I am preparing to make the change.
Tracy, very interesting and I never thought to do that. I love knowing this but I’m afraid many of my friends would be a little surpised to find themselves fans of my page vs. friends. This may work well for a small business owner who does a lot of business with friends though. Thanks for writing it up!
Thanks Tom. I think if you really use Facebook for personal stuff a lot, then this would probably not be a good option for you.
Astonishing Big Value “How to” post for me right now!
I am going to rush and try that!
10000 thanks
Question: I am helping a horse rescue group with their new web site and their Facebook page. They have been using a Facebook personal page as their home base for many years, and it will be catastrophic to lose every post, comment and picture during a conversion to a fan page. we are weighing our options because they understand that they need to convert their page. I have read that ALL personal pages will be converted to Timeline format on February 24th (in two days).
My first question is, should they wait a few days to convert from a personal page to a fan page, on the off chance that the new Timeline format will retain their content?
My second question is very important too. If they convert to Timeline in a few days without converting their page to a fan page, will the Timeline format prevent them from converting their personal page to a fan page?
We have been using a profile page for the last 3.5 years on facebook and our “friend” list has grown to 3,300. It’s time to do the conversion before we hit our max friend amount of 5,000 and to also follow the rules properly. Just curious, do I start the process by posting on our wall that in x amount of days we will be converting, or just do it since they all should be transferred over any ways? Also, if I run an ad from the profile page can I convert that as well or do I need to delete that and start all over again from the business page. Any help would be great as the Facebook Help page is lame.
All you need to do us convert it.
Keep in mind that everyone is moving to Timeline in a few weeks. As for the ad, not sure.
Hi Tracy,
I have converted my FB to a page but I seem to have lost some great tools. I now cannot search other businesses or people. You know you that button was at the top for searching, it is gone. Also once I leave the page there is no home button to get me back. I either have to log out or use my back arrow. Is there something I am missing?
Love to hear from you.
Thanks,
Kim
Hi Kim,
Every fan page has a personal profile attached to it as the Administrator. You should have those options under your personal profile. The Admin section can be hidden with the new Timeline. If you hide that and scroll all the way up, you should see the search bar regardless of whether you are in a fan page or a personal profile. You can also use your fan page as your fan page (not your personal profile) to search and like other companies.
Does anyone know what happens to online ad campaigns, if you convert to a Facebook page? Do they remain online in my new account and can I still see my old ads? Does my funding source remain?
Hi Sippe, not sure. Is there a way for you to add your new account as an admin of the ad campaigns? If not, then I wouldn’t think there’s a way to maintain it once you convert.
Thanks for the tip! I added another admins, but I’m still worried about the ongoing campaigns. I have to do some tests…