What is a Facebook professional profile, and do I need one?

As natural health and wellness practitioners we have the amazing benefit of social media for our marketing.  Never before has a generation of entrepreneurs had such fantastic – and free – tools at their disposal to marketing their natural health practice.

I’m someone who’s been on Facebook since the very beginning, I got a profile when it was just starting up and had a Facebook page in the first wave of business pages.  I’m also someone who got hacked and overnight lost a group and a business page that took over a decade to build (yep, I just logged in one morning to be told my account was gone and due to overstepping the community guidelines, there was no review or recourse process).  I don’t want this to happen to you, so heed a couple of warnings here…

1.  Always have someone else in your account as admin of pages and groups, even if that’s your spouse, partner, adult child.  I had a VA who was always part of my page and group, who’d just finished up the week prior so when my account was hacked, there was no one accept me as admin – so learn from my mistake here.

2. Your email list is KING. I don’t care what others in the industry might say, I stand by this. You own your list, you have it safely tucked away in your email marketing platform – no one can hack that and take it away from you. So do all you can to build your list, and move your followers and likers onto that list.

That important info out of the way, the question I get asked most about social media, in particular Facebook, is how do I use it? What do I need to have? What is the right way to use them for a natural health practice?

In the recent delivery of Marketing Mastery this question was asked a lot – what is a professional profile and do I need one? What about groups, do I need one of those and how would I use it? Do I still need a business page?

With so many options on Facebook, how do I know the right ones to market my natural health practice?

So in today’s post we’ll cover the options, talk about what each is for, and help you work out what might be best for your natural health business.  What I’m not covering here is engagement and the algorhithm, as that is so unique to each persons profile, but I will cover some tips for these in an upcoming post.

You currently have 4 options available when you’re using Facebook for marketing your practice. These are:

1. Personal Profile

2. Business Page

3. Group

4. Professional Profile

 First up, let’s discuss the one you already have an know well, your personal profile.

Facebook Personal Profiles

This is the one you already have, that you use to connect with friends and family.  In order to have any business presence on Facebook you must have a personal profile, so all health & wellness entrepreneurs will have this type of profile. 

Think of it like a cafe where you’re catching up with people you know, having a chat over coffee and sharing what’s been happening.

Pros of a personal profile – you already have it (and you must have one to have a business page), and it’s a great place to connect with friends and family.  

Cons of a personal profile – you aren’t allowed to share business related content here.  Those that have can end up paying the price of ending up in Facebook jail, or worse yet, losing their account completely. So it’s not worth testing the boundaries here! 

Facebook Business Pages

A business page has traditionally been the space on Facebook where you can share what your business does, connect with potential and current clients, and share your business life with the goal of building your audience and converting them to clients.   

Where your personal page is a bit like hanging out in a cafe catching up with friends & family, your business page is literally your shopfront on Facebook, where people can come to learn about what you offer.

Content shared here can include static posts (for example the images you might make in Canva), tiles (where you type some text into the post and put a background pattern/colour behind it), and video content like lives, reels and stories (many practitioners also share their static posts and tiles to stories, which is great repurposing).

Pros of a business page – it’s a dedicated space where you can build a following or audience of your ideal clients.

Cons of a business page – it’s another thing to plan, execute and manage and that takes time. Plus, are your ideal clients even on Facebook?   

An example of a business page on Facebook, this is my replacement page after losing my account in the recent hack.  As I’m using a professional profile predominantly these days, I’m not focused on growing this page right now, but I’m not willing to delete it just yet either 😉 

Facebook Groups

Groups aren’t new to Facebook and have been around for quite some time.  There are groups on Facebook for practically everything now – from how to start your first business, to how to garden! Pretty much anything you’re interested in, there is a group for it.

As a business owner a group can be a great way to connect with potential clients on a deeper level. Remember how I said that your personal profile was kinda like hanging out in a cafe, catching up with friends & family? And your business page was your shopfront or reception counter, where interested people could learn more about what you do? Well your group is like offering a free session or workshop, where people can come and get to know you.  

The connection you can create in a group is far beyond what you can develop on a business page, but it does take a lot of time and effort – consistently.  However if you can put the work in, it can be very beneficial – I’ve seen people grow a group from nothing to fully engaged in six months, and have six figure program launch.  

Pros of a group – you can get to know people on a deeper level, they can ask questions and you can really give value and help.  I like to use groups as a way for clients who can’t work with me (yet!) to be able to access some support.  

Cons of a group – it is another thing to add to your marketing to-do list and it does take time and effort. To grow it well, and fast, you need to be in there daily and have some great value content to share. 

Pros of a group – you can get to know people on a deeper level, they can ask questions and you can really give value and help.  I like to use groups as a way for clients who can’t work with me (yet!) to be able to access some support.  

An example of a group, this one I set up after the hack to replace my “Create & Elevate Community” (so if any of you are still in that old group, please come over to this one, the link is on the image).  In bro-marketing terms (the slimey, salesy type) they call creating an engaged group “shooting fish in a barrel”, as you’ve got a group of people all keen on what you offer.  I personally hate that term, but I do agree that the group members are all your ideal clients, so a great place to share your offers & services.  As a practitioner, you could have a group for your niche or program, such as “Metabolism after 40” if you support menopause and weight loss, or my own “Chronically Well” that I ran alongside my clinic, for people with chronic health issues.

Facebook Professional Profiles

This last one is the NKOTB (new kid on the block, for those of you not from the 90’s 😉) – Facebook Professional Profiles.  I see this as Facebook’s answer to two issues – the professional networking on platforms like LinkedIn that you previously couldn’t do on Facebook; as well as a way to legitimise the business posts on personal profiles – ’cause let’s face it, it was happening regardless.

I’ve had a Professional Profile since the beginning of the year and so far it’s been a positive experience.  It’s a simple change in your settings to “professional mode” that you can switch off again if you don’t like it.  So far engagement has been great, and it’s cut back my work load as I’m not bothering posting on my business page.  So a big win!

For anyone who is standing up as a professional, an expert or an influencer in their niche, I think Professional Profiles make complete sense.  Yes, you Nan might get annoyed with the “business content” you are posting (I have a snarky message from a relative with a similar tone!) but heck, it’s YOUR business, YOUR profile and you should post whatever you want.  

Pros of a professional profile – it will replace your business page and give you less marketing work to do, a huge win!  It also makes connecting with people really easy, particularly if you’re an expert in your field. If you are focused however on 1:1 clients and filling your books, it might not be the best solution, you may be best to use a business page.

Cons of a professional profile – apart from upsetting Nan, there hasn’t really been any as yet! The one feature I do miss from the business page is the ability to pin 6 posts to a “Featured” section, but with engagement so low on business pages these days, was anyone reading these anyway?

This is an example of a Professional Profile, it basically looks the same as your personal one – accept you won’t land in Fb jail for sharing business content! Just remember to use the “privacy” options when posting, so things you only want family and friends to see, stays private!  To change your profile to professional, click the three dots top right and select it from the drop down menu.

So I hope that’s cleared up some of the confusion regarding Facebook options and how you can use them.  If you have questions or would like to know what is best for your practice, jump into my Soul Aligned Marketing group and feel free to ask anything!   (I would also like to point out that this post is not paid for or endorsed by Facebook in any way, I am sharing my opinion as it relates to natural health practitioners).

Thank you for reading and if you’d like to chat with me about getting help with your marketing, social media and strategy or creating a profitable practice, you can reach out to me and book a free Connection Call here.

Till next time,

Cass x