While on the Global Apps Network Live Event today (and if you missed it, WOW – all I can say is don’t miss next month’s event), I was inspired to put together a little video on how to segment your Facebook Friends into lists so that you can better control who sees each of your posts.

By jannoon028 at FreeDigitalPhotos.net

Now, why might you want to do this?  For those of us who conduct business on Facebook here are a few ideas.

When I first joined Facebook years ago, I had two different Facebook accounts.  One was for my “personal” friends, who I felt I would interact with more on a personal level, and one was for my “business” friends who I didn’t necessarily want to know all about my personal life.  This was really almost unmanageable.  For one, Facebook actually frowns on this.  But more importantly, I would have the same people try to send me friend requests on both accounts.  I would need to “explain” to them that I had one business and one personal account, and it got really complicated.  So I gave up on two accounts and instead started creating friends lists.  I have many lists, but they include things like High School Friends, Business Only, No Politics!!!, Family, Close Friends, Acquaintances, Internet Marketers, etc.

Over time, I learned about what were then called “Fan Pages” (now just “Business Pages”), and I moved much of my business conversation to my Facebook Business Page.  Business Pages are great for gathering people together who are interested in you, and that you don’t know at all, but there are definitely times when you would like to have more personal interaction with some of your business contacts that you know by name, and having them be actual “Facebook Friends” makes sense.

But face it.  If you are in ANY kind of business, whether it be a shoe shop, restaurant, consulting, computer maintenance, internet marketing, network marketing, daycare, hair styling, whatever, your friends DO NOT want to hear all day long about your business on your personal Facebook Page.  And your business contacts probably don’t want to hear about the cat puking on the carpet, or your youngest child’s latest grades, or your trip to the Grand Canyon, or your latest gripe about a political candidate (heck, a lot of your PERSONAL friends don’t want to know about that last one, hence my “No Politics!!!” group – heehee.).

Oddly though, it seems that not that many people understand how to segment their Facebook friends, so I’ve put together a little video to show you how.

Segmenting your Facebook friends into lists

I hope you find this useful.  If so, please comment here or on Youtube and let me know!

Thanks

Danita