I'm working on switching my Facebook activity over to a fan page, where there's no cap on the number of friends. Thanks to the tour, I would have busted through the 5K limit on a regular page. Please connect with me on the new page!

So when I was at FB for another meeting yesterday, I got their advice on the most successful fan pages -- they mentioned Michael Phelps as a model for success. Here was their advice - and it's equally applicable to regular FB pages too. Think of your friend circle as an audience to be entertained. That'll keep you from getting the FB version of a cane pulling you offstage - them filtering you out of their newsfeed.

1. Build the conversation first; sell second or third.
In other words, be yourself and build your personal brand and collateral by being generous with content and openness before asking for anything. "Be yourself" and interact with you audience for a good while to build your rep before asking for or advertising anything.

2. Make sure the page strongly conveys your individual voice.
This is pretty self-explanatory, but make sure the page screams YOU. Spend time there being yourself.

3. Post compelling content.
Metrics show that fans like photo and video best. (And btw, tbe best and easier metric for how you're doing with content is in the number of comments you get.) The images should be complimented by interesting, uniquely-you status updates.

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