How would you best optimize your use of Facebook for advertising purposes?

[James S]

I currently am working for Southern Oregon University, a small 4-year college in Ashland, Oregon. We are looking to use Facebook to advertise our college to perspective transfer students. Our target audience are community college students living in Northern California.

[Sandwichheat]

You need to create a fan page first and foremost. Allowing people to become fans put your key stakeholders directly in touch with your organization. Also, as more people become fans of your page, their friends will receive recommendations of pages that they've recently joined. You should be able to pick up a wider audience there. That also gives you the opportunity to announce new features and programs at your school to mutliple stakeholders at the same time. And, if you want to twitter, for instance, you can announce it there and transfer your fans to your Twitter as well.
I do this same work for a futures/foreign exchange trading firm out in Chicago. They were afraid of Facebook and Twitter because they're older folks that don't necessarily understand these programs, but trust me, you'll get out of it what you put into it.