• Giga, Wednesday, July 27, 2011 11:40 AM

Facebook just debuted a step-by-step online guide to help small businesses familiarize themselves with the social-networking site. The "online education center," so-called, gives directions on such things as how to set up a profile page, create targeted ads and deals, and interact with customer feedback online.

"The timing is interesting, as it comes just a week after Google began shutting off all company profiles on its Google+ social network," GigaOm notes. "The search engine giant says it's just company policy to restrict Google+ access to individual users, a stance that has inspired a good deal of controversy in recent days."

Facebook's new business guide isn't heavy on new features, GigaOm adds. Rather, "it simply puts a lot of information that may be handy for small businesses in one place." Also, it serves as "a nicely timed reminder that unlike Google+, Facebook encourages companies to use its service for company branding," GigaOm adds.

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