By now you've certainly heard about Facebook. The fast growing social network now has over 500 million registered users and is on pace to pass Google as the world's most visited website. With so many people flocking to Facebook you might be wondering how you can tap this virtual population.

Here are 5 Facebook marketing secrets that are sure to help you leverage your Facebook account and drive traffic to your website.

1. Build a presence.

The first thing you'll need to do in order to start promoting yourself on Facebook is create a fan page. A fan page is a customized page linked to your Facebook account that's all about your business, group, ministry, etc. To create a fan page simply login to your Facebook account then click on this link http://www.facebook.com/pages/create.php

2. Connect With Your Customers

The fastest and easiest way to connect with your customers is to suggest your fan page to your friends. To do this you'll need to go to your fan page while logged into your Facebook account. In the upper left hand corner you'll find a link labeled "suggest to your friends". Click on it and begin suggesting your friends become fans of your page.

Other effective ways of getting people to become fans of your Facebook page include sending emails to your friends and customers and putting a link to your Facebook page on your website.

3. Start a genuine two way conversation with your customers and audience.

Once you've created some connections your Facebook fans will see your posts in their feed. But be careful, all your fans have to do is click the "Hide" button and chances are they'll never see your posts again. For this reason it's important to keep your conversation genuine. Have real conversations with your customers. Ask them for their opinions. One proven strategy to help get a conversation going is to ask a simple yes or no question. Studies have found when people are asked a simple yes or no question they're more likely to elaborate on their answer. Once people start responding to your posts it's critical to keep them engaged by chiming into the conversation.

4. Make your fan page engaging.

The easiest way to make your fan page engaging is to continually offer a reason for your fans to keep coming back. You can do this by holding contest or having give aways. Give your fans something for free and they won't want to miss your posts. In fact, they'll be watching and waiting for the next one.

With these few ideas you'll be well on your way to maximizing the effectiveness of your Facebook presence and driving traffic to your website.  If you haven't already done so don't forget to visit WebStarts.com to make your very own free website.