Thomas the Tank Engine on Facebook

For the last 12 months, I have been working on building up a Facebook page to discover the benefits and pitfalls of said task. I created a page which is easy to maintain, easy to monitor and very enjoyable to manage.

I chose ‘Thomas the Tank Engine’ as my theme and have had literally thousands of fans join. I think that nostalgic toys and the memories they invoke can bring many people together to join ‘forums’ and discuss new topics. I also have an interest in Thomas the Tank Engine due to my 4 year old son being completely obsessed with the little blue engine and all his friends. The latter has made me realise, this is not a brand that’s deminishing in any way.

As success as it appears, my Facebook Thomas the Tank Engine page has had it’s moment of uncertainty. In August last year, Facebook decided to ban me from promoting the character because I wasn’t the owner. I had to get HIT Entertainment, the current owner of the brand to contact Facebook to realise the lock they had imposed upon me. Since then, it’s been very good progress.

The page allows fans to post pics of their Thomas toys and tracks and video of themselves riding Thomas at various theme parks all over the world. The newsfeed is mostly comprised of googled news about the Thomas the Tank Engine brand and Thomas the Tank Engine TV Series which encourages fan to comment. Other news articles featured consist of worldworld events where Thomas the Tank Engine might appear for children to visit.

In March I created some polls using (Poll Daddy) to ask the fans various questions about their appreciation of Thomas the Tank Engine. The results will be published next month, and reveals some very interesting points.

As I publish this (3rd March 2010) I’m looking at 19,778 fans and it’s increasing every day.

To join my Thomas the Tank Engine page on Facebook, click the link and become a fan.