Facebook launches Community Boost, a program to teach you about digital skills

Starting next year, a team from Facebook will tour 30 cities across the U.S. that will teach digital job skills to the unemployed and help small businesses expand their digital footprint.

The company announced on Friday that it had launched a program called Community Boost that “will provide US businesses and workers with the digital education and skills they need to compete in the new mobile economy.”

Program Components

Community Boost has two components: digital training and business tools.

The company “will train job seekers, entrepreneurs and community leaders on sharpening their digital and social media skills to help them reach their goals.”

Also, Facebook “will help businesses expand their digital footprints and find new customers around the corner and around the globe.”

It is a fact that businesses—big and small—use Facebook to promote and sell their products and services.

Investments

Citing Morning Consult’s research, Facebook said: “small businesses using Facebook’s services translates into new jobs and opportunities for communities across the country.”

In Michigan, in particular, Facebook has formed a partnership with local organizations in training 3,000 residents in coding and social media marketing skills.

Facebook said Morning Consult’s study showed that “62 percent of US small businesses using Facebook said having digital or social media skills is an important factor in their hiring decisions—even more important than where a candidate went to school.”

Small businesses consider social media skills as more valuable than having a diploma when choosing their employees. (Source)

With regard to helping businesses, Facebook said they have “trained more than 60,000 small businesses in the US and hundreds of thousands more around the world.”

“More than 1 million small businesses have already taken advantage of Facebook’s free online learning hub to learn how to use our marketing tools.”

Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg said: “One of the things I’m most proud of is that 70 million small businesses use Facebook to connect with customers.”

“That’s 70 million people who now have access to the same tools the big guys have. Now we need to make it easier for people to start and build new businesses or find jobs and opportunities, and in the process strengthen their communities.”

Meanwhile, the Community Boost tour will include stops in Houston, St. Louis, Albuquerque, Des Moines, and Greenville, South Carolina, according to a TechCrunch report.

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