Facebook Graph Search Optimization for Brands
Stephanie Liu

Facebook Graph Search Optimization for Brands

  • By Stephanie Liu
  • January 31, 2013
  • Facebook

fbgraphsearchpilates

Facebook Graph Search, is a new way to search on Facebook that allows users to search not just by name but by people, photo, places, and interests.

Users can perform specific search queries that connect the dots between people in their network and information shared publicly on the social graph such as likes, interests, and activities.

For example, if I want to go to pilates this weekend and invite a few friends, I can search for “My friends that live in San Diego that like pilates.” Any of my friends that indicated in their profile that they lived in San Diego and like pilates will appear in the results.

I can even plan ahead on where we could go for lunch after pilates by refining my search to, “Restaurants near The Pilates Room, San Diego” and garner results for restaurants that my friends have checked-in to or are fans of.

Facebook Graph Search Optimization

Now that we understand how Graph Search can be used when it hits mainstream, it’s important that companies set aside time for Facebook Graph Search Optimization and update their Facebook Brand Pages now for maximum visibility. Below are a few tips on how you can get your Facebook Page ready for Graph Search.

Update Facebook Page Info
Make sure details about your brand are up to date:

  • Select the appropriate group and category for your business
  • Specify up to three related sub-categories (these will appear in the page header and search results)
  • Confirm that your address is correct
  • Establish a vanity URL and list your website address
  • Allow users to tag photos posted by your company (under Manage Permissions)
  • Check that your business appears in Facebook’s Nearby tool on your smartphone

graphsearchoptimization

Optimize Photos and Videos
Users will be able to search for photos and videos related to brands:

  • Add descriptions and locations to photos, albums, and videos
  • Tag photos with your Page name

Publish Content Directly on Facebook
After announcing Graph Search, Facebook advised businesses to share content directly on their Pages because, “Only photos and videos shared on your Page can appear as results for photo and video-related searches.”

  • Avoid publishing content on third-party plaftforms and post directly to Facebook when possible
  • Leverage Facebook’s post scheduler
  • Strengthen Your Page Connections Ensure that fans are interacting with your content as check-ins and likes will appear in results:
  • Employ a check-in strategy if your brand has a physical location
  • Launch a Facebook campaign to drive Page Likes

fbgraphsearchopt2

Strengthen Your Page Connections

  • Ensure that fans are interacting with your content as check-ins and likes will appear in results:
  • Employ a check-in strategy if your brand has a physical location
    Launch a Facebook campaign to drive Page Likes

Have any other tips on how to optimize Facebook Brand Pages for Graph Search? Feel free to leave a suggestion in the comments below.
– See more at: http://www.theideabrand.com/2013/01/31/facebook-graph-search-optimization-for-businesses#sthash.ZgjJXcrb.dpuf

Have any other tips on how to optimize Facebook Brand Pages for Graph Search? Feel free to leave a suggestion in the comments below.

Originally posted at the Great Matters blog for i.d.e.a.: http://www.theideabrand.com/2013/01/31/facebook-graph-search-optimization-for-businesses

San Diego Restaurant Week: 7 Tips for Restaurant Owners
Stephanie Liu

San Diego Restaurant Week: 7 Tips for Restaurant Owners

San Diego Restaurant Week kicks off January 13th – 18th with over 180 participating restaurants in 12 unique regions across San Diego. It’s the perfect opportunity for  guests to discover new restaurants around town and indulge in the art of dining with discounted prix fixe menus for lunch and/or dinner.

Now if you’re a restaurant owner that’s participating in  the event, you are going to have a lot of competition that week and you will have to be on top of your marketing to break through the noise and get the attention of foodies all over San Diego. Fortunately, I have a few tips on how you could do just that. Please note that these tips are based on outside observations, I am not affiliated with San Diego Restaurant Week at all.

Let’s start with how you can optimize your listing on the San Diego Restaurant Week (SDRW) website.

Tip #1: Feature your restaurant logo.
SDRW is a great way to attract new guests to your restaurant. Prove to them that you’re an established restaurant by putting your best foot forward and including a logo in your listing. This shows that the restaurant is buttoned up.

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First Day of the New Year Hike
Stephanie Liu

First Day of the New Year Hike

I’ve always been superstitious when it comes to celebrating the new year. Growing up, my mom established the tradition that our family had to wear stripes or polkadots on New Year’s Eve because it would attract good luck and wealth. She also stressed the importance of being around family and loved ones because that would symbolize how close we would be the following year.

So with that type of background, it shouldn’t be a surprise that I came up with my own superstitions—er, traditions.

It’s my belief that the first activity you do in the new year will set the tone for the rest of the year and that being outdoors will breathe new life into a relationship.  So for the last three years, Ting and I have always gone on a hike on New Year’s Day. And this year, Ting and I headed to Cowles Mountain to embark on our annual tradition of  a day hike.

Cowles Mountain New Year’s Day Hike on January 1, 2012. Elevation: 1,594 feet

I was actually really quite surprised at how crowded it was on the trail. We saw other couples, bands of friends, and even parents with small children going up and down the trail. Occasionally, we had to stop because of the traffic but it was fine because it gave us a moment to pause and enjoy the scenery around us.

To avoid getting distracted, I brought my old iPod and rediscovered a couple of tracks I haven’t heard for a long time. The one that really stood out to me was “Adieu,” from the Cowboy Bebop soundtrack. With a mellow piano melody and a soft and somewhat sultry voiced singer,  it felt appropriate since everyone was saying goodbye to 2012.

“Adieu,” from the Cowboy Bebop soundtrack.

Listen to it yourself and let me know what you think.

Overall, it was a good hike and we made it to the top in less than an hour and most importantly, we did it together.

Happy New Year everyone! May 2013 be filled with love, laughter, and blessings from the heavens above.

Stephanie Liu

Checklist for Facebook’s Updated Cover Photo and News Feed Ad Policy

Facebook is  making changes to its policy on Cover Photos and News Feed ads in regards to text overlays. Effective January 15th, text will be limited to no more than 20% of an image’s area. Logos with text will count toward this limit.

According to Facebook’s updated guidelines under Section III.D, “Ads and sponsored stories for News Feed that originate from Pages may not include images with more than 20% text.”

Since the launch of Timeline, Facebook has always deterred the use of calls to action and price/purchase information in photos to prevent brands from sharing images that looked like traditional banner ads. However, the policy was vague and not always followed or enforced.

This time, to ensure advertisers are compliant with the new policy, the company is developing a grid-based text overlay detection tool to identify non-compliant images. A version of this tool will be available within Power Editor to help advertisers know in advance whether images will be approved.

Since this new image policy impacts community managers, creative directors, and individuals that specialize in Facebook advertising, now is the best time to get everyone on board and discuss how to prepare.

Below is a short checklist to get started. Remember to allow yourself enough time to audit, edit, and update images.

Facebook Checklist

  • Audit all Timeline cover photos and alert the Creative team if any images need to be updated.
  • Check images in current and upcoming Facebook ad campaigns to ensure ads get through the approval process.
  • Review editorial calendars to ensure images in posts that may be supported later with a Promoted Post abide with the new ad policy and replace images as needed.

If you have any other suggestions on how to prepare for Facebook’s updated ad policy, please leave a comment below.

Stephanie Liu

Instagram Disables Twitter Cards And How It Impacts You

As of Sunday, Instagram photos no longer display on Twitter as cards but as links to a photo’s Instagram URL. Viewing Instagram photos now involve an extra click and images that were previously shared on Twitter via Instagram no longer appear on a user’s profile.

In response to Instagram’s actions, Twitter has released an updated app that allows users to edit and refine photos with a filter. Images shared via the Twitter app will now appear as cards in tweet streams and Instagram photos will continue to appear as links.

If you were a hardcore Instagram user that also shared images on Twitter, you’ll also notice that those images no longer appear on your Twitter profile.

Overall, the impact of these updates mean:

  • The best way to share photos on Twitter is to use Twitter’s app
  • Content publishers now need extra time to jump from one app to the other to share a single photo
  • If a publisher continues to share Instagram photos on Twitter, he/she should include a clear description of the photo to entice followers to click

[Image Source: Flickr, WebRankings Pictures]

 

Make Your Instagram Photos Private in 3 Steps
Stephanie Liu

Make Your Instagram Photos Private in 3 Steps

Now that Instagram has released web profiles, that means photos you shared on your public Instagram profile  can now be accessed online. Anyone who knows your Instagram handle can go directly to your web profile at instagram.com/[username] to view your filtered snapshots. If you already had your Instagram profile set to private, only your approved followers will be able to view your photos after they’ve logged into instagram.com.

 

If you were like me, I originally had my profile set to public because I knew that they could only be accessed via a mobile device . Now with the rollout of web profiles, I felt a little bit uneasy seeing my photos on a desktop and decided to make the switch. If you’re interested in making your Instagram photos private, here are 3 easy steps to ensure your photos are shared with the people only you give permission to. Note: These instructions are for the Apple iOS. For Android instructions, please visit Instagram’s Help Center.

Step 1: Log into Instagram and go to your ‘Profile’ by tapping the far right address card icon.

Make Your Instagram Photos Private Step 1

Step 2:  Tap the ‘Setting’ icon in the upper right hand corner.

Make Your Instagram Photos Private Step 2

Step 3: Scroll down to ‘Photos are Private’ and toggle the switch to ON to turn privacy.

Make Your Instagram Photos Private Step 3

Congratulations, your profile is now private!

P.S. For those that were curious, the Step 1 image features a nice dim sum spread from Emerald restaurant here in San Diego, CA.

Stephanie Liu

Be a Part of Ad 2 San Diego Cause Marketing Night 2012

  • By Stephanie Liu
  • August 30, 2012
  • Events

Every year, Ad 2 San Diego selects a local non-profit organization that is making an impact to our community and offers pro-bono integrated  marketing campaigns. We’ve done everything from radio ads, television commercials to a full website redesign to meet our client’s goals and objectives.

Last year, to fund our marketing initiatives, we hosted our first Charity Art Auction at our annual Cause Marketing Night event. We invited agencies and companies all over San Diego to showcase their creativity by donating a piece of art for charity.  At the end of the night, over 20 one-of-a-kind canvasses were auctioned off which helped raise over $3,000 for our public service campaign (see below).

This year, Ad 2 San Diego’s Public Service Committee is excited to be working with Wounded Warrior Homes as their non-profit partner for the year. This organization provides transitional housing to soldiers affected with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder and Traumatic Brain Injuries as they make the transition from active duty military to independent living.

If you’d like to participate in this year’s Cause Marketing Night and donate a canvas for the charity art auction, please contact Ad 2 San Diego at info@ad2sd.com.

To view all of the canvasses that were donated last year, visit our Cause Marketing Night 2011 album on Facebook.

Stephanie Liu

Social Media Club San Diego presents The Social Hour

You’re invited to “The Social Hour”! Social Media Club San Diego is launching The Social Hour every third Wednesday of the month at Co-Merge at 6pm. It’s the perfect opportunity to stay on top of trends and changes in the social media landscape in under 60 minutes.

This month Social Media Club San Diego will be hosting, “The Social Hour – The Twitter Rules,” an informal discussion to talk about Twitter’s new policies.

Haven’t heard about Twitter’s new policy changes? No surprise, not that many folks are aware of the changes and how these policies may affect their content in order to adhere to Twitter’s guidelines. Below are details of the event.

The Twitter Rules

When: July 18, 2012 6pm
Location: Co-Merge
Moderator: Kari Embree

Twitter Trademark and Content Display Policy: Are You Already in Violation?

Twitter recently—and somewhat quietly—updated their brand usage guidelines to be much stricter in order to protect their trademark and content, and these guidelines could affect your business.

For instance, did you know that you:

  • Should always use one of the approved Twitter logos and/or buttons?
  • Should capitalize the ‘T’ in Twitter and Tweet?
  • Should not use Twitter in the name of your website, application, or product?
  • Should not use the Twitter bird on your book/publication cover or title?

Before you dismiss these and the rest of the updated brand usage guidelines too quickly, note this warning from Twitter’s page at https://twitter.com/logo: “This policy is designed to help you use our brand and assets, including our logo, content and trademarks without having to worry about negotiating a separate agreement with us or talking to our lawyers.”

To RSVP for the event, head on to http://thesocialhour.eventbrite.com. See you there!

 

Stephanie Liu

How to Assess Social Platforms


Image Source: Flickr.com/Kexino

How do you assess social platforms for your organizations? Every now and then, I get an email about the shiny new object in social media and questions on whether or not we or a client should engage in it. Below are eight questions I typically ask. Feel free to add your questions in the comments below.

How to Assess Social Technologies

  1. Which group(s) in Groundwell’s Social Technographics ladder does the platform cater to (i.e. Creators, Critics, Collectors, Joiners, and/or Spectators)?
  2. Why are people participating on this platform? What are the emotional motivations for participating on this platform?
  3. How does your target audience(s) currently engage in social media?
  4. Does your target audience’s participation in social media reflect the engagement activity on the social media platform you are assessing?
  5. Are members of the new social media platform providing valuable insight about your business?
  6. Can you
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    measure the social media platform’s impact on your business goals?

  7. Do you have resources in place to engage and support users on the social media platform?
  8. And lastly, shout out to Downtown Rob for this last question: “Is this shiny new object that you’re recently heard about going to be around in the next 6 months?”