I’ve been covering the new Facebook Page Design or template for quite some time here because the layout impacts your cover photo. In fact, I’ve been helping clients all month in getting their creative assets in order. If you haven’t heard, the new design is going to move your company name and category from the bottom of the cover photo and make it a text overlay (along with a few more changes – watch the video for details).
In March I covered the 4 Facebook Page Design Features You Should Watch when Facebook rolls out their new design and now the time has finally arrived…
Early adopters who signed up for Facebook’s Waitlist started receiving messages this week that their Page would be upgraded to the new design on Friday, June 6, 2014. As predicted, the ability to “Highlight” posts no longer appears to be an option for Page Managers with the new single column design. However, Page Managers can still “Pin” posts to the top of their Timeline to capture the attention of visitors that come to their Page.
Facebook just recently gave the News Feed a makeover and now the company plans on making changes to the design of Facebook Pages.
The goal of the new Facebook Page design is to “make it easier for Page Admins to find the info and tools they use most.”
Changes include:
Looking at the screenshots Facebook provided in their announcement, there were four things that really stood out to me as a Page Admin. Let me explain…
Today if you were to highlight a post on your Facebook Page, the post would expand and take the full width of your timeline making the content more prominent.
This tactic has been great in highlighting photo albums and drawing attention to specific posts, images and videos. This new one-column design looks like the Highlighted Post feature will be stripped away. It makes me wonder about the Milestones feature as well.
The “People Talking About This” or PTAT for short is a number is pulled from a variety of interactions that can occur on Facebook over the past seven days. It’s helped Page Admins gauge how their content in the last week has sparked conversations on the platform.
Some social media enthusiasts like to calculate the Engagement Rate of a Page by taking the PTAT and dividing it by the Page’s Total Number of Fans and benchmark that percentage against competitors.
After taking a closer look at the new Page design, this metric is removed (speculating) from the new left column. That means Page Admins will have to identify a new metric to benchmark against competitors. That’s where #3 comes in…
(Update 3/19/14: PTAT can be found under the Likes link)
“Pages to Watch” was released last August and allowed Page Admins to monitor five other Pages to see how many likes they were getting in a week. When the new design is complete, Page Admins can view additional metrics such as New Likes, Total Posts and Engagement This Week.
Custom tabs today have prime real estate under a Page’s cover photo. They’re great for drawing a visitor’s attention and persuading them to take action like entering a contest or signing up for a newsletter.
Inside Facebook confirmed that custom apps/tabs are going to move under the “More” tab. With custom apps being “hidden”, this may negatively impact tab views and engagement.
So if you have a custom app that encourages your fans to sign up for your newsletter, I suggest you benchmark how many tab views you are getting now before the new page design is rolled out.
(Update 4/3/14: App thumbnail apps will also appear on the left hand column.)
While no one except Facebook knows for sure how these changes will impact Page Admins, there’s one thing I know for sure…the social media landscape is always changing and it will keep you on your toes. So to make sure you’re up to date on what’s new, subscribe to my newsletter below. And if you have questions about Facebook, feel free to leave a comment below.
Image Source: Facebook
I had lunch with a girlfriend recently and she told me about a conversation she had with her boss about Facebook. Her boss wanted shorter posts and thought it would drive more engagement. My friend on the other hand, was worried that cutting the word count by more than half would have a negative impact on engagement. She asked me what I would do if I were in her position and that conversation was the inspiration for today’s blog post!
My answer was twofold…
First, Facebook posts should be interesting and compelling enough to inspire your fans to like, comment or share. If you haven’t read Jonah Berger’s book, Contagious: Why Things Catch On, buy it now.
Second, take a look at your Facebook Page Insights to analyze how short posts perform versus longer posts.
WARNING: This post is going to go into detail on how to do this in Excel. Hope you’re ready! Let’s get started…
1. Go to your Facebook Page Insights and click on “Export Data.”
2. When the Export Insights Data modal window appears, select at least a month’s worth of data.
3. Choose “Post Level Data,” select “Excel” as your file format and download your data.
4. Open the Excel file and move the tab “Lifetime Post Stories by Action Type” into a new workbook.
5. Delete columns A, F, G, H and K. You should be left with the following columns: Permalink, Post Message, Type, Comment, Like and Share.
6. Next, insert a new column between the “Type” and “Comment”—name that column as “Character Count.” Now it’s time to count how many characters there are in each of your Facebook posts. Don’t worry, we’ll use the formula “=len(C2)”. C2 represents the cell you want to be counted.
7. Copy the formula above and paste it in the remaining rows to get a full count. Delete the “Type” column to clear up some space or leave it in there if you want to see what type of content is driving engagement.
8. Next is the fun part (at least in my opinion – I’m a data nerd). Select all of your data and create a filter. Sort the “Character Count” column in ascending order.
9. We’re now going to break up the data into three categories: Under 100, 101 to 150, 151 and up. You can choose different categories if you want. Create a new column between “Post Message” and “Character Count” and name it “Category.” Go through each post and identify which category each post falls under.
10. The next step is calculating the average Comments, Like and Shares of each category. Insert a line after each category and use the formula “=average(select range).”
10. You can now create a table illustrating an average of engagement you get on each length of post. Note: To make sure your averages are accurate, make sure you are comparing the same amount of posts (i.e. 15 posts under 100 character, 15 posts that are 101 – 150 characters and so on).
11. Once your table is all set, create a Clustered Column Chart and guess what—you’re all done now!
Note: If you don’t want to make the chart, you can just sort the data by Comments, Likes and Shares in descending order. You can eyeball how posts are doing in terms of engagement.
I know this exercise is really long and can be hard for those that aren’t Excel friendly but I’m here if you need help. Post your questions or leave feedback in the comment section below.
Facebook announced earlier this week that topics you like on Facebook are going to play an even bigger role in your News Feed.
Now when a Facebook Page tags another Page in a post, users that are fans of both pages will see the post in their News Feed. This initiative is very similar to what happens when a friend tags you in a photo (once you’re tagged, overlapping friends get to see that photo and can engage by liking, commenting or sharing the post).
For example, if many people who like Dwight Howard also like the Bleacher Report, it suggests that these two Pages are connected. If we see that people who like both the Bleacher Report and Dwight Howard are liking the post above, that’s an indication that it may be relevant for people who only like Dwight Howard.
This means some Page posts that tag other Pages may be seen by new people. – Andrew Song, Product Manager
Overall, the benefit of this rollout is that it allows Pages to extend the reach of their content, drive engagement and possibly attract new fans.
However, I must admit that I’m a little concerned on how this feature might be abused. What if a competitor tags my client’s page to announce a better discount? Fans of both pages would see that post. I’m curious to see how Facebook will deter spammers from abusing the tagging feature.
Have you started to see these types of posts in your News Feed?
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.
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:
Optimize Photos and Videos
Users will be able to search for photos and videos related to brands:
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.”
Strengthen Your Page Connections
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
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
I have 32 subscriptions to blogs and 1000+ items in my Google Reader that’s waiting to be read. While I filter through these unread items and take steps to simplify and organize my RSS feeds, here are a couple of standout posts, websites, and tools that I found worthy to be highlighted this week.
Posts
Websites
Tools
Ping.fm is the most effective way to update your status on multiple social networks. A single post to Ping.fm can update 16 popular social services at the same time so you don’t have to sign into each account individually. You can post a status update, a blog, or micro-blog through one platform and posting a link won’t be a problem at all – Ping.fm will automatically convert it to a shorter link before posting to your services.
This week my status updates to Facebook, LinkedIn, Mashable, Myspace, Plaxo Pulse, Plurk, and Twitter and took less than a minute to complete. If I signed into each account individually, it would have taken me even longer.
Ping.fm saves me time and it can save you time as well.Go to Ping.fm and sign up with the beta code “pingofpings”.
After you sign up, check out a quick-and-easy tutorial that Trevor at BordelineTheory.com put together. Or you can check out Bwana.tv’s video tutorial below.
(Photo Credit: Ping.fm)
(Video Credit: Bwana.tv)
