A few days ago Facebook released its new format for Facebook Pages (formerly called fan pages) – which are intended for businesses as opposed to your personal Facebook profile.
And some of these changes offer new opportunities for using your Facebook Page as part of an effective social media marketing strategy.
That’s the good news. What’s the bad news?
Facebook Pages will be even more complicated for business owners to use.
Let’s start with the rollout date. While you can preview the format change on your Facebook Page now, if you click to upgrade to the new format you can’t change back.
Then there’s the confusion as to the date on which everyone’s Facebook Page will automatically change to the new format. First I read March 10th, then I read March, so people are guessing March 1st.
And then there’s the problem that you won’t be able to use FBML tabs (which allow you to create customized tabs with simple html coding) after March 11th. But if you already have these tabs, they supposedly won’t go away.
Confused? This is just the beginning.
One major change is that the dimension size for customized art on your Facebook Page is going from 200 X 600 pixels to 180 X 540 pixels. I’ve already upgraded our Miller Mosaic Facebook Page at www.facebook.com/powermarketing — and I think the customized art looks okay reduced in size. (Obviously from now on we’ll create the art to the new size.)
Another major change is that you are able to switch personalities while on Facebook. In other words, you can switch from being logged in as yourself to being logged in as your Page. Then you can leave comments on other Pages in the identity of your Page rather than yourself.
(But you won’t be able to leave comments as your Page on your friends’ profiles because Pages can’t have friends although they can now “like” other Pages.)
Yes, there’s going to be a learning curve for all of us. But I do think that, in the end, the advantages for businesses effectively using Facebook Pages will far outweigh the disadvantages.
© 2011 Miller Mosaic, LLC
Phyllis Zimbler Miller (@ZimblerMiller on Twitter) is the co-founder of Miller Mosaic Social Media Marketing. Download the company’s free report “5 Tips for Staying Top of Mind With Your Prospective Target Markets” at www.millermosaicllc.com/los-angeles-social-media-consultant
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