Boom360's Blog

Facebook and Timeline for Brands

March 6th, 2012 • Posted by Stefani Odom-Wertz • Permalink

You may have noticed that Facebook announced that Timeline is now available for Pages. In fact, all Pages will be converted to Timeline by the end of this month. We're recommending that you hold off converting your business page to Timeline until we've had a little more time to develop a comprehensive social media plan around this exciting new design.

If you've already converted your Page, don't worry! It didn't break anything. Today we're going to spend a little time in this post discussing what Timeline is and how it works. The next post in this series will discuss more of what you should do with your Timeline.

Cover Photo

The first thing to see on a page is a big beautiful cover photo. The cover photo has to be at least 399 pixels wide. If you pick a photo that is too small, it'll get stretched and look funny. If you pick one that is larger than the minimum size, you'll be able to drag it around to select the part of the photo you want to appear.

Please be aware that cover photos are not supposed to contain:

  • Price or purchase information, such as "40% off" or "Download it at our website"
  • Contact information, such as web address, email, mailing address or other information intended for your Page's About section
  • References to user interface elements, such as Like or Share, or any other Facebook site features
  • Calls to action, such as "Get it now" or "Tell your friends"

Profile picture

You still get a profile picture for your Page. This picture will appear with all your Page's posts.

About

The About section will include the address, phone number and hours (if you want).


 

 

 

Custom App views

To the right of the About section, is a section of up to 12 views of custom apps. The first four appear "above the fold" while the remaining views are accessed by clicking the More button.

The most important apps should be above the fold, including the Boomtime Sweepstakes app (naturally).

Photos

The Photos view is the only one that you can't move. It will always be in the first position.

Likes

If you click through on the Likes view, you can see a graph of the Like activity and other Insights information.

Other App views

For the remaining views, you click the More button to edit the views and then use the pencil to make changes to the view.

For example, you can select to swap the location with another view. For some apps you can change the name and the image that appears with it. This is done through the Admin panel and is discussed below. (There is also an Edit Settings link on the pencil drop-down, but it doesn't appear to work in all browsers.)

Once you have your apps ordered and customized the way you want, take a look at the actual timeline.

On the right

On the right side of the timeline, you will see your friends who also like the Page. Under that will be a comment from a friend about this page, if there are any. So this content will be different for every person who views your Page.

Recent Activity

Under the friend-specific activity, a box that shows posts by other fans on the page appears. The rest of the Timeline The rest of the Timeline shows posts by your Page.

There are a number of ways to make a post stand out and get attention.

Milestones

You can add posts and designate them as Milestones. Click the Milestone button in the post window to create a Milestone, such as when the business opened. Milestones appear as highlighted posts in the timeline.

Pinned topics

You can pin a post so that it stays at the top of the timeline. It will stay at the top for seven days. You can only have one pinned post at a time. You can pin the post from the pencil menu in the upper right-hand corner of the post. A pinned post will display a little bookmark graphic on it. Why does it have a bookmark instead of a little pin? No one knows.

Highlighted topics

Highlighting a post makes it spread across both sides of the Timeline. Click the star in the upper right-hand corner of a post to highlight it. You should consider adding a dramatic picture to highlighted posts to make the most of the expanded room.

Messaging

Messaging allows fans to send you message directly without having to post on the Timeline. This is handy when fans have sensitive information to transmit. You can't initiate messages with a fan. You can turn off Messaging through the Admin panel.

Admin panel

Open the Admin Panel. You can see some summary information about your page here. This is also where you see Messages from fans.

When you Edit Page, you have access to turn off messages and set the posting level to the page so that posts have to be reviewed before they will show up. Don't turn that option on, btw, we're just pointing out that it's available.

 

 

 

 

 

 

This slight overview should give you a lot to think about as you plan the transition for your business page.

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