Lets do the timeline agaaaain – a cheat sheet
You may have noticed all the posts and blogs regarding the new brand pages on Facebook. I thought I would gather some of the highlights all in one spot.
Yesterday Facebook admins were faced with the message about new timelines coming for brands and that they can start prepping and previewing. These changes are looking good and the new functionalities will make them that much more powerful.
The Cover Photo
Amazing big canvas that you will be using to get visitors attention when they land on your page. (You won’t have landing tabs anymore – so this is where you have to work your magic) There are rules for the image :
- No calls to action, yep none of this “Tell your friends” or “Buy now!”
- Don’t add any contact information – the ‘About’ section adds this information alot more prominently then the original pages did. (more on that later)
- You know those clever little arrows you added to your fangate images, those ones that said click Like and pointed to the Like button? No more. You are not allowed to add them – you cannot reference Facebook elements in otherwords
- Deal, purchase info – so no buy one get one free shouts, or download the pdf at our site
- Obviously no misleading messaging, copyright infringements
Potential : My thinking here is the obvious rich enticing image, but what if you had a script that based on conditions the image would be changed. (Developers may shoot me down here) What if Heathrow took a photo of flight boards and added that, every hour it refreshes? (again, not sure what development would be needed here, or if FB allowed that) Or the cover of your latest issue if you are a magazine, headlines, etc
Messaging
Love this! Finally you can contact the admins directly. Facebooks attempt at customer support. This will help take those negative comments off your timeline and deal with them. For instance, with twitter, most customer care agents will attempt to take it to a direct message or email. At least this way you can solve any problems off the public areas. Also will make it a lot easier for you to notify comp winners, or influencers on your page.
Don’t want to deal with users? Simply turn off the message button in your admin control panel.
Potential : Complaining on Twitter has its advantages, yet not everyone is there – now that facebook allows it, everyone will be sorting their grievances. Although, not as public… Be interesting to see the amount of Facebook Call centre app solutions that start launching now. (Sprout social – get in!). Also, contacting admin of pages for campaigns, or more info is a whole lot easier.
Views and Apps
The apps and views area is a great addition. You cannot remove the ‘Photos” but are able to move the others blocks around. Great for butting a promtional app or campaign slap bang in front of users.
Potential : What about a collection of blocks that make up an album cover? When a user clicks the down button it looks amazing, then each one can click through to a new track, or video, or behind the scenese…. think advent calander 
Which brings me to App tabs (if we can still call them that)
No longer on 520 in width. Now a whole 810px. Thats massive, thats a load of canvas now.
I’m very excited by this, its like the return of the microsite… or even a full fledged site within Facebook. The above example by Tiffany shows the space available. Great news! (Although if you are running over 20 fanpages with customised tabs, this may have just ruined your weekend – you may be changing some code and design)
Potential : Imagine Amazon simply plugged in their entire site, or a 800 resolution version. Would sites now be built taking user resolution, mobile and Facebook plugin? Thats three methods to find potential customers without causing them to leave. Could be the end of websites within campaigns? If Facebook sorts their search, this would be very powerful.
***** little update . seems on the 810 you should aim for 779 due to padding. error is being reported here : Link
Brand Mentions
eConsultancy.com mentioned that they were seeing brand mentions on timelines form users without using ‘@’ this is a great way to find mentions from user possible casually mentioning your brand – will help with the advertising a lot as well. My only concern here is the duplicates – the non officials, will they get those mentions too? Or would it refer to the most popular? Anyone know?
Pinned posts :
Even though the landing tabs have been taken away, you can draw users attention via a pinned post. This will allow you to keep a post Sticky for a week. Running a competition? Simply add it up there for a week. This will avoid the push down you would get form user posts or your own for that matter. Once the week is over, or you decide to end the ‘stickyness’ the post simply returns to its place on your timeline.
Potential : As mentioned, announce competitions, Keep a post up regarding an event thats on for a week.
Milestones :
Massive event? Big happening in your brand or campaign? Just like you created that “Day i was born” milestone on your personal page, you can do just that for a brand. From the day it launched, to new products, or “this day in history” – Manchester United’s page is a great example of this, going back to 1878. A very interesting timeline
Potential : Turning points or milestones show a great story, the history behind your product. The film industry could create milestones from green lit films, to poster concepts, to confirmed actors to trailers to premier. Seeing the journey of a film come to life would be loved by the fans.
Just so you know, the public can see some of your page insights. More than just the fan cout and people talking about this. If they click the Likes button, this comes up :
Your checklist before you go live :
- Cover Photo – make sure its 851 x 315 pixels. Stick to the rules I mentioned earlier. Nice hi-def image. Users are seeing this first. Its massive, take advantage of it
- Create your customised app buttons : 111 x 74 images. Other than the photo block, put them in the order you want. See what promotions are currently running. Get them up,and yeah, make them look good – the old 70 x 70 buttons were’nt that imaginative – now you can play around. Imagine they were banners on some other website, you have 2 secs to get a click.
- Decide if you want to have message turned on – are you in a postion to answer, do you have a team that is ready to take advantage. This is a new feature, people are going to use it
- Profile picture, the little square under the cover image. Don’t make it something crappy and take away the hard work you just put into your cover image. Blend it it in if you have to. Dimensions : 180 x 180 px. (this will be scaled down for your posts so make sure it works at 32×32 as well)
- Go through your existing posts, covert to milestones (you’ll need a big image = 843 x 403) Pin what you need to the top – especially if there is an offer or launch coming up.
- Update your “about” keep it short so it doesn’t get cut off. Just under 165 characters – you can add your website link here if you want.
- Check out your Activity log, arrange your content. Highlighted on page? Hidden? Delete?
- ensure you have lots of images where you can, this looks great on the timeline
- Click publish – done!
