How B2B Advertisers Can Win on Facebook, Just Like Salesforce

While many B2Bs focus on Facebook for organic interaction with current customers, B2Cs often look to advertising on Facebook to drive sales. But a new case study coming from Facebook's advertising unit shows positive lead gen results in a B2B social environment.

In the case study, Facebook showed Salesforce’s News Feed ad campaign exceeded goals for lead generation, yielding 3.5 times more qualified leads than the original goal with a 50 percent reduction in cost per lead from its target.

Salesforce originally approached the campaign as an experiment to see how Facebook ads could help it drive leads through a demo of its product:

In the end, the campaign drove more than 200 leads with "10 percent of those leads converting to opportunities," according to the study. After this run, Salesforce ran another Facebook advertising lead gen campaign by driving prospects to its website through ads like the following:

In addition to exceeding its goals, Salesforce saw a fan base increase of 24,000 more fans through the advertising campaign as part of an unforeseen result.

Facebook Advertising for B2Bs: Tips for Getting Started

Facebook advertising might be a new concept for B2B companies, and it could be challenging to know how to approach it. Merry Morud, social advertising director at aimClear, gave her top tips for B2B advertising on Facebook.

"Invest time upfront," Morud said. "Just like keyword research, Facebook targeting can take some time, and it should. Facebook targeting segments are an asset that you can use over and over, and use them to analyze your own community with the ad targeting tool."

Morud followed up with the following tips for B2Bs:

• Mine "interest" targeting for job titles, for example, "logistics specialist," "restaurant owner," "cardiac surgeon," "hardware engineer" and "manufacturing specialists"
• Create a custom audience. Have an email list that has never converted? Create a Facebook custom audience in "Power Editor."
• Use category and partner targeting. We love using category target, for example, "small business owner," or partner target, for example, "international business traveler," as qualifiers to our interest segments.

"Smart, focused Facebook targeting is the foundation of your success," Morud said.

What other tips did she have up her sleeve?

"Try various Facebook ad units. The traditional offsite ads found in the right column are generally more expensive than 'organic'-looking ad units. For example, Facebook is now offering News Feed ads tied to Facebook Pages to offsite content. We love these because they offer huge ad real estate in the News Feed, more characters for text copy, they tend to be cheaper than traditional right column ads, and often have better CTRs, which is great for Facebook qScore," Morud said.

"Not only will these ads get your targets to the content (or landing page) on your site, but will often garner page likes and post engagement," Morud said. "Think of the social actions as a bonus, and on-going community building and content delivery because, well, Facebook distribution of your content just ain’t what it used to be."

Morud said don’t forget to customize the landing pages you drive Facebook users to, as well.

"Users coming off social have some of the shortest attention spans. Make sure you deliver on the ad copy with the landing page. Steer away from too much content and make the lead-gen form super simple. There are a lot of affordable options out there for creating dynamic landing pages."
Her final tip?

"Understand that traffic from Facebook isn't looking for you. Qualify your audience with smart targeting, qualify the click with ad copy, and hook them on the landing page – quickly.

Original Article Post by Jessica Lee @ Search Engine Watch

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Facebook Revamps Contest Rules for Businesses

Facebook drastically changed its contest rules for businesses this week. Businesses can now run contests and promotions freely on their own timelines without the use of a third-party app, Facebook announced.

What was once against the rules is now permissible by allowing Facebook users to like, comment, or create posts on a page as a voting mechanism or entry into a contest.

“We want to make it easier for businesses of all sizes to create and administer promotions on Facebook, and to align our policies to better meet the needs of marketers,” Facebook stated in its promotions help document.

Now businesses can run promotions right on their timelines and:

• Collect entries by having users post on the page or comment/like a page post.
• Collect entries by having users message the page.
• Utilize likes as a voting mechanism.

Does that mean apps are dead? No, in fact, Facebook gives insight into how to decide between using an app versus using the timeline for a contest:

Creating a promotion with an app on Facebook allows a Page to create a more personalized experience, more in line with your branding strategy.
Apps provide more space and flexibility for content than Page posts alone. Promotions run through apps can collect data in a secure, structured way that may be appealing to advertisers, particularly larger brands.
Creating a promotion with a Page is faster and easier. Additionally, as with all Page posts, Page posts about promotions are eligible to be displayed in the News Feeds of the people who like the Page and can be promoted to a broader audience.
Businesses always have the option of using both an app and their Page to administer a promotion.

With the announcement, Facebook also said its page terms are updated to restrict pages from tagging or encouraging Facebook users to tag themselves in content "that they are not actually depicted in."

What that means for contests and promotions, Facebook stated, is that it’s fine to ask people to submit names of a new product in exchange for a chance to win a prize, for example, but not OK to ask people tag themselves in pictures of a new product in exchange for a chance to win a prize.

For example, this approach is OK:


Facebook explained this decision further:

We want to make sure that people continue to post authentic, high quality content to their Facebook Timelines to stay better connected with the people they care about.
There are technical reasons for confining the administration of the promotion to either a Page or in an app. For example, because people can choose to limit the visibility of the content they put on Facebook to only themselves, friends, or to a custom group of people, Pages won’t have the ability to access all of the entries that people post on their own Timelines unless these entries are public.

If you're thinking about running a contest for your Facebook page, be sure to brush up on Facebook’s promotional guidelines, found in Section E, here.

Article Post @ Search Engine Watch

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Average Facebook Engagement Metrics: How Does Your Brand Stack Up?

AgoraPulse has released its monthly "barometer" measuring Facebook page metrics across nearly 5,000 pages and 168 industries. The data for July showed the average engagement on posts for pages with less than 10,000 fans is 6.1 percent, while the average for pages that have 100,000 fans or more is 4.9 percent.


Looking at "storyteller" averages, this data is defined from the "talking about this" metric in Facebook. Facebook states "talking about this" is Facebook users who have created a story from a post by doing the following:

• Sharing, liking, or commenting on your post
• Answering a question
• Responding to an event
• Claiming an offer

The average percentage of storytellers for pages with less than 10,000 fans was 2 percent, according to AgoraPulse data. For pages with more than 100,000, the percentage grew 0.4 points to 2.4 percent.

So, how do name brands stack up against these metrics?

Statista released a graphic on August 19 that stated Coca-Cola was the most talked about brand on Facebook, according to real-time data that showed more than 1 million people talking about the company.

That number is down slightly as of today, but according to page averages by AgoraPulse, Coca-Cola’s storytelling metric is still below average for a fan base of that size.


Keeping in mind the average is showing at 2.4 percent, and looking at the number of people talking about Coca-Cola on Facebook on August 21 divided by the total number of fans, Coca-Cola’s storytelling comes in at about 1.4 percent. 

This is one percent less than the average.


However, Coca-Cola far surpassed the average number of fans per industry, according to the research, which showed food and beverage garnering an average of 282,000 Facebook fans.


The NBA was also listed as one of the most talked about brands on Facebook by Statista on August 19. When compared to AgoraPulse data, it showed the average storytelling percentage for a sports website page was about 3.5 percent.


If the NBA fell into this category (note that it’s listed as "sports league" in Facebook and the AgoraPulse data has a category for "sports websites"), it would be down slightly from the average 3.5 percent "people talking about" metric at about 2.8 percent.


So big brand or small, when it comes to the data we’re seeing here, do your Facebook page metrics come in lower, higher or just about average? Please share in the comments if you’re up for it.

Here's Statista's full top 10 list of corporate brands, based on people talking about them:

1. Coca-Cola
2. Avon
3. Walmart
4. Disney
5. Samsung Mobile
6. Intel
7. Bud Light
8. Guarana Antarctica
9. NBA
10. Visa

To access AgoraPulse’s July 2013 Facebook stats in their entirety, go here.

Article Post @ Search Engine Watch

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Mobile Facebook Pages Now Allow Consumers To Make Reservations

Starting today, Facebook’s mobile pages are more functional for both businesses and consumers with the added ability to make reservations through a restaurant’s Facebook Page. 

Facebook continues to expand the features and information Pages provide for the 800 million plus people who access the social network on a mobile device. Facebook partnered with OpenTable and together they will soon offer customers a new way of discovering and booking their next dining experience. 

This integration is available specifically on the mobile Pages of restaurants that support OpenTable in the U.S. Participating restaurants are giving diners the added convenience of skipping the extra step of having to visit another website. This move puts Facebook in more direct competition with Yelp, which also allows reservations through OpenTable. 

Facebook is consistently trying to make itself more useful, which is evident in the announcement made today about their acquisition of a speech translation app. The addition of on-page reservations makes business pages more useful. It also gives users a reason to use Facebook Pages more often. 

While Pages have previously been home to status updates, promotions and static information about a business, the added ability to make reservations makes them more of a business tool. 

Are you excited about the ability to make reservations directly through a restaurants Facebook Page? Do you see yourself using this new feature?

Article Post @ Search Engine Journal

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How to Use Facebook Apps to Promote Your Business

Is your Facebook Page working for your business?

Have you considered using Facebook apps, but don’t know where to start?
In this article I‘ll highlight some of the most popular uses of apps, as well as a few individual apps, so you can find the right fit for your Facebook Page.

What You Need to Know about Facebook Apps

Apps let you do all sorts of things on your Facebook Page without writing your own code.

You can import your blog, run contests and promotions, collect email sign-ups, sell product through ecommerce and provide customer support.

 

Social Media Examiner utilizes a variety of apps on its Page.

At any one time, you can install up to 11 apps on your Page, but only four are visible in the thumbnail images directly beneath your cover photo.

While Photos always appears as the first app, you can choose which apps show in the remaining three spots. Any additional apps you install can be viewed by clicking on the down arrow to the right of the app images.

As the Page admin, you rearrange apps by clicking the down arrow to show all apps. Choose an app to move, and click on the Edit icon in the upper corner of the app thumbnail image to reveal the “Swap position with” option.

 

Use admin tools to edit the ordering of apps on your Page.

Some users may not know how to reveal apps by clicking the arrow, so be sure to include your most important apps in the top row of visibility.

This is important to remember if you’re running a contest or other promotion on your Page, where you’ll want to highlight the specific app for a period of time, but give up that valuable real estate once the campaign ends.

Because apps receive less visibility in the current Facebook design than they used to, you can also use your cover photo to draw attention to them.

Recently Facebook relaxed the rules regarding cover photos, so you’re free to include calls to action and text to accentuate your apps. Just remember not to go overboard as people tend to respond better to a clean Page without too many sales-oriented messages.

 

You can use your cover photo to draw attention to an app.

Should You Care About Using a Facebook Preferred Developer?

The short answer is that for most everyday apps, this isn’t a concern.
However, when running promotions, contests or more unique marketing campaigns, it can be comforting knowing you’re working with a Preferred Marketing Developer. They ensure you’re complying with all of Facebook’s guidelines and getting the most out of the platform.

What About Requiring Users to Like My Page to View Apps?
Before the introduction of timeline if you utilized a default landing tab in conjunction with a “like gate” or “fan gate,” users couldn’t see any content on your Page until they clicked the Like button.

Now that users are able to view your entire timeline without first liking your Page, this has mitigated concerns about this practice.

Today, virtually all app providers allow you to implement the fan gate feature and it can be an effective tool to drive more likes. Just be sure you have a plan for how to engage new fans after they’ve liked your Page.
Stand-alone Apps vs. Suites

When it comes to utilizing apps, one of the first questions you’ll want to answer is whether you’re better off using a single-purpose app provider or signing up with a vendor that offers multiple app suites you may wish to use.

Generally speaking, if you’re looking to get more out of your Facebook Page, then you need to provide more utility to your fans.

Since you’re probably going to want multiple tabs on your Page, I encourage you to look at the many companies that provide a suite of apps to determine what meets your needs and fits your budget.

 

A sample from the menu of apps offered in a suite.
 
With each app provider, there’s a learning curve for creating an app using their tools.

Some vendors provide templates with some degree of flexibility to customize the look and feel using HTML or CSS. Others have more of a drag-and-drop interface where you can add and edit “widgets” (e.g., a video player, a map) within the app.

Most vendors offer a free trial so you can play around with the interface to build and design your app before you commit. This lets you see which one works best for you.

How to Create General Content and HTML Tabs

Create your tabs yourself with HTML.
If you can write HTML, you can probably figure out how to create your own custom Facebook app. However, using an existing app takes the hassle out of creating a custom tab.

With HTML, you can do almost anything that you can do on your own website but have it live within a tab on your Facebook Page.

A popular free option you can use to create custom HTML tabs is Static HTML. In addition to the editable HTML iframe tab, they offer some additional options once you have installed their app on your Page.

Use tools to create tabs.
If you don’t want to dive into HTML, you can use tools to help you create your tabs. Here are some you might want to look at.

Pagemodo is another widely used tool for creating custom content tabs, offering a variety of templates and themes to choose from, as well as the ability to do some custom HTML/CSS editing. Their free plan enables you to launch one tab on one Page only, but they offer paid plans for multiple tabs.

North Social was one of the first vendors to offer a suite of apps for Facebook Pages, and includes a WYSIWYG iframe Editor that allows you to upload an image, URL or full HTML. North Social provides a nice selection of 18 apps to utilize for as little as $1.99 per day.

AgoraPulse is another vendor that offers an HTML app, as well as other content apps (and while you’re there, you should check out their free analytics tool).

Here are some other ways to use your Facebook tabs.

#1: Integrate Other Social Media Channels

Some people think of their various social channels separately, but your Facebook Page is the perfect hub to cross-promote content from your Twitter, Instagram or Pinterest feeds.

In addition to posting photos directly to your timeline, you can use a free app like Statigram to pull your Instagram photos into a Page tab.

 

Example of an Instagram feed app.

Tabfusion has a good selection of simple apps to pull in content from sources including Instagram, Flickr, Pinterest, Tumblr, YouTube and Vimeo. Each app can be purchased à la carte or you can sign up to access all of them.

If Pinterest is your thing, Woobox offers a free app to pull in your Pinterest feed, as well as a Pin to Win contest app as part of their paid subscription plan.

#2: Publish Your Blog to Facebook

If you have a blog and you aren’t already reposting blog entries to your Facebook timeline, you should be!

Share new posts in the news feed and house an archive of your blog posts on your Page. Two popular tools for blogs to integrate with Facebook are NetworkedBlogs and RSS Graffiti.

 

A popular app for bringing blog content to your Facebook Page.

#3: Run Contests and Promotions

Many articles have been written on the topic of Facebook contests because they remain one of the most popular and effective uses of apps on Facebook.

While a number of the vendors mentioned previously provide some sort of contest or sweepstakes application, three that I believe have the most robust capabilities in this area are:

• Offerpop – Provides a variety of contest app types to choose from.
• ShortStack – Delivers a rich set of tools for a very reasonable price.
• Strutta– One of the most robust platforms for photo and video contests.
   
  
  

  Speedway makes use of a like gate on their contest app.

#4: Add Email Subscribers

A fan is visiting your Facebook Page and she may or may not like your Page. If she does, she may be in the 12% who see your posts when you post to your timeline.

Wouldn’t you like to be able to communicate directly via email with the people who like your Page? MailChimp and Constant Contact each offer sign-up apps you can add to your Page.

You can also use a third-party app like TabSite, which offers an email sign-up app as part of their free package.

#5: Enable Ecommerce

If you sell products on your website, have you considered offering them through your Facebook Page, too?

Heyo (formerly Lujure) is an app platform with some nice templates that let you build out commerce-oriented tabs and add product links to drive purchases.

If you want a more deeply integrated shopping experience, check out Ecwid. And if you’re looking to build out your web storefront with Shopify, they offer the ability to easily integrate on Facebook as well.

#6: Offer Customer Support

Social media is one of the first places people turn today to vent frustrations with a brand or product. If you have an existing Get Satisfaction community, you can integrate it on your Facebook Page. Parature is a robust customer service application with strong integration with Facebook.

If these are out of your league, you can also use your app vendor of choice to create a feedback form to host on a tab. Just be sure you’re able to collect the information you need and respond to people appropriately.
Over to You

Well, there you have it. This certainly isn’t an exhaustive list, but I hope it’s been helpful. Check out these providers to see what best fits your business needs.

What do you think? Have you used other apps or suites you can recommend? What have you used apps for? Feel free to leave your thoughts and comments below.

Article Post @ Social Media Examiner

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Facebook Graph Search Now Available to All U.S. English Users

Facebook Graph Search, a way to discover people, interests and more on Facebook, has finally rolled out to all U.S. English users after nearly eight months since its inception.

If you haven't yet used Graph Search, Facebook in its announcement recapped some scenarios users can take advantage of:

• Find old friends or meet new people who share your interests: For example, "people from my hometown," or "friends of friends who live nearby and like playing tennis."
• Revisit your favorite photos or photos you missed: "Photos I like" or "photos of my family."
• Discover restaurants and places recommended by others like "hotels in Seattle visited by my friends" or "restaurants in New York liked by graduates of the Culinary Institute of America."
• Look for interesting activities to explore such as "movies my friends like" or "music liked by people who like the music that I like."

Facebook also said it's now starting to retire the "who can look up my timeline by name?" feature, as announced back in December 2012:

Everyone used to have a setting called "Who can look up my timeline by name," which controlled if someone could be found when other people typed their name into the Facebook search bar. The setting was very limited in scope, and didn't prevent people from finding others in many other ways across the site.

Because of the limited nature of the setting, we removed it for people who weren't using it, and have built new, contextual tools, along with education about how to use them. In the coming weeks, we'll be retiring this setting for the small percentage of people who still have it.

Article Post @ Search Engine Watch

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Facebook Embedded Posts: This Week in Social Media

Facebook Introduces Embedded Posts: Facebook’s Embedded Posts “make it possible for people to bring the most compelling, timely public posts from Facebook to the rest of the web.”

Pin It

"When embedded, posts can include pictures, videos, hashtags and other content. People can also like and share the post directly from the embed."

LinkedIn Introduces New Company Page Analytics: The new LinkedIn Company Page analytics now include the ability to identify the updates that drive the greatest engagement and filter engagement trends by type and time period.



Pinterest Releases a Pinning Shortcut: Pinterest’s updated version of their iPhone and iPad app gives you “a shortcut that lets you pin, like and send a little faster on your iPhone.”

 

"You can try the shortcut when you're on your home feed, a board or looking at a pin close up."

Facebook Offers New Advice for Businesses: The revamped “Facebook for Business” service makes it “easier for advertisers to discover how to achieve goals through Facebook, whether it’s to drive in-store sales, launch a new product or simply build awareness of the app.”

"Facebook has worked to make advertising simpler and more accessible."

Pinterest Rolls Out New Features: Pinterest’s new features “help you see more pins you love, and fewer you don’t. Use the Edit Your Home Feed button to get your feed just how you want it, from the web or your phone. Go to Follow Boards to see stuff you might like based on what you’ve been pinning.”

 

Pinterest introduces a new Edit button.

Pinterest Emails You When Product Pin Prices Drop: “You don’t have to do anything to get notified. Just keep pinning the things you’re into, and leave the price watching to Pinterest.”

 

"There are already tens of millions of pins with price details on them." Now Pinterest will email you when prices drop.

Here’s an interesting infographic worth noting:
Marketers Pick Their Social Media Channels of Choice:

 

"Social media marketing is becoming a more useful tool for both B2B and B2C businesses."

Don’t miss this:
Social Media Success Summit 2013 is a special online conference designed to help you master social media marketing (brought to you by Social Media Examiner).

 

Social Media Success Summit 2013.

Forty-five of the world’s leading social media pros will show you how. Instructors include Jay Baer (author, Youtility), Chris Brogan (co-author, Impact Equation), Mari Smith (co-author, Facebook Marketing), Michael Stelzner (founder, Social Media Examiner), Mark Schaefer (author, Return on Influence), Jesse Stay (author, Google+ for Dummies), Amy Porterfield (co-author, Facebook Marketing All-in-One for Dummies) and experts from General Electric, Sony, E! Online, Kelly Services and Discovery Channel–just to mention a few. Fully online. Click here to learn more.

Article Post @ Social Media Examiner

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New Facebook Features: What Marketers Need to Know

Are you using Facebook for your business?

Are you wondering how Facebook’s newest features can help your business?
To learn about what these new Facebook features mean for marketers, I interview Mari Smith for this episode of the Social Media Marketing podcast.

More About This Show

The Social Media Marketing podcast is a show from Social Media Examiner.

It’s designed to help busy marketers and business owners discover what works with social media marketing.

The show format is on-demand talk radio (also known as podcasting).

In this episode, I interview Mari Smith, who is known as the Queen of Facebook. She’s the world’s leading authority on Facebook marketing and author of The New Relationship Marketing and co-author of Facebook Marketing: An Hour a Day.

Mari shares how the new Facebook features can work for your business and what you should pay attention to. You’ll learn how to use the new hashtags and how to make the most of your cover image.

Share your feedback, read the show notes and get the links mentioned in this episode below!

Listen Now

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

You can also subscribe via iTunes, RSS, Stitcher or Blackberry.
Here are some of the things you’ll discover in this show:

Facebook Features for Marketers

Has Facebook rolled out a lot of changes recently in response to Twitter and Google?
Mari states that there are many reasons for these new changes, although not necessarily in response to Twitter and Google+. However, Mark Zuckerberg and his entire team do keep a very close eye on the competition.

When it comes to features that have been around for a while, Facebook tends to be late with their release simply because they are a much bigger machine. They have a lot more complexity to deal with.

Facebook have a lot of complexity to deal with before they release new features.

With Facebook being a public company, they have to make money for their shareholders. They’ve made a lot of changes to their ad product and it seems like they move things around to try and get the marketers attention.

Listen to the show to find out why most of the features are there to predominantly improve the monetization aspect.

What Facebook hashtags are and why marketers should care
Mari explains that the simple definition of a hashtag is that it’s a way to group conversations together, around the same topic. This makes it easy to discover and follow conversations. Just like you see on Twitter, Instagram, Pinterest, Google+ and LinkedIn.

If you think about TV ads 2-3 years ago, the call to action would be an invite to join the brand, where they would give out their Facebook Fanpage. Now the call to action is a hashtag.

You’ll hear Mari talk about the reason behind why some TV shows have niche hashtags appear throughout their broadcast, instead of one main hashtag.

 

The TV show, So You Think You Can Dance use specific hashtags for viewer interactions.

As a business owner you need to start to experiment with hashtags. Find one or two hashtags that can help you ride a wave. There’s a term called newsjacking. It doesn’t sound very nice but it’s a very popular way to get your business in front of people who are talking about something anyway.

The great thing about Facebook’s hashtags, is that they are clickable. So if you click on any, whether it’s on a Post or a Comment, it opens up into what is called the Hashtag Feed. This feed displays other posts with the same hashtag.

 

The Hashtag Feed displays all posts with the same hashtag.

However, recently they have introduced related searches into this feature. So not only will you see the exact verbatim hashtag but also similar ones.

As a strategic marketer, Mari highly recommends every business owner make good use of hashtags. Even if you don’t have them personally, they are active for other people.

Listen to the show to find out how clickable hashtags can get you in front of new people.

Tips and creative uses for Facebook hashtags
Mari uses two generic Facebook hashtags which are #facebookmarketing and #facebooktips. You’ll hear what hashtag Mari uses to separate herself away from her peers.

It’s where you’ll find all of her posts. This is one thing to consider when you create hashtags.

 

Mari uses a mixture of generic and specific hashtags.

You really want to do your homework before you create a hashtag. Basically use the same best practices as you would on Twitter.

You can search by going to www.facebook.com/hashtag/whatever your keyword is. Every hashtag has it’s own unique URL, which you can use to drive traffic.
The hashtags are still very young on Facebook and most users don’t know how to use them. It’s something that you should experiment with and see if it makes a difference.

Listen to the show to hear why Mari believes Facebook hashtags are the tip of the iceberg and what else there is to look forward to in the future.

The changes on Facebook’s commenting system
Mari talks about the main change which is the Reply feature. It has been around for some time as a Facebook commenting plugin but was finally brought to the main Facebook site.

With the Replies feature it gives you the ability to have threaded conversations. On Fan Pages, you can turn it on or off. It’s a feature you can enable in your admin panel.

 

The Reply feature is a great way to have threaded conversations with your fans.

You’ll hear about a brand new feature that was rolled out recently, which is the ability to sort.

As a Page owner, Mari advises to make sure you use the @tag for the person or page you are replying to in the Reply feature. As a Fan Page you can hit the @sign and then start to type their name and that way their name will be a hot clickable link and they will also get a notification.

With regards to images, right now you can only use them in Personal Profiles with the Reply feature. When you hit Reply, you can add an image. It’s coming to Fan Pages and mobile too.

You’ll discover the advantages to using the threaded comment capability and what it means for your fans.

Listen to the show to find out what feature you can use to help drive traffic back to your conversation.

How marketers can take advantage of the new changes to the Facebook page cover image

The Facebook cover image is the huge header at the top of your Facebook page and is there for visual branding.

 

The cover image is the perfect space for visual branding.

When Facebook first introduced the Timeline design about 18 months ago, the rules were very strict about what you could have in the image. For instance, you weren’t allowed your website name, contact information, calls to action or arrows pointing to features.

 

You are now allowed to add call to actions to your cover image.

Earlier this year the rules changed and the only one that remained in place was the 20% text rule. More recently this rule has quietly disappeared out of the Page Guidelines. The only caveat is that the 20% text rule still applies to any paid products.

This new change got a lot of social media experts and Facebook experts excited.

 

You can use text in so many different ways on your cover image.

You’ll discover why you need to keep your cover image visually appealing and how frequent you should change it.

Listen to the show to find out what Mari recommends you put in the description of your cover image.

What’s the deal with Graph Search? 
If you make the swtich to Graph Search, you’ll notice that the search box at the top will look completely different. Your name and your page now sits in the white search box.

When you type in any word or name you’ll get a drop down box with a bunch of different icons in there. For example, there is an icon for the hashtag and for photos.

 

From the drop down box in Graph Search you'll see different icons for each category.

If you haven’t already got Graph Search, you’ll find out what you need to type in the search bar on Facebook.

You are able to search for four things which are photos, people, places/pages and interests. However, it will not surface an individual post and is only available on desktop right now.

You’ll hear Mari give an example of how you can use Graph Search to find people within a very narrow niche and how you can use it to search for specific photos.

Listen to the show to find out how you could use it in terms of a business application.

Discovery of the Week

If you want to find out what your website or blog looks like on a laptop, tablet, smartphone or desktop, then you should check out this free tool by QuirkTools called Screenfly.

 

Give Screenfly a try if you are interested to know how others see your site on their device.

You can enter any URL from your website and you’ll have options to see how it looks on any size desktop or any hand held device. You’ll also find many other options that are available with this tool.

It’s not perfect but it’s good enough to run a quick test if you hear from some of your readers that your site doesn’t look right on their device or desktop.

Listen to the show to learn more and let us know how this works for you.

 

Other Show Mentions

Over the last couple of weeks I’ve done a series on ‘How to Launch,’ using the new site we are launching as an example.

I’m very excited to let you know that My Kids’ Adventures has officially launched this week.

It’s an online magazine for busy working parents, who want to have fun adventures with their kids anywhere. It’s your go to resource to get articles on how to do really cool stuff.

These are some of the articles that came out this week:

• Getting Dirty: Five Fun Composting Projects for Kids
• How to Make an Adventure Movie With Your Kids
• How to Create a Backyard Treasure Hunt, Minecraft Style
• How to Create Glow-In-The-Dark Bowling In Your Home

Go check them out.

Call in and leave your social media–related questions for us and we may include them in a future show.

Listen to the show to learn more and let us know how this works for you.

Key takeaways mentioned in this episode:

• Connect with Mari Smith on her website, Facebook or Twitter.
• Check out Mari’s books: The New Relationship Marketing and Facebook Marketing: An Hour a Day.
• Take a look at how the TV show So You Think You Can Dance uses Facebook hashtags.
• See how popstars Mariah Carey and Will.i.am feat. Justin Bieber use hashtags in their song titles.
• Check out David Meerman Scott’s book: Newsjacking.
• Discover more about #facebookmarketing, #facebooktips and #facebookmari.
• Read about the Facebook Reply feature.
• See what you can do with the Facebook cover image.
• Check out the Page Guidelines.
• Learn more about Graph Search.
• Try Screenfly, the free tool by QuirkTools, which lets you check out what your website looks like on any size desktop or hand held device.
• Check out My Kids’ Adventures articles.

Help Us Spread the Word!

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What do you think? What are your thoughts on Facebook’s new features? Please leave your comments below.

Article Post @ Social Media Examiner

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4 Ways Marketers Can Use Facebook Hashtags

Have you started using Facebook hashtags for your business?

Are you wondering how to best use a Facebook hashtag?

In this article, I’ll reveal four important benefits of using hashtags on Facebook.

I’ll also explore important considerations when putting together your hashtag strategy.

Why Facebook Hashtags?

As you’ve undoubtedly seen, hashtags are now clickable and useable on Facebook.

Using a hashtag # (or pound symbol) in front of a word or phrase turns the word into a clickable link.

When you click on the link, you’ll see a feed of public posts (or posts that are visible to you due to a friend relationship on Facebook) that include that hashtag.
Here’s how you can use Facebook hashtags:

#1: Expand Your Reach

As hashtags gain momentum on Facebook (they’ve been in use on other platforms such as Twitter, Instagram, Pinterest and Google+), they’ll help you expand your reach to people who are looking at posts in your topic.
Hashtags have been a great way to help people interested in niche topics find each other and find the conversation.

 

The #WalkingDead hashtag connects people interested in this show.

By including a hashtag in your post, you can possibly get in front of people who may not have seen your post otherwise.  But you’ll have to monitor this in your Facebook Insights.  Make sure you watch your Reach and Engagement Numbers to see if your hashtags are making a difference in your posts.

Click the Reach column in your Facebook insights to see which posts are getting the highest reach.

#2: Amplify Your Brand

Branding your Facebook Page with your own special hashtag can help an idea or new product catch on.  By branding all your posts about a new product, you can break this information out into a separate stream of information and give people an easy way to share information about that product or idea.
Think carefully about what types of things others would also be interested in sharing.  If the posts are too promotional and not valuable, you may have a hard time getting people to share them with their friends.

 

Home Depot uses #HDHacks to share fun ideas with their audience.

#3: Cross Social Platforms

If you’ve already been using hashtags in your Twitter, Google+, Instagram, LinkedIn or Pinterest posts, it’s now more natural to use hashtags in Facebook.  You can save some time by being able to post the same content across several platforms.

While I don’t recommend doing this for every post in Facebook (some people are annoyed by the hashtags entering into the Facebook realm) it does work to your benefit to occasionally cross platforms with a single post.  Plus many people have already been doing this with their own posts from Twitter and now the hashtags are more searchable in Facebook.

 

The Starbucks #treatreceipt hashtag has been in use on Twitter in the past and is now searchable on Facebook too.

#4: Promote Specials and Events

You can use a special hashtag in your posts to promote something special.  For example, this can work really well for a #contest.

Use a specially branded hashtag to help promote a contest across several platforms.

Realize that you can’t have people enter your contest on Facebook by including your branded hashtag like you can on Pinterest, Instagram or Twitter.  Because of Facebook contest promotional rules, you can help people find the content across platforms by including the hashtag in your Facebook posts.

If you know some popular hashtags that fit your marketing goals—such as offering a special coupon or deal—then you can include them in your post as well.  I don’t recommend stuffing your posts with tons of hashtags that aren’t relevant because that doesn’t look good and may turn off some of your fans, but a few relevant hashtags are OK.

You can also attach a hashtag at the end of your post that's relevant to people looking for special deals such as #backtoschooldeals.

Important Considerations When Using Facebook Hashtags

1.  Privacy settings are still in effect.
If you’re using hashtags on posts on your personal profile, they’ll still have the privacy settings set up according to how you control your privacy on your profile.  Just because you use a hashtag doesn’t make that post suddenly public.  If you add a hashtag to a post that you only share with a certain group of your friends, only that group will be able to see that post.

Your privacy settings are still in effect even when you add a hashtag to your post.

2.  Hashtags have to be all one word.
If you wanted to use #Facebook Marketing as your hashtag, it will need to be posted as #FacebookMarketing or #facebookmarketing (see the next tip).

3.  Capitalization doesn’t matter.
You can choose whatever capitalization you want in the words themselves and the hashtags will show the same results.  #FacebookMarketing and #facebookmarketing show the same search results.

4.  You can make up whatever hashtags you want.
There’s no “hashtag registration” or “database of approved hashtags”, you can make up whatever hashtags you want to use.  Consider your goals.  If you want to brand your own hashtags, you can, but make them short and easy to use and understand.

A hashtag that’s overly complex or hard to read won’t get much traction.  If you’re abbreviating, make sure it’s clear what point you’re going for – a hashtag like #IKPMTTTRWD won’t mean much to many people.

5.  Research your hashtag before you use it.
There have been some recent embarrassing cases of brands using a hashtag that’s already in use for an entirely different purpose that doesn’t align with their company message at all.  Take a look at the social sites where hashtags are in use such as Pinterest, Twitter, Instagram and Google+ and see if your hashtag is already being used by people.

6.  You can easily look for hashtags on Facebook by URL.
Easily search for hashtags or bookmark their results by using the URL:  www.facebook.com/hashtag/ then just include your keyword on the end.
For example https://www.facebook.com/hashtag/FacebookMarketing shows you the results of posts that include #facebookmarketing or #FacebookMarketing (or any alternate capitalizations).

Conclusion
I strongly recommend you test out hashtags as part of your Facebook marketing strategy and measure your results.  Use them sparingly (not in every single post) and don’t over-stuff hashtags into your posts.

While some people may not be as excited about hashtags on Facebook, they’re firmly entrenched in other social sites and aren’t going away anytime soon.

How about you?  Have you been using hashtags in your posts?  Are you going to give them a try?  Share your thoughts with us in the comments section below!

Article Post @ Social Media Examiner

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