Facebook Pages has been given a revamp by the powers that be and unlike some of the changes made by Facebook, I think this one will prove fairly popular.
The redesigned pages are not live on every page as yet but this will be phased in between now and March 10th. The changes go beyond a simple redesign though and some of the changes significantly change the way you manage your page. It is certainly worth taking the time to get familiar with the new functionality.
I’ve included a summary of the main changes below. You’ll find a few features in new positions as a result of the changes listed below too but the best thing is to preview the pages or make the update and have a good play around.
Comment as yourself, or your page – Probably one of the major changes is the ability to post and like on other pages as your page. You can find the ‘Use Facebook as Page’ option to select whether you wish to operate as personal or page under the ‘account’ menu in the top right of the Facebook page.
This functionality gives great opportunities to promote your page by adding value on other relevant pages and groups. It also opens up opportunities for people & brands to SPAM other walls to attract followers so just be mindful of this.
When you are signed in as your page the options you see are very different. You won’t see your personal inbox or personal updates and instead you’ll be shown the alerts relating to your page, such as new ‘likes’.
Sidebar changes – The left sidebar of your Facebook page will look quite different. The Profile image has been reduced from 200px x 600px to 180px x 540px. Facebook appear to have automatically resized profile images uploaded in the previous size but should you have any problems with your existing profile image when you upgrade your page simply upload a new 180px x 540px image.
Picture perfect – Similar to the changes made on personal profiles, page photos will now appear at the top of the page. This will include wall photos and admin uploads. It is easy to remove photos from this section if you don’t think them appropriate or wish to have something else instead. Simply mouse over the images and click the cross of the photos you wish to remove.
No more tabs! – Tabs are no-longer tabs. The options that were above your wall in tabs are now listed below your profile image as a vertical navigation. These can be updated or added to in the same way you updated your tabs with the exception of custom FBML tabs.
Custom FBML tabs – The custom tabs option is changing in March too. Previously these have been created using the FBML application. This option isn’t going to exist from March although an alternative option does exist. Existing tabs that have been created will remain active and functional, certainly in the short term. It may be worth setting up any additional tabs you think you may require prior to the facility being removed in March.
Receive updates by email – You may have already started getting emails of your page’s activity. You can change your email preferences in the ‘notifications’ tab within your account settings. You can select a default setting for all pages you are administrator of, or choose which pages you receive notifications for individually. This is great where you manage a number of pages! These updates can be sent every time somebody comments or writes a post on your wall, which could fill up your inbox pretty quick so it’s worth customising the settings to suit what you need.
Manage profanity settings – You can automatically set the level of automatic profanity moderation to either none, medium or strong. Facebook will automatically moderate from their list of commonly reported terms. You can also add your own terms to a blacklist. Any comments or posts using these terms will be marked as SPAM.
Featured Owners – You can now have selected owners of the page listed if you wish. This is an option you need to enable but allows you to promote the personal profile of the person administering the page if required. Go to Edit Page > Featured to enable or disable this feature. There is also an option under this menu for featured pages – the pages you recommend on your Facebook page and want to give preference to.
Not Chronological! – Not likely to be the most popular decision by Facebook and maybe something that they’ll look to change in the future but the new wall will not be in chronological order when the ‘everyone’ option is selected. Instead, the Facebook algorithm will determine the order based on relevancy. There’s nothing you can do to change this currently but it something to be aware of. I’d imagine recency will be part of the algorithm so a post you just publish is likely to appear high up or at the top but a number of other factors will determine what sinks down the page and what rises.
To preview how the changes will affect your page or to permanently change your page over to the new format visit here.
By selecting preview you get a short tour of your new page but your users will not get to see the new look prior to you choosing the upgrade option. By choosing to update you will get the new page and will not be able to change back to the old style page. However, remember that all pages will be automatically converted on 10th March if they have not already been updated.
To see an example of a page with the new layout visit www.facebook.com/DevilishlyChocolatey. Feel free to sign up to the page if you like chocolate too ?
On the whole the changes appear positive and the greater separation between Fb profiles and Fb pages is extremely useful. Just make sure you check which you are set as before you go commenting on page walls!
Hi James
I have also heard and read (but not looked at this in anger yet) that the news feed only updates with feeds of people you have recently interacted with and so you may notice over time that people are missing from the feed? I need to have a look at this in more detail. I think you need to go in and change the default settings on your feed to allow updates from all friends.
Nice detailed overview though – I like it.