Facebook is making a big push over the next few weeks to get all fan pages over to their new layout. You can choose to do it now or wait for it to be forced upon you in March, but don’t wait. This upgrade is huge for marketers. Here’s why.
Many businesses have Facebook Fan Pages which is great if you have lots of followers coming to you. But when you went outside of your page and left comments on others, those comments linked up to your profile not your page. Until now.
The new page update has a very powerful toggle in the right sidebar that allows you to surf Facebook as your personal profile or as your page. That means that, like blog commenting, you can now leave comments all over Facebook that lead back to your business (page) instead of back to you.
Conversely, you can switch from page persona to personal and respond to comments on your page as yourself and not as the admin. That means you can put a human face on a business which is always a good thing.
This is also helpful if you have multiple people monitoring a page as it allows each one to comment personally instead of having it all lumped under one icon as it was before.
Other components of the upgrade include the removal of tabs. Now the navigation is in the left sidebar where you expect it to be and the overall design is more modern.
The one downside to the upgrade is the line of photos that now take up the top of a page. While photos may be the bread and butter of a personal profile, they’re less important on business pages but you’re stuck with them (or does someone know a way to turn them off.) They do give the pages a more colorful, dynamic look, but they pull from the wall posts as well as the photo albums so careful moderation is in order. Individual photos can be removed by clicking the x when you roll over them.
Overall, this is an excellent update for marketers and long over due. The ability to be able to move around Facebook with your page as your persona is big for everyone but especially for those who handle a variety of pages on behalf of clients.
One word of warning. Make sure you pay attention to which logon you’re using (personal or page) before you post to avoid any embarrassing mix-ups.
Have you converted? What do you think of the new Facebook page upgrade?
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