Tag: Facebook

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Facebook Reviews Are Now Being Picked Up by Google Places

info-puzzlesThis past week I saw something really wild and wanted to share it with you. I saw that in a Google Places site reviews had been picked up from Facebook of all places. Wow that is big news!

We are going to put the pieces of this puzzle together for you and need your help to do it!

Now, what I am not sure of is if you create a FBML page and add your website reviews there will the reviews be picked up or is Google only picking up reviews from people using the Facebook Business Page reviews app. If I had to guess I would say from the application.

As I do additional testing this week on how reviews from Facebook are picked up; meaning if I can ascertain whether you can simply add your own website reviews or if other Facebook users have to review you while they are logged in to their own accounts, I will make sure to let you know at Facebook. In the mean time, this is exactly what we are going to do to test and I sure would appreciate it if you can help us out on this one.

  1. I am going to create a tab in one of my Facebook Business Page accounts and load a sampling of my website reviews to the new FBML page I will create. I will even try to have the reviews coded using Google’s hReview tags. You can visit my page here. While you are there make sure to like this business page that I am testing on as I will only send out a note of success or failure through Facebook to fans. This is not my main Facebook page but one I have created to make sure I hold onto my business name.
  2. I am going to turn on the application for Facebook reviews in my main Facebook Business page account and solicit reviews from clients on that page. If you are not already a fan, make sure to like this page as I will also only be sending out the results to fans of this page. You need only fan one page to get the actual results.

So check out the two pages, look in the left nav bar for the reviews link, like the page, and if you want leave a friendly review. Then when I can see what is going on I will send the results out via Facebook to all of our fans at both pages.

Thanks for your help in advance, this could be a great mini whitepaper!

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Facebook Changes Fan or Business Page Look Again

In an effort to blur the difference between fan or business pages and personal profiles even more, Facebook this past week changed how business pages look. The basic behind the scenes control panel for business pages has not changed, but the look and feel has changed significantly.

First, I have to say that I don’t like the new look. Before Business pages had tabs across the top; allowing you good control over helping to focus your user on things that were important to you. Now tabs have gone away, imitating the look of a personal profile, and links to pages have moved to a lower left sidebar. For me, the issue was, if we created a Giveaway tab now this tab is hidden under the “show more options” in the left sidebar and so is not featured as in the old business page look. The end user may miss our giveaway or have to hunt to find it.

One thing I do like is the option to select entities from which you post. Now when you post updates to someone else’s wall, you have the option to choose to be posting from your personal profile or your business page profile. Actually, that is a good thing as when I post on other Business’ walls, my icon and link was to my personal profile. Not my choice but Facebook’s default. Now I can choose. By choosing to post as my business entity, my icon and link matches my Facebook business page and so drives traffic to my page not my locked down, family only, personal profile.

What do you think about Facebook’s new look for Business pages. Click comments and let me know.

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HootSuite and Seesmic Reviewed

If you are involved in social media using Facebook or Twitter you will want to be using one of these applications for posting your updates. In this post I will be reviewing HootSuite and Seesmic.

HootSuite
I use this product and own two Pro accounts. I have been using the HootSuite product since it came out and like it. I have four team members using one account and write for over 10 client social networks using the application. This is what I personally like about the product:

  1. The Pro account allows me to add unlimited social networks and easily helps me to link Facebook personal pages, Facebook Business Pages, and Twitter accounts.
  2. It is very simple to add team members to my account. My team members only see in their personal control panel the accounts that I have given them access to and not all client accounts.
  3. When I have several team members working on one account, I can see in my master control panel who has done what, who has responded to a comment, and who has posted which update.
  4. I like that I can schedule updates for future dates. Some of our writers work several days ahead or at night and set up updates to publish the next day. When you work on the volume of clients that we do you need this flexibility for your staff.
  5. HootSuite Pro account have a bulk upload option. Although I don’t routinely use this option, it is there and allows for greater flexibility to feed out content over time.
  6. Reusable updates. This is one of my personal favorites. I like the feature that I can save an update and then reuse is and schedule it to be sent on days I select. Where we have something very important to get out for a client this feature is valuable.

If you want to check out HootSuite, you can for free. If you use my link, set up an account and upgrade to the Pro Account HootSuite will pay me a small commission.

Seesmic
I don’t use this product routinely, but am always on the look out for new applications that can make our work easier. Seesmic is great for a single user or for someone is just managing Twitter account. Seesmic does support Facebook, but only the Facebook personal profile, while HootSuite allows you to post to Facebook personal profiles AND Facebook Business Pages.

The Seesmic interface is easy to set up, but not as intuitive as that of HootSuite. You do not have the option to show columns for each account such as pending for one Twitter account, but you can see the pending updates for all accounts in one column. I set up my Seesmic account with three Twitter accounts and two Facebook accounts. I could not however set up or send to my Facebook Business Page.

Seesmic has a control panel for each account on the left side bar instead of tabs like HootSuite has at the top. This could be an issue if you were managing many Twitter accounts as you would have to scroll up and down to interact with accounts near the left bottom as your account list grows.

In Seesmic you can see, for Twitter only, retweets, mentions, sent, favorites, and searches but not pending. Remember pending appears as a column on your screen and is not sorted by account but rather by date. For Facebook you don’t have any options other than the home feed.

I feel that for professional users HootSuite is a much more usable product. For small accounts Seesmic certainly is an alternative to HootSuite. If you have more than five social networks you have to upgrade to the Pro Level in HootSuite but with Seesmic you are still at a free level. I think that as an alternative to HootSuite for do it yourselfers on a budget, Seesmic certainly is a nice choice, but not one that I would want to work with everyday, day in and day out as a power user.

That being said for clients that want to watch what we are doing and to respond to tweets, I think that a Seesmic account would be fine for them as this solves the problem of having to add them as a team member in HootSuite. They can’t see pending updates with this approach, but can see what has been posted after the fact. I will look forward to improvements as Seesmic grows and tries to establish its market share. In some ways it is similar to Sendible.

Seesmic has not paid me for this post and I do not make a commission on your use of the application or download.

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Facebook Lessons Learned

My understanding of what people want from a Facebook Business Page is changing over time as we get feedback and interaction from colleagues, fans, and clients. Here are a few things that I have learned and am still doing testing on our own Business Page.

  • People are thirsty to connect with a person. Too much selling information or focus on your own services is a real no-no.
  • People want to have personal tidbits about you. Although you do not want nor have to reveal a lot of personal information about yourself on a Facebook Business Page. People do want to know who they talk to on the phone. They love to see photos to “know” who you are.
  • Fans and visitors love humor. A funny video, joke, quote, or funny photo can really elicit a positive response.
  • Asking questions and taking polls can engage visitors and clients.
  • Commenting back on a thread on your Business wall is a must. Make sure that fans and visitors see that you are interacting with what they write.

For us, we are testing and having fun with a new concept of engagement using our spokesdog. It is not hard nor time consuming to put a little bit of “personal” juice behind your Facebook posts. Remember people who are visiting you are used to the personal interaction from their own personal page on Facebook, your Business Page needs to reflect and feed this need to get the best response from your visitors.