There has been a lot of speculation recently regarding a revamp of Facebook’s brand pages. As we speculated last week, many are expecting a February 28th rollout, which is only a few weeks away. But what will these new brand pages look like?
Well, the best indicator of Facebook’s brand page improvements are usually derived from profile pages. When Facebook overhauled profile pages in 2010, brand pages were soon to follow, in the very same style. So back to the present, where Facebook have rolled out Timeline to its users, and it is fully expected that they will replicate the Timeline’s visual aesthetic to the full – and with good reason.
Timeline is visually rich and could be exploited by brands, with lots of room for big visuals and app integration. So we thought we would try and see how a few of Facebook’s biggest brands could take advantage of the possible new look for brand pages.
*NOTE: These are only rough mock-ups of how the new brand pages might look.
McDonalds
First we have the global McDonalds page – while still being very strong, lacks a major focal point. Now, for the possible revamp. The first notable change is the cover photo. This would be the biggest visual area brands could utilise. The entire header of the page is ready to be filled with a banner ad displaying the latest offer, product or just showing the brand’s visual identity.
This is a massive change from what Facebook are currently allowing – five microscopic sized icons at the top of the page, that can’t really give any visual impact. Also, it would be a much easier way of integrating and sticking videos/ads onto Timeline permanently.
Nike
Next we have one of the biggest brands on Facebook, Nike. Known for their slick advertising campaigns, their Timeline could provide a plethora of visual ideas for the brand. One thing Facebook could also integrate is its frictionless sharing applications. So, for example, Nike could pin their latest Likes and Pins on Pinterest, or share what movies they Like.
Mercedes Benz
Finally, we have Mercedes Benz. Again, their current page isn’t bad at all, providing lots of information on dealers, products etc, as well as the usual photos and videos. With a Timeline page, their Facebook presence could be dramatically transformed. In fact, the Timeline cover photo is perfectly suited to things such as cars. Car companies could display their latest model in a massive banner ad at the top of their page. Apps could be integrated with the page, bringing much higher engagement with current fans.So there you have it, just a wild guess as to what Facebook’s rumoured new brand pages might look like. Do you think they will in fact use the Timeline style? Also, will they integrate apps on the page like our own profiles? Only time will tell, but it seems certain that brand pages will receive a long overdue revamp very soon.
With the capabilities of Facebook’s open graph only beginning to be explored, career site Glassdoor have announced their new job search app ‘Inside Connections’, which helps you find a new job and see where your friends work via your Facebook account.
Effectively an extension to what the site already does, the app scours your friends on the site and see what jobs are on offer. If one of your friends, or someone your friend knows, is linked with a company that has a vacancy, such results will appear at the bottom of your feed showing you what connections you have at a company.
Once you’re logged in, you can read all the usual information associated with each vacancy such as anoynmous reviews and ratings, salary reports and interview questions and reviews. It allows you to get a feel for the company you’re interested in and develop a much better idea about whether its the best fit for you or not.
Glassdoor say that 60% of all jobs are obtained through an inside connection and it’s through this principal that Glassdoor have created their app. It’s incredibly similar to LinkedIn in this regard, but since Facebook is more about social connections, there’s a much higher chance of you having a connection in an industry you’re interested in.
While it’s at best an extension of their site, it’s a good example of a site using Facebook apps to enhance their product instead of tacking it on to gain more traffic. Not everyone is on LinkedIn and it’s perhaps easier to network with someone if you have a social connection as opposed to a professional one.
The site has information on more than 150,000 companies from across the world and currently has more than six million job listings on its site. There are over three million reviews and salaries listed on the site to help your search.
For the last couple of years, I’ve been writingabout the huge challengeFacebook faces when it comes to asserting its social networking dominance as consumers move from the desktop to mobile devices. The numbers within the Facebook filing for its IPO were certainly impressive. Nothing really unexpected within the tech community, but the traditional media will of course lap it up with stories of billionaires and world domination.
I want to stay focused on Facebook’s mobile strategy with the company themselves admitting in their filing that it was the area with the biggest potential, but also a huge threat to their business going forward.More and more people (450 million) are using Facebook on their mobiles but with no revenue streams and with Facebook unable to own the biggest platforms (they belong to Andoid and iOS) the future is slightly uncertain. As they say themselves:
“We do not currently directly generate any meaningful revenue from the use of Facebook mobile products. Accordingly, if users continue to increasingly access Facebook mobile products as a substitute for access through personal computers…our revenue and financial results may be negatively affected”.
In truth, Facebook have been in this tight corner for the last couple of years and they have been making some great strides (including their own rumored phone and mobile operating system), but as the story of the IPO shows there are still a lot of unanswered questions that investors will need to know about the future…
Facebook Only Owns The Desktop
Since it started, Facebook has been a huge success first and foremost on desktops. They have over 400 million mobile users and that side of the business has been booming for the last twelve months. But in terms of revenue, nearly 100% comes from people clicking on ads or playing games while using the platform on desktops.
Consumer browsing habits are fast moving from desktops to mobiles though and Facebook finds itself in the tricky position of trying to navigate this change and find a solution that works across all the mobile platforms. They are clearly in the phase of acquiring as many mobile users as possible and are doing this with as much success as they did the desktop. However, making money from those users is going to be tricky because location based services, targeted mobile advertising and other mobile revenue streams have just not really taken off.
Facebook Eating Its Own Revenues
While it might seem like a great thing that Facebook users are moving in increasingly large numbers from the desktop to mobile devices (including tablets), that will start hurting their own revenue as time goes on. To put it simply, there are ads on the desktop that a lot of people click on while no such ads exist yet on mobiles.
There is no doubt that Facebook will start to monetize mobile later this year and open up new revenue streams, but for now Facebook is actually cannibalizing their own revenues by improving their mobile offerings. It will be interesting to see if and when Facebook turn on their mobile ad platforms and what they look like.
Facebook Deal with Apple Is Inevitable
The IPO filing mentions the biggest threat as being the fact that Facebook is reliant on two of the biggest platforms in iOS and Android. As they say themselves:
“We are dependent on the interoperability of Facebook with popular mobile operating systems that we do not control, such as Android and iOS, and any changes in such systems that degrade our products’ functionality or give preferential treatment to competitive products could adversely affect Facebook usage on mobile devices.”
As there is very little chance of Google and Facebook ever working together in a meaningful way then the only option is really Apple. They are, of course, already in bed with Twitter baked in to their iOS5 operating system, but there is no reason why Facebook shouldn’t be more deeply integrated into iOS.
It would make both Apple and Facebook more powerful and they have been very close to a deal of this nature in the past only for it to break down at the last minute. It won’t be easy for either side but the companies will eventually strike a deal and declare Android as the common enemy.
The Five Year Plan
Despite all the problems and perceived threats, Facebook have been making great strides in the last year in terms of getting their mobile strategy together. Their apps have improved drastically, they have beautiful tablet versions of their sites and they have accumulated a huge amount of mobile users.
The desktop is still kind, but Facebook will need a strong five year plan that sees at least 30 or 40% of their revenues coming from mobile. It’s a very serious challenge and if I was investing, it would be my biggest fear but based on Facebook’s track record and their huge new pot of money, it is a challenge that I’m pretty sure they can pass with flying colors.
The vast majority of users are still only getting used to their Facebook Timeline, and the fact is that it will be mandatory for everybody within the next week or so. The first thing that people notice is the cover photo and the new flashy design, but there are tons of little tricks and tips that you can use to enhance your Facebook experience. Given that Timeline is essentially a picture of everything you do in your life, you will probably want to make yourself look as well as you possible can and avail of some of these cool new features that are available…
Subscribers
This was a subtle change that Facebook introduced a couple of months ago. You don’t have this switched on by default, but by turning it on you can bypass the problems you have with too many people sending you friend requests. You now only have to have your real friends and you can allow other people to simply subscribe to your updates. Your subscribers don’t need to see everything you update either as the options allow you to customize every single thing they see. To activate subscribers, simply go in to the subscriber tab on Timeline and then click on “settings”.
Tagging Photos To Map
You can upload photos from the various mobile versions of Facebook, but you can also retrospectively add photos to your map on Timeline. It’s a great way of tracking where you have been around the world and when. Improving your map will become addictive with the more photos and locations you add over time the better it gets.
Life Events
Life events are new on Timeline and they allow you to paint a picture of the major things that have been happening in your life like getting a job, relationships, moving house or starting a hobby. Remember that these will all be dated and added to your Timeline at the relevant time so it’s a great way of keeping track of all the big moments in your life and looking back at a future date. You can also add events retrospectively.
Pimp Your Photos
The Timeline photo is obviously something that you can play around with a lot to create a unique look for your page, but you might not be a graphic designer or have the eye for creating something truly stunning. Luckily Schweppes have launched an app that does all the hard work for you and allows you to create stunning Timeline cover photos. The video explains how it works and you can check out the app itself here.
Hide Stuff From Your Timeline
As soon as you start using Timeline you are going to realize that there is stuff that you never want to appear so publicly for the world to see. The nature of the layout means that people can scan back over everything you have done for a number of years and find the geeky or drunk photos you posted way back in the day. Luckily you can click on the little pencil beside any individual item you spot and choose to hide it forever from your public Timeline.
Hide The Sidebar
Facebook is currently doing everything it possibly can to keep your attention within the site. The ticker (the little mini real time news feed in the top right hand corner) and chat appear on every single page and they keep you on the site. They can also be very annoying and highly distracting as you probably don’t want to know what song somebody is listening to or what article they’ve just read. Luckily one simple little click of a button on the bottom right of the screen will remove the ticker and chat and give you a purer Facebook experience.
Block People From Seeing Your Timeline
If you really don’t want somebody to see your Timeline at all you can go through a series of steps to restrict who sees what. Once you have clicked on the privacy settings you can then enter the names of the people that you want to block. Once you have done that you can head over to your Timeline and click on “view profile as” which will show you what your profile will look like when viewed by a particular person.
Change Your Cover Photo On The Go
With the main cover photo acting as the main feature on your profile it can be a nice tip to change this while on the go. By simply firing up any of the Facebook apps and heading over to your profile, you can then click on the photo icon and snap a photo that will instantly appear on your Timeline. A great way of letting people know what is happening with your life while on the go.
Play Beautiful Full Size Videos
If you have shared (or somebody else has shared to your Timeline) a video then you can click the little star beside it that will allow you to “resize” the video. This simple action means that the video will then appear full size on your Timeline forever going forward (unless you change it back of course). It’s a simple way of showing off great content and making your Timeline look more unique. This also works for photos.
Control What Appears On Timeline Of Others
The most important place to go on your Timeline is “Activity log” which allows you to control what is happening on your Timeline and what gets shared. You can also chose to remove stuff that you have been tagged in, remove the post from Timeline completely or even mark it as spam. This is the best place to go if you are worried what other people are posting on their Timeline about you.
You may remember back two months ago, we covered a campaign where two girls created a hiring campaign where they told advertising agencies, “hire us or we’ll get married“. After a lot of attention, blog coverage, and over 10,000 Facebook likes later, one of the two girls involved, Charli Hoffmann, has created a new idea involving Spotify’s integration with Facebook.
Called ‘Spotify your status‘, it basically allows those who have the app installed onto their profile to select music that reflects their status update. Through identifying key words that you type, a list of songs are selected for you to accompany your status update, the idea that a song will convey a message more than a simple status update.
Frankly, I’m not a user of Spotify and the idea of my Facebook friends seeing my (questionable) taste in music has meant that I’ve avoided it so far. But it does tap into the idea of people linking youtube clips with status updates – usually when they’re announcing something important – so I could easily name a few of my friends who would use this app, especially if its integration is as seamless as it appears. Others will more than likely avoid it if it ever comes to fruition, but if you’re interested and want to see how it could work, have a look at the video below. (Note: there’s no sound in the video except for when songs are being played)
We’ve seen all sorts of brands thanking their fans for reaching certain milestones; the latest is KLM who reached a million fans recently and wanted to give a little back to their loyal Facebook community. Following on from Cadburys and Heineken creating videos for reaching the million fans mark, this one is fairly simple and straightforward and shows the everyday people who work at KLM saying thanks. It’s a great way of humanizing the business and showing some of the normal people who work there rather than having a huge flashy promotion.
KLM have shown countless times just how much they understand social media with the likes of this airplane campaign, this smart Twitter campaign, and also some excellent customer service. Watching this video would make me feel happy to be a KLM fan, and want to engage with the page even more so you could say that is probably job done.
With Facebook’s IPO ready to happen this week, there has been a push towards increasing advertising on their site. We’ve already been subjected to advertising and sponsored posts located on the right hand side and in the news ticker respectively, but now they’re including sponsored stories in image viewer.
This morning, many users may have noticed a change to the layout of the image viewer on the site. Instead of the likes and comments being located below the photo, they are now located on the right-hand side of the photo. Visually, this layout is a lot easier on the eye since you can now see all of its content together.
However, looking underneath the likes and comments, you can see that advertising is taking advantage of this new reshuffle. Located underneath your comments are sponsored stories and advertisements, placed in a prime location for those flicking through your album collection to see.
While Facebook has chosen a clever area to integrate their advertisements (visual material is always more appealing to click on and explore than simple text), it does leave you wondering where these advertising opportunities will end.
It feels more like Facebook is shoehorning them into every section they can find in order to generate further revenue and you can see a situation arising where users will feel annoyed about their inclusion.
Despite potential grievances, Facebook normally come out the other side unscathed whenever they make a change but since the company will have public investors to appease sometime in the future, the likelihood of similar advertising appearing in other sections of the site could be higher than we expect.
When Mark Zuckerberg announced at f8 last September that Facebook would be expanding its Open Graph to do more than just ‘Like’, we didn’t know exactly how this would be fused with our profiles. Facebook want us to share as much as possible, such as what movies we’re watching, what songs we’re listening to, what books we’re reading and so on. Zuckerberg describes it as ‘Frictionless Sharing’ – a way of apps integrating with your Timeline seamlessly.
Last week, Facebook unveiled 60 apps that would be seamlessly integrated into users profiles, and some of these apps are a great way to truly personalise your Timeline. So with Facebook making Timeline compulsory for all users, there’s no better time to run through some of the best apps so far.
Pinterest
Pinterest is a fantastic way of personalising your timeline by showing your style, humour, fashion sense, interests and other things you love. Each time you ‘Like’ or ‘Re-pin’ something on Pinterest, as well as creating your own boards and pins on Pinterest.com, it gets automatically added to your Timeline (Twitter sharing is also integrated here). What’s best about Pinterest and all of these Timeline apps is the little box that gets automatically stuck onto your timeline, giving a glimpse of the past few items you have Liked/Read/Watched.
Facebook seem to be reserving the right side of your Timeline for these Apps, thereby leaving the left side free for all the content from you and your friends – wall posts etc. A nice design choice, considering the possible information overload there could have been.
The Guardian
One of the most revered news organisations in the world have built a great app that replicates their famous website very faithfully. You are only asked once to install and approve the app and from then on, every single story you read will be pushed to your friends ticker and onto your Timeline. A strange concept to adjust to initially, but it becomes second nature if you read a lot of articles during the day.
If one of your friends is reading/watching an article, you will see a handy little ‘Read/Watch’ icon in your ticker, letting you go straight to the story. The Guardian aren’t the only newspaper trying to become the coveted social news leader - The Washington Post Social reader has already become a massive hit, as has Yahoo! News and The Independent.
Soundcloud
Soundcloud shows you all the music your friends are listening to, letting you immediately listen to that very song or playlist your friends are. Already, it is proving to be a great way to find some unexpectedly great artists and user-created playlists. Spotify and Rdio have also got great apps with solid Facebook integration.
As with most of these Timeline apps, it’s very early days, but music apps have the potential to be massive when more people flood in and start engaging with them.
Foodily
For those of the culinary persuasion, Foodily is a must have. It is integrated with foodily.com by asking you what you want to cook. It shows what your friends are cooking and what they like. It’s a great way of finding new recipes and ingredients. As usual, your activity is shown in your friends’ news feed.
Foodily is a lovely app but it’s one that I can’t see myself using as much as others, for the simple fact that it’s not as natural as say, listening to a song or reading a story with an app.
Rotten Tomatoes by Flixster
Rotten Tomatoes one of the largest aggregators of movie reviews in the world and they have done a fantastic job of merging their massive website together with Timeline. At rottentomatoes.com, you can login with one click, and immediately see what your friends have watched, rated or recommended. If you see a movie you have recently watched, you can rate it or Like it. Once you have rated a movie, it’s automatically posted onto your Timeline in a little section dedicated only to Rotten Tomatoes.
Overall, apps for Timeline are a massive leap forward for Facebook’s Open Graph and for users. If you compare and contrast Timeline to the profile pages we had just six months ago, the difference is incredible. We have masses of rich, dynamic content, accessed on our Timeline with real ease and organised very well.
As Timeline rolls out to everyone, we will only see these apps grow as more developers and companies start to take advantage of the huge reach they can have. We have only scratched the surface with how these apps are merging with our profiles.
For some, the idea of Frictionless sharing is fantastic – approve once and everything you do from then on will be pushed to your Timeline, making it much easier to share and enjoy content with your friends. For others, it will no doubt add more discontent regarding Facebook and privacy issues. For example, does every user know that everything they watch, read or listen to is being shared with their friends? For those who are uneasy with all of this sharing, every app can be removed from your profile so that nothing will be shared.
There is no doubt that Facebook are rapidly moving towards their goal of open sharing and tight integration with the entire web, it’s up to each user to decide how much they want shared. If you want to try out some of the launch apps, go onto the Facebook apps page and see what’s on offer.
February 29th only comes around every four years and while there isn’t anything noteworthy about that day apart from that last fact, it’s could become a exciting date for brands and businesses if the latest rumours are to be believed.
Business Insider are reporting that Facebook is in the process of launching Timeline for Brand pages with an official announcement to be made on February 29th, when the social media site holds its invitation only Facebook Marketers Council.
With the company making all users switch over to the new timeline format, the next logical step is to allow brand pages access to the same features. Considering the narrative style look of Timeline, brands will have to find different ways of engaging with their audience with the new format.
One of the sources told Business Insider that “At Facebook they pushed back the launch of Timeline for brands to the end of February….Those two pieces of information [the council and the pushing back of Timeline for brands] are too much of a coincidence.”
Looks like a lot of brands and marketers will be learning about the features of Timeline on personal accounts to figure out the best way of working it for brands. The obvious customisation feature will be the cover photo which will result in a number of creative attempts, but factors like the left-right presentation of posts and status updates, the chronological element of Timeline and the ability to find favourite moments or posts and highlight them on your wall, will certainly feature in the strategy of all social media marketers.
Car brands always come up with large innovative real world stunts for their launches and the latest comes from BMW who were launching their latest model in South Africa. Players were asked to connect their Facebook account to an iPad which they then used to steer a car around a track which was on a giant screen in a city center location.
People taking part could win prizes in the real world for the fastest times by getting to the top of the leader board and the racing game was the perfect way to showcase the interior of the car and steering wheel.
All the scores were also pushed back in to Facebook which would have increased the reach of the campaign and built even more awareness around the new launch. The only slight problem I have with this campaign is that I am not getting the chance to play it because I would absolutely love to!
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Now, for the possible revamp. The first notable change is the cover photo. This would be the biggest visual area brands could utilise. The entire header of the page is ready to be filled with a banner ad displaying the latest offer, product or just showing the brand’s visual identity.
Known for their slick advertising campaigns, their Timeline could provide a plethora of visual ideas for the brand. One thing Facebook could also integrate is its frictionless sharing applications. So, for example, Nike could pin their latest Likes and Pins on Pinterest, or share what movies they Like. 
With a Timeline page, their Facebook presence could be dramatically transformed. In fact, the Timeline cover photo is perfectly suited to things such as cars. Car companies could display their latest model in a massive banner ad at the top of their page. Apps could be integrated with the page, bringing much higher engagement with current fans.
So there you have it, just a wild guess as to what Facebook’s rumoured new brand pages might look like. Do you think they will in fact use the Timeline style? Also, will they integrate apps on the page like our own profiles? Only time will tell, but it seems certain that brand pages will receive a long overdue revamp very soon.
