7 Tips for Improving Your Facebook Fan Page

When all Facebook pages were made to adopt Facebook’s new timeline interface, many didn’t find the change that interesting because that wasn’t exactly what they were expecting, since there were lots of changes to be made in the user interface design.

The new Facebook timeline totally changes the way content is displayed on your Facebook page. More than that it also affects the third party apps that you would have otherwise integrated with old pages to make it look “Awesome”.

Well, here is how you can improve your Fan page for good.

Following is a list of 8 pointers for you to remember and take care while managing your Fan Page.

Use Proper Cover Photo and Profile Photo

The first thing that anyone/everyone would see on your new Fan page is the Cover Picture and Profile Picture. It takes just 2 pictures to convince a user, if they should Like the page or not (i.e. to make a first impression). The dimensions of cover picture are 851px width and 315px height which is displayed at the top of your Facebook page.

It is important for you to choose the right cover photo as well as profile image. These are the two things that define the core brand value as well as generate interests to users depending upon how it is. This is essentially where most of your branding is done.

I don’t have to explain about the profile picture, but all you need to know is that it is equally important as cover picture and utmost care should be taking in selecting the most appropriate picture for both.

Generally, brand’s logo is used however you can also use it more creatively and use it to complement your cover photo like putting up a QR code for your website or app or any other relevant information (This is just a random example).

Custom Tabs

Thankfully, this feature still exists for users which allows Fan Page to have 12 custom pages displayed below your cover photo. Unlike the old ones, not all the tabs are visible from the home page and it is thus not very effective but still it doesn’t mean it is not useful.

You can put up your brand page or product info or even Web-page (not advisable) in these custom tabs. Now each tab, that includes an icon and title, can be customized as per your requirements.

Pro-tip: Have only relevant custom tabs which you think adds significant importance to your page.

These tabs work like navigation and are an excellent way to structure your Facebook page. For example, you can have a custom tab pointing to your products or services, for your blog, and another call to action such as email sign-up or perhaps an inquiry form or simple create a online playlist of your tracks if you are an artist.

Use of custom tab icons or thumbnails for each tab helps grab attention as well as improves visual appeal and usability.

Highlight Important Posts

You have some important post that you want to give extra importance? Highlight it!

By clicking on the star icon for each post you highlight it which allows you to give more focus to that selected posts.

Again, it is helpful in breaking down the monotony of the default double column layout of posts. The highlighted post is stretched to cover the full width of the page, making the post more prominent and visible to viewers.

Be it important updates, or good customer feedback, you can choose to highlight any post that you feel relevant and showcase it to your audience.

Use ‘Pin to Top’ Feature for sticking posts

You would know this that by default, new posts are displayed at the top of the timeline and older posts are pushed down. But you want a particular post to be on top so that it gets more visibility.

Then you can ‘Pin' it to top to create a sticky post that will always be displayed at the top of your timeline irrespective of any other post.

If you're promoting an offer or have an update that you want your new fans to see, you should definitely use this feature.

Take Advantage of Milestones

Timeline is used for creating milestones of bigger or major event about person or page. Thus, you create milestones on timeline regularly e.g. founded, launched, and other important events in your history.

Don’t keep on doing that every now and then, otherwise the importance of Milestone will be undermined.

You can specify your milestones that can include any dates from the past and associate posts with that but make sure it is something significant and big.

Vanity URL (Choose wisely)

Facebook lets you choose a custom URL for your page once your page has received at least 25 “likes”.

Custom URL offers the opportunity choose your brand name or another memorable name as the page address e.g. Facebook.com/your-brand-name. You can do this with the ‘change username’ link in your admin panel.

NOTE: A Username once selected and set, can’t be changed again. So think more than twice before finalizing any username because that will stick with the Fan-page forever.

Add Facebook Plugins to Your Website

The more users engage with your content, the better is your overall reach and chances of going viral. One of simplest ways to do this is by using social plugins on your website or blog that make it easy for your website visitors to share your content. There are too many options for this thing.

Facebook provides their share of plugins for your website and lot of third party apps provide different tabs and features which includes many other plugins – either way these plugins are a must have.

If you have any other points that can help improve Facebook Fan page, please let us know in the comments below.

Featured Image by: birgerking