Tag Archive for: facebook

Quick overview of Facebook Multi-Product Ads

Quick overview of Facebook Multi-Product AdsLately, you may have noticed multi-product ads on Facebook. They feature multiple images, each with its own linkable URL. Apparently they are seeing higher than normal results for less than normal cost. And they look pretty good too!

 

 

If you’re a small business owner, you should really pay attention. Facebook multi-product ads seems especially well-suited to retail shops (you could feature images of your most recent / best-selling items), restaurants, coffee shops, and service providers like salons, and photographers. Remember, each image links to its own page, so it is a chance to showcase different sections of your website. And you only pay for one ad,  even though there’s multiple images and links.Facebook Multi Product Ad

This is one of the newest and biggest things on Facebook at the moment, and I recommend jumping on board before everyone else does.

It took me a while to figure out how to make these, but I finally found a very simple, step-by-step set of instructions on the Facebook page. You can view the info here: https://www.facebook.com/help/382681505244772

Note that in order to take advantage of this new type of ad, you need to be using Facebook’s Power Editor. And you can only use Power Editor through the Google Chrome website browser. But it is amazing. Check it out!

Need some help? Please send me a message or leave a comment. Happy Facebooking!

Facebook left menu - Facebook Interest List

A few months ago, Facebook introduced ‘Interest’ lists. If you know me, you’ll know that I love lists; I have them for everything from steps to achieve clients’ goals, to what to pack for a camping trip, to just plain keeping my entire life in order.

Facebook Interest lists are great for two reasons. First, they allow you to organize the pages that you already like into lists, so that you can quickly and easily browse through those pages’ updates. And second, you can follow lists that other people have created, which probably include pages that you’ve never heard of before.

Facebook left menu - Facebook Interest ListYou may have an Interests section on the lefthand menu of your Facebook homepage; if so, click on “Add Interests”.

 

If not, the easiest way to add the Interests section is to click in the white box at the top of the page that says “Search for people, places and things” and enter the name of a page that you would like to add to an interest list. Once you are on that Facebook page, click on the drop-down arrow beside “”Message” and select “Add to Interest Lists” (see below). Then click “+ New List…”

Later, once you’ve created Interest lists, this is one way that you can add additional pages to the list.

 

Facebook Interests

A box will pop up; click on “Pages” on the lefthand side. Then start scrolling through the list of pages that you like and click on each page that you want to add to the list – a check mark will appear on each page that you have selected. Click “Next”, then add a name for the list and select who can see the list (public, friends or just you). Click “Done” and you are finished!

Now go to your Facebook homepage (click the Facebook icon on the upper lefthand corner) and on the lefthand menu you will see “Interests” with your newly created list. Click on the list to view updates from only the pages within the list, instead of your entire newsfeed.

To add a new Interest list, click on “Add Interests” on the lefthand menu and then follow one of the suggested lists, search for a list by keyword, or create a new list of your own.

And there you have it – how to organize the Facebook pages you follow using the Interest list.

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Click here to add my “Marketing Pages to Follow” Interest list. And if you have your own Interest list, feel free to post it in the comments section.

Have you tried out the new Facebook Pages app? For anyone who manages at least one Facebook page, this is a great addition, and even better for those of us who manage multiple pages. But it does have its limitations…

So what can you actually do with this app? Well, you can:

  • View page posts and filter them to show either only the page’s posts, or everyone’s posts
  • Like and comment on the page’s posts
  • Write a new post or share a photo
  • View a list of the people and pages who like the page
  • See new notifications
  • View a list of admins associated with the page
  • And the most important thing is the ability to view a simplified insights overview for the page

And the limitations?

  •  Much of what you can do with this app, you can also do on the regular Facebook mobile app (provided you have set up your page correctly), such as writing new posts, sharing photos and liking and commenting on posts
  • While you are able to view a list of page admins, you can’t change their authorizations or add or delete admins. Clicking on an individual admin simply takes you to their Facebook profile on the main Facebook app
  • The insights provided are very simple compared to the advanced insights available on the web version

So what do you think of the new Facebook pages app?

Photographer taking photo

Photographer taking photo

The other day, I visited a client who runs her own photography business. She does amazing work and gets great referrals by word of mouth but is looking to increase her rankings for some very specific keywords.

So I took a look at her website and made up a few suggestions, based on two different options: stay with her current website or trash it and start again (my recommendation is to trash it, but probably not possible until after the busy wedding season is over).

The client is using photobiz, a company that offers quick and easy websites geared especially to photographers. Her website looks great, due in large part to her amazing photographs. But the problem with the website is that every page has the same URL address. I have seen this before with other website services such as wix.

The beauty of these programs is that someone who is not very knowledgeable about websites and HTML can create a great looking website in a very short amount of time, without having to pay lots of money to a website developer. The downside to quick websites is that these companies often charge an ongoing monthly fee, in addition to your hosting costs, and the websites are not set up in a very SEO-friendly manner.

After some digging, I discovered that my client is unable to create unique page URL’s or link to her blog (hosted by another company) or Facebook page from the home page. Both of these are really important to having a search engine-friendly page (in fact, the blog should actually use the same URL).

So before you take the quick and easy route, do some research. Type the name of the website you are considering into Google, followed by “review”, and read the positives AND negatives that people have said about the service. If you need a website right now, maybe it’s best to use a quick website set-up service. But if you have time, or if you’re considering changing your website, make a list of what’s important to you and then ask someone who specializes in SEO what would be important to them.

We all love Facebook. It is where we post our pictures, spy on our friends’ lives, send messages, and respond to events. But there is also a lot of discontent with Facebook, for many reasons, one of which is the constant updates and changes to the way Facebook looks and operates.

Facebook CartoonThe newest proposed change (see, sometimes Facebook gives advance notice!) is the roll-out of the “timeline” layout for pages, with March 30th scheduled as the day when it all goes down.

The two most important things for businesses:

  1. The custom welcome landing tabs will no longer have the same impact, as users will automatically be taken to the timeline page. Viewing the welcome tab will require users to actually locate and click on the tab.
  2. Time to make another Photoshop image – the suggested size for Facebook cover photos is 850px wide by 315px high.

Are you excited about the change? Have you already switched your business pages over to the timeline view?