At the start of the year, Facebook rolled out it’s new Timelines layout for user accounts with a lot of positive feedback indeed. Now it’s the turn of Pages to get a design overhaul, and Facebook have applied a very similar aesthetic.
In my opinion it’s a significant improvement for Pages, which have felt a bit neglect recently.
If you’re a Page owner and you’re using it to promote your business, product or service, then you’ve probably tested a few ways to optimise your page so it generates more Likes, engages with visitors as much as possible, and converts some of them into a prospect mailing list (or another action).
Traditionally, this has been done using a Fangate - a simple app that defines a page that visitors to your Page see when first viewing (before they hit Like), then a confirmation page when they Like it, after which they’re directed to the Wall / Feed.
The theory behind this is that it increases Likes because you can use your Fangate to include a clear message defining your business, and a gaudy big red arrow pointing at the Like button.
Like many (often forgotten) great learnings from Direct Marketing, it works. If you haven’t been doing this over the past year (at least) then you’re either not concerned about increasing your Facebook traffic, or you’re too concerned about presenting an overly clean UX on a (formerly quite clumsy) Facebook Page structure.
To give you an idea about the effect this has on numbers - one page I administrate received between 1 and 5 new Likes per week pre-Fangate, and gets more than 5 Likes per day with the Fangate.
But no more. The new Pages layout prevents you from using a Fangate. My guess is that this will significantly lower the number of Likes to many pages. So what’s a good route forward to replace them?
In my opinion, the answer is not to sit still and just accept lower stats. Test some new strategies and see for yourself what improves your results.
The main problem I think viewers faced when checking out a Page in the old layout, was that all they’d really see without a significant amount of exploration was the most recent 2-3 posts on the Page’s Wall. Often that can be pretty unrepresentative of either the business/product/service or the general atmosphere of the Page.
The new Page layout doesn’t suffer from the same problem, it has space with the header for your business logo, business name, and a short description to be visible straight away. That should actually clear things up quite a bit for confused visitors.
But more importantly, the new layout allows you to add a ‘Cover Picture’ - a header photo to run at the top of the page. Stop and think about this for a second because it’s actually very powerful. Before you assign it to being a funny photo of you and your cat, or to a generic shot of your shop front, or something equally meaningless - FORGET that this is a photo space and think of it instead as ADVERTISING space.
Run a product photo. Run a shot of your team. Run a promo shot that you had done of your most recent exhibition. Either way, use it for something meaningful and use something that has real impact.
Don’t forget, it’s also an opportunity to overlay more text. Here’s an example of a Facebook Page that I manage (www.facebook.com/theartcurator) and have already moved over to the new layout already. I’ve included a bubble above the Like button as a short statement about the service and as a CALL TO ACTION - that magical term we all forget with social media marketing.
Face it, you’ve got just a few seconds to convert a viewer from a passing Bouncer, to a dedicated Fan. So it’s important to make that first impression count. Keep your Wall full to the brim of interesting posts, videos, pictures and links. Don’t be boring, develop a personality in the way you talk. Post links to associated content on the web that’s worthy of your readers’ attention. Don’t just post links to your own site and your own products, share the love a little!
The new Facebook Page layout will be rolled out universally at the end of March - so get ready for it. Like any piece of marketing, TEST and ANALYSE.
Featured photo courtesy of owenwbrown.
