Facebook Brand Pages Get Timeline Layout, New Business Features

Facebook has opened its new profile design, Timeline, to business, brand and organization pages.

According to Facebook, besides the addition of the cover image and the ability to choose which posts to highlight, the update offers some brand specific features including the option to pin posts to the top of the profile for a week and a new dashboard called the Admin Panel where page stats, notifications and messages will be displayed, and where page managers can feature, hide or delete posts. Fans can now send private messages to brands as well.

TechCrunch points out that brands that have a long, and preferably visual history, will benefit most from timeline, since it makes it easy to go back in time to a company's early days. For example, The New York Times' brand page has an image of the inaugural edition of the paper from September 1851, when it was called "New-York Daily Times." (with a period after Times).

The new pages are also much more focused building a business' fan base through fans Facebook friends. When you go to a brand's page, the first thing you will see, at the top right-hand side of the feed, is a widget where you'll see stories about posts your friends have "Liked," as well as any posts that your friends posted regarding that brand. For example, when I went to The New York Times' page I saw that nine of my friends liked it, and that my friend Allison had posted a link from a Times story about hot dogs to her profile.

During a Timeline demonstration session attended by VentureBeat, product director Gokul Rajaram said, per VentureBeat,"We've seen that most businesses have a core group of loyalists, but those loyalists also have friends. We've made it easier for people to connect with a business through the lens of their friends… It's a much more personalized experience."

The new brand pages aren't compatible with mobile Facebook apps yet, but they will be soon. Businesses can begin converting their Facebook pages on Wednesday. The update is not optional: Those pages that have not switched will be forced to make the change on March 30.

Timeline was announced in September 2011 at the company's F8 conference. Personal profiles were first to get the Timeline update. In late January, the company said the new design would become mandatory for all users in the coming weeks.

Check out Facebook's introduction for the Timeline brand pages in the video below.

WATCH:

A featured post on ice cream maker Ben & Jerry's Timeline-enabled Facebook page:

Want to see some awesome Timeline designs that users have created for personal profiles? Take a look at our slideshow of 13 favorites below.

Comments

[TimelineCoverDotCo]

09:33 AM on 04/26/2012

I've found out that a cover with the dimensions 863px X 315px gives the best results and the image is not so pixelated.
At http://www.timelinemods.com/ we have over 2300 unbranded timeline covers, all of them in this size.

[TheSocialMediaCafe]

05:59 PM on 03/04/2012

This is my workaround for being able to direct people to your landing pages on facebook http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qjMAsvaRxw8 hope it helps someone

[SNVBiz]

01:25 AM on 03/04/2012

Well I've been "friends" with Captain Morgan since 04.

www.bizinverter.com

[beerbagger]

10:48 AM on 03/01/2012

Cool now we can have like a real friendship with these fun loving "brands."

[ClubStyle DJ]

09:15 AM on 03/01/2012

Very surprised they're not trying to charge us for it...

[BryanNagy]

08:08 AM on 03/01/2012

Excited/disappointed with the new Timelines. I was hoping brands could still choose their landing pages.

What I've seen from the new Timelines and what it means for brands:

https://bryannagy.wordpress.com/2012/03/01/facebook-announces-new-brand-timelines/

[Victor Stanescu]

08:03 AM on 03/01/2012

The new update of the Timeline for brands change was brought by Facebook to favorite their adds campaign! The need to make profit now as an IPO right?!

All of these new changes are not meant to help the little guys, the small companies, unless they want to spend some money with Facebook.

We will miss the Default Landing Tab and all look so much..

But there are some nice added features like "pin" a post and the message button:
http://www.vectorash.ro/facebook-timeline-brand-pages/

[David Husnian]

06:44 PM on 03/08/2012

Hi Victor,

I'd disagree and say that a Timeline makes it easier for the small guy to compete because it lets you (some might say forces you to) be more engaged, connected and personal with prospects and customers.

Small guys like you and I are usually much better at that than big, faceless, bureaucratic corporations so it really levels the playing field a bit.

Now, while my first reaction was negative to the loss of a default landing page, after thinking about it a bit and doing some creative brainstorming I realized that this is actually letting me (forcing me but I'm glad for it) market in ways that I should have been doing before and wasn't, at least as much as I should.

I will also admit that I usually used direct links to my Facebook landing pages even if the page was the default so the impact of this isn't as great for me.

I did that because I targeted campaigns to a specific Facebook page and if I went to the default page, if I changed the default page then my links and traffic wouldn't be going to the page I wanted them to but if I used the direct link then they would still work.

But I will be changing some of my existing ones to be different after my realization of how much better they could be if I engaged more.

[Victor Stanescu]

11:48 AM on 03/09/2012

Hey Tom,

I guess we can agree to disagree :)

The only "positive" feature is that contact feature.

I know the old default tabs links work, but I would make a bet with you, that Facebook will slowly find a way to remove those.

There is nothing forcing you to be more engaging as you could have been before. A history of your posts doesn't make you want to post more. You could have done that in the old format as well :)

But only time and statistics are gonna tell in the end.

[msm0207]

05:10 AM on 03/01/2012

facebook used to be easy to navigate. They are making too much work out of it now. I have heard a lot of the people I communicate with say they are probably going to retire. Many of them hardly post any more.

[Nytowl68]

03:49 AM on 03/01/2012

They need to keep FB hip, like the original MySpace....before in became a cyber ghetto, that is.

[DanielCern]

03:39 AM on 03/01/2012

Web based social communication tools are expanding very fast expecialy in latest years. Because of that we also need to learn (using) the right communication tools that are solid and free and will give everyone an opportunity to manage their team, business, interests, linking, sharing... the way it is supposed to be in the 21th century.
Check this blog for more information:
http://blog.beezway.com/

[nikkitytom]

02:38 AM on 03/01/2012

My main complaint about facebook is that it links to many message boards ..... and if you're not really sharp about checking out a TINY little box at the bottom of the comment section, your comment will be AUTOMATICALLY posted on your Facebook page. I've had to clear out this junk a couple of times ...... now I watch everything like a hawk.

Facebook also has PUBLIC as DEFAULT for almost every feature and makes it very hard to locate how to disable this nasty feature. I've decided not to put any photos on because of the "tag" feature. I don't want to embarass friends who may not want to be tagged.

Big Brother ..... FaceBook ..... wake up and smell the coffee. And don't post anything you don't want displayed to the entire world.

[marcyw]

02:27 AM on 03/01/2012

I wish they would leave facebook alone. Timeline sucks.

[babettekittie]

02:10 AM on 03/01/2012

I willingly changed over to it. After a couple days I got used to it and it's not bad. It has a nice option for mapping, customizing, etc. I disagree with it being mandatory however. It's a lot like the "Ticker" they forced on certain accounts last year which turned out to have major security issues. The thing about privacy is that, you shouldn't put anything online that you aren't willing to tell the world! If you only have REAL friends and family on there then who cares? People who complain about this stuff are just wasting their time. FB has and will continue to do what they want.

[brew8jn]

01:34 AM on 03/01/2012

Well, the way I see it...the FB employees HAVE to keep changing things, or they probably wouldn't have a job! And I agree with some of the others on here, WHO has time?? I used to be on FB alot, now hardly ever..boring..and I have time to do so much more now than be on there reading how much money somebody saved at the grocery store, etc, etc...I like THIS much better..lol

[emily00011]

12:50 AM on 03/01/2012

I deleted everything on my account because I didn't want a timeline because it's nobody's business.

It is true that their business pages are extremely boring, but very predictable and follow the rest of the format of the site. Should just leave it alone. Companies will make them anyways. Just give it a little more time, FB will be mostly for people who want to promote or sell things. People who are trying to be "social" will realize there is nothing social about FB and start calling and meeting their friends instead.