Getting my Facebook Business Page noticed - A Guest Post by @avi_kaye

 

- A Practical Guide

Or, how I worked hard to get to my first 1,000 fans

There are any number of guides on Internet about what you should do to promote your page. They boil down to ‘engage your fans’, ‘post quality content’ and ‘give a reason to return’. Nice, but not what you would call very useful. You KNOW that you need to engage your fans, and that they are looking for quality content - the question is what, when and how.

So we’ve decided to give you a few practical tips on what and how you should post.

1. Status or Link?

You may not know this, but Facebook grades the content of your posts, and gives them each an Edgerank. I won’t go into the details of Edgerank (that’s for a different post), but it’s important to know that posting statuses aren’t as effective as posting images, for example. The higher your grade, by the way, the higher the likelihood that your updates will appear in your fans stream, and that is what this is all about.

The best thing to post are Videos, followed by Pictures, Links and Statuses.

 

 

 

By the way, if you REALLY want Facebook to like your video or image - make sure you write something about the link.

OK, but what do I do?

Well, what’s your page about?

Is it a restaurant? Post a video showing how you make your special dish. Post pictures of your menu and venue. Post links to recipes that you love, or that your customers sent in.

Are you running a bookstore? Post movie trailers that are based on books (Harry Potter, Lord of the Rings and so on), post pictures of your book covers or favorite authors, and post links to their websites or blogs.

Have you got a moving business? Videos of trucks, pictures of the New York skyline, your favorite stop along the way - anything goes.

Got more tips as to what people can post on their pages? Leave them in the comments!

2. Ask people to like your posts

This is a very important step - without people actively seeking out your posts, liking and sharing them, there’s a good chance that they won’t be seen by fans of your page. Facebook makes it difficult for newcomers to break the viscous cycle - you need to be seen in order to be seen.

OK, but what do I do?

First of all, your real-life friends that are also your Facebook friends - ask them to go to your page and like and share your posts.

 

 

Then ask your Facebook friends to do the same, and ask them to ask their friends to join in the fun - and your posts will start getting enough juice to run under their own power and Facebook will start showing them in the news feed as top stories, and the Ticker

 

 

Got more tips as to how to ask people to like and share? Leave them in the comments!

3. It matters when you post

As you already know, your post doesn’t stay in your fans’ news feed for very long, so timing is critical. I mean, if all your fans are on Facebook at two in the morning (maybe you cater to the younger crowd), and you update your page at around 10 in the morning, well, your posts just won’t be seen.

OK, so what do I do?

Go to your Business Page, and click ‘View Insights’. That’s the link on the top right that gives you a bit of.. well.. insight, into how the page works.

 

 

Now there’s tons of information we can get from the insights - and we’ll get back to this - but right now, we want to concentrate on one specific piece of information. Check out the small ‘See Details’ link (yeah, they made it really small).

 

 

You’ll be able to see when your posts got the most interactions - the most likes and comments. And that’s when it’s the best time for you to post. There are usually two or three times during a day that your post will get a good amount of attention.

Got more tips that will help people promote their Business Page? Let us know in the comments

Good Luck!

TDD Or Not TDD Guest blog by @avi_kaye

 

Test Driven Design, or TDD, is one of the leading development methodologies in the world today. The premise is simple - developers test their code while writing it to prevent bugs from occurring. In TDD, developers first write a test, which fails, then they write the code to pass the test.
Remember that sinking feeling when it’s getting close to the release date? Between developers writing code, QA testing code, and developers writing more code to fix bugs, the launch time just keeps getting pushed back, while all the time customers are waiting to get their software. That’s exactly the kind of situation TDD prevents. The QA gets code that is already extensively tested, and when a bug does make it through the cracks, developers can find the problem much faster.
So if you want to be able to manage your release cycles better, ship higher quality software and improve the productivity of your development team - TDD is the way to go.
To learn more, check out the upcoming Three Day TDD .NET Course presented by Lior Friedman, Agile Coach and software craftsman.

 

Tal Druyan

And then came @MyWebees

As  a social media expert that wakes up with Twitter, lives on Facebook and hangs out on Linkedin, I had my own little dream... Obviously, I’m addicted, so as you’ve probably figured out ;), my wish is connected to the online world.
Well, it’s easier say than done, but I’ve always wanted to connect them all together... From Stumble to Twitter, Tweet from Facebook... Free to do what I want from where I want. With a little time, and using the various tools that are available for managing all your networks (Hootsuite, TweetDeck, I managed to combine and merge the streams. Some of the tools are very good, others are barely up to the task.

But there was one thing that I couldn't do. No application or client had a solution for the problem of importing a blog or website into a Facebook company page. True, there were some workarounds, which I used for my customers. Applications, FBML, iFrame - but there wasn’t an end-to-end solution.
All I wanted was to put my blog in my page. Was that so much to ask? And companies that I represent on Facebook? I wanted to bring their site to the customers and not the other way around. The customers are already on Facebook, so why can’t the website be there too???

And just before I start pulling my hair out :), along comes MyWebees, an application that brings your website to Facebook, and it literally only takes a few minutes. Don’t trust my word for it - Go try it... it’s real!!!! And the best part is, that I got to be in the team that promotes it. As you can imagine, I’m incredibly excited! 

MyWebees lets you embed your site on other websites, rather than working on bringing traffic to your site, you will be taking your site to where the traffic is.
A little bit about this application. With MyWebees, it’s easy to embed your website in your Facebook page, providing you with a simple and effective way to create exposure, drive traffic and subsequently generate more business via your website. Just a few short clicks, and your website will be available to the millions of Facebook users, with all the functionality and user experience of the original site!

 

Tal Druyan

Is your Kanban worth a new iPad? @TargetProcess

You still here?
Good - then you know what Kanban is :). It’s not that simple - heck, if you would have asked me two years ago, I would have said ‘WTF is Kanban? Come to think of it, WTF is an iPad?’ :)

Well, time flies, and I found myself representing Agile companies, Agile consultants and spreading news of Agile tools, such as Kanban.

And no, Kanban isn’t a clever play on words, it’s from Japanese - and simply means ‘Signboard’ - and Kanban boards are used to manage projects, in many industries around the world.
And what’s the BEST way to get more people to hear about Kanban, and learn how it can help them? That’s right -

TargetProcess is sponsoring a Kanban competition on Facebook. Just upload your Kanban board, collect likes by inviting your friends to like it - and one of the two submissions with the largest amount of likes will win a new iPad.

Sorry, at the moment the competition is for US residents only.

So get out your iPhone, Nexus, or webcam, and show us what you’ve got!

 

Tal Druyan

How to give your Facebook Notes a face lift?! by @butterknife_sm

At ButterKnife, we have a rule. When we find cool stuff that helps social media efforts, we share it... We don’t keep secrets, because, believe it or not, we want to see everyone succeed.
The latest cool thing has to do with Facebook Notes. There are tons of Facebook users that write notes; and one of the most annoying things in writing notes, as opposed to writing blogs, is that you don’t have a lot of design options while writing notes. Bolding your title or underlining important stuff is more or less it. Forget about adding a video, or enlarging a word. Those of you who write notes are probably nodding your head by now :)
You want to know something? You can make your notes look as good as a blog post, with a bit of work and behind-the-scenes magic. Facebook gives you all the HTML tags you can use on your note - the Facebook Notes Cheatsheet.

All you need to do, is to copy the tags that you want to use from the Facebook Notes Cheatsheet, and presto! Your notes will look much better. No, you don’t need to know HTML. Just copy and paste, and away you go!
So save the Facebook Notes Cheatsheet, and the next time you write a note - open it, and have fun.
Just a tip - if you use an HTML tag like <big>. for example, which enlarges the text, you can paste the same tag a few times - it will enlarge the text more. How? Instead of using <big> once at the beginning of the test you want to enlarge, use as many as you want <big><big><big> your text and don’t forget to close it 3 times as well with </big></big></big>
Don’t forget to preview your note before you publish it, so you can see the effects for yourself :)
If you have questions feel free to ask … here or on our Facebook  page or send us a message on our website

Good luck …
Avi Kaye and Tal druyan

Obsessed with Facebook?! “Here, in a visual nutshell, are some highlights about Facebook usage, 2010 trends and adoption numbers” @butterknife_sm

Via: Online Schools

Tal Druyan

Better Facebook! brought by @ButterKnife_SM

Well, I’ve just installed the better Facebook plug-in for Firefox, after reading through what this tool has to offer, and it has a few really cool features. So here’s what I think (I’ll try it for Chrome as well later, and let you know if there are any major differences)
So The Better Facebook is a FREE plug-in (you can make a donation if you like) that adds tons of functionality and a lot of great features to your Facebook account!
For Example:
Once you read every story on a page, just click 'Mark All Read, and they will be hidden the next time you view or refresh the page. But no worries - When new comments are added they will show back up! This helps you keep track of conversations that you otherwise might have missed ;) I like it already….
Besides, you can always click ‘Show’ and see your hidden stories again.
Another feature, is moving all posts by known applications to their own specific tabs. Now I personally am not sure how much I like this feature, but you can change this in Options->Feed Filter.
You can also change options to your Facebook page,  by clicking the 'Options' button in the header above!
I’m going to start using it right away, and promise to keep you guys posted and it’s recommended to  "Like" the Better Facebook page for more information and support!
By the way, I’m not associated with this plug-in in any way or form, and am not responsible for it. It’s just something that someone recommended to me, and I am passing on the news ….
If you like it, I’d love to know!

Tal Druyan