“If the original Facebook was the first five minutes [of a
conversation] and the stream was the next 15, what I want to show you
today is the rest–the next few hours of a deep engaging conversation.” –
Mark Zuckerberg, f8 2011
11
we were presented with some groundbreaking platform updates and
partnerships, which would shape the way we engage in social channels as
end users, technical solution providers and marketers. Notably, a major
release at the time was Timeline for Facebook users.
Working in the area of brand marketing, I find this quote from that
release rings just as true with the announcement of the the brand
Timeline and new products at fMC (Facebook Marketing Conference) in New
York on February 29th.
Sheryl Sandberg, COO of
Facebook, opened the event by sharing some
moments in which connections through the Facebook Platform have had a
dramatic impact on government, family and institutions.
Chris Cox, VP of Product, echoed Mark’s original sentiments in his
keynote today – this time expanding from the f8 presentations,
discussing how the Facebook evolution more directly relates to brands
and marketers.
Mike Hoefflinger, Director of Global Business Marketing at
Facebook,
delivered a compelling keynote, which gave a deeper overview of the
platform changes and clearly marking Facebook’s positioning going
forward from today. His delivery addressed the major announcement that
Timeline is now available for brands and is “the richest, most
customized marketing canvas we’ve ever built.” The point he clearly
presented is that more and more Pages are going to become “mission
control” for businesses to engage with consumers across all areas of the
platform. We also received an overview of the new advertiser solutions
to help brands achieve scale across the platform being offered from
Facebook which we will provide an overview of later in this post.
Brand Pages Product and Timeline Updates
Below are some of the updates being released as part of the new brand
pages product. This includes an entire page redesign and functionality
updates, giving brands Timelines.
- Friend Activity is now surfaced on a brand’s Timeline. If someone
likes or comments, stories of how your friends engage with the brand are
surfaced. A more relevant and personal experiences can be delivered for
each user of the page by being able to see how their friends are
engaging.
- A new views and apps section helps users navigate to other parts of
your page. “Tabs” which were formerly on the left hand side of the page
have been replaced with the ability to select “views” across the top of
the page. The photo application always shows as the first app option,
and the page owner can control which other 3 immediately show to users
in the same row with a custom designed icon. In total, through an
expanded list option, up to 12 views can be surfaced to the users.
- The composer now provides the ability for brands to “pin” a story.
These pin anchors posts at the top of the page by default for 7 days,
unless refreshed. Marketers are still encouraged post frequently through
their content strategy, while having one main story featured throughout
the course of the content calendar.
- Page posts can be “starred.” Starring makes a post go full width
across the Timeline to prominently feature the story. Posts can also be
“hidden” from the public view, but still visible in the admins Activity
Log.
- Milestones are now an option in the composer. Page owners can add an
event, with a mandatory photo to feature relevant or key moments in the
brands history. These have a larger story format and help highlight
defining moments.
- Page owners can now change dates on posts to populate and manage timeline.
Brands can now assign a Cover Photo to show at the top of their
Timeline. This large creative canvas area, set at 851×315 pixels
provides an opportunity to create an immediate visual impact. It’s
important to note that there are policies
for brands related to how to use the platform and the Cover Photo,
which includes limitations on using this creative area for promotional
messaging and certain calls to action. The profile picture still exists,
and is the consistent representation that is used when the brand icon
is shown throughout the platform.
There are also a handful of updates when it comes to administering a
page as an owner. These include the “Activity Log,” which can be used to
manage Timeline and posts to control Timeline content. Also announced
is a new “messaging” option for users to connect directly, and
privately, with page owners to create a one-on-one dialogue. User
Insights management and notifications options are also enhanced in the
administration area.
As a page owner, you can preview and push your Timeline live at anytime. Note that your page will
automatically roll over to Timeline, if not performed manually, on March 30, 2012.
New Advertising Products
“This is where marketing on Facebook is going to feel
like the rest of Facebook.” – Mike Hoefflinger, Facebook’s Director of
Global Business Marketing
Facebook also announced their new advertising solutions for marketers
on the platform. Their key point through connecting Pages to the new
distribution opportunities is that we are no longer creating ad
messaging but providing the opportunity to deliver stories at scale and
the amplification to drive a return on investment.
The new advertising (or I guess I should say, “story”) distribution offerings include
Reach Generator,
Premium on Facebook and
Offers.
Reach Generator is an offering from
Facebook to increase distribution and provide more visibility and
ultimately brand favorability for brands. This enables brands to take
stories they post from their page (“mission control”) and gain
distribution by being featured on the right hand side of the home
screen. Facebook reported on average, brands reach about 16% of their
fans on a typical week through stories. The distribution and placement
of stories through Reach Generator provides the opportunity to push this
reach to 50% (and beyond) on a weekly basis and increase engagement
levels. This has been in beta for a few months, and Facebook reported
this story placement is providing double the engagement levels than
posts not being featured on the home screen.
Premium on Facebook is Facebook’s premier
offering for marketers on the platform and what they are stating is “the
most impactful way to distribute your content.”
Starting at the Page level again, this product allows a story, which
is created once to be distributed in multiple areas of the site for
maximum reach. These placements include:
- Right hand side of the home page (as noted above.)
- Eligibility for sponsored distribution in the Facebook Newsfeed.
- Facebook’s logout screen will now show stories and become another area of distribution.
- Distribution to mobile devices.
Sponsored stories in the newfeed are showing a
5-10x CTR
over placement in other areas of the site. Currently Facebook serves up
over 100 billion impressions daily through the newsfeed and it is where
people are expecting the stories in their life to be surfaced.
37 million Facebook users log out of the site every day (believe it
or not, people do log out) and this has traditionally been an untapped
area of real estate. Expect logout screen story distribution to be
available in April ’11, while newsfeed and mobile distribution is
already available. This announcement solidifies Facebook’s mobile
positioning as they distribute these stories at scale to the over 425
million mobile users.
Offers provide a way for brands to get
promotions in front of their more important customers. Offers can be
distributed through a story, featured and give users the opportunity to
claim the offer through 1 click, where it is then sent to their email
and mobile device. Along with this there is frictionless distribution
when you engage with an Offer.
As brand marketers, we all need to be master storytellers to drive
word of mouth at scale. It is also becoming critical to optimize your
business to coordinate content with the media teams. From a content
strategy perspective, marketers need to monitor and understand what does
and does not work to optimize their new Timelines and scale
opportunities. Equally important to drive this distribution, there needs
to be an awareness and a connection to when content reaches a certain
level of engagement with the media team so they can amplify the best
performing content through Facebook’s new products in a timely matter.
To sum up Facebook’s positioning… now is the time for
unsecured loans brand
marketers (whether they have before or not), to focus on leveraging the
power of the platform to engage in two-way conversations and deliver
rich social experiences that drive engagement and curate
stories
over time. This can be done through the the various Timeline story
types, custom experiences and a multitude of other ways. Facebook on
their end, has put a stake in the ground to be the command center for
businesses looking to engage consumers in a social manner at scale.
With 800+ million active users and the most advanced owned, earned and
paid media products on the market, Facebook is bar none becoming more
and more critical for brands. Throughout the day, Facebook and its key
bad credit loans clients touched on the complexity of social business efforts and the
need for trusted partners that can deliver the strategy, management,
technologies and services in this ever-evolving ecosystem.
