Your shop’s Facebook page is getting a makeover later this month, whether you want it to or not.  It would be a good idea to plan ahead so that you’re already updated the new design by the March 30 deadline.  If you don’t make the change, Facebook will do it for you (which is not the best way to optimize your page).

The new design is similar to the Timeline feature available to individuals for their personal profiles.  You might want to take a look at a few of these for inspiration, or at least orientation.   The first thing you’ll notice is the large, horizontal cover art image that fills the top part of the page.  It is essential that this be a vibrant, attractive photograph of your business.  You can change this image as often as you like, but it is important to spend some time selecting one that is successful in representing your shop. Facebook offers suggestions for selecting this photo on this help page.

While you’re working on finding new images, look for a profile picture that works well in the square space.  An excellent article about Facebook by Julie King from Canada One suggests putting a simple frame around this image to make it stand out. A tip: the profile picture will overlap with the bottom left corner of your cover art, so make sure that it won’t cover up anything important.

The top of your page shows up to 12 apps, one of which is your photos and one for your number of “likes.”  So what should you put in the other 10? A link to videos and events would be important.  Keep in mind that the first four will be given priority.

The timeline allows you to prioritize entries in an entirely different way, hovering over story and clicking on the star to make it wide, or the pencil to “pin it” to the top of your page, or to hide or delete it entirely. The pinned post will be the leading story for one week, even if you add lesser stories.

There is also now an administration panel with the statistics from your site, which is also allows you to respond to comments posted on your timeline. This activity log will give you a good idea of who is visiting your page, and what thoughts they are sharing.

The final main difference is that customers can contact you privately through using messages.  These will not be posted on the site for everyone to read.

There are a number of good articles about these important changes on Facebook that you might find useful. One is the Quicksprout blog by Niel Patel, and the other is the video course provided by Facebook. Facebook has clearly put a lot of effort into creating the new way that business pages will look, and hopefully these changes will prove to be beneficial.

Happy Retailing,

Carol “Orange” Schroeder