The new Facebook layout and what it means for online marketing

On October 10, 2011 in Development, Internet, marketing, Website Design.
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If you’re keen on online marketing, you may already know that Facebook is about to roll out a major update to user profiles layouts. This UI update adopts a “timeline” approach, enabling a chronological view of a person’s activity. Using Facebook’s developer centre, it is (and was) quick and easy to view the new layouts before general release.

Ladies and gentlemen, let me introduce you to my timeline Facebook profile (annotations to follow!)

Facebook's new TimeLine layout

Iv’e blacked out the parts of the profile which remain (pretty much) the same, and highlighted four new / highly altered page areas.

When you see the new layout for the first time, it’s quite shocking. Not much has remained the same. I think a lot of people will be put off by such a large change at first. Anyway, that’s not what I’m here to talk about… So let’s get onto the four annotations.

Firstly, there’s the all new “cover” for your profile. This is a banner across the top of the profile, which users can customize by uploading their own images. Note that I’ve already been playing with mine, to incorporate the profile picture (which lays over the top of the cover). The introduction of these “covers” is a huge step for brand awareness via Facebook pages, as I’ll discuss in a minute!

The second alteration is the timeline. Contrary to previous speculation (including my own previous article) the timeline takes a vertical approach, rather than a horizontal one. The “horizontal rumors”, as we shall call them, were imagined with the possibility of reducing the amount of content under the fold of a typical profile. The ATFC (Above The Fold Content) has been addressed with annotation four, however!

Annotation number three comes in the form of conglomeration. Friends, Photos, GeoTagging, Likes, Music and much more are now accumulated in respective groups (almost like Folders) which can be expanded independently. This generally tidies the profile (in my opinion) and leaves more room for the all important “wall”.

The final point is the wall itself. Facebook have divided the area into two columns (4″ to 9″ wall, for those in the building trade?!) to maximize on space saving. This works well, especially with a blue timeline running down the middle to show when individual posts were added.

It’s a good looking, next generation profile layout (and it’ll look lovely if replicated for Facebook’s iPad app!).

Want to know what this means for Online Marketing? Read More »

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Facebook to Change User Profiles and Launch iPad Application?

On September 29, 2011 in Development, Internet, New Technology, Website Design.
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So, like it or not, when a Facebook update is released you can expect a wave of opinions in the form of status updates! And it seems the coast is no longer clear with a tsunami of opinions eminent!

Facebook User Interface ChangeFirst off there is the revamp of the Facebook profile pages, up until now laid out somewhat uniform, with the profile picture on the left, paragraph of information at the top, stream of tagged photos parallel and the wall below. It seems, however, that this is soon to change; In favor of a timeline approach style! This new style will (probably) conglomerate tagged pictures, status updates and activity on the social networking site, to eliminate (or at least reduce) the amount of content hidden beneath the fold (beyond the view-able screen without scrolling).

Secondly, as discovered a while ago, the iPad Facebook application is “launching soon” according to a 9to5 Mac article. Personally, I wouldn’t be surprised if it launched alongside the Facebook UI updates!

So, this change again will inevitably cause a current of opinions in the world of Social Media… With everyone holding their own thoughts (and most posting/tweeting their feelings) be prepared (Social Sandbags?) for the next wave of “I love/hate the new Facebook layout” status’.

I leave you with this famous quote from Winston Churchill;

To improve is to change; to be perfect is to change often.

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How to Reset the Tagged Photo Stream on Facebook

On August 15, 2011 in #60SecondShout, Internet.
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Today I was struggling to find out how I could show all the tagged photographs on my Facebook profile, after previously hiding them from the most recent five displayed on the new profile layout.

The solution?

Navigate to the following page;

  • Go to “edit my profile” of your Facebook home page.
  • Click “Profile Picture” in the left hand menu.

And then;
Beneath your profile picture, “Edit Thumbnail” and “Remove your Picture” links there is a “Row of photos at top of profile” and an “Unhide All” button. Hit that. Not much happens to confirm the process is complete, but go check out your profile page. All the tagged photos of you will now be accessible, with the most recent 5 appearing in the image stream on your page!

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Start-Up Businesses use of Social Media

On July 17, 2011 in Business, Internet, marketing.
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According to a recent survey, performed by Market Research company ‘Opimium Research LLP’, less than half of small businesses use any form of Social Media. The broken-down stats go something like this;

  • 28% of small businesses said they used a corporate Facebook page
  • 18% own a LinkedIn Profile
  • 8% have a company blog
  • 6% use YouTube or similar video-streaming service
  • 2% own a corporate Twitter account

With over 2 million enterprises in the UK alone (according to the governments ‘Office for National Statistics’) that’s over 1.4 million businesses which don’t utilize Facebook, the world’s largest social media / networking website (with over 750 million users!).

Seems crazy, given the focus and publicity of these potential market avenues! Sure some businesses wouldn’t find all of the options necessary, but with such a high volume of service based business in the UK I can’t help but think some of the 1,000,000 businesses with no social media avenues are missing out.

Ultimate Hairdressing, Wolverhampton Case Study. Read More »

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Access Restricted (Bad IP) for Facebook Mobile

On September 17, 2010 in #60SecondShout.
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Having trouble accessing Facebook on your iPhone, Android or other mobile device? Getting the error message: “Access restricted: bad IP” and “You are trying to access Facebook from an IP (internet protocol) address that has been associated with abusive behaviour”. So are many other users on the Orange UK network this evening. So, don’t panic, it’s nothing wrong with your phone or Facebook account. Orange have released an announcement saying they will sort the issue as soon as possible, hopefully over night.

An Orange spokesperson said today “We are aware that our mobile customers are currently having issues accessing Facebook via their handsets. We are working with Facebook to fix this as a matter of priority and would like to apologise to our customers for the inconvenience this may cause them.”

Update: I think this is now fixed, according to the other half, although some users may continue to experience problems until the early hours.

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Facebook Places Vs Foursquare

On September 17, 2010 in Development, New Technology.
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Geo-tagging is nothing new. It’s been used by Twitter, Flickr and more recently Youtube for a while now. It’s quite simple really: Sharing the location of your media as metadata. This allows people and API’s alike to search by location. Useful stuff!

In March 2009 Foursquare was launched, primarily in New York, but soon found itself checking people in all around the globe! The concept is again simple: Tagging yourself instead of a photo (or other media) in the form of a ‘Check-In’. Other people can also ‘Check-In’ to locations, and a hierarchy can be build for individual locations. It’s a superb example of social media turned addictive game! It works brilliantly with the ever evolving capabilities of smart-phones and other IED’s (Internet Enabled Devices).

But let’s go back to the beginning for a moment. Dennis Crowley, one of the head developers of Foursquare created a similar program back in 2005 called ‘Dodgeball’. It was soon snapped up by internet giants Google and closed down in 2009 (to make room for ‘Google Latitude’). So, Foursquare is mature. It’s evolved. It’s developed. And it’s got competition.

Facebook Places. Announced August 2010. It’s a big hit for Foursquare. After all, who want’s to go up against Goliath? Places allows users to ‘Check-In’ much like Foursquare, but that’s about it. I see what Facebook have done, in keeping it as a simple status update style addition it refrains from encroaching on Foursquare’s USP (Unique Selling Point). But it could have been so much more! And it should have been too. I was so excited to see the new icon on the Facebook iPhone app, and thought that something being added to the home screen of the app like that would be more than an additional way of updating your status, in effect. Perhaps the Facebook team have bigger plans for Places? I hope so.

For me, Foursquare is a much more addictive, interesting and smart geotagging application. Seem’s like David may have slayed Goliath again!? It’s hierarchy scheme, locational advice/tips and badges make it far superior to Facebook Places. Personally, I will use both. Foursquare for its addictive, fun nature. And Places for it’s ability to update friends and family on Facebook exactly what I’m up to, the essence of social media.

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twitter changes interface to app style design

On September 15, 2010 in Development, Internet, Website Design.
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Since it’s launch in July 2006, Twitter has rapidly became a household name for almost any surfer (internet surfer that is!) as well as being constantly in the spotlight for breaking news, celebrity rants and thousands of web trends. The micro-blogging platform gets over 190,000,000 hits per month, and generates an estimated $400,000 per quarter! Now that’s “what’s happening”?!

A little birdy told me Twitter is changing. Re-designing. Evolving. It’s been speculated for some time, but last night (September 14th, 2010) Twitter began rolling out it’s brand new user interface to some of it’s users. The 141 strong employee team have been busy, producing not only a lovely looking interface but also an impressive video to demonstrate the new features. Check it out.

The re-design strategy, much like Facebook did in 2006, 2008 and 2010, is a smart move, keeping the top-dogs of the internet fresh and up-to-date. It’s a principle which I like to follow quite closely, re-designing this site quite often! (Could be less as my final year approaches!). Sure, some people will dislike the change, but such is life. You don’t see anyone moaning about Facebook’s latest interface like you did back when they rolled it out in February 2010!

Twitter’s new layout is very interactive. One could say it’s almost trying to resemble a certain mobile device application look and feel? Not that there is anything wrong with this (Just look at the success of the official Twitter App for iPhone!). The smooth glides and efficient persona exuded by the new website succeeds in giving users the concept of a well-oiled machine. A lovely development from the Twitter team.

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Make Facebook status update Twitter via RSS

On May 17, 2010 in Internet, Tutorials, Website Design.
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Picture the scenario; You update Facebook status often but forget about the little bird which is Twitter. You want to update Twitter automatically when your facebook status changes, but Facebook have banned the apps that allow this to occur! Enter TwitterFeed.com, a website designed to pull RSS feeds and post them to other pages such as Facebook or Twitter.

Now, stay with me here, as I spent ages looking at blogs thinking that the Facebook RSS pages have been blocked, but they haven’t. To access your Facebook RSS feed navigate to Facebook and click on your notifications (“See all Notifications”). On the right hand side is a “Subscribe to Notifications” section, and under that is a “Via RSS”. Uncheck all the tick boxes and click on this link. From there, simply change part of the URL from “notifications.php” to “status.php”. This should produce the RSS feed required.

Now, on TwitterFeed.com sign up and add your copied URL for Facebook RSS feed. Authenticate Twitter and set (in the advanced options) your prefixes, postfixes and update schedule.

And that’s it! Facebook will now generate the RSS of your status’, TwitterFeed will pull them in (checking every 30 mins or whatever) and post them to your Twitter for you! If your really clever you could set up an RSS from your website too, and get that to post to Twitter/Facebook whenever you add a new article!

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Download all your friends tagged facebook photos

On March 9, 2010 in #60SecondShout, New Technology.
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So, there are lots of facebook applications out there that claim to download all your photos. However most end up with credit limits or only downloading a maximum number of photos.

There is a relatively new release is a small piece of software. You can find it over at http://code.google.com/p/photograbber/. It not only allows you do download all your tagged photos, but also any of your friends. It’s brilliant for downloading all the tagged photos of yourself, but not so great for downloading individual albums.

For that, I’d use FacePad, a firefox plugin that allows you to right-click on albums and download them all. It’s important to note that facePad will only download the first 20 photos unless you have set the default language to that of your facebook by going to tools > options > addons.

Either way, try it out!

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Download all your tagged facebook photos

On January 11, 2010 in Development, New Technology.
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This has been on the minds of my collegues and I for a while now – To develop a peice of software to search through and automatically download all of your tagged photos from facebook onto your PC hard-drive.

Export Photo’s Too does this brilliantly. Install the application to your facebook profile and hit ‘Download Tagged photos’. The application then takes some time to compile a .zip folder of all the photos which you have been tagged in. In the meantime your free to continue using facebook.

After a short while you get a notification explaining that your photos are ready to download. Click the link and you can start to download the folder. It’s brilliant! The only negative is that it’s a little slow (as it’s being ran through the developers php pages on a relatively slow server. The fastest download speeds I was getting was 10Kbps with a folder of approximately 20Mb.

Never the less this is a brilliant app! Just goes to show that the little people can still make killer software too! If I were facebook I’d look towards incrementing this to the iPhone’s version of facebook.

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