2012

2011

2010

2009

2008

2007

FACEBOOK TIMELINE
TIPS FOR BRANDS AND MARKETERS TO MAKE THE MOST OF FACEBOOKS 2012 TIMELINE CHANGES FOR PAGES

MARKETERS GUIDE TO:

2006

2005

TABLE OF CONTENTS
HIGHLIGHTS FROM FACEBOOKS 2012 CHANGES ...... 3 TIMELINE FOR BRANDS: OUR POINT OF VIEW ............. 4 MAIN PAGES CHANGES ............................................... 5 #1: VISUALIZATION: TIMELINE LAYOUT #2: TIMELINE OPTIMIZATION #3: FACEBOOK APPLICATIONS #4: 1-ON-1 MESSAGES & USER CONTROL BRAND PROMOTIONS ................................................ 13 #1: OFFERS POSTS #2: POSTING STANDARDS #3: REACH GENERATOR #4: PREMIUM ON FACEBOOK BEST PRACTICES: A NEW SET OF PRINCIPLES ............. 18 #1: BRAND OVER COMMUNITY #2: DONT FORGET NEWS FEED #3: EMPHASIS ON VISUALIZATION #4: STORYTELLING THROUGH MILESTONES JACK MORTON WORLDWIDE ..................................... 23

HIGHLIGHTS FROM FACEBOOKS 2012 CHANGES

Every once in a while, Facebook makes its users and marketing partners feel like its ruining everything. Does Facebooks new Timeline layout really ruin Facebook for brands? Probably not. But there are some substantial changes marketers should be aware of just one year after the last round of sweeping changes (remember photo strips?). One thing to know: your custom applications wont look as good as they used to. On the heels of the rollout of its new Timeline format for user Profiles, Facebook is launching the new Timeline format for its brand partners, too. The new layout will have an impact on what brands have built on Facebook in the past (i.e. applications, posts, photos and more) and how brands can best use Facebook in the future. Brands have until March 30th to activate the new layout for their Pages, but in the meantime, Jack Morton has assembled this guide to key changes in the platform and the best ways to leverage tomorrows Facebook starting today.

FACEBOOK TIMELINE FOR BRANDS: OUR POINT OF VIEW

Facebook has undeniably changed the way we communicate with and relate to other humans. As Facebook COO Sheryl Sandberg said in her keynote during the Facebook Marketing Conference, For the first time, technology is powering us and who we are. On its path to reshape our lives as individuals (and yes, make a profit), Facebook (and social media in general) has also begun to change the way brands communicate with consumers. The focus is no longer on how brands communicate, but rather on how they relate. We believe brands relate best to consumers through brand experiences. We also believe that brand experiences are most meaningful when consumers are surrounded by their social connections. Facebook has given brands a platform to listen, comment, ask, answer, converse, innovate and, yes, even sell while users are surrounded by their social context. Facebooks Timeline puts social brand experience at the platforms center. No longer will users experience brands in isolation or with a few other (often random) users on message board-style Pages, but rather, users will be prompted to experience brands and their heritage through their closest -- and most trusted -- social connections. In light of Facebooks announcement of the rollout of Timeline-based layouts for brand Pages, were having conversations with our clients about what the social brand experiences of the present and future will look like. To catch a glimpse into our thinking, we offer up this guide to the shifts on the platform, including what we believe will be the best practices for brands as they journey forward to relate to their consumers. Is your brand ready to make the most of Facebooks Timeline for brand Pages? Ben Grossman Digital Strategist

PAGES CHANGES

PAGES CHANGE #1:

VISUALIZATION: TIMELINE LAYOUT

PROFILE PICTURE
Though many brands used extended, promotional prole pictures in the past, Facebooks new Timeline layout means that a brands prole picture can now stay a relatively consistent reection of the logo, using the Cover Image for major promotions instead. It should be uploaded at 180 x 180 pixels. It will automatically be scaled down to 32 x 32 pixels for News Feed viewing.

TIMELINE LAYOUT
The new Page layout allows for the biggest, most customizable visual branding ever. Combined with a new, moments-in-time focused layout, Pages now act as more of a brand narrative than a community message board.

COVER PHOTO
The new home for on-Page promotion, the Cover Photo should be uploaded at 851 x 315 pixels. The perfect place to feature a fan or photo of the month, a new promotion or even a call-out for a (now more hidden) custom Facebook Application. Careful! Cover Photos may not include price or purchase information, contact information or calls to action. Consult Facebooks rules before development.

PAGES CHANGE #1:

VISUALIZATION: TIMELINE LAYOUT

VISUALLY COMPELLING POSTS WIN
Facebook was popularized based on a sleek and simple, mostly text-based interface that made it easier to understand what friends were thinking, doing and saying. With bad memories of ashing and disorganized MySpace proles far behind users (or even before some users time), Facebook is beginning to put more of an emphasis on helping users visualize their friends and brands posts and activity. Brands that create posts that are accompanied by visual media (i.e. a photo or video) enjoy greater inclusion and engagement through users News Feeds and also are now core to a quality user experience in the Timeline layout. Posts that include ll-in-the blanks, caption contests and video clips will drive engagement as Facebook continues to evolve. Additionally, visually compelling posts make for an easily scannable, engaging Timeline history, which users can now scroll through at any time.

PAGES CHANGE #2:

TIMELINE OPTIMIZATION
WHAT GIVES TIMELINE ITS NAME? WELL, A TIMELINE.
The entire structure of the new Facebook Pages layout is inspired by a history-based timeline that documents a brands existence (ctional or actual), from its founding or opening to the present. Brands with a rich and interesting history now have the opportunity to use a new type of posts, Milestones, which allow them to add historical landmarks for their businesses or the backstory for an upcoming movie. A simple tool at the right of Pages allows for navigation through time.

FRIEND-PRIORITIZED VIEWING
A new section of Pages acts as a personalized social lens through which users can view a given brand. A call-out with the number of a users friends who like the Page as well as some of their recent activity pertaining to the brand is featured at the top of the Timeline. Friends care about friends, making the prominence of this section a compelling reason for brands to respond to each and every post on their Pages.

PAGES CHANGE #2:

TIMELINE OPTIMIZATION
STARRING STORIES
Page Administrators now have a way to prioritize their own content within the Timeline by starring the best (most engaging) ones and allowing it to expand with double width on the timeline. Just as easily, Administrators can hide less engaging or less important stories. The net effect of this functionality is that once a post is no longer current, Administrators can choose not to feature it as a main part of the companys past in the Timeline. As such, product recall announcements or public apologies can still be distributed and shown while relevant, but can later be hidden in favor of more positive milestones in the brands past.

PINNING POSTS FOR 7 DAYS

While Facebook recommends Pages post once per day, it has created a capability that allows Administrators to Pin a post to the top of the Page, so that it is the rst thing users see upon arrival for a 7-day period. The terminology of Pinning may seem suspiciously close to that of recent social media darling Pinterest. Widely, the media agrees and attributes the use of the terminology to Zuckerbergs ongoing obsession with staying up to speed with start-up competition.

PAGES CHANGE #3:

FACEBOOK APPLICATIONS

NO WELCOME TAB. APP SIZE UPDATE.

The new Timeline layout dispenses with a tab-based brand favorite: the welcome tab. Administrators will no longer be able to set a default landing tab as the rst thing users see upon arriving to the Page. Instead, the Cover Photo will need to do any Welcome talking desired by the brand (though current fans will see it too). The new application display will continue to allow older apps (520 pixels in width) to display, but theyll look narrow in the new layout that allows for 810 pixel-wide layouts. Applications new and old require a new icon to appear on the Page that is 111 74 pixels.

PAGES CHANGE #3:

FACEBOOK APPLICATIONS

APPLICATIONS GET A DOWNGRADE

Much to many brands chagrin, custom Facebook Applications, which represent a signicant investment to many marketers, were given a low priority in the new Timeline layout. Pages can choose to feature up to three custom applications by default (the Photos Application is xed), but the rest fall below in an area that must be expanded by the user prior to viewing additional applications. Because Facebooks interface has long been based on a tabbed navigational structure, where brands would often create Welcome Tabs to orient users to the Page, this will trigger a major change in many Pages user experience. Users will now have to be drawn in by a brands content, rather than a messaging tab.

PAGES CHANGE #4:

1-ON-1 MESSAGES & USER CONTROL

COMMUNITY MANAGERS: REJOICE!

Uncharacteristically, Facebook is allowing brands complete control over how conversations appear on their Pages. Buried in Facebooks Timeline updates are new capabilities that allow Administrators to prevent fans posts to the Timeline from showing up publicly until they have been approved by an administrator. Administrators can also hide a box that allows users to see recent post by people other than their immediate friends, pretty much killing any sense of community that Pages once had.

1-ON-1 MESSAGES ARE HERE

Previously, the only way brands could communicate with consumers through their Pages was publicly through the Pages wall. With Timeline, Facebook is introducing a new Message button that appears next to the Like Button at the top of the Page (at a brands discretion -- it can be hidden). Though brands still cannot reach out to users directly to initiate a 1-to-1 conversation, they can now receive messages from users and respond through the platform. Not all customer service can or should be public.

BRAND PROMOTIONS

BRAND PROMOTION #1:

OFFERS POSTS

READY TO BATTLE DAILY DEALS? NOT YET.

Facebook has made several attempts over the past few years to develop an offering that could rival daily deals sites like Groupon and Living Social. With the release of Timeline, Facebook has added another new post type called Offers. Using the post, brands can feature a promotion on their page, allow users to claim it and have the coupon sent directly to the users email or mobile device. The seamless experience is powered by Facebooks ability to leverage users prole data to offer analytics and tracking that brands will be intrigued by. For additional exposure, Facebook also recommends combining Offers with its ad units to reach a broader audience and trigger viral spread.

BRAND PROMOTION #2:

POSTING STANDARDS
FACEBOOK GOES ON RECORD WITH RECOMMENDATIONS
For the rst time publicly, Facebook went on the record with recommendations about the frequency of posts Pages should use. The answer was what most strategists had concluded: one, engaging post per day is golden. Facebook also released some staggering statistics about what types of posts work best. Visually engaging posts generate 2X the engagement of basic text posts. On average, people visit and engage with Pages most often between 9pm and 10pm. Posts between 100 and 250 characters (less than 3 lines of text) see about 60% more likes, than longer posts. Facebook estimates that the average Page reaches 16% of its fans in the average week. It also recommends using Page Insights to nd out when people engage most with content and post during those hours.

BRAND PROMOTION #3:

REACH GENERATOR
FACEBOOKS NEW TAKE ON SPONSORED STORIES
Over a year ago, Facebook launched new ad units referred to as Sponsored Stories. These units essentially help to amplify Page Posts so that they reach more users (both fans and non-fans) to trigger further viral spread and awareness of the brand and/or offering. These ad units have now been re-launched and now fall under an umbrella grouping called Reach Generator. In addition to re-naming the offering, Facebook is also breaking its Sponsored Story ad units out of the right side of the interface. Units will now also be eligible to appear in users News Feeds on their desktops and, once Timeline comes to mobile devices in April, through mobile devices. This will be the rst time mobile advertisements are available through Facebooks platform. When using Sponsored Stories, it it is imperative that brands express the core of the message in the rst 90 characters of the post, as that is the size of the ad unit.

BRAND PROMOTION #4:

PREMIUM ON FACEBOOK
BIG SPENDS GET BIG BENEFITS
Facebooks top advertising spenders will now be using an offering re-named Premium on Facebook. In order to augment its preexisting premium advertising offering, Facebook is adding the in-News Feed ads, mobile News Feed ads and a new Log-out experience as parts of its paid media offerings. And these higher end products have paid off in the past. Facebook reports that ad units featured on its homepage (reserved for premium advertisers) have generated 5x-10x more engagement than all other places on the site. Further, Facebook reports that Premium Ads and Sponsored Stories on the right-hand side are typically 40% more engaging and 80% more likely to be remembered than all previous offerings. Among other new claims Facebook is making about the benets of its paid advertising products is that well-run campaigns that leverage social drive ROIs of 3x or greater.

BEST PRACTICES: A NEW SET OF PRINCIPLES

BEST PRACTICE #1:

BRAND OVER COMMUNITY

FORCED COMMUNITY IS DEAD... CONTROL IS BACK
One of the biggest challenges for brands joining Facebook (especially those in highly regulated industries) has always been the fact that users could post whatever they wanted to brands walls whenever they wanted to... for the world to see. Timeline does away with that. In fact, the entire interface has made a shift from being a dolled up message board with some cool interactive features to becoming a narrative story about a brand... completely controlled by the brand. Administrators can prevent users from posting to the timeline, moderate all posts and even re-publish the user-generated posts they like. The Timeline is engineered to tell the brands story as it wants to be seen. Blemishes can be hidden and Community Managers have complete control over what happens on the Page. One-to-one, consumer-to-brand messaging also keeps consumers and brands dirty laundry (i.e. customer service issues) out of sight and, perhaps, out of mind.

BEST PRACTICE #2:

DONT FORGET THE NEWS FEED

VISUALS SHOULDNT DISTRACT FROM WHATS REALLY MISSION CONTROL.
If nothing else, users will have to admit: Timeline is pretty. Marketers are sure to love playing with the Cover Photos and nding new ways to feature neat history as part of the Timeline. Facebook is even pushing the idea of the Page itself as Mission Control every chance it gets. None of that changes the fact, however, that perhaps the most important part of Facebook for brands has not signicantly changed at all: the News Feed. Indeed, the majority of engagement and awareness is generated by brands posts being seen among their friends posts in the News Feed. While Facebooks new paid advertising units will be able to land brands in the News Feed, a strong content strategy with engaging posts at the right time will still be at the core of the most successful brands on Facebook. So go ahead, make your brands Page beautiful... but dont forget to think long and hard about that News Feed.

BEST PRACTICE #3:

EMPHASIS ON VISUALIZATION

RICH VISUALS MAKE THE BEST CONTENT AND THE BEST TIMELINES
No one wants to read a book when they hop on Facebook to stalk a few friends. A quick scroll through a brands timeline will give you an idea of whether it is posting enough rich visual content. The more photos, videos and links relevant to individual posts, the more a brand stands out in the timeline and builds affinity through its timeline. As the entire Internet drives towards a future of representing a new world of data with easy-tounderstand visuals, it will be no surprise if Facebook continues to focus on making improvements to the platform that make it more visually gripping.

BEST PRACTICE #4:

STORYTELLING THROUGH MILESTONES

HISTORIC NARRATIVES CONTRIBUTE TO BRAND STORIES THROUGH TIMELINE
Brands, public gures and institutions that have a rich history have a perfect opportunity to display it through Timeline in an engaging way. Administrators can literally go back in time and use the new Milestone post type to add landmarks in an organizations past all the way back to the year it was founded. Brands that have longstanding relationships with customers can even encourage users to contribute photos that can then be re-posted as part of the Pages history. For those brands that dont have a history, like movies, Timeline allows Administrators to tell a fanciful backstory that can build anticipation for premieres. For television shows or entertainers, Timeline offers a wonderful way to catalogue episodes or performances and the journey to accomplishment.

WILL YOU USE TIMELINE TO CREATE COMPELLING SOCIAL BRAND EXPERIENCES FOR CONSUMERS?
JACK MORTON WORLDWIDE is a global brand experience agency with offices on four continents. Our agency culture promotes breakthrough ideas about how experiences connect brands and people in person, online, at retail and through the power of digital and word of mouth influence. We work with both BtoC and BtoB clients to create powerful and effective experiences that engage customers and consumers, launch products, align employees and build strong experience brands. Ranked at the top of our field, weve earned over 50 awards for creativity, execution and effectiveness last year, including best new product introduction, best media event and employee campaign of the year. Jack Morton is part of the Interpublic Group of Companies, Inc. (NYSE: IPG). More information is available online: Web site: http://www.jackmorton.com/ Blog: http://blog.jackmorton.com/ Twitter: http://twitter.com/jackmorton

FOR MORE INSIGHT INTO FACEBOOKS TIMELINE FOR BRANDS, CONTACT BEN_GROSSMAN@JACKMORTON.COM

2012

2011

2010

2009

2008

2007

FACEBOOK TIMELINE
TIPS FOR BRANDS AND MARKETERS TO MAKE THE MOST OF FACEBOOKS 2012 TIMELINE CHANGES FOR PAGES

MARKETERS GUIDE TO:

2006

2005