Facebook Archives - Page 11 of 11 - Public Relations, Advertising & Social Media

Improving Edgerank in Facebook

Posted on May 7, 2012 by Brian Lee

I recently spoke on Facebook marketing at the Greater Madison Chamber of Commerce’s annual expo. A key point I made was that don’t spend too much time worrying about the appearance of your Facebook page, as the vast majority of interaction with fans happens in the News Feed.

For those unfamiliar with Edgerank, it’s Facebook’s tool/formula to calculate which posts matter to you the most. In other words, have you ever noticed some friends ALWAYS appear near the top of your News Feed? It’s because you’ve interacted with them more than others, and Facebook keeps track.

Edgerank applies not only to personal pages, but to fan pages as well. I’ve created this chart to explain how to improve your Edgerank on the three main categories: Fan Engagement, Time with Status and Frequency of Posts.

Fan Engagement	Time with Status	Frequency of Posts
No marketing messages or any other type of “broadcasting”	Post videos	Post no more than once every four hours
Ask questions	Post photos	Post during peak Facebook hours; or
Elicit emotions	Post links	Post during your audience’s peak hours
Topical posts	(All suggestions from first column)

The key takeaway is that good content should be your No. 1 goal to make your page more visible to your fans.

It’s complicated with Facebook

Posted on February 3, 2012 by Emilie Buckman

With going public and another mandatory change looming in form of Timeline, it’s been a big week for Facebook. After reading a week’s worth of news, I found this this article, about five problems it faces, that seems to reinforce my strained relationship with Facebook. (It’s important to note; my personal and professional feelings towards Facebook, and most other social media outlets, are drastically different. Everything that makes social media an amazing tool for business and marketing I find asinine in my private use. Having the ability to talk directly to customers and fans is fantastic for building brand loyalty but detrimental to causal online friendships.)

It would be easy to latch onto number two, “Facebook users hate change,” but I’ve been on the site so long I’ve come to understand change is inevitable. Consider these fun facts about when I joined in the summer of 2005: to join you had to belong to specific universities, your only picture was your profile pic, you literally had one page and your wall resembled a dry erase board, and it was still called The Facebook. So yeah, if I was still complaining about changes I’d seriously need to reevaluate my life!

Instead, I am drawn to number one, “Facebook actually makes us miserable.” I have to agree; most days Facebook makes me miserable. Unlike most of my generation, I don’t subscribe to the world of over-sharing. I use to the site primarily to share pictures and music ; post self-deprecating anecdotes about myself or unwarranted pet peeves, like pajama pants in public; and, most importantly, to have easy way to communicate with friends, family, and casual acquaintances. Unfortunately, it feels like a majority of users see Facebook as a chance to post rants about politics or personal squabbles and over share about every detail of their lives, no matter how mundane or even icky. (I’m sorry but there is never a reason to post running commentary on potty training your toddler. Gross.)

But I have to point out; my feelings are irrelevant because, clearly, I am in this relationship for the long haul. Whether it’s me or Facebook complicating our relationship status, it doesn’t matter. I have no plans of deactivating. I just wish people would take few seconds to think, “Should I really post this?” or more importantly, “Does anyone really care about this?” It’s not the most realistic wish; but hey, a girl can dream.

No place for MySpace

Posted on January 12, 2011 by Brian Lee

Back in 2004ish, I remember joining MySpace to see what all the fuss was about (I wasn’t yet on Facebook because it was meant for students only at the time). A lot of my friends were on MySpace, and it was a nice way to share photos and write comments on each other’s pages.

However, I soon began to dislike the service, especially after signing up for Facebook. MySpace’s user-view was cluttered, as I preferred viewing your page as others see it, like on Facebook; I got a lot of spam; and eventually MySpace just stole all the features of Facebook, e.g. feeds, tagging, etc., making it lose its uniqueness.

That’s why it doesn’t surprise me that MySpace is in a lot of trouble financially, as reported in today’s New York Times. I’ve always described MySpace as hanging out at a virtual bar; for example, you can meet new people (a bit better than you can on Facebook) and you can listen to some music (bands can set up decent pages pretty easily, plus other artists’ songs are available for free).

But that’s about it. I can’t imagine a scenario in which I would recommend setting up a MySpace account for a client, other than a band. See, bands can upload their songs, post their tour dates and interact with their fans. Even still, I would probably lean toward using Bandcamp instead.

Did you have/do you still have a MySpace account? I just have one to squat on a particular URL.