All the New Changes top Facebook Explained-And how it effects You!!

All the New Changes top Facebook Explained-And how it effects You!!

See the full gallery on Posterous

Prior to the announcements at the F8 Conference, I was feeling a great sense of resistance about the Facebook changes. As Mark Zuckerberg presented the new features, a sense of excitement and enthusiasm began to overcome the initial discomfort.   Zuckerberg’s energy sparked my curiosity and I quickly found a way to update my profile to the new timeline.

The public reaction was not quite as enthusiastic.  At the end of the day, there was a flurry of images like “Honk if you think the new FB Sucks” and a variety of complaints streaming into the Newsfeed. (The amusing thing is these complaints were coming in from Facebook users who did not yet have access to the new features!)

Here is a quick summary demystifying the Facebook changes that are rolling out over the next few weeks with a quick video at the end.

The Newsfeed Change: The News Feed is going to feature Top Stories and the most newsworthy, relevant updates. The best way to make sure that you have updates that interest you is to Subscribe to your favorite peoples’ updates.

The Ticker: The small changes and more “lightweight moments” are going to be relegated to the Ticker in the top right hand corner of the screen. The Ticker feed will be the moment to moment updates from your network. You can see your friends updating in real-time and choose whether or not you want to engage with them.

Facebook Timeline: The profile is changing to what is now called the “Timeline” and is an aggregation of all of your posts since the day you signed up for your Facebook account. Your Timeline is “The Story of your Life on a Single Page” and can be edited as you see fit. Entries can be Highlighted with a Star or Deleted according to your preferences. Visitors to your Profile/Timeline can scroll through all of the important events of your life.

This new design takes a page out of Tumblr’s playbook. It enables each user to create what is essentially a personal blog or an ongoing digital scrapbook of life moments, interests and events. This is going to be a great memory-keeper for today’s youth and there was even discussion of being able to create an Annual Report of each year.

The Cover Image: At the Top of your Profile is the Cover Image that serves as a photographic header. It’s basically the Big Picture that best represents your personality at the top of the screen. Tip: Wide Horizontal images work the best.

Status Updates: Your updates now drop chronologically onto the Timeline and you can Filter your updates to denote Work & Education, Family & Relationships, Living, Health & Wellness and Milestones & Special Events. Essentially, your updates become your stories that you are sharing with the people you have connected with.

Graphic Mapping: In addition to status updates, there is a Graphic Mapping feature that documents the moments geographically. Click on a place and add pictures or comments about your experiences.

Social Apps: What has the most groundbreaking potential is the endless possibilities for App Developers to create new ways for us to interact socially. Mark Zuckerberg used the term “Frictionless” as he described the seamless way that our apps would automatically update our Timeline. For example, what you read in the Wall Street Journal social news app will automatically populate the news section of your Timeline. There are already Media apps in the pipeline: Netflix for renting & watching movies, Spotify for sharing songs & playlists, Hulu for sharing TV Shows, Wall Street Journal and Washington Post for News. Lifestyle apps include Nike+GPS for runners, biking, hiking, hobbies and various recipe/food review sharing apps.

And if these features are not enough… These were only some of the changes announced, so it will be interesting to see how the Facebook community responds to the fresh new look. Stay tuned for more updates as Facebook continues to evolve & roll out the changes.

If you just can’t wait to update your Facebook profile, here is a quick 3 min YouTube video that will guide you through the process of “How to Enable & Activate Your Facebook Timeline Today.”

 

Allan Fine
Marketing and Franchising consultant,
Marketing Systems
GUARANTEED RESULTS
EXECUTIVE EDGE
allan@executiveedge1.com
 Phone: 403-246-7386
403-217-8432 Fax
Mountain Standard Time|
http://www.executiveedge1.com
http://www.facebook.com/MarketingCalgary
The Executive Edge
Internet Marketing / Website Development
SEO + SMM and Consulting services.
******************************************