As you may have read from many different sources, Facebook has announced a complete redesign for Pages. March 11th will be the last day that the “old” Page layout will be available. Until then, admins have the option of touring and then upgrading to the new layout.
Even as one who considers herself a savvy Facebook user, I have found this Facebook Page Manual to be quite handy.
I have updated the Saint Michael’s College Page and will use that as an example in this post.
New Layout
As you can see, the new layout of Pages is a close match to the recent switch in design of the Profile.
Tabs
The new Page redesign has eliminated the top row of tabs and instead replaced them with a row of links underneath the Profile Picture. Beware! Only six tabs are visible above the “more” link.
Custom Tabs (err… links)
FBML will soon be a way of the past. As announced via Facebook’s Developer Blog, admins should now build custom landing pages and all future tabs in iFrame.
Log in as the Page
If you were on Facebook when it glitched in December, there’s a good chance you’ve been anxiously awaiting this change. Admins can now log in as the page.
What does this mean to you? You can now interact with the Pages you manage… as yourself! You need to go into “Your Settings” and un-check the first box in order to do this.
Email notifications
Pretty self-explanatory. You can now opt into receiving email notifications when people post or comment on your page.
The good and the bad
As with all redesigns and updates…
I’m in a love-hate relationship with this update.
Love: logging in as a Page, ability to interact with the page as myself, email notifications, added visibility of the Pages you have “liked,” sleeker design.
Hate: admins being displayed, spending 20 minutes editing my custom FBML tabs because they were too wide, losing the ability to add new FBML tabs, having to learn iFrame, potential loss of traffic to custom tabs because they are not as visible, having to spend time updating the many Facebook community managers at St. Mike’s on these changes.
This update is also encouraging me to reconsider my decision to not link St. Mike’s Page and Place.
Facebook is not giving you a choice. On March 11 your page will be updated. If your Facebook presence is important to you, it is well worth your time to update the Page now.
What do you think about these changes?
UPDATE: According to allfacebook.com Page tabs are not changing sizes. This is just a bug that will be worked out. Either way, that doesn’t give me back the 20 minutes that I spent this afternoon resizing my FBML tabs.
UPDATE #2: Users rejoice! Posts can once again we sorted chronologically on your Page wall.
February 10th, 2011 at 5:49 pm
Great post summarizing some of the key changes. Really helpful info.
One thing: I’m not sure the admins are visible to fans. I think only other admins see that (at least that’s what I noticed in my testing, anyone else confirm or refute this?).
I’m also only seeing the pictures up top when I’m looking at the Page as an admin, not as a fan. Maybe just an early glitch on Facebook’s end.
February 10th, 2011 at 9:11 pm
Great catch! Admins are not visible to fans. Thank goodness…
I do see the top row of photos when I’m looking at the page as a fan and not an admin. Others? What do you see?
February 10th, 2011 at 6:18 pm
[...] This post was mentioned on Twitter by Inigral, Inc., Mallory Wood and Mallory Wood, Mark Rothbaum. Mark Rothbaum said: RT @MalloryWood: [New Blog Post] Facebook announces Pages Redesign – highlights and my thoughts on it – http://bit.ly/fZBi0N #marketing … [...]
February 10th, 2011 at 7:41 pm
Quality post Mallory. Great info on the FB page changes. Love that they did this before my webinar on Tuesday…love it, like cold coffee or Iowa winters!
February 10th, 2011 at 9:12 pm
Or Vermont winters.
At least you have the weekend to work on your webinar or at least they didn’t roll this all out Tuesday afternoon. Now that would have been interesting.
February 12th, 2011 at 6:42 pm
I probably would have died a little inside if they had rolled this out on Tuesday. Thankfully, it’s a 2-part series. I could have made changes for day 2: “You remember what I said on Day 1….yeah, about that…”
February 10th, 2011 at 8:01 pm
Personally I love the change. I like the greater visibility of photos but don’t like the now hidden events and overview of location and phone number.
I am glad they are switching things up. Thanks for the detailed write-up!
February 10th, 2011 at 9:14 pm
Events don’t have to be hidden, you can edit the order in which the side tabs appear. Unfortunately for the pages I admin, events will probably fall below the fold for now.
February 10th, 2011 at 8:35 pm
Great overview here, Mallory. Like everything else Facebook rolls out, however, it would have been nice to get a warning that today was the day for this. That way, we all could have been better prepared for the new way tabs and page widths are handled!
February 10th, 2011 at 9:09 pm
It did get a little crazy around 3:30 when the changes happened, didn’t it?
February 11th, 2011 at 9:59 am
Mallory, it looks like the smaller width of page tabs on the new page layout is a glitch, so I might hold off on redesigning all your static FBML tabs.
Facebook Page Tabs Not Changing Sizes
February 11th, 2011 at 10:02 am
Yes, I saw that article last night and added it as an update to the bottom of the post. Thank you for noting it in the comment section as well.
I know I was not the only Facebook admin who had a few moments yesterday when the tabs appeared incorrectly!