The profile means that your Facebook page won’t just be a little slice of what you’ve been doing in the past few weeks or months, but rather a broad overview of your whole life. That means you’ll probably want to spend some time polishing up that page before it goes live. Here are some tips for getting your Timeline spiffed up before Facebook makes the complete switch.

1. Choose a cover photo

You can get as creative as you like here. The cover photo will be the large picture that dominates the top of your page, while your traditional headshot profile pic will be smaller, situated in the left hand corner. Keep in mind that you’ll want to choose an image that looks good as a wide, short image–portrait-type shots won’t look good here. For some really creative ideas check out this post on Mashable.

2. Scrub a dub dub

The new profile means it’s easier than ever for people to look at your whole life, or at least your life since you’ve been on Facebook. You already know that your social media presence is important, and that you shouldn’t be posting inappropriate content where your grandmother or potential clients are going to see it. And sure, now you use Facebook to post pictures of your vacation and your kids, but those shots of you doing a kegstand could still be floating around in the recesses of 2005. That’s the kind of stuff that won’t stay buried once you have the Timeline profile. Keep in mind that it’s going to be easier than ever for people to see your older posts, and do a thorough scrub of your profile.

Take down those embarrassing status updates or photos, or just hide them from your Timeline. Click the pencil icon next an event to hide it or delete it.

If you have memories you want to keep just between friends, you can customize who sees an event by clicking the friends icon next your name on each event. You can select a list, only you, or customize exactly who has access to this event on your Timeline.

3. Fill in the gaps

You can also take this opportunity to have some fun filling in the “scrapbook.” Timeline gives you an opportunity to post events – moving, traveling, a new job, changes in relationship status, etc. – and to include photos and tag friends in these events. Take a quick trip down memory lane and fill in the big events in your Timeline with tags and photos. The map function is a lot of fun as well. You can add trips to your Timeline, noting the date you were there and who was with you, and then add an event photo. Also take the time to be sure that your employment info is updated and that all the dates are correct. You can give important events top billing on your Timeline by clicking the star (right next to the edit tool we just covered).

4. Add life before Facebook

If you want to, you can go even further back in your Timeline and add events that happened before you were on Facebook, and add photos to those events. If you want to get really literal with your Timeline, you can add baby pictures, wedding pictures… anything you like. We recommend getting all the stuff that’s already on Facebook in order first, then moving on to your pre-Facebook years if you’re feeling ambitious. If the photos are already on Facebook, just choose “Change Date” to change the date from the time it was uploaded to the time it was taken, or upload old pictures directly onto your Timeline.

(That’s me on the left in the aqua polyester, circa 1996.)

You should take at least a little time to look at your new Timeline and get comfortable with the new format, because Facebook chooses which photos and updates are important mainly by looking at the number of comments and likes something receives. Those might not be the things you want defining your profile. Although Timeline means that there’s more stuff on your profile at once, it also makes it much easier to regulate who sees what.

So take some control of your page. Have fun with it!

Are you doing something cool, creative or hilarious with your Timeline cover photo? Whether you’re repping your favorite sports team, sharing a vacation picture or doing something totally wacky, we want to see it! Take a screen shot of your cover, send it to us at socialmedia@vtldesign.com and we’ll feature the best ones on our Facebook page. (Just be sure to let us know if you don’t want your personal info visible.)

The fact is that social media just does not work for in-your-face marketing. Your account will be unfollowed rapidly if all you use it for it is telling people to buy stuff. But if you already actively use social media to share fun stuff and original content, and to have conversations with people interested in what you do, then you’re ready to put social media to work for you. Here are some tips for taking your hard-won followers and fans and turning them into new customers.

Draw people with a promotion

Use Twitter and Facebook to promote special offers or contests your business is running. Create a sweepstakes or contest for something that will pique people’s interest– a free estimate, a free personal training session, a free manicure, etc–and have followers enter online. It’s also great to bolster interaction with your company by creating a contest that requires people to participate in an active way. For instance, ask something like “What’s your favorite Acme ice cream flavor? One respondent will win a pint of their favorite flavor!” or “Why do you love Acme Diner? Tell us, and our favorite answer will win breakfast for two!” It’s especially interactive to run promotions like this on Twitter, because you can give participants a hashtag, which they can then use to see what their friends and others on Twitter are saying. Twitter’s contest guidelines are also more permissive; see “Keep it legal” below. (No idea what a hashtag is? Check out out Twitter tutorial).

Stay connected

You can’t just flip a switch and start promoting your business left and right (sorry). Introduce special offers and contests gradually, and be sure that you’re staying engaged with your fans and followers on a personal level. The Red Arrow Diner, which has locations in Milford and Manchester, does a great job of this. Their Facebook page and Twitter account ask fans to send in recipes for a cookbook, name a new restaurant (with a $100 prize to the winner) and share their favorite comfort food. They also interact: congratulating newlyweds, thanking their vocal fans, cooing over cute babies, and, importantly, apologizing sincerely when someone complains. The car sharing service Zipcar has a university-specific Facebook page that is also a study in effective use of social media–they offer deals, get fans to post pictures, respond to fan queries and occasionally share a good old fashioned puppy pic.

Offer exclusive deals to your fans

Special offers can be as simple as this: “20% off all cupcakes today for our Twitter followers! Just mention you saw this tweet.” Easy, right? Plus, offering deals like this will keep your frequent customers tuned in to your Twitter and Facebook feeds to watch for deals. (But again, keep these thoroughly mixed with the chatty and/or interesting updates that aren’t trying to sell something). An awesome deal will get your followers through the door initially, but frequent, smaller ones may keep them following and coming back.

Keep people coming back

As much as possible, be generous with the small Twitter and Facebook offers like the one above–a contest might get someone in the door once, but if they can stop by and get 15% off their lunch because they saw the offer on Twitter, they’ll keep following you. Also be sure that your already established customers know that they can follow you for deals, news and updates about sales. If you have a retail location, a sticker on your door or a placard by the cash register can tell your customers that you’re linked in to the social media sphere.

Be sure you’ve got the right followers

Sure, you may have lots of followers, but are a lot of them spambots, competitors, or random, inexplicable dudes in Romania? If you find that your promotions aren’t getting the response you want, you may need to tweak the people who are following you. This means some more work for you such as finding the people you want to follow you, interacting and hopefully showing them that you’re somebody worth following. For more on this, check out our blog posts about using Facebook and Twitter for business, and our post about fine tuning your social media strategy.

Last but not least: keep it legal

Facebook prohibits most contests that take place directly on business Facebook pages. If you want to run a contest or sweepstakes, you’ll have to take entrants to a website separate from Facebook. Be sure to check out all of Facebook’s promotion regulations before you post. Twitter is less regulated, but there are still rules. Make sure your contest or offer checks out.

What do you think? What approaches have you used that have helped keep your social media accounts healthy with engaged interaction? Feel free to comment below.

Here at NH Web design firm Vital Design, our awesome developers and designers can help you set up sweepstakes on your website; and our social media experts can help take your social strategy from boring to buzzing in no time. Follow us on Twitter, “like” us on Facebook or contact us via our website to get connected with Vital.

This story is often used as an example of rock and roll diva behavior, but the truth is that it was an ingenious safety measure. David Lee Roth explained in his biography that if the band got to the dressing room and found brown M&M’s, they knew that the promoters hadn’t read the rider thoroughly. This tipped off Diamond Dave that the elaborate staging, the electrical system and all of the other technical specifics of the show were also suspect and possibly unsafe.

Bad grammar is like brown M&M’s for your marketing. It makes you look sloppy, and it’s a red flag about your professionalism.

When you’re writing for the Web, it’s easy to get messy about grammar and spelling. It’s simple – maybe too simple – to just hit “publish” and send something into cyberspace without a thorough review. (It’s not just business blogs and websites. Print material is even more important because it’s permanent).

We know how it is: you’re updating your website in a big hurry, so you make a typo here and dangle a modifier there, and you don’t think much of it. When you do this, though, it’s obvious to your readers that you didn’t take a few minutes to check your professional work. Each stray apostrophe or misspelled word is a little chip in your image.

So how can you be sure your writing is as professional as you are? First, have someone look over your writing before you publish it. Of course, it helps if that person is good with writing and grammar, but it’s useful simply to have a fresh pair of eyes looking over your work. Nobody’s perfect. In fact, you might even find an error in this post. But take some time to avoid errors when you can.

Remember that spell check is great but not infallible. It can’t tell the difference between discreet and discrete, baited and bated, or Wales and whales. Check and double-check your work for spelling and for commonly confused words. (And turn off Office grammar check; it’s only good for adding confusion.)

A Few To Watch

Make sure you have no improperly used versions of they’re/their/there or instances of your/you’re confusion. Those are some of the most obvious errors to readers. Another common mistake is apostrophe use. Here’s a quick primer: Use an apostrophe after a noun to make either a possessive (Joe’s boat) or a contraction (Joe’s going to to the store, a contraction of “Joe is going to the store”). Don’t use apostrophes to make pronouns possessive (hers, its, theirs). But you do use an apostrophe when you want to make a pronoun into a contraction (It’s raining, you’re late, they’re happy). And never use an apostrophe to make a noun or a pronoun plural, except when it’s necessary for clarity. So “cross the t’s and dot the i’s” is acceptable but “I have two dog’s” is not.

Need more advanced help? Hit the bookstore. We’re a Web design company, which means the majority of our work is online. But we’ve still got paper-and-ink copies of the old Webster’s dictionary and the “Associated Press Stylebook” kicking around our office, and some of us even use them.

If you need help with grammar, you won’t find anything online that’s as helpful as an old-school copy of Strunk and White’s ”The Elements of Style,” although the OWL at Purdue is a close second. Everything you write – whether a client is going to see it or not – should get at least a once-over for punctuation, capitalization and spelling (and yes, this includes your social media updates).

Content that will be published online or used in a marketing campaign should get the fine-toothed-comb treatment and be read by at least two people. Finally, always think of your writing as a reflection on your company. Just as you wouldn’t go to a meeting in ripped jeans and flip flops, you shouldn’t publish or send sloppy writing.

In addition to being a NH Web design company, we’re also a full-service creative agency. We can help write and edit your blog posts, press releases, Web content and more, so get in touch. You can also check out our Facebook and Twitter pages. (And in case you’re wondering, we only eat orange M&M’s).

We kid! But seriously, people want to pay you money for your services or products. Trouble is, they don’t see you when they search on Google for that thing your company provides.

Lucky for you, inbound marketing company HubSpot has published a free, downloadable ebook on Internet marketing. We checked it out and cribbed some of the best tips for you. An Internet marketing plan can be a lot to tackle on your own. We’re here to help so feel free to contact Vital with any questions.

1. Choose Your Keywords Wisely.

Pick about five keywords that you want your business to be found for, and be sure to use them in your website content. If you are a small to medium-sized company, try to avoid widely used words like “company” and “business” when choosing your keywords. They’re so widely used that they won’t help you get found. Instead of trying to be found for “software company,” for example, try to be slightly more specific: “NH software,” “educational software” or “software for teachers” are better choices. (But don’t be too specific. Very specific keywords technically boost your SEO rating, but they don’t do anything for you if no one is searching those terms).

2. Optimize For Your Keywords.

It is great to include the keywords and search terms for which you want to rank on Google, but be sure you are still writing content for the end user, not just Google. Don’t try to squeeze in as many search terms as possible all over your site. Another way to maximize your SEO is to link your search terms to other pages of your site that relate to that search term. Also, make sure you name your images with search terms when you save the files and with ALT tags when you (or your Web developer) puts them on your site. Search engines don’t “see” images, just text.

3. Create Content.

We love business blogs. When you create lots of original content (integrating your keywords of course) you boost your SEO ranking. A blog gives you a chance to add pages to your site each time you publish a new post. Because your blog will have interesting, remarkable content (as HubSpot would say) such as industry news, company news, and community-related info, it becomes something other people will link to and share through social media. This increases your number of inbound links, which has beneficial search results. You should also use Facebook and/or Twitter and/or LinkedIn and other social networking sites to promote new blog content. Social media can help boost your page views and, in turn, your SEO.

3. Turn Clicks Into Cash.

Once you have a base of people following you on social media sites and visiting your site or blog, turn those clicks into sales. Try promoting a special offer on your site and on your social media pages—you may bring in new customers. Experiment with different ways of doing this to see what kinds of promotions help you connect with your audience. (HubSpot has lots more tips in their ebook).

4. Go Mobile.

Talk to your developers about optimizing your site for mobile so it can be viewed on smart phones and tablets. Add a QR code to your print materials so potential clients can scan it and be directed right to your site. Offer mobile-friendly offers using Facebook Places or Foursquare.

5. Analyze. Then Adapt.

Keep an eye on your analytics. How much of your site traffic is repeat readers? How many viewers are you getting, and from what sources? Who is linking to your site? If you’re not getting the results you want, you may have to make tweaks to your strategy. Would more specific keywords get you found more easily? Do you need to start posting more or better content to your blog so that other people want to link to it? It’s important to take a step back and look at your strategy and think about if there’s anything you could be doing better.

This is just scratching the surface of HubSpot’s ebook—be sure to check it out for yourself. Want some help? Vital Design can help you with all your Internet marketing needs. If it’s time to take your Internet marketing strategy to the next level, (which it is) get in touch with us by phone at (603) 766-1902 or on our website.

Some American Express card holders are already getting cash back when they check in at selected locations around New York City, and so far it’s been a success for everyone involved.

The initiative is simple–you just go online, sync your American Express card with your Foursquare account and start getting deals. For example, if you check in at clothing store H&M on Foursquare and spend $75, you earn $10 that goes straight into your American Express account. New duds, cash back and a chance to be Foursquare mayor? Sign us up.

During the program’s beta testing, carried out at the South By Southwest music festival in Austin,  business owners reported that American Express cardholders who checked in on Foursquare spent 20 percent more than those who didn’t. In the initial tests, the partnership with Foursquare brought a “higher response rate than anything else we’re doing,” said AmEx vice chairman Edward P.Gilligan, in an interview with the New York Times.

The partnership is a great example of business leveraging social media to their advantage: Foursquare gets new members, local businesses gain customers, and American Express boosts the amount customers use their cards and maybe even adds some new deal-seeking cardholders.

Based on the success of Portsmouth’s first Foursquare day, we think this is something that could work here in the Port City. What do you think?

Do you use Foursquare? Would you use technology like this if it were brought to your city? And would it influence your decision to either start using Foursquare or get an American Express card? Tell us what you think in the comments.

Not a Foursquare member? Join here. Want to learn about how Foursquare, Facebook, Twitter and other social media sites can help your business? That’s what we’re here for. Contact us at 603.766.1902 or via our website.

Facebook recently made some changes to their business pages, which have made Facebook into an even more effective tool for reaching potential clients and customers. Facebook business pages give your company a home on the most visited website on the Internet. That means that you have a huge number of potential fans, but also that it’s easy to get lost. So if you want to start tapping the true potential of your Facebook page, here are five things that your business page needs:

1. Smart promotion

Don’t just send your Facebook page to everyone in your personal friends list. Put a link to your Facebook page in your business email signature so every email you send is accompanied by a reminder to “Like” your business. If you have a email marketing list, send out reminders about your page and encourage clients to join the Facebook page. Send these out repeatedly. Make sure that there is a blurb on all your printed materials touting your Facebook page. If your business has a physical office, put a small sign on the front desk or the window reminding visitors to become Facebook fans.

2. Personal involvement
If you host events, take plenty of photos and encourage fans to tag themselves in those photos, or tag them yourself. Don’t use the page strictly for serious marketing–encourage fans to send questions and comments, and occasionally just throw out a fun question for your fans. (i.e., “We’re ready for summer here at Vital Design–what’s your plan to beat the heat?”) Letting fans know that there are real people behind the Facebook page will help fans feel connected to you and your business. And yes, this will take some time, but remembering to log in every day and spend even a short amount of time updating the page and communicating with your fans makes a big difference.

3. Widgets
Facebook now lets you put “Like” buttons and other Facebook widgets on your business Web page, so that everyone who will be reminded to like your Facebook page every time they visit. If you have a Facebook page, you must promote it on your homepage–these widgets are a great, graphically appealing way to do that. You can get the plugin in the Facebook Developer’s page here, and there are more advanced tips about adding and tracking social media buttons at Yoast. (Thanks to Vital’s Jesse Rand for the find).

4. Link up with personal pages
Put a link to your business’ Facebook page in the “Something about myself” box under your Facebook profile photo. You can also link to your business Facebook page in a status update using the @ function. Putting an @ before your business name will tag your business page in the post, which will put a link right in your status. (Check out the new stuff we’re up to at @Vital Design!) Encourage the staff of your business to do this too, if they’d like. Also consider using a program like HootSuite or Tweetdeck that will allow you to share news and links to all your social media accounts at once.

5. Mobile connectivity
Fans can link up to your Facebook page from their phones if their phones are verified as a mobile device on their account. You’ll need 25 “likes” and a verified username. Then people can just send a text to 32665 with the words fan (your username). This could work great if you are hosting a mobile event because attendees could like your page from the audience. Texting to Like a page is also useful in TV and radio spots.

What do you think? What strategies have you used to make your Facebook Page a more effective way to communicate with your audience?

Want more? Social media marketing is one of the things we do best. Contact us on our website or at 603-766-1902. And of course, don’t forget to like us on Facebook and follow us on Twitter.

The photo function can even help you keep tabs on your most far-flung friends, whether it’s your son touring the country in a band, your California cousins, or your old classmates.

But thanks to Facebook’s new Tag Suggestions tool for photos, the site now knows not just your name, age, hometown and what you “Like,” but also what you look like. If you haven’t updated your privacy settings lately, you’re already using the Facebook’s new facial recognition app every time you upload photos–and it’s being used on photos of you as well.

The new Tag Suggestions tool pre-tags a user’s friends using facial recognition software to match newly uploaded photos with photos that have been tagged elsewhere.

It also suggests the name of a friend in the photo. It then opens a window that lets you choose to keep, remove or edit the tags.

The software works, but it’s not perfect. Facebook frequently makes mistakes about who is actually shown in a picture. (I’ve noticed that it does especially poorly when subjects are squinting in bright sunlight–meaning that you can end up tagging people you haven’t seen in years in the pictures from last weekend’s beach trip).

Unless the software has been disabled, the user creating the album has to go through the individual photos and remove or correct tags as necessary. It makes it easier to tag friends, which has its pros and cons. It can be quicker, and if you’re uploading dozens and dozens of pictures from a trip or wedding, it’s pretty convenient.

But if your friend approves all of the automatic Facebook tags, you end up tagged in everything, whether you like it or not. These tags, and automatically scanning users’ photos with facial recognition software, is something that many people are saying borders on violating users’ privacy.

That picture of you mid-sneeze, or tucking into a fried dough the size of your torso? Hey, at least it’s only visible to the 600 million or so people who use Facebook.

If the new Tag Suggestions app skews a little too “1984″ for your taste, you can disable it easily from your Facebook privacy settings page. Here’s how:

1. Under the “Account” drop down menu, choose “Privacy Settings.”
2. In the bottom left-hand corner, choose “Customize Settings.”
3. In the second section, “Things others share” you’ll find a setting called, “Suggest photos of me to friends.” Choose “Edit Settings” and then “Disable” from the drop down menu in the window that opens.
4. Click, “Okay.”

Disabling this setting both turns off tag suggestions for your pictures and keeps you from being suggested in other people’s “Tag Suggestions” window when they upload pictures. Also, here’s another great post on how to disable facial recognition photo tagging on Facebook from email marketing company Blue Sky Factory.

While you’re on Facebook, be sure to “Like” Vital Design! And if your business doesn’t have a Facebook page–or it needs a little help–check out our tips and tricks for creating a Facebook fan page and contact us at 603.766.1902 or by email.

What do you think about Facebook’s new privacy settings? Will you follow our tips to disable Tab Suggestions? Or do you like the convenience of having photos of you easily tagged?

(If the video doesn’t load, click here to view it on YouTube.)

The new Facebook Pages upgrade offers a lot of the changes that the personal page accounts received at the end of last year. Most noticeable are the photo thumbnail feature at the top of the Pages wall, shift of navigation from top “tabs” to the left side as on your personal account, and the ability to interact in other areas of Facebook as your business Page.

This last one is huge for using Facebook for marketing because you can essentially use your business page in the same ways you use your personal account. It also gives us the ability to further separate personal accounts from business pages, which is good.

Facebook lists the new capabilities as:

As you all know, social media is exploding. Almost everyone has either a Facebook, Twitter (although my wife may think it’s stupid), and/or LinkedIn account, if not all three. YouTube is becoming an everyday resource for tutorials etc. If you still think this social media thing is just a fad, you may be surprised to learn that in January UNH will offer it’s first Social Media course.

Facebook is kind of a big deal, and surprisingly enough the fastest growing demographic of Facebook users is those 35 years old and older. What started as a platform for students to communicate, has evolved into a highly sophisticated marketing tool with more than 300 million users worldwide. Major companies are taking notice, and it’s showing up everywhere. The other night I noticed that Honda is using their Fan page url, facebook.com/honda, in commercials rather than www.honda.com. It’s an interesting concept. Honda is trying to get their customers to build strength in the Honda brand socially through, “The Experiment.” A project attempting to prove that, “Everybody knows somebody who loves a Honda.” Seeing if we can all be connected through Honda Love.

Other companies like Walgreens, Coca-Cola, and Red Bull are using it too. It makes sense, go to where your customers are rather than making them come to you. There are 128,940,004 daily users already familiar with the Facebook functionality, becoming a fan of your company is just a click away.

So you have a Facebook page, you picked a custom Facebook URL and have started to add content. But your page is still just a Facebook page with your content, and not nearly as impressive as Coca-Cola’s customized page.

How do you create a custom Facebook page?

Static FBML is a Facebook application that allows you to add custom HTML code to your Fan Page giving you the ability to brand the page or pages however you want. Ideally, a professional looking custom designed and developed landing page will make the viewer want to become a fan of your business.

In this tutorial you’ll learn how to add the Static FBML application to your page. How to set up your code so it works correctly. And how to set your new page as the default landing page for visitors, rather than your wall.

Here’s what you do…

Go to www.facebook.com and Login to your Facebook account.

At the bottom left of your screen click Applications.

Then click on Browse More Applications.

In the search box type in Static FBML.

Click on Static FBML.

Once on the Static FBML page, click Add to my Page select your page from the menu by clicking Add to Page.

Next, return to the Fan Page you are editing and go to the wall. Click Edit Page from the options under the logo/image box.

Scroll down to the FBML application, and select Edit.

This should bring you to a page that has two empty boxes. In the Box Title field, enter the name you want to display on your new tab. In the larger box, paste in your HTML code. When you are done click on Save Changes.

NOTE: The code should be from opening to closing div or table tag and contain no opening or closing body or HTML tags. Image/flash files etc. need to contain the full url and all styles need to be inline.

Setting Your New Page as the Default Landing Page

Go back to the Wall of the Fan page you are working on. Click Options, and then click Settings.

In the “Default Landing Tab for Everyone Else:” option, select the tab that you have just created.

That’s pretty much it. Log out of Facebook, go back to the Facebook Fan Page you just created to see how everyone else will view it. And remember, if all else fails… we can do it all for you! Contact us to learn more.

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