DebJJones.com

Facebook Brand Page Changes That Need Your Immediate Attention

If you have a brand page on Facebook with custom tabs, there are some things you need to start working on right away before the timeline layout is implemented for all brands on 3/30/2012.

Right now you can preview your page in the timeline view so that only admins can see it. This gives you a little time to get your page in shape. There are a couple of things that need your attention right away:

Brand Page Logo - Be sure to re-size and crop your page logo. If you let Facebook do this, you could get some very unbecoming results:

Custom Tabs - If you have custom tabs set up at the 520 px width, that is changing to 810 px width. Until you get your custom tab updated, it will look like this:

Notice all the extra white space to the right and as you can see, the "Like" callout is now pointing in the wrong direction.

Application Icons - Your custom tabs will need application icons that should measure 111 x 74 pixels. These will show up on your brand timeline. If you don't update your application icon, it could look like this:

These are the top priorities for you to get your Facebook brand page into shape, but there are more changes you should know about. Mashable has a great article about the Facebook brand page changes.

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Google "Megasitelinks" for Adwords

Maybe you've noticed these in your organic results:

Now they're available for your paid search, too. Here's how they work: if you have ad sitelinks enabled in your campaign, Adwords looks throughout your account for ads with the same destination URL. It then pulls the ad text in under the sitelink and the result is this mega-ad that takes up tons of real estate and is super impressive. Google reports CTR lift of up to 30% for these ads.

Caution: Since this is enabled at the account level and performed automatically by Adwords, you can't enable it for some campaigns and not for others.

Read more about this on the Inside Adwords blog. I don't believe there is any additional cost for this, but if you find there is, please leave a comment.

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The Power of Green

via video.nytimes.com

Tom Friedman talks about how, for green energy alternatives to work, they have to make economic and financial sense in the short term. Is he too idealistic to think that the U.S. could actually be a leader in alternative energy and environmentalism? (About 6 minutes long.)

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Inspirational Leadership & Sustainable Values - Aspen Ideas Festival

via aifestival.org

What digology is thinking about now: how principled business can be more profitable. Tom Friedman and Dove Seidman talk about how bringing values of sustainability to our decision-making impacts both our financial markets and Mother Nature.

What does this have to do with small business? Sustainable values are about focusing on how to be, not how big to be. In this new world, a focus on creating value for all stakeholders instead of just for shareholders can actually create a stronger business model.

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Our adorable interns

The Fan Gallery Group is a collaborative of co-habitators: James River Tile & Stone Art, Topos, LLC, and digology, working together on a not-ready-for-prime-time, local marketing project. This is the creative team...an important ingredient in our secret sauce.

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Your Phone is Ringing...or it isn't...Do You Know Why?

You're sitting down to pay your business expenses and there's this bill from the local newspaper, or the yellow pages. You hesitate...is it really worth it? Can you risk not advertising there? Is it getting you any business? How would you know? For many businesses, the answer is simple: tracking phone numbers.

This simply means putting a different phone number on each advertising source and reviewing monthly statistics about which channel generated the call...where your business is coming from.You can even record your calls to capture prospect information and to identify coaching opportunities with your sales and phone staff. It's often worthwhile to track what happens after the phone call, to determine which advertising investments are actually returning a profit.

Even if your website has a phone number on it, that phone number can be set up to change according to whether the caller came from online advertising, a recent email newsletter, or your Facebook page. And then you can tell which effort made your phone ring. No more wondering.

This one, simple measure can significantly increase your business for the same advertising dollars you're spending today. Why? Because you have the knowledge necessary to cut out the expenses that aren't generating business and to shift your budget to channels that produce results.

Now the only thing you need to wonder is why you didn't do this a long time ago?

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Posted from my mobile phone (SMS)

Did you know you can post to Posterous with a text message?

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Getting Online Marketing Help

If you click on an ad agency's ad and it leads you to their home page, that's a red flag that they aren't really pros in online advertising. Your "landing page" should be specifically crafted to deliver on the promise of your ad and should tell the reader EXACTLY what they should do. Home pages have a completely different purpose and it is virtually impossible for a home page to serve as a landing page. So, if you're looking for online marketing help, a quick litmus test is to click on some ads and see where you end up. Happy clicking!

Deb J Jones

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Fan Gallery Group Coffee Talk

The "Fan Gallery Group" (@fangallerygroup), consisting of @greenitect, @jamesrivertile and @digology with guests including @RicCyclingCorps and other smart Richmond business owners. We talked about what works and doesn't work about social media for business. I know I came away with some great ideas from these smart people.