The Benefits Of Facebook Timeline Changes For Businesses

Major press outlets and blogs (as well as social media sites like Facebook and Twitter) are all buzzing about the new updates that Facebook make recently to their site, and the Facebook Timeline design that is coming soon to all profiles. While some have said this may be bad for brands, the truth of the matter is that Facebook will continue to evolve and change.

Deciding to rely on the positives of how the new Facebook changes could potentially lift business profiles, can help small business owners and employees learn to make the best of the situation and continue to grow their audience via Facebook.

Screenshot from https://www.facebook.com/about/timeline

More Attention Paid To Small Businesses From Facebook

Facebook launched their campaign to give over 200,000 small business owners $50 in ad credit starting next year. In addition to the free ad credit, Facebook is also seeking to educate business owners and advertisers on their ad platform, their sponsored stories option (which is discussed in more detail below), and other attributes of Facebook Marketing that is available for business owners.

Facebook says that in some cases, businesses only need a small ad budget to generate high returns, especially if they have a smaller or local demographic. This means that Facebook recognizes the importance of small businesses on Facebook and is seeking to create better relationships with them.

Faster Snapshot Of Potential Customers & Employees

The Facebook Timeline layout mainly focuses on what is important in a user’s life. This can help give businesses an important view into each user they are looking into, either as a potential customer or employee.

For instance, if a non-profit organization is hiring a Volunteer Coordinator, seeing a candidate’s timeline that is filled with pictures of them volunteering for Habitat for Humanity or their recent volunteer trip to Haiti may let them know that volunteering and giving back is important to the candidate and they may be a good fit for the position.

Possibly Upgraded Pages

Mashable had a good article recently about the way some business profiles could use the new layout, if the opportunity is eventually rolled out to business pages. This could help businesses be more creative and to further customize their business pages in relation to specific marketing campaigns, their brand, or new products.

While some users may be apprehensive about the timeline layout for their own profiles, for businesses, this is a key opportunity to utilize their creativity in order to further drive traffic and grow their customer base.

Promoted Status Updates

Facebook now allows businesses to promote certain posts or feedback concerning their company called “Sponsored Stories”. According to Facebook, “Sponsored Stories are regular News Feed stories that have been promoted to the right column of Facebook, where you may be more likely to discover new things that your friends are interested in.

These stories only show up for friends, so you can learn about places to go, apps to use, games to play and organizations your friends like.” Facebook claims that sponsored stories are a good way to generate conversation naturally by promoting your existing customer base’s interaction with your brand. This may give users exposure to the business that they may have not received before.

However Facebook Timeline is received, Facebook will continue to be used daily by millions of people, continuing to make it an important aspect to an overall marketing campaign for almost all businesses, large and small.