Facebook’s NEW Newsfeed – What this means for businesses?

Do you remember the time when Facebook first introduced the Newsfeed concept? I do, and with all that, I remember all those complains and frustrations. People in general, don’t like change. And when it comes to social media, change happens all the time.

As a business owner, you have to learn to adapt fast to today’s technology changes. To be honest, I am not a fan either of some changes. However, this change looks promising with its countless opportunities for business pages.

We all heard the announcement about the new Facebook’s newsfeed changes and I know many of you wonder what to look for and when these changes will actually unveil?

Facebook is introducing the new look slowly, so you will have time to get used to it, and the development team at Facebook will be able to integrate user feedback.

What the new look will mean for your business?

The new look will have a more personalized newsfeed where photos and visual content reigns.

The new Facebook Newsfeed look was designed with mobile users in mind. Images will be larger and when someone “likes” you or some of your posts, your image will show up on the Newsfeed. I recall when a business owner on my last speaking event asked: what is the value of a “LIKE”? Now, more than ever before, each “like” will have a significant value.

Sidebars will be different

The new sidebars on the left will look modern and clean and it will be the space for chat as well.

Content will be organized by genre

To be honest, I really think this will eliminate the clutter feel.

On the top right side, you will be able to view content by simply selecting topic feeds, such as music, photos, or users who all following certain pages. As well you will have the option to see the most recent posts or you can choose “All friends” options. Many were complaining about Facebook not having this option and if you haven’t been interacting with someone their post didn’t show up in your feed. Now with a click you can choose what you want to see.
You will be able to select specific categories
You will have the option when you reach the bottom of your newsfeed to change your views. This will open up new ways of scanning the newsfeed and will more likely keep users on Facebook longer.

The New Facebook Newsfeed is device friendly

The new design is meant to be device friendly – from cell phones, to iPads to desktops, the new newsfeed will offer the same user experience. Facebook wants you to sped more time searching.

Facebook can be very addictive, and the new clean, modern, and user-friendly look will encourage users to spend more time on Facebook. With keeping people perusing longer, Facebook is providing more opportunities for advertisers.

So what does this mean for business owners?

Just think about it. Every minute people are spending on Facebook creates more advertising opportunity. As a business owner, you should be excited about this. More people sending more time on Facebook means more opportunity for you.
When a Facebook user “likes” your page – your business page cover photo with your profile photo will show up in the Newsfeed – this is great free advertising for you. However, if you don’t have a professional cover photo, your business will look unprofessional and outdated. If you don’t have a custom cover photo then this is the time to order one right now!

The new Newsfeed will highlight your Business page’s most popular posts! This is incredibly amazing and can help you increase the interaction on your page as well increase your followers.
The New Following Feed will show users what is new in the pages and people they follow. This will provide more exposure for Pages as users will be able to easily view your business updates alongside friend’s updates, rather than instead of them.
As the users will have the same experience on all devices, your potential customers will be more likely to keep up with your page updates regardless whether they are on the go and use their mobile devices or at home using their home computer.

Are you ready and excited about these changes and the possibility that comes with it? You can actually click this link https://www.facebook.com/about/newsfeed and experience the new look, or if you wish you can sign up for to be on the waiting list and experience the new Facebook Newsfeed as it becomes available.

If you need a Facebook custom cover photo for your Business’ Facebook Page, take a look at some of our cover images we created and contact us or give us a call at 905.616.2971 to order yours and be ready when the new newsfeed rolls out.

Facebook’s New Timeline Cover Photo Rules

Facebook has relaxed their new policy governing what you can and can’t put on your timeline cover photo. There are lots of new and exciting things you are now allowed to do with your cover photo, which is a big boost for business pages. Let’s find out more.

As a Facebook Page user it is your responsibility to comply with Facebook’s terms of use and guidelines.

I heard about these changes a while ago, but I had a hard time sharing the information with you, because both the old and the new versions said: “ Date of Last Revision: December 17, 2012”.

You can read the new revised guidelines here https://www.facebook.com/page_guidelines.php and the date now clearly has been updated to March 06, 2013.

More likely you will need to clear your cache to see the revised guidelines or just copy and paste this link into a new browser where you’re not logged into Facebook.

Facebook’s New Timeline Cover Guidelines are:

Noticeably present in the new rules is the Cover photo 20% rule. This rule forces users to keep the header real estate to feature 20% or less space allocated to text in the cover image. Text in the logo does count to that 20% mark.

The current cover guide now simply states:

All covers are public. This means that anyone who visits your Page will be able to see your cover. Covers can’t be deceptive, misleading, or infringe on anyone else’s copyright. You may not encourage people to upload your cover to their personal timelines. Covers may not include images with more than 20% text.

Old Guidelines for Facebook Cover Photos:

Covers may not include:

price or purchase information, such as “40% off” or “Download it on socialmusic.com”;
contact information such as a website address, email, mailing address, or information that should go in your Page’s “About” section;
references to Facebook features or actions, such as “Like” or “Share” or an arrow pointing from the cover photo to any of these features; or
calls to action, such as “Get it now” or “Tell your friends.”

Really Facebook just simplified the rules — and boiled it down to a very basic 20% text rule:

Put whatever text you want on your cover, but keep it under 20%.

I’m happy to see that the tight rules have been removed because Facebook had a tough time enforcing them, and I had a hard time to explain my clients why they can not have some call to action while “other Facebook pages” had those call to actions on their cover images.

I’m thankful for the new simplicity. Will you update your Facebook Page cover photo according to the new rules? Check out our Facebook Cover photos we created and give us a call to either update your old cover photo or create a new one for you according to the new regulations.

Keep in mind that with the new News Feed Facebook launching, when people like your page, a cropped version of your cover photo will show in the news feed of the new fan’s friends — so you should definitely have a cover photo that represents your business well.

What do YOU think of the new Facebook Cover photo rules? Above you can see the new cover photo we created for our facebook page with the allowed 20% content ratio, yet we incorporated the call to action.

Google+ Just Rolled Out New Design Changes

March 7, 2013/in Social Media Marketing /by Piri Darabont

Do you ever feel like that there is just not enough time to keep up with all the social media changes? You just finally get comfortable with the latest changes when a new change occurs again.

Today, I want to share with you the latest changes Google+ made, hoping this will help you stay on the top of all social media change!

If you visited your or anyone’s Google+ profile you recognized right away that there are some big changes in the design of both personal and page profiles.

There is a new “Review” tab, added cards to the “About” section and a much larger cover photo for both personal profiles as well on Google+ pages.

Google+ made their announcement about these changes in a Google+ post on Wednesday and of course with every change the question is – how these new features look like and are they making conversations easier?

Under the “Profile” section there is a new tab for “Reviews”. Now, in addition to your Photos, +1’s, YouTube videos you will also find a space for your local reviews. As a Google+ user you are able to highlight favorite locations, or you can simply choose to hide this tab completely. It’s really up to you whether you want your reviews to be available on your profile or not. The changes can be made through the “Setting” option on the platform. This tights into Google’s effort to expand the local search usage.

Local search is excellent to build “word of the mouth” referral system that people are using to make informed buying decisions. If your business is not listed and OPTIMIZED on Google Places and Google+ Places you should contact us and we’ll help you set up and optimized your Google places profiles which are absolutely necessary to be found in local searches.

When you click on the “About” tab you will notice that there are separate cards now which look a lot like Facebook’s “About” section. These cards include categories like” Places, Links, Story. With the new changes you are able to edit these cards through a prominently displayed “Edit” link.

The most obvious change however on both Google+ Profiles and Pages the much larger branded cover photo with a much smaller photo and logo space. This is great news for branding purposes. The new cover photo size is 2120px by 1192px.

Google+ stated that users will see these new features rolled out gradually. I’m not sure if your profiles have the new look already or not, but you can check here.

Please follow our Google+ page to stay on top of these latest social media news and join our Google+ community to connect with fellow Entrepreneurs. These communities are targeted for Milton Businesses for now, but I will add a new community soon focused mainly on social media topics.

If this information was helful to you please be kind and share or comment here. Did you noticed the Google+ profile changes and have you updated your cover images yet?

Website Design for Milton Spinal Decompression Centre

February 27, 2013/in Website Design Projects /by Piri Darabont

As a website design company we know the importance of having a professional website designed to the latest web principles. We build websites that position our customers as a professional entity in their space.

While the Halton Spinal Decompression Centre uses the latest technology for back pain treatment, their online presence did not reflect their outstanding expertise in their field. The Halton Spinal Decompression Centre uses this highly advanced SpineMED decompression table that provides a NON-SURGICAL, DRUG-FREE back pain relief, which is EXCEPTIONALLY COMFORTABLE.

When the owners of Halton Spinal Decompression Centre contacted us with their search engine optimization needs, we had to look at their current online presence with a website audit and realize that it was time for a major re-branding. Websites built 10+ years ago were designed by the trends and technology of the past and as the web development industry changes, clients need to adapt and change, or they will be left behind in the growing competition.

We design websites that are search engine friendly and are designed by the latest SEO best practices. Our clients can rest assured that their website will be crawl and indexed continuously by search engines.

One of the requests was the ability to update the website easily, so we decided that a website built on CMS will be the best fit for their needs.

The new website was built on WordPress and has the following features:

Rotating slider on the home page
Logo design & Brand Development
Clean, easy navigation
Increased functionality and usability
Integrated Blog
Social Media Integration
Contact Us form
Video Promotion Integration

As we took a look at their overall Marketing Strategies we talked about the importance of incorporating social media in their marketing plans. We set up their Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn accounts with a custom Facebook Cover image, logo, and Twitter Custom background for branding purposes.

Social Media is an excellent way to increase the communication with current and potential customers and position a company as a tough leader. The Halton Spinal Decompression Centre is a leader in their industry; they just need to use social media to make people aware of their incredible back pain treatments.

So, if you are suffering with back pain or neck pain, and you have a herniated disc or herniated disc symptoms, and you already tried different therapy services such as Physiotherapy, Chiropractic, or Massage Therapy Services and find you are still complaining of low back pain I suggest calling the Halton Spinal Decompression Centre and tell them you found them here.

Social Media Training was part of the services as well. If you want to learn more about how to use social media to increase your leads, get more traffic and make more sales contact us today.

If you want to get your current business on line with a brand new website, or you are looking to re-design your old website give us a call at 905.616.2971. We work your online presence so that you can work your business.

1- steps to optimize your Pinterest pages

10 Steps to Optimize your Pinterest Page

February 21, 2013/in Pinterest /by Piri Darabont

Pinterest has exploded in the past year. In December 2011 there were about 7 million Pinterest users.

Today there are 25 million unique monthly visitors and these numbers are growing as we speak.

Pinterest become the 3^rd most popular social media network after Facebook and Twitter, and refers more traffic than Bing or Yahoo!

With all these statistics you should be using Pinterest to the max to increase your website traffic, grow your leads and sales!

The following 10 steps can help you rocket fuel your Pinterest profile:

Step #1 – Personal Photo

Use a professional head shot of yourself. A brand logo will also work but even for business, a photo of the business founder, especially if they are the face of the company. Having a personal photo instead of a logo can be more powerful. Remember: People buy from people!

Step #2 – About Section

You, You, You!!! Use the 200 characters available in the “About Section” to tell people clearly who you are, what you do and what products or services you offer. Incorporate your best SEO keywords, avoid being rude and whatever you do, don’t leave it blank!

Step #3 – Location, Location, Location

As Pinterest grows, local search will become more relevant. Get in early by adding your city or state to your About section to be found when people search for your services, products locally. Attract local customers by creating a board about the city or region highlighting local events, famous landmarks even if these are no relevant to your business.

Step #4 – Get Verified

Prior to verification, website URL were hidden on your Pinterest home page that could easily be missed by visitors. However, Pinterst in November made some changes and now verification makes your website URL more visible by placing a bold red check mark next to it and forming a clickable link. This feature increases engagement, and drives more traffic to your site and ultimately boosts your SEO. Follow the link for details on how to verify your pinterest business profile.

Step #5 – Be Sociable

Pinterest is a social network and interacting with others will build relationships, generate interest for your own content and grow your following. So take time to repin, like, follow and especially comment on other people’s pins. The key to using Pinterest is to become part of the community and alwys focus to give more than you get.

Step #6 – Organize your Boards

With lots of focused boards you can create a lifestyle around your brand. Make each board theme specific, use a clear title that indicates what the board is about, add keywords in the description for better searchability and be sure to pin enough content to make it look complete.

Step #7 – Board Placement

The top 2 rows are where visitors focus when they land on your Pinterest page. Make it worth their while by placing your best, most popular and relevant content in this precious Pinterest real estate. Give preference to trending topics throughout the year by moving boards around and don’t forget to make your most eye-catching pin your board cover.

Step #8 – Outside Interests

The best way to increase your followers is to create boards on trending topics such as Food, Home Decorations, Travel, Cars, DIY, all of which are popular on Pinterest. This will help you to attract pinners who would not normally have found you and give your audience an insight into the other aspect of your personality and brand.

Step #9 – Mix it Up

Intense self-promotion is a no-no on Pinterest. Don’t just pin your own content. If you really want to influence people and win friends, share and curate other people’s content alongside your own, so that your boards become a destination for your followers.

Step #10 – Visualization

Pin a variety of content in different forms. Use high quality, eye-catching, colorful images but also include charts and graphs, videos from YouTube and Vimeo, infographics, tutorials pins, and images with text overlays.

Website Design for Milton Entrepreneur Robin Read Griffin

February 10, 2013/in Website Design Projects /by Piri Darabont

Milton Website Design Company

When Robin contacted us, she was just getting ready to start her new business venture and she was looking to have a professional website for her newly launched business.

As the owner of her social media management company, Robin knows that a responsive website is absolutely crucial if you want to grow a business and stay ahead of your competition. Speaking of competition, this was one of those circumstances when we took on to build a competitors website. While on some levels we provide the same service, over the years we learned that we should never focus on our competition, but try to work with them.

I sincerely believe that our biggest competitor in life and business is – us. We have to grow to be better day-by-day, we have to strive to provide the best customer service and experience, we have to provide results for our clients and focusing on our growth and strength will put us in the right position.

The new website is built on WordPress with the following features:

Rotating banner on the home page
User friendly design
Increased functionality and usability
Blog integration
Social Media Capability
Easy to update

If you are looking to not only driving traffic to your website, but generate new leads and sales then contact Intact Marketing today for a website design consultation. Whether you need a brand new website or re-design your old website we can develop a website to meet your business need and budget.

To learn more about how to use social media to increase your leads, get more traffic and make more sales Sign Up for my exclusive social media and online marketing updates!