No More Custom Facebook FBML Tabs!

Hello All,

It's confirmed!!! There will be no more FBML tabs on Facebook from 11 March 2011!!!

Facebook has announced today this would be the case. this also apply to all the new FBML apps on the platform. However, it doesn't affect the old FBML apps.

We think this has a BIG impact on small businesses. As you know, the more tech savvy people will just hack in and produce their own FMBL tabs. The plus side is that you can have any tabs you want with whatever tab name.

As from 11 March 2011, you are kind of stuck with full development of web pages and to bring them in to Facebook as iframe. Again, it can be done if you know what you are doing. But then if you are busy running a small business, where do you find the time.

Enough said,

do check out our new gallery of Custom Facebook Tabs. The cost is as low as $12/Month, so it’s a lot for your money. Check it out at:

http://on.fb.me/gvaC9k

Facebook Custom Tab Helps to Promote Business Fan Pages

Hello everyone,

Do you know Custom Tab can help to promote your Facebook Fan Page? If you know how Facebook works, you can create your own Custom Tab. However, most people don’t!!! This is where we come in.

Social RSS has been working with businesses and developing apps for some time. We acknowledge the needs for your Fan Page to stand out of the others. We are launching a new service enabling businesses to have their own very lost-cost Custom Tab. Check out the examples here:

http://on.fb.me/gvaC9k

If you are interested, please email socialrss (at) hotmail.com

Custom Tab for your Facebook Fan Page

Get Your Own Facebook Fan Page Custom Tab For Only $12/Month

Hello Everyone,

We have just launched a new tab with examples of Custom Tab for Facebook Page Pages. You can include your own custom header banner, with one-directional inbound link to your website. You can also have custom tab name, etc. All for $12/Month. Please see examples at:

http://on.fb.me/gvaC9k

Please email socialrss (at) hotmail.com for further info.

Social RSS

Are you running a Viral Social Media Agency???

Hello Everyone,

Are you running a viral Social Media Agency??? Would you like to lever the power of Social RSS to help your clients on Facebook? Social RSS now comes with the most needed Metrics for Paid and Trial customers. You can monitor the performance of newsfeeds on Facebook for the very first time.

You can partner with Social RSS and to deliver powerful performances on behalf of your clients.

Please email socialrss@hotmail.com for this unique partnering opportunity.

Paul P
Social RSS

How to make your news popular on Facebook using News Feeds

Businesses and organizations on Facebook who really understand how to leverage social media are constantly looking for the best ways to engage their fan bases and the Facebook community at large. They want to drive traffic to their sites and increase sales.

Of course, there are many ways that this can be achieved but since I am a developer of Facebook applications, I thought I'd let you know a few things about how Facebook's News Feed system works and how your news can be optimized to take advantage of Facebook's organic viral streams.

What are Facebook News Feeds?

News Feeds are the stories that appear on your Page/Profile Wall or your Home Page. They are, in my opinion, the most important viral tool on Facebook. Think of them as free adverts to your Fans. As you can see in the News Feed above many of our Fans liked and commented on this story, increasing engagement on our Page and in turn increasing sales, since it was an article that praised one of our applications (Social RSS).

Do all News Feeds get seen on my Fans Home Pages?

All the News Feeds posted to your Page Wall will appear in the "Most recent" tab on your Fan's Home Page. However, the "Most recent" tab displays the News Feeds in chronological order. This means that if your story (News Feed) was published 8 hours prior to the Fan logging on to Facebook, it may be quite a way down the list and the Fan might miss it. What you are really trying to achieve is making your story popular enough to be featured in Facebook's "Top News" tab (again located on your Fans Home Pages).

How does Facebook decide which News Feeds appear in the "Top News" tab?

Without getting too technical about this, Facebook has an algorithm (called the "Edge Rank") that helps them decide how popular a News Feed is and also how relevant the News Feed is to the individual Fan in question. For those of you interested in the formula they use, here it is:

∑euewede

e - Edge (Edges include comments, likes, tags etc.)
u - Affinity score between the viewing user and the edge creator (in other words has this particular Fan interacted with your News Feeds a lot previously).
w - Weight for this edge type (Eg. Facebook gives "comments" a larger weight than "likes").
d - Time decay factor based on how long ago the edge was created.

So how can this knowledge be used to create more engaging News Feeds?

How to create engaging News Feeds

1. Use media. Through our work on the Facebook Platform we have found that using media in your News Feeds creates much higher engagement. Images, flash files and mp3s can be used in News Feeds, so you can choose the media that suits your company best.
2. Ask your Fans direct questions. Eg. What do you think of the new iPad? This often creates a discussion between your Fans.
3. When you are designing content for News Feeds always ask yourself, is this going to be of interest to my Fans? Would I comment on it?
4. Don’t post too many News Feeds. If you bombard your Fans with content, they may start to hide news from your Page. Wait until your latest story has “decayed” and then post up another.
5. Always “like” and “comment” on your own News Feeds. This will give your News Feed a boost in the right direction to start with. Some applications such as Social RSS have an “auto-like” system, that automatically posts News Feeds for you and “likes” them without you needing to do anything.
6. Use voting. People like to vote on any subject. Democrats or Republicans, Football or Baseball, Mac or PC. Including votes on News Feeds can be a successful engagement technique.
7. Make sure you post your News Feeds using an application that includes a “share” link on the story (Social RSS includes this feature). This way your news can spread virally throughout the Facebook community.

These are just 7 ways to produce engaging News Feeds. There are many others, so feel free to comment on this article with methods that have worked for you. Remember once Fans start to engage with your brand on Facebook, their “affinity” score will increase and they will see more of your news. This is the key to successful marketing on Facebook.

Social RSS new release - Part 1 - Metrics

We are pleased to announce that we have finally released the new version of Social RSS, our most popular Facebook application. It helps companies and bloggers promote their content throughout the Facebook community. Since there are quite a few differences from the old version of the software we decided we should let you know about each in easy to read snippets. Here's part 1.

Part 1 - Metrics
Metrics are a vital component of the new release. They allow people using the $24 per year service to see a selection of statistics outlining the engagement that is being created due to their RSS feeds and the promotional potential of Social RSS. In other words, we've opened up Social RSS so that you can see which items in your RSS feeds are popular and creating engagement on your Facebook Page.

Why do I need this?
At Social RSS, we often get asked questions like:

"What content should I put in my RSS feeds to create the most engagement?"

Using the new metrics we provide, companies and bloggers can decide this for themselves.

Thanks for taking the time to read about the new metrics system. I'll post part 2 up here in the next couple of days.

Paul Brindle
Social Revitalizer
http://www.socialrevitalizer.com/services.php

Social RSS Guide to the New Facebook Home Page Design 2010

Hello Everyone,

You will know by now that Facebook has started rolling out the new home page design for users.
Many of you have asked for an illustrated guide. So here we are.

Please reference to the attached diagram of the new Facebook home page.

1. The Facebook logo!!!

2. This shows you how many friend requests are waiting for you. Click the link to show the current friend requests. You can confirm or ignore individual friend requests. You stay on the page.

3. This shows you how many new messages you have. Click the link to see the latest 5 messages in your inbox. You stay on the page.

4. This shows you how many notifications are waiting for you. At the time of writing, apps can send notifications to users at will. However, Facebook will be removing this function from apps in the near future. Please watch this space for further information. You also stay on the page.

5. This is the search box provided by Facebook. You can find things on Facebook here. If you type the name of a friend here, Facebook will give you a list of friends matching your typed words. You can also search for apps and fan pages here.

6. This is the space where Facebook would broadcast their important messages from time to time. For example, the diagram is trying to explain the new features of the new home page design.

7. This takes you back to your home page. Please note that only you can see your own home page. Your friends can only see your profile page.

8. This takes you to your profile page. This is how your profile would appear to your friends!!!

9. This links gives you access to your accounts. It includes the following: Edit Friends, Account Settings, Privacy Settings, Application Settings, Credits Balance, Help Center and Logout. Perhaps the most important of all is the Application Settings. Application Settings control what permissions you have granted to apps. For example, if you are using Social RSS and would like to grant additional special permissions to the app to send newsfeeds automatically to your wall, you should select this link.

10. This link is similar to link (2), with the exception that the link will actually take you to a new page, rather than staying where you are.

11. These are the suggestions made by Facebook. There are call-to-actions linking to your friends. They could be someone you haven't spoken to for a while. Facebook made suggesions as to what you might want to do.

12. This is the link for Facebook IM (Instant Messaging). It shows how many of your friends are available. This links back to items (14) and (15) to be discussed below.

13. This is a newsfeed from Social RSS app. Newsfeeds perhaps is one of the most important items on your wall. You can either update it using the interactive panel, or you can chose to receive newsfeeds from your fav apps. For example, Social RSS can send newsfeeds containing photos, images, videos and even MP3 playable music!!! Please note that there are major changes afoot in the near future. Facebook will be removing all profile boxes on the front wall as well as the Boxes tab. Newsfeeds will be an important way to interact with your fav apps. More details to follow so please watch this space. You can chose if you want to display the "Top News" or the "Most Recent". The "Edit Options" enables you to control how often you want to see new posts.

14. This indicates your friends are NOT available for Facebook IM.

15. This indicates your friends are available for Facebook IM (with a solid green dot against their profile picture).

16. This is the new Facebook game dashboard. You can browse through all the games apps available on Facebook here.

17. This is the new Facebook application dashboard. You can browse through all the apps available on Facebook here. The link takes you to a new page. You will see some of the apps used by both yourself and your friends. There are also six categories for apps: Business, Education, Entertainment, Friends & Family, Games and Just for Fun. You can select any of these links and search for your fav apps. For example, type in "rss" to serach for the RSS reader apps available.
The top app is Social RSS with about 400,000 users.

18. Last but not the least, this is a newsfeeds control as well. This enables you to browse through different categories of newsfeeds, messages, events, etc.

As we said, there will be more changes afoot within the next few weeks. For example, the removal of profile boxes, Boxes tab, changes to application tabs and application canvas pages, no more notifications from apps. Please bookmark this page and come back later for further details!!!

That's all for now. Thanks for reading!!!

Paul P
Social Revitalizer/Social RSS

what do you think about the new facebook home page design???

hey people,

what do you think about the new facebook home page design for profile users? we understand that facebook is rolling out the new design in different stages. some of our app users have it, but some don't.

we have had a good look at both old and new ones. as usual, new designs take a while to get used to. having said that, we actually quite like the new home page design:

(a) the top banner is now much clearer with various options.
(b) the navigation of different items are also better on the left (narrow) side

apart from that, not a lot has actually changed.

i know users don't actually have a choice, but we do like the new home page design...

more details to come....

social revitalizer
:)

facebook launches new profile home page design

hello everyone,

we believe facebook has started rolling out its new home page design...
we understand that some of the users will start seeing it in their own profile home pages...
let us know what you think of it

:)

social rss creates inbound links to websites of facebook pages

hello everyone, allfacebook has an interesting article on improving your page's SEO (Search Engine Optimisation). have a look at this:
http://www.allfacebook.com/2009/08/facebook-page-seo/
if you add Social RSS, it should increase the number of inbound links to your website
:)