How (And Why!) To Embed A Facebook Post

Facebook has recently given business page users the ability to embed posts into their blog or web site.

It's very easy to do, and it's something that you definitely should do whenever you have a popular post that really gets some traction on Facebook.

I'll talk about the 'Why?' a little later, but first to the 'How?'.

Step-By-Step Guide To Embedding Posts

Step 1: Navigate to the post that you wish to embed and hold your cursor in the top right hand corner so that a little, grey, downwards arrow appears:

Step 2: Click the arrow to make the full menu appear.

Select 'Embed Post' as shown in the image below:

Step 3: Facebook will now give you the code that you need to embed the post.

Step 4: It looks complicated, but don't worry, all you need to do is 'copy and paste' it:

Step 5: You now need to paste this code into your blog or web site. If you're using Blogger you will need to click the HTML toggle button as seen below:

If you use Wordpress, you will need to click on the 'Text' button on the top right hand side of your post:

Step 6: In some cases you may find that you need to centre the post on the page.

If you need to do this just add <center> before the code starts, and </center> at the end (as seen below) and that will sort out the alignment issue:

That's it you're done!

Your embedded post will look like this:

Post by Clixeo.com.

Why You Should Use Embedded Posts

I have seen embedded posts used very effectively by businesses.

Facebook is an excellent place to ask questions - such as 'Which social media outlet works best in your business?' or 'What do you consider to be customer service best practice?'.

Once you get your audience talking, you have got some great content for a blog post.

So embed that post on your blog, incorporate all the great comments that your audience added on Facebook and the two media will feed each other.

People will find your blog and can then add to the debate on Facebook.

People will see the debate on Facebook and check out your blog.

Embedded posts are a superb way of beginning great conversations and then taking that momentum and engagement and bringing it over to your blog or web site.

How To Create Your First Business Page On Facebook

With well over 1 billion users using Facebook, this represents a massive opportunity for all businesses, whatever their size, niche or type.

So how do you get started as a business on Facebook?

Well, the good news is that you really don't need to ship in a team of technical experts ... it's no harder to create a page for your business than it is to create a page for yourself.

Important Alert!

I used to see this problem a lot when I first started using Facebook for marketing in 2009. In the early 'gold rush' days of Facebook, many people used 'cheats' - whether knowingly or not - that are against Facebook's terms and conditions.

Source: https://www.facebook.com/legal/terms

The key points here are:

• You should only have one personal profile
• That personal profile should use your real name
• You should use Facebook pages for your business, not your personal profile

I see it much less frequently these days, but I have met several people now who built their business on a personal profile only to have it terminated without mercy by Facebook - and losing all their followers in the process!

I think Facebook users are much better informed about the dangers these days ... but just in case, make sure that you do this correctly!

Step-By-Step Guide

Creating your first business page is simple ... and remember, it's also free.

Step 1: Log in to your Facebook account

Step 2: Click on the menu link on the top right hand side of the page, then select the 'create page' option:

Step 3: You will now be presented with the options below. Usually you'll select one of the three highlighted options, whichever is most suitable for your business.

Do not use a brand name unless you own that brand or have paid for official licensing rights.

Take care and advice also if creating a page that is based around a music star, celebrity, TV programme or something similar.

You need to make very clear that you are not acting in any official capacity and also take note that you may be required to remove your site if you misrepresent or pass yourself off as 'official' in any way.

Step 4: Read and accept Facebook's Terms And Conditions for business pages.

These are pretty brief and straightforward, but it's time well spent learning what is and is not permissible.

My view on this is it would be a terrible thing to build up a brilliant community on Facebook only to lose it all because you didn't follow a few simple rules.

Step 5: Make sure that you complete the page information section fully because this is where you can make the most of Facebook as a brilliant SEO power tool.

Tip: You should make sure that (without keyword stuffing!) your keywords are included in the description area.

Depending on your business type, you might even use your geographical location here.

Make sure that you add your web site links to (this is how you drive Facebook web traffic to your main site) and take great care when selecting your unique Facebook web address too.

These are difficult to change but, most importantly, you get to ride on the coat tails of the 2nd most popular web site in the universe, make sure it counts for your SEO purposes!

Step 6: Add your profile picture.

Remember that these are displayed quite small most of the time, so make sure that it works well in your Timeline feed.

For businesses, it's fine to use a professional face picture if you're the 'face' of your business, but logos are fine too.

Step 7: Add your page to your 'Favourites' for future easy access or just 'Skip' for now:

Step 8: Skip ad creation for now!

I don't recommend that you promote your new business page until you have some decent content to share.

At the moment your page looks a little sparse, so keep it quiet for a little while longer.

Step 9: Add a cover image to really make your business page stand out.

This needs to be 851 pixels wide and 315 pixels tall.

You can use a photograph for this or use a service like TimelineCoverBanner.com.

That's it, you're done!

You have just created your first business page on Facebook.

How To Add A Free App That's Essential For Every Business

One of the many fabulous things about Facebook is in the ability for users to add 'apps' to business pages.

These apps add amazing functionality to a basic page.

This is another pressing reason why businesses should not use their personal profiles incidentally, because these apps can only be added to business pages and you miss out on a lot of good things if you don't use the correct business page format.

 

Image source: actualphone

So what is an app?

Without getting all technical about it, it's like a bit of software that you can add to a Facebook page that allows you to provide a useful service without having to download anything.

It just 'attaches' itself to your business page and you're good to go!

To give you a basic introduction to using apps on your business pages, I've selected a free app which will be pretty useful for virtually all businesses.

It provides basic and useful functionality which applies in most business settings, so you're bound to be able to make use of it, whatever line of business that you're in.

The great thing about apps is that they're usually free with basic functionality, then you have to pay for extra features.

In this step-by-step guide, you'll not only see how easy it is to add apps to your business page, you'll also be able to add this excellent free app to your own page.

Essential App: Add A Contact Form To Your Business Page

Direct link: https://www.facebook.com/contactforms

This app adds a 'Contact Us' form to your business page and allows you to take a prospect's email address - great for follow up!

Step 1: Go to the URL above (Hint: I found this more straightforward using Internet Explorer as my browser).

Step 2: Click the 'Go To App' button.

Step 3: Read through the simple instructions, then click the 'Get Started' button.

Step 4: Select the business page that you want to add the app to:

Step 5: Confirm that you want to add the app to that page:

Step 6: The app has now been added to your business page.

To access it, just click on the new button that was just added to your page:

Step 7: Enter your email address so that you can receive notifications, then click the 'Setup account' button:

Step 8: Your contact form is now ready to use:

Please note that because you are the admin of this page, you see the form slightly differently to your page users.

You will see the 'Customize My Form' button and the 'Admin' button - because as page admin you need to see these - but your page users will see a different view:

The support for this free tab is extremely good, so if you have any problems or issues, you can get in touch with the ContactMe team here.

The installation process for any other app is pretty well the same as this one, so if you're new to apps, you can use steps 1-4 for most other Facebook apps, the process is very similar every time.