Tag: Facebook

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Facebook’s Graph Search – Instant Search Only Better Kind Of

This past year Google created Instant Search, you know those suggestions that pop up under what you are typing at Google.com that recommend finishing your query based on other popular searches that Google has seen and recorded. Well you could consider Facebook’s Graph Search like Instant Search for Facebook, but with a twist – it delivers results from friends, friends of friends, and friends of other friends.

It’s kind of cool to have really personalized results from people who you may trust more than a search engine algorithm. You’ve got to enable Graph Search on Facebook first to use it. Once you do, Facebook inserts a search bar on the top left of your Facebook page. Results are personalized based on your friends and if your friends don’t have the answer, the answers come from Bing.

I did a search for best Chinese restaurants in Waldorf and got ratings on two from friends of friends. The page of the restaurant actually even showed images of people eating including children, shared ratings, and the location.

After reading the information I thought I’d better check my Facebook privacy settings as clearly anything you post, images you share, or locations you log, Facebook is now using for their Graph Search results. I am not so sure I want everything I do and say used in a personal search engine. As a result, I blocked many of the things that I allow Facebook to share so you probably won’t see my comments in a Facebook search in the future.

With Facebook Graph Search you are just losing another piece of privacy that can now be used to sell products, encourage shopping or visits to a restaurant, even if you didn’t even know your comments were being used. Kind of scary when you think about it.

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Did You Know That Share-ability Impacts Who Sees Your Facebook Updates?

Did you know that most likely only 15% of your Facebook Business Page status updates are actually seen on your fans’ walls? Scary isn’t it, to know that the time you spend in keeping your Facebook wall updated may actually have marginal impact. Why? It’s about EdgeRank and share-ability.

Just like Google has an algorithm to rack and stack websites to determine where they appear in the organic or unpaid search results, Facebook has an algorithm to determine when your updates will appear on the walls of subscribers and fans. Not everything you write will be shown, but why such a little amount and how can you get more updates to show?

A great article that explains this topic further and really digs into EdgeRank can be found at SiteProNews.

The bottom line is that the higher your EdgeRank the better your chance that others will actually see what you write and post to your Business Page’s wall. A very simplified explanation of EdgeRank is share-ability. If more people comment, like, link to, and share an update you’ve posted on your wall, the higher the EdgeRank and the more likely this update is to appear on the wall of people who have liked you or subscribe to your news feed.

One way to work to raise EdgeRank is to be specific in a status update and let the reader know what action you really want them to take upon reading your update. Do you want them to share it? Ask them to do that. Do you want them to like your update? Ask them to click like! If you are linking to a download back on your website – ask them to click in and download your paper. Be specific and make the action simple and easy to do.

Improving your EdgeRank is all about action that people take when they read your post. Make sure you are doing your part to help to raise your own EdgeRank by changing your wall post to be more share-able and actionable. EdgeRank will rise when you do so and are successful in engaging reader activity.

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Facebook Cleaning Tips

I am using Facebook less and less and in part due to the clutter but this article may just turn that around for me. I recently read an article called “How To Reclaim Your Facebook News Feed – 20 Spring Cleaning Tips” and it was filled with some really great tips. It is definitely worth a read.

Here are some of my own tips on how you can clean your Facebook page to add to the articles 20 tips.

1. If you don’t like the language in a post on your wall by one of the young people you follow (family members or extended family), just hide it by right clicking on the right top of the post. This way you won’t have others see bad language on your page.

2. If you want to unfriend a person, they won’t know you did so, just click the hyperlink on their name to go to their Facebook page and then click the starred friends button on the top right just under the cover photo. The drop down that appears allows you to select how much information to see from this friend as well as a link to unfriend them.

3. Know that every time you like a page, you are allowing them to spam your wall and the wall of your friends if they are following your information – they may or may not see these posts depending on how much information they have subscribed to on following you. But know if they get all your updates if you like the Giant Grocery Store page and they follow all your updates they’ll see Giant’s wall posts on their wall too. Review who you like and purge accordingly. I have found that sometimes I have more posts from page likes in my news feed than I would like. Plus know that if you allow the like and app installation, you are agreeing to share your personal information with this business. Be aware!

4. Don’t Friend people instead choose to subscribe to their updates for greater control. If you have a person who does a lot of gaming on Facebook when you start to get game updates, click into their profile, go to the starred friend button and tick off the things you want to get updates on. You may want to choose only life events.

When it comes to Facebook you are now really in control, but it does take a little tweaking to set the amount of information you want to see.

 

 

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Facebook Cleans Up Fake Users and Likes From Accounts

Did you know that September 27th Facebook started to purge its system and your account of fake likes and bogus users?

In fact this is what Facebook Security had posted on its wall:

“These newly improved automated efforts will remove those likes gained by malware, compromised accounts, deceived users, or purchased bulk likes.”

That means if you bought followers – actually I know some business clients who were actually thinking of doing this at one time, when a like actually meant something. So far our Spokesdog Facebook page is still there, but Facebook may clean that up too in the not too distant future.

Facebook states that this clean up effort is to improve things for personal accounts and brands, and it does make sense. With the ability of people who friend you to have access to your wall for their business or spam, it is a good idea for Facebook to clean up its act.