Timeline Is Coming To Your Agency's Facebook Page: What to Expect

Last fall Facebook introduced a big change to personal profiles... a new profile layout called Timeline. This morning Facebook officially announced that Timeline will now be available to brand pages. All brand pages will be automatically updated with Timeline on March 30, 2012.

What you can expect:

• Though the layout of your page will change, Facebook will remain a channel of two-way communication.
• Like Timeline for personal pages, you will now get to add a cover photo to your agency's Facebook page. This large photo at the top of your profile is a great opportunity for showcasing some creative designs and reinforcing your agency's brand.
• New admin capabilities will include the ability to pin your most important content so it remains at the top of your profile for seven days.
• You can also star different milestones in your agency's history - like opening a new location, adding a line of business, etc - so it appears twice the size of other items in your profile thereby drawing attention to those important periods of your history.
• A simpler, easier-to-use admin panel that expands and hides on the same page you're editing. You will no longer have to go to a separate page to change the content.

What to do:

• If you have a social media plan, review it and look for what works, what doesn't and what Timeline can help improve. If you don't have a social media plan, now is a great time to consider putting one together.
• Start working on your cover photo. Since it is a large photo, there is a lot of space to feature something captivating and reinforce your brand. You can update your cover photo weekly so it's always fresh. The dimensions for cover photos are 851 pixels wide and 315 pixels tall.
• Go through your agency history and star the milestones you want to highlight.
• Update your information and look at who has access to your page. Do you need all of those admins? Get rid of anything that isn't necessary or is out-dated. 

If you have an insurance website from Insurance Website Builder, please note that Timeline will not affect our Facebook social media plugin, which puts a mini-version of your website on Facebook.

Changes to Facebook tend to cause a bit of a panic. Take a deep breath. This change is not going to happen overnight. You have until March 30.