This is a guest post by Kevin Lau.
By now you will undoubtedly have worked with the new Facebook page design. Either you’ll like it or you won’t, and there are probably features you will think are pretty good and others you won’t be so keen on. This seems to be par for the course when it comes to Facebook.
Here are some of the pros and cons to be aware of in terms of the new design. Do you agree or disagree with them? Are there others that haven’t been mentioned here that have annoyed you or pleased you?
PRO: More Details in the About Section
This is great news for anyone who wants to tell people what they’re all about. Connecting with people is a big part of the reason people use Facebook in the first place, so it makes sense that this section should be enhanced. You can also to link back to your website quite easily in this section, so there is a bigger opportunity to get more traffic to your site now than there might have been before. Make sure the link happens near to the beginning otherwise you won’t see the whole thing. You’ll get about 165 characters so experiment to make the most of them.
CON: No More Landing Tab
If you designed your Facebook page to bring people in and engage them right from the start, you’ll hate this new feature. People will not be able to land on a specific page anymore – instead they’ll find themselves looking at your wall. Not exactly the most thrilling experience for many, I’m sure. I’ve seen lots of engaging landing pages that have clearly had a lot of work put into them. It’s a shame that you no longer get the option of making such a page the first one people see.
PRO: Icons Have Been Introduced as a Way of Catching the Eye
Now this is a good move by Facebook and one I like. Tabs once appeared as simple text links, which is fine as far as it goes but they don’t have the same punch as an image. It would appear that Facebook agrees, because they will now introduce icons to replace the text links. This means you can promote an offer and design a special icon to represent it. It’s a fine way of promoting a freebie of some kind and getting more click throughs as a result. It might be worth getting a designer to create some special icons for you in some cases, although some of the more standard ones (think of an RSS feed logo for example) can easily be found online.
CON: It Takes More Time to Build a Worthwhile Facebook Page
In some ways you get more freedom with the new design. But this in itself can be a curse. It means you cannot simply fill in the blanks and hope for the best. You have to take time to ensure everything looks as good as it possibly can, otherwise it will just look like a disorganized mess. This might put off newbies to Facebook who want to join to promote their business. If you are determined to make the best of it, it might be best to allocate a day or more just so you can do this. If you try and rush it it’s sure to backfire.
Are there too many cons – or not enough pros?
Of course everyone will have their own opinions on this. One of the biggest upsets seems to be the lack of the landing tab that people once used to bring people in and welcome them in the best possible way. We all hate change but some think that Facebook makes changes just for the sake of it rather than to help those who use the site. This would certainly seem to be the case in terms of getting everyone to look at your wall, which is probably one of the least appealing parts of your page.
Which camp do you fall into? Do you think the pros outweigh the cons, or are there just one or two detrimental changes that outweigh all the pros of the new Facebook page design?
About Kevin Lau
Kikolani covers blog marketing and blogging tips for personal, professional, and business bloggers to succeed in search and social media marketing. Kristi Hines is a 
Hi Kevin,
Facebook is hardly recognisable from what it once was, but along with the changes some people will suffer. Personally I like the new changes, whatever it looks like we will still use it. It’s not like FB have a real competitior atm.
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By far, the biggest con (which just about overshadows anything else or any other pro) is the fact that there are no landing pages any more. People spent good money having some amazing landing pages designed for their FB pages, and one day FB decided that it will simply do away with that. Not cool. But I guess it was to be expected especially since they went public.
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Hi Marlon,
Yeah, those changes we’re expected.
Landing pages we’re a bit expensive and I feel for those people who spent tons of money just to have a good looking landing page(s). 3rd party apps usually charge monthly for those landing pages to be on your Facebook page.
Sooner or later other social networks might change as well in order to provide their users quality service and at the same time spend more time on their site. I guess we’ll just have to wait. Cheers!
Kevin K. Lau recently posted Boost Your Internet Marketing Strategy With Influencer Marketing!
Hi Kevin, thanks for sharing.
For me the most important problem with new FB design is lack of landing page. As you wrote – there is no possibility to engage visitors from the beginning – and it is a big difficulty.
BR, Chris
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Yeah that’s true.
That’s why we have to put more value on our pages through the posts that we share with our fans.
However, the pages that we created from 3rd party apps are still there. Now those tabs are really nice though I don’t think they’ll substitute the efficacy of landing pages.
Kevin K. Lau recently posted Boost Your Internet Marketing Strategy With Influencer Marketing!
Hi Kev….I agree about the landing page, but am thankful I can still use it as an application in one of my visible 4 squares. Pages are a challenge for many because it’s difficult to gain traction with them because they take some time. I spent a good deal of time building my brand on my Profile, and am one that shares business and personal on that Profile because I have enough friends who are people with whom I’d love to do business. I think Pages are important enough to schedule time to pay attention to regularly, so I applaud you writing about them!
I am not a fan of the changes, I really liked the old landing tab. Do Facebook ever consult users before they make the changes?
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Hi Dean,
I think Facebook did some research before they make the changes. Though there are disadvantages with the recent changes, we have to adapt to it. Just as the as we adapted when landing pages arrived on Facebook.
With the new timeline design, I think Facebook wants the pages to be an engagement portal rather than just a mere page where you could promote your website or business and get traffic. I guess that’s the reason why they don’t want you to put your links and even call-to-action stuff on your page’s cover photo.
In the first place Social Media is all about engagement right?
Kevin K. Lau recently posted Boost Your Internet Marketing Strategy With Influencer Marketing!
I really don’t like the way the timeline works now. Even though I’m on Facebook quite often, I almost always forget the comments that shift to the right side so I end up just browsing through the left. Ah well.
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Hi Kevin, totally agree that the new Facebook timeline has several pros and cons. Overall I think what people need to realize is that the timeline, along with all of its features, are now much more visually driven. Eye-catching cover photos, customized tabs, pinned and highlighted posts are all very key to driving engagement on Facebook pages. I think that if brands focus on visuals to promote all of their great content and incorporate that into their Facebook strategy, they will eventually reap the benefits. You just have to keep trying out new ideas and methods to figure out what works!
Whether or not you think this new layout is an improvement, it is still important to know how to use it. With how important social media has become for business success, not understanding the current formatting/layout will leave you in the dust. It’s needed to stay as up to date as possible, so thanks for the pro’s and con’s, which are essential to know.
I like the fan page design right now, since they removed the landing tab which forces me to put my email just to view the content and wall inside.
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I like the new fanpage designs, and of course while there are a few cons along the way, I think the pro’s outweigh them now. There are some amazing creatives out there utilizing the icons for important content. That is until the next Facebook update… Let’s hope they focus on making it more user friendly for business owners, schedules updates is a great addition, can’t wait for some more.
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Hi Kevin,
there are definitely more pros than cons in the new timeline.
It seems that Facebook is going more visual than ever, following somewhat Pinterest did.
I don’t mind change while others have a hard time with it.
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I still find it hard to adapt to the new Facebook page design, even if, by now, it’s not actually “new” anymore. Maybe if FB had a real competitor (G+ is not) , they would provide more quality service to their users.
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