By now, we are well aware of the Facebook fan page, which is used for promoting businesses and organizations online on Facebook. We also know that setting up an out-of-the-box fan page will not help you get the fan following you want. You will need to do something special.
The problem is that it is hard to stand out on this popular social platform. Facebook is known for its uniformity; that is one of its defining features. And there is not much you can do to customize your Profile. But Facebook Pages has plenty of apps you can plug in that can make your Pages unique and that can define your brand. There are also quite a few ways to customize what people see when they land on your Page.
Because of this ability to customize some areas of Facebook Pages, people are joining the cause to create apps to make it easier for everybody to create great Facebook landing pages, especially those who are not up to using FBML or even HTML.
Setting a Welcome Tab
When you set a ‘Welcome’ tab as the first thing that new visitors land on after they have clicked the “Like”, you have the ability to place whatever you want under this tab and explain your brand better.
When a visitor lands on your wall, you are never sure if they are going to check out the info or read about your company or organization.
Take a look at popular landing pages like Victoria’s Secret, Coke and Starbucks – first time visitors are taken to a mini-website within Facebook, often with special offers, downloads or deals – they are not taken to the wall or feed as they would with a Facebook Page without a welcome page.
Gallery of 50 Custom Facebook Pages
Inspired Mag published a gallery of 50 Custom Facebook Pages: “The showcase below is a collection of 50 custom Facebook pages of top brands & celebrities. Some of them are just pictures, some use Flash or JavaScript, but mainly they are plain HTML pages.”
In the past, to create a landing page also called a welcome page, you would need to know Facebook markup language, HTML, and static FBML. Now, several apps make page creation much easier to do.
Three Free Apps to Build a Facebook Welcome Page
There is a range of apps to build Facebook Landing Pages for your business or organization. Those who are more technically gifted can create the welcome pages with FBML, but these three apps are simple and all have free options.
- Tabsite
- Pagemodo
- Welcome for Pages
Tabsite Uses a Simple Visual Editor
Tabsite has free and paid-for options depending on how many features you want to add to your welcome page. This app uses a simple visual editor to create landing pages. If you are familiar with Microsoft Word or blog software like WordPress, you will be comfortable in this editing environment. With Tabsite, you are able to design your landing page.
Pagemodo – Design Professional Facebook Welcome Pages
Thailand-based Pagemodo offers a free service to design professional looking Facebook welcome pages – its free option offers a selection of templates. And the paid-for packages just add more features and value. It is very easy to manage. Once you log in with your Facebook account, you will be able to create a new page where you will be taken to a self-explanatory editor to help you achieve your page tab.
Welcome for Pages - Over Two Million Users
Welcome for Pages has over two million users. It is designed for Facebook page owners to showcase their brands, businesses organizations, or events the blurb on the site says that the app also provides “real-time metrics on visitors coming to your tab”
As landing or welcome pages grow in popularity, this is surely just the beginning for these kinds of platforms and as long as Facebook does not offer users the tools to customize their own pages, we are going to see more of these tools popping up like mushrooms.
Karen Lotter - Karen Lotter is a journalist and writer based in Durban, South Africa. She has written profiles, features, advertising copy, ...
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