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CUSTOMIZE YOUR SOCIAL SHIP
top sites that you can customize to create a better customer and brand experience
To think is easy. To act is difficult. To act as one thinks is the most difficult.
—JOHANN WOLFGANG
VON GOETHE
There are a ton of new ways to customize your profiles on social sites so that they look exactly the way you want them and provide a variety of business solutions. Customization is extremely important for not only your company brand image but for consistency when marketing online. If your Twitter profile looks different from your Facebook profile you can cause confusion with your branding. Let’s look at each of your social sites in depth to make sure that you are consisten with your brand image and your overall marketing on each site.
Facebook is more than social
Facebook customization for fan pages can turn a page into a purchasing platform. A rapidly increasing number of businesses are adding an option to use the social networking site to browse and buy their products. Furthermore, you can use your fan page to run contests, encourage brand word of mouth, and get together with connections in a branded space. Let’s first take a look at a few customization options to have your storefront on Facebook:
Facebook storefront customization options
This free beta (as of publication of this book) app allows you to handle your entire e-commerce operation through Facebook. You can accept credit card and PayPal payments, which are credited to your PayPal account. You can customize charges for shipping and choose whether to charge sales tax. Unless you disable the option, your products will also appear in searches people make on other Payvment storefronts when they choose to search “all of Facebook.”
Other helpful features include selling multiple quantities of an item from one listing; the ability to give discounts to customers who like your page; and adding options like sizes or colors to item listings. Store owners have access to their selling histories and order statuses, and they are able to send messages to buyers through the app. Implementing Payvment’s instant payment notification can help keep on top of orders as they’re made. This is becoming a very robust system for Facebook fan page storefronts.
This storefront shopping cart software creates a tab on your page that allows you to showcase items in your online store. Some templates include options to Tweet or share specific items, and shoppers can search by customizable categories or with a search bar. In order to set the store up, you need to install the Storefront Social app. The basic package costs $9.95 per month. You cannot use the store as your sole storefront because there is no way to complete a transaction using the platform. Rather, people who wish to buy your products are directed to the product URL that you provide. If you are a seller on eBay or Amazon, you could link to your listings on those sites, as well.
Like Storefront Social, BigCommerce SocialShop doesn’t allow transactions. It directs users interested in products to an online store and allows them to share their products on their walls. Because BigCommerce is a full e-commerce platform, it’s a more extensive Facebook storefront tab option. At $24.99 per month for the most basic package, it’s also the most expensive.
This app allows customers to drag and drop products into a shopping bag and check out without leaving Facebook. You can integrate the same store on your website, MySpace profile, LinkedIn profile, or
Tumblr, by copying and pasting widget code. Basic accounts are free, but selling more than 100 items will cost you $17 per month.
You can also customize your tabs on Facebook and add in video as well as custom graphics, banners and landing pages; this does require FBML knowledge (Facebook markup language). There are hundreds of people online who specialize in FBML so you don’t have to. They will create your custom fan page starting at $97. The really great customized fan pages can cost thousands, but the cost is well worth it if you have a brand you want to set apart from your competition.
Customize Twitter
A custom Twitter background can make a positive impression and enhance your brand, but how do you make one? You can start with the basics by using one of Twitter’s 12 stock backgrounds. Each background has preset colors for the elements on the page. You can also modify the colors of the overall background, text, links, sidebar background, and the sidebar border. The first thing you should do is get that generic background off of your Twitter account, unless, of course, you like branding Twitter without getting paid for it, and do not like standing out, then fine, just leave it. However, the fact that you are reading this book shows you want more, so let’s switch your background and change the color palette. All you need to do is go to “Settings” in the top row of links on your Twitter page, click on the “Design” tab, and then either select a “theme,” or click on “Change background image,” or “Change design colors,” and get creative. Don’t worry about messing anything up, because any changes you make will not be visible to anyone but you until you click “save.”
You may be perfectly happy with one of the themes Twitter has provided for you but there are still going to be thousands of people on Twitter with the same background as yours. It’s like having the same company name as a bunch of other—well—companies. The best way to make sure that your Twitter page doesn’t look like anyone else’s is to upload your own background image. Those of you with the necessary skills might want to use Photoshop or a similar program to create your own from scratch. If that’s not a possibility, then there are other options. You can simply upload a photograph you’ve taken or even your logo and choose the tile option to just tile it onto your background. The image will tile (repeat) in an appealing way. You can also search Google for “tile background” and you’ll find thousands of places to get them if you do not have a logo or one of your own.
ColourLovers.com is an excellent place to start if you want to make your own tiling background patterns. They also offer palettes that help you pick colors that go well together so your Twitter page doesn’t look like you picked the colors with your eyes closed or let your parrot do it for you. What, don’t people still have parrots?
TwitterPatterns.com is another great place to find patterns for your tiled background.
Another way to create a unique background is to use a photograph. There are a few things you’ll want to keep in mind, though. For one thing, a limited amount of the photograph will actually be visible. Realistically you have about an inch on either side of the main text area to work with. That means if you upload a cool picture and you are in the center of the photograph, no one is going to see you.
If you want the photo to fill the entire background, the size of the image is also important. Twitter will give you their current picture file size specs when you go to upload your photo. Once you’ve selected your background, you may want to change the colors of the sidebar background and border so they complement the colors in the overall background image. Don’t pick a dark color, or your text will be hard to read. You might be tempted to use white or light-colored type on a dark background, but if you use light colors for your text links, they won’t show up in the upper row of navigation links.
Your Twitter background can actually work for you like a business card if you use the space on the left side and, to an extent, up to the top. A professional-looking Twitter background also makes an excellent first impression and will help you pick up followers who might have otherwise overlooked you. Even if someone only looks at your profile one time, the results could end up being well worth the time and effort you put into creating an attention-getting background.
A custom Twitter background gives you the opportunity to tell someone more about what you do aside from the 160-character limited bio you get to put in your sidebar. An obvious choice would be to use your logo along with a bit of text, perhaps something like: “Mention you saw us on Twitter and. . .” insert your offer. If you don’t offer a product, but just want to promote your blog, you might want to use design elements from your website and then add a bit of text about your blog, along with the URL and your email address. A custom background is also a good way to let people know at a glance what company you represent, which is especially important if your company is well-known. For example, Zappos CEO Tony Hsieh has a Twitter page with over 30,000 followers, but word has it that nearly 300 Zappos employees also have Twitter pages as part of the company’s marketing plan. Since only one Twitter page can use the domain
twitter.com/zappos, the best way for the employees of Zappos to let people instantly know what company they are with would be to use a custom background with the Zappos logo on it somewhere.
LinkedIn customization
By simply adding applications and widgets to your profile, you can create a different experience for your profile visitors. You might find yourself saying, “Who needs a website anymore? Just use a social profile!” Applications on LinkedIn do many things, from adding your WordPress blog feed or your Amazon Suggested Reading List, there is also a Company Buzz widget that will populate a Twitter feed of anything that is mentioned using the keywords that you entered when setting it up. These features can be added from your edit profile button at the top of the navigation bar. These are great ways to automatically show your connections what you’ve been up to. The 15 applications that you can add through the “Add Sections” link are as follows:
Applications 1. Creative Portfolio Display
2. Events
3. FT Press Delivers
4. Google Presentation
5. Huddle Workspaces
6. Lawyer Ratings
7. Legal Updates
8. My Travel
9. Polls
10. Projects and Teamspaces
11. Reading List by Amazon
12. Real Estate Pro
13. SAP Community Bio
14. SlideShare Presentations
15. WordPress
In addition to all of those fancy applications, LinkedIn recently added a “personalize your profile with patents, publications, and more” option located in the “edit” section of your profile. The five new sections that are now available for you to use within your profile are “Publications,” “Certificates,” “Languages,” “Skills,” and “Patents,” the last of which is very important and pertinent to our country’s quest for technological advances and innovation. The Publication section now allows you to add your original, published works to your profile. Share with your connections specific publications that will help showcase your areas of expertise. The Certifications section gives you the ability to list any certifications, clearances, and licensure that you have attained throughout your professional career. Not everyone will have the ability to add to this section. But think of it this way: in your profession or industry, are there a lot of others who do what you do within your own geographical area? For those who have certifications, licensure, or special clearances, this section will help you build your credibility and help you stand out in the crowd.
The Languages section tells what languages you are fluent in. If you are fluent in more than one language, or are even somewhat proficient in another language, this section allows you to share this information with your connections. The Skills section can be added to your LinkedIn profile to show what skill sets you have and what your areas of expertise are. You can either type in your own skill sets or type in the first letter or two to populate a list of skills that start with that letter. You can then choose your level of proficiency for each skill, as well as choose the number of years of experience you have for each skill. Other than the skill itself, there is no requirement to choose a proficiency level or set number of years, but by choosing a proficiency level for each of your skills, you set up realistic expectations. You would not want to be skipped over because your profile does not exude proficiency, but you also do not want to inflate your experience and tell people you are more proficient than you are in a given area. It won’t take long before people will know the truth. And last but not least, the Patent section: What better way to show prospective venture capitalists, competitors, and consumers what patents your company has been issued or applications you have pending?
In addition to adding new sections and applications to your profile, you also have the ability to reorder the sections on your profile using the site’s built-in drag-and-drop technology. This enhancement was added as a result of it being one of the most highly requested profile features from LinkedIn users. This feature gives you the ability to highlight the skills, expertise, and/or experiences that you would like to portray first and foremost. To do this, simply go to the section you wish to move, place your curser along the top of the section, then drag and drop it to its new location within your profile.
Customize YouTube channel
There are three simple places where you can customize the look and experience for the user on your YouTube channel: channel info, channel design, and video organization. For your channel info, make sure that you take some time to fill in and complete all of the sections such as description and tags, as this information is indexed by search engines. Your channel design is the most important option of all. This is where you can specify the colors of your page or specify a background design. You can also rearrange the layout of the boxes on your page, specify which video will show at the top of your page, and much more. Many users may choose to have a default plain color on their page but you can also upload a customized backdrop or wallpaper as your background to make your social sites reflect your brand. Just upload your wallpaper in the “advanced design customization” section, choose “repeat background image,” and bingo! You’ve got yourself a nice, branded background. You can change the font, the playlists that are displayed, the boxes that are displayed, the color of the links, and the color of the text as well. When it comes to organizing your videos, you can choose which uploaded video shows up first or in a certain order. So if you have a video that you would like to display more prominently, you can bring it forward.
No matter how you decide to approach your social site customization, it just needs to be done. If you want to show that you are serious online, that you are a brand to be recognized and remembered, then invest time and/or money to make this happen. You will feel better about your online brand and so will your prospects and customers.
WIPEOUT
I do not know html or website coding to do customization, yet I do not have the budget to outsource. What can I do to make my social sites look presentable with my branding without having to learn code or break the bank?
WAVE TIP
Customization is not as expensive as it used to be because there are so many people online and around the world who do it. If you truly cannot budget $100 for some customization, then you can just upload your logo and tile it on sites such as Twitter or Youtube. For Facebook, you can upload your logo as the profile picture file. You should, however, find a way to budget customization and get it done right, because your brand image online is your client’s first impression. Check out sites such as
custom-page.com that sell a wide selection of ready-to-go templates.