How to Hide Your Birthday on Facebook
Posted on May, 10, 2013 by Kerry Rego -Some people love to get birthday messages on Facebook.
Heck, the first year I was on I couldn’t figure out why no one wished me a happy birthday when my turn came. I realized I had the setting turned off (knowing a lot about reputation management can have its drawbacks).
And some people don’t.
If you’d like to keep your big day to yourself, here’s how to make sure all 900 of your friends aren’t notified, prompted to write on your wall, or purchase a Facebook Gift.
- Navigate to your profile
- Click Update Info (as of May 2013). It may get changed, so look for any kind of “Edit”.
- Click Edit next to Basic Information
- Click on the audience button next to your birthday
- Choose Only Me
There’s one more drop down that allows you to choose whether it can be seen on your profile at all. The options are: show my full birthday on my timeline, show only month and day on my timeline, and don’t show my birthday on my timeline.
Not showing your birthday to the entire world is a good preventative measure to take against identity theft (dang! I’ve shown you mine). Now that we can piece together more and more about each other based on the sheer volume available about us online, be safe where you can.
How to Tag Another Page in Your Facebook Post
Posted on April, 10, 2013 by Kerry Rego -Have you ever wanted to know how to tag another Facebook Page in one of your Page posts? 
First go to their Page, click on the gear under the cover photo, and select Like as Your Page (the Like button is for you as a person). Then go back to your Page, start writing your post, type the @ symbol and the Page name, and it should appear as a link.
This creates a direct link between your Page and their Page. It’s cross promotion and creates goodwill. They will also appear in the box called Likes on your Page. This Like box shows businesses you recommend and want others to know about. If you want to tag the Page but don’t want them to stay in that coveted real estate, you can like them for the post then unlike them and they will not be featured in your Like box.
How to Add and Remove Facebook Admins
Posted on February, 04, 2013 by Kerry Rego -Today a friend asked me how to remove himself as an admin of a Facebook Page and transfer ownership to another person. I recorded a screencast to demonstrate, which you can see below. It used to be you couldn’t transfer ownership of a page but now you can. Have the new owner/admin Like the page first, make them an admin (screencast walks you through it), then have the new admin remove you. It’s simply passing the baton.
Maybe you’ve got some extenuating circumstances or it’s more complicated than that, you can hire me to straighten it all out!
What happens to your Facebook account when you die?
Posted on January, 10, 2013 by Kerry Rego -I’ve been asked this question a few times but today it was close to home. “What happens to your Facebook account when you pass away?”
No one likes to talk about this but someone very sweet transitioned yesterday and I thought I was being too Facebook nerdy when I said her family will want to memorialize her account. But first thing this morning, there’s a post “from” the deceased in my feed. It was triggered by someone posting a comment to a previous post but there it was staring me in the face. Next thing, Facebook will want me to reach out to her via algorithmic suggestion. It’s painful for those that care to see a smiling profile photo as if nothing had changed.
If you know of someone that needs this info, here’s the link to the Facebook Help section that talks about how to memorialize a deceased person’s account. https://www.facebook.com/help/
Get Page Notifications from Facebook
Posted on November, 13, 2012 by Kerry Rego -
Is there a page on Facebook that you don’t dare risk missing their posts? Make sure you don’t by opting into notifications. This feature is fairly new, I’ve had it about a week, but it can be overwhelming if the page posts a lot. I originally signed up to get them from my own page, Mari Smith’s and Techcrunch. The last one posts something like 20 times per day so I turned it off after 4 days but the feature is out there should you need it.
Navigate to the page>hover over the Like button>select Get Notifications
Blank Facebook Like Box Plugin?
Posted on September, 22, 2012 by Kerry Rego -
Do you have a Facebook likebox plugin stream on your website that shows a miniature of your Facebook Page? Have you ever seen one that was blank? I had never seen it happen until I got a phone call from a client when it happened to him. I figured out one reason for it in case you have this problem
My client is a politician running for local office and he noticed on his website that the social plugin code that I had provided to the web designer wasn’t working anymore. The box that showed a small (and fully interactive) version of his Facebook Page was empty of information. I went from browser to browser to see how it represented differently but everything looked okay to me. I couldn’t figure it out UNTIL I logged out of Facebook. When you are logged out, these plugins empty out and have a “Sign Up” call to action.
I went through many testing scenarios and when I took a look at the Manage Permissions section of the back end of his Facebook Page, I discovered the setting that makes this happen. It doesn’t seem that this would be the culprit but if you change anything in the country setting, this is the result. My client had changed the settings that I’d entered for the page and put in United States and it effected the rendering of the code. Leave it empty and this won’t happen.
Using LinkedIn and Facebook to Advance, Slideshow for WICT
Posted on July, 11, 2012 by Kerry Rego -
Women in Cable Telecommunications WICT Southern California hosts the Wednesday Webinar Series and July 11, 2012 was “Using LinkedIn and Facebook to Advance” by Kerry Rego. She talked about consumer use of search engines, reputation management, social media marketing strategy, tools available, personal branding, professional use, and action items for leveraging social media.
Google Author Tag
For the question on how to get the author tag, here’s the link with step by step instructions on how to do it. http://www.devonwebdesigners.com/3278/relauthor-step-by-step-for-wordpress/
Promoting Your Posts in Facebook
Posted on May, 31, 2012 by Kerry Rego -
There is a new feature that Facebook rolled out allowing you to promote posts. There have been reports that Facebook Pages only reach 16% of the people that like a page. Promoting a post will allow you to pay to have more of your fans see posts you deem important for three days. I decided to test it out.
You have to enter in your credit card information in the Account Settings>Payments area but since I already had mine filled in, the process was pretty painless. My only complaint is that it duplicated my post so I have split results as to whom saw it. I am hoping I don’t get billed twice for this! See the screenshot below to show you how it looked to me. The amount of people it reached shot up quite quickly, so I’m pleased with that but I wasn’t able to see it in my own feed. I had to ask my assistant to double check to see if she saw two as well (she did). One of them is larger because I highlighted the post.
Check out this help page to learn more about how to use this new feature: https://www.facebook.com/help/promote
How to Adjust Your Custom Apps in Timeline for Pages
Posted on March, 01, 2012 by Kerry Rego -Now that you have Timeline for your Facebook Page and don’t have the option for a default landing tab, how to you adjust the custom applications that appear under your Cover Photo? Here’s some instruction:
- Click on the arrow next to your custom applications
- Hover over the application you want to reorder and a pencil will appear
- Click on the pencil and a menu pops up
- Pick the application you want to take its place and they will reorder
- You can rename the application by selecting Edit Settings
Check out this synopsis I wrote on what you need to know about Timeline for Pages. Here is a product guide by TechCrunch.
What questions do you have about this new development?
Facebook Timeline for Pages, What You Need to Know
Posted on March, 01, 2012 by Kerry Rego -
We knew that Facebook was going to introduce Timeline for Pages today but they jumped the gun and debuted it late last night. I turned mine on early this morning and have been tinkering with it all day. You have the ability to preview it and work with it up until March 30, 2012 when it’ll go live for all Pages. Here is a synopsis for you.
What you need to know:
- Default landing tabs are gone (if you still use FBML, it will disappear completely in June 2012)
- There is a Message feature so fans (and non fans) can privately communicate with Page admins
- The custom apps or tabs are now 760px wide (and you can change their images)
- The Timeline will go into effect for all pages March 30
- You can pin an important post to the top for a maximum of 7 days
- You can highlight posts to make them bigger.
- You can add Milestones as well (you can change the date of the post so that it fits in chronologically)
- This is the visual story of your business or organization
Your cover photo may be up to 850px by 315px, but may not include:
- Calls to action such as “Go to our website” or “Like this page”
- No reference to Facebook features such as Like, Share, Comment, etc.
- Contact info for the business (this should be in About)
- Price information
Here is a great guide by TechCrunch. See how to adjust and rename your custom apps.
Are you turning yours on now or waiting?