Facebook business pages get a new timeline design, direct access to admin tools, and a new feature that lets you size up your competition.

Kristin Burnham, Senior Editor, InformationWeek.com

March 11, 2014

3 Min Read

10 Famous Facebook Flops

10 Famous Facebook Flops


10 Famous Facebook Flops (Click image for larger view and slideshow.)

Facebook will roll out redesigned business pages this week, the company announced in a blog post. The changes, which apply to Facebook's desktop version, make it easier for users to find information and help page admins find the tools they use most, it said.

Last week, Facebook announced another set of changes to users' news feeds to improve the consistency of the desktop and mobile versions. Those updates, which roll out over the next few weeks and are largely cosmetic, showcase larger images, a darkened background color, and fewer navigation options from the left-side menu.

Facebook's updates to pages come almost a year after it spruced up the mobile version of pages, which gave admins a simplified panel and added business-location details and actions, such as likes, check-ins, and shares, below the cover photo.

The latest Facebook page redesign includes a more streamlined look to mimic what you see on mobile, a handful of design updates, and a couple new features. Here's a look at the changes.

[Get a grip on your Facebook account. Read 10 Most Misunderstood Facebook Privacy Facts.]

Updated timeline design
Facebook will finally ditch the two-column timeline design in favor of the one-column feed that all user profiles already have. Before, posts would render differently on the page than they would in newsfeeds. Moving to a one-column design changes that. Page posts will now display consistently both on the page and in users' news feeds.

fbpageredesign2.png

The left-side column now displays information about the page's business, including a map, hours of operation, phone number, website, photos, and videos. Previously, contact details were only visible under the About section, and you could browse photos only from the Photos tab.

Direct access to admin tools
Admins will have a slightly different view of their pages: Facebook added key information about the ads you're running, new likes on your page, and unread notifications and messages, all within the margins of the main view of your page.

fbpageredesign3.png

Facebook also added new navigation options to the top of the page for activity, insights, settings, audience building, and help. The Build Audience tab will send you directly to your Ads Manager account.

Pages to Watch
The newest feature in the redesigned pages is called Pages to Watch. This lets admins create a list of competitors and monitor how they compared to their own page's performance regarding total page likes, new page likes, posts this week, and engagement this week. Facebook tested this feature with some pages last month, but all admins will have access to it in the new version.

fbpageredesign4.png

Admins can switch to the Posts tab within Page Insights to view the past week's most engaging posts from the pages you add to this section.

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About the Author(s)

Kristin Burnham

Senior Editor, InformationWeek.com

Kristin Burnham currently serves as InformationWeek.com's Senior Editor, covering social media, social business, IT leadership and IT careers. Prior to joining InformationWeek in July 2013, she served in a number of roles at CIO magazine and CIO.com, most recently as senior writer. Kristin's writing has earned an ASBPE Gold Award in 2010 for her Facebook coverage and a Min Editorial and Design Award in 2011 for "Single Online Article." She is a graduate of Syracuse University's S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communications.

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