All Facebook pages come with a standard set of tabs – Wall, Info, Photos, Discussions, Reviews, Notes – depending on your business type, but you can add your own tab customized for a specific purpose. I recommend adding a tab that contains a custom landing page for non-followers that encourages them to “like” your Facebook page.
Here’s what you need to do to add a custom landing page.
Create Landing Page in Photoshop
Facebook uses a proprietary programming language called FBML (Facebook Markup Language) to allow people to add custom content. By the end of 2010, they will drop support for FBML and will require people to use iFrames to add custom content. I recommend using an image to present your contain so you don’t need to worry too much about differences between FBML and iFrames because all your doing is embedding an image.
Here’s how to create the landing page in Photoshop:
1) Create a new image that is 520px wide X 600px high. The maximum width for a custom Facebook tab is 520px.
2) Add your content using a specific call to action to get people to “like” your Facebook page. Click the images below to view examples:
3) Save your Photoshop document and export it to PNG format and try to keep it below 50Kb.
Download this Photoshop template to get started.
Upload Your Landing Page Somewhere
You’re not able to upload your landing page directly to Facebook so you’ll need to have somewhere online where you can host the image and access it through a URL. If you use WordPress to manage your website, you can easily add the image to your Media Library and grab the link.
Add the Static FBML Application
You’ll need to add the Static FBML Application to the list of applications that are available to you when editing your Facebook page.
Here’s how:
1) Go to Facebook, and click “Ads and Pages” in the left column. Then, click on “Pages”, if you’re not brought to the list of pages that you manage.
2) Click “Edit Page” for the page you want to edit.
3) Scroll down the page until you see “More Applications”. Click “Browse More”.
4) Type ”static fbml” in the search box in the left column and press Enter.
5) Click on the “Static FBML” link in the search results. It’s the one with the most active users.
6) Click “Add to my Page” in the left column.
7) A new application called “FBML” will appear in the list of applications available for your page.
Add Your Custom Content to the FBML Application
You’re almost there, but you still need to configure the FBML application to display your landing page content.
1) Click on “Edit” for the FBML Application.
2) Change the box title to “Welcome” or “LIKE US” or something that announces the intent of the page – this title will appear on the tab in your Facebook page
3) In the FBML box, enter the HTML code that will display your image. Here’s an example:
<img src=”http://www.acceleratedonline.net/wp-content/uploads/2010/09/facebook_page.png?fbrefresh=1201226472″ />
The part after “src=” is the URL of the image you created and uploaded earlier.
The “?fbrefresh=1201226472″ code is a small counter that you can increment, if you want to update the image that you want to display. It may take you several tries to get the image to look exactly the way you want it, and you’ll have to re-upload that image to your hosting provider. Facebook caches these images so in order to tell Facebook that you want it to re-load your image, you’ll need to increment the counter by 1.
4) Click the “Save changes” button, and you’re done! View your Facebook page to make sure you’re happy with the way your custom landing page looks. If anything looks out of place, repeat the steps above.
Display Landing Page by Default to Non-fans
The last setting you’ll need to change on Facebook is to display your custom landing page to non-fans by default instead of your Wall. Here’s how:
1) Go to your page’s edit screen again
2) Click on “Edit” for Wall Settings
3) Select the name of your custom tab from the “Default Landing Tab for Everyone Else”
That’s it! You’re all set, and non-fans will now see your custom landing page by default encouraging them to “like” your Facebook page. You can test it by copying your page URL, logging out of Facebook, and pasting your page URL to view it as a non-fan.
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