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Nature Manipulated (NM) creates visual, wearable and practical art that reflects upon nature and all of its elements. At NM, we believe that everything is a part of nature, some things are just "nature manipulated."

NM specializes in one-of-a-kind handcrafted jewelry, handmade greeting cards, nature photography and other unique accessories.

To read more about who's behind NM, please click here.
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Sunday, July 12, 2009

Creating a Facebook Fan Page for Your Shop

I've been on Facebook (FB) for a while and have seen many people have pages for their businesses, also called "fan pages". It was not until yesterday that I found out how to create one. I've had a MySpace business page for years and have stopped keeping up with it because MySpace became too overwhelming and full of viruses. I'm in tune with Twitter and a bunch of other social networking sites. Now, Nature Manipulated is in tune with Facebook too and I am hoping it doesn't turn into another MySpace.

After creating my fan page, I did a lot of searches to find out what I can and cannot do with the page. Some of the features seem confusing as the page is linked to your personal page. By this post, I am hoping to clarify some of the confusion other people may be experiencing and hopefully find out about new features myself.

After looking through the Etsy forums, there were two common questions I came accross:
1. How do I find my page?
2. How do I put my Etsy mini on my fan page?

Hopefully the answers provided will help you out.

1. How do I find my page?

Unfortunately, Facebook does not provide an easy way for you to access your fan page from your FB home page. There are three ways of accessing it without driving yourself crazy. The most important thing is that you must remember what you named the page. Otherwise if you haven't posted anything to it, you will not find it. The easiest way is probably doing a FB search for the page name. If a lot of results show up, click on the Pages tab and look for it there. If you have already posted to your fan page, you can click on the Pages link (left hand sidebar or tab) from your personal page and it should show you the posts from your page. Click on the page name or the profile picture you selected for your page. Lastly, become a fan of your fan page and follow it in your updates. Click on the picture profile or name from the updates page.

2. How do I put my Etsy mini on my fan page?

The Etsy Shop application does not work on fan pages! If you download the application and set it up to appear on your wall, it will show up on your personal page wall. Not a bad thing but you cannot use it on your fan page so don't keep trying like I did. I wasted a lot of time before Googling it.

To place your Etsy mini on your fan page:
- Click on "Edit Page" (under profile picture) from your fan page. This will bring you to a page with your settings, applications and more.
- Scroll down to the bottom of the page and click on the pencil near "More Applications" and select "Browse Applications"
- Search for "My Stuff" by Gigya and add to your page (option on left hand sidebar).
- Go back to your fan page and "My Stuff" should be one of your tabs. If not, click the "+" button and type My Stuff. This will add the application to your tabs.
- Once the tab is available, click on "My Stuff" and then click on "Edit My Stuff". You will see an option to "Add Code".
- Click on "Add Code" and enter the Flash version code for your Etsy mini.
- Click "Add to Profile" under the code box and you are all set. If you click the "Add to Profile" at the top of the page it will add to your personal page.

Please note the code for Artfire minis is not accepted in this application.

The things you can do with your fan page are pretty limited as most of the applications are for personal pages and you don't necessarily know that until you download and don't see it on your fan page. If you are unsure what works and what doesn't, either try it or Google it.

One neat thing you can do if you have a blog is import your blog into your notes. This will automatically update your notes every time you publish a new blog post. How do you do this?

- Click on "Notes" This will bring you to the "Notes" page
-If you do not see the option to "Import from blog" on the right hand side, click on "Write New Note". This will bring you to a page with a text box. On the right hand side there should be the option to "Import from Blog". I had to try two times before seeing the import link.
-Once you find the import link, put in your blog URL and it will import your most recent posts
-Click "Publish" and you are done.

One last tip, when you fan and comment on other people's fan pages, please note your personal profile picture comes up, not your fan page picture. This means if you comment, make sure to put a link to your fan page and/or write in your fan page name so the page owner knows where to find your fan page.

Remember, once you hit 101 fans, you will have the option to pick and secure your fan page URL. If you are under 100 fans, you may have noticed your URL is long and has a bunch of numbers at the end. After 100 fans, that can change, and you can shorten it to http://www.facebook.com/fanpagename.

Lastly, and most importantly, if you do not have a fan page and have no idea how to create one, visit this Etsy forum post for a very detailed step-by-step guide. It has screen shots and all.

Hope everyone found this useful!

18 comments:

Splendid Little Stars said...

Thank you so much for sharing! I will come back and read this when I have more time.

Shannon said...

Great post. I didn't realize I could import my blog feed into the notes section. Very helpful! :)

Memories for Life said...

Thanks so much for the info! I have my page started, but haven't published it yet...this is very helpful!

Felix and Jayne said...

great post! i'm glad i'm not the only one who has trouble finding my fanpage. i usually just google it, but seems like they could make it a little bit easier to find.

Nature Manipulated said...

memories, let us know when you do publish it. I will definitely be a fan!

Felix, yes they could make it easier - at least somehow link from your personal page. That would also allow your friends know you have a business page without bombarded them with "suggestions"

SiSi Sparkles said...

A good tip in remembering your page is simply to bookmark it. Once bookmarked, you can just find it there, and post on the status:)

TiLT said...

great write up - thanks. I have a page, but have not been sure on how to manipulate it, this helps a lot!

storybeader said...

great post, and very needed. What I did to get to my Storybeader page: put a link on my Profile page!

Nature Manipulated said...

Good advice storybeader! I will add the link to my profile page. Didn't think of putting it in the "Websites" part. (At least that's where I think I would put it.)

Unknown said...

thanks!

(still upset that can't use etsy shop, just the my stuff app, but I'll get over it!)
Rach
http://tinyurl.com/fbrachellucie
(this is my shortened fb fan page, not reached 100 fans yet)

risa said...

Great post. Helpful. I click into my fan page from the bottom of my home page (click on the little f icon-"ad and pages". Off to try out that little bit about linking your blog to notes...thanks!

victoria kloch said...

good stuff...the fan page has been really confusing to me. Thanks!

Cheryl Patterson said...

Great, helpful post! Your instructions are simple, clear and concise. Here is my fan page, http://artist.to/feltsewgood.

nomadcraftsetc said...

Where was this a week ago whenever I set up our facebook! How cool are you to post this!

Unknown said...

THANK YOU!!! I have learn a couple of things I can use! I am going to get working on it right now!! PS ~ I am following your blog now =) My fan page on FB is Lucky Ladybug Designs

Amanda said...

Thanks so much for this helpful post! I am still pretty new to FB and fan pages, so I am learning something new every day.

Best,

Amanda
Greater Retro Area

TiLT said...

I had set up my page already, but it was some time ago & I had forgotten how I did most things :)

Do you by any chance know how to UNDO the posting of your blog to the wall? I have searched all over the facebook help forum & have not found it. And unless my computer was acting up at the time, I couldn't just go into Notes and change it...but my computer acting up is a very probable possibility :)
thanks

Nature Manipulated said...

TILT, if you go to your notes, you should be able to delete the post. You do not have the option to edit so if you want to fix something, you have to delete and then repost it.

If your blog comes in through RSS and you edit your blog, it will not edit the post on your FB notes.

Hope this helps!

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