Business owners who rely on Facebook and Foursquare to drive customers will notice some significant changes to their pages on the sites. Facebook has redesigned its mobile Pages for businesses and Foursquare has updated business pages on its website.
On Facebook, the new layout is designed to make it easier for people to find out useful information about your business including address, a map, hours, ratings, reviews and photos. There are also buttons at the top of the mobile Page now that make it easier for customers to interact with your business, including Like, check in, call, message and share. This is noteworthy since the previous mobile layout made it difficult for users to find useful information about local businesses.
As a Page owner, you can now also pin posts -- such as Facebook Offers or videos -- to the top of your Page to highlight special content. Until now, this was only available on the desktop Timeline. With close to 700 million mobile users on Facebook, this is a significant development for brands since these pinned posts are now front and center on mobile Pages.
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One feature Facebook's mobile Pages redesign doesn't seem to answer is the ability to have mobile custom apps. Sending users to a specific app landing page has been an effective way for brands to generate leads through contests and giveaways, and has been available on the desktop version but not mobile. With Facebook's growing mobile user base, brands have been waiting for a mobile custom app solution. Their wait will continue.
At Foursquare, the new design changes are specifically for its web version. Last week, Foursquare announced improvements to its search functions, pointing to a shift in focus from customer check-ins to customers using Foursquare to find local businesses. Now, to help customers access information faster, Foursquare redesigned business pages so important information -- such as name, address, phone number, hours, and menu -- can be easily scanned closer to the top of the page. Photos of a business have also been relocated to the top of pages.
New business pages on Foursquare.com will also feature tips, additional suggestions and ratings from the Foursquare community.
Since these redesigns make it easier for new customers to find your business and get them in your door, it's even more important to ensure your information on Facebookand Foursquare is up-to-date and complete on your Page. If you're not already encouraging customers to check-in and leave you a rating and review, now would be a good time to start.
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