Social media has become so mainstream that many people now use platforms like Facebook as their main form of communication. Often users will even check if a company has a Facebook page before searching the Internet. With the ever-expanding number of users, the company's developers are constantly introducing new features to make the platform better. The latest announced feature will bring with it some pretty big changes to the way the service is used.

This new feature is called Graph Search, and with its introduction comes a number of new ways one can use Facebook.

What exactly is Graph Search? The idea of Graph Search is that it provides users with a new way to search the Internet. Now, you won't be using it like you would other search engines - to find websites - instead you will use it to find people, pictures, posts, information, etc., already published on Facebook. This feature integrates with Open Graph - a feature that allows users to share pictures, music, videos, etc., with the public.

If you enter a search query that Facebook can't find results for within the platform, it will return results from Bing (Microsoft's search engine). This is an interesting move, mainly because of Bing's lower usage rates compared with Google. Then again, Google does have Google+ - an impending major competitor of Facebook. And knowing Google, they would use Facebook's information, something Facebook probably doesn't want.

What is the main focus of this feature? Bing search results aside, Graph Search focuses on four main areas: People, Pictures, Locations and Interests/Likes. It takes these four focuses and combines them into a near limitless amount of search possibilities. Want to find small business owners, who like Office 365, in San Diego, in California? What about: Friends of friends who like Windows 8 and are looking for work? This will be possible.

Graph Search essentially turns Facebook into a powerful recruiting tool, an incredible specific targeted marketing tool, a great way to find new friends, and more. Upon its release, it will be available for finding information related to the four focuses, but you can be sure that highly advanced marketing and advertising tools that use this feature aren't too far behind.

How do I prepare for it? There's no doubt that this could give small businesses a large boost, both in terms of presence and marketing power. This will also likely make having a Facebook profile essential if you want to be considered to have any form of valuable Internet presence at all. But, with every up there must be a down. If you don't have content, or have incorrect information on your profile, you will be either glossed over or could see your online reputation falter. Here are five things you can do to get ready for the switch:

1. Confirm business details - Go through your profile and ensure your contact details are up-to-date and accurate. This includes your address, email, operating hours, etc. Any spelling mistakes and people will likely miss you in search results.
2. Confirm your classification - When you signed up for a Facebook Page you were asked to pick an industry your business operates in. It would be a good idea to check this and ensure you are in the right industry classification. This can be done by: Going to the Admin Panel, selecting Edit Page followed by Update Information.
3. Get some content ready - Content, especially pictures, likes and shares, are about to become very important. So, go find some interesting images, articles and Facebook pages and share or like them. Just be careful what you like, because this could be used against you.
4. Check existing content - Perform a profile audit to check and see if there are any posts that can be considered as inappropriate, offensive, or implicate you in any negative manner. Use your best judgement: If you think it's a little controversial, or could be construed to be negative, then you're better off unliking it, or deleting the post.
5. Optimize SEO - When the masses start using Graph Search, there's a high chance that many Facebook power users will no longer switch over to Google to conduct a search. They will likely just do this from Facebook. If you haven't been conducting any Search Engine Optimization, now may be the time to start.

There is no official release date, as of the writing of this article, for Graph Search. However, you can head over to Facebook's Graph Search page and sign up for the Beta test. If you have any questions about optimizing your Facebook profile for the switch, please contact us today.

Facebook can be a terrific marketing tool for your company. With a solid and active profile, you could see your brand grow and with it an increase in customers. The problem is, many companies set up a profile but don't bother to track how their efforts are doing. Are you one of these companies? If yes, you can get a glimpse into how well your Facebook page and content is doing through the use of powerful analytical tools provided by Facebook.

Here's three basic points on using Facebook analytics to help figure out what content is working and what isn't, and make your social media campaign even more effective.

Gain some content insight with Insights Facebook's built-in analytical tool - Facebook Insights - is a powerful way to keep track of how well your content is doing. Insights is available for free to Facebook Page administrators and can be accessed by pressing the Settings cog - located in the top-right of the window - and selecting View Insights.

Among other things, Insights allows you to view your content's Reach, Engaged Users and Talking About numbers. Reach is how many people have seen your posts; Engaged Users is the number of users who have clicked on your links, and Talking About is the number of users who have shared or liked your posts.

Looking at these three numbers will give you a pretty good indication of what your followers like and don't like. You can also compare the results from different types of content which will give you a great overview of what type of content your customers like.

To take it one step further, Insights also allows you to view activity by day. So, if you notice a picture or article got a lot of likes on a Saturday, this may be a good day to post similar content.

Get to know your audience Insights doesn't just provide information about your content, you can also get a snapshot of your audience by tracking data too, such as the average user age clicking the "Like" button and where they clicked the button - on your page, through a plugin, etc. If you notice that the majority of your users are older, it may not be a good idea to use slang commonly used by younger users.

The information Insights provides about your audience can help you gain a clearer picture on the type of content you should be creating to reach the intended audience. Furthermore, if you notice that a lot of likes or shares are coming from a website, or your blog, it may be a good idea to make the button more prominent or easier to find.

Take Facebook Advertising out for a spin Once you have mastered Insights and know the type of targeted content you need to develop, why not try Facebook Advertising? This service allows you to target your content and posts to specific demographics in the hopes of increasing your brand's exposure.

While this is a pay-service, you can choose to sponsor stories - these show up on the right-hand side of the page - or promote posts - these show content to users who have already liked your page. Both of these options allow you to set the demographic indicators which will place the ad in front of the users you want to target.

It's important to not go too overboard however, as you could over-reach your brand and end up alienating potential customers. It's a better idea to start small and continuously track how things are going. If something doesn't work, you haven't wasted thousands of dollars and can go back to the drawing board.

If you would like to learn more about Facebook Insights and how they can help your business reach the audience you want, why not give us a shout, we're here to help.

With the heavy adoption of social media users have started to share information they usually wouldn't and some go so far as to literally divulge everything. It's kind of weird that on one hand we are happy for others to know so much and on the other, we demand information privacy too. This is especially true with Facebook, and users have recently been posting a warning notice on their walls. Many users have been wondering if this message is legitimate or not.

The most recent letter popping up on user's walls is a copyright notice. You've probably seen it and been curious enough, or enraged enough to share it. The problem is: it's completely fake and 100% unenforceable.

The letter, which looks and reads something like this: "In response to the new Facebook guidelines I hereby declare that my copyright is attached to all of my personal details, illustrations, graphics, comics, paintings, photos and videos, etc. (as a result of the Berner (sic: Berne) Convention). For commercial use of the above my written consent is needed at all times!

Anyone reading this can copy this text and paste it on their Facebook Wall. This will place them under protection of copyright laws. By the present communiqué, I notify Facebook that it is strictly forbidden to disclose, copy, distribute, disseminate, or take any other action against me on the basis of this profile and/or its contents. The aforementioned prohibited actions also apply to employees, students, agents and/or any staff under Facebook's direction or control. The content of this profile is private and confidential information. The violation of my privacy is punished (sic: punishable) by law (UCC 1 1-308-308 1-103 and the Rome Statute).

Facebook is now an open capital entity. All members are recommended to publish a notice like this, or if you prefer, you may copy and paste this version. If you do not publish a statement at least once, you will be tacitly allowing the use of elements such as your photos as well as the information contained in your profile status updates…"

If it sounds legitimate it must be, right? Wrong! Here's something you should know about this post:

• The Berne Convention: This is at least a real act, and it focuses on international copyrights related to literary and artistic works. The problem is that it was established in 1886, almost 100 years before the Internet. Therefore, anything in relation to the Internet (read: Facebook) isn't covered by this act.
• Legal language: There is some legal language, or at least legal sounding jargon, in this post. For example: 'By the present communiqué'. Communiqué is the French word for statement, it has no legal bearing whatsoever. The thing with legal language is that just because it's included doesn't mean the post is legally binding. Also, if this was a legal message, the '!' wouldn't be used.
• Rome Statute: We're not sure why the Rome Statute is mentioned here, as it covers mainly International crimes such as genocide and other serious war crimes. Last we checked, Facebook hasn't been hauled to The Hague and put on trial for genocide or other serious crimes against humanity.

So, this post and many like it are useless. There is an important underlying issue however: Who owns the data, pictures, movies, etc. you post on Facebook? The answer: You do. According to Facebook's Terms of Service you own any content you produce and put/share on Facebook, and have complete control over how it's shared.

Caveat Emptor There is a catch though. According to Facebook's Terms of Service, "For content that is covered by intellectual property rights, like photos and videos (IP content), you specifically give us the following permission, subject to your privacy and application settings: you grant us a non-exclusive, transferable, sub-licensable, royalty-free, worldwide license to use any IP content that you post on or in connection with Facebook (IP License). This IP License ends when you delete your IP content or your account unless your content has been shared with others, and they have not deleted it." Essentially Facebook can do whatever it likes with your photos and videos, and you are mostly powerless to stop them.

What can we do? This policy sounds a lot worse than it really is, Facebook has publicaly said that they don't use/sell user's images or videos. The issue to many is that Facebook can use your content, and that's what has experts so nervous. At this time, there isn't much you can do, if you're really uncomfortable with this policy, you could delete your pictures, or not post any to begin with. Another option is to contact Facebook's customer service and ask them about potentially putting an opt-out clause on image and video content which allows you to determine if they can use your images or not. Who knows, if enough people do this, then Facebook may integrate it.

When it comes down to it, if you see posts like the one above, it always pays to do a quick search on the Internet to check the facts. If you'd like to learn more about Facebook and how it can help your company, please contact us.

Companies that are successful have great customer service, and employ social media sites like Facebook to help build brands and connect with customers on a more personal level. The problem some businesses have is taking superior physical customer service and translating it to social media, with comments or posts sometimes coming across as rude.

Here are seven social media etiquette tips you should be following to keep a well respected Facebook profile.

1. No ranting and raving. Remember that your Facebook profile represents your company. If you post negative rants about other products or gasp customers, you can be sure that you’ll destroy your image post-haste.
2. No over-sharing. Sharing is good, sharing too much is bad. Customers and social media fans don’t need to know every time you’ve restocked the vending machine. You should try to keep sharing to pertinent information, or updates that customers will find useful. Also be sure to not post every single little bit of news as the more you share, the closer you get to spam.
3. Cut back the quotes. Quotes used sparingly can really help customers and followers relate to the brand and the company. Some companies capitalize on this and use a quote for nearly everything. To much of a good thing is definitely at play here. You should really leave this for marketing campaigns, not day-to-day social media.
4. Size doesn’t matter. Stop comparing how many friends/followers/etc. you have to other companies. If you have a new profile, you will have fewer friends than other companies. You should instead focus on providing quality content and working on fostering relationships with existing and prospective clients and friends. If done correctly, your friend count will grow naturally, over time.
5. Use terms properly. Every industry and company uses acronyms, we love them. The only problem is, your friends on Facebook may not know what they mean. It’s best to either spell out words then provide the acronym, or not use them at all. The reason for this is because fancy speak may turn off customers.
6. Social media isn’t turnkey. With social media, like Facebook, you can’t just establish a profile, put some content on it and expect people to follow you. You need to provide updates, or information on a regular basis. Most companies post at least once every two weeks, or every week, but you should post when you have relevant information.
7. Watch what you share. Before you share anything, you should ask yourself if it’s what your customers want to see, would like to see and would share. If it’s in any way rude, inflammatory, negative or less than true, delete it.

Social media isn’t always easy for companies, one wrong post and an online reputation can be damaged. However, if you create original content and interact with your friends/followers/customers you will see success. If you feel that you could use a little help with your Facebook profile or other social media efforts, please get in touch with us.

Social networks are “in” at the moment, it’s hard to find someone without an account with at least one service. The most popular is Facebook, and it's even gone so far as to completely disrupt modern marketing and branding procedures for organizations of all sizes. With this popularity, scammers are taking advantage of the system and trying to trick people into giving away their credit card and private information.

The scam is a virus that injects itself into your Facebook page and flashes messages asking you to donate to a children’s charity. If you click donate, you will be asked for your credit card, CVV - the number on the back of your card - billing address and name.

What’s special about this scam? The first thing to note is that while this scam poses as a children’s charity, there are currently no children's charities that ask for money directly through Facebook. There is another unique aspect to this scam, it tailors the message to the predominant language of some local areas including: English, Spanish, Italian, Dutch and German.

Each version of the message is tailored to take advantage of popular charities in the related countries. For example, in the US and Canada, it asks users to donate to disadvantaged children in Haiti. It also takes advantage of local URLs that make it appear more legitimate. To date the domain names used are: hopeforthepoorchildren.org, fundcauses.com, lwbspain.blogspot.ca, and childfund.de.

If you or your employees have seen a message like this, it’s best to logoff the network and conduct a virus scan. To prevent something like this from happening, never give out your credit details over Facebook, especially if you’re asked for them in a pop up window. If you suspect a message or an action is spam you can also report it to Facebook Security. For ways you can utilize Facebook in your company, while still remaining secure, please contact us.

901 million. That’s the number of people and businesses that have Facebook profiles. It’s obvious that Facebook is an important and influential medium that’s practically unchallenged. Any user is well aware that Facebook likes to change things around, much to the chagrin of more than a few. Recently Facebook made a change that could affect companies.

On the normal Facebook profile, before the recent change, when a user clicked About to find more information about a company, how to contact them for example, they would be presented with an email address for the company. That’s changed, now your primary email address presented will be username@facebook.com.

This is a potential problem for companies that rely on their Facebook profile to encourage users to contact them directly. If the user does want to email, they only have access to the Facebook email address, which sends messages to the Messages centre (located the the top left of the Facebook window) of the profile. Hardly ideal.

The upside to this is that the change of email address hasn’t resulted in a new set of security rules, or made any changes to security. Also, Facebook isn’t forcing users to keep their Facebook email address as their primary contact, they can still set which email address to use as their primary by:

1. Logging in to Facebook, and viewing their Timeline profile (clicking on your username from the main screen.)
2. Clicking About followed by Edit under the Contact Info field.
3. Selecting the blue upside-down triangle beside their email address. Note: the “no” sign means the email address won’t show up on your Timeline.
4. Selecting Shown on Timeline for the email they want shown, or Hidden from Timeline for the address they don’t want shown.
5. Pressing Save.

While some users are making a mountain out of a molehill on this issue, it’s important to be aware of this and if you would prefer your primary contact email to not be the Facebook email, change it. If you’d like to learn more about using Facebook in your business, please contact us.

Here’s a new question that’s being discussed in the courts: Do employers have the right to ask new hires for their username and password to various social media sites? According to the state of Maryland, the answer is, “No.”

Recently the Maryland General Assembly passed legislation that prevents employers in the state from asking prospective employees for their login information for various social media sites, including Facebook and Twitter. If Gov. Martin O’Malley signs the bill, it would make Maryland the first state in the nation to set such a restriction into law. Other states are considering similar legislation, including Illinois and California.

Ironically, this practice was criticized by Facebook, one of the biggest users of personal information to sell advertising to its members. Erin Egan, Facebook’s chief privacy officer, wrote about the issue on Facebook, calling the practice of employers requesting potential hires’ Facebook passwords “alarming” and “not the right thing to do.” Maryland business groups, including the Maryland Chamber of Commerce, pointed out that there may be cases where an employer should be able to ask for the login information of potential new hires in order to weed out unwanted candidates.

Of course, this bill is just one of many issues being raised between employees and employers using social media. While asking for login information may soon become illegal, employers are still free to “friend” potential hires or search online for information about potential employees. Supporters of the bill point out that it’s illegal for employers to discriminate based on age, sexual orientation, race or religion; since most social media sites contain this type of information, they feel employers might gain access to a candidate’s personal details and use them to disqualify candidates illegally.

What are YOUR thoughts on this matter? Have you ever reviewed a potential new hire’s Facebook page, blog or LinkedIn account before hiring them? Do you think it’s fair for employers to request this information, or is it a violation of someone’s privacy?

Promotion. To small businesses this means spreading the word and driving interest about products, services or the company itself. Traditionally this was done by placing ads in local newspapers and on the radio, tv or the Internet. Facebook has changed all that and is now one of the top ways to promote. A new feature has been added that makes it even easier to run a promotion campaign on Facebook.

The feature is called “Promote” and aims to give businesses a way to increase the reach of their posts. Think of it as a simplification process: instead of having to go through the ad dashboard to create an ad, it can now be done with one click.

The idea behind the promote button is to turn posts on your Page into ads that show up on a user’s News Feed - the area where posts are viewed - instead of in the ad bar, which is located on the right hand side of the page. This will, in theory, help your promotion or information reach more users while making marketing and advertising easier.

When you create a post, you can press the Promote button, located at the bottom of the post window. A pop-up window will appear giving you options. As this is a form of paid advertising, you pay to reach a guaranteed number of users. When you enter an amount to pay, (USD 5.00 is the lowest amount), you’ll be given the approximate number of fans the post will reach. You’ll also be able to target demographically and geographically. The post will be promoted for three days.

Once the promotion campaign has started, you’ll be able to view how effective the promotion is by going to your Page timeline and hovering over the numbers at the bottom of the promoted post. You’ll also be able to see how many users the post has reached, and how they viewed it. A useful tool to tell if the Promote feature is actually working.

At this time, the Promote feature is available for Page owners located in the US with more than 400 followers, and should be rolled out to all Page owners in the near future. If you’d like to learn more about the Promote feature, or other ways you can utilize Facebook as a marketing tool, please contact us.

What’s the most visited website? If you said catvideos.com aka YouTube, you’re close. Facebook was actually the most visited website in 2011, not really shocking when you think about all the people and businesses that use it. One of the underutilized features of Facebook, Groups, now gives members the ability to upload files to share with others in the group.

With the update, there’ll be a new files tab added to a group’s page. Members will be able to upload and share files with all members in the group. When you click on the publication box, you’ll now have the option of uploading a file to share with the group. You’ll be able to upload files up to a maximum of 25 megabytes in size. The majority of file types can be uploaded, however, music files won’t be allowed.

Groups can currently create and edit documents within the Group page, although these documents can’t be exported to a word processor or be printed. The new feature covers this hole but does not allow online editing at this time. To edit a file, users will have to download it to edit it and reupload it when they’re done. The edited file won’t replace the old version, allowing for reversal of changes if need be.

Will Facebook be the death of cloud collaboration services like Dropbox? It’s too early to tell, but, it does provide Facebook users with an enclosed sharing solution that all users will have access to. If you’d like to learn more about ways you can use Facebook in your organization, please contact us.

Everyone has the right to privacy and most are willing to go to great lengths to keep their information private. When it comes to the Internet however, many of us seem to be freer with our private details. Companies have been taking advantage of this and have been using the Internet to research applicants who apply for jobs. A few companies have gone a step too far, much to the indignation of job seekers.

News agencies have been carrying stories about companies that have been asking job applicants for their Facebook logins and passwords before or during an interview. This is a slightly unsettling trend when observed from the job interviewee viewpoint.

It’s become a common practice of employers to look at the social profiles of potential employees to get to know the job seeker on a more personal level. Users have responded by ensuring that their profiles are private, much to the chagrin of would-be snoopers. So what have companies done? Some have started asking potential employees for access to their social media usernames and passwords. This new practice has the masses wondering, “Is this legal and am I protected?”

Currently there are no laws (in the US) that state that it’s illegal for employers to ask employees, potential or otherwise, for their social network usernames and passwords. There are however lawmakers in California, Maryland and Illinois who have introduced legislation that will bar companies from asking for account information. But this is by no means law yet.

Facebook has weighed in on this as well, “This practice [asking for passwords] undermines the privacy expectations and the security of both the user and the user’s friends. It also potentially exposes the employer who seeks this access to unanticipated legal liability.”

What Facebook means by this is that if a company does check into a potential employee, sees they are part of a protected group e.g., LGBT, and does not hire a person on those grounds the company could face claims of discrimination. Beyond that, Facebook also pointed out that giving out or soliciting passwords to your or another user’s account is a breach of Facebook’s Statement of Rights and Responsibilities.

According to most articles, this is a fiasco. But if you look at it from an HR point of view, you want to know that the person sitting across from you really is who they say they are. You are protecting your interests as much as the interviewee is protecting their privacy. Short of asking people for their passwords there are five legal actions you can take to find out more about an interviewee.

• Basic Internet search: Your results may return hits for other people with the same name. To get around this, narrow the search by adding an email address, phone number or address.
• Facebook: It’s perfectly fine to use Facebook to search for a job seeker’s profile and do a little social snooping. Don’t forget, there are other social media sites out there, LinkedIn is a particularly good source for discovering a person’s work history. A big boon of Linkedin is that users tend to be free with their work related information on this site.
• Conduct background checks: It’s a good idea to conduct checks, especially if you work with money or other high value items. If you don’t have time to conduct checks, there are companies that will conduct checks for you. It’s important to be aware of the law regarding background checks in your region.
• Ask for, and check references: Companies just don’t do this anymore. It only takes a few minutes to call or email each reference provided. If you call the referrers and ask the right questions, you could learn a lot more about the applicant this way.
• Prepare ahead of time: We are all busy, but it’s important that you look over a resume before the interview. Pay close attention to employment history and take note of gaps in employment or short stints (less than one year) at companies.

You will be able to find just as much information about a person by using legal means to research as compared with asking for their social media accounts. If you would like to learn more about Facebook or other social media sites let us know.