Friday 23 September 2011

How complicated is Facebook going to get?

As a struggling author, relying on word of mouth to get people to hear about my work, I’ve been counting on the opportunity to get some key people (people who are in my target demographic and have lots of friends) to ‘like’ my Jack Barrow page. The idea is that people who ‘like’ my page will be seen to do so and their friends will be curious enough to look. I’ve always thought that this was what the like feature is all about. At the same time I'll buy some Facebook ads, do other promiotions, generally put in some effort. (I've got a list somewehere of what I need to do when the time comes.)

Now they’ve introduced the new makeover with subscriptions, conditional news feeds, features that only work on a Tuesday when there is an R in the month, etc., it’s just so complicated I despair at anyone ever understanding how this all works. I might actually manage to set up my options so that people see what I want them to see, but if I have to rely on my key people having their settings right then have I really got a hope?

I’m finally getting close to the situation where I can do a re-launch of my career. Soon, very soon I hope, my books will be on sale again, but with a broken Facebook (Twitter simply isn’t enough) then I can’t see where to go next.

3 comments:

  1. http://facebookprivacyandsecurity.wordpress.com/2011/09/23/false-rumour-alert-no-subscribing-to-friends-comments-and-likes-doesnt-make-them-public/

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  2. Google+ isn't ideal either...

    We need someone that really gets what social media is about and is less bothered about the revenue aspects of it...

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  3. There are a few more changes still to come on facebook... The new timeline feature for example goes live next friday... also there are new reporting tools ('x has started using y' type things) for apps launching soon...

    http://i.imgur.com/hcUx1.jpg -- developer preview of the timeline

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