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Facebook revamps brand pages

Many Facebook faces: Durex

Social network Facebook has made a series of changes to its brand pages that will allow companies to localise their pages according to which country a Facebook user resides in.

The changes to Facebook’s brand pages, highlighted in a press release from the company, include:

  • One global brand identity. Users from all countries will see the same Page name (translated into their local language), fan count, and People Talking About This.
  • One URL. Brands can promote one single URL in all off-Facebook campaigns, and users will be automatically directed to the best version of the Page for them.
  • Global Insights. Page admins will see Insights for all global users in one easy-to-view dashboard.
  • Who it works for: Brands that have historically managed one single Page with geo-targeted page posts as well as brands who have managed multiple, country-specific Pages.

Commenting on what the changes will mean for Australian brands, Dave Bentley, MD of digital agency Profero, said: “Local brands can finally represent themselves on Facebook in a way that is logical to consumers, who don’t care about where a Facebook is managed.”

The changes will allow global brands who want to create an Australia Facebook presence, but don’t have the resources to run one themselves locally, Bentley said.

However, Bentley questioned the level of work needed for brands to make this happen. “Plus I’m sure brands will very interested in understanding what level of control will remain in the local markets once it’s in place,” he said.

Gual Barwell, senior creative strategist at Holler Sydney, added that the changes would enable Australian brands to benchmark against other regions.

Social media strategist at digital agency Reborn, Samantha Hasler, said that her agency had trialled the merged brands pages.

“It’s great to have access to global insights and still be able to monitor at a local level. During the period of the page merge, we saw an increase in our client’s fan base as we acquired new Australian fans that were previously on an international page – now we can provide them with local content,” she said.

However, Hasler noted “teething problems” with how Facebookers see a brand’s page.

“There is low awareness with fans, which has led to some confusion around whether they are seeing global or local content in their newsfeed. Fans are used to seeing the local page name and when they visit the page they see global ‘likes’ which doesn’t suggest they are on the local page.”

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