Tag Archives: facebook

On February 5th, 2010 Facebook announced a new site design. Since then the feedback has been overwhelmingly negative. The biggest complaint is the loss of the ability to filter updates and posts from your favorite Facebook applications.

Facebook states:

We’re making it easier for you to find and interact with applications and discover new ones, with the new Applications and Games dashboards, accessible via the “Applications” and “Games” links on the home page. The dashboards will surface the applications you’ve interacted with most recently as well as your most recent application activity and your friends’ activity.

Then later in the post they clarify:

We’re also working on a more granular set of controls for specific applications, so that you can turn off activity for certain applications while leaving it on for others. We’ll have more information to share on this soon.

It’s not clear if the latter means they are working on more controls for filtering or for privacy.

I, for one, used the application filters daily and missed them as soon as they were gone. However, I did find a work around. It’s not the best solution but it works for now.

UPDATE: As of March 20th, the instructions below DO still work but you have to scroll down past several new posts in your feed before your filter starts displaying your application posts correctly.

If you obtain the application ID for the application you want to set a filter for (actually it will be a bookmark in your browser) you can still see posts only related to the application you’re interested in.

For example, to view only FarmVille posts, you can do so by clicking on this link: http://www.facebook.com/home.php?filter=app_102452128776

You can then bookmark this in your browser.

The format for the bookmark is: “http://www.facebook.com/home.php?filter=app_APPICATION-ID-NUMBER”

To obtain the application ID number, I found it by searching for the application in Facebook. Once it appears in the search results, click on the application and it should have a long URL containing the application ID in the address bar of your browser.

For FarmVille the URL was: http://www.facebook.com/search/?q=farmville&init=quick#!/apps/application.php?id=102452128776&ref=search&sid=572162762.2672672765..1 and the application ID is listed after “application.php?id=” and before the “&”. So the ID is: 102452128776

Hopefully Facebook comes up with a fix for this soon, but for now, enjoy this work around. You’re also welcome to visit us on Facebook!

You’ve probably heard quite a bit about “social networking” lately. But what is it? Through sites such as Facebook, MySpace, and Twitter, you can network with others who are in your field, as well as business contacts, customers, and potential customers.

When the Internet became popular, people checked to see if a business had a website. If they didn’t, that customer may very well have gone to a competitor who did have a website. These days, customers—current and potential—are looking to see if a business has a Facebook page, or a Twitter page (we do!). It’s free and easy to set up an account with these sites, and once you do, you’ll have the ability to connect with people in a whole new way.

Through Twitter, you can easily give quick updates about company news, sales, and promotions. You can even give a link to a new blog post, or promotion, which in turn could mean increased sales. With Facebook, you can draw in customers and potential clients in a non-invasive, laid-back environment. Sure, you have a product to sell, but through Facebook and Twitter accounts, you can give that extra level of service without the “in your face” tactics that many businesses use.

The opportunities are endless with Twitter and Facebook. You can keep your customers up-to-date through Twitter (or Facebook, for that matter), which will increase customer confidence, as they will be able to see that you’re quickly resolving the problem, and that you care enough about your customers to provide updates.

While it’s understandable that some may be hesitant to embrace social networking, it’s clearly taking the Internet by storm, and those businesses who don’t embrace it may find themselves left in the dust, as customers flock to customers who keep up with the times.

Don’t let your business be left in the dust. Let your business flourish, and gain even more customers by not only creating accounts with social networking sites, but actually taking full advantage of it by interacting with customers, and constantly keeping your content fresh and updated. Update your Twitter page daily, even if it’s only just once. Respond quickly to direct messages, and comments. Respond quickly, too, on Facebook, MySpace, and any other social networking sites you may join. By doing this, you’ll impress your customers, and enjoy one added bonus: word of mouth, which is part of the wonders of networking.