As you may have noticed, Facebook has made some significant changes to the layout and functionality of facebook pages. Some of these changes have been long overdue, while others are a bit surprising and may change the way Fan pages are built and used by businesses and fans alike. Up until today, switching facebook pages to a new design layout is optional. However, now the new layout is mandatory. Here’s a brief overview of the changes and what they mean for businesses and fans:

• 1. Tab Application Menu has moved to the sidebar: Users can now view different tabs on the vertical/stacked menu on the left side of the page.
• 2. New photo strip at top of page: For everyone who has personal profiles (and if you’re reading this blog post, I’ll assume you do), the Fan pages will look a lot like the new personal pages with a “film strip” of photos at the top of the page. These photos are the most recently tagged photos of the brand.
• 3. Profile picture reduced: The new dimensions of the profile picture are now 180 x 540 pixels (formerly 200 x 600). This shouldn’t affect businesses since the height-to-width ratio is the same; the image will just be reduced a bit.
• 4. New information tab: The small blurb below the profile picture has been removed and has been added to the information tab in the tab menu.
• 5. Interact as user or page admin: This long-overdue feature has finally arrived! At long last, there’s a way to post as yourself on Fan pages for which you are the admin. On the flipside, you can now post on other Fan pages from a specific brand. For example, Fish Marketing could post on the Yard, Garden & Patio Show page, congratulating them on a successful event. This is a very interesting feature that can be used as a brand awareness tool by strategically interacting on pages that may have influential followers.
• 6. Sponsored stories: Think about all the times you’ve “liked” a post on a Fan page, or have “checked-in” to a restaurant or retail store. Now businesses can turn those actions into advertisements. Sponsored stories allow everyday “word of mouth recommendation” to become promotions for brands. For example, Fish Marketing could say they want to promote Fish Marketing “likes” so that any user who has a friend that “likes” Fish Marketing will see a “sponsored story” advertisement—users can click through and “like” the page, or just check it out. This can be a highly targeted way to advertise and build fan growth for brands. Allowing Fan pages to promote brands similar to the user news feed is a more natural way of building fan growth.
• 7. Featured likes: You can now feature different pages that your brand “likes” on the left side of your brand’s Fan Page. You can feature up to five pages as a way of showcasing brands that you are associated with.
• 8. Enhanced two-way communication: This new setting allows admins to receive e-mail notifications when fans have posted something to their page. There are also enhanced security/spam settings that allow you to block profanity, as well as blacklisting certain “spammy” terms like “FREE”.
• 9. iFrame support: Facebook has indicated that while FBML apps will remain functional for the time being, they will eventually be phased out. jFrames will become the development option for applications within tabs on Facebook, making the way developers build applications on Page tabs consistent with the dominant way they are built on canvas pages.
• 10. Landing pages for Facebook ads: This feature is not as new as the rest, but it’s probably the fastest-growing trend among Fan pages. Much like Google Adwords, Facebook allows Fan Pages to link ads to landing pages that are set up as tabs on Fan Pages. This allows advertisers to create a more consistent message by designing landing pages that match their brand identity. The landing pages can be built on FBML tabs and the titles of tabs can be customized.