Earlier this week, Facebook announced that status tagging was opened up to all users.
The new tagging features make it easy for a user to link to any friend, page, group or event by using the @ function and choosing from a provided list (drop down determined by your friends, pages, groups and event).
The new functionality is powerful and I wanted to break down the opportunity for brands in particular.
As a user, a post now becomes more interactive when I call out a brand by using the @ symbol before their name. By using the @ symbol, the brand name is then automatically hyperlinked to their page, making it easy for my friends to navigate to it.
Facebook Status Tagging User Example
Your post then appears in the feed of all your friends and is also posted on the brand wall:
Facebook Status Tagging User Comment on Brand Wall
Result for brands: Now much easier way for a fan to talk to a brand without having to go to the brand page and still provides the same viral benefits by sending the comment to my friends.
Additionally, as Inside Facebook cites, “Page managers will now have a major new channel for tracking comments and feedback about their brand or business. Until today, brands have been able to track posts and comments made on their Facebook Page directly by fans, as well as search public comments made by Facebook users through Facebook’s new real time search. However, starting today, all @ tags will appear on the wall of the Page as well, even though users never visited the Page. That’s a big deal for Page administrators hoping to gain more insight into how they’re being talked about inside Facebook.”
We are excited about the new tagging feature and how brands will incorporate this new functionality in the way they engage and listen to their most passionate consumers.
This image shows three different versions of the Facebook Fan Box. At the top right corner of this page, you can see where we have implemented our Facebook Fan Box.
