tutorials

How To Set Up a Facebook Fan Page

by Mandi on December 30, 2010

facebook fan page

As Facebook continues to grow with more than 500 million users around the world, creating a fan page is a great way to connect with your readers in another medium. I’ve never viewed the Life Your Way page as a popularity contest or a fan clubs but rather as a way to interact with people in a less formal way and to keep them updated on the things going on at Life Your Way even if they’re not visiting every day.

Unfortunately, Facebook may be the most popular social media platform, but it’s not always intuitive to use, so if you’ve been wanting to create a fan page but aren’t sure how, here’s a quick tutorial to help you get started:

Create a Facebook Page

1. Go to Facebook.com/pages.

2. Click on + Create Page:

create a Facebook fan page

3. Select Brand, Product or Organization and Website from the dropdown menu:

create a Facebook fan page4. Enter the name of your page. Choose carefully because you can’t change it once it’s set:

create a Facebook fan page

5. Check the box to indicate that you are authorized to create the page by the official organization (if it’s your blog, you are!).

create a Facebook fan page

6. Click Create Official Page.

create a Facebook fan page

7. Verify that you’re authorize to create the page once again by clicking Create Page.

create a Facebook fan page

Add Your Information & Profile Picture

Once you’ve created your page, you’ll want to add your branding by uploading an image, writing a brief intro to your site and editing your site information.

create a Facebook fan page1. There’s some debate about whether it’s better to upload your personal picture or company logo on your page. Because Life Your Way is a site made up of more than 20 contributors, I felt that using the logo was better. However, if you are the personality behind your site and that’s the image you want to convey, uploading your personal photo may be a better choice.

2. Be sure to include the link to your site in the sidebar information so that users can quickly visit your blog from your fan page.

3. The Basic Information will show as a permanent tab on your fan page, so think carefully about what information you want to present here.

Claim Your Custom URL

Finally, you’ll want to claim your custom vanity URL. Facebook will initially assign you something like http://www.facebook.com/pages/Life-Your-Way/186926437991273, which isn’t exactly easy to remember, but once you have 25 fans, you’ll be able to select a vanity URL, such as http://facebook.com/lifeyourway.

1. First, start by suggesting that your Facebook friends like your page. Call in favors from close friends, family members or blogging buddies until you’ve hit 25 fans.

2. Go to Facebook.com/username.

3. Click on your page name in Each page can have a username dialog box.

4. Choose your username carefully because, once again, you won’t be able to change this once it’s set.

5. Click Check Availability.

6. Confirm your username choice.

There’s a ton more you can do with a Facebook fan page, and I’ll be sharing more tips and tutorials over the next few weeks. For now, take some time to get to know your page and invite your readers to join you in your Facebook community!

{ 47 comments }

Tutorial: Set Up a New WordPress.com Blog

by Mandi on February 15, 2010

Setting Up a New Blog

This week we’re going to continue last year’s post-Blissdom blogging series with more tips for taking your blog to the next level based on my own experiences and lessons I learned at BlissDom. But before we jump in, I wanted to write a basic post for those readers who want to start blogging but have no idea where to start.

There are many different “platforms” on which you can host your blog — TypePad, Blogger, WordPress.com or WordPress.org, LiveJournal, Moveable Type and more. I host at WordPress.org because it allows me to have my own domain name, run advertising and control all aspects of my site using WordPress’s platform.

If you have aspirations of turning your blog into a business, those are all things you’ll need to think about eventually, but if you’ve never set one up before and aren’t familiar with HTML, I would recommend starting with a simpler system, such as a WordPress.com blog, which gives you a custom URL on the WordPress domain, like myblog.wordpress.com.

For the purpose of this post, I’m going to share instructions for setting up a WordPress.com account and blog for beginners who just want to try out this blogging thing before jumping in with both feet.

To get started:

1. Go to WordPress.com and click on Sign Up Now.

2. Fill out all of the required account information and click submit.

3. Select a blog name and custom URL and click Sign Up.

4. Finish filling out your profile while you wait for your activation email.

5. Click on the link in the email to activate your account. Be sure to check your spam folder if it doesn’t show up within a couple of minutes.

6. Click on View Your Site to get an idea of what your new blog looks like.

7. Log in to begin customizing your site.

A downside of WordPress.com is that you do not have the ability to customize the appearance to the same degree that you do with a self-hosted blog on WordPress.org. However, if you start blogging and decide you want to be able to do more, you can always move to WordPress.org down the road.

To begin customizing the look of your blog, scroll down to Appearance on the left menu bar. Choose from the following options:

:: Themes allow you to choose the basic layout and look of your site.

:: Widgets control what goes in your sidebar.

:: A Custom Header allows you to change the wording or upload your own picture to be used at the top of your blog.

:: Header Colors gives you the option to change the background colors if you keep the standard header.

:: Use the Typekit Fonts option to change the fonts that appear on your blog. You need to create a free account at Typekit.com in order to do this.

:: Follow the step-by-step instructions to edit your CSS, which changes the appearance of your posts and the elements of your blog.

Now that you have your site set up, you can begin posting.

You’ll notice there is already a sample post set up, but if you click on Posts, it will bring up a list of the current posts, including the one title “Hello World”.  Hover over that post title until the options show up underneath it, and then click on “Trash” to delete the post.

You can then click on “Add New” and begin writing your first post. Note that there are two ways you can view your post — Visual and HTML — using the tabs above the post window. If you’re not familiar with HTML, write your post in the Visual view and add any formatting using the toolbar at the top of the post window. You can then click on the HTML tab to get an idea of the code used to make it look the way it does.

Click Publish and you’re done. Congratulations, you’re now a blogger!

Obviously, this just scratches the surface on setting up a new blog. Here are some additional tutorials and tips to help you get started:

:: Basic HTML Tags, ProBlogger

:: WordPress.com Support

:: Blog Pages, Posts, Categories, and Tags…HELP!, Remarkablogger

If you’re just getting started, what other questions do you have about blogging? If you’re an established blogger, what do you wish you’d known when you started?

Mandi Ehman at Organizing Your Way

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All About To-Do Lists: Decoupage a Notebook

June 2, 2009

We’ve talked in the past about the different methods for creating a to-do list that works for you, and I wanted to share more of my system with you today. While I continue to love and use Microsoft OneNote faithfully, I’ve found that I’ve moved back to a paper list for my weekly and daily [...]

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