Facebook has long been the leading source of referral traffic on the internet. Despite this fact, many companies have not optimized their links. How many times have you clicked a link only to see irrelevant information in both the text and picture displayed. Under the assumption that this irrelevant information discourages users from clicking through the link, means that brands are wasting a valuable opportunity.
Facebook is fairly efficient at determining the title and body that should appear when displaying a link. The most common issue that brands encounter is that the image is either missing or incorrect. By utilizing Facebook’s open graph meta tags, brands can prevent this from occurring. By adding the following three tags to your HTML header you can optimize your link and in theory it’s CTR:
<meta property=”og:title” content=”INSERT YOUR TITLE” />
<meta property=”og:description” content=”INSERT YOUR DESCRIPTION” />
<meta property=”og:image” content=”HTTP://www.LINK TO YOUR PREFERRED ICON.jpg” />
A quick note on the preferred icon, all images should be square, also the maximum pixels allowed are 250 x 250.
Once you’ve added the tags it is essential that you visit
http://developers.facebook.com/tools/debug . There you will be able to enter the link for your website at which point Facebook will refresh its cache. This will ensure that users are seeing what you want them to.
It is important for brands to recognize that their fans sharing their link is a vote of confidence and one of the most credible sources of advertising they will receive. It is essential for brands not to squander that opportunity and following these steps will help ensure that brands are optimizing their fans support.
