Facebook recently released its places application.  The application is a real time geolocation interface that uses gps to tell your friends where you are and what you are doing while you are doing it.  Think of it as a status update with a map attached to it.  The application has been released for the iphone, but other versions do not exist yet.

Places can be seen on Facebook already, but the check in is only available on certain devices.   Here is what a place profile looks like

http://www.facebook.com/home.php?#!/pages/Demandforce-Inc/127924707253103?ref=ts

To checkin without a iphone, visit http://touch.facebook.com.  This will bring you to the mobile version of Facebook.

Facebook Touch

Click on places and your web browser will prompt you for your location.  I am using Firefox in this picture.  Other browsers may appear differently.  The browser will find your location using your IP address.  Click to allow the browser to find your location.

You can then proceed with Facebook places as normal.  Allfacebook.com has a nice instructional for using Facebook places for your business here:

http://www.allfacebook.com/facebook-places-business-2010-08?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+allfacebook+%28Facebook+Blog%29

Start checking in, and share your business!

A couple of weeks ago we explained the benefit of the “Like” button for your website.  I hope that most of you have installed one by now.  Now it is time to use that like button to spice up your website’s appearance on Facebook.

The like button is a simple line of code that can be added to your website.  Left alone, it will pull existing information from your website to display on Facebook.  You can customize how the website is displayed by the use of custom meta tags.  These tags, as seen in our previous post, will assign a title, description, and thumbnail image to your website.  This will also come into play when Facebook begins to include outside websites in its search.

When these tags are employed, a like from your website will appear as John Smith likes ABC Dentistry on Dr. John A  D.D.S..  The pattern is made up of  the title meta tag (<meta property=“og:title”) on the site name tag (<meta property=“og:site_name”).  This allows for some clever wording.

You will need to respect your local advertising laws and restrictions, but you can have fun.  Perhaps you could change your title meta tag to “My teeth feel great” and your site name to “Dr. Lipscombs office”.  Another idea may be a title tag of “No Cavities” and site name “My teeth with Dr. Lipscomb”.  This would render a post of “John Smith Likes No Cavities on My teeth with Dr. Lipscomb“.  Theoretically, you are not making any claims, but just taking advantage of the word placement by a third party website.  Even though it may seem trivial, local advertising laws still apply.  Always follow the local laws as closely as possible.

The detailed “Like” button post can be found here.

One of the most common questions I receive from dentists is how to get more Facebook fans and how to get more traffic to a website.  The website is obviously the flagship of any online presence and can make or break your success.  A beautiful website will never be a success if no one sees it.  A terrible looking website may be a smashing success if it has great visibility.  The same goes for a Facebook fan page.  You may have a lot of great information, but how can it be effective if no one is there to receive it?  The Facebook open graph system is here to help.

Facebook started the open graph system several months ago, and it may evolve into a neccesity.  Basically the Open Graph system is a way for Facebook to spread outside its boundaries into the rest of the web.  Some think that Facebook wants to compete with Google by building a search engine based on “Likes” instead of links.   (Facebook is actually the #4 search engine)  The new “Like” button is probably the best example of the open graph system.  The Like button can be added to any website and almost any piece of web content that allows HTML code.   It then turns that item or website into a searchable Facebook object that can be shared.  The Like button is usually accompanied by a set of Meta tags that will mandate how the item is displayed. Google also uses meta tags to determine how websites are displayed.  Let’s see how this works on my website.

As you can see, I have added the Like button to an empty area on my website.  The like button can be introduced to the website by adding a small bit of code into the HTML of the site.  To get the code for your website visit

http://developers.facebook.com/docs/reference/plugins/like.  Enter the appropriate information and the code for your like button will be generated.

A certain set of meta tags will also accompany the Like button.  These will have to be installed on their own.  These meta tags will determine how the “Liked” object (your website) will be represented on Facebook.

These meta tags will also tell Facebook a little more about the business being Liked.   This will become more important if and when Facebook delves further into search.  The meta tags should include the basics which are title, site name, display image, url, and description.  Other meta tags can include address, phone, fax, lat, long, and type of business.

Once the like button is clicked, the user can add a comment or quote.

The “Like”  will now show up in the news feed of the user.  This will expose your website to all of that user’s friends.  Remember the average Facebook user has about 130 friends.  The meta tags used  will determine how your website shows up.   Facebook will gather information about your site to display if the meta tags aren’t set up correctly.  It may grab the first picture available for your thumbnail.  Often times the first picture available will not be the one you want.   Facebook will usually display your site or item with this pattern:  Jason Lipscomb likes “og:title” on “og:site_name” followed by “og:description”.  The thumbnail will come from the “og:image” tag.

Once you have established your like button and meta tags, run your site through Facebooks Linter.

http://developers.facebook.com/tools/lint/?ref=mf

The linter will submit you site to be evaluated by Facebook, and allow it to be “crawled”.  It will show you how your site will appear on Facebook and  it will tell you what meta tags you have and need.  It will also display your thumbnail image.

Why does all of this matter?  Facebook claims that websites with Facebook widgets and applications above the fold have 2 to 3 times higher click throughs than plain sites.  A click through means that people are engaged and willing to look at more of your content.  The longer they stay focused on your material, the more likely they are to become a patient.  Clicking the “like” on your page also allows them to share your website passively without much effort on their part.  They give you an instant vote of approval, even if they don’t realize it.

Many dentists are missing one of the biggest secrets of dental social media success.  Dental Staff!  I have always been a been advocate of getting staff involved in the social media process.  These are the people that keep your office running smoothly and make your office the great place that it is.   Your staff does most of the communicating with patients in the office and on the phone, why not involve them in your social media presence.   Now I know many of you don’t want your staff interacting with patients on social media sites, while many of you let your staff run the whole process.   We have come up with a list of things that staff can do to boost your social media efforts no matter what your restrictions are.

1. Tell their friends and family about your office profiles (Facebook Fan Pages, Twitter account, Foursquare profile, Yelp….)  Many Facebook fan pages and other profiles need a jumpstart from friends and family to get going.  Create a list of all your profiles and get your staff to spread the word.  They should be proud of their workplace  and willing to share to make it successful.
2. Have your staff comment on your Facebook fan page posts even if they only say “nice!”.  Every post should have a comment.  Vistors are much more likely to comment on a post if they have seen others reacting.  There always needs to be an icebreaker comment.
3. Tag your staff in office pictures. (if they allow it)  When people are tagged in photos, their friends will be notified that they appear in pictures.  Pictures generate curiosity and will lead to more visits than text posts.
4. Have staff comment on blog posts.  Well worded, well tagged blog posts can have a lot of SEO benefit.  Comments can also help with rankings.  The more the better.  Make sure the comments have something to do with the content, but simple ones will work as well.   Try to get them to comment at home so the IP address will be different.  It is even better to have your assistants and hygiene staff to write blog posts. You trust them to educate your patients in person, why not let them share their insights into dental care with the online community?  It will allow them to show their expertise and it will help the online identity of the practice.  If your staff really wants to get involved, set up individual blogs for all of them.  You could have a hygiene blog, a office management blog, and an assistant blog.  Use the right keywords to point back to your content, and you are rolling!

• Bookmark and share posts with social bookmarking and sharing tools.  I strongly advise against false reviews written by staff, but I know it happens on a regular basis.  There are ways staff can give a vote of confidence without creating a false review.  Bookmarking websites shows search engines that human beings are actually interacting with the content shown.  You can bookmark almost anything.   Have your staff bookmark your website and local search engine profiles on their computers.   Also have them share your blog posts on social bookmarking sites like Digg and Stumbleupon.   Have them “share” your YouTube videos and Facebook posts.   Your office can become a quite formidable social media force when you work together.  Install a Facebook “Like” button on your website and have them all “Like” your website.  It will show up in their news feed and be seen by their friends.

I have also heard of employees having “Check in Battles” on Foursquare to claim territory in the office.  This is a light hearted competition, but it may actually increase visibility for the office.  Geo Social platforms like this will probably see increased exposure in the next couple of years.  Staff can jump on the Geo Social bandwagon by geotagging videos and photos of the office on sites like Flickr and Panoramio.

Social Media can be a real team effort.  Be sure to work together to make your office’s social media presence the best it can be.

During our webinar last night, I spoke of embedding Facebook videos.  Most people know that you can embed YouTube videos on your website or in your blog.   The embed option is very apparent, but the Facebook embed is not.  This is the embed option on YouTube.

As you can see it is pretty straightforward.    You can take this code and paste it directly in any html setting.

There is no such embed prompt for Facebook, but the process is still pretty easy.  Every item on Facebook has its own custom url.  Upload the video or find a video that you would like to use.  Scroll to the very end of the url in the web address bar.  There will be a number at the end of the address that looks like this. Only the highlighted numbers in the picture matter.

Look for these numbers Remember to scroll to the end!

Copy these numbers and place them into the code in place of the red text.  Be sure not to delete the quotation marks!

<object width=”400″ height=”224″ >
<param name=”allowfullscreen” value=”true” />
<param name=”allowscriptaccess” value=”always” />
<param name=”movie” value=”http://www.facebook.com/v/place numbers here” />
<embed src=”http://www.facebook.com/v/place numbers here” type=”application/x-shockwave-flash”
allowscriptaccess=”always” allowfullscreen=”true” width=”400″ height=”224″>
</embed>
</object>

You can change the size of the video by changing the height and width in both areas.  Copy the new code and place it into your website or blog.  Here is the result.

The great thing about embedding the Facebook video is the opportunity to tie it in with your Facebook page.  The Facebook logo in the upper left hand corner is actually a link back to the Facebook page which hosts the video.  Once they go back to the Facebook page they see a prompt to like the page.  This will help drive traffic to your page.  Be sure to visit us on Facebook at http://facebook.com/socialmediadentist.

Most everyone has heard of SEO (Search engine optimization) and many of us are obsessed with getting our websites on the front page of a Google search.   What you may not know is that Facebook is rapidly becoming a titan of search.

In a recent article by Nick O’neil of AllFacebook, he describes Facebook’s spread of the open graph concept and how it will relate to websites being found by Facebook. Facebook best  illustrates the open graph concept by the use of the “Like” button across the internet.  The “Like” button can turn any website into Facebook discussion material.   It can be added to any website or blog, thus instantly connecting the website to Facebook.  This spreads the reach of Facebook beyond its normal boundaries, much like that of Google.   Other examples of the open graph are toolbar add-ons, fan boxes, live streams, and other widgets.  The AllFacebook article also recounts the fact that Facebook is starting to index some websites for its in-house search.  Indexing is the method in which search engines analyze each website to determine its relevancy for search results.  For example, when you type a Google search for Dallas dentist Google will index websites to find out which has the most relevant material pertaining to a dentist in Dallas.

Facebook has not shown much in the way of indexing outside websites, but now may be increasing this service.  The article states that the website tripadvisor.com has started to appear in some searches indicating that it is being indexed by Facebook.

What does all of this mean?  It may mean that Facebook is taking on Google in the search department and wishes to become the end-all be-all of websites.  Search traffic within Facebook has eclipsed big name search engines such as Ask.com in the past.  It may be gunning for a bigger stake in the game. Dentists who focus on using SEO to show up in Google may want to start thinking about their Facebook ranking and visibility.

How do you get started with the open graph system?  Become active in Facebook and make sure you have a business profile there.  Add a “Like” button to your website.  The “Like” button can be found here:

http://developers.facebook.com/docs/reference/plugins/like

Many of you who pay attention to your website ranking know that meta tags within your website often play a part in website ranking.  The open graph protocol for Facebook has also denoted some meta tag coding that you can add to your website in order to be indexed by Facebook.  The tags provided also seem ready for Facebook’s  forray into the localization market (i.e. Foursquare and Gowalla).  These geographic codes will allow provide localization platforms with the information needed  to link your website with a localized business profile.  In other words, sites like Foursquare automatically associate your website with the business listed at your geographic location.  This is a very exciting proposition.  The tags are available now and can be added to any website.

What does this mean for the future? It may become very important to optimize  your website for Facebook searches as well as Google searches.  Once again, early adapters will most likely be rewarded.  The age of the listing also plays a part in Google’s rankings and may play a part in the listings of Facebook.

The original post by Nick O’neil can be found here

http://www.allfacebook.com/2010/06/facebook-tests-show-seo-may-be-possible-with-open-graph/

Social Media for Dentists

Recently I have been seeing a lot of Facebook backlash from dentists.  They are unhappy with the new privacy policies (which will be changing for the better).   These dentists are often focusing on the personal aspect of Facebook and other social media outlets without seeing the grander picture.  Social media is one of the fastest ways to communicate with a large group who are actively engaging with each other.  The communication is in real time and it is powerful.

Take for example the recent bills that affected dentists in Virginia.  Bills HB1263 and SB 622 came up for vote in the Virginia legislature.  The bills prevented insurance companies from dictating the price of non-covered dental procedures.  So in essence, the dental insurance companies could tell the dentists what they could charge for services that did not fall in their plan.  This could be a real detriment to the practice of dentistry and cost dentists thousands?  The Virginia Dental Association sent out a letter and informed the dentists in the area, but what they did next really showed the power of social media.

The VDA, which also has a Facebook fan page reached out to its fans to make sure the bill passed.  They sent out daily updates, and links to email addresses for state senators and representatives.  They took the time to explain what the bill was and how it would affect dentists in the area.  The discussion it created allowed other dentists to express their concerns and communicate to their community.  It was a grass roots campaign with a twist.  Letters and calls will get the message out, but a social media gathering will allow a group of similar mind to share information like never before.  A link to a Senator’s email address will make it much easier to find and access, therefore making the call to action much more possible.  Constant updates are the rallying cry for the cause, keeping everyone moving towards the goal.  In the end, many dentists knew about the bill and passed on the message to many other dentists.  Many of these dentists were young dentists like myself, and probably would never have become involved in the process.

On the day of the vote my friend, who works at the state capitol, messaged me and said “This place is crawling with dentists!  What is going on?”.  I told him about the bill, and he was very impressed at the dental turnout.  The bill eventually passed, but similar bills are heading to many other state legislatures.  Facebook and other social media outlets can be used to spread the message to other dentists in your area, and unite all of you towards a common cause.  Social media may have a hiccup along the way, but don’t be so quick to discount its power when your livelihood depends on it.

Social Media/Website marketing for Dentists privacy concerns.

As many of you have probably heard, Facebook is facing some real privacy concerns.  They have made changes to the platform that have upset a large portion of the population.  When I talk to dentists about social media, privacy is one of their biggest concerns.  The fact is, that many of these privacy concerns can be overcome with a little bit of due diligence and discretion.

The problems arose when Facebook switched from its default platform of “All private until made public” to “All public until made private”.  This switched all profiles to a public setup until the user actually changed the privacy settings.  At that time I encouraged everyone to evaluate their privacy settings, and make sure that they fall in line with their plans.  This is also why I discourage the use of a personal profile for business use.  It is very hard to maintain privacy while advertising your business from the same profile.

Facebook has also incorporated instant personalization with partner websites like Yelp.  The instant personalization pulls profile information from Facebook while you search Yelp in order to give more pertinent search info.  Privacy advocates see this instant personalization as a threat, and invasion of privacy.  Facebook is also making more information from profiles and posts visible on the internal Facebook search engine, as well as third party search engines.  This is a great concern for the Facebook population, because they feel that their posts are somewhat private.

The truth is, this is all nothing new.  Google stores every email sent through its GMail platform, and indexes the content of your emails to provide targeted advertising.  Have you ever received an email about a dental procedure and noticed that the ads on the side are all about dentistry?  Google also has a picture of my house on the Internet, and various other facts.  Even if you don’t pursue an Internet presence, it is already there.

There are ways to protect yourself.  Facebook is totally voluntary.  You do not have to have a profile if you don’t want one.  You also don’t have to provide every tidbit of information about yourself.  The old expression garbage in, garbage out definitely applies here.  Only post information that you want others to see.  Be sure to use the privacy settings given to you.  Take the time to evaluate each setting, and make sure it is to your liking.  Facebook recently added a new privacy feature to address public searches.

This feature will allow you to exclude your profile in search queries.

The other new feature you will see when you log in will be the computer registration.  Computer registration is meant to prevent phishing attacks, by authenticating log ins.  Many of you have probably been the victim of, or seen phishing attacks.  Here is one that I recently received.

It is the typical phishing attack.  It has a funny comment that says something like “Is this you” or “Check out this funny picture” then a shortened link to obscure its true target.  Once you visit the link, the scammers will piggy back onto your account and send out similar messages to your friends.  A nice virus or malware will probably attack your computer also.  The computer registration will help prevent these attacks from piggy backing your account, so don’t take them lightly.

Now we have established that all of these privacy changes are bad, RIGHT??  Not necessarily.  The whole goal of putting your dental practice on Social Media is to gain visibility.  The privacy changes, for all of their faults, are actually a plus for small businesses.  The changes allow for mundane posts from your fan page to populate search results and be seen by more people.   They also allow you access to the social consciousness, and find out what people are thinking around you.  Instant personalization as seen on Yelp.com can make it easier for people to share your listing.  It allows for more content to cross the Internet/social media gap.   So while you may want to shore up your personal profile, let your public fan page fly.  Enjoy the features that may make you a social media dental star.

Be sure to become a fan of Social Media for Dentists on Facebook.    http://facebook.com/socialmediadentist.

We all know that a Facebook business page is a great marketing tool for any practice.  A call to action is also an important part of any online presence.  I always suggest adding a “Make an appointment now” link to any website. 

This is a quick tutorial showing you how to add a “Make and appointment now” button to your Facebook page that links to your online appointment scheduler. 

We will be using FBML which is short for Facebook Markup Language.  It is the HTML of Facebook.  Visit Static FBML (http://www.facebook.com/home.php?#!/apps/application.php?id=4949752878&ref=ts).  

This is the application that you will need to add to your page in order to use FBML.  Click on the Add to my page link under the profile picture.  Choose the page you would like to add it to.  You will have to scroll down if you have several pages.

Return to your Fan page.  Click on “Edit page” under your profile picture.

When you scroll down, you will now see a box that says FBML.  Click on the Edit. 

This will bring you to the page where you can enter the FBML text.  Choose the title for your entry.  The title will appear above your appointment button on the page, so make sure it ties in with the theme.

As you can see I have added the code to the box. You can copy the code and enter your own information.   Much of the code you will see is for a table.  The table allows for the picture to stay centered in the right spot.  The first bit code that you will want to change is the link where you want to direct traffic.  This the code that looks like this <a href=”http://d35……….’/>   so it would look like <a href=”http://yourwebsite.com”/>  I link to my Demandforce page so they can see my reviews and make appointments easily.   After the outbound link you will need to place  the link to the image  which looks like this <img src=”http://socialmediadentist.com/images/makeanapptnow.jpg”</a>.  You will have to link to the picture because Facebook does not have an image folder that you can upload to.  The picture will have to be 200 pixels wide or less.  You can use your own picture or feel free to use mine by just copying the image link.  When you are done click Save changes. 

Go back to the page once again and click on the “boxes” tab along the top of your page.

Scroll until you see your appointment button.  Click on the little pencil in the upper right hand corner of the box and select “Move to wall tab” 

 You are done!  You can move the box around by clicking and dragging, but it is a bit twitchy.  Check to make sure that when you click on the button, it goes to the right link.  I hope it will generate several new patients for you!

The code in text form:   <table width=”200″ border=”0″ cellspacing=”0″ cellpadding=”5″>
  <tr>
    <th scope=”col”><a href=”http://yourwebsite.com”><divalign=”center”><img src=”http://socialmediadentist.com/images/makeanapptnow.jpg” </a></div></th>
  </tr>
  <tr>
    <td>&nbsp;</td>
  </tr>
</table>

Facebook has begun to implement some new features to take the social media giant more mobile.   Facebook states that there are over 100 million mobile users, and mobile users are twice as active as non-mobile users. -Facebook-   The use of mobile Facebook is nothing new to many users.   What mobile users can expect is more integration into handsets, user friendly apps, and online advertising.  There have been many power plays in the past year involving mobile advertising companies.

Users can also expect more localization in their social media.  Twitter began to roll out their localization feature several weeks ago.  Sites like foursquare, loopt, and Brightkite have taken advantage of the localization craze from the very beginning.  These localization platforms use your location, determined by your mobile device, to tell others where you are and make suggestions based on your whereabouts.  Yelp the online review site is also getting into the mix by suggesting local businesses near your present location.  Facebook has not issued any localization feature yet, but it shouldn’t be very long before it does.

Today Facebook has also rolled out a cool new feature, the QR code. You have probably seen the QR code before.   They usually appear on shipping packages or other consumables.  They carry much more information than the normal UPC code, and they can now carry web addresses.  Some new phones that work on the Android system can decipher these codes and correlate the results with applications on the phone i.e. Facebook.  The inclusion of these codes on Facebook will allow mobile users to compact much information into a small code bar.  Users will also be able to share there information by offering up their code bar.  Thus furthering the mobile social media revolution. 

The rollout has been a bit spotty.  It appeared and disappeared on my profile today before I had the chance to do a screen capture.  But it does indicate the push to get more social media networks integrated into the mobile world.  This will also be a great opportunity for dentists using social media.  Many dentists search and search for more fans and followers.  It is sometimes difficult to get patients and potential patients to become fans of your social media content.  With this new scan system, you can have your barcode at the front desk and have your staff say,” Want to become a fan of ABC Dentistry on Facebook?  Well here scan this with your phone.”   It can be that simple.