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Facebook Vanity URLs

June 10th, 2009 · by David Bradley >> 5 Comments

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Facebook Privacy HacksAhead of the land rush for vanity URLs on Facebook this weekend, I finally created a Facebook fan page for myself!

Does that sound conceited, arrogant, narcissistic, self-obsessed? Tough! If I don’t blow my own trumpet who else is going to do it for me? I don’t think my mother is on Facebook just yet to do it on my behalf. Anyway, it’s not vanity, it’s simply sensible.

Anyway, it’s a good way to get your personal message out there and what’s more, unlike your standard Facebook page, a fan page (silly name) is searchable by all users. Moreover, if you get yourself 1000+ fans, you can have a proper “vanity” URL (ahead of the launch of vanity URLs for normal Facebook pages).

If you want to create your own fan page, and gain all the benefits of a bit of personal publicity either for you or your business, it’s very straightforward. What you don’t want to do is create a “group”, that’s not a fan page and is something of a dead-end as I’ve discovered.

Here’s the basic method:

  • Visit any fan page. This one for instance.
  • Scroll down and look on the column, below the list of fans you’ll see a couple of links one of which will be Create page
  • Click “Create Page”
  • Add a logo, avatar, or photo of yourself
  • Add some information and links to your website, blog, twitter page(!)
  • Click the link to publish your page, which makes it public and searchable
  • Do some promotion, write on your wall, add some photos, videos, links and stuff
  • Sit back and watch your fans come flocking to you.

I’ll race you to your first 1000, see who’s blowing their trumpet after that.

http://www.facebook.com/pages/David-Bradley/91034214002?ref=s

Facebook Vanity

5 responses so far ↓

  • Kim Woodbridge // Jun 10, 2009 at 3:38 pm

    I didn’t know about the vanity url for fan pages with 1,000 fans. Geesh – I was excited because I have just over 100. I get really excited when people I don’t know join ;-)

    But I have some bad news about your new fan page – “If you signed up for a Facebook Page after May 31 or a user profile after today at 3 p.m. EDT, [June 9th] you may not be able to sign up for a username immediately because of steps we’ve taken to prevent abuse or “squatting” on names.”

    http://blog.facebook.com/blog.php?post=90316352130

  • David Bradley // Jun 10, 2009 at 4:06 pm

    Oh bugger…actually that’s good to know, in that it will give the genuine owners a chance to land grab first…I was wondering about that.

  • Kim Woodbridge // Jun 10, 2009 at 4:14 pm

    I’m lucky for once – I just made it. I created the page on May 22nd or somewhere around that date. I thinking I should go for /pizza ;-)

  • David Bradley // Jun 13, 2009 at 9:58 am

    http://facebook.com/sciencebase

  • Tracy // Jun 22, 2009 at 2:36 pm

    Awesome! Do your first dozen fans get a prize? ;-) I know a lot of people are probably rolling their eyes at my “branding” efforts, but they can kiss my grits.

    Although it would probably help if I made my page go live…


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