Last week, we talked about the new feature Facebook is rolling out, Questions. If you added questions to your own profile at that time, then you will automatically be able to use the questions feature on any page on which you're an administrator. Just make sure you're using the page as the administrator (the can be done by default in your page's settings, or manually in the upper right-hand corner of your page).
If you have multiple admins on your page, however, you might want to add the questions feature to your page, to make using the feature easier for them. To do this, again, make sure you're using Facebook as your page admin, and get questions for your page. (Mashable has step-by-step illustrations.)
Once you've asked the question, you should click on it, answer it, invite the friends it applies to to answer it, then "follow" it, so that you can monitor the results, in case someone posts something inappropriate.
This might be a good time to review our talk about polling your readers and self promotion on Facebook. Remember, just because you have a nifty new feature, doesn't mean you need to use it twelve times a day, seven days a week (especially if every one else is also trying out the new feature and probably over-using it).
Jennifer Pointer (e-mail) is in Tulsa, OK. She promotes a simple, a low-tech approach to effective online profile management, search engine optimization and social networking.
Well, here's a fun new feature on Facebook, to end the week. Go HERE on Facebook, and activate Facebook questions. Once you do, you'll see a new option for submitting items to your profile page and news feed, called "Questions." This gives you the option to ask everyone following your newsfeed any question and to make it a multiple choice or true/false question. Your friends can answer and/or share the question in their own feeds.
According to Facebook:
We noticed that people were frequently asking for opinions ("what are your favorite restaurants in New York?") or hoping to learn about their friends ("what was your favorite movie as a kid, something you watched over and over?"). For most of these questions, experts weren't going to be the best source for advice. The answers to these questions are meaningful or interesting because you know your friends and your friends know you.
We wanted to make questions easier and faster to answer. With the updated Questions you can agree with an existing answer with a single click, or you can add a different response. This makes it easy for many more people to respond to you. It also helps us show you the most popular responses...(more)
I added it to my feed, and above is an example of the form for setting up a question. This is easily accessible once you've enabled the feature by clicking "questions," then following the instructions. So, go ahead - find out where your friends like to eat locally, what movie eveyone's watching this weekend, or try something silly, like asking them what they think the next word added to the dictionary will be (hint: it won't be "LOL" or "OMG" - those are already in there).
BONUS
While you're checking out Facebook, take a look at Kim Kommando on the "creepiest" Facebook apps:
Jennifer Pointer (e-mail) is in Tulsa, OK. She promotes a simple, a low-tech approach to effective online profile management, search engine optimization and social networking.
This week, we've been reviewing some of the different types of blog posts. We've covered the essay, and search engine bait, such as reviews, lists, link posts, and polls. Yesterday, we talked about some different types of media posts. Now, let's talk about posts that are great for drawing traffic from the social networks - controversy-generating posts.
When we talked about polls, that controversy can be a double-edged sword; overdo it, and you're going to get spammed with traffic you don't even want. But it's fine to expand your readership by being just a little bit controversial, so as to invite vigorous discussion, debate, and return readership.
Ask Questions
People love to give their opinion, and a blog post that is bascially an open-ended question can be a great discussion starter. Some bloggers use these to drum up traffic on the weekends, or on their slow days.
Satire
Poking fun at ourselves, or at our competitors can be a good way to express a point, as it keeps things "light," while still generating thought and discussion.
Critiques/Debates
In political blogging, this is called "oppo," or "opposition research." To do a critique, simply choose an article from your feed reader that interests you, and write a counter-argument to it, pointing out what was lacking in the post, or what part you may have disagreed with. Again, don't overdo it (See Top 10 Worst type of Blog Post - and how to fix them).
Op-Ed
This type of post can be in essay form, as we discussed earlier, or may be more in the form of a "rant," which is far less organized, or more personal. Rants tend to be observations on current trends, and often contain elements of satire or humor.
Have you seen or written posts that successfully used controversy to generate traffic? Please share!
Jennifer Pointer (e-mail) is a trainer and tech writer in Tulsa, OK. She promotes a simple, a low-tech approach to effective online profile management, search engine optimization and social networking. Her weakness is the mocha frappuccino.
Jennifer Pointer (
