Facebook Cookbook - Jay Goldman [22]
Figure 2-21. My Mini-Feed (names also blurred to protect the not-so-innocent)
Your Mini-Feed will contain every News story that gets published about you, regardless of whether your friends saw it in their News Feed. It also has the ability to import Mini-Feed items from external sites using the “Import” link in the box’s subtitle, which is responsible for the YouTube story you see in my Mini-Feed. The Profile redesign launched in mid-2008 merged the previously separate Wall and Mini-Feed into a single tab of the Profile, with the ability to filter entries using the small filter control at the top of the screenshot in Figure 2-21 (setting the filter to “Posts by Jay” essentially makes it the Mini-Feed, and “Posts by Others” makes it the Wall).
Users now have a lot more control over how stories appear in their Feeds. Each entry can appear in one-line, short, and full sizes (assuming the developer of the app has provided templates for each size), and users can set an app-wide default, which they can override for each story. Overall settings for apps can be edited from the All Applications page, which brings up a settings dialog (Figure 2-22).
Figure 2-22. iLike application settings
Clicking on the blue pencil to the right of each story title on their Wall shows a pop-up menu with story-specific size options (Figure 2-23).
Figure 2-23. Feed story options
The iLike application has templates for each size: one-line, short, and full (Figures 2-24, 2-25, and 2-26, respectively).
Figure 2-24. iLike one-line story
Figure 2-25. iLike short story
Figure 2-26. iLike full story
Facebook users can adjust their privacy settings (http://www.facebook.com/privacy/?view=feeds) to control the items that appear in their Mini-Feeds (and therefore in other users’ News Feeds), as shown in Figure 2-27.
The best use of News Feed stories is to broadcast a significant action taken by a user of your application that includes some relevant information that the user’s friends will find interesting. Remember that your primary goal is to get their friends to install the application, so think about adding a call to action that provokes their curiosity. Consider Facebook’s own Photos app, which makes masterful use of the News Feed (Figure 2-28).
Figure 2-27. News Feed and Wall privacy settings
Figure 2-28. Photo app News Feed
Everything you need is in one place: information about your friends, what they did, a sample, and a very obvious call-to-action link to lure them into clicking.
Noteworthy Notifications
Problem
How can I keep my users coming back to my app after they’ve installed it?
Solution
Getting users to install your app is like G.I. Joe’s message about knowledge: it’s only half the battle. Your app’s real success will be measured on your total install base and your percentage of active daily users, which is particularly relevant if you’re planning to monetize by selling ads. You need to think about how you’re going to get users engaged with your app on an ongoing basis. What’s going to keep them coming back for more, and how are you going to let them know when there’s more to come back to? Notifications are the key. Your app has the ability to send on-Facebook Notifications (and off-Facebook emails if users have opted into receiving them), letting your install base know about something relevant to them. It’s important to keep them relevant or else users will start blocking your app, so try to think about things about which you can notify them that will really draw their interest. Scrabulous (and any game in which you challenge your friends) is a great example, since Notifications (like the one in Figure 2-29) are used to let you know that it’s your turn to play.
Figure 2-29. Scrabulous new game Notification
Discussion
As part of its ongoing effort to combat app spam, Facebook clamped down on Notifications in February 2008, implementing a scheme that grants applications a sliding cap on Notifications per user per day, based on how well your Notifications are