June 11

Facebook Vanity URLs — Get them while they last!

Many of you have already seen this alert from Facebook, but we wanted to be 100% certain that all clients working with or considering to work with Triangle Direct Media had advance notice of a very important Facebook Alert:

Starting on Saturday, June 13th, at 12:01am, you’ll be able to choose a username for your Facebook account to easily direct friends, family, and coworkers to your profile.

To select your username, visit the link below after 12:01am on June 13th:
http://www.facebook.com/username/

To learn more about usernames, visit the Help Center:
http://www.facebook.com/help.php?page=896

This opportunity is great for individuals, companies and groups that have established Facebook accounts. Specifically, odds are that a “vanity”, more personalized Facebook URL will lead to increased Google rankings for “branded” search terms. As reputation management continues to grow in popularity and as a pro-active strategy for companies seeking to control the first 10 organic results in Google — this seems to be a “layup”.

Fortunately, Facebook has rigid guidelines preventing “name squatting”, which has given Twitter a blackeye in recent months but securing these new, vanity usernames is on a first-come, first-serve basis.

Good luck securing your name!