Make Your Facebook Friend Lists – Now!
ByIf you use Facebook for purely personal use or you blend both personal and business, you’ll want to implement this strategy of creating friend lists. Why?? Because Facebook’s got a beta (I don’t have it yet), out there that gives you ultimate control of who sees any update you post. Facebook’s calling it ‘Publishing Controls’. Read more about it at allfacebook.com
Looking at the graphic below, when you want to share ‘what’s on your mind?’, you’ll see a drop down menu with some default settings, Everyone, Friends & Networks, etc. Below that, you can choose the ‘edit’ button and choose a specific friend list(s). Maybe there’s something you want to pass along just to family members or a group of business friends you have. Simply select the appropriate friend list and it’s done!
It’s almost like sending out an email to a group – and depending on how people have their settings configured, they’ll be notified via email when they get a new FB message. In addition to your message, you can attach a link, video or picture. If you’ve set up your ‘NetworkedBlogs’ from within Facebook, you can attach one of your blog postings. Now your friends don’t need to worry about opening attachments in their email, or having to download pictures. This is really great! I wonder if Twitter will come up with something similar? Right now, it’s post to all or completely private with Twitter.
Set Up A Friend List
So, now you want to get some friend lists set up so you’re ready. Here’s how:
- From any page in Facebook, click on ‘Friends’ at the top of the page and look at the column on your left
- You’ll see ‘Lists’ in bold and at the end of the column you’ll see ‘create’. Click on it.
- A box pops up and you name your list.
- At this point, you can scroll through all of your friends (could be a daunting task), and click on the ones you want, or you can start typing someone’s name and it’ll appear quickly.
- When you’re finished, click ‘Create List’, and you’ve got it. Feel free to go back and edit any list you’ve created.
For myself, I’ve felt a bit conflicted on trying to use Facebook for personal and business, so I’ve used it mainly for personal use. I know I get tired of seeing everyone’s game status, who they are most like, etc. I also tire of seeing constant business updates. So I hope you know who you are and will take appropriate steps!
I liked this recent article by Tina Jacobson, owner of a media, publicity and consulting firm. She humorously takes us through some of the do’s and dont’s of Facebook Faux Pas. It is so true that when we get together with our friends and talk about Facebook, we usually complain about the things that irritate us about it first – human nature, I suppose.
Good article…blog looks great!
[...] & Use Lists. This is a wonderful feature that I blogged about a year or so ago. Why do you want to do this? Use it to control who sees certain posts you do, use [...]