How travel companies can best make use of Facebook Timeline

by Mark Frary

The airline Emirates this week became the latest company to update its official Facebook page to take advantage of recently released features that make the 850 million+ social network a much more visually interesting place for travel brands.

The social network introduced its new Timeline feature for a selected group of individual users in 2011 and rolled it out for businesses worldwide in March 2012. The change totally reorganises the Facebook user interface, allowing users to promote the stories they like (favourite posts, photos or events) and the apps they use (what they have been listening to on Spotify, buying through Amazon or the latest movie quiz they have completed).

One of the most popular features of the new Timeline has been the addition of cover photos. These allow users to place a letterbox format picture at the top of their profile rather than being restricted to having a small square profile picture at top left. The extra space means there is plenty of scope for creativity and you can see how some of the world’s top brands have jumped at the chance to push their brands online.

However, travel companies should be aware there are strict rules on how these can be used. They cannot contain price information, offers or contact information, must not encourage people to click Like or Share and should not include any call to action – just the sort of things a travel brand on Facebook might want to do.

While this seems very strict, it is common sense. The travel companies that are using Facebook best are those that are not using it overtly to sell. This was clearly highlighted in last November’s TNS Digital Life survey, which showed that 57% of social network users in developed markets, including the UK and US, do not want to engage with brands through their networks.

Facebook Timeline, as the name suggests, also allows brands to share their heritage with their fans. Instead of having a static profile page, the new look allows companies to share key moments from throughout their history. Emirates’ page shows how the airline was launched in 1985 with just two aircraft.

Retro travel images, customer memories of trips from travel’s “golden age” and clips of crackly cine film are online gold dust and travel brands should embrace them.

Coming soon from Facebook will be real-time data on how your new timeline is working. At the moment, companies have to wait for anything up to 48 hours to see how well their social content is doing. The company promised at its first ever marketing conference earlier this year that it would soon update its Insights tool to allow users to see straight away which posts are working and which are not.