Ok, I admit, I’m trying to make waves with this title, but it’s 100% true. I am tired of seeing people in “authoritative” positions, and “gurus” talking about how Facebook is “dead” and is a waste of time.

Here’s the thing – Facebook is NOT dead. It’s not going anywhere for quite some time. Now, this isn’t to say you should ignore newer and possibly more productive social media platforms like Pinterest and Instagram, but what I’m saying is that you shouldn’t ignore Facebook either.

Facebook is still driving incredible amounts of traffic to blogs and websites to this day.

One example I have is Katie from Kroger Krazy, who I featured here a while back. She is arguably the most successful blogger who I have featured and listed her #1 traffic source as Facebook. I’ve seen it with my own eyes. She has good, unique, shareable content that increases her FB reach a lot. People share her posts in their own timelines and tag their friends in her posts so that they see it.

You see, if you have good content that real people want to share on their own timeline, Facebook’s algorithm isn’t going to slow you down much.

Similar to the changes that Google makes to SEO, Facebook’s changes will have less of an impact on people doing the right thing from day one.

According to a recent Mashable article, “we’re seeing less like-baiting and meme photos in news feeds”. This means that people trying to “game” the system by posting memes of unrelated topics in hopes of going viral or people trying to boost reach on a post by asking people to vote using the “like” or “share” button are going to be negatively affected. Like this:

Facebook is also showing more posts for pages who have a higher percentage of engagement. This means if you built your fan count using methods such as fiverr, buying likes, or giveaway entries, you are going to suffer.
Those are not engaged followers and won’t be “liking” or sharing your content. Subsequently, this will bring your total reach way down and people who truly do “like” your page will not be shown your content. Again, people doing the right thing from day one will not suffer due to this.

Just like when Google came down on people trying to game the SERPs by linking back to their site using only keywords, Facebook is trying to improve the quality of what people see by taking out the “gamers”. This is one of the reasons why people like Katie are still successful. Her Facebook posts are informative, unique and highly shareable.

I’m not saying there is anything wrong with trying to build Facebook pages or do SEO or any of that, I’m just saying you can’t be surprised when companies try to weed out people who are “gaming” the system.

That being said, even if Facebook is only showing your updates to 4% of your 5,000 fans, that’s 200 people. How long does it take to post a status update with a link on your page? 10 seconds? I don’t know if very many other places on the net where you can reach 200 targeted people for just a couple of seconds of work.

I realize that study after study is coming out where teenagers are saying they are not on Facebook anymore. Well, I have a question for you – is your target audience teenagers? If it is, they by all means, listen to those studies. The truth is, I’d have a hard time finding any 22-35 year old saying that they have not been on Facebook in any given day.

Facebook is very much alive and kicking, and if I ever met Mark Zuckerberg, I’d thank him for the free traffic to my website.

So what should your Facebook strategy be going forward? Post high quality, engaging content and encourage interaction without baiting it. Post on a regular basis but not too often. DO NOT buy “likes” or engagement. None of this will guarantee results, but it will give you the best chance at having a sustainable Facebook strategy.

When Gary Vaynerchuck reaches out to you on Twitter, you have but one option: respond.

@MorefromUrBlog hey Z email me when u have a second – gary @ vaynermedia com 🙂

— Gary Vaynerchuk (@garyvee) October 31, 2013

So naturally, I emailed him pretty quickly. I was excited to find out what Gary wanted from me. I mean, this guy does it all. But it’s the way he got started that appeals to me the most. Winelibrary.com was his first venture and he went bonkers from there. He now runs VaynerMedia where he and his over 250 employees consult for Fortune 500 companies on the regular. He is one of the best in the social media business and that statement is backed by his tremendous success.

So, as I said: when he reaches out to you, you find out what the heck he wants.

Turns out, he’s got a new book out called Jab, Jab, Jab, Right Hook: How to Tell Your Story in a Noisy Social World. He was looking for people to read and review the book. I was super excited because while he has a few other books, I had not read any books by him. I knew I was in for some awesome content though.

From the first page, I knew this was going to be such an incredibly helpful book. Gary has done it all and shares with you what works, and more importantly, what doesn’t work. The book heavily covers the big 4 social networks: Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and Pinterest in addition to other networks. The meat of the book finds Gary breaking down dozens and dozens of status updates from brands and public figures – telling you what he likes and what he dislikes. There is so much valuable content in this book it’s ridiculous. I have re-read it once already and plan to refer back to my post-it bookmarks often.

The thing about this book is: you can read stuff like this in a number of places, but when you read it from someone who has had more success than just about anyone else in the field, it tends to have a little bit more weight behind it.

If you are relying on social media conversions and performance for success in your business, or just want to learn some awesome tips, I would definitely pick up a copy of Jab, Jab, Jab, Right Hook today!

After you do, be sure to Tweet @garyvee and let him know what you think using the hashtag #JJJRH!

Facebook is apparently dropping the hammer on improper use of their logo. Take a look at this post post deleted, which is from someone who had her Etsy shop taken down because she was selling custom designed Facebook logos.

I know many of you own Etsy/design shops so I wanted to get this post out quickly so you could re-evaluate your situation. The person referenced above did get a warning email but could not get a hold of anyone in customer service before she got her shops simply removed once and for all.

If you get a warning from Etsy about this, or anything similar, remove ALL content relating to the warning immediately. Do not wait for customer service to clarify. You will get your shop taken down if you ignore these warnings.

For clarification on what you can and cannot do, see the following pages:
• Facebook Logo Usage
• Twitter Logo Usage
• Pinterest Logo Usage
• Google/G+ Logo Usage
• YouTube Logo Usage

I have grabbed the proper icon examples from the pages linked above and put them in an easy to grab set. Download the image below (or print screen then paste in Paint or something) and use the icons as you wish. Just don’t do anything other than re-size and re-order them and you’ll be ok. Also, keep the dimensions at least 32px each.

So yes, all of the icons on my site are non-compliant. I am ok with this because once I get one warning, I will fix them. Also, I am in control of my site, so no one else can shut me down. If you run an Etsy shop or a blog on Blogger, you can be shut down at any time. The reason for this is that those companies are responsible for hosting your site/shop and THEY can be sued by the social media companies for having improper logos published.

I assume any of the networks could shut down your profile if they make the connection between the two, but as of right now, they appear to be only going after people who are directly profiting from the sale of their logo.

Facebook has updated the terms of use for pages!
See the full release here.

What’s changed?
• You no longer have to run giveaways through 3rd party apps. The release directly says: you CAN collect entries for giveaways by having users “like” a post or page.
• You can also now utilize “likes” as a voting mechanism.
• Tags must be used appropriately. You cannot as people to tag themselves in photos they are not actually in.

The big takeaway here (in case you missed it) is that you CAN use a Facebook “like” as a giveaway entry method now!

Now, you might have been doing this stuff already, but it was actually against Facebook’s terms until today. So now, you won’t lose your page when they find out you’re doing it. Yay!