I recently published the following note on my Facebook account to help a few of my “newbie” friends familiarise themselves with the site, and it proved to be quite popular so I figure I might as well share it with the Blogosphere.
Hope it helps…
1. Privacy is Paramount
The very first thing you ALL should have done when you signed up was click on the “privacy” link at the top right of screen and gone through each category of settings. This will allow you to specify who is able to see your profile, what they are able to see when they arrive at your profile etc.
2. Facebook Toolbar
If you are a regular Facebook user like me, then the Facebook Toolbar, if you don’t have it already, will become your new best friend. It gives you quick one-click access to the main areas of the site as well as adding cool pop-up notifications to your screen letting you know immediately when you have:
- received a new message
- been poked
- received a message on your wall
- received comments on your images or notes
- one of your friends changes their status
Here’s the catch: the toolbar is for Firefox 2.0 only. I can’t for the life of me understand why anyone would be using any other kind of browser anyway! The pop-ups are really cool though – a bit like when you receive a new message in Outlook, or a friend logs on when you’re using MSN Messenger.
3. Join a Network
It’s still a little lost on me exactly what the major benefits are of being part of specific network be it a school, workplace or geographical location, but it looks terrible having (No Network) next to your name so why not right?
To “Join a Network” simply click on the little trianlge next to the “Networks” menu item at the top and select “Join a Network”.
To join a school or workplace network, you will need to have an email address designated by that institution. That being said, the geographical network type is most appropriate for most people.
4. Find People You Already Know
The quickest way to find all your friends and other people you know on Facebook is via the “Find Friends” function accessible when you click on the little triangle next to the “Friends” menu option at the top of the screen. Simply select the type of email address you have (Hotmail, Yahoo, Gmail etc) and “virtually” log into your mail account. Facebook will find the people within your address book who already have accounts on Facebook and provide you with an easy one-click way of adding them to your friends list.
This function also provides you with the opportunity to send a Facebook account invite to all those in your address book who do not already have account. My advice is to skip this bit and just send out individual invites later to specific friends if required.
5. Clean up Your Profile Pics
Most people seem to be blissfully unaware that each time you upload a new profile pic, it is added to a library along with all the others you have used previously – a library that is not connected to your “Photos” in any way.
“How do you get to my profile pic library?”, I hear you ask? Simple. Click on your profile pic on your profile page and your library will appear. There’s a bunch of you that will see the same photo repeated 2 or more times. It makes sense to clean up your library by deleting the extraneous repeated images does it not?
By clicking on any of these images you will be presented with a list of options including tagging, deleting and applying as your profile pic.
That’s probably enough for a start. If you have any other tips you’d like to share with anyone, feel free to leave them below in the comments section.
Happy Facebooking!
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