Do I Feel Lucky? Well, Do Ya?

 

With the theme "Lucky" there are several directions I could take with a follow up post on Facebook's launch of Timeline for businesses and branded pages. But, this one immediately came to mind when I realized I wanted to talk about some of the rules and regulations that Facebook has set for the cover images we will all be adding to our Timelines.

Photo Credit

Facebook doesn't set all that many rules, but the ones they do set...they expect you to follow. They have detailed the following rules for the new large photos that will grace the top of each Timeline account. They may not contain:

• Price or purchase information, such as "40% off" or "Download it at our website"
• Contact information, such as web address, email, mailing address or other information intended for your Page's about section
• References to user interface elements, such as Like or Share, or any other Facebook site features
• Calls to action, such as "Get it now" or "Tell your friends"

You might be thinking, oh...they'll never notice. They have millions of pages to monitor, so they're never going to notice that I've got my URL in my image. But, it's the way Facebook deals with infractions that made me think of this particular use of "lucky".

Facebook follows an act now, ask later policy when dealing with infractions. Meaning, if someone reports you, or if Facebook simply stumbles across that URL in your cover photo, they take your page down without any warning. And getting it back up and running isn't as easy as a "sorry, I won't do it again". It can take months of work to get your page back up and running. And who knows how many followers and opportunities you might lose/miss in that amount of time.

So, do you feel lucky? Do ya, punk?