The new Timeline for business pages went active on Friday for most Facebook business pages. This change is a pretty radical departure from what was available before, and at first I was inclined to hate it.

But, since Facebook looks like it is going to become the “Borg” (of StarTrek fame), the quote “resistance is futile” led me to find a way to like it. Once I started digging in to the changes, I found that there is a lot to like, not the least of which is the Cover Photo feature. Facebook gives us a huge picture space to tell a story to our fans. The space is 851 x 315 pixels. That covers the entire width of the fan page and is tall enough to really convey a lot of information. But, Facebook giveth and Facebook taketh away…you can’t use the space to overtly market! No calls to action, no links, no “Like my page” … all of which seemed like a natural way to use all of that space.

Determined to find a way to use this valuable space in a way that would not violate the Facebook Terms of Service, I went on the hunt. I found a lot of resources that would help you create a Timeline photo, but none that offered a marketing slant…until I found PicScatter.

At first glance I thought “so what?” But, then when I saw that I could take a photo album and use it to create a collage, the light went on. If you have a listing that you want to put on Facebook hopefully you will have uploaded a ton of pictures for it. Why not use PicScatter to create a collage for that page. Here is an example of what I mean: http://www.facebook.com/3058LiveOakCourt. I used PicScatter to create the cover image from the photos in the album on that page..

The free version uses your Facebook account to login and will allow you to take photos from your personal account, your Facebook Friends or your Likes. For less than $5.00 you can have the pro version which will allow you to remove the branding from the picture that it creates, add your own branding and also to grab pictures from any Facebook fan page! There are 8 different effects that you can apply, you can change the pictures by clicking on them or you can shuffle the whole mess and you can move the pictures around to get just the right look.

I am pretty impressed with this little tool and maybe you will be too!

If you are interested in learning how to use the new Facebook Timeline in your business, there are still a few seats left for my Facebook Timeline class on April 4th. Go here for info and for the registration form: https://www.facebook.com/events/357857867590964/