Yesterday Facebook announced via the developer forum that Facebook Pages now need to be authenticated in order to have landing tabs. WTF, what the hell is this? This basically means any new visitor to your Facebook Page will not be able to land on a custom tab unless you have greater than 10,000 fans or the Page administrator has worked with an ads account representative.  I don’t know how many of you have tried to get a hold of anyone at Facebook but it’s impossible. Why would they do this to us?  This is going to kill small businesses. Hasn’t Facebook been telling small businesses to come to Facebook to promote their business?  Welp, looks like they are screwed now.

This is a massive blow to Page owners who were looking to build their fan base organically on their own. I have found that landing tabs is critical in converting new visitors into fans and prospective customers. Here’s what was posted on the developer forum earlier today:

Hello all,

We apologize for not messaging this earlier. Facebook recently made a change requiring that Pages be authenticated before enabling the ability to set a landing tab beyond Wall or Info. To be eligible for authentication, a Page must have greater than 10k fans or the Page admin must work with their ads account manager. If you are already working with an account representative, please contact that representative to begin the authentication process. If you do not work with an account representative, you can use this contact form to inquire about working with an account representative.

Also, for advertisers who don’t have a representative or 10k fans, and want to run ads and land users on a specific tab, you can still do so with standard Facebook ads by making their Destination URL as the URL incl. your tab. Unfortunately, this currently will not work with “Fan” ads.

Thanks,
Matt Trainer

WTF? Is all Facebook is concerned about is getting more money.  This move is going to kill them and kill Facebook Fan Pages.  I hate this and am starting to HATE Facebook.  I think someone should start a company that says something and sticks with it.  Facebook, we are sick of your shit.  I don’t know if I told anyone but we started a Facebook fan page 4 years ago called facebook.com/ilovemyfamily  We had over 3 million fans.  Facebook stole it from us and killed the page.  It took us months to finally get an answer from them.  Their answer was “it was to general” that’s all they said. WTF…  We spend thousands of dollars on pages and had them taken away.  Facebook needs to get their act together or people will rebel and shut them down.  It’s US who helps Facebook grow, it’s US that keeps you in business.  Don’t bite the hand that feeds you.