Screw Libyan uprisings, Egyptian democracy, or Charlie Sheen’s crack-fueled #winning (secretly failing) tirades, Facebook is pulling the plug on FBML and that means your Facebook Page could possibly break (at some point in the future)! Here’s what you need to know to survive the tyranny of Facebook!
Your Options
So now that you already know that Facebook is beginning to phase out FBML completely (as we described on Valentine’s day, just to let you know how much Facebook loves you) what options do you have? While you may already know the various options, I thought I’d take the time to spell it out for you.
Learn How to Program
Seriously … go to the bookstore (those that still exist) and pick up a somewhat heavy book on programming. Keep in mind that you’ll want to find a nice mid-sized book as the book store clerk will surely know that a there’s no way in hell you’ll know how to program after reading less then 200 pages and there’s also no way you’ll complete a 1,000 page textbook. Once you get home, spend the next three months pulling out your hair after hours of painful trial and error attempting to get a random javascript animation working within Facebook’s iFrames.
After you’ve learned a little something about programming, spend a few days thinking about how crazy it is that Facebook has successfully managed to get millions of people to build things in iFrames. If you aren’t infuriated after dwelling on a fact which you think is worthy of a PHd dissertation (because you are now in genius territory after months of programming and everything you think is genius), this path would have been well spent.
If you’d prefer not to learn some basic HTML because you’re too busy having a social life, I’d suggest to take one of the next options.
Hire A Programmer
Who needs to become a genius when you can hire them, right? If you don’t already employ a developer in your company, you are either a sole proprietor or your company simply prefers to avoid this “technology” thing all together. No matter what your situation is, hiring an individual developer is always much better than hiring a company because it’s cheaper. Best of all, it takes twice as long (or longer) because nobody in the service industry makes money by getting things done quickly. Find a $75 an hour developer and see how long it takes them to get the job done.
Remember, hiring a developer is only worthwhile if you’re willing to go through the process of writing a specification document which outlines your expectations. Alternatively you can skip the spec document and leave it up to chance.
Hire Another Company
If this is you, I’m not sure why you are still reading this article. There are plenty of people who will take your money at $150 to $300 an hour and tell you everything that I wrote in this article. Reading is for losers. Paying boatloads of cash for work which takes a little bit of computer know-how is much cooler. If you fall into this category, I’d suggest three things: give yourself a pat on the back for being an absolute baller, kick your feet up and enjoy the good life, and stop reading this article.
Use A Page Service Provider
So maybe all the companies won’t cost you hundreds of dollars an hour. There are a number of companies like Wildfire, Involver, and many more who provide tools to Page administrators. While none of them are free, there are some relatively cheap monthly plans available from companies.
Leave Your Page Running as Is
This is the last option. If you already have an FBML page you can keep it running without making any changes for the foreseeable future. Since you have better things to be concerned with you can just let your Facebook Page sit and languish. Go spend time on your blog or somewhere else that you’ll get the most ROI. While this isn’t necessarily the best option, it’s the most likely of options for most page administrators.
What Most People Will Do
Given that most people take the last option, they will probably wait until Facebook completely kills off FBML permanently. At that point they will continue to complain about the changes, not switch their layout, and wait for everything to break. It’s a perfectly legitimate option, but it’s probably not the best one. However if you’re like most businesses, it’s hard to find the time to even change a link on a page let alone reprogram an entire Facebook tab.
If you need to refresh other people within your business what their options are, feel free to share this article with them!
So will we be able to edit existing FBML tabs or not after the switch?
Comment by Jason — March 10, 2011 @ 11:43 am
I don't believe so … they will just continue to operate as is. IF you want to make changes you'll need to switch to iFrames.
Comment by biznickman — March 10, 2011 @ 12:09 pm
I loved your reference to the all-knowing book store clerk.
Comment by @myssmiranda — March 10, 2011 @ 12:31 pm
Despite leveraging the world's largest social media networking property, it is a risk to invest so much development effort on Facebook pages; in my opinion, investment is better spent developing your own website. And as this article points out, it is all subject to the whims of Facebook who love their users so much that they will do these constant changes. In my opinion, going to standards (HTML, JavaScript, iFrame) is better than FBML. I never bothered learning FBML and now I am glad I unknowingly made the right decision.
Comment by David — March 10, 2011 @ 12:38 pm
Do you have any specific books that you recommend?
Comment by BDub — March 10, 2011 @ 12:39 pm
Good Stuff! Made me laugh a few times but realize at the same time I may need some coffee before trying to fix my facebook page. I may just outsource it this time. I have dealt with Iframes before though..so we will see.
Comment by @rewardscards — March 10, 2011 @ 2:40 pm
Eum… If there is a good alternativ to FBML that even makes it easier to use i-frames then FBML, you would use that, right? Well here it is! A free, easy to use, in 1 minute installed iframe app foranybody who wants to put content in their facebookpage. Use it if you like it, leave it if you don`t.
http://www.facebook.com/apps/application.php?id=1...
Hendrik
Comment by Hendrik Maat — March 10, 2011 @ 3:03 pm
You will not be able to add new FBML Tabs – add them before March 11th.
Comment by Keith D Shrock — March 10, 2011 @ 4:00 pm
My understanding is that you will be able to edit your FBML tabs after the switch, you just can't create new FBML tabs. (http://developers.facebook.com/roadmap/). Existing ones will work for the indefinite future. Related to the "Use a Page Service Provider", I'd like to recommend our TabSite Fan Page App. (http://www.tabsite.com) It offers a easy-to-use Content Editor so you don't need to use html and we just rolled out a Fan / Non-Fan option. Test the free version, upgrade to get all the tools.
Comment by @mike_gingerich — March 10, 2011 @ 4:45 pm
@Jason, I can edit mine, but I can't add any new ones.
Comment by sheila — March 10, 2011 @ 7:47 pm
Hi! I am a computer -stupid . I jumped here after hours of desperate research so forgive my stupid -question in case: is there ANY WAY to build , before tomorrow, a FBPage with the same features as many politicians/actors/business pages display?
I mean the BOXES on the top instead the small icons ( they keep calling them Tabs) on the left column below the main image.
If YES please give me a link or a help.
If NOT I have spent my time invane as you say in your article.
Thans for any help and reply.
Beba from Italy
Comment by Beba Botticelli — March 11, 2011 @ 1:58 am
If you are talking "TABS" that go across the top of the wall, the answer is NO. That went away last month. Sorry. All new pages have left hand navigation now.
Comment by @TinyMalone — March 12, 2011 @ 9:22 am
OK – You can relax.
We just released the antidote to iFrame-itis.
Seriously it does allow a non-programmer to build his/her own fan page or micro site and get it into the Facebook iFrame for free (or pay a small fixed fee for us to do it for you).
See brief video here for more http://AngelPages.biz/4Store
Comment by Barry — March 12, 2011 @ 1:34 pm
You're right. Learning to create pages/Facebook elements with universally supported HTML markup, CSS styling and JavaScript scripting instead of learning a Facebook-centric markup system is a horrible idea. Why would you want to invest time and energy into learning how to work with web standards that can be used to manipulate any website and will definitely outlive Facebook itself?
Sorry for the sarcasm, but though this may be a temporary setback for some of you, this is a much better way for Facebook to proceed. Consider how many FBML experts you could read/ask/hire for assistance. Now consider how many HTML+CSS+JavaScript experts that are available to you for that same purpose. Please try to look beyond your own immediate disadvantage and consider the big picture on this matter.
Besides, if FBML is some variation of XML, I think you are going to find that HTML is very similar and that, with the HTML+CSS+JavaScript stack you will only have increased flexibility and control.
Comment by Jason Simanek — March 13, 2011 @ 9:51 am
Wildfire has developed an app which allows you to still use FBML on your pages with their app. If you sign-up now, you have the chance to be grand-fathered into the service to be able to continue to use the app for free even after it turns into a paid model. http://blog.wildfireapp.com/2011/03/07/wildfire-r...
Comment by @AnthonyCerreta — March 14, 2011 @ 2:37 pm
this all about money dammmmmm
i hate this.im not a good programmer.i only well in html that similar with fbml
ermmmmmm i hate this.im really confused actually about iframes
Comment by tuah — March 15, 2011 @ 12:11 am
Yes, the existing FBML pages can be changed
Comment by iyounes — March 15, 2011 @ 11:45 am
Anyone know why we can still add NEW FBML app pages? Has there been a push-out of the cutoff date? I just created a new page for a new client and the option was there, same as it ever was, so I created a couple pages and it worked same as it ever did. What's the story?
Comment by @MyBizPresence — March 27, 2011 @ 2:33 pm
They pushed the date back until this past Tuesday, probably in part due to some iFrames issues.
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