Last week, Facebook launched a new feature that marketeers have wanted for some time; the ability to embed Facebook posts on websites and blogs.
Twitter users have had the ability to embed tweets – learn how here – for over a year so it’s great to see Facebook finally follow suit. Clicking an Embed post link will take you to some lines of code for copying onto your webpage or blog. All Page posts and any public posts from profiles can be embedded.
As with tweets, this new feature will allow you to embed all public statuses, photos and videos with users who will be able to interact directly with the embedded content. So they can can like, comment and share without leaving the page that the post is embedded on.
It’s a much better option than a screen shot, as Facebook members can effectively use part of Facebook but remain on your website. I’ll be giving you some ideas of how to use Facebook embedded posts in a future article. It’s great for Facebook too as conversations can carry on outside of Facebook and ultimately strengthen the site. People who want to interact with posts will sign up thus helping Facebook grow.
Embedded posts dovetail nicely with the recent launch of hashtags – read 5 tips on using Facebook hashtags – as both features encourage convesation which is what social media is all about.
As with all new Faceboook feature ‘launches’ it’s not been widely launched yet, although certain users like Mashable can embed tweets now. Full rollout across the US and Europe is expected by the end of this month.
It will be interesting to see how Facebook Ads will relate to embedded posts. It wouldn’t be a huge surprise to see embedded posts used to display Facebook Ads. Perhaps users will have to click and Ad to reveal a post?
Update as at 22 August: Facebook Embedded Posts are now live for all users. Select the date/time to view post, click on arrow in top right hand corner and then select Embed post.