An Exciting Opportunity for Your Facebook Author Page

A guest post from Jebraun Clifford.

Facebook just made it easier to create visually engaging content on your author page with a new feature: a video instead of a static image for your cover picture. You could play a book trailer. A very short interview. A montage of all your book covers. You’ve got 20–90 seconds to grab your visitors’ attention, and the possibilities are endless.

I made a video on http://lumen5.com. 

The process is simple, even if you’re not a superstar with technology. I played around for an hour or two and ended up with a 38 second video that I feel represents my brand well. The website is very self-explanatory and coaches you through each step.

Here’s how you do it:

1. Collect images. 

These can be stock photos (I like stocksnap.io for a good, free selection), or use your own photos. This website also suggests photos to go with your text, though—lookout!—there were some dodgy photos! I recommend including a recent head shot and certainly pictures of your book covers if you’re published. Each image runs for about 4 seconds in a slide-show format.

2. Figure out what words you want your video to say. 

I briefly described what genre I write and then organised the images to go with my chosen text. Don’t try to squeeze too many words on each picture as your visitors will only have 4 seconds to read each frame. Other ideas include brief testimonials or endorsements, a blurb of a chosen book broken down into several sentences (you could do one trailer for each book you’ve written if you’re so inclined and rotate them through!), or your tagline which I also included at the very end of my video.

3. Upload your images onto the website.

Then drag and drop them in the order you want. It’s easy to switch them around until you’re happy with the placement. Keep in mind that your Facebook cover photo area will only show two thirds of your video (top, middle or bottom two thirds since you can shift the video up or down to place it), so make sure the important parts of the images are in a consistent location.

4. Type in the correct text to go with each image. 

Choose ‘title’ ‘text’ or ‘quote’ to format the text (though there’s only one font), and decide the placement of all your words. There’s a grid for upper left, upper middle, upper right, middle left, etc. for you to put your text in. Here’s where I messed up: because only 2/3 of the video fit on my Facebook cover photo area, I had to go back and switch my text to show at the top of the photos so it was all visible. I actually ended up making four videos, changing the word placement here and there, until I was satisfied with how it looked on Facebook. You can also have your text in different colours (including custom colours!), so play around and have fun with it.

5. Choose your music. 

There’s a melody for almost any mood or style you can imagine!

6. Preview. 

Make sure the music fits with your pictures. I even added an extra photo to take advantage of the music’s timing for some extra punch.

7. Publish your video. 

Wait for them to email it to you (it can take up to an hour), then upload it onto your Facebook page.

8. Admire your awesome looking Facebook page!

What are you going to put on your video?

About Jebraun Clifford

Growing up, Jebraun Clifford always wanted to step through a door into an imaginary kingdom, so it's no surprise she now calls Middle Earth home. Too short to be an elf and too tall to be a Hobbit, she lives in the centre of New Zealand where she and her preacher husband planted a church over a decade ago. She has three children, a crazy Jack Russell named Bree, and Gidget, a tortoiseshell kitten. She studied English Literature at Cal Poly San Luis Obispo, and the Central Coast of California is still one of her favourite places ever.

You can find out more about Jeb at her website, or on Facebook:

www.jebraunclifford.com

Jebraun Clifford on Facebook