Ok, here we go!  I’m going to be as honest as possible.

1. There is a grammar error in your cover photo.  “Loves” should be “love.”  You are a group of “people who love” not a “group” of people “who loves.”  Things like these are very, very important if you want to convey professionalism and trust.

2. Website description could be more compelling, more exciting.

3. When you post a “Question of the Day,” like you did on Sunday, use the Facebook Question feature, it is under the “event/milestone” tab.  All the research I have read says that if you make it super easy for people to respond, they are more likely to respond.  It is much quicker to click a radial button than to add a comment.  A poll format will help engage your fans.

4. Delete the entry from May 12, or make it private.  It looks like an error, and makes the page look unprofessional and sloppy.  People do not want to be fans of sloppy pages.

5. Since you are posting pre-launch, it might be kind of fun if you did a weekly post titled “Launch Update” or something, listing your progress.  You could even do this in the “milestone” format on the timeline, this will be a fun way for users to keep up with how things are going pre-launch.  If you use the “milestone,” you can create a mark on the timeline showing everything you’ve done up to launch date.  Kind of a fun thing for you, a fun thing for your fans, and will help beef up the page a lot.

6. Instead of making posts that just say one line, like, “Happy Mother’s Day,” find something really interesting to post related to the day.  Like, link to an article about how they celebrate Mother’s Day differently in another country, or link to a gallery of famous mothers.  You should focus on posting things that people actually want to read, not just posts always about your site and your products.  Engage your users on a personal level before you pitch to them.  Let them know you’re a human over there, too!

7. On Monday you posted that you were butting heads with your programmers, and asked how everyone else’s day was going.  On Mondays, I like to post something silly, like a riddle, or a news article about something odd or interesting that happened over the weekend.  On Mondays, no one wants to be at work, everyone is tired, no one can focus.  Help them take a little break with something fun.

8. Also, on that post, I would have put a poll.  Something like, How is your day going?  A. Typical Monday.  B. Starting off the week right!  Or C. Help!  Just something kind of amusing that will catch people’s eyes and encourage them to share.

Otherwise, great start!!  Hope that helped!

Oh, I completely understand.  We had the CEO doing our Facebook at first, he just went by instinct and it was a complete disaster!  He gave up after two weeks and only 7 likes, which were all family members.

He isn’t a dumb guy, he’s brilliant.  But he was thinking of updating a company page with a very “marketing” attitude instead of a “social” attitude.  All he did was post photos of products.  No one cared.  No one liked us.  And our page looked stupid, sitting out there abandoned eight months prior with 10 posts and 7 likes.

Social marketing has to be approached in a completely different way, and we all need lots of help.  It is like we need social help to be effective social marketers!

Great critique @juliacasey! 

I’m going to add a couple points.  1.  Your About section is empty.  This is prime real estate since it shows up on the front page of your Timeline.  You also do not have anything at all in the larger About section.  I still don’t really understand what I’m saving on.  I need more information about what types of products, how it works and how I’m saving.  

2.  On your landing page, the first sentence is awkward.  ”Join our new and growing community of people connecting, discussing, and saving on amazing products they need”  I think that maybe the capitalization makes it awkward because when I write it there it doesn’t seem as difficult.  But I think the problem comes in the ‘saving on’ part because it doesn’t fit with the other two verbs.  Anyone out there good at copywriting who could help with that?  The other thing that I think doesn’t flow is the part about products they need – it already feels like you are talking about a different group – the “they” excludes the person and makes it feel like you are outside the group.  

Overall, I think it looks really good.  But you asked for brutality  Hope that wasn’t too bad.  Good luck with the launch!!

I didn’t look at any of the technicalities of your page, but my first reaction was, what is this? I think you could be a bit more clear as to what your business is and what you offer. Also, who do you serve? You say people….is it anyone and everyone? You should pick an ideal client and try to use language that speaks directly to them and appeals to their emotions and needs. Everyone wants to save, but that doesn’t compel me to click further. Don’t try to be everything to everyone.

Instead of saying “Free sign up” tell them the benefit of clicking in that box, not that they’ll be entering their email address. For example, what does your newsletter offer, or what does your community do? Saying something like, “join our community” or “start saving today” entices people to click and enter their email address. No one wants to sign up for another newsletter, but people do want to feel like they belong or take action to save money.

Make sense?

Thanks Danette, funny you said that. I do have a cover image that reads exactly as you said, I just didn’t upload it. Now that you said it I will.

Thanks

Very interesting observation @Alexandra. I didn’t thing the people would be distracting…. That landing page did not perform very well so I think a redesign is necessary… thanks

Just a quick update @Alexandra. The link below is the landing page I’m currently testing (starting today). The ad got 17 clicks and 11 sign ups. I’m merging all my sites into one social network (Phruugle).
http://www.facebook.com/downloadrecipebooks