Timeline has launched!  Confused yet?  That’s okay!  We’re here to help.

Timeline is Facebook’s new layout for brand pages.  It offers what is basically an interactive history of Orlando City.  It’s a great way to look back at our humble beginnings and track the steps on our journey to becoming the next MLS expansion club.

The way you interact with Timeline is a little different that the old Facebook layout.  Near the top of the page (after all of the headers, etc.) you’ll see the Friends box.  This shows how many of your friends also “Like” our page.  It’ll also show a recent post where one of your friends has tagged Orlando City in a post.  Below that is a quick summary of all the recent posts other fans have made.

This does not mean your posts on our wall are gone!  They are still posted, you just need to click the “See All” button to see more fan posts.

The focus of this new design (as best as I understand Facebook’s logic) is increased interactivity with the brand’s posts.  Every time you comment on our post, it creates a “story” on your own News feed.  This gets broadcast to all of your friends, including those that haven’t “Liked” our page.  The same goes when you tag us in a post on your wall, or in a picture.  Every interaction helps spread the word of Orlando City.  Spreading the word is exactly what Commissioner Garber tasked our supporters with, and this new design is one of the easiest ways to do that.

Because of the way posts are organized now, you’ll see less frequent, but more meaningful posts by us.  This is to avoid cluttering your News Feed with constant information.  This will allow for more meaningful interactions with our posts, as well as give more people the chance to see our info.  Our frequent posts will instead move to Twitter, and actually allow us to increase or tweeting frequency!  Be sure to follow along at @OrlandoCitySC.

How to Tag:

We’ve discussed tagging before, but realize that not everyone how to do it.  Here’s a quick run-down.

1.  Either on your wall, or someone else’s wall, start by typing the “@” symbol.
2.  Type the first few letters of “Orlando City Soccer Club”, and it should pop up in the options automatically.
3. Select our page from the menu, and then continue with your message.

Sometimes the tagging system gets wonky, so don’t worry if it doesn’t work.  It just happens.  Try again later, and it’ll probably be fine.