Facebook Vanity URL's

[Amadeus]

Facebook Vanity URL's for Musicians

Here’s something important for any musician and/or Facebook user to consider. Up until last year, in order to get a vanity URL on Facebook you had to have at least 1000 friends (or fans for an artist page). This has since changed and now all you need is 25 users. This is still a little known secret to the general public, kind of like domain names before the domain name rush. The greater population doesn’t seem to ‘get it’ yet, which is good new for you. Vanity URL’s are available on a first come first served basis however so if you miss securing your extension of choice then you will have missed the boat permanently. Also important, these Vanity URL’s are not transferable!

So, what is a vanity URL?
Previously your address on Facebook would have looked something like this: www .facebook .com / username / useridcode
With a vanity URL however you can have www .facebook.com / yourusername

Why should you bother securing your vanity URL?
This is important if you are a musician interested in protecting your artist name. Although Facebook is not a musicians network it is an important marketing tool for any artist. Given the sheer size, popularity and effectiveness of this network vanity URL’s offer an excellent opportunity to protect and promote your brand name. Facebook is a great place to update friends and non musicians when you have posted a new track or have success with a release. Ask people to ‘like’ your comments too and then their circle of friends will be exposed to your post. Something to consider.

How to secure your Facebook Vanity URL
In order to have a Facebook Page for your music you need to have a regular Facebook id. So if you haven’t got one already, then crawl out from the rock you’ve been hiding under for the past couple of years and get started!

The procedure for getting a vanity URL for your regular id and your artists Facebook Page is the same. Let’s look at the artist page route first.

1) Log in to your account
2) Go to the following link: Create a Facebook Page
3) Click Artist, Band or Public Figure and enter your chosen name. Be very careful that you put in the correct name here, you cannot change these names in the future. You can have any number of pages associated with your Facebook id but to create vanity URL’s each will need 25 fans.
4) Set up the basic page information then ‘Publish’ the page to make it go live.
5) As a member of the mp3unsigned community you are welcome to post a link on our wall at www .facebook/mp3unsigned looking for ‘fans‘ to sign up on your page. Also, send a message to the friends on your regular Facebook page asking them to become fans too.
6) Once you achieve 25 fans on your page you can set your Vanity URL. To do so, click the following link: Facebook Vanity URL and click on “set a username for your pages”
7) You have now secured your artist name on the largest social network on the planet.

You should also do this for your regular Facebook id, at this stage you will be lucky to secure your exact name given that there are 350,000,000 users (and counting).
Be very careful when setting your main id, you only get one shot so try to use something that will last the test of time. The rule of thumb for user id's and page id's is to secure something as close to the name as possible. If your name is gone then you could try qualifying it with your location eg 'facebook. com/joebloggslondon' but you should also consider what impact this could have if you move in the future. Put some thought into it!

I hope the above helps. Once you set up your artists page please become a fan of us at facebook.com/mp3unsigned

Admin

[Fluid Breaks]

Thanks Amadeus

I actually did this a while ago, without realising what I was doing. I can't remember how I did it now, but I think I got the option (maybe I had/have 1000 friends)

facebook.com/TheChenko

[CherylGuy]

Thanks for sharing the informative article. Keep doing it.