We’ve been getting lots of calls recently from people whose Facebook profile has been “broken and needs fixed quickly”.
Welcome to TIMELINE, Facebook’s new layout for your profile. A number of you have voluntarily switched over already. But for the many of you who haven’t made the switch yet, Facebook is in the process of making that change for you… regardless of whether you want it.
This forced migration has been staggered, and every day more accounts are being switched over to timeline. So if you log into Facebook and your profile suddenly looks different – and a whole lot worse – there is no need to panic!
Instead, you just need to update your cover picture. Before you had a small profile picture that was displayed in the top left of your profile. Timeline still uses this profile image, but it now has another crucial image that you must update: your cover image.
The cover image stretches across your entire profile and is displayed up at the top, above everything else. It is the new visual focal point of your profile and the lack of a cover image is why the majority of our recent callers feel that their profile is broken.
The solution is extremely easy.
- First, decide on what image you would like to use for your profile cover. The image is much wider than it is tall, so be sure to take that into consideration when you are selecting the image that you want to use. The image should be a JPG file that’s 851 pixels wide and 315 pixels tall. So the best results come from images that were specially created, photographed, or cropped for these dimensions.
- Once you have the image ready, log into Facebook and go to your Facebook profile. From there hover your mouse over your (missing) cover image at the top of your profile and click Add a Cover. Then select the photo that you wish to upload. Once it has been uploaded you can reposition it by clicking on the image and dragging it up or down. Then click Save and you are done!
One final note: PREPARE! If you still have the old profile layout, you won’t have it forever. Your profile will be switched to timeline – it may be today, tomorrow, or next month – so get ahead of the change. Create your cover image, log into Facebook, and switch your profile over manually. This will ensure that your profile will always remain looking good and you will avoid needing to scramble for a cover picture at an inconvenient time.
