Clarity Strategic^TM

This is reprinted from a question I answered recently on LinkedIn. Although my experience in this area is pretty small compared to others, I've done a few Fan Pages, and here's what I've learned:

• In general, when we talk about creating a Fan Page on Facebook, what we are really talking about is creating a custom landing tab for that Fan Page. This is done with Static FBML, which is remarkably similar to HTML, and can be used with or without stylesheets, and the stylesheets can be inline or remotely hosted.
• Fan Page design became a big deal for Web designers not all that long ago, and we just didn't think about ownership of the gate like we should've. We designers made OURSELVES the Creators of the pages we made. That's a mistake. If we are Admins but not Creators, our clients can remove us - if they want to - when the business relationship ends. But if we are Creators we have greater authority and cannot be removed, though WE can remove other Admins and members. We hold our clients hostage, effectively. BUT. It IS possible to change the Creator of a Fan Page. You have to get Facebook involved in the procedure, so it takes a couple days, and it will be less smooth (if not impossible) if the original Creator is not involved. If by chance your designer is Creator of the Page, start now on getting that changed.
• On design changes: apart from some Facebook-specific tags used for embedding videos and Like buttons and so forth, which are well-documented, The custom Fan Page tab is a Web Page, and you don't even HAVE to use CSS. You can position stuff with tables and do other things that nobody does on the Web at large any more. What we are talking about is technology that any Web designer already knows. Guys like Mike have more experience and do it better, but the fact is that lots of people can do this, including lots of people who don't know they can. Yet. That does a lot to overcome the shifting Facebook priorities.
• The real tricks are in the graphic design. There you want somebody good. Better than me, at least. LOL

But I'm showing here a few simple ones I've done, so you can see it's doable:

• Partners on the Planet
• the Devotional Chef
• No Such Thing as a Bully
• MARA Foundation

I might also mention that the image above is not itself a Fan Page, but a "Box," which uses the same techniques. Facebook affords you the choice of positioning custom parts of your Fan Page as Tabs (each like a page of its own) or Boxes (each sectioned off into a smaller area of your Fan Page's Wall, for instance). We could talk about this all day. LOL