Truth, as they say, is stranger than fiction. Facebook has produced an app that will automatically send Facebook Page updates to Twitter, allowing businesses, organizations, bands — anyone with a Facebook Page — to have posts automatically generate a tweet to their Twitter followers. The details were posted on the Facebook blog by Michael Gummelt — the summer intern who developed this app.
If you administer a Facebook Page, you can set up Twitter updates by visiting http://www.facebook.com/twitter/. You’ll be asked to configure what kinds of new posts will trigger Twitter updates.
Note that this new feature doesn’t apply to Facebook user pages. So, for example, I can’t automatically send Twitter updates for new posts to my personal Facebook wall, but the BigBlueBall Facebook page can.
The fact that Facebook is announcing this feature is interesting, since many of the features they’ve been implementing are designed to compete head-on with Twitter.
Good for pages I suppose. I tend to use a Facebook status a little differently than a Tweet anyway. So for me, even if it did work for user pages, I probably wouldn’t find it all that helpful. But it could save those businesses/groups trying to establish a web presence a little time.
Seems like Facebook is trying to elbow their way into Twitter’s market. From a business-branding standpoint, it makes sense. If I want to promote my business by Twitter, I probably also will want to have a Facebook page. If I can simplify the process by posting updates once, then all the better.