Facebook usage has continued to grow around the world as more and more people flock to the popular social networking site. Look at this year’s statistics of the top 5 countries with the highest number of users:

Above image and stats via NickBurcher.com

If you or someone you know is not yet on Facebook, that will likely change soon. People of all age groups have signed up and began their social networking activities with friends, family and the many where-are-they-now folks from the past.

The reconnection of old classmates and neighborhood buddies is one of the most attractive features of Facebook and for this reason alone, you will want to have a nice looking profile.

Below, I have listed 13 Facebook tips to help you get started with the continued expansion. Now on to the list.

First things first - Once you’ve signed up, get rid of that newbie avatar. You are on Facebook with no face? Find and upload a nice image of yourself. You don’t want your profile to look like it was just created 10 minutes ago (even if it was). Use a passport style photo showing your smiling face. No need for glamour shots here, it is what it is.

Make some friends – Now that you’re on Facebook it is time to make some friends. Find someone you know who is already on FB, they can recommend others that you likely know. Otherwise, making friends is just like in real life, find someone with similar interests and you have a new friend.

Invite the family - Facebook is a great way to stay in touch with family members, many of which may physically live great distances away. Invite them to join you and build your family connections. Eh, better leave Uncle Harry out of it.

Be polite at all times - Online etiquette is something to adhere to always. You never want to be seen as being anything less than nice and polite. There will be times when your friendship will be requested by total strangers. You have no obligation to befriend everyone that happens along and it’s okay to decline if you so desire. Keep in mind however, that everything on FB is reciprocal, so give the decision some thought. This is a “social” network.

Write on your friends’ wall – Once you have connected and made friends, be sociable and write a message on their wall occasionally. Don’t forget about that long-lost friend you just reestablished contact with. Writing on their wall exposes you to all of their friends and helps to build your online brand. This will likely lead to more friends and the expansion of your personal network.

Be aware that the wall content is visible to all friends, so save the personal info for Facebook’s messaging system.

Send Messages – Clicking on the photo of any of your friends will take you to their “Wall”.  Just beneath their photo you will see the option to send them a message. This is where you can carry on a more private conversation. Unlike the wall post, the message you send can only be viewed by the recipient.

Adjust your privacy settings – From any page at the top toward the right side, you will see the “Settings” link. Hover your mouse over it and click the “Privacy” link and then select one of the other options like “Profile” for instance. The drop down menus will allow you to configure your settings as you please. Remember to hit the “Save Changes” button near the bottom.

Notifications - These notifications can be found at the bottom right of your Facebook application and they represent actions that have occurred on Facebook that have somehow involved you as a user. Facebook keeps a log of all actions, making it easy to see a time line of what and when something occurred.

Adjust your News Feed and Wall settings – returning to “Settings” and “Privacy”, you can then select “News Feed and Wall”. Check or uncheck the appropriate box to configure as desired.

Make some lists - Friends list on Facebook can be very handy and may be used in a variety of ways. Once created you can easily adjust the profile and privacy settings for the entire list. Now we’re talking people here, so don’t get carried away with “labeling”, as this is strictly meant to be a management tool to help you stay organized. You can have a list for school friends, club members or whatever. Once you populate the list, you adjust the settings and everyone within the list sees your profile exactly the same. Create your list from the “Friends” page.

Relax and have fun - If you are relatively new to Facebook, don’t worry about learning everything at once. Facebook is loaded with all sorts of features and it will take a considerable amount of time to become highly proficient with the entire package. While easy to use, to completely cover every aspect of Facebook would likely cover about 300 pages of data. So take your time and get a feel for this powerful social networking site.

Got games? – If gaming is your thing, Facebook is loaded with many popular ones. Mafia Wars, Scrabble, and about 2000 other game applications are available. WARNING! Many of these are quite addictive and are tremendous killers of time. If you’ve got something to do, you may want to accomplish that task first.

Beware of scammers and fraudsters - Like everything else on the internet, there are those who seek to take advantage of others by running shady dealings and out and out scams. You should apply the same level of caution that you would apply anywhere else in cyberspace. For instance, don’t open links contained in messages posted to your wall, or email received from people you don’t know.

You should enjoy the Facebook networking experience and the opportunity to share and learn.

Bonus tip – I recommend that you spend some time learning how to adjust your privacy and profile settings so that you are aware of how others actually see you. Go to Settings > Privacy> Profile and you’ll see a screen like this.

Notice the “See how a friend sees your profile:” text near the top and the box next to it that reads “Start typing a friend’s name”. Enter the first few letters of a friend’s name, then click on your selection. This will allow you to view your own profile as they will see it.

Showing too much or too little information? Go back and adjust accordingly.

In closing, I will reiterate the fact that Facebook is much like taking a course. There are so many things to learn as you use the application, but don’t panic or worry. Take your time and enjoy the experience. Once you’re on Facebook, you’ll be involved for years to come.

Oh, and one last thing. I have spoken to many Doctors and Specialist, all of which have agreed. There’s no cure for the Facebook bug, once bitten, you’ll be a Facebooker for a long, long time.  

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