How to Create a Tab on a Facebook Page

Adding a custom tab to your Facebook Page lets you turn it from a simple social profile into a powerful mini-website for your brand. This guide will walk you through exactly how to set up custom tabs, manage them, and use them to showcase your content, capture leads, and connect with your audience in new ways.

What Exactly Are Facebook Page Tabs (And Why Bother)?

Facebook tabs are the navigation links you see on a business Page, typically located on the left-hand menu or just below your cover photo. By default, you'll see standards like Home, About, Photos, Videos, and Reviews. But the real potential comes from adding custom tabs.

Think of a custom tab as an iFrame - a window into another website that lives directly on your Facebook Page. It allows you to embed external content like:

• Your YouTube channel or a specific playlist
• A welcome video or an "About Us" page
• A lead capture form for your email newsletter
• An entry form for a contest or giveaway
• A portfolio of your latest work
• Your online store or a featured products page
• A booking calendar for appointments

Essentially, they let you hold your audience's attention without forcing them to leave Facebook to take the next step. By reducing friction, you make it much easier for a casual fan to become a subscriber, lead, or customer.

The Modern Way to Add Custom Facebook Tabs

A few years ago, you could add custom tabs using Facebook's own "Static HTML" app. That functionality has since been retired, and the process has shifted almost entirely to third-party applications. This might sound complicated, but it's actually become much easier and more powerful.

Here’s the basic idea: You use an external service to build the content for your tab, and then that service provides a simple one-click way to install it onto your Facebook Page. You don’t need to know any code. Your job is to create the content you want to display, and the app's job is to handle the connection to Facebook.

The best part is that many of these services offer generous free plans that are perfect for getting started.

Your Step-by-Step Guide to Creating a Custom Tab

We'll walk through the process using a generic example, as the steps are very similar across most popular third-party tools. No matter which platform you choose, the core workflow remains the same.

Step 1: Choose Your Third-Party App

Your first step is to pick a tool that fits your goal. There are hundreds of options, but they generally fall into two categories: specialized apps for specific functions or general-purpose apps for embedding custom content.

A few popular and reliable choices to look into are:

• Woobox: A great all-in-one option that excels at creating contests, giveaways, quizzes, and coupons. It has a powerful free plan for managing a single tab.
• ShortStack: Similar to Woobox, ShortStack is built for running campaigns like photo contests and landing page promotions. It’s a bit more advanced and a favorite among agencies.
• Heyo: Another user-friendly platform focused on creating mobile-optimized campaign pages that can be easily embedded as Facebook tabs.
• Static HTML Apps: A spiritual successor to the old Facebook app. This type of tool gives you a blank canvas to either paste in a custom HTML code snippet or simply embed a URL. It’s perfect if you just want to display an existing webpage, like a sign-up form or a contact page, inside a tab.

For this tutorial, let’s assume you want to add a simple tab that showcases your YouTube channel. A tool like a Static HTML app or Woobox’s HTML tab feature would be perfect.

Step 2: Sign Up and Connect Your Facebook Page

Once you’ve picked your app, you'll need to create an account. During the setup process, the app will ask for permission to connect to your Facebook account. This is a standard and safe procedure.

You’ll be presented with a Facebook permissions pop-up. It's important that you:

1. Are logged into the correct Facebook profile - the one that has Admin or Editor access to the business Page you want to modify.
2. Grant the app the necessary permissions. It will usually ask for permission to view your profile and manage your Pages. This is what allows the tool to add the tab for you. Apps cannot post content on your behalf unless you explicitly grant them that permission separately.

After you approve the permissions, you’ll be redirected back to the app’s dashboard.

Step 3: Build Your Tab Content

This is where the magic happens. Inside your chosen tool's dashboard, you’ll find a content editor. What you see here will depend on the app's specialty.

• For a contest app like Woobox: You'll see fields to add a title, description, contest rules, images, and set up the entry form.
• For a general HTML app: You will typically see a simple box where you can paste a URL or HTML code. This method is incredibly versatile.

Let's continue with our YouTube channel example. The simplest way to do this is to embed the URL of an existing webpage. Your job is to create the content you want to display, and the app's job is to handle the connection to Facebook.

How to Embed a URL:

1. Navigate to the page you want to show in your tab. This could be your YouTube channel page, a specific video, a Google Form, a Calendly booking link, or a landing page from your website. Important: The URL must be secure (starting with https://), or Facebook won't display it.
2. Copy the full URL from your browser's address bar.
3. Go back to your third-party app’s editor and look for a field labeled "URL" or "Website." Paste your link there.
4. Save your changes within the app.

Step 4: Install the Tab on Your Facebook Page

With your content ready, the final installation is usually just a button click away. Inside your third-party app’s dashboard, look for an option like “Install Tab,” “Add Page Tab,” or “Publish.”

A pop-up will appear from Facebook asking you to select two things:

1. Facebook Pages: A dropdown menu will list all the business Pages you manage. Choose the Page where you want to add the new tab.
2. Confirm: Click the "Add Page Tab" button.

That's it! The app will confirm that the tab has been successfully installed. Now you can head over to your Facebook Page to see it in action.

Managing and Optimizing Your New Tab

Your new tab is now live, but it may have a generic name and be buried at the bottom of your tab list. A little housekeeping will make it far more effective.

To manage your tabs, go to your Facebook Page and follow these steps:

1. Click on Settings in the left-hand menu.
2. In the Page Settings menu, click on Templates and Tabs.
3. Scroll down to the "Tabs" section. Here you will see a list of all your current tabs, including the new one you just added.

How to Rename Your Tab

By default, your new tab will probably be named after the third-party app you used (e.g., "Welcome" or "Woobox"). To make it more descriptive:

1. Find your new tab in the list and click the Settings button next to it.
2. A pop-up will appear where you can enter a new custom tab name. Click "Edit Settings."
3. Give it a clear, compelling name like "Watch Our Videos," "Sign Up Here," or "Book a Call."
4. Click Save and then OK.

How to Reorder Your Tabs

Your tabs appear in a specific order on your page. You absolutely want to move your most important custom tabs closer to the top for better visibility.

In the same Templates and Tabs settings menu, simply click and drag the tab you want to move. The six-dot icon next to each tab name is the handle for dragging. Place it right below "Home" or "About" to make it highly visible to visitors.

Finding Your Tab's Direct URL

Every tab on your page has its own unique web address. This is incredibly useful for driving traffic directly to your new content. You can drop this link in an email, a tweet, or a separate Facebook post announcing your new feature.

To find the link:

1. Go back to your main Facebook Page view.
2. Click on your new, fancily-renamed tab in the left-hand menu.
3. Once the tab's content loads, copy the complete URL from your browser's address bar.

That's the permanent link you can share anywhere.

Creative Ideas for Fueling Your Marketing with Custom Tabs

Need some inspiration? Here are a few practical ways you can use tabs to accomplish specific marketing goals.

• Build Your Email List: Embed a simple sign-up form from your email provider (like Mailchimp or ConvertKit). Create a tab called "Get Free Updates" and use the space to offer an incentive, like a free download or a discount code, to encourage sign-ups.
• Showcase Video Content: Create a "Watch Now" tab and link it directly to your brand's YouTube or Vimeo channel. It keeps users engaged on your page instead of sending them away to another platform.
• Generate Leads: Use a tool like Google Forms to create a "Request a Quote" or "Free Consultation" form. Embed it into a tab so potential clients can get in touch with you without leaving Facebook.
• Run Engaging Contests: Use a dedicated app to create a giveaway tab. Promote it with posts, directing people to enter via the tab. This is a classic tactic for boosting page engagement and reach.
• Drive Sales: For e-commerce brands, create a "Shop Our Best-Sellers" tab that links directly to a curated product category on your website. Use strong visuals and a clear call to action to entice clicks.

Final Thoughts

Setting up custom Facebook tabs is a straightforward process that lets you seriously level up what your Page can do. By using third-party apps, you can easily embed content that engages your audience, captures leads, and drives traffic - all without needing to write a single line of code. It's a small change that can make your Facebook presence much more valuable.

While perfecting tiny details like a Page tab can really sharpen your social strategy, we know the real bottleneck is often the day-to-day grind of content creation, scheduling, and community management. We built Postbase to streamline all that chaos - letting you visually plan your entire calendar, post to every platform at once, and answer all your DMs from a single inbox. It’s what we wished for when we were wrestling with a dozen different browser tabs just to keep up.