One of the bigger issues with Facebook is that shared links sometimes show the wrong images or even worse sometimes even the wrong website!
Stop! Don't share that link just yet!
The tool to fix this issue is called the Facebook Debugger. This is a Facebook tool that will allow you to see and update sharing information for a page.
How to Fix the Problem (it's very easy!)
Follow this link to open the Facebook Debugger and type in the URL you want to share
Click "Fetch new scrape information".
Wait until the result loads. When it does, you may want to repeat this a couple more times i.e. click the "Fetch new scrape information" 2 or 3 times before it loads the latest information.
Now, next time you share the link in Facebook you should see the correct image and information being presented!
Here's More Technical Information if you are Interested!
1. Check you have Open Graph (og) Tags on the page you are sharing
First of all, we should clarify how Facebook generates these images and links.
When you share a link, Facebook gets the social sharing information it needs from "meta" tags in the code on your webpage. These are called "og" tags (Open Graph tags).
Website systems like WordPress typically have plugins that generate these automatically for you.
If you have a custom coded site then just check with your webmaster that these are included.
If you look at the source code for your web page these tags would typically be in the top section of th HTML and should be easy enough to spot.
For example, on CharlieSmithRealty.com they look like this
<meta property="og:locale" content="en_US" /> <meta property="og:type" content="website" /> <meta property="og:title" content="Charlie Smith Realty Group - Charlie Smith Realty" /> <meta property="og:description" content="Welcome to Charlie Smith Realty; a website that demonstrates the versatile, flexible and mobile-responsive IDX widgets provided by the Buying Buddy IDX/CRM suite. On each page you will see examples of how the MBB widgets can be used for search, display and lead capture. Most pages show the widget coding in YELLOW at..." /> <meta property="og:url" content="https://charliesmithrealty.com/" /> <meta property="og:site_name" content="Charlie Smith Realty" />
If you don't have any og tags then when you enter the page in the Facebook debugger you will see the following types of warnings:
If an og:image is not explicitly specified then one will be inferred by Facebook. So, where possible you should specify an image to be used.
2. Force Facebook to Re-scrape your URL
Once all the tags are set, you can then force Facebook to clear its cache of old saved or inferred data, and use your current og tag settings.
To do this open the Facebook Debugger and type in your URL and click "Fetch new scrape information".
When the result loads, you can check that all is as expected
Sometimes you may need to tell Facebook to "Fetch new scrape information" 2 or 3 times before it loads the latest information.
Now, next time you share the link in Facebook you should see the correct image and information being presented!