Facebook's new functions

Doug Akin
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Social Media Posted on May 17, 2010

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A new form of social currency is on the rise
Facebook is moving toward a currency system through its upcoming App2User platform that will allow brands to sync their loyalty and rewards systems to offer users Facebook Credits. Since August, Facebook Credits has been in beta testing, allowing users to make in-game purchases and more. However, the platform will deepen by aligning with brands' loyalty and rewards programs and allowing users to redeem their rewards for Facebook Credits. We've heard buzz words such as social CRM and loyalty 2.0 thrown around, but this truly merges the old-school loyalty world with the new-school social world.

So what does this mean for marketers? It would allow consumers to redeem their loyalty points for virtual currency, and would likely be a much cheaper redemption for the retailer versus having to stock inventory and fulfill physical rewards. In-game advertising has received backlash because many brands have seen a surge in unqualified leads. However, the recent news around Facebook Credits and App2User allows for a more sound solution for marketers. So if you're an avid Target shopper but prefer to spend your rewards on guilty pleasures such as Farmville items, now is your chance.

Making your website more "likable"
As many of you have heard, Facebook has truly scaled its platform and opened up a world of socialization outside of the Facebook walls. Currently tens of thousands of companies are integrating the expanded "like" features on their websites. From Pandora to Yelp to CNN to BuzzFeed, their web content is now becoming highly social in nature. I first became intrigued by this concept of social news when I noticed what dozens of my friends were reading on HuffingtonPost.com by connecting via Facebook Connect.

Facebook's "like" functionality opens a much deeper world than purely seeing what everyone is reading. It will likely play a huge role in influencing shopping behaviors among web purchasers.

Imagine having your circulars (yeah, I just said that) or catalogs brought fully to the digital space and infusing "like" functionality across all of them to create social conversation and trending, and also seek out the most popular items among your peers. Around the holiday season, retailers could truly leverage this functionality and hopefully rid the world of crappy holiday gifts. While something tells me that Grandma might still knit a cat sweater, they would probably be super popular these days in the Facebook space.

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seyi akinde May 28, 2010 at 5:04 PM

their is more mileage for brand when you chose to advertise using facebook, in Nigeria we are leading in the four front to educate brands on the value they will get ,while leveraging facebook.

in Nigerian consumer behavior are changing to advertising , the consumer are getting more sophisticated and want a better platform to engage them this make facebook a solution to the problem .

we are encouraging brand in Nigeria
Seyi Akinde
MD/CEO
TSS Marketing Company Ltd
lagos,Nigeria
tss.marketing@yahoo.com
07057627955

Doug Akin May 18, 2010 at 3:12 PM

Lonny - interesting point, people are inclined to be more trigger happy with a keyboard than they would be in real life with regard to promoting something. If you look at sites like Glue.com its all about liking a ton of items across a range of categories. Ultimately, I think we could start to see people get "Like Happy" and carelessly start liking everything they have a mild interest in just bcs the button is there.

What becomes of the data and patterns will be determined. For now privacy seems to be the surging topic and potential data abuse. The likelihood is that people will approach the 'like' functionality with caution due to all the privacy madness.

Doug Akin May 18, 2010 at 3:08 PM

Peter: well worth exploring. i definetly see the need for more brand marketers to embrace a 'Reviews' tab on their FB Pages, and encourage user reviews. This could even extend to a Dr. who encourages his patients to post reviews on his page. With regard to Yelp, Citysearch and the likes being crushed by FB reviews, i think it would take considerable time.

Yelp has a strong and pretty loyal user base, + they have their coveted Super Reviewers. Similar to an eBay power seller. It will be tough for those core reviewers to jump ship to FB anytime soon.

Right now, Facebook seems to be going a similar path with their Community Pages, but any strong review functionality is still early stage. In the near term the power of the like button is being integrated into Yelp and its much more of a casual click vs writing a full review.

Peter Anthony Gales May 18, 2010 at 10:40 AM

Important considerations for all brand marketers and web entrepreneurs. The scope and scale of the power FB is accumulating makes Google seem small by comparison.

Am curious to know how you see the future of review sites like Yelp, TripAdvisor and Zagat reviews?

Specifically, do you see FB replacing them? Seems with the ability for users to "like" any page on the web, they will also have the ability to accumulate, sort and filter that information in ways that could make current review sites irrelevant?

What would they need to do to stay relevant and add value?

Lonny Dunn May 17, 2010 at 6:18 PM

I like this piece. Social Networking and Social Media are about consensus in concentric circles and the areas where those circles overlap is your middle ground, your keywords, your concepts and ideas which reach across arcania of ideas to find the audience. When Facebook Introduced the like feature, it realized it would be spinning this off into the ether across a blogger or article writers piece or onto our desktop thru multiple channels.

But is FB really finding patterns, rythyms, and sociological data about real people? Or the online identity they have created for themselves? Is some aspect of our lives moving over into the realm of fantasy along with the "like" button? Do we even really like what we just read? or are we just blasting out code because we can, and we like it?

I tweet at http://twitter.com/ProDevNetworker

Richard Bramwell May 17, 2010 at 2:05 PM

The moment you referred readers to The Huffington Post, my eyes glazed over, my concentration was lost, and my belief in marketer's reliance on Capitalism, diminished. THP is radically Left... which means they oppose every element of any purposeful marketer's intent... the opportunity for their client to profit.

THP hates those clients, yet you think they offer a lesson in marketing. Well, so did Leni Riefenstahl, for Hitler.

Your actions (because of your ideas of what is right) only achieve the destruction of all upon which you rely, long term. Both you & your clients need to make your smartest choices WITHOUT a bureaucrat deciding those choices for you. As soon as the bureaucrat makes your decisions, you will see that he DOES NOT HAVE YOUR BEST INTERESTS IN MIND.

Stop drinking the Obama Kool-Aid. Get a conscience. Market for individual success, not for the collectivist cries of Leftists.

Facebook has collectivist elements, because that is how its members work. Lead them to thinking for themselves, or join with Josef Goebbels. That is how sickening your article is, to those who care about individual peoples' lives.

In other words, "get a moral compass".

ZEDO Inc. May 17, 2010 at 11:19 AM

Great recommedations Doug! I would add that brands should take advantage of the Facebook self service platform, which allows advertisers to buy ads directly from the site, and use this to cross-promote relevant messages about their campaigns in real time. Doing so could increase engagement on fb by followers.

Elizabeth Kulin
Marketing Manager
ZEDO, Inc. Advertising Technology Partner for Publishers