Our team just returned from Facebook’s “f8″ conference in San Francisco and we’re pleased to provide the following recap, including what we expect to see in the future from Facebook:
Key conference takeaways:
- Facebook recently surpassed Google in weekly traffic making it the most trafficked site in the US. The implication here is that the web has gone from an information based platform (Google = search) to a social platform (Facebook = interaction)
- Facebook is now expanding beyond Facebook.com to socialize the rest of the web. Yesterday dozens of top sites (CNN, ESPN, Pandora, NYT, etc.) added Facebook social features to bring their sites within the Facebook “open graph.” Users will now bring their friends and their friends’ recommendations with them across the web and share everything they “like” on other sites
The “Like” Button
There was much excitement recently about the switch from “fans” to “likes.” It turns out that this has much less to do with how users interact on Facebook.com and lot more to do with how they interact on other websites. Dozens of top sites (IMDB, ESPN, CNN, Yelp, etc.) launched “like” button integrations yesterday. Soon you will be able to pick a restaurant by seeing which ones your Facebook friends “like” the most on Yelp or listen to music on Pandora that your friends recommend. Here’s how it works for the popular AMC TV show “Mad Men”:
- Facebook user is on IMDB.com and sees a “like” button on the Mad Men page
- The button shows how many people “like” Mad Men and which of their friends “like” Mad Men
- User clicks the “like” button and Mad Men is now included within their list of favorite TV shows in their Facebook profile
- A post is sent to the user’s Facebook newsfeed announcing that they are a fan of Mad Men
- Friends can now also “like” Mad Men from within their Facebook newsfeed
- If a friend clicks on the Mad Men link, they are not sent to a Mad Men page on Facebook, they are sent to IMDB.com’s Mad Men page
Note: This is where it gets a bit complicated as Netflix can also have a Mad Men page as can AMC or anyone else with Mad Men content. Facebook will have to figure out these disambiguation issues. Here’s what it looks like:
Activity Feeds and Social Bars
Facebook is also making it very easy for users to communicate with each other while on other sites and see what their friends “like” and comment on within that site. CNN.com can display what your Facebook friends (Cat Lee) and others (non-friends go below the line) think is important on their site. Of course, these activities are also posted on the user’s newsfeed on Facebook. This is equally useful on a site like Rotten Tomatoes or Trip Advisor where you are seeking advice on movies or travel destinations.
Sites will also add be able to add a social bar that sits in the footer of the site. This allows users to chat with each other while on their site and get more information while outside of Facebook.com.
What makes all of this so easy is that Facebook users do not have to log in separately each time they go to another website. Essentially, if the user is logged into Facebook in one of their browsers, the user’s identity (and friends) travel with them across the web.
What’s Next For Facebook:
Community Pages: Facebook is also launching a new type of Page for things like “cooking” or “art” to help you learn about the topics that interest you. Still in beta, Community Pages are owned by the Facebook community and centered around a topic, cause or even experience, like “art” or “cooking.” Since all of these Community Pages will be public, it sounds like a new strategy to become very relevant in search engine results (one final frontier that Facebook has not conquered.)
Location Based Service (not discussed at f8): Yes, soon Facebook will launch a geo-location capability so mobile users can tag their status updates with their physical location. It seems like they are in no rush to launch this as Foursquare is laying the groundwork by fighting the initial privacy concerns for the time being.
QR Codes (not discussed at f8): Facebook has been testing QR (quick response) codes. It is unclear what they have planned, but it would not be surprising if they start showing up on CPG product packaging and driving consumers to Facebook pages.
RFID Tags: Within the badge booklets, each f8 attendee was given a unique RFID token (generally used for tracking cattle and physical goods). After syncing it with their Facebook profile, attendees could swipe the token to check in at different booths and sessions. This prompted a status update in the user’s news feed. Again, it is unclear what Facebook is testing with RFID but perhaps there is a real world application in the works.
Page Insights: The Facebook analytics tool is getting more robust. This is great for clients that want to take a deeper look at how fans are interacting with their page. The danger here is that there are still no clear benchmarks for the metrics so just data alone will not solve the problem.
Facebook Credits: Facebook is trying to standardize the virtual currency on its site. Perhaps as users take their Facebook identity with them to other sites they may someday also be able to bring their Facebook wallet for e-commerce shopping.
Stay tuned for future posts on the developments highlighted above as Facebook continues to evolve!