As many of you have been following in the mainstream and tech media, in late April, Facebook [FB] announced and launched a number of new and updated products for developers. This set of products is centered on the Open Graph platform that allows the sites, brands and apps to share information about users in order to tailor offers, features and services. FB’s approach will lead to a truly social semantic experience across the web.
Why do you want to integrate your
website or blog with Facebook?
Context. FB has amassed more than 400 million users, 100 million mobile Users, 100 million Facebook Connect users and 25 billion items shared each month on FB. While integrating with FB may not be right for all businesses and situations, it will likely be a valuable tool to create rich connections between marketers and their audiences.
What does that
mean for your brand today?
Lets start with the social plug
ins. Imagine a person coming to your website
and knowing what their friends thought about the content of your site. FB has developed a set of portable social
plug-ins that will make it easy for users to see information from or about
their FB friends, share things with their friends or even log in to FB all
without leaving your site.
You may have recently noticed that the
fan page you were a “fan” of has become more of a community, company or brand
page that allows you to “like” it. When you “like” a brand or product page, their
content will appear in your personal news feed. The FB feed is the femoral artery of the FB and social
experience. If you are a brand who
wants prime real estate on the social web, the “like” button is the permission
you need to deilver your content into people’s daily lives. Under this new release the “like”
button is much more powerful and now more portable. You now can implement the “like” button,
with a line of code on to your website.
The Activity Feed exposes the actions your friends on any website. When you're logged
into FB and visit CNN.com, you will instantly see articles & topics your friends’
sharing, recommending & commenting on via Activity Feed.
The Recommendations Social Plug In helps make sites more relevant to you by highlighting content
based on top "Likes" across a site. Think of it as a people-powered
"most popular" list. For e.g., if logged into FB, a user can visit
your brand web page and instantly see articles, product summaries and features
that people are liking & sharing with their friends most often, in real
time.
The
portable FB Log In now lets you increase sign up rates at your site. This feature has the potential to
catapult the power of the social CRM space. The Log in with Faces plugin displays
your friend’s profile pictures that have already signed up for your site in
addition to a login button.
We cannot
forget the FB Social Bar. This nifty toolbar can be
added to the bottom of your site. The Social Bar includes a like
button, friends who like the site,
as well as Facebook chat. I expect to see chat addition groups pop up across the web.
What does this mean for consumers on sites in the FB ecosystem?
Tonight
when I visited Pandora,
using FB’s new
open graph protocol, I was able to see
that it picked up my FB music interests and recommended Bebel Gilberto’s latest and recommended that I create a Pandora
station because of it. Now
that what I call personalization.
The new FB platform has jump-started the semantic web so that a users experience is incredibly personal and social with easy and simplicity.
If you have not had a chance to check out this video of the f8 conference key note address, I highly recommend it for anyone who wants to connect their brands to consumers in a relevant way.
f8conference on livestream.com. Broadcast Live Free
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