OK I know what you are thinking. Facebook isn’t the number one commercial website at the moment but if recent trends and predictions continue it won’t be long before they are.

It has been announced recently that Facebook, which boasts over 800 million users worldwide will float on the market next year and early predictions show that its value will be £100 billion. That is still half the worth of Google but perhaps more significantly puts the site on a par with the likes of Disney, Amazon and McDonald’s. Not bad for a website that was set up to provide the opportunity to socialise with friends.

So is Facebook a genuine threat to the Google monopoly when it comes to online marketing and retail? Well the answer to that is not really as they both rely on two different models and methods.

Google is exactly what it says it is on the tin and that is a search engine. It recently dipped its toe into the social networking pond but got burnt as figure released for November show when it revealed that Facebook produced 1000 times more referrals.

But when it comes to searching and finding any product Google still remains the main stream and with such advertising products as Google AdWords it serves the user very well.

Facebook on the other hand approaches things from a far different perspective. With it being a social network it has already built up its audience. The main difference to them and Google in this respect is that when Google lists its pages it has no idea who it is targeting for in terms of the search results.

With Facebook it already has a set audience and perhaps the most genius thing about Facebook becoming a site with commercial presence is that not only is the audience already there but it comes with a whole load of unique personal information, which makes advertising and selling a product a whole lot easier.

You will probably read on the Internet that Facebook ads only really raise the awareness and don’t produce results. These figures can be put largely down to two things. Firstly, people are still unsure how to use Facebook properly for this purpose, and secondly, it is more of an awareness site anyway, so the purchases that are made from things that are seen on Facebook often can’t be recorded or traced back to the site.

Another thing to consider is how much time people spend on Facebook. When you are searching Google you literally search for what you are looking for and then click through to that page. When you use Facebook you are on the site for a longer period of time. On average, half an hour each time you visit. So your attention is gauged for more time and that is what the people running Facebook including founder Mark Zuckerberg want.

What you then see is tailored ads and pages based on the personal information that you enter when you first sign up. If you think about it every time you ‘like’ a group, product and hobbies or when you change your relationship status, you are giving  Facebook headquarters and the many advertisers involved with the site, an insight into what you are interested in or what you need.

So what success can we expect to see from Facebook in terms of commercial gains? Well for a start Facebook is expecting to top $3billion by the end of 2011 for revenue. The way trends work you can expect that figure to further increase in the 2012. In terms of marketing, well the ball is well and truly rolling on that frontier. The last blog we did we talked about the effect of mobile browsing on retail and how people were going to be doing more Christmas shopping using their phone. Well major store brands are already moving to capture this market with perhaps the best example being Walmart who have released a Facebook ‘app’ which can decipher who your top ten friends are, and by using the data that they have entered on their Facebook accounts, it can then recommend what would be the ideal present for them. Yes Facebook really has got that personal and it is the ability to dig this deep that makes the site a very realistic leader for the future when it comes to online marketing. There is no doubt that eventually the site will be a big name as an ecommerce site as well. Watch this space.

For advice on how to get the most out of social media why not contact us and speak to one of our experts.