Facebook

Recent stories, like this one from Reuters, continue to suggest that Facebook is growing fast and that it is raking in tons of advertising revenues. The source of all this incoming cash, of course, is paid advertising. Some investors expect Facebook to earn more money than Google from advertising in the near future. The idea is that, unlike Google, Facebook users can be shown ads that are relevant to users even when they are not searching.

“We can provide really good, relevant advertising to people because they tell us exactly what they are interested in, and who they know, and those people tell us what they’re interested in,” Facebook Chief Executive Zuckerberg said at the All Things Digital conference this month.

Relevant Ads Worth More Money On Facebook

The business strategy behind Facebook’s rising advertising revenue is sound enough.

A user fills out a profile in which they state that they have “Interests” in various things. For example, a user might say that they are interested in chess. Then, theoretically, that user would be more likely to have advertisements related to chess appear than a user who had indicated interest in other topics. But, does the reality of Facebook ads bear this out?

If you are a Facebook user you may have noticed the various ads that appear on the right side of the screen. These ads are the ones that are supposed to be relevant and “targeted” to users based upon their profiles and other preferences. However, to most users, these ads appear to be thinly targeted, if at all, to their interests.

Recently, some advertisements tried to make use of the personal information in Facebook profiles by using the person’s age in the advertisement. Ads like “If you are 24 years old, you can get car insurance for $20 a month” appeared. Is this what Facebook means when they say, relevant advertising?

Other ads seem to be vaguely geographically targeted. For example, users in Phoenix get advertisements that make use of the word Phoenix (even for national brands and ads) or, in some cases, ads for actual Phoenix businesses. This is indeed useful, but hardly revolutionary. Unless you take advanced measures to frequently wipe out your Google cookies and other information you’ll get plenty of local ads there too.

Ironically, ads that are actually irrelevant and uninteresting to users will frequently appear on the user’s Facebook screen. For example, users that block Facebook games like Farmville or Cafe World still often see ads for those games despite having indicated that they are not interested. Users who are members of a Ford fan club, have tons of posts by themselves and friends about Fords, and have hundreds of “likes” for Ford related sites and information still see ads for Chevrolet. In fact, members of groups like Chevy Sucks or I Hate GM will still see advertisements for those products on Facebook.

Facebook Ads Not Relevant To Users – Worthless?

It is often said that reality is perception. Facebook frequently states how they can target users based upon their personal preferences and information and that concept is often repeated by journalists and analysts. But, is anyone actually checking to see such targeting is being done?

Going beneath the surface and doing some actual business analysis takes more time than many pundits can commit. Savvy technology writers, however, may uncover some interesting nuggets about Facebook’s so-called relevant advertising. The question is, can Facebook establish its “reality” or get a Facebook IPO stock for investors strategy executed before the world starts asking the hard questions?

Time will tell.

Facebook Ad Revenue Growth Real? is a post from Best Hubris. All content exclusively written by Freelance Writing Business of ArcticLlama, LLC

(See! What did I tell you! That’s a LIKE button right there on this very webpage.)

This super-powerful Facebook weapon, called F8, is a Google killer and there is nothing anyone can do to stop it. If you are not a Facebook user, you must sign up NOW. If you are a website owner, webmaster, content publisher, Internet marketer, writing to make money online, an online business marketing expert, or even if you are the guy who pumps the stuff out of the bottom of Porta-Potties, you must start using Facebook now! You must add Facebook LIKE buttons to every website, webpage, mobile phone, iPad, iPhone, iStore, iFacebook — I forgot where I was going with this sentence, because I just can’t stop thinking about the awesome new power of Facebook!

Whew!

Sarcasm can be hard to pull off in writing, even for a professional writer. How did I do?

I might be exaggerating a little bit, but only a little bit.

• The Mercury News says Sorry Google, Facebook Is the Web’s Most Important Company
• A Newsweek blogger headlines Facebook’s Play to Take Over THE ENTIRE INTERNET
• The co-founder and CEO of Mashable, via CNNTech, goes all past tense on us with How Facebook Won The Web
• The Tech Section Velocity at Forbes notes Facebook’s Plan for Internet Domination

You get the idea.

And, that’s just the "responsible" journalism subset of websites. You can about guess what this all sounds like out in the rabid echo chamber of social media, or social marketing, or Web 2.0, or whatever people are calling it these days.

If all of this sounds just a little too over-hyped, then you just don’t understand what is going on!

Right?

Wrong.

Facebook Like Button Is No Google Killer

Don’t get me wrong, Facebook’s new F8 initiative could potentially be pretty great. It might even grow into a useful tool, but that is a long way from being anything more than a blip on the technology radar. The problem, of course, is that the people writing about the big new development from the Facebook developer conference are people who would go to, or read about, a developer conference. This is not a cross-section of middle America. These are techies.

Read my parenting skills tips or my credit card rewards reviews.

Again, don’t misunderstand. I am a techie. I spent years as a high-end computer systems consultant. Although I bailed on the tech industry right before the Internet Bubble popped and the computer industry melted down, I have never given up those techie roots. Thanks to my time as a computer consultant working at numerous companies from senior management down to local desktop support, I have a lot of experience with Information Technology and the issues and problems IT Departments and IT managers face. I leveraged my background to become a freelance technology writer and built that into a pretty nice little freelance writing business. — In all fairness, my expertise after my computer days came in personal finance where I was a Certified Financial Planner. I leveraged that into becoming a freelance financial writer, and the two combined were what gave me enough clients and income to go from start-up entrepreneur to building my own small business.

However, these days I interact with a wider circle of people both professionally and personally, thanks in part to Facebook. Like many people, a few years ago I had no interest in being on Facebook, in large part because I didn’t really know anyone else who was on Facebook. More specifically, I thought I didn’t know anyone else on Facebook. The ONLY reason I even signed up was that an increasing number of freelance writing gigs started asking for people who were "experienced with social media," or even "experts in social marketing." It’s hard to say that you are an expert in social websites if you don’t have an account on any of them.

With a Top 10 Social Websites You MUST Have a Presence On from some magazine, I proceeded to sign up for six social networking websites. (The other four were so obviously not germane to anything even remotely business related that I didn’t bother.) One of those sites was Facebook. I think three of the others no longer exist, or if they do, are most certainly not anything that you MUST be a part of anymore.

I filled out the little profile thing, plugged my freelance writing website (www.arcticllama.com) as much as possible and posted a handful of things. It might have ended there, except for one little thing. A former high school classmate who still consider a friend, but who I hadn’t talked to in years, sent me a friend request. Soon, I was linked to a dozen or so high school classmates. Then, my sister sent me a friend request and mentioned that I should do the same for a cousin who was living abroad, and so on and so on. Eventually most of my family was on Facebook and an increasing number of my friends and former colleagues.

Facebook Weakens Privacy Then Asks Users To "Like" Everywhere They Go

Which brings me to exactly why the Facebook LIKE button will not replace Google or even threaten to cast a the tiniest shadow over Google and its massive search engine business.

There is no way that I am ever going to LIKE certain things lest my friends, family, and co-workers see them.

Already, I have taken Facebook’s privacy tools to their limits. I have my "friends" organized in lists and with every single post, I carefully select which list gets to see that status update, MANUALLY.

I have to. It is not an option.

I have some friends and relatives who have strong religious beliefs. I have other friends and family members who are very liberal. I have clients who are very traditional (I have to wear a suit and tie when I go onsite) and I have clients who are more freewheeling than my crazy friends (I might have to go onsite naked … if it’s Friday).Whatever I do, I need to ensure that it does not jeopardize relationships that I have spent years, or in some cases, a lifetime, cultivating just so that I "Like" a webpage or website.

There are LOTS of people using Facebook who are in a similar situation. And, with Facebook weakening its privacy standards at every opportunity, it only gets harder to maintain the proper boundaries. Facebook has already made it so that users cannot hide their friends list. That means that some users must choose between keeping an ex-girlfriend as a friend or risk losing their current girlfriend. That also goes for former employers, current employers, former and current bosses, former and current clients, and so on. And that is just one tiny thing.

Facebook has offered no easy to use controls for its users to keep their LIKES separated based on friend lists for example. If I "like" a Save the Baby Seals page will a client that sells clubs stop using my services? Or, will they insist that I "like" a How To Club Protestors site? (I jest, but you get the point.) In other words, users will only be able to recommend websites that they know are inoffensive across their entire friends list. Either that, or they will have to violate Facebook’s Terms of Service and sign up for multiple accounts.

In the end, Facebook has already shot itself in the foot with this current initiative. Far from threatening Google, Facebook’s F8 universal LIKE button is already doomed to fail.

After a handful of Likes cause ripples by being sent back to Facebook profiles, people will stop using the button and go back to using similar services that they can keep separated like Delicious, Digg, or Yahoo Buzz, or whatever. Then, will come the news stories like the ones you see now about employers firing someone, or not hiring them in the first place, because of what they "liked" or even because of what they had not "liked." Usage of the like Facebook function will dwindle until it becomes nothing more than a bunch of techies creating a virtual mirror of the funny news, political wailing, and Apple stories that dominate Digg.

Of course, by then, all of those people writing about Facebook’s New Google Killer App will be writing about the next must use Internet dominating service or feature. Just like they were all writing about Twitter two years ago.

You thought we forgot, didn’t you?

Will You Use Facebook Like Without Being Able to Control It?

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Since you can’t separate LIKES using any built-in Facebook privacy features, how will you handle the new F8 Universal Web-Wide Like Button? Will you ignore it or only Like certain kinds of websites?

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P.S. If you have any examples of BEFORE / AFTER type news stories from major technology pundits who were writing about the domination of Twitter within the last two years who are now writing about the domination of Facebook, I would love to hear about them. Leave them in the comment below and I’ll even DoFollow your comment link back to your LEGITIMATE website.

(Don’t bother if its a "landing page" for some Internet marketing affiliate thing or whatever. I will only Do Follow links to real content, no cloaked links, no landing pages, no tricks. If you have a legitimate sales ad or opportunity on a webpage containing useful information, that is fine.)

Facebook Like Google Killer ? is a post from Best Hubris. All content exclusively written by Freelance Writing Business of ArcticLlama, LLC

But, at 12:01am, Facebook will allow people to pick a username.  The blog entry makes it sound great. Now, it says, you can be www.facebook.com/bob.smith instead of www.facebook.com/profile=19837254.  Mainstream media is already touting what they are calling “vanity URLs.”

Yeah, sure.

That will be true for about 37 seconds.  According to Facebook’s numbers there are 200 million “active users.”  How many of them have your name? Including middle initial? Your nickname? Your online persona name?

Don’t think for a second that there won’t be millions of cyber-geeks, opportunists, jerks, weasels, and just plain old Facebook users sitting up hitting refresh at midnight.  By tomorrow morning, that oh, so great sounding blog post will look quaint and naive when you can be known as “bob.smith8201735” or “The-Bobster-O-Rooney-Ding-Dong.”

In other words, after tonight, things will be just like they are now for millions of Facebook users worldwide.  You will have to email, link, or write down your profile address for people to find your Facebook profile.

The only difference is that a few thousand Facebook users with fast Internet connections and nothing better to do on a Thursday night that sit in front of their computer will have better links and web addresses than you do.

It’s kind of a bummer.  One of the things I really liked about Facebook was that I got to use my real name, the one people might actually look for me with, instead of having to try and come up with something that was unique, but not embarrassing, yet memorable, but not too…

It seems every time Facebook makes a change, they make it worse.  The funny thing is that their current platform is wildly popular.  Why not look for things to ADD instead of things to CHANGE!

Coca-Cola did one of them in the 1980s and the other later on.  Which one constantly ranks in the Top 10 Corporate Blunders of All-Time and which one increased revenue and market share around the world?

Those who fail to study history are doomed to repeat it.

Facebook, get out the books.  It’s time to study.

Facebook Screws Up and Gets Usernames Vanity URLs Wrong is a post from Best Hubris. All content exclusively written by Freelance Writing Business of ArcticLlama, LLC

But, I noticed this today and can’t help but wonder why this would in any way be a necessary thing.  Unless you were inviting people, do they really need to see that you have a reservation somewhere? 

Now, posting your review after dining at the restaurant might be a useful thing, but this up front posting doesn’t really make sense to me, especially at the level that there might need to be a dedicated button to handle such a once in a year posting as opposed to some sort of manual posting.

The question then is this:  Is Open Table – and several other businesses – trying too hard to somehow be linked / connected to social media sites like FaceBook and Twitter, or is there a legitimate need being met?

Social Networking Going Too Far or Business Just Trying Too Hard? is a post from Best Hubris. All content exclusively written by Freelance Writing Business of ArcticLlama, LLC

Since then, the rules have been loosened, and I joined mostly to satisfy a particular client who, as far as I can tell, wanted to have a couple more people he knew out on Facebook.  At the end of the day, it is probably a good thing for both me and my various business ventures to have a presence on the social media scene like Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn, if for no other reason than to keep someone else from usurping my good name first.  There would be no benefit in doing so today, but who knows, I could be big.

Ironically, it has been worthless from a business standpoint, although I haven’t put any effort into it that way, but still very fun.

It turns out that many of my old high school friends are also on Facebook (many of them newcomers as well) and also many of my extended family members, including one who lives in Japan.  So, hanging out and getting updates from friends and family has been a welcome treat.

Social Spam

Like most new Facebookers, I started out taking tests and surveys that I found or were passed on to me.  I even sent flair to a cousin of mine.  Most recently I’ve started playing Mafia Wars after my sister’s wall said that she needed help robbing the police impound lot.

I’ve come to realize all of these things are nothing more that socially engineered chain-mail spam.  After taking a test to tell you which insect you are, the test will, oh so helpfully, pop up with a list of your friends that you should “invite” to take the test too.  So, you click some names and pass it on, and they pass it on, and…chain email masquerading as social networking.

Even worse, are the games, like Mafia Wars.  I joined my sister’s mafia, and she joined mine.  But, apparently that isn’t enough.  In order to do certain jobs or fight certain bad guys, I have to have more mafia members.  How do I get more mafia members, by sending “invites” to my friends.  In fact, the game helps me out by saying that to have a powerful mafia I should check my list of Facebook friends and send invites to some of them “every day”.  Whatever.

So, I am putting out a call to see if there is a resource to find good, spam free, Facebook games that I can play so that I don’t get interested in a game that cannot be won, or played well, until I harangue fifty of my friends into joining as well.  Otherwise, I’ll have to startup that website too, and I’m already starting to think that maybe I have too many.

Oh, and don’t even get me started on the “offers” that give you points inside the game.  How big of a loser do you have to be to go to some website and sign up for something in order to get 42 lucky charms or whatever.  Pu-lease.

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Are Facebook Games Tests and Surveys The New Spam? is a post from Best Hubris. All content exclusively written by Freelance Writing Business of ArcticLlama, LLC

This morning I found myself at Search Engine Journal, as site that has good tidbits from time to time, but whose short, thumbnail sketch, type articles leave me a little wanting, when I stumbled across an article suggesting that Digg.com was taking the “social” out of social media.

I was struck by three things as I read the article.

1. The title of the article is “Why is Digg.com Taking the “Social” Out of Social Media.
2. The review of complaints about Digg prior to this one.
3. The comments made by the readers.

Search Engine Journal Uses This Title?

I am not sure how SearchEngineJournal.com is put together nor how its writers submit stories, or how much editorial control SEJ exerts over them, but it seems ironic that a blog about search engines would use an article title that doesn’t seem very SEO optimized.

Read anywhere for two minutes and you will again and again be instructed to use titles which put your keywords first.  Some go so far as to suggest that anything after the third word in your title is meaningless to search engines.  This isn’t true based on my own SEO experience.

If we decide to burn ‘is’ as a stop-word, then the title’s first three words are still, Why Digg.com Taking.  Why would an SEOer do that?

As I’ve found, the first three words thing is not true.  However, it is true that your words take on less and less meaning the further into the title tag they drift.  This title however, has many things going for it.

First, many users actually use words like “Why”, “How”, and “What” in their searches, oftentimes as the first word of their search.  Using the same words in your titles allows for a solid match with the query. 

Second, the author managed to repeat ‘social’ twice which would normally be worthless if not a wrong move.  However, in structuring the title this way, social appears once in quotes as a standalone word and the second time as part of the oft used key-phrase “social media”.  This may or may not produce dividends, but if there is a way to do a double keyword title, this is it.

Ironically, I never read an posts about nuances like these at SEJ or anywhere else. I wonder if he even did it on purpose.

Complaints About Digg.com

Digg has been tweaking its interface and submission rules and guidelines over the last year or so.  This is much to the chagrin, and flat-out anger, of many of its users. However, it is important to note which of its users this tends to anger.

Digg.com, if you are not familiar with it, is a website where users submit interesting or otherwise worthy website pages by “digging” them.  The idea is basically, “Hey, I dig this story, maybe you would too.”  The more users who dig a story, the higher it ranks.  The higher a story ranks the more prominently it is displayed.  A story that makes the front page of Digg can receive huge amounts of traffic, with smaller sites occasionally being knocked offline by the sudden rush of visitors.

In theory, all of this is great. However, much like SEO attempts to game search engines by taking their methods and using them to make your pages seem more worthy whether they are or not, a culture has grown up around Digg.com where certain “power users” have figured out how to do the same, and can sometimes push articles to the front page at will. Becoming one of these users essentially involves working your way up the Digg hierarchy until legions of other Digg users follow your moves closely and essentially do your bidding in hopes of getting some love back from you. When that happens, then they too can become power users.

In the last couple of years, however, the little clique of Digg users with the power became a little too chummy, a little too focused on the same kind of stories over and over again, and a little too hard to crack.  Complaints arose from the masses who actually digg articles based on their merit and not as part of a coordinated campaign to reach the front page.

So, Digg implemented some changes to try and curb the growing monopoly of Digg users by banning some users whose contributions may or may not have violated some of the terms of service, for example.

One obvious no-brainer change was to limit people to 200 Diggs per day.  While this did raise some howls of protest, they came only from the Digg gamers trying to promote their own network of followers and articles with massive amounts of Diggs.

If you do the math, you might say that it takes a person 3 minutes to actually read an article.  With Digg buttons and links, we can even say that it take zero time to actually Digg a story, but in practice that probably isn’t really true.  But, even then, in order to digg 200 things that you have actually read would take 600 minutes.  You don’t need a calculator to see it would take 10 hours to legitimately digg 200 stories, and that is only if you read fast, don’t do anything else, and only read short articles.  So, clearly anyone diggin more than 200 times a day isn’t reading everything they are digging and therefore are not contributing to the quality of the site.

Digg.com Commenters

Just as interesting were the various comments (I left one too.)  There were plenty of pseudo-comment spam like “great article” or “nice read” comments which are basically throwaways from people just trying to put a username and website on the end of the article.  But, many of the others were split between either, I used to be someone who used Digg to promote my stuff, but they made me angry, or I used to read the stories actually posted on Digg, but there ended up being too much uninteresting junk.

Ironically, perhaps if both groups of users read the others comments there could be a worthwhile discussion, but that isn’t really what comments are good for.  It might make and interesting Digg conversation, but the power submitters wouldn’t be reading.  They need all of their time to submit new articles that the readers should just shut up and read.

And so it goes…

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Digg This – How Digg’s Changes to Favor Readers is a post from Best Hubris. All content exclusively written by Freelance Writing Business of ArcticLlama, LLC