Like for the whole internet
Facebook is re-focusing its publisher and developer relationships. Instead of Facebook Connect which doesn’t translate well to most users of Facebook, they’re implementing a well-know feature of facebook – a “like” feature for the whole internet. Partner publishers and websites can put “like” or “recommend” links to their contents, and this is connected directly to the Facebook users’ stream. Liked articles may appear in users’ stream. This will put an enormous data on facebook’s hands about the relevance of outside pages to the users.

Instant personalization
This is the more controversial feature that Facebook announced. What it provides is that when a Facebook user visits partner sites, the site can automatically personalize the experience for the user by looking at the publicly-available information that a user has on his account. This automatic sharing of personal information that you put on facebook to its partner sites can be prone to abuse.

Facebook is playing a delicate game of balance between the privacy of its users and its potential to become a central player in the internet.

The conference, which is to be held tomorrow at the San Francisco Design Center at 635 8th Street in San Francisco, California will have three simultaneous tracks: the industry track, techniques track, open technologies track, and new tools track. Topics to be discussed under each track include:

Industry Track

• Facebook’s Growth – framework and tips
• Mobile + Social: Connecting the Dots
• Social Games: State of the Art and Next Generation
• From Idea to Successful Business – Evolving business models in the social web

Techniques Track

• Making Things Fast – On optimizing the speed and scalability of Facebook apps integration
• Basics of Integrating with Facebook
• Focus on Feed
• Designing for the Social Web – Site development and latest social plugins

Open Technologies Track

• Open Source PHP Development
• Tornado: Facebook’s Real-Time Web Framework
• Get Started Faster with Three20 – Building iPhone apps
• Fireside Chat about Open Technologies – Emerging standards

New Tools Track

• Not much information here but apparently new tools will have its own four sessions so probably there will be some new tools launched during the f5 conference.

As you can see in the next few days we can expect a glut of information appearing on blogs an on Facebook pages about stuff people learned during the f8 conference.

-number of new fans
-wall posts
-statistics on the pages visited by fans

Obviously, this is an effort on Facebook’s part to get more information to administrators that they can use to quantify the activity on their pages. One of the biggest problems social media sites face after all is the lack of metrics to show online marketers just how well (or bad) their marketing efforts are going. What Facebook is doing is trying to bridge this gap by updating them on their page activity.

The statistics contained in the email is still a far from what marketers need to determine the ROI for putting ads on facebook and creating their own facebook page, however, it is a step in the right direction. Hopefully, eventually they will come up with better tools to keep track of statistics and of course analyze the data. As Mr. Adams points out, is there a Facebook Analytics (ala Google Analytics) looming in the near future? Whether there is or isn’t, in the end it will still be up to the marketers to keep track of conversion rates coming from click from facebook. Aside from that despite all the measurable data it will still be impossible to determine just how many people really will look at an ad on facebook and have their brand awareness increased since not everyone who glances at an ad will click on it. Just shows that there is still a long way to go when it comes to having things quantified for social marketing.

Disclaimer: Got this from Blog tips though they give credit to xkcd for the image. It says there that images found there use Creative Commons License. Just in case though, leave a comment in case of copyright issues.

Facebook is in the lead among the social media platforms with 79% of the business users citing Facebook to be at least one of the platforms where they have an online presence.

One of the reasons for the enthusiasm of businesses to go online to market their products and services is the comparatively low cost of online marketing. Small to medium-sized businesses that can’t compete with big firms in more traditional advertising channels such as the television and full-blown media campaigns find that they are able to reach a lot of their target market via social media.

However, despite the rising numbers of businesses in Asia that have presence in social media platforms the actual conversion rate is remains problematic with only 12% of the surveyed firms getting more than 50% of the sales inquiries online.

This fact does not dampen the enthusiasm of the businesses though with 80% of the surveyed businesses signifying intention to increase their budgets for social media marketing in the near future.

One thing’s for sure though as Asia and the rest of the world gets even more wired we will see even more businesses jumping on the bandwagon.

Here are just some of the findings:

* 38% of users of sites such as Facebook and Twitter have posted status updates detailing their holiday plans and a third, 33% of people have posted status updates saying that they are away for the weekend.
* Nearly half, 48% of respondents have no worries about the security or privacy of social networking sites.
* Of all social networking sites, Facebook creates the most concern with 46% of respondents feeling that there are some security and privacy risks.
* The younger you are, the more likely you are to give information away concerning your whereabouts, with nearly two-thirds, 64% of 16-24 year olds sharing their holiday plans – which could be a cause for concern for parents.
* 34% of respondents have seen somebody else’s phone number posted on their social networking profile.
* Nearly one in ten, 9% of respondents have included their own phone number and 5% have included their address in the personal information section of social networking sites visible to friends.
* Some people are sharing mobile numbers and addresses directly with strangers: 6% have written their phone number and 3% have written their address “wall-to-wall” or on pages open to those who are not accepted contacts.
* Men are more blasé about personal information – 13% have included their mobile number on their profile compared with just 7% of women and 9% of men have included their address compared with just 4% of women.
* 70% of users think that social media sites are a great place to share photos of their cool new purchases and presents.

All these info may seem innocent enough to you but remember that’s because you are innocent but for burglars they’re huge neon signs saying “I’m ripe for the picking!”

According to their report the difference in Facebook still dominated the social media market with 78% of the survey participants using the platform. MySpace takes the number two spot with 42% of participants saying they use the site. LinkedIn gets only 17%. Twitter, on the other hand, may may come in last with only 10% market share but is enjoying being known as the social media site that “encourages closer connections.” Twitterers are apparently mostly using the site to connect with friends with other reasons such as updating their status and finding news being secondary.

Despite the fact that social media sites users primarily use them for personal reasons note that it is stilla powerful marketing tool. Anita Watkins, Senior Vice President at TNS, said, “Social media has transformed the way individuals connect and communicate with one another. Smart marketers are utilizing this behavior to their advantage by setting up online communities in which consumers can freely interact, discuss and debate issues around products, services and brands in a natural way. Companies are listening in to these conversations and harnessing the power of influencers to co-create their marketing strategies.”

The Social Media Smackdown started yesterday and gives celebrities only ten days to raise as much money as possible for their favorite charities using Facebook, Twitter, StumbleUpon, and MySpace. The event is sponsored by PayPal, which has pledged to donate and additional amount to the charity that the celebrity team supports. Celebs joining the smackdown include:

Kyle Petty for Victory Junction
Corbin Bleu for Stand Up to Cancer
Ernie Johnson for Samaritan’s Feet
Hayden Panetterie for The Whaleman Foundation
Elevennoms for Share Our Strength
Alec Baldwin for The Actors Fund
Linkin Park for Music For Relief
Brea Grant for Girls Rock Camp Austin
Pete Cashmore for Leukemia and Lymphoma Society

You can vote for your favorite celeb or choose to vote because of the charity they support. So far Team Kyle is in the lead with $360 and Linkin Park lags miserably with just $10. Hey people remember this isn’t just another popularity competition so click on those links and donate to charity!

If you want to help a team raise money you can copy the Paypal widget for the charity and add it to your own page.

In my previous post, I wrote about not depending solely on social media platforms for your business. That is not to say that you should not jump into the bandwagon. I was merely pointing out that it is not wise to simply rely on one venue. Experts still see social media as one big way to reach the countless masses and I agree with that. So here are some tips that you should bear in mind when working with the various social media platforms for your business.

Decide on which platforms you want to be seen at.
There are countless platforms which you can use. You have Facebook, MySpace, Twitter, Plurk, and so on. The idea is to focus on a few and channel your energy into those platforms. While it may make sense to use as many as you can, you might find yourself spread out too thinly if you have too many social platforms to manage.

Be active.
This is actually the main reason for narrowing down your social networking “homes.” You have to be quite active in whatever social platform you decide to be part of. Otherwise, you might as well be defeating the purpose of social networking platforms. If you do not update, you do not reply to messages, and the like, you’re as good as dead.

Remember to make giving value your top priority.
PR and marketing campaigns are all over the place. Customers are looking for more than selling points. They are looking for something that they will actually find useful. Bear this in mind and create content that will be found valuable. It may be as simple as a blog post or a short note but as long as customers will find it valuable, you are doing yourself a favor.