Is Facebook for Business Really Coming?
Last November, we asked you if in 6 months time Facebook would have more business contacts than LinkedIn. Over 2/3rds of you thought that LinkedIn would still be the dominant business networking tool. It hasn't quite been six months, but a lot has changed since then, and Facebook looks poised to make a serious run at the business networking crowd.
Bernard Lunn predicted on this blog in December that 2008 would be a huge year for business networking. He also said that Facebook would continue to be a major player in the consumer market, but wouldn't make much headway among business networkers. The infrastructure for Facebook to make noise in that area, though, is starting to fall into place.
From the Consumer Perspective
Probably the biggest concern from a consumer perspective about using general social networks for business networking had to do with privacy. When you start adding colleagues or other business contacts, you have to be more careful about what you expose on your profile. But with the addition of new privacy controls last week, Facebook users now have more granular control over who sees what on the site.
Profile information and other shared items -- such as photos -- can now be restricted to user-created groups of friends, to specific people, networks, or "friends-of-friends." Users even have the option of barring specific content from specific users. Though we also noted that they are so inclusive they could potentially be overwhelming for some users, they are also a necessary step in making users feel comfortable using Facebook for professional networking.
Facebook is slowly positioning itself to be a place where both casual and business networking can take place at the same time, which means that rather than maintaining two accounts -- one at Facebook and one at LinkedIn or Xing -- users could stay at Facebook and use the tools they grew accustomed to in college.
From the Business Perspective
The concerns from the business side are a little more complicated for Facebook to deal with. First, there's the issue of security. The photo lapse we reported on earlier this week may seem inconsequential for most business uses, and was apparently fixed once it was discovered, but security issues like that don't make businesses happy about storing data on a site. Another, potentially more serious (from a business use scenario) security issue that was reported recently is a phishing technique that allows users to record some information from private Facebook groups. Though the info it is able to gather was mostly benign, it still highlights the concern that business users might have about Facebook security.
It is important to note that the above concern assumes a business use case for Facebook that is slightly different than the networking going on at LinkedIn. In the above scenario, businesses would actually be utilizing the network at Facebook internally, rather than professionals merely using the site to network on their own time.
However, the larger hurdle to getting businesses and professionals to adopt Facebook as a networking platform is about attention. Unlike LinkedIn or Xing or Plaxo, Facebook is not all about business. First and foremost, Facebook has been about connecting with your friends and having fun, and that will worry business users. Facebook might have potential as a great business networking platform, but it's also a guaranteed timesink.
The Infrastructure
Facebook, of course, already has a huge number of business users, they're just not using Facebook for business. The business networks on Facebook are already enormous. Microsoft's network has 30,000 users, Google has 8,500, Well Fargo has 4,200, The US Army has 74,000, and the list goes on. Even MySpace has 407 users in its Facebook network.
The trick is to get those users to start looking at Facebook as a place for work as well as a place for play, and the way to do that may be to leverage something that LinkedIn doesn't really have: a platform full of eager developer. (Yes, LinkedIn did launch its platform last December, and it does have OpenSocial involvement, but as we've pointed out, so far it has been quite closed and the results have been less than stellar.)
What Facebook should do, is appeal to the companies that these networks -- which have grown organically as employees voluntarily joined Facebook and declared allegiance to this network or that one -- to utilize Facebook for a closed corporate networking environment. Facebook should encourage platform developers to create tools aimed at enriching company networks (or create them in house if need be), and encourage companies to leverage their existing Facebook network as a corporate intranet by installing applications on it.
That's no small task, certainly, but it is plausible. It's not the same route that LinkedIn has taken -- where company networks have grown organically in much the same way that they have on Facebook. But the end result is the same: making people comfortable enough with the network to do business on it.
Conclusion
Facebook has a history of attacking their competitors at their strongest points. MySpace had a strong widget ecosystem, so Facebook launched their application platform which forced MySpace to scramble to do that same. MySpace has strong ties to music and film, so Facebook has recently tried to forge their own (too early to tell if it is working). LinkedIn has a strong stake in business networking, and Facebook has recently been making moves to suggest that they could be laying the groundwork to go after LinkedIn's audience they way they've gone after MySpace's.
What do you think? Could Facebook ever be a place where serious business is done? Or does it pay to maintain two separate network profiles -- one for work and one for play? Let us know in the comments.
Update: According to Webware, Facebook quietly launched a "People You May Know" feature that is basically identical to a popular LinkedIn feature of the same name. Hmmm...
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Facebook won't ever beat LinkedIn for the business crowd for a very simple reason -- large corporations currently ban or will ban Facebook due to its productivity drain. Corporations wouldn't ban LinkedIn since it can only be used for business purposes, which would help them succeed.
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You know I'm not so sure that Facebook in a year or two won't be a memory. I have a feeling that everyone is just chomping at the bit for the next new thing to come along. And that is really the problem. The moment something new shows up on the scene, Facebook will be deemed old hat and everybody will jump ship.
Facebook for business? Really? You sure? I'm not.
The Masked Millionare
@Masked Millionaire:
Social networking introduces more of a chicken-egg problem, though. I can easily dump one blog service and switch to another. But if I go from Facebook to NewFangledService, what about the hundreds of friends I have on Facebook? Somehow I have to convince them to switch too... but they may not want to if none of their friends are on NewFangledService.
I've seen shifts in social networking use in my own circles of friends, but they definitely take time. And the more users a site has, the more momentum - which is part of why Facebook hasn't overtaken Myspace. Facebook may not be around forever, but they'll be around for quite a while - and with the way Facebook developers are innovating and updating, Facebook should stay competitive for many years to come.
It's interesting that "business networking" is so often interpreted as "corporate networking." According to Intuit's recently published study, "The Future of Small Business," (see http://www.intuit.com/futureofsmallbusiness/), 20 million of the 27 million businesses in America are what the U.S. Census calls "personal businesses." That is, solopreneurs, independent professionals, consultants, freelancers, and anyone self-employed. The Intuit study predicts this number to grow to 32 million by 2017.
There are a number of growing business networks that are designed specifically to address the networking needs of this huge and growing small business community (see http://Biznik.com for one example). I question whether a social networks the size of Facebook can create a simple-to-use network that this huge segment of the business community will find works for them. For example, solopreneurs have none of the same privacy needs as corporate job seekers - their big problem is simply getting noticed. The complexity of the permissions systems on both Facebook and Linked in diminishes their usefulness to non geeks who are more interested in building their own business than they are their friend lists.
The problem with Facebook, is that is already branded and used as a very "youth-based" social network, which is famous for sophomoric type functionality like "being bit by a vampire".
its not just a content problem (pictures of your friends getting drunk) - but a functionality problem. Business is Business and people want to connect, network and market their business. Facebook shuns people trying to connect with "strangers" - but this is the heart of business networking - meeting new people.
The best network for business networking is Fast Pitch! - http://www.fastpitchnetworking.com
This is truly a business-oriented site that is built for marketing and networking. They have more "business" users than Facebook, and you don't have to worry about a "zombie biting you".
Absolutely, serious business can be done - and IS being done - on Facebook by solo-professionals, entrepreneurs, authors, speakers, internet marketers, info-product creators etc. etc.
No way Facebook is just for kids anymore! Businesses who ban Facebook in the office have their head in the sand. ;)
I can attest that significant business profits are being generated as a direct result of being active on Facebook. The trick is not to be a 'marketer' - but to connect, to care, to be a thought leader, to add value... to come from win:win, and to think relationships first, business second.
All this activity may be way too time consuming for most busy professionals. So, what you're going to see more and more of is professional social networking assistants who act as proxies.
I teach my students and clients how to generate business results from Facebook in just five minutes a day. One of the tricks is to *ignore* 95% of what I call the "visual noise." Another strategy is to hand-pick high-level people to connect with. Facebook makes it extremely easy to generate dialog.
What Facebook needs to do to become effective for business
From the consumer perspective: They need to become functional at a faster rate than people get bored with them.
From the business perspective: They need to become boring at a faster rate than they become functional.
Hey I already know a site that is already giving LinkedIn a run for their money it's called Virtudex.com it's invite only so you will need a passcode to register. I dont have a code but if you ask around you may find one.
Some interesting comments.
Facebook isn't a platform to do business. First off, it's an intimate and informal community to which the conservatism of business doesn't easily mix. So it's OK in principle to decide which of my friends or business contacts see what on my profile, but how do I effectively walk the line between issuing general updates that seem too stuffy for my friends, but unprofessional to my business associates. Assuming people can master the granular control -- a point rightly raised -- that doesn't mean I'll master how to wear a suit AND a baseball cap and not look stupid to everyone.
Secondly, it annoys me when people refer to LinkedIn (forget Facebook for now, which is miles away) as a business networking site. It is, in fact, a site for individuals who just happen to be in business. Look at a profile on LinkedIn -- everything you could want to know about that individual, but very little about what their company does or why I would buy from them. Even the addition of corporate profiles on LinkedIn doesn't fix this, as it's all people-centric information, aimed mainly at helping me decide whether I would work there or hire from there. Where is the business benefit to one of my staff having their CV on LinkedIn? Or the business benefit to me if someone hires them through LinkedIn? Or the business benefit to me if my staff take all their contacts with them? No wonder many corporations ban access to LinkedIn as they do Facebook.
Finally, I share the assertion that Facebook and MySpace will be seen as pioneers of social networking, but a few a years down the line we'll take our enthusiasm for the medium to new, more focused specialist sites that enable us to get closer to realising our real reasons for networking -- perhaps a sports focused network, or a local business network for exmaple. We don't expect to get ALL we need from one newspaper or TV show and so this medium will be the same. I am quite sure Facebook will be around and used as a hang out for all, but probably most of our time with go to the niche players. And on these, finally advertising might work.
I am interested in anyone else's thoughts.
Ian Hendry
www.wecando.biz
I don't know about all the other social networks out there but I have been connecting with so many people on facebook recently... successful business professionals... that I would never have been able to meet otherwise. So maybe it depends on the type of business one is in whether facebook is good enough for business networking and business building than another. Another place I became a part of, that's related to my field is http://www.selfgrowth.com - unfortunately as the public heard about it, more and more people in all different professions signed up and got pages to promote their businesses as well, so now it seems to be for anyone, not just those working in self-growth. Anyways, all I know is that just these two sites have taken up so much of my time, it's crazy! I for one, have no intention of switching to another at this point, so I'm counting on facebook to do well for me and my little private business at Divorce Support Plus, http://divorcesupportplus.ca and it's new sister site http://www.lovingtherightways.com All the best to everyone...
Facebook is, in my opinion, the best place to connect with people and create deeper, lasting relationships in a fun and friendly atmosphere.
The people who think business connections are about "hit and run" speed networking are going to waste a lot of time producing little results, wherever they go.
The core of business is and has always been based on know, like, trust and this requires the willingness to get to know people better.
The payoffs are life long friendships, more success business and a whole lot more fun.
Facebook's not for everyone and may not be the best playground for big business but it's certainly the place for independent business owners and entrepreneurs who have learned how to enjoy life while working.
Life's too short to do anything that's not pleasurable.
My secret and what I've taught in my seminars and through my books, is that first discover what you want to do that you're passionate about, that brings you joy, that you can't imagine not doing, and then find a way to get paid for it:-)
I have accounts with LinkedIN, Plaxo, Xing, Hi5, and Facebook, as well as a couple of specialist forums and bulletin boards, but the only one I use regularly is Facebook. I have recently done business with someone I am in contact with on three platforms, which came out of a Facebook personal message conversation. At some stage, almost all business will go to email, telephone, and face to face, wherever it is initiated, so the move to facebook is not a hard one.
Will this Facebook movement kill LinkedIn's business? I don't think so. People will still use Facebook as it was, as of for LinkedIn. I, for example, will stick to the diversification.
Right now I use Facebook exclusively for friends. I will let those friends into my LinkedIn network, but not vice versa.
Facebook for business?
Well, first of all, I'm not on Facebook to rush into people's faces with my products and services.
I'm making new connections, both of a personal nature and a business nature. I enjoy meeting new people in both arenas and I'm fine if I make a connection and the person isn't compelled to buy something today or ever. It's nice to make connections.
I know that I'm getting traffic (to my blogs/sites) from Facebook, so that's a tangible plus.
As with others who have commented here, I was initially concerned about which "image" to present: business or personal or some concocted blend. Now, I don't care. I'll throw up some pictures of my family, include a few videos of causes I support, and play a game of Scrabble with a stranger.
If someone comes by and thinks my profile page isn't "professional" enough to want to look further, I am fairly certain I'm not going to lose sleep on it. The next visitor may very well be delighted with the candidness they see.
Last but not least, I don't worry whether Facebook will become a "memory" a year or so down the road. I'm making connections I didn't make on MySpace or LinkedIn and a certain percentage of these will lead to an increase in productivity. The rest will be harmlessly enjoyable.
There's a couple ways to slice this idea. (1) Use of Facebook for business purposes; or (2) implementation of Facebook's innovative features inside the enterprise. Both are manifestations of Facebook for business. Does Facebook have designs on being more than a rival to LinkedIn?
One other thought. As more employees are exposed to the social networking features of Facebook and other sites, what does that mean for mainstreaming social networks? It sounds funny to talk about "mainstreaming" something like Facebook. Isn't everyone it? Well actually, no, they're not. What happens as the work environment has more of these Web 2.0 technologies? Expect many to go mainstream. More thoughts on this here: http://tinyurl.com/2uuzpm
Can FaceBook be used for business or professional purposes? No. Here is why.
1. People go to facebook to socialize. Like me, I started having an account on Facebook to socialize with friends and family. Then gradually, I started adding professional friends. It created a big dilemma. I had to separate different picture albums and make sure my professional contacts will not see my social photos. Changed my fun social profile photo to a semi-serious photo. Started becoming more careful on what comments i leave for others and what comments others leave and not to mention photo tagging. Although facebook has privacy functions to somewhat control these things, it has become a hassle and time consuming for me. But importantly the purpose of my facebook (to socialize) and have fun / keep in touch with friends and family has now changed to professional and I am not too fond of it.
Two things will happen in the next 6 months, I will either stop my socializing on facebook and find another cool site (i just need an app that will keep my friends connection on the new site) or I will find another good site for business networking with better features (LinkedIn is definitely out) and still remain connected to my facebook friends through an app.
2. Another reason why Facebook cannot do well in professional networking - Their Search Function. When i network professionallly, I want to reach out to people from everywhere not just within my network. You can't do this on Facebook. All you can see is their photo, name and the network they belong. If facebook starts displaying others' profile who are not within my network(s), then, facebook will be heaven for perverts like on MySpace.
Facebook should stay social, if not, they risk losing focus. I love facebook for social not for professional. It is easier for a professional networking site to implement some social elements than for a social site to implement professional networking tools.
And don't get me started on LinkedIn. For a site that popular, they have screwed it up big time. Reid is only focused on selling LinkedIn. Sell it quick and dump the site.
This is our view and we have backed this with our own money: by 2011 Facebook will be the premier social networking site for professionals.
At current growth rates Facebook will have 500m users by end 2011. At least 40% of these will be 25+, i.e. in the workplace, which means 200m professionals by end 2011.
LinkedIn at current growth rates will have about 80m.
When the 200,000 Facebook app developers reach saturation on developing fun apps (just about there already), they will start focusing their attention on business.
Our app - "ki work bounce" which is aimed at helping online workers find work anywhere in the global marketplace is positioned in Facebook precisely because Facebook is the most flexible and user-friendly environment for addressing our market. It also has fantastic tools for marketing a business such as events for teleseminars.
see http://www.ki-work.com/bounce.html
Linked-in and Facebook have amazing member levels.. I joined a new business networking web site called Million Impossible Plc www.millionimpossible.com and received free UK wide advertising and also a business mentor. Although it is a fairly new site. I like the fact that it is very personal and i have been sent screen shots of their new web site and i must say.... Facebook and Linked-in have the numbers but Million Impossible hold the dreams!
2008 WILL INDEED BE AN INTERESTINGLY YEAR
I doubt Facebook will have as many users in 2011 as they do now, barring some big changes. People are already growing tired of walled gardens for their social data, and networks that refuse to open up and embrace data portability / data federation will be displaced by ones that do.
The big social networking hit for 2011 probably doesn't even exist yet, but somebody is probably slaving away in their garage working on it. Actually, there may not *be* a "big social networking hit" for 2011, since data federation will definitely reduce social networking to "just a feature" status.
I think Facebook still needs abit more time and some more improvements before it will be a place for serious business. They would also have to make steps to attract more users to come over - more business savvy functionalities and an aggressive marketing campaign.
For the meantime, it's still advisable to maintain separate networks I guess.
dk09
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