The Future of Facebook

This blog is not sponsored.

Last week, I had a conversation about Facebook for business with two Denver area business activists, one of whom was Todd Morrissette, Vice President of Business Development for Corossol Software. Todd's vision of Facebook as a business tool was so compelling and interesting that I asked him to be interviewed for this blog. Todd responded with a complete article so eloquent that I have decided to publish it here in its entirety. I can get kicked pretty swiftly, myself.

Corossol Software specializes in developing software applications for small and medium size businesses. Corossol's latest product is Centreboard, an online document management solution that assists companies with automating their business processes. Its goal is to provide an enterprise software solution without enterprise software costs. For more information, please visit www.corossolsoftware.com or contact Todd at todd.morrissette@corossolsoftware.com.

It is from this perspective that Todd offers his views about Facebook as a business tool. I hope you find it as kickin' as I do:

Facebook in its current form is a social networking tool. It was not developed for business, but for personal use by individuals. However, as we have seen over and over, tools developed for one group is often used by another. Typically, tools for business have been adopted for personal use such as cellular phones and email. Facebook is having the trend move the other way. Businesses are now trying to determine how to best benefit from the Facebook phenomenon. The reason businesses are adopting Facebook is because, unlike its social networking predecessors such as My Space, Facebook is being used by a larger demographic, not just teenagers. Since Facebook is being accepted by such a diverse group, businesses are taking notice and are trying to see how they can most benefit by adopting the application.

Currently, we are seeing businesses start to use Facebook as a marketing tool to communicate their name and brief descriptions about themselves. This is being done by creating “Fan” pages. Once users become “Fans” of the company’s page, the company can then direct market to those individuals by posting information on the page or sending emails to the individuals. In order to take it a step further, companies can create groups for people to join. Groups allow companies to find “like minded” people and then direct market to them. Here is an example of an organization using a group to its advantage:

A company that prepares tax returns for individuals creates a group called “Doing Taxes Stinks”. Several people may join this group for many reasons, such as they agree, they think it’s funny, or perhaps because a friend joined. The group starts to grow and grow using the 6 degrees of separation theory. Soon the group is over 200 strong. Now the tax company has the names of 200 users who think doing taxes is not fun and they can now market directly to these users through the group page.

More importantly is where the future of Facebook will take us. Facebook is already making changes to fit the needs of businesses by trying to outline how a business can create a Fan page or Groups.

I believe Facebook will eventually become a collaboration tool businesses can use to bring people in remote locations together- virtually. Businesses will be able to create “internal groups” where project team members can provide status updates, schedule meetings (events), post messages to the team and post documents to be shared by the team. This will be an application a business can easily introduce to their employees because their employees are already familiar with the tool. Furthermore, their users enjoy going to Facebook and do it frequently. Employees will not be as reluctant to adapt to the change and the application will be accepted more.

Once again we are seeing how the internet is providing a change to how we do business. With the new social networking websites, individuals are able to communicate with one another like never before. Communication is frequently listed as a major issue in companies, by both employees and management. Facebook, as well as other social networking websites, offers another option for people to communicate. Today, Facebook users are able to share their thoughts and communicate easily to masses. Likewise, users are able to filter who they want to hear from. In the near future, the same will be done within organizations who seek creative solutions to their historical issues.