Can your business afford to ignore Facebook

Until the partnership between Facebook and Bing, the ranking of your website on SERP was not significantly impacted by your presence on social media sites - Facebook likes, tweets, posts on Facebook Pages.

On December 15, 2010 Bing had announced major updates to Bing search, centered around richer Facebook integration and visually organized experience. For a business, the feature of most interest is how your company's Facebook presence influences organic search engine ranking.

Bing has tweaked its algorithm with its announcement on 16 May 2011. When you search a keyword, Bing finds out what your Facebook friends are interested in, finds stories they have liked by clicking "Like" buttons on web pages, and then shows those pages in the top results - even if those links would not have appeared in SERP.

On 16 May 2011, Bing took a swipe at Google by commenting "Search is better when it's not just based in math and algorithms, but also infused with the opinions of people" in its announcement Bing is bringing the collective IQ of the Web together with the opinions of the people you trust most, to bring the "Friend Effect" to search .

There are three components of the new, social powered Bing experience:

• Friends you trust


• Collective Intelligence


• Facilitating Conversations

With this new tweak, it is not only votes by your Facebook friends, but the collective wisdom of online crowds that will influence search results. Bing now shows well-liked content, including trending topics, articles and Facebook fan pages, from sites across the web, to help you dig in and quickly find exactly what you're looking for. Bing will show what major brands and companies are saying in recent Facebook posts

With Enabling Conversations, Bing helps people to quickly identify those people in their network who may be able to help them in making a decision or providing advice.

Bing will help in your buying decisions:

• Bing Travel Wish List: You can compare trips with Facebook friends, get their advice, suggest new travel destinations, and learn more about a city on Bing Travel.


• Friends Who Live Here: Bing will show you which of your Facebook friends live or have lived in the city you intend to visit, so that you can go to them for travel tips.


• Flight Deals: Bing will send to your Facebook feed great deals on flights, for cities you've liked on Bing Travel.
  
• Shared Shopping Lists: You can build a shopping list and share, compare and discuss it with your friends on Facebook.
  

So finally, You, the user of internet, has a say in the search engine results. The power of secret algorithms with 100 or is it 200 signals and parameters has been diluted, albeit only a little. You can say what you like. In effect you vote for a page, and your vote becomes a part of collective intelligence of all users.

How do you vote for or 'Facebook like' a page? When you see a web page you like, you just click on 'Facebook like' button. What if the page does not have this button? Bad luck for the website - it does not get your vote!

Thus it becomes critical for webmasters to add 'Facebook like' button to all pages. Sharing a URL on Facebook wall will not have same effect as liking a page.

Why would a person 'like' a page - why make the effort at all? It is to recommend their friends and the world. The Like button lets a user share your web page with friends on Facebook. When the user clicks the Like button on your website, a story appears in the user's friends' News Feed with a link back to your website.

If are a consumer gadget company, like TV or mobile phones, it is easy to get 'liked'. You need to showcase your new gadget and highlight cool features - people will be motivated to 'like' it. But if you are a B2B industrial products manufacturer or a hotel, how can you leverage Facebook? Consider the room tariff page - how to make it sexy so that people say 'aha - I like it'? Yes, it is not easy - but perhaps you can showcase cool new deals on same page. Else, you can make interesting blog posts on travel and use keywords like 'bangalore service apartments' within the page. Blog post could be on new Bangalore attractions or how to save money while travelling. Give people a reason to share content with their friends. This implies that every page and blog post should feature a Facebook like' button.

The code for Facebook like' button is here. code for Facebook

Blog CMS like Wordpress have plugins for 'Facebook like' button

The Like button enables really great interaction for users. If you include Open Graph tags on your Web page, your page transforms into a Facebook page. When a user clicks the Like button, a connection is made between your page and the user. Your page will appear in the "Likes and Interests" section of the user's profile, and you have the ability to publish updates to the user. The XFBML version of button gives the user the ability to add an optional comment to the like. If user adds a comment, the story published back to Facebook is given more prominence

What about the B2B industrial products manufacturer ? Fret not. Your competition too is same boat, and Bing has only 15+% market share. Concentrate on solid SEO work. Real, lasting results will come from focused SEO efforts - rest is icing on cake. You can engage a search engine marketing company for Social Media Optimization and SEO.

According to the May 2011 Search Engine Market Share from comScore, Google search market share grew to 65.5 percent (a small increase from 65.4 percent in April), Yahoo was steady at 15.9 percent, and Bing was steady at 14.1 percent. Between Bing and Yahoo, they now hold 30% of the U.S. market.

Businesses can no longer look at Facebook as a passing fad for youngsters and Bing as a marginal player. You can boost your internet marketing efforts with a informative and interactive Facebook page for your business and integrate it with your SEO efforts.
You can create a Facebook page for a company, or for a specific brand or product offered by the business. You need to make the page compelling for online visitors, to motivate them to "like" your page and share it with friends. If you achieve that, you now an audience whose permission you have to send them relevant messages about your product. You can engage with them and find out what they love and hate about their product use experience.

All this is compelling evidence that companies and businesses must put on their social hats and engage with Facebook. Read about Seven Steps to Market your Product on Facebook.