Social Media Part 1: Facebook's Untapped Potential

Social media like Facebook and MySpace are great opportunities to create experiences for customers. They have untapped potential for creating interesting interactive web spaces to enhance a company’s customer experience. They have the potential to make the experience more personal, turning a company into a being they can relate to, a Facebook friend. Because MySpace usage has decreased over the years compared to Facebook and because MySpace has turned into a social media primarily for music, especially indie music, I will be focusing more on Facebook and its potential for creating customer experiences.

Many businesses of all types and sizes have begun to start their own pages on Facebook. From browsing multiple companies Facebook pages, I believe few if any are using Facebook to its potential, let alone understand its culture and how it is used. Most companies are using Facebook passively instead of actively. Anyone can use and be a part of social media, but the key to being successful at using any social media, whether business or person, is active participation. Having an account on Facebook so fans can merely join isn’t good enough.

There are several ways companies can use Facebook to create experiences. First, the Facebook profile should be an important part of an employee’s job, or a team’s job. This means the profile should be updated with wall posts at least every day and the site should be maintained, for example uploading photos and keeping track of “fans”, “members”, or “friends”. The goal is to basically create a being that your customers can connect with, the “Facebook” you have created. The manner of your posts should reflect your customer personas (older or younger, male or female, etc.). Even creating “interests” for your Facebook business profile is a good idea. For example, REI would have things like hiking, enjoying the fresh mountain air, and maybe even eating healthy. Second, blogs, twitter, and your company website should be linked to your Facebook making it your one-stop-shop. For example, I get on my Facebook, see in my updated list of wall posts that you’re having a sale, I go to your businesses’ Facebook profile by clicking on the wall update, and then can easily click on the website link from the Facebook page. But most importantly, the greatest way to create a customer experience would be to develop applications for Facebook. For example, Starbucks could create “Your own Starbucks coffee shop” application where their customers run their own virtual coffee shop, make coffee drinks, hire employees, and invite friends to come have coffee at their shop. Starbucks could also create Starbucks coffee “gifts” that friends could send/gift each other. You could even create an application for “What Starbucks drink am I”. For Nike, they could have an application on Facebook where you set distance or time goals for running and could update your application with your new information after every run. It could help you plan and reach your running goals. Maybe you could even create running groups through the application, enabling you to watch your friends’ progress and cheer them on. The application possibilities are endless and I think this is where companies can really create customer experiences through Facebook. Don’t let your customers just become a “fan”; make them an active fan through the use of applications.