Facebook Becomes a Search Engine!

For years, Facebook has been collating data on each and every aspect of our lives; from shopping habits, to cuisine preferences, sexual orientation and marital status. Previously, Facebook has only ever used this information as a money making tactic, by offering highly segmented targeted audience to advertisers - think about how often you've been invited to 'meet sexy singles in your area.'

Facebook has now begun to utilise this hoard of data to actually add value to its end users. The feature is called 'Graph Search' and allows users to search for restaurants, doctors or TV shows that are recommended within your network of friends. For instance, if you want to know which TV shows your friends enjoy, just type "TV shows liked by my friends" into the search box at the top of your screen and watch the results populate - awesome!

With this release, Facebook has officially entered the world of 'search', plausibly creating competition with Google's search offering. However, the question of its success lies in the volume and accuracy of Facebook's data. As Facebook's data is entirely user generated, it relies on all users becoming extroverted socialites, 'checking in' every time we go out for coffee, 'liking' our orthodontist on Facebook and consciously deciding to look up 'Breaking Bad' on Facebook and 'liking' the TV series. Suggesting that users will better utilise these features is entirely speculative at this stage, however it is imperative to the success of Facebook's Graph Search.

So how will graph search affect your business?

For Facebook business pages, Graph Search is the most significant update since the rollout of 'timeline'. The new feature will force businesses to become more focussed, creative and strategic in compelling their customers to 'like' their page and 'check-in' to their premises; for the business with the most likes will gain the greatest recommendations from a highly influential peer network. In light of this, we can expect to see more call-to-action placements within stores, prompting customers to interact with the business on Facebook during the in-store experience. We can also expect to see more incentivised promotions, convincing Facebook users to like pages and engage with the business online.

Presently, there is a whole industry based around Search Engine Optimisation (SEO). Is it really that far-fetched to suggest that in the near future we will see social media strategists and consultants becoming specialists in Facebook Graph Search optimisation?