

See? Nobody Buys on Facebook. Nobody Cares - fezzl
http://blog.zuupy.com/see-nobody-buys-on-facebook-nobody-cares

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grovulent
For every person who wants to believe that facebook is the biggest thing since
word-of-mouth, there is someone equally hoping the whole thing collapses in on
itself.

Each party wants their outcome so passionately it's hard to believe that
anyone can look at the data with a neutral frame of reference.

~~~
jerrya
Okay, so how do you and I make money on both these types?

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jerrya
I'm so new here. Why would someone downvote my comment? Noting there are two
types of people with different needs and predictable responses and asking how
to make money... Sounds very appropriate for a hacker forum.

And the basis of arbitrage.

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veyron
The fundamental problem with social networking as it currently stands is that
the advertisements are a distraction rather than being synergistic with the
sites workflows. I used to use facebook to communicate with second-tier
acquaintances (before realizing why I didn't really communicate with them in
the first place)

If I want to buy something I have a pretty good idea of what I want (hard to
draw thenwindow shoppers to an online store). That being said I will go and
search ( google, not a social network )

~~~
phamilton
I think an interesting case to look at was the Best Buy vs. Circuit City
competition. After going head to head on prices for so long, Best Buy decided
to raise their prices and better train their staff and service. If people know
what they want, they can find it on Amazon, or New Egg, or somewhere online
for cheaper than Best Buy can offer, often because of the sales tax exemption
in buying from out of state vendors. What Best Buy discovered is that people
come into Best Buy when they don't know what they want. When they need to ask
a few questions and get some recommendations. Then they figure, "I might as
well buy it while I'm here" and pay a little premium for it.

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kariatx
I have heard from a friend in the hotel business that the majority of the
leads they get from Facebook are from Facebook messages (meaning friends
telling one another about the hotel). The other efforts they've made with
advertising and marketing have pretty much fallen flat.

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rokhayakebe
There maybe a huge informal sector within Facebook. My older sister tells me
she goes to Facebook to see pictures of merchandise from her friends before
going to their house to buy stuff.

