
Facebook’s only weakness: Mobile - ukdm
http://www.extremetech.com/computing/116661-facebooks-only-weakness-mobile
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GFischer
"We do not currently directly generate any meaningful revenue from the use of
Facebook mobile products, and our ability to do so successfully is unproven."

I don't think it will be a problem if management is aware of it and is taking
measures to correct it. Also, smarthphones evolving will also help them. Good
for them to have identified their main risks and weaknesses.

I also disagree that relying on advertising revenue is such a bad risk for
Facebook: so does Television and their business model has been succesful for a
loong time. Not to mention their largest rival Google also relies on ad
revenue.

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JerusaEnt
"I also disagree that relying on advertising revenue is such a bad risk for
Facebook: so does Television and their business model has been succesful for a
loong time. "

It's not a problem to rely on advertisements as a main source of revenue, but
Televisions have commercial breaks. What Facebook is afraid of is that most of
their users won't even use the website at all, and only the mobile app. Or to
continue the Television metaphor, it's like having all the TV watchers switch
from TV, to TVs without commercial breaks. _poof_ goes the revenue.

~~~
freehunter
This makes a lot of sense to me now. I have been scratching my head at some
obvious and simple things Facebook left out of their otherwise fantastic
mobile applications on the platforms I use. Windows Phone has a great built-in
Facebook client, but when I'm viewing my status, all I can see is how many
people "Like"d it. To see who it was, I have to go to their website. Likewise,
I can't add new friends from it. On WebOS (IMO the best Facebook client I've
used, but I've never used the iPad app), it's fantastic but there's absolutely
no Facebook Chat support anywhere in the entire OS. On Android, Facebook and
Facebook Chat are two different apps. Both need to be running to get the
"full" experience, and I'm sure there are still things missing.

It seems every platform is missing something, and it makes sense that they
would deliberately give you basic functionality to use but require you hit
their website for the full experience (and full ads). In a world of "apps just
launch the website", Facebook is taking the opposite approach. Apps are the
gateway drug to the full version.

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manmal
I have always wondered why Facebook does not display any ads in their apps -
after all, the traffic generated by mobile devices and iPads must be
substantial. Perhaps that was the reason why they did not plan any iPad app at
first - forcing users to view ads? I'm sure that they will do fine, though -
the desktop won't die soon. I often find myself switching to the browser
version because I can't stand typing more than a few words with a soft-
keyboard.

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thetrendycyborg
That is far from their _only_ weakness. They have really weak ad-clicks-per-
users numbers. They rate at which they add new users has been slowing
drastically.

