The simple answer is for their traffic driving power.

Facebook has passed search-engine giant Google to become the top source for traffic to major portals like Yahoo and MSN, and is among the leaders for other types of sites.
This trend is shifting the way Web site operators approach online marketing, even as Google takes steps to move into the social-media world.
Some experts say social media could become the Internet’s next search engine.

Astoundingly, Facebook not Google is the largest driver of traffic to major websites. This reminds us in a way of AOL, back in the early days of all this. AOL attempted to control the users online experience, from dialing up to the internet, (remember that?), to checking email, to surfing the web all within the AOL “experience”.

Stickiness.

Another great achievement of Facebook is the time people spend there. It has been said that currently people spend more time at Facebook than all other sites combined. This too is astounding.

If you have been putting this off today’s the day!

Facebook/Real Estate Action Plan

1. Get a facebook personal page.
2. Get a facebook business page. (Read our How to create a Facebook Business Page here).
3. Customize your Facebook business FBML. (Read See how a customized Facebook Business Page FBML looks here).
4. Get Leads

Yesterday’s snow day was a good day for many reasons. Online, where it wasnt snowing, was a hive of activity. We saw a great spike in the number of people clicking in our facebook ad.

Spot which day was the snow day?

One of the great things about a snow day is that you can be somewhere between working and not working, or at both places at one time. One screen on your work, the other at facebook. Sound familiar?

Having tried google ads also in the past we were pretty impressed with the ease with which we could create an ad. Facebook also makes it very easy to target specific groups. In our case we wanted to target:

• Real estate agents
• who work for Weichert Realtors

limeyboy's facebook ad

Facebook was able in  real time, to search their database and told us that this would yield around 2000 possible facebook accounts where our ad would be displayed.

Where facebook ads do really well is the conversion from ad to customer. They enable an on going relationship to form.

What do we mean by that? Well, if someone clicks on your google ad, you pay, then they get to your website. From your site they are either going a). email you or b). add you to their favorites, (does anyone still do that) or c). do nothing.

At facebook however all they have to do is become a fan of yours, which in a sense, is a favorite, or a bookmark. However, by fanning, they are also subscribing to your news feed or as facebook calls it, your wall from then on. You are in effect creating a broadcast network of subscribers to your news.

At google, you get a click a visit, and often nothing. At facebook, you get a click, a visit and a fan, indefinitely!