Paul Joseph

The Facebook IPO goes live tomorrow and there is a lot of excitement in the social media circles. Facebook’s IPO measures have already been covered obsessively but Facebook itself is concentrating more on their consumers due to the many changes they have shipped to service this week. Facebook is no longer just a social networking site as it has impacted advertising, media and the creation of jobs along with its social component. Let go deeper into how it has managed to do this. Impact on Jobs: Facebook created the ‘platform’ known today as social media along with Twitter and MySpace. Social Media is not just about social networking, it is also about advertising, outreach campaigns and general spread of information like videos, photos and ideas. Now, a lot of startups and next generation Internet companies are leveraging Facebook’s space to access the crucial 900 billion people that it has. This is a huge number and no wonder the Facebook app economy is growing so fast. According to a study conducted last year by University of Maryland, the Facebook app economy gave rise to at least 182,000 new jobs and had a total contribution of $12.19 billion in wages and benefieds to the US Economy. This is just taking into account the US market. Imagine other markets where the social media usage is growing especially India and Brazil . Facebook is probably going to be valued at $100 billion or more and has only 3500 employees and yet they have managed to drive such an impact on technology and business. Facebook has been integrated with some 20 million apps so far which include Spotify , Farmville and even Indian ones like Saavn and Dhingana . The Indian Scenario: Facebook is looking at India to be its main growth driver besides its other favorite, Brazil. Brazil has recently ditched Orkut and dived into Facebook and has surged past India to become the second biggest country on Facebook. India currently has around 57 million registered Facebook accounts compared to USA (157 million) and Brazil (59 million) according to Social Bakers . Almost one out of every two Internet user in India is currently on Facebook, according to the Economic Times . The reason why India is going to be huge for Facebook is because of the fact that the in terms of users, the social network has barely scratched the surface. There is a huge scope for more people to get onto the Internet and thus use Facebook. The Mobile Internet revolution will bring with it millions of new users. Mobile subscriptions in the country stand at 919.17 million and this will only increase every year. Google’s Rajan Anandan explicitly states that Mobile Internet is where it’s at in this country. This is exactly the same reason why Facebook wants to target India. They have made Facebook available on almost every mobile phone, thanks to their acquisition of Snaptu many months back. Already, Facebook’s revenue from Asia stands at an impressive $99 million, led by South-East Asia and India. Imagine the potential for Facebook from India a few years down the line when the Mobile Internet penetration will have advanced deeper. The IAMAI states that that the advertising budget allocated to Social Media, largely Facebook is 94 crore out of the total of 26,500 crores. This is slowly shifting as Indian brands are realizing the viral nature of Facebook and the engagement opportunity it offers. “Users in India, United States and Brazil represent key sources of our growth. We expect that user growth in the future will continue to be higher in those regions where Average Revenue Per User (ARPU)  is relatively lower, such as Asia,” Facebook said in its SEC filing. Thus, India will play a vital role in the company’s and social media marketing’s future unless the Government sticks to its ‘ objectionable content ’ card. Facebook is testing a Pages App for Mobile: Social Media Managers and executives have always cribbed about the non-existence of Facebook Page management functionality on mobile.  Now there is a reason for them to rejoice as Facebook is testing its Pages app for mobile and according to these screenshots, it is awesome! Source: 9to5Mac Source: 9to5Mac Source: The Next Web Currently it is only available to very few users on the Australian Apple App store. Facebook has released a statement saying, “We’re testing an app that helps owners of small to medium Pages more easily manage their Facebook presence.” Besides this, there is no real information on it. We hope they roll it out soon on all platforms. Looking For A Social Media Agency?? – Contact WATConsult – India’s Leading Social Media Agency