The Emergence of the Facebook Search Engine + Facebook SEO Needs

Friday, June 25th, 2010

Though Facebook has had a search box for many years, it’s predominately been used to help users find their friends quickly, track down existing community groups, or locate brand pages.  But slowly Facebook’s search ambitions are growing, and with the recent launch of the open social graph (mostly known for those ‘like’ buttons) the social networking behemoth is moving full steam towards providing a full service search engine right inside Facebook.com.  Here are two ways that Facebook is expanding on search, and why we need to make sure our clients are prepared for the looming Facebook SEO battle:

1. People-powered search results
Every site that incorporates Facebook open social graph tools (like buttons, comment boxes, etc.) is being indexed and ranked by Facebook based on how much Facebook users engage with the content.  As more and more users ‘like’ websites Facebook is beginning to include the popular sites in the Facebook.com search box.  This approach is different from Google, which ranks sites based on linking and content relevancy.  Instead Facebook is prioritizing search results based on what the Facebook audience is saying about sites on the web.  Facebook will also likely prioritize search content based on what your specific friends recommend as well.  Brands can get a head start in ensuring they’re in the Facebook.com search results by implementing Facebook open social graph plug-ins in a smart way and fueling users to start ‘liking’ their content.  Brands can also influence how their sites are listed in Facebook’s search engine by including special meta-data in their site code.

2. Socially powered content farm
Facebook is now automatically building what they call “community pages” for any topics that users list as interests in their profiles.  These community pages enable Facebook to serve up content through their search box that “locks in” users by providing them internal site content rather than sending them out of Facebook the public web.  The community pages are filled with pictures + text pulled directly from Wikipedia about the topic, as well as a stream of status updates that Facebook users have posted on their walls about the topic (any status updates from a viewer’s friends are highlighted first).  Currently the “community pages” are not able to be edited by anyone, and brands cannot claim pages.  However, brands should monitor the conversation that is being aggregated on community pages, and they can join in the stream by publishing content on their own pages about the subjects.

Though we’re still at the early stages of Facebook’s search product and the changes aren’t very visible yet, it’s important for us to pay attention to this on behalf of our brands.  With over 500 million users, Facebook has the ability to make major waves in search very quickly.  We can help prepare our clients for this by recommending smart Facebook SEO tactics- building a robust Facebook presence, leveraging the social graph plug-ins, and watching the community pages.  We need to lead this forward thinking as social search hits prime-time.

Read about how Google is tackling Social Search

Further reading on Facebook SEO:
http://www.allfacebook.com/2010/06/facebook-unleashes-open-graph-search-engine-declares-war-on-google/
http://staynalive.com/articles/facebook-and-the-new-seo/

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