skibum - 11:03 pm on Dec 30, 2010 (gmt 0)

Thats like a store owner in 1995 saying, until websites send people to my door why should I bother with this internet fad.

Kinda, except there the Internet represented people actively looking for things through search engines IF the site owners "got it".

Facebook (I think) is not a website, its an 'internet' (there's probably a better word for it that someone will invent soon).

More and more it does seem like Facebook does in fact represent the Internet to a lot of people. This internet, however is a chat room/forum and not typically where people go to buy stuff. They just go to talk about stuff and post/view pictures.

Unless a business creates some kind of FB application that keeps the business top of mind and engages someone to do or buy something, it seems like the jury is still out on how much effort to throw at Facebook.

Would it be safe to say that so far most of the traffic and sales for any business do NOT come from Facebook or Twitter?

Would it also be safe to say that the best investment is still to build out your own site, host your own content (or engage others to create it on your site) so that no matter what happens with Facebook you still have the bulk of your content under your control?

It seems like with the exception of maybe photos, content posted on Facebook has a shelf life of maybe a day or 7 at most unless it is some really engaging contest or something of that sort. Seems like FB is best used to post highlights of your business or website and start a conversation.

Even if you do that, it is amazing how many people will go, "oh I didn't know you had a website" after you have been posting links to the new content on it for a year or more!

I probably record a lot more time and page views on FB than a search engine, but that time [on fb] has got to be nearly worthless to an advertiser. The time I spend on a search engine has got to be worth 100X what my time on FB is worth to an advertiser.