Facebook to begin charging merchants to run Offers

Facebook to begin charging merchants to run Offers

SAN FRANCISCO—Facebook said it will start charging businesses to run Offers on its social network, turning a previously free service into a potential revenue generator at a time when Wall Street is demanding new sources of growth and profit from the company.

Facebook launched Facebook Offers this year, letting retailers and other local merchants send deals to their Facebook fans. Users claim the offers from their News Feeds and redeem the vouchers at stores to get discounts.

The service has been free, but in coming weeks Facebook will require merchants to pay at least $5 on related ads to promote each Facebook Offer to a targeted audience of fans and friends of fans. The cost will vary based on the size of a company’s Facebook pages.

Source

Is this the first step in the demise of Facebook, especially in light of the shares valuation fiasco and their need to generate revenue streams to keep wall street profit seekers at bay? How long until Facebook becomes a pay to use service? How many users would still use it if they had to pay for it?

Well, its free now and I still dont use it

reply to post by Ericthenewbie


I don't think it's the demise of FB. You have to monetize all those subscribers in some form or else you don't make money as company. I'm surprised they haven't done it yet.

reply to post by pavil


This.


As much as I despise FB, I have to admit that it is an excellent place to advertise.

reply to post by Ericthenewbie


Zuckerberg will more than likely be taking a back seat here eventually. I have a source on the inside

Facebook will continue to decline as they attempt to increase the mentization of it. The heads at facebook forgot that people dont use facebook with the mindset of spending money. People want it to keep in touch with people. Thats it. Hell i use FB frequently, and i cant even remember a single ad ive seen.

reply to post by sixswornsermon


Its actually not that great of a place to advertise, Tbh

I think the creators of adblocking plugins deserve every penny that failbook makes

reply to post by VonDoomen


I've had the opposite experience.

Originally posted by Juggernog
Well, its free now and I still dont use it

Yeah, well done. I wouldn't use it even if they paid me.

Foozebook, shmoozebook.

reply to post by Ericthenewbie


The FB pump and dump worked fairly well wouldn't you say? People are so addicted to it that they (FB) will rape pillage and burn every penny they can get! Just like the FED and bankers! The herd mentality is really quite amazing, if you think about it.........

reply to post by seeker1963

I never understood the facebook valuation when so much of it was free and not monetized, but now that they are trying to monetize it, I guess we will see how well it holds up.

I don't think it's doomed, but I don't think it will be worth as much as they thought it was, especially when there's some hungry competition out there.

reply to post by sixswornsermon


Im glad you had a positive experience. Im not saying its impossible to have a good experience with it, but ive read a lot of negativity about it. From what ive read, its not as bad for already established brands.

A lot of people, myself included, do not go to facebook to spend money. Or just flat out refuse to be capitalised through fb.

Stock currently trading at $22.91 down from initial offering of $45.00. Lowest it's been traded at is $17 and change.....tell me again how good of a company/investment they are?

Originally posted by Arbitrageur
reply to post by seeker1963

 

I never understood the facebook valuation when so much of it was free and not monetized, but now that they are trying to monetize it, I guess we will see how well it holds up.

I don't think it's doomed, but I don't think it will be worth as much as they thought it was, especially when there's some hungry competition out there.

I agree... the initial stock price was just hype by FB and by the willing media. I have done marketing on FB and made decent money and I have used other offers that I have found on FB. It has the potential to be a very good marketing tool as well as a social platform. It's seems FB really didn't and still doesn't have a really good plan on how to monetize all of that potential. I'm mean they are still figuring out the whole "mobile" thing when they should be dominating it. Imagine what a "Groupon" thing on FB could do?

Does it cost to advertise on this site ?

reply to post by dayve

Of course. This is an advertising supported site.

Step 1. Get as many users on FB as possible.

Step 2. Make FB part of their everyday lives

Step 3. Set up whacky, complex security settings that users don't understand.

Step 4. Data mine the crap out of users for targeted marketing purposes.

Step 5. Invite merchants to the party. Give them free access to users. Get them addicted.

Step 6. Charge the merchants for targeted marketing based on data mining.

Step 7.TBD

reply to post by Zarniwoop


Step 7? Step 8? ...hindsight is 20/20 and only worth a dime a dozen!

reply to post by Ericthenewbie



7. Facebook gets desperate for quarterly earnings and continues to invade the privacy of it's user base
8. Users get fed up with this, along the constant attempts by companies to engage them.
9. The model doesn't work and Facebook's stock drops below 2.00/share
10. Facebook gets purchased by Google and remains just a social network.

or...

7. Merchants require Facebook accounts to get the best possible deals on their products.
8. Facebook finds a way to become a corporate application in addition to a social network
9. Facebook becomes the defacto all-in-one corporate communications tool.
10. Corporate sales soar, as does the stock.
11. If you are not on Facebook, you are labeled a social misfit that must be hiding something
12. I can't go on... it's making me sick

reply to post by Zarniwoop


I sure as hect hope it's the first of those two scenarios because the later sure does make me taste vomit in my mouth