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The effects of the recent FacebookCamp Toronto can still be felt throughout the city as conversations continue and corporate marketers launch new campaigns to take advantage of what Facebook has to offer. I recently caught up with two of the three organizers, Andrew Cherwenka, VP Business Development, Trapeze Media & Colin Smillie, Founder, Freshnews.ca (Roy Pereira is the third member of the organizing team) behind FacebookCamp Toronto to talk about the recent growth and impact to marketers.

What is Facebook?

Andrew - In Facebook Inc.’s words, Facebook is a social utility that connects you with the people around you. In words my mom would understand, it’s your own personal website that makes it easier to communicate with your friends by sharing photos, videos, public and private messages - all from the same site.

Colin - On the surface Facebook is social network that lets you communicate, share information and experiences with your friends. I think what most people miss though is that its really a network of networks. For example I have my network of friends, the Toronto network, and most people have either a school or employer network. Each of these lets you connect with people at different levels and has their own privacy settings.

What is the opportunity for corporations with sites such as Facebook?

Andrew - One common misperception is that Facebook is a giant network when in fact it’s thousands of them. Imagine an ocean full of countless little islands, each with their own unique villages. It would be a marketer’s dream to target only those islands that fit their target market and ignore those that don’t. Facebook allows this through its many networks, groups, and individual preference fields. The smarter money is on highly targeted advertising dollars, and Facebook allows this on a grand scale with greater precision than we’ve ever imagined.

Colin - The opportunity for corporations and brands is to join the social network. For corporations the challenge is really to join in a meaningful way and this means moving beyond their traditional advertising thinking. Facebook has ready made features for creating groups and events, these are easy ways for companies to start. From the pre-built features, corporations can advance to a branded group or a Facebook application to build a deeper experience.

What does a city with over 500,000 users represent to a social networking site such as Facebook?

Andrew - Facebook’s enormous Toronto network, now at almost 800,000 members, is of great value to Facebook. Toronto is wired, social, and spreads far and wide. Compared to San Francisco, Toronto is 60x the square mileage but only 7x the population. What does this mean to Facebook? We’re prime targets for a networking site that allows us to socialize across this big city, and more people spending more time on Facebook.com means a richer opportunity for both Facebook Inc and its marketers.

Colin - I think 500,000 users represents an early success for most social networks. As more people join a social network, like Facebook, the users get more out of the experience as they have more people and friends to interact with. Another key with social networks is that they keep users active and Facebook, especially with the Facebook applications, does a good job of keeping users coming back.

How long can Facebook expect to see this kind of growth continue?

Andrew - My hunch is that the high school and university crowd will continue to grow steadily and the adult crowd will continue to spike rapidly for another 6-12 months, after which we’ll see steady but continued growth across the board.

Colin - In Canada, and especially Toronto, Facebook has become very well adopted but in most of the US there is still a lot of growth left. I think we’ll see Facebook focusing its efforts on growing south of the border but Canadian corporations are in a good position to learn from the success here and apply the same marketing strategies as the market develops in the US. Even if Facebook doesn’t become the dominate social network in the US its likely to be similar and its a great opportunity to learn.

Categories: Features, Interviews, Social Media
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