Who do you trust more? An algorithm, or your “Friends”?

Thursday, April 21, 2011

Let me couch this blog by saying we're not sure this is how Facebook is going to do their search but it may be close.

Facebook is banking on the idea that people will accept the advice of their friends over that of a computer. It is their goal to turn Facebook’s 500+ million users into an internal referral source for movies, restaurants and yes…attorneys.

When you do a search on Google, you are letting an algorithm suggest information that is relevant to your query. Facebook is working on a search engine that will deliver results that your “friends” “Like”.

Business pages on Facebook have a “Like” button. Once someone clicks the “Like” button all of their “friends” in their network will be notified that they like a particular restaurant, charity or attorney. So, if one person has 200 “friends” all 200 people will be aware of your law firm. That means, every time you receive a “Like” hundreds of people will now be aware of your business. Even better, eventually, when someone searches the Facebook network for an attorney, your law firm will show up in the results if any of their “friends” is connected to you.

At Omnipresent SEO, we believe social media is going to be a big part of the future for law firms. Think 10 years back and how many law firms had websites. Nowadays, if you don’t have one people look at you strange. The same is going to happen with social media resources like Facebook.

Below are two great articles that give more insight into how big and revolutionary this type of search will be.

Facebook Patent on "Curated Search"

Facebook Goes After Google's Market