Review: I’m on Facebook — Now What?

Great review and great tip. I’m yet to be convinced that Facebook is anything other than a massive timewaster – albeit a fun one. I’m still not convinced enough to read the book … but it may be my age and general Scrooge-ey-ness… 🙂

Pete,
I KNOW how you feel.

Until I read the book, the phrase I would use was ‘colossal waste of time’ or ‘enormous time suck’ or maybe even ‘serial time killer’. But they’ve opened my eyes to a number of features I didn’t know about and I’m going to give Facebook a more serious go, but importantly- ON MY OWN TERMS.

“Serial Time Killer” – that’s gold!

I like your approach. I’m a lover of intentionality, so finding a way to make something like that or Linked-In work for you is fantastic. I’ve not read either book but I’m about to try a mutually beneficial tactic with Linked-In … when I can get some time away from this social media… 🙂

IMO, people who waste their time on FB would otherwise waste it on other things anyway, so at least they are being ‘social’ about it in a community.

One of the first lessons in Marketing 101 is that – you cannot create a need. People have needs, you have to know how to satisfy them. Right now, FB is doing that wonderfully where Classmates couldn’t. C’est tout.

I’m cohosting a group on FB that has had some success where a blog or yahoogroup would not. Our problem is that many people aren’t on FB and that as the novelty of FB wears off to many (sane) people, so goes the traffic.

I can’t believe there is a Facebook book. They’re going to have to update in 6 months.

Thanks Jacob! This book sounds realy interesting! How did they manage to actualy write one and publish it in such a short time! I agree, it must be updated rather frequently as FB is changing sooooo fast! (Not that I keep up with all the appications as most are total STK as you said 🙂 )
Thanks heaps!

Jacob,

Thank you for your great comments, and especially your critique. Linking Universe I am told should be exiting beta over the next week or two – keep an eye out! One other app you might want to try if you like the concept of the GrandCentral app but can’t join GrandCentral is the Jaxter app (they are also a client of mine). I believe they target a slightly more international audience.

Jacob, thanks for this review. I like the “what I didn’t like” first. I’ll take this away: “I was surprised by how much I liked this book.” Priceless, considering JibberJobber’s last review got a C, so I know how you grade things :p

Regarding the book, we got it out quickly, working together in a complementary fashion. Regarding keeping it updated, we are doing updates on the blog behind the book: http://www.FacebookAdvice.com.

Josh – one of the things that Facebook does well is draw people in with all its invitations. If you know someone that might be interested in your group, invite them to it by email and that alone may get them to join Facebook.

Benji – they may have to update it already, but since both the authors have pitched in here I’ll let them take that one.

Ina – glad you liked the read.

Jesse – thanks for the updates. I’ll keep my eyes open and check out Jaxter. Nice how you Utah guys (Utahniks? Utahpians?) stick together 🙂

Jason – I calls ’em as I sees ’em 🙂 Good job, you two.

I know, I know but some people are simply not internet people, others know better than to get sucked into a STK (I like that acronym!), and then my conscious in insisting people sign up FB. I’ve already seen a couple get sucked in deep.

If anything, I’m sure there’s a rule someone saying not to base an effort on one communication channel. At least couple it with a blog, other website, mailing list, etc…

Benji, updating is definitely an issue, both because of Facebook’s progress and the application developers. That is one of the main reasons we have http://www.FacebookAdvice.com, which we call “the blog behind the book.”

Josh – I totally agree with you on both points (not everyone is online and FB shouldn’t be your sole strategy). FB can be a great professional tool, but it shouldn’t be the only tool you use.

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