My Social Actions and Facebook’s

Yesterday, Facebook announced a new advertising platform called SocialAds. The system will deliver advertisements that feature the “social actions” of a user's Facebook friends.

Mark Zuckerberg, Facebook CEO and Founder, put it this way:

If I understand correctly, advertisements will start appearing in the individual news feeds of Facebook users. When a user looks at a product, buys a product, or in any other way interacts with a company’s profile on Facebook, a news feed item will be created that links the “social action” of that user with the company’s brand.

This new form of advertising amounts to what I would call “assisted word-of-mouth” or better yet “automated word of mouth,” regardless of whether the person wants to spread the news about what he or she is consuming.

Mr. Zuckerberg and I seem to be operating on the same wavelength but with opposite intentions. We both see the potential for an individual’s social actions to influence friends and family. In my case, I created the website Social Actions to help people amplify the good work they’re doing and to find more opportunities for making good things happen.

Last week, I told Qui Diaz:

When Qui asked about the impact of micro-philanthropy on donors, I responded:

The difference between Mark Zuckerberg’s use of social actions and mine: Social Actions will never be valued at $15 billion but it may help people to overcome their consumption habit. Facebook seems bent on leveraging a person’s social actions to keep them hooked.

PS -- It will be interesting to see how Facebook’s SocialAds platform evolves. Personally, my Facebook use has dropped significantly since the introduction of Applications. With the introduction of advertising that mimics genuine word-of-mouth marketing, I’ll probably find the platform even more difficult to maneuver. I go to Facebook for meaningful news about my friends – not for advertising created by their inevitable interaction with companies. Finding the news and ignoring the clutter is going to become increasingly difficult.