Facebook & SocialToaster: What's With the New Like Button?

Over the past few weeks, there has been an epic amount of buzz in the social media world about the many Facebook enhancements announced at F8, the social network’s developer’s summit held on April 21. 

We are excited to release a series of blogs about these new developments and how SocialToaster will complement these innovative enhancements.  So, first things first, what‘s the big deal with the “like” button? For the first time, Facebook is allowing companies, news outlets, and brands like CNN, Sephora, the NHL and Mashable to link their sites directly to their corporate Facebook presence. Visitors click the “like” or “thumbs up” button on the site and join the company’s Facebook fan base in just one step without ever leaving the site. Their endorsement is then promoted to their friends in their Facebook news feed.  On the back end, Facebook pools each user's “likes” and serves them up recommendations, advertisements, and other personalizes content based on their interests.

We are particularly excited about this new enhancement as it represents a significant opportunity for SocialToaster to offer a complementary service. First, we already know that Facebook is an excellent forum for recruiting Brand Ambassadors, but now that users can connect with Facebook directly from a brand’s web site in a consolidated process, more people are likely to “like” the brand, thereby growing the pool of prospective Ambassador. SocialToaster can also tie the Brand Ambassador sign up process in with the “liking” process. Furthermore, The regular appearance of the like button on popular websites conditions visitors to widespread website integration with social networks, something that our software enriches and takes to the next level of interaction.

As internet marketing messages become more and more tailored based on “likes” and “dislikes” audiences will come to expect more than the typical banner or other pay per click ad to capture their attention. We already know that our Ambassadors’ friends “like” our Ambassadors or they wouldn’t be connected, so SocialToaster provides brands with the opportunity for friends to connect with brands in ways never previously possible.