Facebook applications of all varieties are appearing, dealing with
topics such as business, e-commerce, sports, games, cooking and
dating. The whole idea is to engage users with some sort of social,
hedonistic or functional benefit in exchange for the users? time.
Social networking sites is where people are spending time - hence
that?s where the marketing dollars need to be.

An advantage social applications offer over regular facebook features
is the ability to have added functionality. The social aspect of an
appliction is what drives users to share it and have a collective
experience. In order for Small-to-Medium businesses to spread their
word in today?s recession economy they have to focus on cost-effective
methods of marketing such as ?word of mouth?, that?s essentially the
core of what social networking is about.

1. First step is to create an application with the goal of bringing
your existing user base to it so they can start inviting their
friends. You should make it as easy as possible for them to do this,
and social networks are the best way to do this.

2. What are your goals? Brand awareness? Driving virtual goods sales?
Know your goals and establish metrics to measure them, which an admin
panel can help you do.

3. Applications should be interactive and add value. Remember, users
are INTERACTING with the application and hence has to be interesting.
This does not mean taking your existing junk and throwing
social-berries on it. This means rethinking your marketing model and
providing incentive to users to use it. Think ?reward?.

4. Applications don?t necessarily spread themselves, no matter how
brilliant they are. Join the conversation in existing forms and groups
and share your application where applicable. Avoid spammy behavior as
that can compromise your efforts.

5. Analyze and optimize. Never before have we had better analytics
tools. If you are able to get a bunch of traffic, make sure that you
are constantly optimizing based on your goals.

There is something out there for everyone and the market is young.