3 Reasons Why New Facebook Is Better For Apps

Scott Rafer, the founder of Lookery posted a slideshow that pronounced Facebook applications as dead [ here ]. He claims, among other things, that the traffic to Lookery has been halved and that new users are far and few in between. In order to remedy the situation, he encourages new developers to jump onto Facebook Connect.

I understand that Scott is an expert in this field, and my opinion is probably flawed in many areas, but I contend that Facebook applications (and social applications in general) are very much alive, and that further, the new Facebook is going to help app developers.

As a short tangent, I wanted to point out the inherent value of Facebook to web developers is that Facebook is an instant distribution channel. That is why simple applications like (lil) Green Patch can get 6.5 million monthly active users. Further, that is also why Facebook Connect, as convenient as it might be, is never going to replace embedded applications on social networks.

Here are 3 reasons why the new Facebook is actually better for Facebook applications, even in light of the sharp decrease in users.

1. Apps are getting better users with better user engagement

In order to fully understand the consequences of the new Facebook design compared to that of the old, we have to look at the impacts that the designs have made for users. Prior to this new design, Facebook's profiles were becoming more and more like MySpace, in that they were getting cluttered by useless applications from users that don't know how to manage their profiles properly. This decreases the user experience and ultimately drives away users, look at MySpace's stagnant growth as an empirical example. The new Facebook has shifted applications to focus on providing value to users and increasing user engagement which then translates to user virality, as opposed to applications that focused solely on user virality.

The users that continue to use applications on Facebook use the applications because they want to use them, not because they were tricked into clicking on the invite from a friend that likes to spam.

2. Good applications shine over bad/spammy applications

If you look at the applications that were doing very well in the beginning of Facebook's application launch they were applications that had very little to no value. They included applications like Ninja vs Pirates or Warewolves vs Vampires. These applications relied solely on users inviting other users to join. So it only takes one friend to decide that the application is fun to spam all his/her other friends. This kind of viral growth ignores the underlying premise of applications, which is creating some sort of social value. Now if we look at the top applications they are all well maintained and produced. There is a fundamental shift in the focus of applications from leveraging virality for the sake of virality to creating good applications that users will gladly share with their friends because they want their friends.

Another thing that Facebook has done is that it has started to cherry pick some of the better applications to be placed on the main profile page. By creating a more stringent filter, users can still enjoy showing off their cool applications without overloading the casual user of Facebook.

3. Application bar allows faster access to frequently used apps

One of the recent features to Facebook is the application bar at the bottom of the screen. This is a great idea because it allows for fast access to frequently used applications. This also shows a stronger stand that Facebook is taking to have applications focus on quality instead of quantity.

In conclusion, Facebook's new design signals a commitment to increasing user engagement instead of relying on spam. This will ultimately pay off for Facebook and developers because a happy user is more likely to be a paying user.