My Facebook Profile? £150 to you, mate
He’s only 23, you know. Facebook’s CEO (and owner of your personal data), Marc Zuckerberg
As has been previously noted on our little blog, we love Facebook at Cake. As well as checking our mates’ status updates (obviously only in our lunchtime), sending mail and writing on walls, we’ve also used the social network for campaigns, and are currently building Facebook applications for several of our clients (at a reasonable rate - give us a call if you’re interested in one).
Yet, one thing in the network’s rise to mainstream success that has yet to be noted by most observers, is how much personal data we’ve handed over to Marc Zuckerberg, Facebook’s founder. This is the real reason why Facebook is valued so highly - we have created the most comprehensive marketing database of all time, just by all filling in our Facebook profiles.
The actual value of this data may be more than you think. A study by Deutsche Bank recently found that “a newspaper reader in 2004 was worth $964 a year. Today, that’s $500.” US blogger extrodinaire Jeff Jarvis then works out that on this logic we’re worth $300 each to Facebook. Interesting reading - read the full post here.
The final question it posts, is, will we willing to give this data away for free forever? We’re used to selling our shopping habits for reduced grocery bills (loyalty cards) and we get paid for focus groups. Perhaps this is the start of something bigger?
Thanks to Simon Collister for the information for this post.
