Facebook Poised to Take 30 Percent of Your Sales ... and Replace Currency?

This needs to be said.

Facebook allowed gamemakers like Zynga to create streams of revenue by asking players to purchase in-game items with real cash. Then, they revoked that privilege -- partly. They said games could only accept Facebook Credits as payment.

Two important points:
1. The items had already become important sources of revenue for gaming companies, and crucial to gameplay.
2. Facebook takes home 30% of Facebook Credits transactions.

Now, online shops are being developed for Facebook. Just think, your friend could recommend you a top from, oh, Banana Republic, you could Like their page and go see the top, and possibly purchase it right there (most if not all similar transactions are completed off-platform; you get linked out to an external page). It's not that far away -- in fact,  in-Facebook transactions may already be happening, thanks to the iframe makeover.

As social recommendations are proven over and over again to be hugely influential in purchase decisions, this construct could be terrific for retailers -- and for Facebook, as it will have people spending more time on Facebook. And it's so convenient for consumers, right?

Well, ladies and gentlemen, Facebook is just as poised as they were with games to wait until Facebook social commerce becomes an integral revenue stream for retailers all over the world and then insist they switch over to Facebook Credits. It's their platform. They can do what they want.

And then, assuming that they wait until the practice of buying things on Facebook has become relatively regular, they will have 30% of everything.

You may call me a conspiracy theorist. Fine. But don't say I didn't tell you so.

Let's take it a step further. Facebook Credits have a unique allure: no foreign exchange rates. Imagine kids today growing up in an economy filled with social commerce. They want to buy something from a kid in Germany? They're not going to google out an exchange rate, they're going to ask "How much in Facebook Credits?" and possibly carry out their whole transaction on the big blue wall.

Facebook Credits is already a currency -- but because of its universality, it could actually grow to be extremely powerful. Eventually (and that's a big eventually), what will be the point of having individual currencies?

You can currently purchase a card of Facebook Credits at your local drugstore. They were wise not to start with banks, but I imagine that's where they'll end up.

Lastly, I don't think the very real possibility of Facebook claiming 30% of your sales should discourage brands and retailers from using social commerce. If that's the way human behavior is headed, you'd better be there with a social shopping cart -- just be prepared.


Image by ZyMOS via Wikimedia Commons.