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We've seen Google's efforts to use social as a method of powering search. TL:DR; it ended terribly. Obviously Facebook has more to go with, but at the end of the day, the recommendations of our friends are really not what we want 98% of the time. As SEOs, I doubt this will ever matter much to us unless they somehow find a way to create a Bing/Google search bar interface naturally.
I'll agree and disagree. Agree that Google/Bing has failed miserably at Search + Your World type initiatives. Disagree that we don't want our friends recommendations. I would absolutely value a friends referral for a plumber, dentist, movie, beer, or restaurant over anything I found in Google. In fact, the only reason why I don't post almost all those questions to Facebook, is the sample size isn't big enough. If I could "post a Facebook question" to 100,000,000 users or even 1,000,000... (think about it)
As Danny noted here and others have in the past, Facebook's almost certainly not going to take a Google/Bing style generic, broad, webcrawl approach to search. I think when they say "search" it doesn't mean the same thing we think of when we say "search."
Good point Rand, I feel like as an Industry we often get stuck in semantics with "SEO". Even your last sentence could be interpreted differently, ask 10 different people what "search" means to them and you'll probably get 10 different answers. Still, I believe Facebook search, Google search, and the rest are all more similiar than any of us would like to admit (http://keithbrown.com/facebook-search-vs-google-seo/). The problem is that for so many years SEO = Google, so as an industry we have become incredibly dependent on it (and defensive of it).
It will probably be "search your friends' drawers" functionality.
Can't they crawl where the Like buttons are?
This is a bit infuriating. I've been saying Facebook search is right around the corner for two years now and, still, they don't seem willing to get up the gumption to do it. Does Mark Zuckerberg want to make Facebook work without following in Google's footsteps? Search doesn't have to be traditional (http://www.blindfiveyearold.com/the-future-of-facebook-search) but more and more it feels like Facebook is avoiding search because they want to succeed on their own terms. (Sing your Sinatra tune here.) Is Facebook overcompensating and trying NOT to do search. If so, they miss the real opportunity. Because Google wins when people use the Internet more often. That's their big out-in-the-open secret. It's about time and attention. Facebook is winning the war of attention but fritters it away by not offering options for when a users' context shifts from social to informational; when intent goes from generation to harvesting. Turning a blind eye to this second (and potentially more lucrative) stage in the decision process is just poor conversion rate optimization. As for recommendations from friends, I'm will Ross on this one. Do you really trust a friend with stock research? Are you going to take their word on the right doctor? Does that friend actually have good taste in food? I'm not saying this input isn't valuable, but it's used as a way to triangulate and not as the primary source. We seek out expert material and subject matter experts as well as rely on the wisdom of crowds. Input from friends is usually secondary and sometimes avoided because you don't want to feel bad when you don't go with their recommendation or if that hot stock tip turns out to cost you a lot of money.
Good points, and to the commonly-accepted notion of "people want recommendations from friends" - I say that's a carryover belief from a day when talking to people you knew was the broadest and quickest way to get good information.
How bout they just make it easier to find stuff on FB ...and go from there. Focus on the users.