Poway Entrepreneur's New Service Allows Merchants to Build Fans on Facebook

Longtime Poway entrepreneur and resident Bobby O’Connor has launched a new service that lets small businesses tap the exploding popularity of Facebook and other social media sites.

O’Connor’s Web-based service, doing business as The 1099 Guy (the1099guy.com), provides the online software necessary to set up fan pages on Facebook, so that his customers can market their products and services in the new media.

He said the software, provided by website Social Outbreak (socialoutbreak.com), is easy to learn, and in fact, “even a 10-year-old could use it.”

Customers can also use Social Outbreak’s tools to market on LinkedIn and Twitter, two other fast-growing social media sites.

O’Connor is officially one of the Las Vegas company’s “independent business owners,” who act like independent sales reps for the company.

Now counting more than 800 million users, 7-year-old Facebook has become a huge phenomenon, and even overshadows the success of search engine Google, which many small businesses are using for their marketing.

Social Outbreak is the latest in a number of digital businesses using a controversial sales model called “multilevel marketing,”  in which clients like O’Connor are compensated not only for his own sales, but also for the sales of those that he recruits into his network.

It’s a common revenue model found on the Internet, but it’s called into question because critics compare the model to digital chain letters.

But O’Connor, whose family has owned and operated Poway Equipment Rental since 1959, says it’s an effective, not to mention affordable, way for very small enterprises to market product and services online.

“Social media today is stronger than the radio or the search engines on the Internet,” he said. He notes that Facebook has approved the service as a third-party application for its hundreds of millions of users.

“It’s accessible to very small businesses,” he added.

O’Connor charges $100 to sign up, which includes the first month fee of $50 to set up a fan page. Customers then pay $50 a month to maintain their fan pages. His customers can receive compensation if they recruit other subscribers into their network, and other subscribers can do the same.

He says he has signed up 29 clients so far, including a few who are selling the product to their customers.

Previously, O’Connor sold Internet advertising for another concern using the Google Ad Words program, but he found that small businesses, especially small retail businesses in Poway and nearby cities, couldn’t afford the $600 to $800 a month required to be effective.

His market is businesses that don’t have experience with social media. The software allows his clients to create pages that match existing marketing materials, including Web pages. The site provides templates to guide new users in setting up pages, said O’Connor.

“It’s a cheap advertising tool,” he said, “but an effective one.”

The software notifies O’Connor’s customers when users visit the fan page, giving his customers the opportunity to interact directly with their visitors.

“You’re notified in three to five seconds that somebody is there,” he said, “looking over what it is you have to offer.” He said the business can chat with the visitor, and offer such incentives as discounts and other promotions.

The software puts the interaction “out on a person’s wall, which alerts the friends of that user he or she got a two-for-one deal and you can get the same deal, too.”

“The interaction can go viral real quick,” said O’Connor.

San Diego-based Bill Mattola, director of sales and marketing for aarson.com, a Web-based business that develops sites ranging in price from $4,000 to $100,000, has teamed up with O’Connor to sell Social Outbreak to his customers.

“It’s a no brainer,” said Mattola. “It’s affordable, and it works.”

Mattola said he has his daughter using the software to develop fan book pages for some of his smaller clients, and feels that it’s a better method than using SEO, or search engine optimization, which might be unaffordable for small businesses, especially very small retailers and service providers.

“Not many competitors can reach this many people at this price,” he said.

Reid Carr, president and CEO of San Diego-based digital marketing firm Red Door Interactive (reddoor.biz), said Facebook fan pages can be a “wonderful asset for small, local businesses to connect, share knowledge and retain a relationship with their customers.”

“But it isn't always easy for these companies to know how to set them up or to know what type of Facebook tool to use,” he said, adding it “is difficult to know the protocol without having a lot of experience using Facebook as a consumer.”

“So, a lot of businesses reach out to consultants, software providers and others to help them navigate social media with mixed results,” said Carr. “However, if one company is doing it well, it makes sense to leverage them and their experience to ease the burden on getting started.”