No matter how social, connected or Web 2.0 your web site is, no matter how Facebook-like your web site is, it is not Facebook. With a reach of over 70 million participants and reputation for defining the new features of the Social Graph, Facebook has become the metaphor by which we describe the features of social networking. In addition, no other web site, save MySpace, could reach a connected community of users ready to respond to using and enhancing that social network. It’s no surprise that many brands are tapping into the infrastructure of Facebook rather than going it alone in the wider internet.

Consumer-oriented companies are looking to expand their brand into the Millennial generation are creating a Facebook presence the same way that companies a decade ago created a web presence. Most are using out of the box groups and fan pages to recruit new advocates for their products. The next generation of consumer companies are creating their own applications leveraging access to the friend lists of their members and encouraging sharing of new news, information, photos and content. The consumer experience on Facebook is just as content-oriented as the experience on the web, but accelerated through social networking and sharing.

ConnectedWedding.com is an example of this type of web property (site doesn’t really do it justice). ConnectedWeddings lets Facebook users plan weddings, invite guests, keep people up to date on plans and share in all the fun and frustration that goes into the process. It also allows the couple to create a professional looking presence in the process. Of course, I mention this because they are using Alfresco to build this, but I think it is a great example of how we can’t just be satisfied with our current notions of how you use the internet. Smart consumer-oriented companies continue to move where their customers are.

If you are on Facebook you can find out more on http://www.facebook.com/pages/Connected-Weddings/19881944105. If you aren’t, here’s the old way of finding them: http://connectedweddings.com/