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Facebook, which is already the leader in sharing photos, videos and links, now wants to be a key player in messaging, commerce, payments and just about everything you do online.
The company's ambitions are that WeChat has become the centerpiece of digital life in China, where people use it to order movie tickets, subway passes, meal deliveries and rides. If Facebook manages to turn its own messaging services into a platform for everything, it could ultimately threaten established services such as Snapchat, Yelp, Venmo, eBay and even Apple and Amazon.
"It's clear that Facebook has great ambitions here," said Bob O'Donnell, president and chief analyst at Technalysis Research. "Their goal is to be the WeChat from all over China."
But Facebook faces many obstacles. One of the key is the restoration of user trust, following a series of privacy breaches that include the sharing of personal information from as many as 87 million users with an affiliated consulting firm in Donald Trump's campaign. And any change can cause users to rethink their relationship with Facebook.
"Facebook has a lot of dynamism but it's not completely invincible," said Roger Kay, an analyst at Endpoint Technologies Associates. "People came to Facebook for one thing in particular. Offer them a different thing and they are likely to re-evaluate if they want to be present. "
After all, Friendster and Myspace come and go as Facebook grows. Yahoo and AltaVista are gone for Google. And remember when AOL was popular, powerful and rich enough to buy the traditional media company Time Warner? AOL and Yahoo are declining brands at Verizon.
After creating an ad-supported service that draws on data on your hobbies, interests, and political views, CEO Mark Zuckerberg announced last week that Facebook would now highlight ways for small groups of communicate in a truly private way.
This involves scrambling all messages in WhatsApp, Instagram Direct and Messenger so that even Facebook can not read them. Facebook will also let the messages disappear automatically after a set amount of time, which is already being done by rival Snapchat.
Zuckerberg said that Facebook "will then create more ways to interact: calls, video chats, groups, stories, businesses, payments, commerce and, ultimately, a platform for many other types of private services."
Facebook declined to spell out its ambitions and a spokeswoman claimed that it was too early in the process. But there are clues in what Chinese tech giant Tencent has already done with WeChat in China. WeChat combines functions that are typically performed by separate companies located elsewhere – think of Facebook and its messaging services associated with PayPal and Uber. People use WeChat to buy goods in retail stores, share restaurant bills with friends, pay utility bills, donate to charities, and arrange rides for Didi Chuxing at Uber.
Facebook is already allowing people to send money to other people via Messenger in the US and some other countries and is currently testing payments via WhatsApp in India. The New York Times reported that Facebook is also developing its own digital currency to allow users to send money to their email contacts more easily.
Facebook did not provide much details about its digital currency plans, but said that a "new small team" was looking for ways to use the kind of technology that feeds bitcoins and other crypto- currencies.
While current payment options require linking Facebook to bank accounts or services such as PayPal, a digital currency could potentially work without them. This could be of interest to users, particularly in Asia and Africa, who have limited access to banking services, said Avivah Litan, an analyst at Gartner, specializing in security and payments.
And that would solve a key problem with trading on phones. Litan said that entering credit card information on a phone is tedious and companies often lose customers before completing their orders. If Facebook can integrate payments into email, it can keep users in Facebook and convince advertisers that they are more likely to close deals.
Facebook could also diversify revenues beyond advertising. For example, this could take a commission, whether for newspaper subscriptions or for food deliveries, as Apple already does with a discount of up to 30% for application-based payments.
According to Kay, messaging could become a one-stop shop for Yelp-style business reviews, OpenTable restaurant reservations, Uber-like on-demand and eBay-like marketplaces, the latter already being offered by Facebook. on its main application. Amazon may be more difficult to challenge, he said, given his expertise in delivery logistics, but some items, such as grocery delivery, may be used by Facebook. .
Nevertheless, potential rivals on Facebook do not yet have to pack their bags. Zuckerberg's blog is a manifesto, a list of things he wants to implement, and it's unclear how much will be done, "said Debra Aho Williamson, an analyst at eMarketer. She said it was too early for competitors to start adapting drastically.
"You can not make fun of everything Facebook says or does," she said. "But I think it's definitely time to see how it all goes."
It could also be that Facebook can sit alongside existing services. Facebook could, for example, turn to OpenTable in messaging rather than creating its own service for meal reservations.
"It depends on the exact appearance of the product and its different utility for different types of audiences," said Brian Wieser, leader of the GroupM advertising consulting firm. "It's not necessarily a zero-sum game."
For now, analysts say, potential competitors need to be careful and be ready to adapt once the details are communicated. Companies that ignore the threat do so at their own risk.
Potential rivals can also begin to point out how they differ from Facebook, as Apple does by focusing on protecting the privacy of its devices and services. O'Donnell added that those who make payments must ensure that their services are compelling and easy to use in order to compete with anything that Facebook brings.
Apple, Amazon, eBay and OpenTable did not respond to messages for comment. Yelp, Snap and PayPal, also owner of Venmo, declined to comment.
The most immediate threat that Facebook poses to other courier services. Apple's iMessage is popular on iPhones, but there is no version for Android. Facebook might seem more appealing by breaking the walls and making its three discreet messaging services work like they were only one.
Meanwhile, Snapchat is in trouble since Facebook and its Instagram service copied a feature to publish temporary "stories" that disappear after 24 hours. Zuckerberg devoted part of his blog to "reducing permanence", suggesting that Facebook would now support the essential functionality of Snapchat to let photos "disappear" after a set number of seconds.
"This is another example of Facebook's attempt to attack Snapchat," said Rich Greenfield, an analyst at BTIG.
But the success of Facebook will depend on the number of people wishing to move their conversations. Greenfield said Snapchat had a lock on its core, a younger audience.
Facebook's plan may be faced with external competition. In contrast to WeChat, Facebook is facing new privacy regulations in Europe and calling for more controls in the US, writes Forrester analyst Jessica Liu. Zuckerberg is trying to find an "impossible balance" between capturing more users' time, using advertisers and regulators.
"Zuckerberg can not have her cake and eat it too," she wrote.
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