Last week, Kevin Marsh wrote a blog entry discussing some new developments announced by Facebook at the f8 Conference. These changes not only affect the way people use Facebook but also the way people find relevant information on the Internet as a whole. Facebook is essentially attempting to connect itself with all websites on the Internet, and, given its popularity and large user base, it just may be able to pull this off.

Here are a few of the major changes that Facebook announced last Wednesday:

• “Like” buttons: Facebook’s plan is to allow businesses to include “Like” buttons on their sites for Facebook users to click. The businesses will then be added to users’ profiles on Facebook.
• Friends’ faces: If you happen to visit a website that one of your Facebook friends “Likes,” you may see a small icon with his/her Facebook profile photo. Basically, it will look like one of your friends is recommending a particular site to you, and, at the same moment, you may be recommending another site to one of your friends.
• No log-ins: As an addition to the friends’ faces feature, you do not even need to log in to Facebook to view which of your friends recommends the site you are visiting. Just having logged in recently will be enough to get your friends’ faces to appear on sites they “Like.”
• Toolbars: Businesses will be able to add the Facebook toolbar to their sites. The toolbar will let visitors “Like” particular pages and chat with friends who are logged in to Facebook, all without viewing Facebook’s actual site.

The above changes will definitely add a new twist to the way in which many people find information on the Internet. The underlying question here is: Will Facebook users be willing to click the “Like” button and have businesses added to their personal profiles?

If Facebook is successful in steering users’ online behaviors, I imagine we will start seeing businesses adopting social media into their marketing mixes at a much quicker pace.