I worked hard on twitter and facebook for over a year because I assumed that social media was ‘the future’. I got lots of friends and likes but not a lot of business. I was more successful with traditional SEO. As a small player I assume that is typical.
But I don’t think you can or should ignore such a big market – no matter how big or small you are. My impression is that many people live on facebook and to a lessor extent twitter. But you have to practically manually push their mouse button to blast them off of those sites.
As with other measures of online success, you can artificially inflate your ‘numbers’. But to get real benefit you have to interact and provide some type of engagement with them. If you’re a big market player with millions at stake, you can afford a full time presence and hire some techies to make things constantly fun and exciting.
However, that is not to say that the ‘little guy’ has no hope. I’m sure there are plenty of smalltimers currently on their way toward facebook riches. But it isn’t going to come without lots of work, talent and luck.
I am far from being an SEO expert, but I assume that google expects you to have some type of presence everywhere – especiallly at those large sites (with members and money that google covets).
If you are farmville and other non-casino games you can sell directly, But with current gambling & advertising restrictions it is neccessary to slide into that area sideways with ‘phoney money casino games’.
At the present time I think the small outfit gets a better return from non-social media efforts. But, the internet is constantly changing and you need to be prepared.