In a move to help Facebook developers to make money on their applications Zuora, Inc., a subscription billing and payments service, is implementing Z-Commerce for Facebook. To date most of Facebook applications were limited to an advertising-based revenue model while Zuora offers another vision - the commerce engine for cloud-based services.

"Today less than 2% of Facebook developers make any real money," said Bruce Richardson, AMR Research. "The Facebook community is 150M strong and has tens of thousands of applications. Imagine if just 20% of Facebook developers started charging $1 a month for their applications. Do the math on that, and you see the true potential that Zuora unlocks for the Facebook community."

With Z-Commerce Facebook developers will be provided with the four new modules:

• Subscription Console, that allows developers to register their applications with Zuora, set up their various price plans, and view which Facebook users have subscribed to which applications;
• Plug and Play Commerce Widgets to enable developers to add pre-built widgets directly into their Facebook application, to handle common operations such as subscription signups, updating billing and contact info, viewing subscriptions, invoices, and payments;
• Access Control allows limiting access to Facebook applications only to subscribed users, and directing them to the appropriate sign up, update payment information, or other screens as needed;
• Self Service Account Management enables users to update their own billing preferences, payment methods, and billing information, as well as upgrade to other price plans.