WebProNews - MySpace

MySpace Losing $1 Million Per Month On Empty Offices

Doug Caverly — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 17:07:11 +0000

Don't be shocked if ads for 420,000 square feet of office space start popping up all over MySpace. It seems that the social networking company no longer intends to use a particular facility, but until it can unload the space, has gotten stuck paying over $1 million per month.

Matthew Garrahan reported late yesterday, "The company is locked into a 12-year lease worth about $350m that it signed in August 2008, when the number of people using MySpace was increasing and the social network was running out of space in its Beverly Hills offices."

The economy in general has taken a big hit since then, however, and MySpace in particular decided in June to lay off about 400 employees. Hence the decision not to go ahead with the expansion.

So MySpace has been saddled with a lot of office space in Playa Vista, California that no one (as of yet) seems interested in subleasing. And that space will in fact become more costly to MySpace over time, since payments are scheduled to increase. (If you do the math, $350 million over the space of 12 years averages out to $2.43 million per month.)

Maybe this snafu will result in an interesting resolution, at least. If not the office ads on MySpace, perhaps realtors could get offered the chance to have their profiles swapped with Tom Anderson's for a day.

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10 Reasons Social Media isn't Replacing Email

Chris Crum — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 16:54:53 +0000

Update: VerticalResponse CEO Janine Popick has written a separate piece adding 10 more reasons.

Original Article: The Wall Street Journal just ran a piece about the evolution of communication technology, chronicling the rise and alleged fall of email to social media. "Email no longer rules," the title reads.

Do you agree that email no longer rules? Tell us why or why not.

"We all still use email, of course," says Jessica E. Vascellaro, the author of the piece. "But email was better suited to the way we used to use the Internet—logging off and on, checking our messages in bursts. Now, we are always connected, whether we are sitting at a desk or on a mobile phone. The always-on connection, in turn, has created a host of new ways to communicate that are much faster than email, and more fun."

Correct me if I'm wrong, but don't all social networks also require logging on to use? Sure, you can set them up to remember your info so you don't have to log-in every time, but the same could be said for most email services. That's beside the point though.

It's fun to look at how communication has evolved, and it's easy to declare the old medium dead (although to be fair, Vascellaro didn't exactly go that far). It's just not the case.

WebProNews recently ran an article about how social media will not replace search, despite plenty of mutterings to the contrary. I will go ahead and declare the same thing about email. Social media will not replace email. Just as it did with search, it may replace it in some (even many) instances, but there is room for both forms of communication. In fact, they do a pretty good job of complimenting each other (for better or for worse).

Reasons Email Isn't Going Away Anytime Soon

1. People still send hand-written letters via snail mail, even though they could instead make a phone call, send an email, text message, or status update.

2. Nearly all sites on the web that require registration require an email address. Some are starting to integrate social media into this process (through things like Facebook Connect), but that is still a very small fraction, and they typically still allow for email information as well.

3. Email notifies you of updates from all social networks you are a part of (provided your settings are set up that way).

4. We haven't seen any evidence yet that Google Wave really is the next big thing and will catch on on a large scale.

5. Email is universal, and social networks are not. Nearly everybody on the web (while there are no doubt some exceptions) has an email address. Many places of employment give employees email addresses when they begin working there. Meanwhile, a great deal of them are banning workers from even accessing social networks.

6. There are plenty of people who have no interest in joining social networks. Frequent news stories about security, privacy, and reputation issues do not help convince them.

7. Email is still improving. It hasn't screeched to a halt with the rise of social media. There is still innovation going on, and integration with social media. Look at how Google is constantly adding new features to Gmail. Look at the new Yahoo Mail.

8. Even social networks themselves recognize the importance of email. Never mind that they update users about community-driven happenings via email. MySpace (still one of the biggest social networks) even launched its own email service recently.

9. More social media use means more email use. Look at these recent findings from Nielsen. The people consuming the largest amount of social media are also the people consuming the largest amount of email.

10. As far as marketing is concerned, email is doing pretty well, as many companies continue to struggle to find the right social media strategy to suit their needs.

Email Marketing

Let's expand on that last one a bit. There have been a significant number of studies released in recent memory, indicating that email marketing is doing quite well. Epsilon shared some findings about how email marketing is driving offline purchases. The same firm also found that email open rates increased for the fourth quarter in a row (up 18% YoY according to the most recent study). Forrester Consulting and ExactTarget found that email marketing is the most popular channel for consumers. Earlier this year, Forrester Research reported that email marketing in the U.S. alone was expected to reach $2 billion by 2014.

Is the email landscape changing? Yes, without a doubt. Social media has become a very large part of the online lives for many Internet users. Earlier this year, social sites were even said to have surpassed email in usage. That said, Facebook has come significantly close to matching Google in terms of unique visitors, but that doesn't make Google any less important does it? The two can co-exist, and so can email and social media. They are co-existing.

Email marketers are facing new challenges with an increasingly social and mobile web. For tips on embracing this, check out our coverage of a related session from the recent Shop.org summit.

Related Articles:

> People 18-24 Would Rather Give Up Social Networks Than Email

> Social Networks Blamed For $2.25B In Lost Productivity

> Some Brands Have Good Ideas For Social Media. Do You?

> Making Money With Social Media Marketing

> Report: Online Video the Top Priority in Marketing

Do you think social networks will replace email? Share your thoughts here.

Consumers Are Looking for Offers on Social Networks

Chris Crum — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 12:59:50 +0000

Razorfish has released a wealth of interesting data about consumer online behavior, and a good deal has to do with social media and brand interaction. For those struggling to find the right use of social networks for their business, the data is worth paying attention to.

The data is based on a survey of 1,000 consumers in the US, about half male and half female. They cover four major age groups and 10 major cities.

"To avoid duplicating the more broad-based work of Pew, Forrester, and other research firms, our goal was to survey what we call "connected consumers,'" Razorfish explains. These connected consumers have broadband access, have spent at least $150 online in the past six months, have visited a "community site" (MySpace, YouTube, Facebook, Yelp, etc.), and have consumed or created some form of digital media like photos, videos, music, or news.

"Based on previous Razorfish consumer research, we have found that these 'connected consumers' roughly mirror the U.S. population with broadband access. According to the Pew Internet & American Life Project, about 63% of all Americans today have a high-speed Internet connection, up from only 55% in 2008. This translates to roughly 200 million people, based on a July 2009 population estimate from the CIA World Factbook (total population 307,212,123, July 2009 estimate)."

In other words, pay attention to the results. You can find them all here. I wanted to highlight a few of the particularly interesting ones here, which pertain to social media use. They paint a pretty good picture of what consumers are looking for from brands on social networks (although these are certainly not the limits of what companies can do with them).

Beyond the data in the above graphs, another point worth mentioning derived from the research is that for Facebook, MySpace, and Twitter, those who follow brands are mostly looking for exclusive deals or offers. This mentality will likely increase moving forward as deals get more personalized as well.

Like Jeremiah Owyang recently discussed with WebProNews, sites can connect with existing networks like Facebook, Twitter, etc. (think Facebook Connect and similar services), and in the future, people may be able to log-in to corporate sites with their Facebook (or whatever) account, which will bring up their profile information for companies to serve personalized content (or perhaps personalized deals).

The point is, consumers are clearly more than willing to interact with brands through social media, and this will likely become increasingly true as social networks themselves gain more users. It's not only about pushing your offers out there and hoping people bite. People are becoming friends/fans of brands hoping you do give them special offers.

Interesting new marketing opportunities are going to continue to present themselves moving forward as networks get more advanced and more brands figure out new ways to use them.

Related Articles:

> How Big Brands Use Social Media

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MySpace To Host Exclusive Stream Of "New Moon" Red Carpet

Doug Caverly — Tue, 10 Nov 2009 22:38:12 +0000

Don't be surprised if MySpace experiences a big traffic spike on Monday, November 16th. The social network intends to host a live stream of red carpet arrivals at the world premiere of The Twilight Saga: New Moon.

In one sense, this could have been something of a cheap trick; it's a good bet that boatloads of young girls would tune in even if they could only catch a glimpse of Robert Pattinson and listen to a random correspondent babble. MySpace is demonstrating its influence and taking things quite a bit further, though, offering fans an exclusive experience.

According to an official statement emailed to WebProNews, "Viewers will . . . be able to take part by posting comments or questions to The Twilight Saga: New Moon Premiere MySpace page that may then be presented to the celebrities during the broadcast."

What's more, "Anya Marina, writer and performer of 'Satellite Heart' on The Twilight Saga: New Moon Original Motion Picture Soundtrack, will co-host the broadcast."

The Twilight Saga: New Moon Trailer and Premiere Announcement

New Moon Premiere | MySpace Video

So consider passing word of the event along to any relatives or friends who are Twilight fans. And with respect to what sort of traffic numbers MySpace might see, it should interest even the franchise's biggest detractors to know that the New Moon trailer received a whopping 4.2 million views within 24 hours of its debut on MySpace.

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> Paramount Follows Up "Paranormal" Marketing With More Social Fun

> Facebook, MySpace May Share Content

> MySpace Introduces New Music Features

Social Networking Donation Cause Leaves MySpace For Facebook

Dan Morrill — Fri, 06 Nov 2009 16:32:19 +0000

Causes is a social networking donation platform that uses MySpace so that people can raise money for causes or issues that they believe in. Generally these kinds of activities help provide a community around issues like Breast Cancer, or stop smoking, or other issues that are part of our daily life. Causes is an excellent application that makes the process of raising and donating money for a specific cause very easy and embeddable into someone’s MySpace page.

Last night according to ReadWriteWeb and Stanford Social Innovation Review, Causes has sent an e-mail out to all their MySpace members stating that they will be moving over to Facebook and no longer supporting MySpace. I do not see why they could not do both, but apparently Causes does not want to support both platforms. From a business viewpoint – Causes would be very smart to provide support for both platforms; everyone needs a simple easy way to donate to the cause they believe in.

Stanford Social Innovation Review though also brings up the specter of money, in that it is well known that Facebook caters to a richer clientele than MySpace. Going out to Quanticast – the demographics for MySpace and Facebook makes this a compelling argument.

MySpace Demographics:

Facebook Demographics:

What is interesting about the Quanticast information is on the right side data pane where people who are likely to visit Facebook, Causes shows up as the number one entry in the likely to visit category.

Where on the likely to visit column causes does not even show up.

Demographics are also telling – people are much less likely to be college educated on MySpace, meaning they just simply do not make a lot of money. However, some research points out that poor people donate more overall money to causes that influence their groups or their interest groups than rich people do. The problem also might be in the micropayments processing side; small amounts of money usually are quickly degraded by mounting fees from payment processors, handling, and movement than larger payments, which is a definite possibility and, one of the drawbacks to the micropayment system.

What is sad though is that rather than supporting both platforms, which is just good business, Causes has decided to abandon MySpace in favor of Facebook. Regardless of the reason, from a business viewpoint you don’t abandon a channel until it stops being profitable, if Causes believes that MySpace is no longer profitable, then there is more here about the internal workings and visitor counts of MySpace than we generally have discussed in the blogging world, let alone the press.

Causes definitely needs to post a statement on their blog, so we know what the reason is, rather than speculating as to what the reasons are.

Comments

MySpace To Miss $100 Million From Google Search Deal

Doug Caverly — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 16:04:29 +0000

Way back in 2006, MySpace and Google signed a three-year deal that was supposed to have the search giant become the social network's exclusive search provider in exchange for $900 million. Now, unfortunately for MySpace, around $100 million of that amount isn't going to change hands.

The amount of money Google was supposed to pay MySpace was in part dependent on traffic levels, and it's no secret that those are in iffy shape. As a result, News Corp. execs admitted to analysts yesterday, a significant amount of cash is going to stay with Google.

Rupert Murdoch said, "It's quite simple. We've not been making our minimum guarantees so our search revenue will not be what our revenue was."

Still, it's worth noting that Murdoch didn't appear to be losing sleep over the development. In fact, he wasn't even keeping close tabs on it. Staci D. Kramer reported, "When I asked during the press part of the call how far short of the $900 million the deal would run, Murdoch at first guessed it would come in as much as $300 million short but other News Corp. execs on the call tried to reign that in, saying more like $100 million or maybe 10 percent, which would be $90 million."

It doesn't look like this represents as big a blow to MySpace as one might expect, then, which may mean its other revenue sources are proving more than productive.

Related Articles:

> MySpace, MSN Now Said To Be In Talks

> Facebook, MySpace May Share Content

> MySpace Introduces New Music Features

Paramount Follows Up "Paranormal" Marketing with More Social Fun

Chris Crum — Thu, 29 Oct 2009 20:22:03 +0000

Paramount, the company behind the distribution of the smash-hit Paranormal Activity is now showcasing a new film-meets-social media project. Paramount's Paramount Digital Entertainment (PDE) division has teamed up with Adobe, MySpace, Mountain Dew, and Blockbuster on the production, distribution, and marketing on a new "supernatural thriller" web series called Circle of Eight.

We were interested in how the concept came about. PDE Senior Vice President, Creative Development & Production, Keith Quinn tells WebProNews, "The story and the interactive format were conceived at the same time—Circle of Eight was born as a project that was intended and customized for digital distribution in its debut window, and across platforms for additional windows."

Circle of Eight debuted with 3 episodes on MySpace. Viewers are able to share and embed the content, interact with the series through social gaming and content, and broadcast their thoughts via forums and commenting. The series will consist of 10 episodes in all, and the gaming and social media elements are integrated into the show itself.

The marketing is integrated too. That's where Mountain Dew comes in. Mountain Dew plays a "critical" role in the Circle of Eight storyline. One of the characters in the series joins the Green Label Art community and creates a unique, custom-designed Green Label Art bottle. The bottle is also featured in the online game where it "unlocks deeper mysteries" in the Circle of Eight storyline. "Green Label Art" is Mountain Dew’s limited edition series of collectable aluminum bottles.

"From the start of our collaboration on this project, it’s been essential that Mountain Dew has an authentic purpose within the Circle of Eight storyline and provides value in the interactive experience," said Frank Cooper, SVP and Chief Consumer Engagement Officer, Pepsi-Cola North American Beverages. "Paramount Digital Entertainment and Milchan/Van Eyssen shared our vision and the final result is innovative digital content that we believe is engaging and entertaining."

Between Circle of Eight and the headline-making marketing strategy of Paranormal Activity, Paramount seems to be embracing social media in interesting ways that other production companies aren't (or at least aren't getting the attention for). We asked Quinn why Paramount is so successful in creating social buzz.

"Circle of Eight is a property that works best when we embrace social media for both its distribution and marketing," he responded. "Paramount succeeds in creating social buzz precisely because we embrace social media and digital distributions, thinking of entertainment ideas and promotion of these ideas that will work across new media in addition to traditional media."

"The use of social networking and casual games to enhance the Circle of Eight story supports PDE’s focus on delivering bold, relevant programming targeted to a Gen Y audience steeped in Web 2.0 media," Quinn added.

All sponsoring companies are heavily involved in marketing Circle of Eight to raise awareness for the series and its multiplatform experience. Quinn says Paramount has more unique projects like Circle of Eight lined up, but they are unannounced as of yet.

Circle of Eight is directed by Stephen Cragg (Reaper, ER, NCIS), and stars DJ Qualls (Road Trip, All About Steve), Austin Highsmith and Ryan Doom. It was is produced by Alexandra Milchan (Righteous Kill, Street Kings) and David Van Eyssen (BMW Film Series The Hire).

Related Articles:

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Google Aims to Make Finding Music Easier

Chris Crum — Thu, 29 Oct 2009 12:54:15 +0000

Google began rolling out its new music search feature late yesterday. The feature enables search results with links to audio previews of songs provided by MySpace (which just acquired iLike) or Lala, when a user searches for music-related queries like the name of a song, artist, or album. The results also include links to purchase full songs.

Google says it is always looking for ways to reduce the "time to result," or the length of time it takes a user to actually find what they are looking for. Since Google gets millions of search queries about music each day, they figured this feature would be a good way to reduce that in many cases. "If you're searching for music, 'time to result' is really 'time to music,'" Google says.

Google takes a step further by providing results based on specific lyrics. "Many times, though, you don't know the name of the song or the artist who sings it," the company says. "Maybe you remember only the chorus — or maybe you remember who sang it, but you forgot the exact name of the song. If you've ever heard a catchy song in a car or cafe, but just can't figure out the name of the song, you'll know what I'm talking about. This search feature also helps you find many of those songs by entering a search containing a line or two of lyrics."

Google has also partnered with Pandora, imeem and Rhapsody to include links to their sites where you can discover music related to your queries as well.

Yahoo took Google's announcement as an opportunity to bring up what it has been doing with music search itself. "We have found that nearly 6 percent of all Yahoo! searches are music-related," says Larry Cornett, Vice President, Consumer Products, Yahoo Search. "Given the massive number of things people search for, we think it is pretty significant."

"We've made it easier to find music videos, artist information, and play full length songs from within the search results page," he adds. "This is just one of the many ways Yahoo! is enhancing the search experience for music lovers. With Search Assist, Search Monkey, and Yahoo! Shortcuts, you can discover even more relevant information about your favorite artist. Wonder what U2 is up to these days? Search for U2 and you’ll see images and videos, and hear full-length songs all in one place."

Since the overwhelming majority of searchers are using Google, finding music looks like it will be much more convenient now. Not everybody can access Google's feature yet, but they should be able to sometime today. Do you have it yet? What do you think? Share your thoughts.

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MySpace, MSN Now Said To Be In Talks

Doug Caverly — Tue, 27 Oct 2009 13:42:40 +0000

Yesterday, the surprising news that Facebook and MySpace are negotiating a content-sharing partnership broke, yet that's not all the latter social network has on its plate. A fresh report indicates MySpace is also in talks with MSN over some sort of music deal.

MSN is interested in "using the social networking site's music service, MySpace Music, to help power music offerings on the giant portal," according to Kara Swisher. She then continued, "While sources at both companies cautioned the talks were still early, Microsoft (MSFT) - which has its own music site that it programs with original and partnered content - execs are interested in goosing it."

An arrangement that would give MSN users access to more music would be of obvious benefit to Microsoft. The exposure - and/or cash - that MySpace would receive from such a deal would no doubt help it, too.

Plus, it's not like either company has defined itself as some sort of lone wolf. Microsoft's reached out to Yahoo and Twitter in recent months, and MySpace CEO Owen Van Natta was quoted yesterday as saying, "Partnerships are going to be a big part of our strategy moving forward as a lot of value can be derived from them."

So stay tuned and see what happens. It may be that little "powered by MySpace" graphics will start popping up in quite a lot of places.

Related Articles:

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Facebook, MySpace May Share Content

Doug Caverly — Mon, 26 Oct 2009 21:27:17 +0000

Never mind swine flu - it may in fact be time to start watching out for flying oinkers. Social networking archrivals Facebook and MySpace are discussing the idea of sharing content, according to people at the highest levels of both organizations.

On Facebook's side of things, Sheryl Sandberg, the company's COO, told Emma Barnett, "Facebook is focussing on building the best technology which helps people share content, while at MySpace they are focussing on more a content-led strategy. We would like to have their content, as we already do with many other sites, shared across our network because it is good for our users."

Then, sure enough, Owen Van Natta, the CEO of MySpace, also contributed a quote. "We are in talks with Facebook, and other sites, about how we could partner with them," he said. "Partnerships are going to be a big part of our strategy moving forward as a lot of value can be derived from them."

So, although nothing's been agreed upon, this isn't scuttlebutt being circulated by the mail guy and an intern.

In fact, this is a fairly major development that could be taken as weakness on either side's part - either Facebook worrying that people will jump ship to MySpace, or MySpace thinking that this is its best chance to get eyeballs - but a properly implemented partnership should benefit everyone.

It'll be interesting to see if Facebook and MySpace can set aside their competition for users long enough to pull it off.

Related Articles:

> Twitter Makes Share Buttons More Useful

> MySpace Introduces New Music Features

> MySpace Names First Chief Financial Officer

MySpace Introduces New Music Features

Mike Sachoff — Thu, 22 Oct 2009 13:42:54 +0000

MySpace is making a big push to reposition itself in the social networking space by introducing a number of new music offerings.

The social network has rolled out what it calls a new comprehensive MySpace Music Video experience, a MySpace Artist Dashboard, and the ability for users to now purchase music on iTunes.

"Artist Dashboard and Music Videos are an important step forward in our mission to define the future of how content is socialized on the Web," said Owen Van Natta, CEO of MySpace.

"We'll continue to build publishing tools, social tools and bring more content onto the MySpace platform to help us achieve our goal of being an important content distribution platform."

Highlights of MySpace Music Videos includes:

New music video hub within MySpace
Music video recommendations based on what your friends are watching
An A-Z browsers to search for videos and a video player link to buy music

The new MySpace Artist Dashboard allows bands and artists to track their popularity on the social networking site.

Features of the MySpace Artist Dashboard includes:

Access to charts, graphs, and snapshots of data for all global artists
Data includes fan geography, song plays, profile views, friend count, and profile visitors

"Whether you're a small town garage band, an emerging Indie, or a well-established act, our ultimate goal is to provide the right mix of tools and real time data to help you gain a deep understanding of who your fans are and how best to reach them," said Courtney Holt, President of MySpace Music.

Small Businesses Slowly Embracing Twitter

Mike Sachoff — Wed, 21 Oct 2009 18:38:38 +0000

Only a small percentage (9%) of small and medium-sized businesses (SMBs) currently use Twitter to market themselves, according to a new study by BIA/Kelsey.

In addition, 32 percent of SMBs report they plan to include social media in their marketing plans in the next 12 months by establishing a presence on social sites such as Facebook, LinkedIn or MySpace.

Stephen Marshall,
BIA Kelsey,
Director of Research
and Consulting

More than a third (39%) of SMBs plan to include customer ratings or reviews on their own websites in the next 12 months, and 31 percent plan to include links or ads placed on social sites or blogs.

"Social media is clearly gaining traction among SMB advertisers," said Steve Marshall, director of research and consulting, BIA/Kelsey. "As local consumers increasingly gravitate to social networks, local businesses understand they need to be part of the conversation."

"This opens up a market opportunity for local media companies that offer products and services that enable local advertisers to easily integrate social media into their marketing efforts."

The study found the adoption of social media by SMBs is more widespread among younger businesses. The percentage of SMBs by age of business currently using Twitter for promotion is as follows:

16 percent of SMBs in business three years or less
11 percent of SMBs in business four to six years
6 percent of SMBs in business seven to 10 years
2 percent of SMBs in business 11-plus years

MySpace Adds Some New Executives

Chris Crum — Thu, 15 Oct 2009 15:56:09 +0000

MySpace made some new personnel appointment announcements. The four new additions to the company are as follows:

- Nada Stirratt has joined MySpace as Chief Revenue Officer, effective immediately

- Dustin Finer will serve as MySpace’s Chief People Officer

- Ali Partovi, former CEO of iLike, will serve as Senior Vice President of Business Development based in San Francisco.

- Hadi Partovi, former president of iLike, will serve as Senior Vice President of Technology based in Seattle.

Stirratt will lead global sales and strategy for MySpace and focus on developing new advertising products as well as "creating unique opportunities for both marketers and users." Stirratt will be based in New York and report to MySpace CEO Owen Van Natta.

"Our commitment to creating an exceptional user experience includes innovating in the advertising space, and I’m confident Nada is the right person to lead this important area of our business," said Van Natta. "Nada’s appointment signals our desire to create great experiences for users and advertisers as well as our continued drive to bring top-tier talent into the company."

Finer's responsibilities as Chief People Officer include HR, facilities, and IT. Ali Partovi was brought in for developing strategic relationships and widening the partner network. Hadi Partovi will bolster MySpace's Seatte-based team, unify the MySpace and iLike teams under one roof, and grow the Seattle team behind products like MySpace Mail and IM.

MySpace Tackles Data Center Costs

Doug Caverly — Wed, 14 Oct 2009 15:06:29 +0000

MySpace has taken a rather huge step towards reducing its data center costs: The company announced that it's replaced old servers using mechanical disk drives with Fusion-io's flash memory products, and the benefits are almost literally off the charts.

According to a statement, "The power and cooling costs of Fusion's ioDrives are less than one percent that of the hard disk arrays, and rack space usage is reduced to zero, as ioDrives are embedded directly within even the smallest of servers."

The statement then continued, "This allowed MySpace to drastically reduce utility and floor-space costs. In addition, MySpace expects an overall reduction in administration and maintenance spending." Nifty, eh?

What's more, MySpace was apparently able to pull off the data center switch without any downtime, even as other big companies like Google and Facebook have experienced problems while just going about their day-to-day business.

The one interesting detail that MySpace didn't share was the initial cost of replacing everything, and how long it might take to recover that investment. This'll be something to keep an eye out for when News Corp. makes its next earnings report.

MySpace Gives Users Offline Marketing Opportunity

Chris Crum — Mon, 12 Oct 2009 16:03:21 +0000

MySpace and Titan have partnered to launch a three-week joint promotion to bring MySpace users' messages to over 300 digital screens in New York, Chicago, Philadelphia, Dublin, London, Liverpool, Manchester, Edinburgh, Glasgow, Leeds, and Birmingham. Titan is the largest transit advertising sales company in the US, and provides advertising on bus, rail, bulletins, telephone kiosks, and street banners.

The promotion is called "Step Up to the Mic," and is designed to let MySpace users in the United States, the United Kingdom, and Ireland, share their thoughts with the public in these cities. The two companies are also encouraging celebrities and music artists to take part to promote their "passion projects" and communicate with fans.

"The convergence of social media and digital out-of-home advertising is actually happening as a result of Titan's partnership with MySpace." said Bill Apfelbaum, Chairman of Titan. "The ability to create and connect communities through Titan's digital signs located around the world and the ability for advertisers to interact with and connect with their target audiences on a real-time basis now exists. We are delighted to work with the social media trailblazers, MySpace, in revolutionizing our industry."

"MySpace has continuously provided our users with online and offline capabilities on a global level," said Angela Courtin, SVP of Marketing Entertainment and Content at MySpace. "The project with Titan reaffirms that offering by marrying the world of advertising with socialization and sharing. It enables our users to broadcast themselves in a creative and innovative manner, just as they do on the site."

The promotion certainly provides for an interesting spin on social media marketing. Users can go to the promotion's MySpace page to participate. There is a 50-character and one image limit.

MySpace Names First Chief Financial Officer

Doug Caverly — Mon, 05 Oct 2009 18:35:08 +0000

When News Corp. acquired MySpace in 2005, it paid $580 million, and all sorts of large figures (the $900 million Google ad deal, for example) have been attached to the social network since. However, it's never had a chief financial officer, and this morning, MySpace changed that.

Mark Rosenbaum, the new CFO, does not appear to represent an afterthought. He starts immediately, and will indeed be in charge of all of MySpace's finance- and accounting-related operations. He'll also work out of MySpace's headquarters and report straight to CEO Owen Van Natta.

Moreover, there's his resume to consider. Rosenbaum has worked for MGM, tvguide.com, Twentieth Century Fox, and the Walt Disney Company, which means he should have plenty of experience with big corporations and the online space.

Van Natta said in a statement, "Mark understands both startup culture and mature businesses, and is well suited to guide MySpace's financial organization through its next phase of growth. We're thrilled to add someone with his pedigree and experience to the team."

That just leaves us to wonder about the timing of the development (and perhaps the phrase "next phase of growth"). It's worth considering whether MySpace is up to something big, or if Rupert Murdoch simply decided to give someone else a try at squeezing money out of it.

Breast Cancer Survivors Lead MySpace Initiative

Chris Crum — Fri, 02 Oct 2009 14:57:56 +0000

As you probably know, October is Breast Cancer Awareness month, and a number of Internet companies are showing their support in a variety of ways. Yesterday, we looked at what Ask.com was doing - turning their homepage into a memorial.

Today, we look at MySpace, who as they have done for the past three years, is teaming up with General Mills to support an online community called Pink Together, which resides on MySpace.

A spokesperson for MySpace tells WebProNews, "The popular community was developed to provide people with an online forum to share how breast cancer has personally affected their lives and reach out to other MySpace users to show support and share hope. The profile has been extremely successful, to date."

The spokesperson shares the following stats:

- 37,575 connections have been made (via stories shared, flowers gifted, etc.)

- 13,259 MySpace users are “friends” with the community

Every year, Pink Together identifies a number of survivors to serve as the site's ambassadors. "From sharing hope with other newly diagnosed women to raising awareness about early detection with 20 somethings - this group of commendable people is reaching others through MySpace," says MySpace Senior Vice President of Marketing, Angela Courtin. "Their belief is that one person's story becomes another person's hope and inspiration."

The site has tools like forums, "virtual bouquets" to send to friends and family, and ways to stay up to date on cancer-related news.

MySpace Music Goes Down Under

Chris Crum — Thu, 01 Oct 2009 20:53:53 +0000

Today MySpace announced the launch of MySpace Music in Australia and New Zealand. This release represents the first for MySpace Music outside of the United States.

The launch brings a new e-commerce partnership to MySpace Music with iTunes providing the music downloads locally, a MySpace spokesperson tells WebProNews. She also shares the following stats for the US version of MySpace Music:

Source: Nielsen Netview / August 2009

- MySpace Music unique users have grown 169% since launch in September 2008 and 1472%, year-over-year

- MySpace Music has nearly tripled its unique users since launch

- People ages 12 and 17 are 2.3 times more likely than the average active internet user to visit MySpace Music

- People ages 18-24 are 2.2 times more likely than the average internet user to visit MySpace Music

Source: comScore Media Metrix / August 2009

- MySpace Music is the #1 site in time spent for the 18-34 demographic

- MySpace Music is #2 in total unique users

- MySpace Music has 18.95 million monthly unique users

"MySpace Music brings to Australia and New Zealand all of the functionality currently available to U.S. based users including an ever-growing catalogue of fully licensed major and indie artist audio tracks, user-friendly e-commerce solutions, personal music players and user and artist playlisting, in addition to creating monetization opportunities for all artists," the spokesperson says.

"Both Australia and New Zealand have always been rabid music markets for MySpace Ever since Jet launched our Secret Shows program in August 2006 we’ve seen our fans share their favorite playlists, take advantage of advance listening sessions and help up-and-coming local artists build a following both locally and globally via MySpace," says Rebekah Horne, Managing Director and SVP of International at MySpace. "In Australia alone, we have had exclusive album premieres from Cut Copy, Silverchair, The Presets and Guns n Roses and hosted 40 free and intimate Secret Shows with some of the greatest acts in the world, including Air, The Cure, Hilltop Hoods and Duffy. New Zealand too has had its share of some great Secret Shows with the likes of Fall Out Boy and Evermore."

The site launches with Toyota and KFC as its flagship sponsors. Users can purchase and download single songs and full albums through iTunes.

MySpace Brings NASCAR Content to Fans

Chris Crum — Thu, 24 Sep 2009 18:47:54 +0000

MySpace has announced a partnership with Turner Sports, which sees MySpace adding NASCAR content to its sports portfolio. MySpace says users can view and share the latest race highlights, news headlines, league standings, and race results.

MySpace highlights profiles for drivers like Kasey Kahne, Brian Vickers, and Denny Hamlin. They also point to a clip of the group, The All-American Rejects in which they issue a challenge to NASCAR to acquire as many fans as they have. That's a race I will not be attending.

The NASCAR announcement appears to be more of a ploy to create some exposure for MySpace's broader and growing portfolio of sports offerings. The company points out that it serves as a hub for content for "Action Sports" like skateboarding, snowboarding, surfing, motocross, BMX, wakeboarding and skiing, as well as baseball, football, and basketball.

The company has partnerships in place with MLB-Advanced Media and the LA Dodgers, and points to MySpace communities set up by Fox sports and the NBA. The sports fan is a demographic that MySpace appears to be trying hard to go after.

MySpace Introduces Twitter Sync

Bruce Houghton — Tue, 22 Sep 2009 13:42:40 +0000

MySpace began rolling out new functionality today that allows users to sync their MySpace status updates with a Twitter feed. Any U.S. user can opt-in so that updates created on MySpace will appear on Twitter and posts to Twitter appear within their MySpace status & mood.

The system was created using open authentication technology OAuth which allows limited data to be shared between sites while protecting account credentials.

Syncing functionality includes:

Status updates synced from MySpace to Twitter and vice versa
Updates originating from MySpace will be noted as such on Twitter and vice versa
Status syndication can be enabled for one-way or two-way
When updates post to Twitter, readers have a link back to MySpace to make commenting easy
Enables on-the-go status syncing (for Twitter and MySpace Mobile – WAP and apps)
Open authentication technology (OAuth) protects account credentials and data shared between sites

Comments

Celebrities Syncing Their MySpace and Twitter Accounts

Chris Crum — Mon, 21 Sep 2009 20:47:42 +0000

MySpace is touting the fact that a bunch of celebrities have already synced their MySpace and Twitter accounts. The feature was just announced today, and MySpace has already issued an announcement listing a number of celebrities taking advantage of it.

When the feature is activated, a user's status update will appear in their Twitter feed, and any Twitter feed update will appear in their MySpace Status & Mood.

Celebrities that are already using the feature include:

Lenny Kravitz
John Legend
Rachel Zoe
Margaret Cho
George Lopez
Jamie Kennedy
David Spade
Slash
Cat Deeley
Chamillionaire
Jim Gaffigan
David Alan Grier
Larry The Cable Guy
John Witherspoon

"This is only the beginning, as we plan to enable our users to sync their updates across even more networks," MySpace reminds us.

To set up syncing, users should go to "My Account" then setup the desired services they would like to sync. The company says you can sync to Twitter now, and that more networks will be available soon. After choosing a service, just click confirm.

MySpace Users Can Sync Updates with Twitter

Chris Crum — Mon, 21 Sep 2009 17:39:02 +0000

MySpace has announced that it is rolling out a feature that allows users to sync their status updates with their Twitter feed. The feature is available in beta to all US users.

A spokesperson for MySpace tells WebProNews that 55% of US Internet users ages 18-24 are on MySpace, compared to just 14% for Twitter (comScore) and that 31% of survey respondents who visit MySpace said they read other people’s updates on Twitter (source: Forrester, 8/09).

When a user takes advantage of this feature, their status update will appear in their Twitter feed, and any Twitter feed update will appear in their MySpace Status & Mood.

"At MySpace, we believe in open content distribution and want to help users socialize around content in many different places," says MySpace Senior Product Manager Sharon Nguyen. "Your status update is a quick way to tell friends what you’re up to, or in to. Our new sync functionality is part of an ongoing effort to make it simple for people to share their status beyond MySpace and allow friends and followers to interact with that content Web-wide."

MySpace's syncing functionality includes:

- Status updates synced from MySpace to Twitter and vice versa

- Updates originating from MySpace will be noted as such on Twitter and vice versa

- Status syndication can be enabled for one-way or two-way

- When updates post to Twitter, readers have a link back to MySpace to make commenting easy

- Enables on-the-go status syncing (for Twitter and MySpace Mobile – WAP and apps)

- Open authentication technology (OAuth) protects account credentials and data shared between sites

To set it up, users should go to "My Account" then setup the desired services they would like to sync. The company says you can sync to Twitter now, and that more networks will be available soon. After choosing a service, just click confirm.

MySpace Opens Up Recommendation Engine

Chris Crum — Wed, 16 Sep 2009 12:40:40 +0000

MySpace has announced an open source framework for "distributed computation," which is ultimately a recommendation engine. It's called Qizmt, and it's the feature the social network currently uses for its "People you may Know" feature.

"Qizmt can be used for many operations that require processing large amounts of data such as collaborative filtering for recommendations and analytics," explains MySpace COO Mike Jones.

Qizmit's developer environment lets developers code in a "familiar setting," and the SQL interface allows for scripting against Qizmt.

MySpace has published the Qizmt code for developers to download and start contributing to. In addition, they have open sourced their MSFast, which is the company's technology that lets developers track page load performance and user experience data. Features of this include:

Measure the CPU hit and memory footprint of your pages as they render on the client’s browser
Review screen shots of the page while it renders
Review the rendered HTML on each point of the page’s lifecycle
Measure and show estimates of the time it takes to render each section of the page in different connection speeds
Validate the content of your page against a set of proven “best practice” rules of web development
Review downloaded files and show download time estimation on different bandwidths

MySpace is set to demonstrate Qizmt at the ComputerWorld Business Intelligence Perspectives conference taking place in Chicago today.

Windows Live Gets MySpace Activity Updates

Chris Crum — Mon, 14 Sep 2009 19:35:51 +0000

Microsoft and MySpace announced that Windows Live will now begin broadcasting MySpace user activity streams to the Windows Live Platform via MySpaceID. What this means is that users of Windows Live, Windows Live Messenger, and Hotmail, who are also MySpace users, will be able to see their friends':

- Status updates
- Blog Entries
- Photo uploads
- Music

MySpace's Windows Live MySpaceID implementation is built upon the activitystrea.ms open standard. MySpace calls the announcement "an important step forward" in the company's promotion of open standards.

"Utilizing an increasingly open Web enables our users to broadcast, discover, and express themselves in richer ways across multiple networks," says MySpace Group Architect Monica Ciberch.

To check out the MySpaceID integration, go here and sign into your Windows Live account, click "add web activities," choose MySpace from the options, add MySpace to your account, and then you can see your MySpace activities and share them with your Windows Live Network.

Standards for Activity Streams and more info about the activitystrea.ms api can be found here.

TweetDeck Harnesses MySpace, Goes TweetPhoto

Chris Crum — Wed, 09 Sep 2009 13:55:58 +0000

TweetDeck, the popular Twitter and more application, has expanded upon its Facebook-related features, and added MySpace into the mix. Users now have more control over the sorting of Facebook friends, and can update their MySpace status/mood from TweetDeck, just as they have been able to do with Facebook and Twitter.

"It's great to be able to see what your friends are up to with your own eyes, whether you’re around the corner or across the ocean," says TweetDeck. "The new fully powered Facebook stream lets you bring your friends closer by viewing photos, videos, links, wall posts, comments and more in TweetDeck. You can even preview entire albums of Facebook photos and see who’s tagged, without leaving TweetDeck."

Also starting today, TweetPhoto will be the default photo-sharing service provider in TweetDeck’s desktop and iPhone applications.

TweetPhoto offers developers over 35 APIs related to photo sharing. These include things like being able to favorite, vote, and comment on photos as well as geo-tags, photo streams, etc.

“We made a strategic decision when we started the company that we wanted to build a robust photo sharing platform; not just a website. By making a photo sharing platform available to developers we are allowing them the freedom to creatively tie our functionality into their applications. We have seen everything from Adobe Air applications, to mobile integrations to iPhone apps being built off of our Photo sharing API,” said TweetPhoto co-founder Rodney Rumford.

TweetDeck has also made some other adjustments. Users can click the Twitter button in the top left and add new columns or find their synced search and groups columns. They've also simplified the update window so users can paste or drag and drop links into the main space, where it will automatically be shortened and added to a tweet. Buttons are now above the tweet box instead of under it, and they've added the following features:

- Minimize to tray.

- Post photos to Twitter via TweetPhoto.

- Ability to add a Bit.ly account.

- Quick Profile – Simply enter a Twitter name to view profiles in TweetDeck.

- Better follower management.

The new version of TweetDeck can be found here.

Twitter Is Ahead Of MySpace In The UK

Jordan McCollum — Tue, 01 Sep 2009 19:44:48 +0000

Twitter, media sweetheart and microblogging service extraordinaire, has another coup to add to its list: they’ve now beat out MySpace in terms of most visits in the UK.

Remember MySpace? The overhyped media sweetheart before Twitter and Facebook? Hitwise UK reports that Twitter is now the 27th most visited website in the UK. This is a complete, stunning, and utter defeat to MySpace, coming in at a distant 28th . However, the traffic trends over time look pretty alarming:

However, Twitter is not the most popular social site in the UK. That honor belongs to the reigning champ, Facebook. YouTube was #2, Bebo came in at #3, and then Twitter and MySpace.

Meanwhile, Twitter may already be on the decline as far as media coverage goes. (Then again, being featured on 60 Minutes—heck, having 60 Minutes as a member—is probably a sign you’ve jumped the hype shark.)

What do you think? How long until Twitter takes out Bebo, YouTube and Facebook? Or will its limited utility limit its growth (someday)?

Comments

MySpace And Facebook Top Social Networking Sites For Display Ads

Mike Sachoff — Tue, 01 Sep 2009 18:38:59 +0000

Social networking sites in the U.S. accounted for more than 20 percent of all display ads viewed online in July, with MySpace and Facebook combining to serve more than 80 percent of ads, according to a new report from comScore.

"Over the past few years, social networking has become one of the most popular online activities, accounting for a significant portion of the time Internet users spend online and the pages they consume," said Jeff Hackett, comScore senior vice president.

"Social networking sites now account for one out of every five ads people view online. Because the top social media sites can deliver high reach and frequency against target segments at a low cost, it appears that some advertisers are eager to use social networking sites as a new advertising delivery vehicle."

AT&T was the top display advertiser on social networking sites during the month with more than 2 billion ad impressions, which accounted for 30 percent of the company's total number of display ads delivered during July.

Experian Interactive, which delivered a large amount of ads for educational degree programs and credit scores, ranked second with nearly 1.3 billion impressions.

Two of the top ten advertisers on social networking sites during the month delivered the majority of impressions within the category. Pangea Media, which mainly advertises a variety of love and celebrity quizzes, delivered 90 percent of its ads on social networking sites, while online gaming provider Zynga delivered 97 percent of its ads on these sites.

"Social media is becoming an increasingly attractive vehicle for major advertisers seeking to optimize campaign reach and frequency and smaller advertisers desiring to reach a highly targeted audience," said Hackett.

"As social networking sites innovate on their existing ad offerings, the category should continue to grow in ad volume, while CPMs could also increase if the sites can demonstrate a high campaign ROI."

Twitter Tops MySpace In UK, Spurs Data Center Expansion

Doug Caverly — Tue, 01 Sep 2009 13:51:32 +0000

Although the maximum length of tweets remains locked at 140 characters, Twitter itself is turning into something of a giant. This morning, there's news that the site managed to beat MySpace in terms of UK Internet visits, and it also seems to have caused a data center specialist to find new facilities.

Let's hit the MySpace-related development first. In truth, Twitter's accomplishment here isn't as impressive as it might sound; Twitter's conquest is probably due more to MySpace's fall than its own rise.

Still, Hitwise's Robin Goad wrote, "Last week Twitter received more UK Internet visits than MySpace for the first time. As the chart below illustrates, for the week ending 29/08/09 Twitter.com picked up 1 in every 400 UK Internet visits and ranked as the 27th most visited website in the UK, one position above MySpace."

Then there's the data center issue to consider. NTT America, which works with Twitter, has set up in a second facility, thereby expanding its footprint by 15,000 square feet. And Rich Miller recalled that, in June, NTT COO Kazuhiro Gomi said, "[T]raffic generated by Twitter is getting so big, it's basically eating up a lot of our data center network resources, especially the segment where Twitter is hosted."

Together, these incidents appear to show that Twitter's growing quickly on both sides of the Atlantic.

Content Sites More Popular Than Social Networks

Mike Sachoff — Thu, 27 Aug 2009 14:59:40 +0000

The majority (53.1%) of Internet users belong to at least one social networking site, but the amount of time spent on the sites is somewhat short, compared to overall time spent online, according to a new report from Burst Media.

Among 18-34 year olds, 40 percent spend less than 30 minutes per day on sites like Facebook and MySpace. The top content categories for that demographic actively seek out entertainment news (48.6%), gaming (40.5%), local/national news (37.3%) and social media (35.5%).

More than half of boomers are viewing local/national news (55.8%) content, two out of five (41.6%) are viewing shopping/comparison content, and 40.2 percent are viewing health information.

Age impacts the use of social networking sites with 77.4 percent of 18-34 year olds belonging to social networking sites, compared to 47.5 percent of baby boomers. Women overall (56.5% versus 50.6% of men) across all age segments are more likely than men to belong to a social networking site.

"There is no denying the fact that social networks are hugely popular, but it is important to recognize that Internet users still spend a significant portion of their time online visiting content sites," said Chuck Moran, Vice President of Marketing at Burst Media.

"The results of this survey reveal a tremendous opportunity for marketers to utilize both social media and the thousands of high quality Long Tail web sites to reach their target audiences."

Toshiba Launches Social Network for Employees

Mike Sachoff — Mon, 24 Aug 2009 15:10:30 +0000

Toshiba announced today it is launching a social business network called eXCHANGE, aimed at connecting its sales, service, administrative and corporate employees in the U.S.

Toshiba says eXCHANGE is similar to other social networks, such as Facebook, LinkedIN or MySpace and it will offer members an online forum to share and seek information, including best sales practices, user generated information and product tips.

Bill Melo
VP Marketing & Enterprise
Services and Solutions
Toshiba

"Toshiba eXCHANGE is exciting because of its user-generated content and leading-edge technology, but most importantly because of the opportunity it provides our extended Toshiba family members to easily connect and share knowledge," said Bill Melo, Vice President, Marketing & Enterprise Services and Solutions, TABS.

"It's estimated that only 20 percent of an organization's knowledge is actually captured in written documents, while the remaining value-rich information resides exclusively in the heads of employees. Toshiba eXCHANGE gives members the chance to easily document, share and seek that remaining 80 percent of information, therefore creating new opportunities for sales and service success."

eXCHANGE tools include:

Detailed profiles of online eXCHANGE members that will enable users to connect directly to other Toshiba sales professionals
Blogs that will keep members aware of ongoing product and program updates
Video clips that will provide education and product launch information
Content ratings, which will help indicate the value of information and content
RSS Feeds/tags that mark key interest areas for users
Intelligent searches that will help members locate information quickly and easily

The social networking site is currently available to select users in a Beta version. It will launch to all eligible members on September 8.