Rumors are flying.
“MySpace is getting a complete redesign.”
“MySpace is getting bought out.”
“MySpace is losing money.”
When rumors like these start flying, it’s normally a bad sign, but it doesn’t mean it can’t be fixed. The Social Network’s meteoric rise and subsequent decline in users to Facebook has created these rumors, but there are still strengths that can be exploited. If they are going to make it, they will need to make some changes, but more importantly, they will need to rethink their focus and reimpose their will through marketing-guided changes.
Instead of making it the easiest platform to spam and game, they need to appeal to their current best demographic, teens, pre- and post-, and create ways for them to stay with MySpace instead of defecting as they get older to Facebook or someone else. More importantly, they MUST expand to the business sector. Sounds ridiculous, I know, when you consider the current state of the company and the growing disdain towards its inner-workings. Stay with me while I explain.
First, the teens, pre- and post-. As the young grow up, many will with limited doubts migrate to Facebook. Call it graduation. If MySpace will create divisions that will compartmentalize the different age groups, it would be possible to have subdomains to host the profiles. For example, kids.myspace.com, teens.myspace.com, college.myspace.com, etc. Their profiles would follow them through each step, and they would be able to add new features, create better, more complicated themes, etc. This would help to keep them on board for the long haul.
Critics will say that anyone, regardless of age, can join these. With a network as large as MySpace, this is unavoidable, regardless of grouping format. The advantage will be that those who are genuinely in the appropriate group will be more engaged with their own age. Will preteens join college groups? Yes. Will middle-age creeps join youthful groups? Yes. Identity masking is happening anyway. MySpace can work on that end of their problem. I’m just looking to show how to keep the members as they grow.
Now, onto the business focus. This is the Internet. More importantly, this is Web 2.0, 2.5, 3.0, whatever you want to dub it currently. Even with the onslaught of new websites and social networks entering the market, the demand is still outpacing the supply. Businesses are “going social” with no clear direction as to which way to do it.
Companies are demanding a platform to market their products, and while Facebook is the best gig in town for this, they are still limited by the fact that not everyone knows about them. It’s still relatively new, and if you were to poll a thousand business owners (not in a tech field) about which name they know, most will still recognize MySpace over Facebook.
If MySpace can redesign their product AND redirect their marketing efforts, perhaps even soliciting with a true sales force, they can take advantage of the limited credibility they still have. Granted, the credibility is based upon ignorance, but still, credibility is credibility. The checks are all cashable.
I propose a very simple, low cost (not free, as free can sometimes imply no value) solution for companies to enter the social web with little of not effort on their part. If MySpace would offer business marketing services that would include other social media arenas such as YouTube and Flickr, they can succeed for a long time. It wouldn’t be a hard sale: describe Google Universal Search, show it in practice at Ask.com, and show how people are getting ads brought to them in lieu of going after or searching for the data and products they need.
Business owners would jump through hoops and fork over credit card numbers in bulk. That is the only way to fix MySpace for long-term success.
The article linked to below from mashable.com takes the rumors of a MySpace.com make-over and turns it into a soapbox from which to talk about the corporate evils within the organization and regarding the functionality and design. We’ll leave that to Mr. Hopkins for now. Mr. Hopkins Story on Mashable
This post was written by...
JD Rucker – who has written 512 posts on Soshable | Social Media Blog. JD Rucker is a social media enthusiast who resides in Orange County, California. He works simultaneously for 2 companies - TK Carsites (an Automotive Internet Marketing Firm) and Hasai (a Social Media Strategy Firm). He writes for several publications including BusinessInsider, Fast Company, Techi, Top Cultured, and ICanHasInternets. Follow him on Twitter, Facebook, and Google+.
{ 7 comments… read them below or add one }
Hold your horses! Alexa still have myspace as a higher ranking site in the past three months.
Myspace still enjoys a larger market share than facebook.
I think commenting that Myspace is in need of saving is a bit premature.
MySpace has been losing value for a year now. They are going down because facebook is so much cleaner. Less spam and better layout.
Myspace still receives well over double the traffic that Facebook gets. That’s a pretty significant gap. I wouldn’t say they need to throw everything away and start from scratch just yet.
@Vertigo,
Absolutely! I agree. No need to scrap everything, but to use an analogy, if you’re winning a car race, you see someone in your rearview mirror, and you feel like your car isn’t performing up to par, you need to make a pit stop so you can make sure you’re still going at top speeds.
MySpace doesn’t need to enter panic mode. They need to make plans and implement changes because the market is leaning away from them. It isn’t about what’s happening today as much as it’s about the future. Act early (after all, it won’t hurt the prouct the way it sits now) and prepare.
I use a Myspace to promote my band, and it’s most definitely broken… Many features don’t work at all, one of the most vital features for bands, the ability to contact friends based on location has been disabled.
Myspace is a very difficult tool to use for folks who want to target their promotion, and recent changes have made it more so, but it’s easy for those who want to spam or do non-focused blanket promotion.
It seems many touring bands, who are one of myspace’s primary content providers, are looking for somewhere else.
If the content is gone, and nothing but spam and paid advertising remain, I think folks will abandon ship very quickly…
A-
Myspace is loosing money, recently we have seen a few changes to the design yeah. i doubt it will be being bought out though. Hardly anyone cares about Myspace anymore, its yesterdays new. We’re now botherd about Facebook, Sceneparty, Youtube ect..
myspace profile work let lme login
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