Social media’s space has become so crowded that CNBC now has a Social Media stock analyst whose entire specialty are the social media stocks. Groupon, LinkedIn, Google and the closely watched upcoming Facebook IPO including commentary on its pre-IPO private market performance.
Goliath Google launches +
Google launched it’s own social network, Google+, in July 2011 hoping to compete with wide-eyed 27-year old Mark Zuckerberg’s dominant Facebook. How’s the Goliath’s social network done? It’s proven that sometimes the old legend of David and Goliath still holds true. Google+ has declined for 5 consecutive months in referral traffic despite it’s 260MM Gmail users, and has seen its share of referral traffic drop by 82% since launching. Right now it’s looking more like Google- than Google+ yet I give them credit for staying the course with their vision.
Charlie Bit My Finger
Charlie’s brother became a YouTube star when nearly 28MM visitors watched Charlie bite his finger via YouTube. Did someone at Google forget they own the social network powerhouse that is ranked #3 in the world and has nearly 3MM sites referring traffic to it? YouTube, which Google bought in ’06 for $1.65B, has 33% of the global internet traffic market share, daily. Did they really need to reinvent the entire wheel rather than simply leverage this asset and integrate new features?
Facebook’s unstoppable force
The dominant source of referral traffic, 1000 times more referrals than Google+ (wow, talk about competition). The #1 site in the world. New applications installed 20MM times each day. 800MM users each month and from every country imaginable. Besides kicking every other social media platforms toukas, Facebook’s simply the best and the most fun. Why?
It’s where your friends, family and old schoolmates are at and it’s where the new fun, creative games and applications can be found. It’s easy to use and fun to check in with whether you’re on your phone, iPad or computer. Can Facebook’s dominance be stopped? We have yet to see a true competitor that can match it but until they arrive, this is one place that you want your brand to dominate in your industry.
Social brand power
Personal brand or business brand, these networks and their users have tremendous influence and power. Where do you spend your time? On the network with the most influence of course and that’s Facebook. The other networks lag far behind yet coming in second is StumbleUpon, YouTube and LinkedIn. Professionals, go to LinkedIn, Facebook and Twitter. Business owners and leaders, hit up Facebook, YouTube and Twitter along with integrating blogs. Both groups can think of YouTube as your Google integration since Google+ is more of a minus for now.
