The latest Hitwise Consumer Generated Media Report reveals that MySpace’s dominance over other social networks shows no signs of slowing down. MySpace has a market share of 81.92% among the social networks, with users spending over 30 minutes on the site in an average session. This is the second-longest session time in the survey, with only the more child– and game-centric Gaia Online beating it. This increased dominance is ironic, since readers may recall two prominent newspapers saying it was all over for the network just a couple of weeks ago.
However, the site’s users may well also belong to other networks, which are also showing strong growth. A quarter of visits to the other networks come from MySpace. I expect that this trend will continue and that different networks will come to specialise in different areas. MySpace has always been strong when it comes to music, so it would make sense for others to work on presenting themselves as the ‘place to be’ for nightlife, fashion, sports, movies, games, etc.
The report is available for free here, though you do have to register.
These are the highlights on social networks:
Social networking websites have emerged to become an integral part of web activity for many Internet users – in September 2006, one in every 20 Internet visits went to one of the top 20 social networks, nearly double the share of visits compared to a year ago.
- In September 2006, the market share of visits to the top 20 social networking websites accounted for 4.9% of all Internet visits. This was an increase of 94% compared to September 2005.
- The growth of MySpace has outpaced the category, with its market share of visits increasing by 129% in the past year, and 51% the six months between March 2006 and September 2006.
- Users of social networking sites tend to belong to more than one network: in September 2006, 24% of visits to the remaining 19 websites in the social networking custom category came directly from MySpace. Other fast growing social networks between March and September 2006 were Bolt, up 271%; Bebo, up 95%; Orkut, up 63%; and Gaia Online, up 41%.
- The share of upstream traffic from MySpace to the Telecommunications, Shopping and Classifieds, Banks and Financial Institutions, and Travel categories increased by over 70% from March to September 2006.
- The Shopping and Classifieds sub-categories receiving the largest share of visits from MySpace in September 2006 were Music, Ticketing, Apparel and Accessories, Auctions, and Video and Games, reflecting the interests of MySpace users.
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MySpace will cool down just as Friends Reunited has. Back in the early days, Friends Reunited had a huge following, where people from all ages went on it, my school years expanded from 5 names to around a hundred plus, but it hit a saturation point. People went on found their friends and then left. very few new names appear now. However if you look at the years just gone then there’s still traffic and again there’s traffic from the brand extensions. It follows a well-trodden path, of hype followed by fast growth, followed by a reduction to a plateau where it will probably stay for the rest of it’s natural life, or it may just dwindle to nothing. With friends reunited It’s a mass market and it appeals to everyone. With MySpace the curve will be diffeernt, we’ve had the hype and I’d guess we’re hitting the peak, from now on it’s a downward slide to a plateau. But that plateau is going to be much lower than Friends reunited. There are enough new 15–25 year olds that will replace the ones that leave, but it really hasn’t got the mass market apppeal that Friends has. In terms of trends it’s not quite a hula-hoop, or clackers, or a rubiks cube, it’s more of a skateboard.
marcus
Hey Marcus. I’m sure it will cool down eventually, just not *right now* as some of the naysayers have stated. Saying it’s not mass-market because it appeals more to a certain age group is a bit like saying Girls Aloud aren’t mass-market.
Friends Reunited is a tricky one. In some senses its model doomed it to failure. There was absolutely nothing else to do once you’d re-united. Also I’m told ITV stopped all development and simply tried to milk it as an advertising vehicle after its purchase.
I reckon MySpace is more like Top Trumps than skateboards…
Sorry, I meant that MySpace is mass-market now, as it’s in the hype stage, so everyone from kids to grannies have probably seen it and used it, but once it leaves the hype stage, it will settle down to a core audience. And yes it won’t be right now, I give it another 6 months of hype, and then it will crash down to the settle-down audience.
The settle-down core audience of Friends is 18-death, where as MySpace the core is youth and particularly music fans.
Mmmm…
Two things. (a) Friends was never anything like the size of MySpace now.
which means (b) the stickiness of their network is really strong. You can’t really get out.
However, I think they would do well to work on giving users more to do. I think maintaining your profile and cultivating non-existent friends could grow pretty thin. If they increased the photo storage space (only 6 pics at the moment IIRC) for example, and made it compatible with mobile phone uploads, they could really lock people down for life. Maybe incorporate event planning stuff too.
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