Social networks, development prospects and ways to monetize. Part 3
The third part of my report at the UA WEB conference about social networks. The theme of the part: ways to monetize social networks .
For those who missed, I advise you to first read the first part and the second part.
There are social networks, they are popular, they have excellent development prospects, but they still need to be monetized. This is a business, and a business must be profitable.
For projects such as social networks, sales are still one of the main ways to monetize, if it can be called a way to monetize at all.
')
The scheme is very simple: create an interesting project, recruit users and sell Google, well, or, in extreme cases, Yahoo !, Microsoft, and for Runet - Finam.
This is due to the fact that many social networks are unprofitable. They require a huge amount of resources to maintain performance (staff, servers and data centers, expensive development, etc.), and their profits are often lacking. Therefore, now, in order to create a good competitive social network, it is necessary to attract large investments.
In 2007, Microsoft bought 1.6% of the social network Facebook for $ 240 million, thus valuing this second most popular social network in the world at $ 15 billion! An ideal example for demonstrating the “make and sell” monetization strategy, although on the other hand there is an opinion that the cost was frankly overstated, Microsoft did not let its main competitor on the Internet, Google, which a year earlier pledged to pay the MySpace social network, the first in popularity. owned by News Corporation, $ 900 million over 3 years for introducing Google’s search service with advertising messages.
In turn, Google in 2006 bought a social network - YouTube, built on the basis of video content for $ 1.65 billion, moreover paying with its shares! At the time of purchase, the social network was unprofitable, it consisted of 67 employees and large storage capacity. Google has prompted the promise of advertising in online video, its rapid growth and desire to take the lead in this market even at its inception.
Earlier, there was an equally interesting purchase of the MySpace social network in 2005 by News Corporation for $ 580 million.
Does not lag behind the west and runet on the pace of sale of social networks. In March 2007, the Russian-language social network MyKrug was bought by such a giant as Yandex. The amount of the transaction was not disclosed, experts estimate it from $ 1.5 to $ 5 million.
A bit later, the share of the most popular social network in Runet - Odnoklassniki.Ru was bought at a rate of 30% for $ 10 million by the Latvian company Forticom, thereby estimating the resource as a whole at more than $ 30 million, and now some estimate it at more than $ 100 million ., at $ 10 million for one million registrations.
Observing this trend, many new projects at the inception stage immediately adopt a strategy to sell out soon, thereby confirming the words of A.V. Suvorov: "Imitation is the recognition of the lack of their own abilities." Although the main objective of the business is achieved - it turns out a large profit in a relatively short period of time.
Some experts believe that another bubble is awaiting us, like the dot-com crash in March 2000 , and they call this phenomenon bubble 2.0. Although I do not share this opinion, in the 90s projects were bought for huge sums, without any model of return on investment, now there are quite a lot of return on investment models, the most common is the model that Google actually created - advertising . And for social networks, this model is most welcome: information about users allows you to give the most accurate and interesting advertising, which, of course, greatly increases its effectiveness. Although there is still a reassessment of projects, and there is no getting away from it.
However, not all so simple. Effectively implement this model is quite difficult, and the costs of social networks are great. From this it turns out that many projects still remain unprofitable, which conceals a great risk. After all, the unprofitable business is closed sooner or later. Thus, we get two sides of the same coin: on the one hand, there are quite a lot of opportunities for monetization and gaining profitability, and on the other hand, this process is rather complicated, and so far few have been able to bring it to life. As usual, the West is ahead in terms of this indicator, projects there are already beginning to become profitable (for example, Facebook, which last year earned profits of about $ 150 million, and its expenses for the same period amounted to only $ 30 million).
Advertising is the most common model of monetization in modern Internet projects and especially in social networks.
Social networks have access to two important sources of information:
1. Profile and information completed by the user
2. His behavior, involuntarily given information
Based on profiles, social networks can effectively target advertising: by gender, age, income, profession, etc. Thus, you can show the most accurate advertising that is likely to be of interest to the user.
I will give an example: let's say, an advertising agency from Kiev organizes a paid professional seminar-training on PR. The target audience is professional figures in the advertising industry, and it’s PR people from Kiev with an income level of more than $ 1,000 per month. An advertising agency has a large selection of media for this event (magazines, banner and contextual advertising, radio, television, etc.). Many methods imply a certain targeting for a specific audience, perhaps this is a specific broadcast time on the radio, perhaps these are specialized marketing magazines, perhaps this is contextual advertising targeting Kiev, but there is no maximum exact targeting! What can give us a social network? A social network can show an advertising message only to the target group: professional PR specialists, who have a similar position, aged 25 to 60, with income from 1000 to 6000 $ living in Kiev, who read and watch content on PR (based on action analysis). The number of 1000 people is determined in advance by the above parameters, while the advertising message is addressed to each user by their first and last names with the words “Dear” or “Dear”, and the advertiser receives a report on the reading of the advertising message or the number of page views with this advertisement.
The cost of one such message to determine one dollar. As a result, the advertiser will pay only $ 1000 for reading the advertising message from 1000 people from the target audience, and the social network will earn $ 1000 in just one message and one day. Efficiency is obvious, as well as the complexity of implementing such a mechanism.
But there is always a problem, and here the problem lies in the person himself. After all, I and any other users do not interfere with indicating in my profile that I am Bill Gates and work at Microsoft, and the system is unlikely to find a mistake as long as social networks do not have artificial intelligence. Then the second big mechanism comes into play - analysis of user actions .
I will give an example. I, as a person engaged in advertising on the Internet, Internet projects, social networks and similar things, can go into the social network MoiKrug and indicate the position of "electrician", plant "PromStanok", in the interests of writing "wiring, sockets, wires", income - 200 $ per month, and age - 50 years. But I have absolutely no interest in anything related to electricity, and therefore it is quite clear that I will not enter this social network, or be interested in my real interests - advertising on the Internet and the system may well understand it. The easiest option: according to the communities I have entered into; by analyzing the text in the comments; on the headlines and texts of articles and news that I read; by the people I communicate with, etc. And based on this data, show me a specific advertisement.
The system can be built using both parameters simultaneously: if my profile and behavior are the same, I am 100% client; if not, then advertising can be shown by interests, or, in extreme cases, by profile, if there is no other advertising, more suitable.
But targeting is not the only advertising advantage of social networks. There are quite a few other ways in the field of branding, PR, viral advertising and other advertising, which will be effective thanks to the very concept of social networks.
For example, a rather interesting and very popular technique in the west is the branded communities . The idea is to create a community of companies in which the life of these companies is actively covered, employees write, they discuss offers in the most popular social networks and invite all interested users there. This is not a direct and unobtrusive advertisement; users are loyal to it.
We should also highlight the political advertising in social networks. There are very interesting examples of this ad: for example, there was an interesting case when Australian politician Kevin Rudd used social networks such as MySpace, FaceBook, YouTube and others in 2007 to build his advertising campaign and achieved great success! Although the election did not win, but was close to that. It only says one thing: social networks are no longer just fashionable entertainment, but a strong advertising tool, and if people and companies can achieve big goals with their help, then they are ready to pay big money for it, all that remains is to give them that opportunity.
Another method of advertising in social networks can be called recommendations . As you know, psychologically the most powerful advertising is the recommendation of friends, relatives, acquaintances to buy a product or service. This is perfectly understood by FaceBook and first tried to introduce such a mechanism by force, when “recommendations” came from the user without his consent, which caused a wave of discontent, and over time, this social network replaced this function with a more loyal - Market Lodge, when users give recommendations on their own desire and get for it 10% of the value of the advertised product. By the way, by doing so, he began to implement another strong monetization model, in which a social network shares a part of its profits with users.
Another interesting way can be the creation of an advertising platform, similar in principle to contextual advertising , with the definition of CPC on the basis of the auction, text ads (and in some cases, graphic). But you also need to give advertisers the opportunity to target an advertising message at least based on the profile and the data in it. Such a technique will greatly improve the effectiveness of advertising and at the same time increase the cost per click on many topics and bring it to an acceptable maximum, which companies are willing to pay. Especially this method will be effective for networks with a large audience, for example, MySpace or Odnoklassniki.ru, which can easily find advertisers.
Then you can consider social networks as an excellent platform for launching viral advertising (advertising message that is distributed on the principle of the human virus, from person to person, is considered relatively inexpensive and effective advertising technique), which is often done now. But so far there has been no purposeful functionality for this purpose. It is quite easy to come up with a mechanism for submitting a virus message to top participants, the so-called opinion leaders, who will then easily spread it (especially if they receive a percentage for it). In this case, the social network mediates and receives a percentage. You can also run virus messages directly to users with your own social network, but it will be more difficult, although the potential profit will be more.
We should not forget about such a powerful tool as sponsorship . There are many communities in social networks, each of which can be sponsored. This can be expressed in a variety of ways: from a banal payment for placing a logo to organizing professional or amateur meetings at the expense of the sponsoring company.
In addition, no one took standard advertising from social networks, for example, banners or context.
Paid services are the second most popular way to monetize social networks. Most networks have any paid services, most often, these are inexpensive ways to highlight users or help achieve some goal, such as selling something.
The most "delicious" method can be called mediation . Humanity has long been engaged in and engaged in intermediary services. The main thing in this method is to create a convenient mechanism for the sellers and buyers of something + the popularity of the social network, the result is a constant cash flow to the cash desk of the social network, while the social network does almost nothing, the right mechanism automates everything. The cost should be small and be accessible to almost all users of the network. It is also very important that the services can be easily paid, it is unlikely that an ordinary person will run to the bank to transfer $ 5 of a social network. A good example of this concept is the same FaceBook and its marketplace tool (http://www.facebook.com/marketplace/) - a platform for users to sell products: each has its own page and special small ads that you can advertise to others for money. network users, the cost of $ 1. The tool brings the social network about $ 1 million per month.
To create another failsafe paid service, it is worth referring to the human device, and, in particular, psychology . It is known that it is important for any person to attract the attention of others, it is important to stand out, show oneself. This is especially true for a teenage audience. And for such opportunities, people are willing to pay and pay. This is well shown to us all sorts of dating services, they checked this principle first. In social networks, people also meet and communicate, and it is also important for them to stand out. Therefore, the creation of such services is especially important and can bring great profits (for example, this method has recently used the social network VKontakte, it has a service with which you can vote via sms for your rating and thus stand out). This technique is applicable not only for teenage social networks, but also for business networks, for example, you can give an opportunity to stand out in a certain thematic community, in a special place “Looking for a partner” or “Looking for an investor”. For a certain amount of people will be ready in a similar way to find the right contacts.
Of course, a separate item to select virtual goods . The most common gifts can be considered. In many social networks such virtual items are free, but there are also paid ones. Ideal option to give a lot of free and part of the unique paid gifts. Then users will not remain offended, and the social network will earn. Such gifts are, for example, at FaceBook (paid) and MoiMir (free). However, you can sell anything you want, it's more a fantasy.
Above were listed the main and most common ways of monetization, but monetization on them does not exhaust itself. There are some less well-known, but no less promising ways.
One of such methods is recruitment in the social network. As mentioned earlier, social networks are a huge storehouse of information given voluntarily and involuntarily by different people. Therefore, it is quite logical to use social networks in order to recruit staff at the level of social networks themselves, rather than individual users. In social networks, you can see the user profile, you can determine his behavior, approximate knowledge, attitude to work, character, and much more. With such information, companies can select new employees based on a pre-made portrait, which will fit into the team as efficiently as possible and have confidence in their knowledge and experience, as well as other equally important features of a person. Naturally, such an opportunity causes a great interest of many firms, and, most importantly, the business is willing to pay for these opportunities and often not a lot of money, because human resources are one of the main assets of a modern company. According to rumors, this method of monetization is actively used by the social network VKontakte, but official statements deny this and say that they do not receive money for it.
A little bit about knowledge. What is the most valuable thing in the world in the information age? Of course, information! Therefore, another very promising method of monetization is the sale of information . Especially effective for large networks: they can massively sell statistical information, conduct research for the order, including quantitative marketing research, trade access to selected content. You can even sell personal data (although this method causes great doubts because of its unethical and illegal nature, but if there is a demand, then sooner or later an offer will appear). There are a lot of options, you just need to study what information is needed and how much people and companies are willing to pay for it.
In the second part of the report, I talked about the development trend of social networking nicheves and explained why this is happening. In the third part, I called the methods of monetization, which will mainly be effective in large social networks. Niche social networks are most often interesting to a limited circle of people. From here comes the logical question: “How to monetize niche social networks?” The answer to the question is obvious and incomprehensible overnight: “Monetize with niche monetization methods!”.
For specialized or niche social networks, you can think up your own monetization methods that will use the unique aspects of projects. In each case, these methods will be different. For example, you can add your photo bank to the social network of photographers, where any member of the network can sell their photos through this service, and the social network can receive a percentage of all transactions. People communicate, sell and earn money on it, customers buy photos, and the social network considers money and everyone is happy.
But with all the methods of monetization, it is important not to forget about the user : do not overload the social network with advertising; not to go into the user's personal space (his profile), to give the opportunity to abandon certain functions and actions of the system, and, on the contrary, to share with the user profit, at least a small part of it. Then the user will thank the social network and bring her even more profit! And I believe that in the future those social networks that will build their monetization on “love for the user” and will share with it will be popular .
1) telnews.ru - Internet news
2) www.habrahabr.ru - Habrahabr
3) www.cybersecurity.ru - World news of high technology and science
4) webplanet.ru - Vebplanet
5) cnews.ru - High Tech Edition - Cnews
6) webmilk.ru - Internet dairy news
7) www.seonews.ru - Seonews.ru
8) internetno.net - Internet stuff
9) www.vz.ru - VIEW
10) www.w2.com.ua - Web 2.0 magazine
11) www.wikipedia.org - Wikipedia
12) dp.ru - DP.RU
13) www.social-networking.ru - Social networks - ABC of social networks
14) www.emarketer.com - Market research & statistics: Internet marketing, advertising & demographics - eMarketer
15) kommersant.ru - Kommersant Publishing House
16) www.liveidea.ru - LiveIdea
17) www.comscore.com - comScore, Inc
On this my report is over. All who liked it - thank you very much! Anyone who did not like it - I will try better! I am waiting for replenishment in karma :)
Copyright 2008, Nikita Andreevich Semenov
SECL GROUP , CEO
For those who missed, I advise you to first read the first part and the second part.
There are social networks, they are popular, they have excellent development prospects, but they still need to be monetized. This is a business, and a business must be profitable.
3.1. Cost increase
For projects such as social networks, sales are still one of the main ways to monetize, if it can be called a way to monetize at all.
')
The scheme is very simple: create an interesting project, recruit users and sell Google, well, or, in extreme cases, Yahoo !, Microsoft, and for Runet - Finam.
This is due to the fact that many social networks are unprofitable. They require a huge amount of resources to maintain performance (staff, servers and data centers, expensive development, etc.), and their profits are often lacking. Therefore, now, in order to create a good competitive social network, it is necessary to attract large investments.
In 2007, Microsoft bought 1.6% of the social network Facebook for $ 240 million, thus valuing this second most popular social network in the world at $ 15 billion! An ideal example for demonstrating the “make and sell” monetization strategy, although on the other hand there is an opinion that the cost was frankly overstated, Microsoft did not let its main competitor on the Internet, Google, which a year earlier pledged to pay the MySpace social network, the first in popularity. owned by News Corporation, $ 900 million over 3 years for introducing Google’s search service with advertising messages.
In turn, Google in 2006 bought a social network - YouTube, built on the basis of video content for $ 1.65 billion, moreover paying with its shares! At the time of purchase, the social network was unprofitable, it consisted of 67 employees and large storage capacity. Google has prompted the promise of advertising in online video, its rapid growth and desire to take the lead in this market even at its inception.
Earlier, there was an equally interesting purchase of the MySpace social network in 2005 by News Corporation for $ 580 million.
Does not lag behind the west and runet on the pace of sale of social networks. In March 2007, the Russian-language social network MyKrug was bought by such a giant as Yandex. The amount of the transaction was not disclosed, experts estimate it from $ 1.5 to $ 5 million.
A bit later, the share of the most popular social network in Runet - Odnoklassniki.Ru was bought at a rate of 30% for $ 10 million by the Latvian company Forticom, thereby estimating the resource as a whole at more than $ 30 million, and now some estimate it at more than $ 100 million ., at $ 10 million for one million registrations.
Observing this trend, many new projects at the inception stage immediately adopt a strategy to sell out soon, thereby confirming the words of A.V. Suvorov: "Imitation is the recognition of the lack of their own abilities." Although the main objective of the business is achieved - it turns out a large profit in a relatively short period of time.
Some experts believe that another bubble is awaiting us, like the dot-com crash in March 2000 , and they call this phenomenon bubble 2.0. Although I do not share this opinion, in the 90s projects were bought for huge sums, without any model of return on investment, now there are quite a lot of return on investment models, the most common is the model that Google actually created - advertising . And for social networks, this model is most welcome: information about users allows you to give the most accurate and interesting advertising, which, of course, greatly increases its effectiveness. Although there is still a reassessment of projects, and there is no getting away from it.
However, not all so simple. Effectively implement this model is quite difficult, and the costs of social networks are great. From this it turns out that many projects still remain unprofitable, which conceals a great risk. After all, the unprofitable business is closed sooner or later. Thus, we get two sides of the same coin: on the one hand, there are quite a lot of opportunities for monetization and gaining profitability, and on the other hand, this process is rather complicated, and so far few have been able to bring it to life. As usual, the West is ahead in terms of this indicator, projects there are already beginning to become profitable (for example, Facebook, which last year earned profits of about $ 150 million, and its expenses for the same period amounted to only $ 30 million).
3.2. Advertising
Advertising is the most common model of monetization in modern Internet projects and especially in social networks.
Social networks have access to two important sources of information:
1. Profile and information completed by the user
2. His behavior, involuntarily given information
Based on profiles, social networks can effectively target advertising: by gender, age, income, profession, etc. Thus, you can show the most accurate advertising that is likely to be of interest to the user.
I will give an example: let's say, an advertising agency from Kiev organizes a paid professional seminar-training on PR. The target audience is professional figures in the advertising industry, and it’s PR people from Kiev with an income level of more than $ 1,000 per month. An advertising agency has a large selection of media for this event (magazines, banner and contextual advertising, radio, television, etc.). Many methods imply a certain targeting for a specific audience, perhaps this is a specific broadcast time on the radio, perhaps these are specialized marketing magazines, perhaps this is contextual advertising targeting Kiev, but there is no maximum exact targeting! What can give us a social network? A social network can show an advertising message only to the target group: professional PR specialists, who have a similar position, aged 25 to 60, with income from 1000 to 6000 $ living in Kiev, who read and watch content on PR (based on action analysis). The number of 1000 people is determined in advance by the above parameters, while the advertising message is addressed to each user by their first and last names with the words “Dear” or “Dear”, and the advertiser receives a report on the reading of the advertising message or the number of page views with this advertisement.
The cost of one such message to determine one dollar. As a result, the advertiser will pay only $ 1000 for reading the advertising message from 1000 people from the target audience, and the social network will earn $ 1000 in just one message and one day. Efficiency is obvious, as well as the complexity of implementing such a mechanism.
But there is always a problem, and here the problem lies in the person himself. After all, I and any other users do not interfere with indicating in my profile that I am Bill Gates and work at Microsoft, and the system is unlikely to find a mistake as long as social networks do not have artificial intelligence. Then the second big mechanism comes into play - analysis of user actions .
I will give an example. I, as a person engaged in advertising on the Internet, Internet projects, social networks and similar things, can go into the social network MoiKrug and indicate the position of "electrician", plant "PromStanok", in the interests of writing "wiring, sockets, wires", income - 200 $ per month, and age - 50 years. But I have absolutely no interest in anything related to electricity, and therefore it is quite clear that I will not enter this social network, or be interested in my real interests - advertising on the Internet and the system may well understand it. The easiest option: according to the communities I have entered into; by analyzing the text in the comments; on the headlines and texts of articles and news that I read; by the people I communicate with, etc. And based on this data, show me a specific advertisement.
The system can be built using both parameters simultaneously: if my profile and behavior are the same, I am 100% client; if not, then advertising can be shown by interests, or, in extreme cases, by profile, if there is no other advertising, more suitable.
But targeting is not the only advertising advantage of social networks. There are quite a few other ways in the field of branding, PR, viral advertising and other advertising, which will be effective thanks to the very concept of social networks.
For example, a rather interesting and very popular technique in the west is the branded communities . The idea is to create a community of companies in which the life of these companies is actively covered, employees write, they discuss offers in the most popular social networks and invite all interested users there. This is not a direct and unobtrusive advertisement; users are loyal to it.
We should also highlight the political advertising in social networks. There are very interesting examples of this ad: for example, there was an interesting case when Australian politician Kevin Rudd used social networks such as MySpace, FaceBook, YouTube and others in 2007 to build his advertising campaign and achieved great success! Although the election did not win, but was close to that. It only says one thing: social networks are no longer just fashionable entertainment, but a strong advertising tool, and if people and companies can achieve big goals with their help, then they are ready to pay big money for it, all that remains is to give them that opportunity.
Another method of advertising in social networks can be called recommendations . As you know, psychologically the most powerful advertising is the recommendation of friends, relatives, acquaintances to buy a product or service. This is perfectly understood by FaceBook and first tried to introduce such a mechanism by force, when “recommendations” came from the user without his consent, which caused a wave of discontent, and over time, this social network replaced this function with a more loyal - Market Lodge, when users give recommendations on their own desire and get for it 10% of the value of the advertised product. By the way, by doing so, he began to implement another strong monetization model, in which a social network shares a part of its profits with users.
Another interesting way can be the creation of an advertising platform, similar in principle to contextual advertising , with the definition of CPC on the basis of the auction, text ads (and in some cases, graphic). But you also need to give advertisers the opportunity to target an advertising message at least based on the profile and the data in it. Such a technique will greatly improve the effectiveness of advertising and at the same time increase the cost per click on many topics and bring it to an acceptable maximum, which companies are willing to pay. Especially this method will be effective for networks with a large audience, for example, MySpace or Odnoklassniki.ru, which can easily find advertisers.
Then you can consider social networks as an excellent platform for launching viral advertising (advertising message that is distributed on the principle of the human virus, from person to person, is considered relatively inexpensive and effective advertising technique), which is often done now. But so far there has been no purposeful functionality for this purpose. It is quite easy to come up with a mechanism for submitting a virus message to top participants, the so-called opinion leaders, who will then easily spread it (especially if they receive a percentage for it). In this case, the social network mediates and receives a percentage. You can also run virus messages directly to users with your own social network, but it will be more difficult, although the potential profit will be more.
We should not forget about such a powerful tool as sponsorship . There are many communities in social networks, each of which can be sponsored. This can be expressed in a variety of ways: from a banal payment for placing a logo to organizing professional or amateur meetings at the expense of the sponsoring company.
In addition, no one took standard advertising from social networks, for example, banners or context.
3.3. Paid services
Paid services are the second most popular way to monetize social networks. Most networks have any paid services, most often, these are inexpensive ways to highlight users or help achieve some goal, such as selling something.
The most "delicious" method can be called mediation . Humanity has long been engaged in and engaged in intermediary services. The main thing in this method is to create a convenient mechanism for the sellers and buyers of something + the popularity of the social network, the result is a constant cash flow to the cash desk of the social network, while the social network does almost nothing, the right mechanism automates everything. The cost should be small and be accessible to almost all users of the network. It is also very important that the services can be easily paid, it is unlikely that an ordinary person will run to the bank to transfer $ 5 of a social network. A good example of this concept is the same FaceBook and its marketplace tool (http://www.facebook.com/marketplace/) - a platform for users to sell products: each has its own page and special small ads that you can advertise to others for money. network users, the cost of $ 1. The tool brings the social network about $ 1 million per month.
To create another failsafe paid service, it is worth referring to the human device, and, in particular, psychology . It is known that it is important for any person to attract the attention of others, it is important to stand out, show oneself. This is especially true for a teenage audience. And for such opportunities, people are willing to pay and pay. This is well shown to us all sorts of dating services, they checked this principle first. In social networks, people also meet and communicate, and it is also important for them to stand out. Therefore, the creation of such services is especially important and can bring great profits (for example, this method has recently used the social network VKontakte, it has a service with which you can vote via sms for your rating and thus stand out). This technique is applicable not only for teenage social networks, but also for business networks, for example, you can give an opportunity to stand out in a certain thematic community, in a special place “Looking for a partner” or “Looking for an investor”. For a certain amount of people will be ready in a similar way to find the right contacts.
Of course, a separate item to select virtual goods . The most common gifts can be considered. In many social networks such virtual items are free, but there are also paid ones. Ideal option to give a lot of free and part of the unique paid gifts. Then users will not remain offended, and the social network will earn. Such gifts are, for example, at FaceBook (paid) and MoiMir (free). However, you can sell anything you want, it's more a fantasy.
3.4. other methods
Above were listed the main and most common ways of monetization, but monetization on them does not exhaust itself. There are some less well-known, but no less promising ways.
One of such methods is recruitment in the social network. As mentioned earlier, social networks are a huge storehouse of information given voluntarily and involuntarily by different people. Therefore, it is quite logical to use social networks in order to recruit staff at the level of social networks themselves, rather than individual users. In social networks, you can see the user profile, you can determine his behavior, approximate knowledge, attitude to work, character, and much more. With such information, companies can select new employees based on a pre-made portrait, which will fit into the team as efficiently as possible and have confidence in their knowledge and experience, as well as other equally important features of a person. Naturally, such an opportunity causes a great interest of many firms, and, most importantly, the business is willing to pay for these opportunities and often not a lot of money, because human resources are one of the main assets of a modern company. According to rumors, this method of monetization is actively used by the social network VKontakte, but official statements deny this and say that they do not receive money for it.
A little bit about knowledge. What is the most valuable thing in the world in the information age? Of course, information! Therefore, another very promising method of monetization is the sale of information . Especially effective for large networks: they can massively sell statistical information, conduct research for the order, including quantitative marketing research, trade access to selected content. You can even sell personal data (although this method causes great doubts because of its unethical and illegal nature, but if there is a demand, then sooner or later an offer will appear). There are a lot of options, you just need to study what information is needed and how much people and companies are willing to pay for it.
3.5. Niche social networks and unique ways to monetize
In the second part of the report, I talked about the development trend of social networking nicheves and explained why this is happening. In the third part, I called the methods of monetization, which will mainly be effective in large social networks. Niche social networks are most often interesting to a limited circle of people. From here comes the logical question: “How to monetize niche social networks?” The answer to the question is obvious and incomprehensible overnight: “Monetize with niche monetization methods!”.
For specialized or niche social networks, you can think up your own monetization methods that will use the unique aspects of projects. In each case, these methods will be different. For example, you can add your photo bank to the social network of photographers, where any member of the network can sell their photos through this service, and the social network can receive a percentage of all transactions. People communicate, sell and earn money on it, customers buy photos, and the social network considers money and everyone is happy.
But with all the methods of monetization, it is important not to forget about the user : do not overload the social network with advertising; not to go into the user's personal space (his profile), to give the opportunity to abandon certain functions and actions of the system, and, on the contrary, to share with the user profit, at least a small part of it. Then the user will thank the social network and bring her even more profit! And I believe that in the future those social networks that will build their monetization on “love for the user” and will share with it will be popular .
Sources:
1) telnews.ru - Internet news
2) www.habrahabr.ru - Habrahabr
3) www.cybersecurity.ru - World news of high technology and science
4) webplanet.ru - Vebplanet
5) cnews.ru - High Tech Edition - Cnews
6) webmilk.ru - Internet dairy news
7) www.seonews.ru - Seonews.ru
8) internetno.net - Internet stuff
9) www.vz.ru - VIEW
10) www.w2.com.ua - Web 2.0 magazine
11) www.wikipedia.org - Wikipedia
12) dp.ru - DP.RU
13) www.social-networking.ru - Social networks - ABC of social networks
14) www.emarketer.com - Market research & statistics: Internet marketing, advertising & demographics - eMarketer
15) kommersant.ru - Kommersant Publishing House
16) www.liveidea.ru - LiveIdea
17) www.comscore.com - comScore, Inc
On this my report is over. All who liked it - thank you very much! Anyone who did not like it - I will try better! I am waiting for replenishment in karma :)
Copyright 2008, Nikita Andreevich Semenov
SECL GROUP , CEO
Source: https://habr.com/ru/post/23636/
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