Feedback for: Monetizing the Social Networks
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Monetizing the Social Networks by Gary Stein
I couldn't agree more. I came to the conclusion from a marketer's perspective and the desire to shift the marketing spend away from spray marketing toward targeting the folks who actually have the relationships that I am looking for.
For that reason I founded Salesconx. Businesses (mostly small businesses), marketers, and selling professionals come to our site to buy and sell introductions/appointments to decision makers. FastCompany called us LinkedIn meets eBay.
Salesconx consists of 3,700-plus frontline experts in the realms of sales, marketing, business development, and small business. We are adding 20-plus new users on a daily basis, but more important, we are allowing business owners, selling professionals, and marketing exec to monetize their Rolodexes by introducing other businesses and marketers to their business contacts.
Evan Sohn
Let's start with the challenge. Providing a social network is not free, and an organization must recoup their money and at least break, if not make a profit. Marketing directly to their social networks, getting either a fee for the service or (more likely) paid on actions is really no different than a sales position and thus this becomes a multilayer marketing (MLM) program.
Generating some revenue, somehow, is a business requirement, and social network are not an exception. Monetization of social networks can not be about advertising (at least not in totality). Advertising on the Internet is good for branding. The strategy behind the monetization of social networks must focus on the target market and having a call to action that results in a business transaction. This is monetization.
Monetization of social networks has failed thus far for one simple reason: vendors are focused on what they do and how to exploit what they do on a platform. Everyone wants to cash in, but they are failing to address simple marketing rules we learned back in Business Administration 101 -- deliver value to customers. This means a) understanding a target market of customers served; b) understanding how and why they use social networks; and c) what can be delivered to the target market to give them incremental value that is distinguishable from what others offer.
The monetization model I have defined addresses points a, b, and c. It leverages the capabilities of social graphing and exposed connections inherent in the platform. It facilitates immediate, real-time buying/selling with no searching, no wait-and-see bidding, and no spam. It executes on target marketing and sales perfection of supply-and-demand rules.
Feel free to join the Social Network Solutions LinkedIn Group.
Steve Goldner
Nice column. Check out Visa Business Network on Facebook. It just came out a couple weeks ago and is very similar to what you're writing about. Also in a more oblique way, a site called Associated Content has some elements of getting paid for sharing content. Not exactly what you're projecting, but with a couple twists it has the same potential.
Bob Johnson
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