Oct
12
2007Roll Your Own Social Network
12
2007
Originally posted on HHCC.com on March 2nd, 2007
It’s always been a key tenet of advertising that you need to be where the people are. These days that means in online social networks like MySpace, FaceBook, and YouTube. Marketers have already learned this lesson, and are heading to these destination sites in droves. But does your brand have what it takes to take things to the next level? Can your website become a social destination itself?
If you’d like to give it a try, there are plenty of vendors who want to help you get there. KickApps offers instant gratification in the form of a free ad-supported MySpace/YouTube clone, which you can upgrade to a paid version. Customers include TAG Body Spray and National Lampoon. Vitrue offers a slicker interface, more clearly focused on consumer generated video, but doesn’t offer any free or trial versions. Vitrue powers sites from TBS, Lance Foods and the Cincinatti Bengals. ONEsite rounds out the trio, with solutions ranging from free to $1000/mo. iVillage, ClearChannel, and Sprint head up their roster.
While KickApps, Vitrue, and ONEsite have gained the most commercial momentum, there are countless startups in the space, including People Aggregator, CrowdFactory, and the matter-of-factly named Social Platform and Social Network Server.
Web sites without social content will certainly be the “brochureware” sites of tomorrow, but whether a full-fledged social network is an appropriate add-on for most corporate sites remains to be seen. If you want to give it a try though, there’s clearly no need to go it alone.