C2C Balloon

Do you want to make money with a new social networking application?

Well, welcome to the club! There isn’t a clear and killer way to monetize social networks yet. Consumer-facing applications are struggling to pay the bills using the traditional advertising model, and even if you read in the news that “Facebook is worth $15 billion,” you may face significant challenges if you want to make money by building your own social networking application.

The interesting thing is that even if nobody has a clue about how to make millions with a social community, they still can sell it. Blame the “bubble” for this irrational behavior.

People may tell you that these sites have zillions of members, high traffic, marketing potential, blah, blah, blah, but ask yourself if you would pay just $10/month to use MySpace or Orkut? Your answer is probably a resounding “No!”

Here, we are talking about big, huge social sites. It just doesn’t seem reasonable to me to believe that small or new social networking applications can really be profitable with an ad-based revenue model. You have more chances of winning the lottery than to have the same luck and success as Facebook.

I’m not saying that social networking is not for businesses, but the big problem is that it’s not clear what it is you can do with a consumer-facing social network when it comes to making cash. There’re some great business-oriented examples like LinkedIn, but they don’t count only on advertising to be profitable.

If you want to do something cool, and you don’t care about its profitability, then go for it! And write to us as we really love to talk with passionate and idealistic people like you. But don’t do it for the money. Coolness shouldn’t be confused with business utility or profitability.

It’s about time we had a reality check. Startups must recognize the need for profitability. I think some investors are going to lose of lot of money if they’re rooted in irrational behavior. And this time, they can’t really blame any economic crisis.

Tags: advertising model, application, apps, balloon, business, c2c, c2cballoon, entrepreneur, monetize, profitability, social network, sustainability, sustentability, venture, web 2.0, web2


2 Comments »

1. Social Networking per Social Networking is a bad idea for a start-up these days. Facebook, Orkut and Myspace have already filled this market with very optimized solutions.

   If one can’t think of a way that’s really new for using one of these sites you can bet good money that it’s going to fail.

   There is no point in creating a new company if there’s no untapped market one can push itself into or if one can’t make it any better than the existing(and established) solutions.

   Comment by Thiago Cavalcanti — March 15, 2009 @ 7:19 AM

2. Thanks for the tips on how to make money online, there is always something more to learn.

   Comment by Ikedi from make money online — May 10, 2009 @ 5:45 PM

Leave a comment

Your Name (required) Your Mail (will not be published) (required) Your Website Your comment

Recent posts

• Client2Central is live!
  Posted by Horacio Poblete @ May 7, 2009 in Client2Central
• Client2Central Video Presentation
  Posted by Horacio Poblete @ April 29, 2009 in Client2Central
• Freemium model rocks!
  Posted by Horacio Poblete @ April 17, 2009 in c2cballoon
• Follow us on Twitter!
  Posted by Horacio Poblete @ April 15, 2009 in c2cballoon
• Twitter goes Freemium
  Posted by Horacio Poblete @ April 2, 2009 in Web Applications