Competition is a marvelous thing, especially when the proverbial eight hundred pound gorilla gets challenged by another eight hundred pound gorilla. The result of such a clash of titans in the Internet world can only mean better communities, better websites, more features. So, when Facebook officially passed MySpace in internet traffic for the first time this week, it was huge news – except to Rupert Murdoch.
When you look at pure numbers, it would seem to be a horse race. But there’s more to the story than simple numbers. In the last year, Facebook has racked up a mammoth 160+ percent increase in new visitors - 123 million new visitors in May alone – and while Myspace has enjoyed a respectable 114.6 million new visitors (a 5% growth) last month, the fact is obvious, Facebook is on the rise, and MySpace has plateau’d.
How has Facebook managed to zoom past MySpace? Well, it could be that Facebook has been much more successful in abating spam to its members, something that MySpace is notorious for, high profile spam lawsuits notwithstanding. It could also be that Facebook has decided to drop its college and young adult niche attraction and has started to cast a wider net to drive more net traffic its way. But in reality, the research suggests that Facebook is simply more popular with users outside of the United States since Facebook has targeted those who speak Spanish, German and French by creating multilingual versions of its site in recent months. Looking at the Data from the United States alone, MySpace still attracts twice as many users, but Facebook is still growing at a faster rate.
But there are other tools that Facebook has developed which have attracted new users (some poached from MySpace). There’s the keyword search utility that enables members to find others of like-minded interest in exacting detail. Or, the themed applications such as popular fantasy football and interactive games. Lastly, Facebook has become a fresher presence with a completely renovated look to it’s website, whereas MySpace only recently revamped it’s look. But frankly, it still looks like the same old house with the furniture moved around.
What is prompting such an all out competition for users of free social networking services? According to internet marketing watch dog eMarketer, the answer is online advertising dollars which has ballooned in the last few years to about $1.4 billion annually, half of which come from companies in the United States. This may be a bigger reason why MySpace has undergone a redesign of its site – to attract advertisers with larger ad spaces. But the decision to attract more advertisers at the expense of their users may also be why Facebook’s popularity is surging. Could it be that users are fleeing the new MySpace to get away from the ads?
Only time will tell which of these two social web behemoths will emerge victorious, but one thing is sure, competition will always benefit the client base.
