by Andrew Redfern @ 17th December 2008 12:25 pm Social Media

Friendster, Inc., a top 20 global website based on traffic and the #1 social network in Asia, today announced that the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office has awarded the social networking pioneer a new U.S. Patent, titled “Compatibility Scoring of Users in a Social Network” (U.S. Patent No. 7,451,161). Friendster has been granted four patents since July 2006, validating the company’s early and continuous innovation in online social networking.

Friendster’s latest patent, granted on November 11, 2008, describes a unique methodology used to calculate compatibility based on expressed interests between users of a social network. This includes scoring the compatibility between two members of a social network based on their interests and scoring the correlation between two interests for a given member of a social network.

“In just six years, social networking has become both an industry — since 8 of the top 20 largest websites in the world are social networks — and a critical platform for over half a billion Internet users globally to share, communicate, connect and be entertained with existing and new friends, family and colleagues,” said Richard Kimber, chief executive officer of Friendster. “A core component of the evolution of social networks is the ability of the online ’social graph’ to represent our real social life. Understanding the common interests between people establishes common ground to build and enhance relationships.”

Prior to this most recent fourth patent, Friendster was granted three social networking patents in 2006 and 2007:

– In July 2006, Friendster was awarded its first U.S. patent describing how people are connected in the context of an online social network, titled “A System, Method and Apparatus for Connecting Users in an Online Computer System Based on Their Relationships within Social Networks” (U.S. Patent No. 7,069,308).

– Friendster was granted a second U.S. patent in October 2006, which discloses the process of enriching other users’ profiles with text, video, pictures and additional content, titled “Method of Inducing Content Uploads in a Social Network” (U.S. Patent No. 7,117,254).

– In March 2007, Friendster added another patent to its portfolio, titled “System and Method for Managing Connections in an Online Social Network” (U.S. Patent No. 7,188,153 B2), which describes a technology that allows members of a social network to manage their connections by, for example, adding friends; personalizing their network through arranging, ordering and classifying connections made in an online community; and managing these connections at will.

“Since launching the first social network in 2002, Friendster has continued to build and own a significant patent portfolio. Friendster’s four patents address many fundamentals of social networking — establishing connections, distributing and sharing content, managing connections over time and assessing compatibility between users. Friendster’s patent portfolio is one of several assets of the company. Friendster anticipates receiving more patents, and we will continue to focus on growing our large global business into an even larger one,” said Kimber.

Friendster Leads in Asia and is a Top 20 Global Website

Friendster is the #1 social network in Asia, with over 65 million registered users and over 50 million monthly unique visitors from Asia.* In Asia, Friendster has more monthly unique visitors than any other social network.

Plus, Asia is the largest market of Internet users (Asia has 41% of the world’s Internet users while the U.S. has only 19%), and Asia is the fastest growing region in the world.** Friendster has a loyal and growing user base throughout Asia in the following top 10 countries for Friendster: Australia, China, Hong Kong, India, Indonesia, Japan, Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore and South Korea.

Friendster is a top 20 global website in the world in terms of traffic, serving over 18 billion page views a month.** Friendster is 1st in “user engagement” among the top five global social networks, with users spending an average of 187 minutes per visitor per month on http://www.friendster.com.**

Social Networks need “reliable revenue streams”

by Andrew Redfern @ 17th November 2008 10:37 am Social Media

As social networking sites mature, the need to establish consistent and reliable revenue streams will drive site operators to explore and develop a full range of options, including more sophisticated mobile computing and targeted advertising applications, according to the latest report published by Contentinople Insider (www.contentinople.com/insider), a new subscription research service from TechWeb’s Contentinople (www.contentinople.com), an industry-leading provider of news and analysis covering the emerging digital media industry.

Monetizing Social Networking Sites: Fact or Faith analyzes the revenue-producing options available to social networking sites. The report assesses how applications such as mobile delivery, digital rights management (DRM), and premium content can help to churn out profits.

Finally, this report identifies the top ten social networking sites (chosen from hundreds of sites distributed across the Web), providing profiles of their focus and business model.

“Large online retailers are likely to lead the way in using in-depth Web analytics to form a common methodology for evaluating how much money ads on social networking sites can bring through direct sales, brand recognition, or market intelligence,” notes Martin Courtney, research analyst with Contentinople Insider and author of the report. “As the true picture emerges, social networking sites may have to downgrade their market valuations.”

Providers seeking new revenue streams for their social networking Websites aim to use methods that users will be drawn to, Courtney says.

“A host of extra paid-for content aimed at consumer, business, markets around gaming, virtual gifts, community tools, and software downloads will offer more concrete revenue streams than advertising for many sites,” he adds. However, advertising will not be pushed by the wayside: “Location-based information will be increasingly incorporated into social networking sites, so users can advertise their position to friends and buddies to arrange social events or schedules.”

Other key findings of Monetizing Social Networking Sites: Fact or Faith include the following:

Many social networking sites feature new technologies, such as application programming interfaces (APIs) and DRM, to add features that will help generate more revenue by attracting more users.

Sites that have not yet taken the plunge will move into mobile phone delivery as soon as possible to reach those who use mobile devices over laptops or PCs.

Social networking sites, advertisers, search engines, and portals will find new ways to exploit information contained in user profiles to sidestep fears and legal debates about using the information for commercial purposes.

Contentinople Insider is a brand-new research service that tracks, analyzes, and evaluates the key market and technology developments that will have the biggest impact on the digital media and communications industries in the months and years ahead. Starting with the first issue, each edition of Contentinople Insiderwill offer deep insight and hard-to-get market data and intelligence on the core issues facing industry participants and investors, such as:

Content aggregation and distribution platforms
Digital content development
Video sharing
Digital advertising infrastructure
Mobile content platforms
Media servers
IP-aware set-top boxes and connectors
Content delivery networks (CDNs)
P2P technology and platforms
Streaming video standards
Digital rights management (DRM) software
Networked consumer devices
Content management platforms

For a list of companies profiled in this report, please see: http://img.lightreading.com/cpi/pdf/cpi1108_companies.pdf

Would you like to know about Internet Marketing? If so, contact Hit Search, Search Engine Optimisation and Pay Per Click & Social Space Marketing specialists, on 0845 643 9289. Remember, its a big world out there, make sure you become visible.

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Facebook reports it’s voter registration scheme has hit the 50,000 mark

by Andrew Redfern @ 30th October 2008 4:12 pm Social Media

The Official Facebook blog is reporting that the Facebook Register to Vote scheme has logged over half a million Facebook responding to their call to vote on Election Day. Further to this they noted that these users  invited more than 300,000 of their friends follow suit.

More importantly over 50,000 users have registered to vote on the Facebook Vote 08 page.

Voter turnout has long been a worry for politicians and political activists alike and the 2002 Presidential Election showed how every single vote can count. There has been a history of voter registration schemes aiming to reached the disenfranchised electorate from the Motor Voter bill and Project Vote back in the 80s right through to the Sarah Silverman powered Great Schlep and the Kevin Costner project Swing Vote.

It can be said that 50,000 voters is a drop in the ocean however it’s certainly notable how the social media sphere is being utilised duting this election. From the very start YouTube was a key ‘battle ground’ in getting the candiates messages across, Twitter allowed a constant dialogue between supporters whilst Facebook fanpages have been used as campaign co-ordination tools and a support league table.

Would you like to know more about social media and it’s uses? If so, contact Hit Search, SEO and Google adWords qualified PPC specialists, on 0845 643 9289. Remember, its a big world out there, make sure you become visible.

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Social Media Marketing - Success Stories Using Linkedin

by Andrew Redfern @ 9th September 2008 6:59 pm Social Media

There are many ways to market your product on the Internet and social media is fast becoming an integral part of any search marketing campaign; so when you come across a business case study how one man managed to bag a $250k contract using Linkedin.

Rob Getzschman comments on the official Linked blog “Could the phrase “A penny for your thoughts” define the nascent urge of business consulting? If so, the LinkedIn Answers service presents the modern business equivalent of that phrase, and our ongoing series of successful LinkedIn users shows how this week.

Where some employ the service to answer tough business questions, and others to gather quick market research, Steven Shimek uses it to showcase his expertise — and build business relationships which bring in lucrative contracts for his firm. Steven, a Senior VP at Ruder Finn Public Relations in Los Angeles, used LinkedIn first to find his current position, and then began answering questions on LinkedIn Answers.

This led to multiple business developments for Ruder Finn, not the least of which was a a $250,000 contract.”

See a video of how Steven Shimek managed just that below.

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