100 million: the number of users on Facebook on August 26, 2008.
To put that in perspective, imagine if ALL of the residents of Mumbai, Karachi, Istanbul, Delhi, São Paulo, Moscow, Seoul, Shanghai, and Mexico City (the nine largest cities in the world), Athens GA, and Newell PA (pop. 551) were all registered Facebook users. To look at it another way, that’s one-third of the US population. Either way, it’s a lot of people.
Does this matter? MySpace hit 100 million users two years ago. The last time I heard someone mention MySpace was at a concert a few weeks back; the lead singer said that I could find them on MySpace. (I’d give you the link because they were pretty good – but I forgot to friend them. Oops.) MySpace may have been the first to 100 million, but remember that pioneers often end up with arrows in their back.
This user base doesn’t matter enough for marketers to start formulating a “Facebook strategy.” Facebook is one of many channels to choose from and may look attractive versus other social networks, but what about versus search, a loyalty program, or shopper marketing? Your job is to stay elevated above the channels; when including any social technology in your marketing, make sure you have a better reason than drive-thru marketing.
Here’s why the number might matter to you. The user base has value according to Metcalfe’s law. (In a nutshell, one fax machine is useless, two means we’re in business.) If you are an individual and no one you know is signed up, there could be a googol of registered users and it wouldn’t matter to you. If you are a marketer, the key is the overlap between 100 million users and your target audience. No overlap means no reason to care.
Odds are that as 100 million grows into 200, you will have more friends, prospects, and customers on Facebook. Then you’ll have to wrestle with new issues like the ego trap.
But for now – given that Facebook has hit the 100 million mark – are you paying more attention to the site for personal and/or professional reasons?
Peter, the numbers are good but I’m more concerned with Facebook’s profitability (or lack thereof) at this point. Are they going out of biz anytime soon– no. But MySpace has learned how to make their portal profitable. I’m cautiously optimistic to see Sheryl Sandberg’s approach…
Paul – tell me more…from what angle does FB’s profit interest you? I would think that most marketers wouldn’t care, as most involvement today is on a campaign basis. From a personal perspective, we can always recreate our social graph on another site.
The fact that you have so many people in one place is amazing. Think about if a TV station had that kind of viewership but could segment their viewers on clicking behavior or applications they actively downloaded. The advertising revenue would be pouring in.
Peter, your comment about how you can always re-create your social graph somewhere else hits the nail on the head. Eventually these social networking sites are going to have find a way to turn a profit or the party will be over. VC firms and investors aren’t foolish – the money will dry up or follow the next big thing.
So from a marketing perspective – do we care? After all, we’ll just follow the customers right? I suppose my main point is that eventually social networks will have to learn how to turn a decent profit, otherwise there will be nothing “new” to migrate over to. An extreme scenario, for sure, but well within the realm of probability…
I’m paying no more or less attention to Facebook than I am LinkedIn, Twitter or other social media tools I engage with on a daily basis. The numbers on Facebook, while appreciative…well, it’s not a numbers game. Just like the rest of social media. If you’re a collector of numbers, that’s great. What good does it do you as a professional at the end of the day? Rather, the QUALITY of your numbers and who’s behind them – now THAT’S the money if you ask me.
Facebook and LinkedIn could hit a gazillion users for all I care, but if I have a solid group of credible connections with whom I have synergy, then THAT’S where I care about numbers. Sure, more users equates to more potential synergistic connections, but for now, I’m happy with my steadily growing network.
Great post, and fantastic question to ask the Twitterati of the world!
Hey Peter
So… to answer your question: no. It’s not that I’m paying less – or wasn’t paying attention in the first place – it’s just that I’m holding steady, and using the tool.
And that, to me, is probably enough for Facebook to feel good about. They’ve got my attention, as do Twitter, LinkedIn, etc (just as much as they have Erika’s). I’m paying waaay less (as in, pretty much none) attention to MySpace, Spoke, etc. They weren’t sticky in the long run, and in MySpace’s case, most of those 100 million profiles are either for bands, fake, or basically abandoned ghost-files from people who migrated to FaceBook… or just grew up.
I think the more interesting question is: does this 100 million indicate a massive tipping point? Do all the non-Facebook users of the world (6,620,960,262 or so of them) begin to notice & adopt at an accelerated pace?
Or: I am in danger of being friended by my Mom??
Facebook doesn’t have 100 million users.
I would estimate it has about 5% of this number if you count the people actively “using” Facebook and maybe another 5% for people who look in from time to time to see if anything has changed, and the rest who joined, looked, and left.
That’s still a lot of people but the numbers game on the internet is like asking people their golf handicap, it’s always kind of approximative.
Timothy – so are you calling Mark Zuckerberg a liar? I didn’t make up the number, it’s from his blog post: http://blog.new.facebook.com/blog.php?post=28111272130
I lean towards the accuracy of the company CEO’s number vs. an outsider (i.e. you) who blurts out haphazard estimates ironically based on the CEO’s number.
No, not at all. I’m absolutely sure there have been 100 million people “sign up” to Facebook but that is not really the same as saying there are 100 million “users” of Facebook (the fact that it comes from the CEOs blog or anywhere else doesn’t really make much difference to me).
Like I said, I “estimate” only a small percentage of the magic 100 million people “signed up” are actually “using” Facebook actively. I said five percent with another five percent using it occasionally and I think I’m probably being generous.
You could contest this and present me with reasons why, of the 100 million people to have signed up to Facebook, you still think each and every one of those people are using it actively and we could toss the idea around of how the evolution of Facebook in both its profile and impact may have changed, how many of the early adopters are still using it and how the profile the laggards may be different with different future implications for the way business interactions may be affected.
But instead you decide to treat me as an ironic outsider blurting against the sacrosanct words of a CEO.
For someone with such a shiny bio, you sure don’t read comments particularly closely or react very well to them.
Your opinion is what it is.
Which is the idea of blogging and inviting comments I guess.
I must admit I’m a little surprised that someone who obviously positions himself as having his finger on the pulse of contemporary marketing turned sour so quickly at an asinine comment putting into question the difference between “using” a social networking site and having “signed on” to one.
I’m sorry if you took offense at my “opinion”. Maybe it will help readers if you put instructions at the end of your posts on how to agree with you in their commentary.