I’m so sick of hearing about new daily deals sites and social media networks.
With the success of the big social networks–Facebook, YouTube, Twitter, LinkedIn (the list goes on)–some folks assume that they can reach the same level of success just by being a social network.
Sounds like another dot com bubble burst to me.
Social media are hot right now, and they are young enough that employers hire “experts” who aren’t really experts; they just know more. Whenever some new technology pops up, people jump on it and think that they can achieve the same success as the innovators and the early adopters.
It’s not that easy. Even as Facebook surpassed 900 million users worldwide, the social media giant announced Monday that its revenues were down 6 percent from last quarter and that its growth was slowing.
What does that mean for Facebook? It’s just like every business. It has expenses, assets, acquisitions, employees, overhead, and all the challenges inherent in business.
The main factor in Facebook’s success its uniqueness. Along with Myspace, it was one of the first of its kind, and it pioneered the way for other knock-off sites.
There’s nothing wrong with starting your own daily deal or social site, and there’s nothing wrong with lofty ambitions for your business. Just remember that while you’re making a unique pizza pie, you didn’t invent the pizza pie.
