Prompt's TechBlog

While attending a PRSA (Public Relations Society of America) teleseminar two days ago on "Four Factors for Success with Social Networking," it made me start thinking about what really makes a social network a success. There are so many social networking sites, from the goliaths, MySpace and Facebook, down to the increasing hordes of niche sites (see Duncan's great post below) clamoring for a share of internet users' decreasing attention spans.

The four factors of success to creating a social network, according to Sun Microsystems' Terry McKenzie and Carrie Motamedi are:

1) Focus and simplicity
2) Flexibility
3) Control
4) Collaboration

I think that these are great points for a social networking site to keep in mind while developing, but none of these factors will drive people to actually use a social networking site. They completely miss the point of why most people want to use social networking: FUN! People don't log onto Facebook because of its focus or simplicity, they log on to talk to their friends, watch the feed and play with applications. For MySpace, it's because of its music, customizable web pages, surveys, and bulletins which are often the modern equivalent of chain letters.

Have a compelling reason to exist

Right now, social networking is a great buzzword and an excellent communication tool but also a jumbled mess that hasn't completely found its niche in the communication spectrum. When the dust settles, it will find its boundaries, unnecessary sites will be eliminated and usefulness will be maximized.

People won't want to use a corporate social network just because it exists; it has to be a place where they can interact with co-workers: poke them, recruit them into their massive ninja army and be themselves, people who like to have fun. From the presentation, I could tell that Sun Microsystems recognizes this without putting it into words, and I was also very impressed by their ideas on how to build a community.

A community cannot be forced. People only join together when they want to join together. A company can build the most sophisticated and high-tech social networking platform in the world or use an existing one, but it will be meaningless unless they are committed to making it a place where people feel free to be themselves (within the limits of good reason of course), and want to interact because they see the value of doing so.

Labels: PRSA, social networking, Sun Microsystems, web 2.0