Social Media Platforms: Innovate or Phase Out
Social Media Platforms: Innovate or Phase Out
The Orkut Story
Photo by Prateek Katyal on Unsplash
Over the last decade, it has become so obvious that technology and consumer behavior are very closely linked. Mahoney and Tang (2017) explain in their book Strategic Social Media – From Marketing to Social Change that today, businesses use their social media platforms combined with the latest technology to build all types of marketing strategies and business models, that focus on solving the needs of their intended audiences.
On this blog, we’ve talked about the importance of listening to your audience before but this week, we’re going to explore what happens when a business doesn’t innovate its platform to fit the needs of its audience.
17 years ago, Google owned and operated a very unique social media platform, Orkut. Created by a Google employee Orkut Büyükkökten, this social platform was completely revolutionary and quickly became Brazil’s number 1 social media platform.
Orkut made it easy for its “invite-only” users to enjoy the exclusivity of navigating through all kinds of digital communities that suited their interests. What’s super cool about this app was being able to connect with not only people you know but allowed communication with people users admired. Its popularity grew immensely and in 2012, it reported over 30 million users.
Orkut was built on the foundation of building communities and friends. Creator Orkut Büyükkökten explains in his very heartful goodbye webpage that, the Orkut platform brought together so many people who found new employment opportunities, love, laughter, and most importantly, connection.
You’re probably saying to yourself
“wow how great, what could ever happen to this amazing platform??”
Well technology happened...
In Brazil, where Orkut saw its largest amount of success, outdoor advertising eventually became banned and many companies were forced to transition to online business models popularizing digital advertising. Users in Brazil welcomed that and Mahoney and Tang (2017) reported user-generated content positive correlations between purchase intentions, digital ads began to become a growing significantly. In specific, the need for consumers to create their own content began booming in Brazil as well as on a worldwide scale. Unfortunately, that’s where we see the fall of Orkut.
The platform started to slowly deteriorate with slow loading and sharing of photos, little to no support for video hosting, blockages, community and friend amount limitations and slowly began to Orkut phase-out.
3 tips to avoid your business from phasing out in the future :
Photo by Jakob Owens on Unsplash
1. Listen, Listen, and oh yeah, Listen.
Listen to your target audience once you know who they are. Send out email surveys, do an audience audit. Find out exactly what your consumers need and tailor your app, service, or any type of business really, to make sure you’re taking care of them.
2. Don’t be afraid to innovate, invest in optimization for the future.
Look, nobody likes change but it is very necessary. Orkut failed to innovate their platform to integrate more e-commerce, user generated content, and ways for their users to engage deeper. The platform obviously hit the jackpot with their Brazilian users but the lack of optimization left them in the dust.
3. Monitor your innovations and strategies.
There’s no point in investing in platform innovation if it’s not doing anything. Look back at the, collect necessary key performance indicators that are helpful for the platform, and adjust.
References:
Mahoney L. M., & Tang T. (2016). Strategic Social Media: From Marketing to Social Change
Orkut.com. (n.d.). Orkut.com. http://www.orkut.com/index.html.