MySpace case: Evolution of social networks

You are probably a user of one of all the social networks found on the web: Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, Telegram, Linkedin; they are some of the most used today, and continue to add followers at all hours. In addition to them, there are many others that, depending on the public and interests, adapt to the tastes of consumers.

Social networks date back to the early 2000s and evolve more every day, adapting to the context, users and their requirements. In this article, we come to tell about one of the pioneer networks, MySpace, which had a brief period of great success but was unable to stay competitive to achieve the necessary positioning.

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How was MySpace born?

This social network (which its version in Spanish has not been as successful as it was in its country of origin, the United States) was born in 2003, and was created by Tom Anderson and Chris DeWolfe, with the aim of starting to form a virtual community that replaces web pages. Founded a year before Facebook, this company is an example to keep in mind when we mention the importance of adaptability to remain competitive.

Thinking today about how a social network works and its objectives can be simple, since we are immersed in the virtual world. But let's imagine that at the beginning of these, the only thing that existed were web pages and exchange forums, so the innovation of the networks and their proposals to create a community for users was a great novelty.

To measure its rise and fall we will mention these data: in 2005, MySpace was sold to one of the communication tycoons in the United States, Murdoch, for 580 million dollars and in 2011, and then, this tycoon sold it for only 35 million of dollars.

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Rise and fall

In 2006 MySpace was more visited than Google, this gives an idea of the magnitude and presence that the social network had. At that time, it was a new concept in the network that encourages exchange between users, generating community. Leaving aside the simple websites, where users could only enter to view the content, at most the forums where they shared opinions through comments, the MySpace experience came to revolutionize the world of virtual communication.

At the same time, new social networks began to emerge, and as usually happens, its fall occurs at the time that others begin to be successful. Users, who are the ones who give life to these platforms, have preferences, demands and expect to have good experiences when entering a new platform. Obviously, they are the ones who choose where their data will be and where not. When a new network emerges, it is probably new and very attractive, if the others that already exist do not have the skill to adapt to the new moments and requirements of consumers, it is very likely that they will desist from using it because they have better options to choose from. This was the case with MySpace.

This social network went from being an exchange space, in its beginnings, to a mere repository of information. Its value fell abruptly and adaptation actions were not generated that would allow it to continue being at the top of the most visited websites on the Internet, even having beaten Google.

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MySpace today

Surely, like most people, you believed that MySpace didn't exist anymore. This is so since its presence on the internet is so low that it is hardly registered by users. The reality is that this network continues to exist, it has implemented several changes and today it aims to be a social network dedicated to music, where users can access content related to it, from songs to notes from their favorite bands.

When MySpace returned to position itself, in 2013, but this time from the music industry side, it worked and was an important innovation in the new way of consuming music, until Spotify arrived. Again we see that it is not up to the context and its demands. This company invested in better experiences for users and pushed it completely out of the blue. Again, MySpace is diminished by not adapting to what the context and users require.

Although we cannot say that it is due to the lack of adaptability to the virtual context in which we are immersed today, we can say, for example, that creating a profile on this network is not easy. And surely this is another of the reasons why it can't reach the massiveness that social networks are looking for.

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Bearing in mind that any company that generates an experience for users, or provides services more than products, needs to be optimized to provide good quality of use to consumers is a key point. As we said before, users are those who decide and choose where they are going to leave their data and through which platforms they are going to share information: if the experience that is offered is from a website that does not generate trust or ease of use, they will most likely decide migrate to a new one.

The fact of having a digital or technological company does not exempt them from adapting to users, on the contrary, they are the first to be at the forefront of technology to attract customers first.