Facebook For Fish
Saturday, July 26th, 2008
Posted by Saleem Barnard
* This blog post is part of Invoke’s participation in the 2008 Vancouver Blogathon for Charity
In the past ten years or so, I have worked on, or been presented with, dozens of online business ideas. From real estate to horses, hot sauce to social networking, they all share one thing in common: they started with an idea. What differs, however, is where the inspiration came from. One common formula I tend to see is the “me too – but different” syndrome. I’ll make facebook but for: fish, cats, seniors, small people, big people, beautiful people.
The core social networking sites, such as Myspace and Facebook, benefited from a first to market strategy. Myspace isn’t particularity a good site: the usability is lacking, the design is no more than functional, and user customizing has led to slow and annoying user experiences (such as waiting for an animated background to load along with a music file). All of those aforementioned points are thrown out the window by the fact that Myspace has reached mainstream acceptance.
This is not to discourage any spin-off idea from entering the execution stage. Facebook proved that a superior product can outplay an established core. Just don’t abandon the principles of business; Is there a need and market for the product? Is this need being met? What are the opportunities and threats in the market? For myself, I know my fish could benefit from making a few online friends. Or maybe not.
