The MySpace Series Part VI – The Alternatives
For those critical of MySpace there are an estimated 300 or more alternatives. Friendster, hi5, Facebook, Bebo, orkut and even smaller specialty sites like HolyPal are all vying for a similar audience that uses these community sites to make new friends and communicate.
But nothing comes close to MySpace’s reach. Using the Alexa web rankings here is a look at the average daily visitors for some of the most popular community sites:
MySpace 35 million - Friendster 8 million
- Orkut 6.8 million
- Hi5 6.2 million
- Facebook 4.2 million
- Tribe 3.8 million
- Bebo 1.2 million
- HolyPal – 800,000
Most of these sites have their own niches and thus offer some potential for music marketers. Only Hi5 so far seems to be trying to add a strong music discovery component. Tribe is arranged by location and therefore offers some potential for touring acts trying to attract a crowd in a particular city.
Traffic on sites that cater more directly to indie music and it’s fans is even smaller:
Mp3.com 700,000- PitchforkMedia 350,000
- PureVolume 450,000
- Soundclick 400,000
- Garageband 75,000
- iSound 70,000
- Audiolunchbox 40,000
- AudioStreet 20,000
Up against MySpace’s 35 million daily visitors these site pale in comparison. But marketing is not just about big numbers and many of the sites above reach a targeted audience receptive to new music.
Read the rest of Hypebot’s exclsuive MySpace series here. NEXT: MySpace and the adult music community.
How come Alexa is giving me different results?
See:
http://www.alexaholic.com/facebook.com+friendster.com+orkut.com+hi5.com+myspace.com?y=n&r=3m&z=1
It’s not only about the numbers of people who are exposed to the music on these community sites – but it is also about the quality of interaction. For instance listening to music can be a passive experience, but indie bands (or any bands) offering tracks for e.g. remixing, enhance the quality of interaction from the fan’s perspective at least. We are aiming to make mixing accessible to all at another music community, YourSpins.com.
Is it my imagination or does myspace seem to be the place for errors and not for friends? It seems that place is constantly broken in one way or another. The errors aren’t always constant either, as it seems kinda random when you’ll get an error when you’re trying to send a messege, or add a friend, or just login. I just wonder if maybe it’s time to jump ship and find something better, or if we should wait it out as tom constantly says when something breaks to the point where they disable it for a few hours. I have to wonder if it’s worth the trouble sometimes.