By Pete Cashmore
Dave’s Comments (Digital Marketing Tutorial Blog): Ever heard of Mashable? Mashable claims to have more than 150,000 email and RSS subscribers and in excess of 1 million monthly pageviews, making it the world’s largest blog focused exclusively on social networks. I think it’s a good read on a VERY hot topic, one that every online marketer should be at least familiar with. And here’s a good place to start – Mashable’s 2007 Predictions.
“It’s now only a few days until 2007, and a good time for the yearly prediction posts to start rolling out – including one from Mashable. To add a more interesting spin, we’ll throw in a mini-game of blog tag – a few people “tagged” at the end of this post can blog their own 2007 predictions in their niches, if they wish. They can tag other blogs and so on. Also note that derogatory comments aren’t just accepted on this post – they’re positively encouraged as part of our Insulting Comments Contest. So now to Mashable’s predictions…
1. Online Contests Become Huge: Competitive social sites became a trend in late 2006, with the Bix acquisition highlighting their mainstream appeal and sponsorship opportunities. Also check out Xuqa, the Yahoo Talent Contest, YouTube Underground, Islandoo and many more precursors. Media has become so abundant online that attention is becoming the new currency: 5 star rating systems, social news sites and online competitions are all about voices being heard above the noise. To put it another way: now that everyone is a mini-celebrity on MySpace, how do you become a megastar? We’ll see many more social networks based around competition launching in 2007.”
See all of Mashable’s 2007 Predictions on Mashable.com.