{"id":4744,"date":"2009-09-17T05:29:31","date_gmt":"2009-09-17T12:29:31","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.web-strategist.com\/blog\/?p=4744"},"modified":"2009-09-17T11:08:05","modified_gmt":"2009-09-17T18:08:05","slug":"interlaced-email-is-a-social-network","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/web-strategist.com\/blog\/2009\/09\/17\/interlaced-email-is-a-social-network\/","title":{"rendered":"Interlaced: Email and Social Networks"},"content":{"rendered":"

Despite Having 300 Million Members, Facebook is Not The Largest Social Network<\/strong>
\nIn my opinion, online social networks have three distinguishing features: \u00a01) They have profiles that enable people to express their identity 2) Ability for people to connect to these profiles 3) To be successful, there’s a greater value created by a group of people sharing than as individuals who do not.<\/p>\n

This week, Facebook announced it has ballooned to 300 million users<\/a>, far more than MySpace and certainly Twitter. \u00a0Yet, I want to assert that Facebook isn’t the largest social network, email is (we’ve talked about this before<\/a>).\u00a0\u00a0Recent numbers from Microsoft<\/a> showed that the number of active users (although the definition of ‘active’ isn’t explained) exceeds 375 million users for Hotmail.<\/p>\n

When you combine all of the email networks from Gmail, Hotmail, AOL, Yahoo, and the millions in Outlook at corporations all over the world –it dominates over Facebook.<\/p>\n

Not Everyone Agrees Email and Social Networks Are The Same<\/strong>
\nI took the conversation to my own community in Twitter, and while the majority seemed to agree others respectfully suggested that “email is not a social network because:” \u00a01)\u00a0It’s private, not public, 2)\u00a0Lack of profiles, and\u00a0\u00a03) Lack of discoverability of people. I’d like to quickly address why I stand by that email is the largest social network:<\/p>\n

Social networks can be private<\/strong>. \u00a0Just like in real life, some communities are not for the public. \u00a0In fact, Facebook is a closed social network, very little of your personal information can be seen by the public. \u00a0Secondly, some of the most successful social networks are deployed inside of companies, just ask folks like Telligent, Mzinga, Awareness, and Jive.<\/p>\n

Email does indeed have profiles.<\/strong> Many argued that email doesn’t have a profile, yet, consumer email clients all offer profiles. \u00a0For example, see\u00a0Yahoo’<\/a>s,\u00a0Microsoft Live<\/a>, (which can spur from a hotmail account) and the\u00a0Google profile<\/a>. \u00a0We’re encouraged to put our handle, name, location, and other demographic information. \u00a0The second place to look is within the signature of each email you receive, people put their name, company, title, contact information and whatever else they want to self-express. \u00a0In both cases people opt-in to put that information in, and make their profile information accessible to those they want to share it with.<\/p>\n

Email profiles are discoverable and social.<\/strong> Some who don’t believe email is a social network will argue that the profiles are not easy to find. \u00a0A social networks will help like-minded users find each other, and some social networks even recommend others to follow. Take another look corporations that have deployed exchange server have a large directory with individual names, profiles, and groups that they belong to. \u00a0You can search for titles, locations, and groups to find who in a company may have similar needs to you. \u00a0What about in the consumer space? Yahoo encourages it’s mail users<\/a> to ask and answer questions from each other –even if you don’t know them directly. \u00a0In fact, in my Yahoo profile, there’s an area that suggests people I should connect with, one which is Shel Israel, who is certainly a friend, and Microsoft Live recommends<\/a> people “like you” to connect with.
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Agree or Disagree, Email and Social Networks Intertwine<\/strong>
\nA few more indicators that email and social networks are starting to merge:\u00a0For public social networks like Facebook, Glassdoor, Yelp, and Twitter, email is a pre-requistite to register. \u00a0Messages that you receive in Facebook or Twitter, often end up in your email stream. \u00a0Email portals are already developing social features around them<\/a>, have you seen the Yahoo homepage? \u00a0It’s starting to look like a social network<\/a>.<\/p>\n

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Recommendations: Approach Email and Social Tech in an Integrated Strategy<\/strong>
\nIt’s too easy to focus on the shiny microblogging tools and cast incumbent technologies by the side. \u00a0Savvy communicators should factor in how email and social networks fuel each other, they should:<\/p>\n