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Could you Buy or Sell Social Media Profiles like Business Assets?
SEM News Source: http://www.justmeandmy.com
Published: Dec 02, 2008 - 03:41 am
Story Found By: styletime 1169 Days ago
Category: SEM
An interview with a anonymous top Digg user suggests that companies / organisations are willing to pay up to $1,200 submission and promotion fees for the privilege of having access to this Digg users reach
 Comments8 Comments  

Comments

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from KevKirkpatrick 1168 Days ago #
Votes: 0

I love these types of accounts give you an inside look at how the internet often really works. Reminds me of award winning Wall Street Journal investigative reporting.

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from JamesDuthie 1167 Days ago #
Votes: 4

It’s an interesting debate. The agency I work for is beginning to dabble in social services. Naturally, a strong user profile is required to reap maximum leverage for client projects. But a power account takes time to build. While it’s tempting to go underground, we’re taking the longer term view to build strong internal user accounts. It avoids any black hat accusations and provides a far more sustainable platform for future success.

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from yetanotherben 1167 Days ago #
Votes: 0

From the people that I have spoken to about this, I was a tad worried it might have sparked a little debate around various areas that I touched upon, but as I say in the article, it’s tough one to really get to grips with in such few words...Thanks guys for your comments.Ben

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from zigojacko 1167 Days ago #
Votes: 0

My personal Facebook profile has nearly 1000 friends, I wonder how much I could sell it for, heh :p

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from saadkamal 1167 Days ago #
Votes: 0

I think Myspace profiles with tons of friends were publicly sold in 2006-07 for 5-10k. Now it may have less value.But honestly buying a social profile won’t make you successful with every social media service. It might work in few of them...but certainly not all.

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from yetanotherben 1166 Days ago #
Votes: 0

Hi Saad,I totally agree.  The value of anything is in the eyes of the beholder...there are good assets and not so good assets, but although crude, I think social media profiles will be increasingly considered as a form of business asset.  I wonder whether small and large businesses could/would ever put these sorts of assets on to their company’s balance sheet too?  I can’t see any reason why businesses wouldn’t build this into their balance sheet...brands are included in balance sheets so maybe this would be an extension of the valuation of the brand at the very least...In the EU, companies now have to account for intangible assets’ value and considering that "intangible assets such as brands generally account for the majority of a company’s market value"...it’s obviously quite an important part of the business, maybe more so online too as the web gets more complex and information rich?http://www.intangiblebusiness.com/Brand-services/Financial-services/Press-coverage/Brands-on-the-balance-sheet~299.html

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from JamesDuthie 1166 Days ago #
Votes: 1

Interesting thought Ben. I certainly see social media profiles as assets. I’m sure power figures in our industry such as Maki & Seth Godin would as well given their ability to leverage them. Classifying a profile as an asset would create an interesting dilemma. More than anything, it’s a distribution channel (for client campaigns). Yet we’d never consider television or print as assets...

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from yetanotherben 1166 Days ago #
Votes: 0

Hi James, What’s interesting about your comment there is that you describe it as a dilemma - this is a great assertion.  Just think, as with so many things in life, as soon as the value is recognised, it creates a tradable commodity almost immediately - sometimes sinister, sometimes for good too, but the whole essence of value is that it has worth to someone, and as soon as more and more people see the value in social media profiles, the market for them will begin grow. It’s kind of obvious (and a very long sentence), but it’s kind of important to remember.I can’t see greyhat / blackhat social media marketing going any other way to be honest.Cheers,Ben

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