Big 4 Social Media networks suck the oxygen from all the others

When discussing social media marketing $$$ with clients, I am finding that increasingly the Big 4 Social Media Networks (ie. Facebook, Twitter, YouTube and LinkedIn) are the ones clients are choosing to focus on. Their rational is simple: Invest in the channels that have the critical mass and get the highest ROI possible. The Big 4 have the critical mass.  While this is probably not the most incredibly insight you will find on this blog, it does illustrate the challenge that many smaller networks face.

Why is this happening?  While social media is getting a larger % of corporate marketing budgets, those $$ are still finite and need to be allocated with focus. So, to get the best bang for the buck, you need to go where the most people are…….and that’s the Big 4 Social Media Networks.

Does this mean that it is impossible to build a large and vibrant social media community? Probably not, Digg, Delicious and MySpace have life and there are some up and comers like Quora. There are also specialty social media networks like JustMeans (Corporate Sustainability) that have the opportunity to built focused communities of interest.   However, the challenges are quite daunting.