It continues to amaze us how, 15 years after the web hit critical mass, online advertising has basically remained unchanged. Outside Google ad words, most of the web continues to suffer from the same banner ad carpet bombing we were subjected to in 2000.
Where’s the innovation? While sites like Facebook hearken the new age of targeted advertising and spend millions of dollars on their serving technologies, I continue to get served Proactive ads featuring Jessica Simpson on my Facebook page. How much technology is required to assess my age? Click through rates have fallen from 0.41% in 2002 to 0.20% in 2007, and the trend continues to decline. Facebook’s CPMs are now averaging an anemic $0.15 and few other Internet sites across the web are doing much better.
When we founded Fuego Nation a year ago, we were hell-bent on shattering the already archaic convention of online advertising modalities and create the next wave of innovation. We started with the requirement to revolutionize online advertising for lifestyle/luxury brands by creating a social context where passionate people could engage with and evangelize their products. It was only after this customized framework was established that we built a product experience to support that vision. Our intent was to provide an experiential approach that improved the user experience for both lifestyle/luxury brands and members alike.
We call our platform for lifestyle branding in social media FuegoFusion. The name comes from our desire to fuse our memberships’ most passionate interests with more experiential approaches to delivering brand engagement that result in powerful affinity and evangelization. Our focus on solving the needs of high-end brands from the outset has resulted in a comprehensive slate of sponsorship services, ranging from multi-tiered, in-product engagement to offline event sponsorships.
FuegoFusion is our implementation of Integrated Experiential Advertising, or IEA. There are two components to every IEA program. The first involves data filtering and targeting, and the second revolves around the engagement experience itself.
Data Filtering
Most Web 2.0 sites begin with amassing content, then figures out ways to make sense of the data, which theoretically enables ad targeting. Fuego Nation, in contrast, filters data at the outset and at every stage of the data lifecycle thereafter. As a result, our process of data filtering is organic and actually requires very little specific ad-filtering technology. A sampling of key filtering components is listed below:
Data is filtered at the outset, preferably at the brand level. So, for example, Fuego Nation is unique in a social context because it is an exclusive membership club that stands for something very specific – human excellence and endeavor. Guests not attracted to that concept are repelled from the site before they even engage with it – that is strictly by design
Relevant demographic information is collected at the outset, during the registration process, and its accuracy impacts that user’s ability to experience the product fully
Users are then filtered by passions which motivate their actions and drive purchasing behavior (in contrast to interests)
Users rate profile information within the community to further refine the members’ degrees of passion into levels that can be uniquely targeted (e.g. basic, VIP, Elite)
Experiential Advertising
IEA is particularly relevant to lifestyle/luxury branding companies who require tight control over the user experience and brand display. It involves hyper-targeting, but also an experiential, customized component where brands achieve the following benefits:
The advertising is integrated into the experience itself. In Fuego Nation, users rotate through our passion card carousel (note: passion cards are similar in design to baseball trading cards) and read applicant and member commentary about the activities that inspire members the most. Members are looking at small data sets and photos for each person, and ads are tastefully interspersed throughout the experience and can be almost completely indistinguishable from member cards
While I might be annoyed by a Proactive ad, few people are annoyed by an ad featuring a beautiful woman clad in Armani – the advertising positively impacts the overall experience and increases engagement with the brand
We can build layers of engagement into each Flash-based brand trading card so that a user can determine how deeply they want to interact with the brand. Ultimately, they’ll be able to purchase products (Channel sunglasses, for example, directly from the ad window itself)
Users get Fuego credits for interacting with brand experiences, which further increases their status in the community. In Fuego Nation, members will actually WANT to engage with great brands
Brands can sponsor VIP users themselves, who will gain additional credits for wearing branded products in their passion card photo (similar to product placement in movies)
All other brands featured in the product are of a similar quality. So, for example, Mercedes is featured along with Armani, which is featured with the Ritz-Carlton group of hotels – ALL advertising is lifestyle/luxury, so the experience is similar to flipping through a high-end magazine like Vogue, GQ or Vanity Fair
We only accept advertising sponsors that share our focus on quality, brand experience and prime user demographics. We are exclusive not only about our membership base, but about the brands that we feature and support
The net result of the FuegoFusion experience is that high-end brands can substantiate their offerings in a highly controlled environment supported by brands of similar quality and ilk. This alleviates much of the risk associated with social media sites like MySpace, Digg, Hotmail, etc. Brands can then leverage the stature of users in the community to provide feedback on current and future product offerings, evangelize throughout their own micro networks, and target specific products (Prada vs. Prada Sport for example) to members at various levels (e.g. basic vs. VIP). In essence, FuegoFusion represents a more powerful extension of the way these brands have already achieved success in offline environments.
Align with luxury brands – design, demos, intent
Not social network but all web 2.0 – online, off, passion travels well
Consumer friendly – benefits consumers AND advertisers, enabling real communities and conversations
These icons link to social bookmarking sites where readers can share and discover new web pages.
Whether it’s a membership to Diamond Lounge, invitation only sign up on Gmail or getting into a popular club in New York City, we all want something not everyone else can access- something special. If access to goods or services is unfettered then the value generating power of those products is necessarily deflated. This represents the power of exclusivity and it drives lifestyle/luxury branding the world over.
Fuego Nation Online is a hybrid Open-Closed Network and it is the first of its kind on the Internet. It’s closed in that not anyone can sign up and access member benefits as is the case with sites like Facebook, MySpace, Bebo, LinkedIn, etc. It’s open in that anyone CAN request an invite and apply to get in on their own merit. We believe this provides the benefit of scale by reducing the friction created by ‘invite only’ business models while generating the brand power inherent in exclusivity.
Most online clubs generate exclusivity by legacy, offline means. They rely on symbols of material success like income level and celebrity. Fuego Nation Online breaks this antiquated mold by creating exclusivity around the energy that drives the world- individual passions. To us, passion is the great equalizer, capable of connecting individuals regardless as to income level, caste system or common prejudice.
At Fuego Nation Online, talent literally rises to the top. In our world what makes someone elite is the passion with which they engage and participate in the community coupled with the energy and devotion they engage with their passions. In a sense, we are creating a global meritocracy based on passion and believe the combination of all that energy and desire will be combustible– a true social change agent.
Though we see the value in exclusivity as a marketing concept, as articulated above, our application of the concept is more experiential and practical and we believe, more potentially powerful. We use exclusivity to separate the truly passionate from the posers and then we use that knowledge to distinguish between the truly elite and the novices (e.g. in our Mountain Climbing and Fashion Passion Spheres). If one is not truly passionate, after all, then they won’t have the energy and desire to fill out a simple passion card and apply for membership.
We apply exclusivity to leveling of content as well with the purpose of making it easier for adults to assess the relative merit and value of community contributions. This leveling structure enables someone to review only content of members ‘at their level or above.’ In doing so, we intend to help solve the problem of indecipherable user generated content and increase the discoverability of high quality content by levels of magnitude.
We extend exclusivity into the offline world as well via Fuego Nation Events. To attend Fuego Nation VIP events at clubs, restaurants and museums a member must have achieved VIP status online first. Once at an event, those in attendance have valuable data about one another which decreases overall anonymity and provides a psychic tethering mechanism to foster connections via commonality.
In the end, our market approach and strategy leverages exclusivity in the traditional marketing sense while deploying its functional application to create a more engaging and efficient user experience.
These icons link to social bookmarking sites where readers can share and discover new web pages.
Privacy concerns seem to be all the rage these days. Facebook, attacked in recent months by privacy advocates, has swung into reactive mode, largely abandoning their advertising beacon strategy and installing more controls over who can access and view a user’s personal information. Driving this trend are the adults who are joining social networks in droves. These mature users have a much more pronounced need for privacy than youngsters.
We believe the privacy backlash continues to gain momentum for two central reasons. First, most popular social networking sites were designed, engineered and perpetuated by youngsters themselves. Their designs have reflected their own value systems which are often in opposition to that of adults. The second is reflected in the ongoing reliance on antiquated forms of monetization in social networks which rely on CPM-based page views to generate income. As a result, deleting user data and limiting page views is antithetical to their very sustenance. The result is increasingly less control over one’s end-to-end data set.
What is so different about an adult that makes the need for privacy so pressing? While complex in origin, we believe it boils down to a fairly simple difference between kids and adults: the need to protect reputation equity. One might argue that kids are too young to have developed reputation equity as it takes years to establish domain and/or career expertise.
As adults, we’ve spent both energy and resource creating our personal brands and need to know that those brands can be effectively managed and protected in both online and offline contexts. As adults we don’t want everyone to know everything we do. We want them to know what we want them to know and nothing more.
Furthermore, the goal of sites like MySpace and Facebook is to generate as many page views as possible. These page views can then be sold to advertisers in the form of CPM-based online ad buys. Deleting a users profile decreases the available inventory for the site and therefore works against their interest. In addition valuations have been driven skyward by statistics around page views, registered users and monthly visits which further perpetuates the cycle of dependency on all data, good and bad.
The results of a large search on MySpace, for example, will turn up dozens of user profiles that have been inactive for six months or longer. Active or not, these profiles are still regarded as viable advertising inventory. A short term win will almost assuredly result in long term disappointment for user, advertiser and MySpace alike.
In contrast to this, Fuego Nation allows users complete control over their online personas. We monetize only active, engaged users. So, if a user isn’t active for a period of three months, we delete them from our system- entirely. The entire concept behind Fuego Nation was predicated on providing actionable data for both member and advertiser alike and to be actionable members must be engaged in the community.
We don’t have a page view ad model but an active user, sponsorship model. The key, then, is to provide context and environment for people to WANT to be engaged over a long period of time. If a user’s activity lapses, we want to address the problem of engagement not perpetuate a poor product experience by engaging ghosts of data past.
These icons link to social bookmarking sites where readers can share and discover new web pages.
A major impetus for the founding of Fuego Nation was the feeling that in using social networking sites like MySpace, Facebook and Bebo that I was an outsider trying to use the tools and devices of youth on the Internet. Virtually all of the major social networking sites left me feeling like I was searching for a paperclip in my nephew’s messy dorm room.
There are a couple key reasons why these legacy social networking sites look and feel the way they do. The crux of the rationale is that sites, Facebook is a prime example, are designed by young engineers, themselves still kids, with designs largely defined by their own life experiences and needs. This, coupled with the nature of technology early adoption being a youthful endeavor, has led to a preponderance of these tools being geared toward youth and not toward the discerning tastes and unique needs of adults.
But the market for social networking has moved far beyond the confines of schoolyards and dorm rooms. The fastest growth area on Facebook is among 25-35 year old adults, a segment that has seen 181% growth in less than one year. Ultimately, it is interest from this segment that has exploded consumer awareness of social networking beyond the previous confines of the youth market and gained the interest of brand advertisers, large and small. Recent growth trends with MySpace follow similar demographic trending.
Having said that, we anticipate a flattening in both demand and usage among adults currently using utilities like Facebook as the novelty of social networking as a concept wears thin and the utility value on sites originally designed for youth proves vacuous. We also believe that the overwhelming number of, and juvenile nature of, Facebook’s application program will continue to chase away adults from the site. While recently added privacy controls do provide some salve to the psychic wounds suffered by adult users, they will prove out to be band-aids to an inherently flawed experience.
The reality is that the social needs of kids and adults are so widely disparate that no plausible, easily understood and intuited system can peaceably coexist. Adults have very specific needs that have not been addresses by the market. They have more disposable income, but less free time. They are more willing to pay for a better controlled experience that helps them gather the information they need quickly and efficiently. They want a well-lit place for interaction not a messy dorm room when visiting another user’s profile. And perhaps more than anything, they want an experience that offers a simple, intuitive interface as busy adults have little time or patience for learning new technologies. Adults have jobs to go do, kids to get ready for school and mortgages to pay. Time is of the essence and value must be derived from each minute expended.
Send an adult to MySpace for the first time and they will be instantly repelled. Why? Because the UI is so complex, confusing and non-intuitive that user friction becomes volcanic. If an adult first time user is actually able to create a simple profile (no small task indeed), they’ll probably have received a pornographic valentine before logging off. The product experience, itself, is just not acceptable to a discerning adult mentality.
In contrast to MySpace, Facebook and Bebo, Fuego Nation restricts its member base to those 21 years or older. From the outset we have remained steadfast that every feature, every design component and every value proposition should be targeted toward satisfying the digital socialization needs of busy, high-energy adults. We’ve done this because we believe the best market opportunity in social networking is that targeted at adults not kids and, secondly, an ‘adults only’ approach creates greater revenue monetization opportunities than do the frameworks of current, non-exclusive networks.
These icons link to social bookmarking sites where readers can share and discover new web pages.
While at Electronic Arts, it was common to participate in hallway executive debates over the support of one gaming platform over another. Be it Sony, Microsoft or Nintendo, choosing the correct fledgling platform during a market transition could make or break a company’s numbers. While technical capability was always a part of the conversation, the bottom line was trying to predict which platform would be most likely to deliver the largest base of potential customers. With hundreds of millions of dollars in R&D and development expense on the line, choosing one’s platform medicine correctly could either jumpstart, or short circuit, individual career paths.
Even with state-of-the-art research and decades of market experience, accomplished companies like EA have seen prescient predictions quickly go awry. While EA’s bet on the Sega Genesis in the 80’s ultimately catapulted it to 800-pound gorilla status, it recently whiffed on the unprecedented trajectory of Nintendo’s Wii.
We see a similar battle raging in the social networking arena between Facebook and those tethered to the OpenSocial initiative including MySpace, and most recently, Yahoo. Ultimately, the battle will be won or lost on hard economics. Whereas Facebook currently has a stable development environment, OpenSocial is just now gaining traction with MySpace’s firm commitment to the initiative. With 200 million users soon to be enveloped by OpenSocial, Facebook’s formerly massive platform is beginning to look a bit less, how does one say, massive. It would be like Nintendo and Microsoft getting together and saying to the gaming community, “We’re going to create a common ‘build once, write twice’ coding environment for game developers forming, in the process, a platform that would dwarf the market for Sony PlayStation 3. The result would be a compelling argument to design exclusively for that conjoined platform and block ‘exclusives’ from appearing only on PlayStation. MySpace and others are looking to trump Facebook’s social application opportunity by embracing a third party API strategy.
So while Facebook’s audience is still large enough to substantiate an allocation out of most widget development budgets, the risks of doing so as a primary distribution strategy are about to go through the roof. The risk for Facebook in having the smaller audience is that developers will build first on OpenSocial and secondly on Facebook. The result will be a shattering of Facebook’s current social app monopoly. It will also result in the loss of prestige Facebook now enjoys from having what amounts to short term exclusive ‘rights’ to social applications.
It is our hope that having a wider swath of networks across which to amortize development expense will create higher quality applications than currently exist on Facebook. Perhaps we will see the end of mindless zombie playing, sheep throwing, juvenile applications that currently dominate the Facebook experience and open up opportunities for more resourceful uses of the platform. It has become increasingly self evident to us that this juvenile environment wears thin with an adult population very quickly. Kids do not want to hang out socially with adults nor do adults want to socialize with kids. To this point, Facebook has failed to prove that it can provide a social context for generations to co-exist peaceably and we believe this is largely a failure of their application development strategy.
Furthermore, the environment and context in places like Facebook and MySpace are repellent to lifestyle and luxury branding companies who are looking for a more controlled experience reflective of their own brand values. Hugo Boss doesn’t want to associate with juvenile activities, nor do they want to be squeezed between a Proactive ad and one for Monster.com. Hugo Boss wants to appear next to Armani, Mercedes and W Hotel. OpenSocial will provide more adult contexts better suited to the tastes of more demanding brands.
It is our hope that OpenSocial will provide the context and resource to enable a more rich and engaging interactive experience for adults. One that truly leverages the energy and passion of groups to impact their social environment in a manner that benefits both themselves individually as well as the wider community of which they are a part.
In the end, we believe that it is only a matter of time before Facebook joins the OpenSocial initiative. The writing is on the wall. They don’t feel the pressure cooker now, but the fire under the kettle has officially been set ablaze.
These icons link to social bookmarking sites where readers can share and discover new web pages.
Others have referred to the next level of social networking as Social Networking 2.0. Whereas the first generation has been marked by face-to-face interaction progressing to the telephone then to email and now to collective group communication, we believe the next generation of social experience, borne of the digital realm, will engage and motivate communities in wholly original ways. The result will be journeys of the heart and soul left unexplored until now.
So what are the characteristics of the next level in social networking?
First, in order to truly connect emotionally in life changing ways one must do so on a deeper platform than functions and features. One must connect with people, places and things based on the thread of ignited interests.
Second, In order to do this social technologies must infuse real meaning not just offer standard functionality. Utilities are self-liquidating, meaning is not. Many interpret this to mean niche-based networks. To us that is not enough. These micro-networks must be motivated to inflict change on an otherwise lethargic status quo.
As a result, Fuego Nation is organized exclusively around one’s most cherished beliefs and motivating behaviors (e.g. passions). In our nation, passions are called ‘States.’ So while I might aspire to the doctrine of Fuego Nation as a whole (e.g. the nation concept), I might also fuse most powerfully with my state (e.g. passion to end homelessness in San Francisco).
The collective harmonizing of energy associated with individual passions provides the ignition necessary to combust social change on a macro level. We believe that Social Networking 2.0 is also about leveraging next generation RIA technologies to enable these more scintillating connections between people, places and things. We believe that 3D simulated environments will create an atmosphere that better represents our citizens’ passion-states and create new degrees of power in self-expression. Social Networking 2.0 is also about moving from user generated content to user-influenced design and user-determined communities. We want to provide the framework for people to connect in ways of their own choosing and to make passions discoverable in ways that elevate human understanding and tolerance and propel us to ever-greater collective achievements. Next generation interfaces and user experiences enable the shift from inclusive communities to discoverable worlds. The emphasis will go from the current obsession with binary profiles to a more comprehensive toolset that more efficiently matches interests and makes any number of connection types more actionable.
In the end, we’re collectively embracing the potential engendered by the next generation in social technologies and their implication in generating communities of change agents. We have committed to lead the way because, more than anything else, that is our passion.
These icons link to social bookmarking sites where readers can share and discover new web pages.
The phenomenon known as ’social networking’ has exploded on the global scene over the past five years beginning with sites like Friendster and The Globe and taken to new heights by the likes of MySpace, Facebook, LinkedIn and other newcomers. With growing patronage on these sites have come investment opportunities unlike those ever seen before on the web. Facebook, valued at $200 million less than two years ago, now enjoys estimated market valuations approaching $15 billion. MySpace, bought by Rupert Murdoch’s News Corp in 2003 for what most believed was a rather rich $680 million, is now estimated a few short years later, to be worth north of $18 billion. Triggering this explosive categorical growth in social networking is the inherent utility of leveraged communication via web-based technologies coupled with rapid adoption by 20-something’s resulting in a sonic boom of activity and interest everywhere around the globe.
Market Overview
The use of social networking sites worldwide has grown substantially in the past year, with some sites seeing total visits increase by as much as 270 percent, according to a study recently released by Internet measurement company ComScore Inc. MySpace, for example, drew more than 114 million global visitors in June 2007, a 72 percent increase over the past year, ComScore noted. Facebook, which in September stopped limiting access only to college or university students or workers, experienced a 270 percent increase in worldwide visitors over the past year, according to the study. Bebo, a popular social networking site in the United Kingdom, experienced 172 percent growth, with 18 million visitors in June 2007. Tagged, a social networking site aimed at teenagers, grew 774 percent over the past year, attracting 13 million visitors in June.”Literally hundreds of millions of people around the world are visiting social networking sites each month and many are doing so on a daily basis,” said Bob Ivins, ComScore executive vice president of international markets in a statement. “It would appear that social networking is not a fad but rather an activity that is being woven into the very fabric of the global Internet.”
Chronicling Market Growth
While sites like Yahoo! and AOL continue to see a slowing in their site traffic growth, social networking products continue to gain market share and now dominate the Global Top 20 of most trafficked (and most highly valued) web-based properties. Additionally, many sites continue to see net negative declines in average page views per month, social networking sites continue to dominate. With the increase in prominence of social networking sites, comes the increased interest by advertisers to reach this audience. As a result, social networking products are expected to command an increasing share of total advertising dollars spent by marketers online in the coming years.
The Bottom Line on the Web In an analyst report dated August 14, 2007, Juniper Research indicated that revenue from social networking, dating and personal content delivery services will increase from $778 million this year to a staggering $7.8 billion by 2012.
Mobile Social Networking: The Next Frontier Many believe that the next frontier for social networking products will be in the wireless world. “Even though social networking sites are in their infancy, the exponential growth experienced by a number of mobile service providers, in some cases achieved primarily through viral marketing, would seem to affirm that there is huge potential in this area,” says report author Windsor Holden. Holden’s report also noted that users of mobile social networking sites will rise from a current 14 million to nearly half a billion by 2012.
At Fuego Nation, we believe that the promise of mobile social networking could exceed that currently enjoyed by market leaders MySpace and Facebook on the web which is why we designed a web-based product to seamlessly integrate with mobile devices from the outset. As a result, we feel optimally positioned to capitalize on usage trends currently seen on the web while preparing for the next wave of social networking generated by the global proliferation of web-enabled mobile devices.
These icons link to social bookmarking sites where readers can share and discover new web pages.
The power of the Internet to enhance both the quality and quantity of human interactivity is staggering. The recent successes of MySpace and Facebook, among many others, are testaments to the innate human desire to connect with one another. From the time the umbilical cord is cut, eliciting a powerful separation anxiety response, we strive to reconnect with those around us. It is this power of human bonding that is at the forefront of the Fuego Nation business. So, while we speak to the power of status, second generation interactive interfaces, customized user experiences and the like, the value of creating an underlying functionality that provides the best opportunity to make invaluable connections is at the heart and soul of our mission at Fuego Nation. Everything we do serves to shore up this singular purpose. What is the value to you of a product that results in finding a lifetime partner?
What is the value of finding a job that not only leverages an area in which you are most passionate but also provides an upside many times greater than the dead end job in which you currently find yourself mired? The answer is, in many cases, priceless and that is why the Connection Business is such a great one to be in. Couple that with the financial mechanics and low capital requirements of web-based businesses and you have one of the greatest business opportunities in the 21st century.
These icons link to social bookmarking sites where readers can share and discover new web pages.
Over the course of a long career in and around videogames, one of my deepest passions has been to engender an ‘interactive experience’ that would engage not just the geeky types that have made World of Warcraft a billion dollar business but everyone- both gamers and non-gamers alike.
At EA, we referred to this effort as the Holy Grail of gaming… [John Riccitiello’s recent pronouncements at EA that their games are too complicated and difficult to play are an example of both the hope and challenge of attaining this elusive milestone.]
The game-inspired aspect of Fuego Nation online showcases a highly engaging and interactive experience with a core play dynamic, ubiquitous reward/feedback system and utility that were universally intuited (both by region and age). The seeds of addiction sown by the control mechanics would be founded on the premise of status (one of the key motivators in all off our lives everywhere in the world).
In other words, in Fuego Nation, while members ‘apply’ to get in and whereas admission is based on a democratic vote of one’s peers (similar to the Digg model) through a combination of viral participation in the community and profile voting/enhancement members can elevate their status to VIP levels and beyond. ‘Leveling up’ results in not only unlocked core functionality but better product opportunities from our luxury/lifestyle ad sponsors.
The utility would be grounded in core communication functionality that would be more advanced than any other social network and eventually would be used by Members as a hub for all of their contact-based communication (web and mobile). So, as their status leveled, Members would be motivated to sustain participation via the quality of communication technology and the promise of high ’signal to noise’ connections (be they personal or professional in nature).
If successful here, then users would not have to scurry to multiple sites to manage multiple contact types (as is the protocol now). Furthermore, we refer to our ‘Face the Nation’ interface as ‘The Game of Life.’ Just as in real life, when we interact with anyone new, we begin to make judgments based on a very limited set of information. This is reflected in the Passion Cards in our interface (which are abstracts of a full profile and look like baseball trading cards). In other words, the ‘game’ one must play to get into the exclusive community is a direct reflection of real life (only set in a digital universe). And while our target audience may be Gen X adults, the core principals of ‘a community of human excellence and endeavor’ works well reset for other age groups, etc. (e.g. Fuego Nation Kids).
I’ve always struggled with the concept of avatars in online gaming because the nature of the ‘avatar’ conceptually and psychologically is inherently niche oriented (e.g. not mass market). In Fuego Nation, we create the capability, using RIA tech from Adobe and Microsoft to create ‘real-life avatars’- that is photo/video-realistic representations of our core with graphical depictions set in our virtual environment. For example, on the Leaderboard section (which will evolve into FN search over time), depicted members might have floating icons above their heads (photos) indicating their primary passion. They can then change these passion icons as their mood, focus, and intensity changes (on whatever time basis). They will also be able to change those ’status indicators’ remotely via their mobile phones. So while I may have a skiing icon during the winter months, I might change that to a climbing graphic which is my preferred activity in the spring. Then a user can initiate a search based on primary motivator/passion by simply clicking on that icon. The Leaderboard then resets with only those Members that share the same passion at that specific time.
The end result is a dynamic, addictive and compelling social experience that simulates the richness of more traditionally geeky fantasy role playing environments in a way that is accessible and meaningful to a mass audience.
These icons link to social bookmarking sites where readers can share and discover new web pages.
Several folks have likened the Fuego Nation entry process to that of coaxing your way into an exclusive nightclub. Though the parallel at first escaped us, we’ve come to adopt the simile over time and believe the power of the nightclub experience is indicative of the compelling nature of our online product. To draw the parallel, we’ll point to Duvet in New York City and Vessel in San Francisco as examples. At both nightclubs, exclusivity is generated by having 1) a popular concept; 2) a quality product to back it up; and 3) an admissions requirement (AKA The List).
Let’s focus on the ‘exclusivity factor’-the dreaded List. The List assumedly attracts a high caliber of city dwellers while repelling the less desirable. If you’re not on the ‘List’, well then, you’re not getting in. Having said that, even at places like Duvet, there are always ways to get into the club even if you’re not on the list. That’s what makes the process so exciting and the psychic benefit of figuring out how to get in so much fun. You might literally find a back door where a friend inside can let you in, you might pay off the bouncer with a cool 20 dollar bill or you might just create a beautiful enough first impression on the bouncer that he pulls the velvet rope as he admires your short skirt floating by. If, ultimately, you succeed in getting in via one of these ‘back doors’ your actual experience having figured out a way to get in is much more powerful and rewarding from an emotional standpoint.
Once in, there are VIP levels (often table service) for those willing to shell out more cash for the added privilege and prestige. This scenario is actually quite similar to the ‘Face the Nation’ admissions process at Fuego Nation Online. The parallels, components of what we refer to as ‘The Game of Life‘ follow below:
1. As an applicant to FNO you play both the bouncer and the bounced. Similar to American Idol, the voting process is entirely democratic; so, while we set the parameters for admission (e.g. total approval votes required to attain Basic membership) we do not determine who does, or does not, get in; The process is entirely both automated and democratic which is what distinguishes our product from every other ‘closed network’ and allows us to make our basic membership pool as large as we want
2. Since there is no list, no one is on it; This means everyone needs to ‘earn’ his or her entrance thus generating the exclusive component of our brand
3. Applicants must generate the best first impression they can via our Passion Cards, then figure out how to supplement that impression with clever ambition; This is why we refer to this process as ‘The Game of Life’ because it is designed to mimic the ‘connection’ process in the real world
4. So while physical attractiveness may help you get in (via the photo component), this isn’t necessarily the case; it depends on what the community determines is ‘cool, talented and desirable;’ good looks might actually backfire if enough applicants focus specifically on core talents
5. Since charter applicants will help ‘arbitrate the definition of cool’ we anticipate that this might trigger viral activity as friends recruit other friends to help define the basic membership trends in the club; If you have a friend who is already a Basic member, they can get you a Club Pass which essentially gets you around the ‘bouncer’ by generating a huge boost of points to help you gain admission; In this case, both the person giving the pass and the receiver of the ‘gift’ feel better about the product experience as a result
6. Although we won’t launch with the opportunity to ‘pay off the bouncer’ the opportunity for us to create a micro-transaction (i.e. a cover charge) is an opportunity for us to generate more revenue down the road
7. Now that you’re into an exclusive hot spot with a quality product to back up the ‘hype’ (and feel that much better about the product because you had to ‘get in’ vs. ‘just walking in’ at a place like Facebook, MySpace, LinkedIn, etc.) you’ll notice that there are levels of service, mainly a VIP section; If you want, you can purchase the added benefit, prestige and status of this product or aspire to do so some other time; this, functionally is how status levels work in FNO
This brings us to a revenue opportunity unique to Fuego Nation-that is, offline events. Getting back to the DNA of Data, if we successfully generate a tighter grouping of ‘cool, talented and ambitious people’ coupled with a brand that indicates ‘human excellence and endeavor’ we’ll be able to export that database into a collective community. This collective community might end up being an offline nightclub experience, professional networking event, climbing expedition, etc. Staying with the nightclub example, we might find a proud venue with poor traffic long past its prime. I’ll use The Ramp in San Francisco to illustrate this point. The Ramp could have tumbleweeds running through its dance floor one night and teeming throngs of talented, higher income Fuego Nation members the next. In other words, we can make a formerly dead club hop in a matter of days and collect 15% of gross receipt for the simple process of redirecting an existing database to a specific offline event. The event itself would be a Fuego Nation VIP member-only affair with an exclusive guest List. There’s the dreaded list again…only, this time, you’re on it. If you’re not on the list, you’re not getting in. Members might be attracted to this opportunity because of the power of brand association and because they KNOW that the general quality of attendees will be higher than anywhere else. Offline events are just one example of leveraging the high-end database of users we’re generating through our online product and only hints at the many revenue-generating opportunities in front of us.
These icons link to social bookmarking sites where readers can share and discover new web pages.
Where’s the innovation? While sites like Facebook hearken the new age of targeted advertising and spend millions of dollars on their serving technologies, I continue to get served Proactive ads featuring Jessica Simpson on my Facebook page. How much technology is required to assess my age? Click through rates have fallen from 0.41% in 2002 to 0.20% in 2007, and the trend continues to decline. Facebook’s CPMs are now averaging an anemic $0.15 and few other Internet sites across the web are doing much better.
When we founded Fuego Nation a year ago, we were hell-bent on shattering the already archaic convention of online advertising modalities and create the next wave of innovation. We started with the requirement to revolutionize online advertising for lifestyle/luxury brands by creating a social context where passionate people could engage with and evangelize their products. It was only after this customized framework was established that we built a product experience to support that vision. Our intent was to provide an experiential approach that improved the user experience for both lifestyle/luxury brands and members alike.
We call our platform for lifestyle branding in social media FuegoFusion. The name comes from our desire to fuse our memberships’ most passionate interests with more experiential approaches to delivering brand engagement that result in powerful affinity and evangelization. Our focus on solving the needs of high-end brands from the outset has resulted in a comprehensive slate of sponsorship services, ranging from multi-tiered, in-product engagement to offline event sponsorships.
FuegoFusion is our implementation of Integrated Experiential Advertising, or IEA. There are two components to every IEA program. The first involves data filtering and targeting, and the second revolves around the engagement experience itself.
Data Filtering
Most Web 2.0 sites begin with amassing content, then figures out ways to make sense of the data, which theoretically enables ad targeting. Fuego Nation, in contrast, filters data at the outset and at every stage of the data lifecycle thereafter. As a result, our process of data filtering is organic and actually requires very little specific ad-filtering technology. A sampling of key filtering components is listed below:
Experiential Advertising
IEA is particularly relevant to lifestyle/luxury branding companies who require tight control over the user experience and brand display. It involves hyper-targeting, but also an experiential, customized component where brands achieve the following benefits:
The net result of the FuegoFusion experience is that high-end brands can substantiate their offerings in a highly controlled environment supported by brands of similar quality and ilk. This alleviates much of the risk associated with social media sites like MySpace, Digg, Hotmail, etc. Brands can then leverage the stature of users in the community to provide feedback on current and future product offerings, evangelize throughout their own micro networks, and target specific products (Prada vs. Prada Sport for example) to members at various levels (e.g. basic vs. VIP). In essence, FuegoFusion represents a more powerful extension of the way these brands have already achieved success in offline environments.
Fuego Nation Online is a hybrid Open-Closed Network and it is the first of its kind on the Internet. It’s closed in that not anyone can sign up and access member benefits as is the case with sites like Facebook, MySpace, Bebo, LinkedIn, etc. It’s open in that anyone CAN request an invite and apply to get in on their own merit. We believe this provides the benefit of scale by reducing the friction created by ‘invite only’ business models while generating the brand power inherent in exclusivity.
Most online clubs generate exclusivity by legacy, offline means. They rely on symbols of material success like income level and celebrity. Fuego Nation Online breaks this antiquated mold by creating exclusivity around the energy that drives the world- individual passions. To us, passion is the great equalizer, capable of connecting individuals regardless as to income level, caste system or common prejudice.
At Fuego Nation Online, talent literally rises to the top. In our world what makes someone elite is the passion with which they engage and participate in the community coupled with the energy and devotion they engage with their passions. In a sense, we are creating a global meritocracy based on passion and believe the combination of all that energy and desire will be combustible– a true social change agent.
Though we see the value in exclusivity as a marketing concept, as articulated above, our application of the concept is more experiential and practical and we believe, more potentially powerful. We use exclusivity to separate the truly passionate from the posers and then we use that knowledge to distinguish between the truly elite and the novices (e.g. in our Mountain Climbing and Fashion Passion Spheres). If one is not truly passionate, after all, then they won’t have the energy and desire to fill out a simple passion card and apply for membership.
We apply exclusivity to leveling of content as well with the purpose of making it easier for adults to assess the relative merit and value of community contributions. This leveling structure enables someone to review only content of members ‘at their level or above.’ In doing so, we intend to help solve the problem of indecipherable user generated content and increase the discoverability of high quality content by levels of magnitude.
We extend exclusivity into the offline world as well via Fuego Nation Events. To attend Fuego Nation VIP events at clubs, restaurants and museums a member must have achieved VIP status online first. Once at an event, those in attendance have valuable data about one another which decreases overall anonymity and provides a psychic tethering mechanism to foster connections via commonality.
In the end, our market approach and strategy leverages exclusivity in the traditional marketing sense while deploying its functional application to create a more engaging and efficient user experience.
We believe the privacy backlash continues to gain momentum for two central reasons. First, most popular social networking sites were designed, engineered and perpetuated by youngsters themselves. Their designs have reflected their own value systems which are often in opposition to that of adults. The second is reflected in the ongoing reliance on antiquated forms of monetization in social networks which rely on CPM-based page views to generate income. As a result, deleting user data and limiting page views is antithetical to their very sustenance. The result is increasingly less control over one’s end-to-end data set.
What is so different about an adult that makes the need for privacy so pressing? While complex in origin, we believe it boils down to a fairly simple difference between kids and adults: the need to protect reputation equity. One might argue that kids are too young to have developed reputation equity as it takes years to establish domain and/or career expertise.
As adults, we’ve spent both energy and resource creating our personal brands and need to know that those brands can be effectively managed and protected in both online and offline contexts. As adults we don’t want everyone to know everything we do. We want them to know what we want them to know and nothing more.
Furthermore, the goal of sites like MySpace and Facebook is to generate as many page views as possible. These page views can then be sold to advertisers in the form of CPM-based online ad buys. Deleting a users profile decreases the available inventory for the site and therefore works against their interest. In addition valuations have been driven skyward by statistics around page views, registered users and monthly visits which further perpetuates the cycle of dependency on all data, good and bad.
The results of a large search on MySpace, for example, will turn up dozens of user profiles that have been inactive for six months or longer. Active or not, these profiles are still regarded as viable advertising inventory. A short term win will almost assuredly result in long term disappointment for user, advertiser and MySpace alike.
In contrast to this, Fuego Nation allows users complete control over their online personas. We monetize only active, engaged users. So, if a user isn’t active for a period of three months, we delete them from our system- entirely. The entire concept behind Fuego Nation was predicated on providing actionable data for both member and advertiser alike and to be actionable members must be engaged in the community.
We don’t have a page view ad model but an active user, sponsorship model. The key, then, is to provide context and environment for people to WANT to be engaged over a long period of time. If a user’s activity lapses, we want to address the problem of engagement not perpetuate a poor product experience by engaging ghosts of data past.
There are a couple key reasons why these legacy social networking sites look and feel the way they do. The crux of the rationale is that sites, Facebook is a prime example, are designed by young engineers, themselves still kids, with designs largely defined by their own life experiences and needs. This, coupled with the nature of technology early adoption being a youthful endeavor, has led to a preponderance of these tools being geared toward youth and not toward the discerning tastes and unique needs of adults.
But the market for social networking has moved far beyond the confines of schoolyards and dorm rooms. The fastest growth area on Facebook is among 25-35 year old adults, a segment that has seen 181% growth in less than one year. Ultimately, it is interest from this segment that has exploded consumer awareness of social networking beyond the previous confines of the youth market and gained the interest of brand advertisers, large and small. Recent growth trends with MySpace follow similar demographic trending.
Having said that, we anticipate a flattening in both demand and usage among adults currently using utilities like Facebook as the novelty of social networking as a concept wears thin and the utility value on sites originally designed for youth proves vacuous. We also believe that the overwhelming number of, and juvenile nature of, Facebook’s application program will continue to chase away adults from the site. While recently added privacy controls do provide some salve to the psychic wounds suffered by adult users, they will prove out to be band-aids to an inherently flawed experience.
The reality is that the social needs of kids and adults are so widely disparate that no plausible, easily understood and intuited system can peaceably coexist. Adults have very specific needs that have not been addresses by the market. They have more disposable income, but less free time. They are more willing to pay for a better controlled experience that helps them gather the information they need quickly and efficiently. They want a well-lit place for interaction not a messy dorm room when visiting another user’s profile. And perhaps more than anything, they want an experience that offers a simple, intuitive interface as busy adults have little time or patience for learning new technologies. Adults have jobs to go do, kids to get ready for school and mortgages to pay. Time is of the essence and value must be derived from each minute expended.
Send an adult to MySpace for the first time and they will be instantly repelled. Why? Because the UI is so complex, confusing and non-intuitive that user friction becomes volcanic. If an adult first time user is actually able to create a simple profile (no small task indeed), they’ll probably have received a pornographic valentine before logging off. The product experience, itself, is just not acceptable to a discerning adult mentality.
In contrast to MySpace, Facebook and Bebo, Fuego Nation restricts its member base to those 21 years or older. From the outset we have remained steadfast that every feature, every design component and every value proposition should be targeted toward satisfying the digital socialization needs of busy, high-energy adults. We’ve done this because we believe the best market opportunity in social networking is that targeted at adults not kids and, secondly, an ‘adults only’ approach creates greater revenue monetization opportunities than do the frameworks of current, non-exclusive networks.
Even with state-of-the-art research and decades of market experience, accomplished companies like EA have seen prescient predictions quickly go awry. While EA’s bet on the Sega Genesis in the 80’s ultimately catapulted it to 800-pound gorilla status, it recently whiffed on the unprecedented trajectory of Nintendo’s Wii.
We see a similar battle raging in the social networking arena between Facebook and those tethered to the OpenSocial initiative including MySpace, and most recently, Yahoo. Ultimately, the battle will be won or lost on hard economics. Whereas Facebook currently has a stable development environment, OpenSocial is just now gaining traction with MySpace’s firm commitment to the initiative. With 200 million users soon to be enveloped by OpenSocial, Facebook’s formerly massive platform is beginning to look a bit less, how does one say, massive. It would be like Nintendo and Microsoft getting together and saying to the gaming community, “We’re going to create a common ‘build once, write twice’ coding environment for game developers forming, in the process, a platform that would dwarf the market for Sony PlayStation 3. The result would be a compelling argument to design exclusively for that conjoined platform and block ‘exclusives’ from appearing only on PlayStation. MySpace and others are looking to trump Facebook’s social application opportunity by embracing a third party API strategy.
So while Facebook’s audience is still large enough to substantiate an allocation out of most widget development budgets, the risks of doing so as a primary distribution strategy are about to go through the roof. The risk for Facebook in having the smaller audience is that developers will build first on OpenSocial and secondly on Facebook. The result will be a shattering of Facebook’s current social app monopoly. It will also result in the loss of prestige Facebook now enjoys from having what amounts to short term exclusive ‘rights’ to social applications.
It is our hope that having a wider swath of networks across which to amortize development expense will create higher quality applications than currently exist on Facebook. Perhaps we will see the end of mindless zombie playing, sheep throwing, juvenile applications that currently dominate the Facebook experience and open up opportunities for more resourceful uses of the platform. It has become increasingly self evident to us that this juvenile environment wears thin with an adult population very quickly. Kids do not want to hang out socially with adults nor do adults want to socialize with kids. To this point, Facebook has failed to prove that it can provide a social context for generations to co-exist peaceably and we believe this is largely a failure of their application development strategy.
Furthermore, the environment and context in places like Facebook and MySpace are repellent to lifestyle and luxury branding companies who are looking for a more controlled experience reflective of their own brand values. Hugo Boss doesn’t want to associate with juvenile activities, nor do they want to be squeezed between a Proactive ad and one for Monster.com. Hugo Boss wants to appear next to Armani, Mercedes and W Hotel. OpenSocial will provide more adult contexts better suited to the tastes of more demanding brands.
It is our hope that OpenSocial will provide the context and resource to enable a more rich and engaging interactive experience for adults. One that truly leverages the energy and passion of groups to impact their social environment in a manner that benefits both themselves individually as well as the wider community of which they are a part.
In the end, we believe that it is only a matter of time before Facebook joins the OpenSocial initiative. The writing is on the wall. They don’t feel the pressure cooker now, but the fire under the kettle has officially been set ablaze.
Others have referred to the next level of social networking as Social Networking 2.0. Whereas the first generation has been marked by face-to-face interaction progressing to the telephone then to email and now to collective group communication, we believe the next generation of social experience, borne of the digital realm, will engage and motivate communities in wholly original ways. The result will be journeys of the heart and soul left unexplored until now.
So what are the characteristics of the next level in social networking?
First, in order to truly connect emotionally in life changing ways one must do so on a deeper platform than functions and features. One must connect with people, places and things based on the thread of ignited interests.
Second, In order to do this social technologies must infuse real meaning not just offer standard functionality. Utilities are self-liquidating, meaning is not. Many interpret this to mean niche-based networks. To us that is not enough. These micro-networks must be motivated to inflict change on an otherwise lethargic status quo.
As a result, Fuego Nation is organized exclusively around one’s most cherished beliefs and motivating behaviors (e.g. passions). In our nation, passions are called ‘States.’ So while I might aspire to the doctrine of Fuego Nation as a whole (e.g. the nation concept), I might also fuse most powerfully with my state (e.g. passion to end homelessness in San Francisco).
The collective harmonizing of energy associated with individual passions provides the ignition necessary to combust social change on a macro level. We believe that Social Networking 2.0 is also about leveraging next generation RIA technologies to enable these more scintillating connections between people, places and things. We believe that 3D simulated environments will create an atmosphere that better represents our citizens’ passion-states and create new degrees of power in self-expression. Social Networking 2.0 is also about moving from user generated content to user-influenced design and user-determined communities. We want to provide the framework for people to connect in ways of their own choosing and to make passions discoverable in ways that elevate human understanding and tolerance and propel us to ever-greater collective achievements. Next generation interfaces and user experiences enable the shift from inclusive communities to discoverable worlds. The emphasis will go from the current obsession with binary profiles to a more comprehensive toolset that more efficiently matches interests and makes any number of connection types more actionable.
In the end, we’re collectively embracing the potential engendered by the next generation in social technologies and their implication in generating communities of change agents. We have committed to lead the way because, more than anything else, that is our passion.
Intro
The phenomenon known as ’social networking’ has exploded on the global scene over the past five years beginning with sites like Friendster and The Globe and taken to new heights by the likes of MySpace, Facebook, LinkedIn and other newcomers. With growing patronage on these sites have come investment opportunities unlike those ever seen before on the web. Facebook, valued at $200 million less than two years ago, now enjoys estimated market valuations approaching $15 billion. MySpace, bought by Rupert Murdoch’s News Corp in 2003 for what most believed was a rather rich $680 million, is now estimated a few short years later, to be worth north of $18 billion. Triggering this explosive categorical growth in social networking is the inherent utility of leveraged communication via web-based technologies coupled with rapid adoption by 20-something’s resulting in a sonic boom of activity and interest everywhere around the globe.
Market Overview
The use of social networking sites worldwide has grown substantially in the past year, with some sites seeing total visits increase by as much as 270 percent, according to a study recently released by Internet measurement company ComScore Inc. MySpace, for example, drew more than 114 million global visitors in June 2007, a 72 percent increase over the past year, ComScore noted. Facebook, which in September stopped limiting access only to college or university students or workers, experienced a 270 percent increase in worldwide visitors over the past year, according to the study. Bebo, a popular social networking site in the United Kingdom, experienced 172 percent growth, with 18 million visitors in June 2007. Tagged, a social networking site aimed at teenagers, grew 774 percent over the past year, attracting 13 million visitors in June.”Literally hundreds of millions of people around the world are visiting social networking sites each month and many are doing so on a daily basis,” said Bob Ivins, ComScore executive vice president of international markets in a statement. “It would appear that social networking is not a fad but rather an activity that is being woven into the very fabric of the global Internet.”
Chronicling Market Growth
While sites like Yahoo! and AOL continue to see a slowing in their site traffic growth, social networking products continue to gain market share and now dominate the Global Top 20 of most trafficked (and most highly valued) web-based properties. Additionally, many sites continue to see net negative declines in average page views per month, social networking sites continue to dominate. With the increase in prominence of social networking sites, comes the increased interest by advertisers to reach this audience. As a result, social networking products are expected to command an increasing share of total advertising dollars spent by marketers online in the coming years.
The Bottom Line on the Web In an analyst report dated August 14, 2007, Juniper Research indicated that revenue from social networking, dating and personal content delivery services will increase from $778 million this year to a staggering $7.8 billion by 2012.
Mobile Social Networking: The Next Frontier Many believe that the next frontier for social networking products will be in the wireless world. “Even though social networking sites are in their infancy, the exponential growth experienced by a number of mobile service providers, in some cases achieved primarily through viral marketing, would seem to affirm that there is huge potential in this area,” says report author Windsor Holden. Holden’s report also noted that users of mobile social networking sites will rise from a current 14 million to nearly half a billion by 2012.
At Fuego Nation, we believe that the promise of mobile social networking could exceed that currently enjoyed by market leaders MySpace and Facebook on the web which is why we designed a web-based product to seamlessly integrate with mobile devices from the outset. As a result, we feel optimally positioned to capitalize on usage trends currently seen on the web while preparing for the next wave of social networking generated by the global proliferation of web-enabled mobile devices.
What is the value of finding a job that not only leverages an area in which you are most passionate but also provides an upside many times greater than the dead end job in which you currently find yourself mired? The answer is, in many cases, priceless and that is why the Connection Business is such a great one to be in. Couple that with the financial mechanics and low capital requirements of web-based businesses and you have one of the greatest business opportunities in the 21st century.
At EA, we referred to this effort as the Holy Grail of gaming… [John Riccitiello’s recent pronouncements at EA that their games are too complicated and difficult to play are an example of both the hope and challenge of attaining this elusive milestone.]
The game-inspired aspect of Fuego Nation online showcases a highly engaging and interactive experience with a core play dynamic, ubiquitous reward/feedback system and utility that were universally intuited (both by region and age). The seeds of addiction sown by the control mechanics would be founded on the premise of status (one of the key motivators in all off our lives everywhere in the world).
In other words, in Fuego Nation, while members ‘apply’ to get in and whereas admission is based on a democratic vote of one’s peers (similar to the Digg model) through a combination of viral participation in the community and profile voting/enhancement members can elevate their status to VIP levels and beyond. ‘Leveling up’ results in not only unlocked core functionality but better product opportunities from our luxury/lifestyle ad sponsors.
The utility would be grounded in core communication functionality that would be more advanced than any other social network and eventually would be used by Members as a hub for all of their contact-based communication (web and mobile). So, as their status leveled, Members would be motivated to sustain participation via the quality of communication technology and the promise of high ’signal to noise’ connections (be they personal or professional in nature).
If successful here, then users would not have to scurry to multiple sites to manage multiple contact types (as is the protocol now). Furthermore, we refer to our ‘Face the Nation’ interface as ‘The Game of Life.’ Just as in real life, when we interact with anyone new, we begin to make judgments based on a very limited set of information. This is reflected in the Passion Cards in our interface (which are abstracts of a full profile and look like baseball trading cards). In other words, the ‘game’ one must play to get into the exclusive community is a direct reflection of real life (only set in a digital universe). And while our target audience may be Gen X adults, the core principals of ‘a community of human excellence and endeavor’ works well reset for other age groups, etc. (e.g. Fuego Nation Kids).
I’ve always struggled with the concept of avatars in online gaming because the nature of the ‘avatar’ conceptually and psychologically is inherently niche oriented (e.g. not mass market). In Fuego Nation, we create the capability, using RIA tech from Adobe and Microsoft to create ‘real-life avatars’- that is photo/video-realistic representations of our core with graphical depictions set in our virtual environment. For example, on the Leaderboard section (which will evolve into FN search over time), depicted members might have floating icons above their heads (photos) indicating their primary passion. They can then change these passion icons as their mood, focus, and intensity changes (on whatever time basis). They will also be able to change those ’status indicators’ remotely via their mobile phones. So while I may have a skiing icon during the winter months, I might change that to a climbing graphic which is my preferred activity in the spring. Then a user can initiate a search based on primary motivator/passion by simply clicking on that icon. The Leaderboard then resets with only those Members that share the same passion at that specific time.
The end result is a dynamic, addictive and compelling social experience that simulates the richness of more traditionally geeky fantasy role playing environments in a way that is accessible and meaningful to a mass audience.
Let’s focus on the ‘exclusivity factor’-the dreaded List. The List assumedly attracts a high caliber of city dwellers while repelling the less desirable. If you’re not on the ‘List’, well then, you’re not getting in. Having said that, even at places like Duvet, there are always ways to get into the club even if you’re not on the list. That’s what makes the process so exciting and the psychic benefit of figuring out how to get in so much fun. You might literally find a back door where a friend inside can let you in, you might pay off the bouncer with a cool 20 dollar bill or you might just create a beautiful enough first impression on the bouncer that he pulls the velvet rope as he admires your short skirt floating by. If, ultimately, you succeed in getting in via one of these ‘back doors’ your actual experience having figured out a way to get in is much more powerful and rewarding from an emotional standpoint.
Once in, there are VIP levels (often table service) for those willing to shell out more cash for the added privilege and prestige. This scenario is actually quite similar to the ‘Face the Nation’ admissions process at Fuego Nation Online. The parallels, components of what we refer to as ‘The Game of Life‘ follow below:
1. As an applicant to FNO you play both the bouncer and the bounced. Similar to American Idol, the voting process is entirely democratic; so, while we set the parameters for admission (e.g. total approval votes required to attain Basic membership) we do not determine who does, or does not, get in; The process is entirely both automated and democratic which is what distinguishes our product from every other ‘closed network’ and allows us to make our basic membership pool as large as we want
2. Since there is no list, no one is on it; This means everyone needs to ‘earn’ his or her entrance thus generating the exclusive component of our brand
3. Applicants must generate the best first impression they can via our Passion Cards, then figure out how to supplement that impression with clever ambition; This is why we refer to this process as ‘The Game of Life’ because it is designed to mimic the ‘connection’ process in the real world
4. So while physical attractiveness may help you get in (via the photo component), this isn’t necessarily the case; it depends on what the community determines is ‘cool, talented and desirable;’ good looks might actually backfire if enough applicants focus specifically on core talents
5. Since charter applicants will help ‘arbitrate the definition of cool’ we anticipate that this might trigger viral activity as friends recruit other friends to help define the basic membership trends in the club; If you have a friend who is already a Basic member, they can get you a Club Pass which essentially gets you around the ‘bouncer’ by generating a huge boost of points to help you gain admission; In this case, both the person giving the pass and the receiver of the ‘gift’ feel better about the product experience as a result
6. Although we won’t launch with the opportunity to ‘pay off the bouncer’ the opportunity for us to create a micro-transaction (i.e. a cover charge) is an opportunity for us to generate more revenue down the road
7. Now that you’re into an exclusive hot spot with a quality product to back up the ‘hype’ (and feel that much better about the product because you had to ‘get in’ vs. ‘just walking in’ at a place like Facebook, MySpace, LinkedIn, etc.) you’ll notice that there are levels of service, mainly a VIP section; If you want, you can purchase the added benefit, prestige and status of this product or aspire to do so some other time; this, functionally is how status levels work in FNO
This brings us to a revenue opportunity unique to Fuego Nation-that is, offline events. Getting back to the DNA of Data, if we successfully generate a tighter grouping of ‘cool, talented and ambitious people’ coupled with a brand that indicates ‘human excellence and endeavor’ we’ll be able to export that database into a collective community. This collective community might end up being an offline nightclub experience, professional networking event, climbing expedition, etc. Staying with the nightclub example, we might find a proud venue with poor traffic long past its prime. I’ll use The Ramp in San Francisco to illustrate this point. The Ramp could have tumbleweeds running through its dance floor one night and teeming throngs of talented, higher income Fuego Nation members the next. In other words, we can make a formerly dead club hop in a matter of days and collect 15% of gross receipt for the simple process of redirecting an existing database to a specific offline event. The event itself would be a Fuego Nation VIP member-only affair with an exclusive guest List. There’s the dreaded list again…only, this time, you’re on it. If you’re not on the list, you’re not getting in. Members might be attracted to this opportunity because of the power of brand association and because they KNOW that the general quality of attendees will be higher than anywhere else. Offline events are just one example of leveraging the high-end database of users we’re generating through our online product and only hints at the many revenue-generating opportunities in front of us.