Only a few years ago, the term Social Media was not so
familiar even the existence was there. Today, especially in context of
Marketing, Social Media Marketing is popularized as a new platform with high
rate of returns.
What social media is all about, I guess, is to socialize non-physically but effectively. Like a lion in the forest, facebook is the king in social media. Playing smartly, an 8 year kid with millions of profiles has started rigorous captures all around.
Few of the purchases made by facebook are:
February’ 2010 – Octazen Solutions (Contact importing
startup)
April, 2010 – Divvyshot (Photo-sharing service)
April, 2012 – Instagram (Photo-sharing service)
March’ 2013 – Team from Storylane
August’ 2013 – FriendFeed (News aggregator by Gmail engineer)
February’ 2014 – Whatsapp (IM application for Smartphone) –
announced only
To some sources (See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_mergers_and_acquisitions_by_Facebook),
it would be the 45th acquisition by facebook since inception and the
most highly paid too. Its line of action is clear, it’s expanding. Shares of
profits made by facebook that made these purchases possible are the ‘artifact’
of Social Media Marketing. Although, all of the purchases are in favor of strengthening
of the business in social media but, it has raised some other concerns too.
At first, security and privacy issues are already in
limelight with the extensive use of facebook all over the world. Facebook took
a number of measures to tackle the issues but they are still there. In addition
to that, people’s personal information has been circulated widely whether
publicly or privately through social media. It all goes in hands of one,
ultimately. I hope, facebook is already planning to take care of these.
With every new app or tech, we get used to of it like in
past with Instagram and Whatsapp. Can you just think of a couple of days
without facebook? We all are habitual of sharing and socializing now no matter
who has acquired what.
Next few moves of facebook will more clearly explain the horizon
of expansion. Whatever it is, but facebook is really working on ‘connecting
people’. Isn’t it?
