There’s a lot of news about the recent study of the demise of Facebook where it will lose 80% of its active membership. The research is based on the life cycle of epidemics and the inevitable fade.
While there is historical proof of such previous internet giants as MySpace and AOL going this way, it’s hard to predict human behavior and the internet accurately to say when and how things will happen.
But, I can see why it would happen. The novelty tends to wear off and there is a certain fatigue to seeing old news. It’s like a worn-out TV channel.
If you are trying to rely heavily on Facebook for your business, it is a warning to heed, lest you get caught in a changing world that will leave you without an audience, or at least a disengaged one.
Ultimately, it’s one more indicator to watch for and reinforce the strategy to build on your own platforms with your own content.
Imagine if Facebook does fade out and you lose all that valuable content and work you posted. You hitched your wagon to a platform you do not control or own. That’s a lot of hours that will fade into history.
That’s what happens to distribution channels. They will come and go because they require mass collective buy-in.
But your hub and central asset of thought leadership, content and business systems needs to remain yours.
Consider how you are set up and if you have built an audience and assets that stand on its own. We can’t anticipate every change by Google, Facebook or Twitter out there. But we can think strategically about how those who care about what we have to say or think connect and stay engaged.
We all have the option and access to build our own media and distribute it on the internet. It takes time, just like trust, credibility and engagement take time to naturally develop.
But I would rather build something robust and lasting as a body of work than watch the next rise and fall of mediums take place.
Go where the masses are, where it’s not crowded instead. #lastingwork
