In a recent interview by Maria Bartiromo of CNBC (NYSE:GE) with MySpace (NYSE:NWS-A) CEO Chris DeWolfe, she asked him about the progress of the social networking site, and where he sees it going from here.
The first thing she asked him was if there was pressure because of missing the ad revenue targets, which will probably fall short by about 11 percent, dropping from the desired $850 million to $775 million.
DeWolfe said he hadn't been getting any from News Corp., and that it must be kept in perspective that the company is only four years old, is still growing at a healthy rate, and they have been profitable from the day the business started.
Concerning the deal with Google (Nasdaq:GOOG), CEO Eric Schmidt told Bartiromo recently that the expectations for Google ads on MySpace hadn't met their expectations either.
DeWolfe said that while they were working hard to optimize all the advertising from Google, he was very happy with the performance of their own advertising products, which had increased by 50 percent.
When asked about the changes since Rupert Murdoch acquired the company, DeWolfe said the growth has surged from 22 million unique users at the time, to close to 120 million today. The other big change was changing it from a niche site to more of a general site.
I think that's one of the reasons the company has struggled, as far as missing their advertising targets. Whenever you go from a niche site to widening your demographic, you'll end up with less responsive users. It's the rule of the game, and a good reason not to attempt to target a mass market.
It's understandable why Murdoch is doing it, as that's the business he knows, and the way he grew his other businesses. But for most online marketers, it's better not to go that route.
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