Wal-Mart Fails At Social Networking

Posted on October 8, 2006 Written by 4 Comments

Wal-Mart’s attempt at setting up a social network aimed at teens was a miserably failure and was shut down after less than three months. Why was it such a failure you might ask? Well “The Hub” as Wal-Mart called it was supposed to let teens “express their individuality”. However, Wal-Mart screened all the content, informed parents when their children joined and forbade users to e-mail one another. Who great idea was this? There is no way that social site with these types of restrictions could ever be successful.

David Wilson

I have been in providing Search Engine Optimization (SEO) services to clients for the last 8 years. I believe that SMO is where all the online services are going to converge over the next 18 months.

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Filed Under: Brand Marketing, Social Media Marketing, Social Media Optimization

Comments

  1. Igor M (BizMord Blog) says:
    October 9, 2006 at 7:32 pm

    I can see it … 10 grey hair, 60+ execs, creating a social place for teens. Their arguments? … “I have more kids than you, I know what they want” :-)

    Reply

Trackbacks

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  3. » Third Time Lucky For Wal-Mart? - Social Media Optimization says:
    July 25, 2007 at 12:05 pm

    [...] Wal-Mart’s previous social media attempts included a MySpace-like offering aimed at teens was a miserably failure and was shut down after less than three months. It failed mainly because Wal-Mart screened all the content, informed parents when their children joined and forbade users to e-mail one another. Wal-Mart tried again earlier this year with a travelogue “blog” that it was forced to stop when news got out that the blog was created and paid for by its PR firm. [...]

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