The launch of Linda Ikeji’s very own social networking site – Linda Ikeji Social – almost broke the Nigerian web on Tuesday.
Bearing an extraordinary resemblance to Facebook, Linda Ikeji Social (LIS) permits users to produce a profile, post images, include and search for buddies, along with share what’s on their mind.
The long term prepare for LIS, supposing the execution is perfect, will be to rival Facebook in Nigeria. Of course it is a burden, but it is not likely anybody will wager versus Linda Ikeji Social (LIS) pulling it off all the exact same.
Even tech ‘heads’ who (seemingly) know much better are afraid to prophesy doom for Linda Ikeji Social.
– ִ (@xylemic) November 1, 2016
LIS is offering incentives including shared ad income and $3 benefits per original user-sourced news to catalyse engagement.
According to Linda Ikeji:
“There’s a lot of money from marketing on social networks, a lot of brands put cash on popular online platforms and we desire to share a few of the cash we make on this platform with our users,”
The technique appears to be extremely efficient. Barely two days after it initially introduced, the platform already claims over 50,000 users and counting.
Almost 50k users on LIS in 24hrs. Chuffed! Thanks guys! If you have not registered, please join us on https://t.co/7vKviiDjzG
– Linda Ikeji Blog (@lindaikeji) November 2, 2016
And from all indications, the majority of these users are not just small, they’re quite active.
Why Linda Ikeji Social may pull through
In all this, Linda Ikeji is not resting on her oars. She has actually already begun mounting huge signboard campaigns to produce interest and awareness around LIS.
Besides, if there’s something we have actually learnt from the entire story of Linda Ikeji, it’s not to undervalue her audience. With an audience that is mainly driven by generous love for the famed blogger, Linda appears to have gotten a set of patriot to her course. While Linda Ikeji’s Blog (LIB) has grown for nearly a decade for this reason, the shared income method will only serve to add brand-new sets of follower to this same course.
However, running a social networking platform needs heavy financial investment in tech. This involves assembling a team of world class engineers to keep track of the platform on a daily basis. The site went offline briefly, barely two hours after in launched on Tuesday. Following that was an extended duration of over 12 hours where early adopters were unable to trigger or login to their accounts. These are signs of how things could go incorrect if the tech side isn’t accorded due value.
No doubt, LIS is still far from an ended up item. The site still needs a great deal of improvement in the location of functionality and engagement.
For instance, Facebook algorithms are so effective that they can dictate the tone of one’s feed; either by making sure that the feeds contain just the things specific to the user or by creating distinct features that keep such user entirely engaged. This is currently lacking in LIS. But then once again, Linda Ikeji’s economically incentivised approach to user engagement might well show efficient in the long run.
I keep telling these “intellectual” to study the Linda Effect as a part of modern social sociology. https://t.co/q3xJzW5NDU
– Funmi Iyanda (@Funmilola) November 1, 2016
The twist
Indeed, LIS does take the mould of a social networking website. However, its true nature still stays evasive. While the inability to anticipate the real kind of LIS is a bit worrying, it also what makes it unique perhaps.
In August, Linda Ikeji announced she would be broadening her business to consist of other types of media like online TV network, an online radio station, a music site, and something else she called “LIS.” However, the gesture was applauded. But truly, everyone was unaware about how this was going to take place.
But somehow, LIS speaks of Linda’s lofty objective and how she was going to bring them to fruition. Still at its early days, it remains to be seen what LIS will develop into, however there’s every possibility that it will be a parent platform to Linda Ikeji’s growing army of subsidiary business; permitting her to combine all of these functions in one single platform.
Being that the case, the possible stream of untapped wealth this will open for Linda Ikeji is really frightening. In all of this, one questions if LIB might well wind up as her least appealing platform.
While Linda Ikeji mentioned explicitly her objective to take on Facebook in Nigeria, the practicality of that remains to be seen. For all we understand, Facebook hosts a meagre 18 countless Nigeria’s 97 million strong web population. There just might be adequate space for both of them.