The Unique Value of Each Social Network
Since the popularity of social networks has grown in the past years, more and more sites launch that claim to be the next revolutionary/unique social networking service you simply NEED to subscribe to. Some of them stick to certain niches, some of them are positioned as broad as FB or Twitter (click here for a full list; I was quite surprised just how many sites there really are that fit the description of a “social network”).
But let’s be honest, don’t you start rolling your eyes when yet another site asks you to create a profile in order to join their network? Don’t you get tired of keeping more than one “community” updated and having to participate in each of them? Well, rest assured – you are part of the majority. With the limited time people have they actually seek to combine their – online – social activity in a single place. Unfortunately that is not quite possible yet because each of the major social networks offers a different value and covers a different aspect of socializing: keeping in touch with friends and relatives, networking and conversing with people who share the same interests, spreading gossip, gathering business contacts, dating….etc.
Each of the major social networks excels at one, maybe two of these aspects. But none of them manages to combine them all – and I don’t think that will ever happen anyway. People generally feel the need to separate certain aspects of their life (e.g. business contacts and private contacts) and that mostly reflects directly on how they use social networks. A dear friend of mine once said that most people wish to separate online dating activity and social networking. I don’t find this to be necessarily true. I think its much rather an individual choice, similar to the way we act in real life. And it’s an important choice to make online – as early as you can. Since having a clear idea of the contacts you want to mix and the ones you wish to keep separated, of the information you want to reveal to one type of contacts and hide from another, helps realizing which social networks you really need and what type of information to share on each.
When you try to find your way through social networks, the general rule of thumb is: the bigger the better 
(I’ll skip the analogy here). The reason is quite simple: you get the most value from a network which is frequented by a large number of users. Secondly, it is important to define the true, unique value of each network. So here is a list of the most popular networks and the value I see in each of them:
1. Facebook
Facebook started out as a network for the people to stay in touch who studied or went to school together. Today, it’s still great for that purpose simply because each university, each year has its own network which is easy to find and which most people come to use eventually due to Facebook’s popularity. My FB-page is generally something I only wish to share with people I know well, people I studied/went to school with or close friends (maybe some relatives). To me it’s a possibility to offer an insight into my daily life, to stay in touch with friends/contacts even if they live far away and see what they’re up to. It’s like a personal little platform/a window showing more of one’s life and personality. Usually when I start to get to know someone, I prefer to add them to my FB profile after I really met them and actually got to know them better.
To some people their FB-page is very personal, to some less. But generally speaking the contacts on this network resemble a closer circle of friends you wish to keep in touch with.
2. Twitter
Twitter is much more impersonal than FB. Of course it depends on the way you use it. But generally on Twitter you have followers and you follow people you’ve never met before. Tweeps are mostly linked by sharing the same interest and exchanging information/thoughts about these topics. Twitter is great for brief conversations, promoting things, creating a buzz, spreading gossip and keeping informed in real time. In many cases Twitter is much less about the person behind the tweet but about the tweet and the information contained in it. You can customize your Twitter-page to some degree but the level of detail is in no way comparable to FB and it doesn’t need to be, simply because it serves a different purpose. It’s just meant to give a fast impression when you decide if you’re going to follow someone or not. Brief message exchanges, in real time, taking place inside an enormous network. A constant flow of text you can dip into, whenever and where ever you want. It’s really nothing more than that and nothing less.
That explains quite well why I hate the idea of FB trying to copy Twitter’s functionality. Twitter contains much less private information and is used for entirely different things. Both networks have their own distinct value and need to keep it.
3. LinkedIn / XING
The sites that made gathering business cards almost useless. In case you don’t know xing.com, it’s LinkedIn’s equivalent in Germany and heavily used there. What’s great about business networks, is that they allow you to quickly search for and add business contacts which then stay in your network forever. If you ever need to call them for something, you only need to perform a quick search and there you go. Groups help to organize events and both sites have largely contributed to speeding up professional networking (whether it is by helping to find a job or just getting some information on a company/service).
4. Flickr
If you have a blog where you work a lot with pictures or if you’re a photographer, Flickr is irreplacable to promote yourself. It offers a beautiful and easy way of sharing pictures, commenting on them and building groups around similar interests.
5. Google Buzz
To me, Google Buzz is entirely new and still an experiment more than anything. Quite frankly, I don’t really use it that much yet (I only republish tweets there) simply because it is in a deep vanilla-phase right now trying to position itself. Right now Google Buzz is a grey blend of the core features FB and Twitter offer. I actually don’t quite know what to make of it and it isn’t very user-friendly yet. Although I agree that it has a lot of potential (see this very interesting post about how Google Buzz is bound to be a game changer), I’m still searching for a unique value that only GB has beside it being integrated into the email service most of us use on a daily basis.
6. Dating Platforms
Some resemble social networks more, some less. But essentially most people (who try to meet someone online) try to do that at a safe distance without immediately using their personal FB-profile for example. Dating platforms also often offer features which are simply specifically designed to help find a “match” easily. Those features would be unnecessary and unwanted in other social networks (e.g. tests evaluating your personality, matching contacts based on distance and age, pre-formulated lines you can use to contact someone – boy, how lame is that by the way ). But dating platforms certainly bring together people with the same intention in a suited “environment” which clearly represents a unique value and hence deserves being mentioned in this list.
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Girl Goes Tech (GGT) is about a 26-year-old, female tech-addict exploring her geeky side and writing about social media, mobile trends and applications.