Last Thursday (11th December 2008), we iLeaders were very fortunate to have Jeff Roberto, Marketing/PR Director from Friendster visiting us over at the NOC office.

During that few hours, Jeff talked about Friendster and how it has evolved from the beginning stages till now. We found out that Friendster currently has the highest user engagement and leading in every age group among other social networks in Asia, with over 62 million registered users and 45 million unique visitors from Asia.

Jeff also talked about the various new features that Friendster had come up with such as the Open platform and how it brings about benefits towards facebook and the developers in terms of generating revenue.And also, he talked about the direction towards Friendster is heading; advertising, mobile, alternative revenue models etc.

He also gave us an interesting insight on the working culture in Friendster which is an open culture with a small number of employees and a flat hierarchy system.

The discussion got around to the topic of what VCs look out for in start-ups and Jeff gave us a few pointers such as:

1. traction - already having a live website, with evidence to show that there is a substantial number of users utilizing the site.
2. having innovative ideas.

He also gave us some advice on how to approach a VC and he emphasized that it is highly vital that the product must be in either alpha or beta rather than showing the VC a concept of your product on PowerPoint slides as having a live product will be more impactful and garnering a higher chance of success.

In all, Jeff did provide with a lot of information with regards to Friendster as well as the general trends of the social networking industry. We hope that Friendster will be able to achieve even greater success as they expand their network in Asia.

Below are some facts about Friendster:

With more than 90 million members worldwide, Friendster is a leading global online social network. Friendster is focused on helping people stay in touch with friends and discover new people and things that are important to them. Online adults, 18 and up, choose Friendster to connect with friends, family, school, social groups, activities and interests. Friendster prides itself in delivering an easy-to-use, friendly and interactive environment where users can easily connect with anyone around the world via www.friendster.com and m.friendster.com from any Internet-ready mobile device. Friendster has a growing portfolio of patents granted to the company on social networking, with more expected over the next several months.

Headquartered in Mountain View, California, Friendster is backed by Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, Benchmark Capital, DAG Ventures, IDG Ventures, and individual investors.

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