Around the office, we’ve always played this game where we lazily dream up the next big app to revolutionise the social landscape. And a year ago, I came up with NextDoor… except I didn’t actually come up with it.
Those of us in the know don’t believe the latest Facebook statistics – we know that the social giant is dying.
True, it’s dying the way a huge dinosaur with a septic toe might die: Slowly, quietly, and with an everything-is-fiiiiine look on it’s face.
What the statistics don’t tell you is that although the number of Daily Average Users (DAU) is trending upwards, that’s over all of Facebook’s properties (Whatsapp, Instagram, Messenger and the FB app).
And despite reports that the mean average user age is 32, experts say the fastest growing age demographic is the over 50s.
Which means they’re at best late adopters, and at worst laggards. And this applies to their life expectancy too!
“Something’s needed to bridge the gap”
Couple Facebook’s failure to attract the lucrative 35-55 demographic, and the data sharing ‘scandals’ and privacy issues that have dogged Mark Zuckerberg for the last few years now, there’s seemed a gap that needed to be filled.
There’s been plenty of attempts, but nothing has felt like it might usurp the giant…
…until now.
Back when I was sipping tea and dreaming up the ‘next Facebook’, I decided that the obvious focus for this new social platform would be location.
After all, they say “If you want to hide from someone, move in next door”.
Save from signing for parcels and taking the bins out, we don’t really know our neighbours.
So the business I wish I’d started is called NextDoor.co.uk, and it aims to fix that.
Love thy neighbour…
[vimeo url=”https://vimeo.com/182499021″ width=”1300″]The platform promises a place where neighbours can:
- Ask questions of each other, like “Is it the brown bin collection tomorrow?”
- Make recommendations, “If anyone’s looking for a great gardener, give John Hughes a call!”
- Ask for advice: “How do I get rid of an old sofa bed? Will the council pick it up?”
- Buy and sell. (We see this as the most lucrative of all the features – especially if they can somehow be a middleman, like PayPal was with eBay)
- Drum up support for local events, for example, “Street Party at Elm Close on Saturday! Bring a Pizza!”
The other advantage is that new users have to verify their address when they sign up, which should mean that:
- Fewer fake profiles. Yup, looking at you FB with your reputed 83 million fake users
- More relevance. NextDoor.co.uk can filter content by location, which should mean the stuff you see is much more relevant to you
- Better advertising & targeting. I know, marketers ruin everything.
Overall, we’re all pretty excited about this platform both from a user and a marketer point of view.
Stay tuned for more advice on buying media on NextDoor.co.uk