Generating income from social networking websites has been a challenge for their creators, but a Perth digital design agency believes it has found the solution in Buzka.
Generating income from social networking websites has been a challenge for their creators, but a Perth digital design agency believes it has found the solution in Buzka.
Generating income from social networking websites has been a challenge for their creators, but a Perth digital design agency believes it has found the solution in Buzka.
The Modus Operandi agency designed the innovative social networking web application, Buzka, in 2005.
Buzka enables people to build online social communities and save and organise favorite web pages by creating Buzka ‘spots’ around any interest or topic.
Users can bookmark any web content, including video and audio, and save information from friends’ spots to their own page, all with one click of a mouse.
Unlike other social network services, the free spots can be viewed on a mobile phone and indexed by Google and other search engines.
Co-inventor and chief executive Raphe Patmore said Buzka was already generating revenue from advertising and branded sponsorship of spots.
The agency is also about to launch a new network called Buzka ‘popnets’ early next year, which subscribers can brand for business purposes.
Visitors to the popnets will be able to purchase products and services, and search for and capture information related to a purchase.
“When we launch popnets, it will be a completely new way to search for content in the way it presents a search. We think it has a wider range for raising revenue than Google,” Mr Patmore said.
“We’re not looking to take them [Google] on, but rather complement what they do.”
Buzka has had more than 1,000 people create ‘spots’ since its launch in September last year and about 250,000 people visit the spots since.
Mr Patmore has recently returned from California in the US, where Buzka won the Guy Mason hottest technology award at the sixth annual ANZA Technology Summit.
The award judges noted Buzka’s bookmarking and content management features provided web publishers with a much ‘stickier’ community experience.