News Corp.-owned MySpace on Monday announced plans to squeeze out further revenue from its online operations by offering more merchandise to its 109 million registered members.
“We’re going to roll out different areas of e-commerce on our site, then improve them to make the user experience better,” MySpace CEO Chris DeWolfe said Monday at a Los Angeles press conference, according to various reports.
Mr. DeWolfe did not elaborate on the companies involved or merchandise that would be available for sale on the site.
The announcement comes after last week’s launch of MySpace Music, a partnership with Sony BMG Music Entertainment, Universal Music Group, and Warner Music Group. The move marks an attempt from the leading social-networking site to share revenue from sponsorships, sales of concert tickets, digital music downloads, ad-supported audio and video streaming, mobile- phone ring tones, and related merchandise.
Over five million musicians, from obscure garage bands to world famous acts, since the web site's debut in 2003 have built profiles on the popular web site, luring millions of fans to the social network.
MySpace, which News Corp. Chairman Rupert Murdoch bought for $580 million in 2005, is the most popular social networking web site, with 40 million fans over next best social-networking contender Facebook.
The increased effort to boost revenue comes after a report from The Wall Street Journal that News Corp.’s Internet division, Fox Interactive Media, might be short by as much as $100 million on its $1 billion revenue target for the current fiscal year ending June 30th.
“The potential revenue disappointment raises questions about the growth prospects for FIM and the company’s ability to monetize social networking traffic," Sanford Bernstein analyst Michael Nathanson wrote Friday in a report.
As part of its continuous efforts to drive revenue, Fox Interactive Media announced late last week the creation of an “Audience Network” unit led byAdam Bain, the company’s former executive vice-president of technology and production.
The unit’s mission, according to a statement, will be “to optimize monetization across FIM’s content network and for third-party publishers." FIM's network of properties includes MySpace, Photobucket, IGN Entertainment, AmericanIdol.com, and Rotten Tomatoes, among others.