MacIntyre-Kemp queries Facebook valuation
MacIntyre-Kemp queries Facebook valuationNews that Facebook is now valued at more than Boeing at $50bn has sparked concern in some quarters that the social media titan may be overvalued.
Some analysts, including Lou Kerner of Bloomberg TV, are optimistically estimating that by 2015 Facebook will account for 20% of all page views, giving them 20% of all internet advertising revenue – a whopping $22bn.
If and it’s a big if, the social media site can achieve such ubiquity then it will command a $200bn valuation, netting a healthy return for today’s investors.
But is this realistic or merely the tell tale signs of another inflating bubble? The Drum sought out Gordon Macintyre Kemp of Intelligise Social Media Marketing to try and find out whether we should listen to the optimists or the pessimists.
Kemp said: “It won’t happen. If you look at every other social media platform from Bebo and MySpace to Friends Reunited they have all failed after failing to commercialise.
“Facebook might be taking a little longer but it’s a social networking site, not a social commerce site. It wasn’t supposed to be a site where you order your Starbucks coffee.”
A veteran of past dot com bubble’s Kemp is happy to take the long view, he observes: “If I had £1m to invest, I’d put it in LinkedIn.”
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Wow. Well done. Cutting edge stuff that. Here's a slightly older view on the whole facebook valuation thingy, from a respected industry source, with a intelligent comment thread.
http://37signals.com/svn/posts/2585-facebook-is-not-worth-33000000000
LinkedIn? Really?
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Good article Matt - Yes LinkedIn Its the silent superstar of B2B but very few people have figured out how to use it yet. The social media pundits have got the metrics wrong again - its not about how many users you have but how engaged they are with the person using the site that makes the value.
And BTW I have been consistent in my opionion on Facebook for years - see my old drum blog from early last year.
Gordon
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That kind of overvaluation does seem absurd, how much revenue and profit would they need to generate over a consistent period to really earn that valuation?
I suspect that in 10 years time we will look at Facebook as a great generator of idea’s & software & new technologies but commercially used better by other newer kids.
In terms of creating real change, Facebook could be the new NASA and they don’t generate a profit either.
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