Community : Networking on Ecademy is doomed to failure

Ecademy is the oldest online social network for businesses, so you might think its longevity equates with success. After all, if it didn't work, it wouldn't have survived; neither would it have stayed in the top 500 websites in the UK for so long. But a unique study from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology suggests that there is a fundamental flaw in the way many people use Ecademy.

For decades, social theory has told us that informal networks of large numbers of interconnected people are the best way of spreading information. The problem is, this is only a theory founded on anecdotal evidence. It is the theory on which many "networking gurus" base their suggestions of the need to build large networks of people; after all, they say, if you don't have a big network, you can't find the quality people you really need to connect with. They can produce example after example to back up their faith in the "quantity first" idea.

However, this new study is the first ever experiment that puts that notion to the test using online social networks. And it finds the whole social networking theory which social scientists - and networking experts - have used for years is wrong, plain wrong.

What the study found was that unstructured, informal networks fail to pass on information and get messages across. Instead, formal, structured and close-knit networks were much more successful in passing on material. In other words, quality beat quantity in getting a message across.

Networks which encourage you to display your number of "friends" for instance, or your number of "followers" focus the mind on numbers, above quality. And that is why online social networking is failing so many people. The vast majority of people who have joined Twitter, for instance, have sent no more than ten tweets. Over half the people who have set up a Facebook profile have done nothing with it and don't take an active part. The informality and unstructured approach of such networks means that connecting and passing on information and messages is difficult - as confirmed by this new research. Hence people find it difficult.

Ecademy too suffers from the numbers approach to some extent - you can see how many connections people have, for instance and you are encouraged to accept every new contact to build up the quantity of your connections. That takes you down the road of failure to get your messages across, this new research suggests.

But, Ecademy offers two absolutely brilliant ways of furthering your cause, of getting your messages across and getting your business noticed. The first of these are Groups. By setting up specialist, structured groups the information is much more likely to be passed on and gain traction, this research suggests. Similarly, Blackstar, where you connect with friends and like-minded individuals, is bound to succeed much more than an informal group.

So, I teased you a bit with the headline, I admit. Networking on Ecademy is doomed to failure.....if you do it wrong..! The research shows that merely relying on numbers, popularity contests of how many friends you have and trying to randomly connect here and there will not work. What this unique study confirms is that a structured approach, relying on relationships, rather than randomness is the way ahead.

It suggests that if you want to get the most out of Ecademy you have to do one of two things, or both of them:

1. Set up and use groups within your business area or topic
2. Join Blackstar and host Boardrooms to focus on relationships

Either way, simply "being on Ecademy" is not enough. And now we have scientific evidence that this is true.

Graham Jones
Internet Psychologist

Tel: 0118 336 9710
Fax: 0118 336 9711


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