In one word: no.
MySpace is not a startup, it’s a behemoth already and its sales cycles and patterns become quite normal.
Last night when I commented on News Corp.’s recent quarter (and on missing Rupert Murdoch’s $1B target figure), the following slipped my mind. News Corp.’s fiscal year end in June, so technically, the reduced quarterly revenues are from the Oct-Nov-Dec quarter (what I call Q4) to the Jan-Feb-Mar (what I call Q1) quarter.
99% of the time, most media companies see their strongest quarter in Q4, for a few reasons.
- in Q4, ad agencies scramble to spend all of the money marketers want to spend so they can earn their agency commission.
- in Q1, ad agencies are talking to their clients trying to fine-tune and finalize ad spends… so money always start to be spent in February and grow afterwards.
So if and only if we see a continued decline in Apr-May-Jun is it a sign of concern, otherwise, it’s business as usual… and while yes, it’s very hard to monetize social networking sites, News Corp.’s did clock in $900M and that is a very impressive sign nonetheless.
Disclaimer: News Corp? My former employer. MySpace TV? WatchMojo.com’s distribution.
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