Comments for One Year On: Imeem Hype Falls Flat

One Year On: Imeem Hype Falls Flat

2009-08-04T12:00:00Z

One year ago we reported that music-based social networking site Imeem was experiencing strong growth and making key deals with record labels. Our conclusion at the time was that "Imeem's growth rate and buzz is reminiscent of that of YouTube just before it got huge."

Big words indeed. To see if that You Tube comparison was justified, let's check back in with Imeem one year later and assess how they're doing now.

]]> Imeem is a social networking site that offers streaming music. At the time of our report last August, Imeem was the third-largest social network in the United States after MySpace and Facebook, and the No. 1 streaming music site in the US. Key competitors for Imeem were (and still are) MySpace Music, last.fm and Pandora.

The tale of the tape is usually a good indication of growth; and according to Compete Imeem has actually declined by 10.5% in unique visitors this past year. The chart below doesn't include Facebook and MySpace, because they are much larger than Imeem. While Imeem is still larger than last.fm and Pandora, the chart below shows a definite dip - whereas last.fm and Pandora grew.

If we add in MySpace and Facebook, you can see the gulf between Imeem and the other two large social network players. We also see the massive growth of Facebook over the past year; it passed MySpace in Dec '08 - Jan '09 according to this data.

Statistics don't tell the whole story of course, however we've also seen other evidence of problems at Imeem. The company appears to be under pressure financially - in October '08, Imeem laid off 25% of its staff. The product is also under strain. In late June this year we reported that Imeem will remove photos and videos from its features, in order to simplify the service and focus on the service's core social music features. That move did not go down well with Imeem users.

We also note a relative dearth of news this year - just 2 news announcements at Imeem so far this year (into the 8th month), both about Imeem Mobile. Our review of Imeem Mobile was tepid.

We don't want to be too negative. There's much still to like about Imeem - its design has improved and the list of record labels is impressive. But it's obvious that the hype that we saw one year ago (including our own comparison to YouTube!) just hasn't panned out.

With Miley Cyrus now draped all over the Imeem homepage and Jonas Brothers in the default playlist, it seems that the site is now aiming to attract the teeny bopper audience that perhaps MySpace and other online music sites don't serve too well. That's great, but it's far from the diverse mainstream audience that Facebook and MySpace attract.

Unfortunately, Imeem is heading the wrong way in terms of its growth. And there are newer, arguably better music streaming services rising up - Spotify has gotten rave reviews so far from international markets and it's about to launch in the U.S.

Can Imeem turn it around? Let us know your thoughts on Imeem in the comments.

Comment from Florin Grozea on 2009-08-06

2009-08-06T11:45:46Z

I was a huge Imeem from the start. Because of the music, the videos and the legal deals that they made with the major labels!

But now I can‘t find anything good to listen that is not cut to 30-seconds-teaser :-( Every hit, every big artist... That‘s not right, where are the deals?!?

Dalton, please fix this! I want to continue to be you fan!

Comment from Carl Regan on 2009-08-04

2009-08-05T04:06:04Z

I was an active VIP member of Imeem until the financial troubles started and they began cutting back on services like embeddable players, videos, and pictures with a total lack of customer support. Last.fm or Pandora or just good old iTunes is clearly the way to go for any music fans. Imeem was especially great to find artists outside the top 40, but that has almost dried up now, too. I'll be absolutely amazed if company man Dalton's prediction of financial stability occurs for Imeem. Warner Bros and venture capitalist are not giving Imeem any more funding to just watch it get flushed down the toilet like it has been over the past couple years. Miracles don't happen and the especially don't happen with a declining market share.

Comment from Alok on 2009-08-04

2009-08-04T21:19:24Z

I think imeem had a shot to be the internet nervous system and payment management system for songs anywhere via its widgets which used to play full-length songs and pretty much any song at that...just as YouTube has become for videos (it's not too late as no one else has started offering music widgets on a large catalog of songs). We had integrated imeem music search and music embedding into our application (uzvy.com), but after imeem stopped embedding full-length songs, we had to remove music search. I know a lot of other web app, site owners, and bloggers were disappointed. I thought the deal the record companies worked out with Pandora seemed reasonable and wish imeem could've worked out a similar deal and kept the music widgets afloat.

Comment from Richard MacManus on 2009-08-04

2009-08-04T20:02:28Z

Thanks for your comments Dalton. That's great that imeem is doing better financially, as it certainly is a tough industry to be in from that perspective (online music / sns).

Comment from Dalton Caldwell on 2009-08-04

2009-08-04T17:47:27Z

Thanks for the thoughtful post, Richard. You’re right that a lot has changed over the past year, for imeem and for the overall space.

While those changes have been difficult (and at times painful), they’ve put imeem in a much better position as a company. We’ve got a leaner team, new funding, a more realistic set of label deals, and a streamlined experience that we’re continuing to refine. Most importantly, we’re making more money than we were a year ago – significantly so.

In fact, imeem is on track to be profitable by the end of the year. Our ad sales team beat their Q1 and Q2 numbers, despite the down economy, and had a record month in July. And we’ve got a strong lineup of brands signed up to run campaigns on imeem in the second half of the year.

As you point out, we’ve been streamlining imeem to focus squarely on music. Rather than try to be everything to everybody, we’re trying to do one thing – let fans search for and play any music, anytime -- and do it really, really well. The biggest criticism I have of a user of other social media sites is when they "try to do too much." I think we experienced a little bit of that in the past and did not improve the core user experience as much as we could have. I can tell you that inside of the company that we are laser focused on building out a simple, great product.

That focus has required some short-term pain –including, as you note, a temporary dip in traffic related to our recent photo and video changes— but as a result, we’re now in the strongest position of any of our social music brethren to prove that there’s an actual business in ad-supported music.

Overall, the fact that we have made this much progress over the past year on building a FINANCIALLY SUSTAINABLE business that sits in the intersection of some deeply challenged industries in a terrible economic environment is testament to the quality, flexibility and tenacity of the imeem team. I would argue that financial sustainability is the most important metric of any startup. Words cannot express how proud I am of my team because of challenges we have overcome.

Comment from Steven Finch on 2009-08-04

2009-08-04T14:55:35Z

I dont really think Imeem knew what type of service they were. They are streaming, but nothing too special compared to Myspace Music. I dont really think their is a cool community that tailors to the music industry properly.

Comment from Paul Cowman on 2009-08-04

2009-08-04T14:42:19Z

With Pandora switching to a pay service imeem might be able to compete. However to your point, if they have Miley Cyrus and the Jonas Brothers on the hopmepage it will probably turn off a lot of online users.

I'm waiting a looking forward to the US release of Spotify.

Comment from Brant Tedeschi on 2009-08-04

2009-08-04T14:12:11Z

No offense to imeem, but I have no idea why I would go to their site over last.fm. Last.fm shows me what people are listening to, artist bio info, keeps track of what I play at home, and I can stream a lot of the songs there as well.

Sorry, but their traffic is where it should be. Frankly, I don't think there would be an imeem without last.fm.

Comment from NMN on 2009-08-04

2009-08-04T12:42:27Z

It's too bad. I was an active user for about a year until they failed to do anything new. http://AppUseful.com