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| Odnoklassniki logo |
In Russia, if you were to ask people on the streets which social media sites they use, the top sites you will receive as answers are: another Russian site called Vkontakte, Odnoklassniki, Moi Mir, and Facebook. The figure below shows the average monthly audience for the most popular social media sites in Russia from November 2014. Odnoklassniki came in second with about 40 million visitors that month, only trailing behind Vkontakte.
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Many Russians stick with Odnoklassniki, as they are set in their ways
As shown in the figure to the left, in 2014, Odnoklassniki was ahead of Facebook in terms of average monthly audience, and was 2nd overall. What many people may be asking now, is how is it that Odnoklassniki has been able to stay afloat in Russia, when Facebook has already taken over many other countries. The answer is that when Odnoklassniki first came out in 2006, and for years afterwards, Facebook was only available in the English language. Although there are some Russians who speak English, many do not, and therefore could not use Facebook. Odnoklassniki, when it first came out, was only available in Russian, so this made the decision of Facebook versus Odnoklassniki easy for many.
Later on, Facebook was made for use in various languages, but many users already had their Odnoklassniki profiles all set up, and did not see the need to switch. However, as time goes on, more and more users are ditching their old Odnoklassniki profiles and reaching for the social network powerhouse, Facebook. The Facebook team is working on growing the site internationally.
Like most other foreign social networking sites, Odnoklassniki is fighting a battle against Facebook. It must make efforts to keep its current users, and reel others in. Differences in the sites can make one site more attractive than the other. There are some notable differences between this Russian site and other popular social media sites, such as Facebook.
Odnoklassniki allows users to rate photos
If you took a poll and asked Facebook users what one thing they would want to see implemented in Facebook, a "dislike" button would be near the top of that list. Odnoklassniki is ahead of Facebook in this regard. While they do not have a "dislike" button, this Russian site gives you the ability to rate posted pictures on a scale from 1-5 stars.
Giving someone 1 star on his or her picture is the equivalent of a "dislike", and rating a picture 5 stars means you absolutely love it. This gives users the ability to show support for what they like and agree with, and show their lack of support when they don't, thus making the photo experience in Odnoklassniki a bit more personal than that of Facebook. However, Odnoklassniki can arguably be a little too personal at times.
Odnoklassniki tracks profile views
Many people have heard the term "Facebook stalking". If you want to find out more about someone, you can "Facebook stalk" them, or go to their Facebook profile for information, posts, and pictures. You can do this on Facebook, because it does not track profile views.
On the other hand, Odnoklassniki does track profile views. While you are allowed to visit friends' profiles on the Russian site, you cannot do so without the other user knowing, similar to another social media side Linkedin. Therefore, if you really want to "stalk" that cute guy you've been crushing on or check up on an ex-significant other to see what they've been up to, without them knowing you viewed their page, you need a plan.
Odnoklassniki has many active anonymous accounts
The answer that many Odnoklassniki users have come up with to this privacy problem is the creation of fake profiles. Many active profiles do not use their real name or photos. These anonymous profiles make it easy to search anyone, play any games, join any group, and check out anyone's profile, without anyone knowing who you are.
In Facebook, you have the ability to create a fake profile, if desired, but fake profiles are not very popular. For the average user there is no need or desire for a fake profile, because if no one knows who you are, then the main uses of Facebook disappear, such as personal messaging friends, and being able to post news, thoughts, videos, et cetera, on your friends' walls.
Users cannot post to others' walls on Odnoklassniki
Odnoklassniki, on the other hand, does not give users the ability to post to anyone else's wall anyway. However, the site still does include a great messaging system, so whatever you were planning on posting on your friends' walls, you can still send to them in personal messages.
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A last little feature that Odnoklassniki incorporates into its system is that when you send a friend request to someone, you are also asked to state your relationship with that person, when a pop up which looks like the picture to your left appears on the screen. This small addition could come in handy if you are friend requesting an old classmate, who may not quite remember your name, until you check the box that say classmate, which jogs his memory.
Some of these differences have a negative connotation and some are positive for the Russian social networking site, Odnoklassniki. As of now, the site is widely popular and only time will tell whether the Russian site will continue to thrive.
Great post Megan, I did not know that Facebook trailed behind so many social media sites. I figured that it would not be the main social media site for every nation, but I was not expecting it to be in fourth place in Russia. The graph you used helped display this point more so since it allowed me to see the substantial difference. My only critique would be that the last photo is too small so I cannot see what you are trying to show.
ReplyDeleteOdanoklassniki seems to be more the favorable from your analysis because it has been around a lot longer in Russian versus Facebook and some of its specific features. One of the ones that I think is the most interesting about Odanoklassniki is that you can watch lengthier videos and even movies. Since Facebook videos are generally short in length and users do not have the ability to upload hour-long videos such as a movie, more users might choose to not switch to Facebook because their entertainment value will not be matched. On the other hand, since Facebook is an international platform some users might switch over in order to follow their friends that are not on the Russian server.
Gemius researched both sites in order to get a more in-depth demographic and facts about both sites in order to compare them. They found that on average on Odanoklassniki users spent on average 7 hours on the site versus Facebook users that spent 1 hour 12 minutes. Facebook did though have more female users, more popular in Moscow, attract more individuals with a university degree and have users with a higher income. Surprisingly though, both groups attracted the same leading age group which ranged from 25-34.
Even though Facebook may be leading in certain demographics, it is currently in danger of being banned from Russia permanently. Russian media officials have written to the social media giant saying that they are breaking some of their Internet laws and if they do not comply with Russian Internet laws, they will be blocked. Facebook encryption software does not allow Russia to block some of the content displayed on its page and the only way for the government to do so is by blocking out the page as a whole.
Since the Internet has allowed us to share our opinions worldwide, it has created plenty of pros and cons. I think these social media problems will only continue to rise as new sites and apps are developed.
Sources:
http://russiansearchmarketing.com/social-network-matchup-vkontakte-vrs-facebook-russia/
http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/may/22/russia-will-block-google-twitter-and-facebook-if-they-withhold-blogger-data