ExpertAdWords

Google became the dominate player in advertising to social networks today when Friendster announced that Google would be the primary advertiser on their network. Friendster which boosts over 40 million members has an active membership community of about 19.6 million people. Four out of Five of Friendster’s top markets are in Asia while the United States ranks fourth. Google plans on displaying both text and conceptual ads on the site.

Google already has a contract worth $900 million with MySpace, the largest social network in the US to display ads on their site till 2010. MySpace accounts for 80% of all traffic to social networks, has 106 million members as of August 2006, and reportedly attracts 230,000 new members a day. Google currently displays both text and contextual ads on MySpace.

Additionally, Google employee Orkut Büyükkökten developed a social network service similar to Friendster and MySpace simply called Orkut which Google owns. Orkut reportedly has over 43.46 members and is primarily used in South America and Southwest Asia.