Post-acquisition Tuenti expands beyond Spain

MADRID - I originally blogged about Tuenti in April 2008 here. Over four years on from then, and things have evolved dramatically for the Spanish start-up (with international founders).

Tuenti now has over 13 million users and belongs to Telefonica (acquired in 2010). Far from maintaining its traditional approach of "acquire startup and shove under doormat", Telefonica has embraced the potential of Tuenti and has taken it under the umbrella of Telefonica Digital.

Make no mistake, with the new Telefonica Digital division, the European operator has big plans to drive revenue and traffic growth from its numerous digital assets (including Jajah, acquired in 2009).For example, it launched the "Tu Me" free voice and messaging app earlier this year. Now Tuenti is opening up to English,  Portuguese, French, German, Italian, Dutch, Slovak, and Czech audiences.

Monetizing social networks is no simple task when a large part of the audience accesses the service via mobile instead of web (witness Facebook), but in the short term it can open up new markets for Telefonica and drive business across its digital asset. Also, Tuenti prides itself on its additional levels of privacy security, in terms of both sharing and identity, which will allow it to offer an edge compared to other social networking services.

Tooio is to mobile what Tuenti is to web

Tooio (pronounced Two-ee-yo) has been pioneering Location-Based Mobile Social Networking since 2008, with its own twist -firstly, though maps feature within its app they are not, perhaps surprisingly, the main feature and secondly, Tooio's strategy has been to focus exclusively on Spain.

Having initially launched on Blackberry, Java-enabled phones and iPhone, Tooio is now releasing its Android version -sign of a clear commitment to product development.

The company raised $2m in November 2008 reflecting a clear show of faith in Tooio's CEO Rafa Casado's capabilities in launching new services and his pedigree as former chief of Terra Networks, a leading web operator in Spain.

But competition in Location-based social networks is tough, and models that work great on the web (such as 'Spanish Facebook' Tuenti) don't easily translate on mobile. This has meant that despite Tooio's brave efforts, it hasn't been able to gain the traction it requires to develop a critical mass of users. Reviews of its iPhone app are mixed (though the later release seems to have improved things) and its decision to limit and then reduce the number of free messages allowed between community members was heavily criticized by users.

A key success factor for Tooio will be the ability to import relevant (and original!) content and create that unique catch that will make it popular -the long tail of marketing is (very) long and a one-size-fits-all strategy is increasingly making way for unique niche-marketing.

Tooio has great potential -it has built a leading position in its geographical market and has the product development firepower to deliver- but will need to focus on offering a great all-round user experience if it is to stay ahead of rivals.

Tuenti -The Spanish Facebook growth story

Madrid-based Tuenti is making waves in the Spanish-speaking social networking space. Billed as the 'Hispanic Facebook', it has managed to register the biggest Spanish-based web community despite still only having a beta-version available of its platform.

The company is playing coy with the figures, but suggests that it already has exceeded Facebook's 380,000 Spanish members.Co-founder Zaryn Dentzel states that Tuenti emphasizes the privacy element of its members above any aggressive growth target...yet, the company has proved extremely capable at expanding its membership. It now serves over 70 million page views every day and the company is already experimenting with advertising.

Tuenti states that even though they will rely on advertising for their revenue, that 'it will not look like normal advertising' but instead will be intergrated within the normal user experience on the website.

The company is now planning to roll-out a mobile version of their website and has recruited a Swede to handle this task and who will join Tuenti's other 18 employees. Possibly the biggest coup (as yet not officially announced) is that Bernardo Hernandez, Marketing Director at Google Spain, will be taking a 1 year sabbatical in order to take over business development at the ambitious start-up. He will join Rupert Van Millinguen, another former Googler, already installed at the company.

Interesting developments lie ahead, particularly as the company builds its mapping capability and rolls out Location Based Services...