Forrester Underway to Catalog the White Label Social Networking Space

Categories: Analyst, Forrester, Social Networking, White Label Social NetworkPosted on May 28th, 2008

As an analyst at Forrester focused on Social Computing, I’m creating an online catalog for clients that lists out the many players in the White Label Social Networking space, a market I’ve been covering before I even joined the company.

If you work at one of these 100 White Label Social Networking sites (a social network that any company can rebrand) then you’ll want to be included in this catalog. Later, this catalog will help me determine the vendors that will be involved in the Forrester Wave document, which will segment out vendors by strengths.

If you want to participate in this Vendor Catalog, follow these steps:

1) Email Scott Wright ~~swright at forrester.com~~ (Update: Please send to Sarah Glass sglass at forrester.com)with your request: Subject line should be “VPC”
2) He’ll send you instructions, and you can then fill out the short excel sheet.
3) Return it to us by June 4th

If you know someone who works at one of these companies, please forward this post over to them, thanks. I’ve emailed those that I have on hand, but that’s clearly not the entire list.

Update, May 31: Important note about privacy.
Many vendors have expressed concern about how revenue numbers will be used, as many are private companies. The final report will show “price brands” such as 1-5 million, or 6-10 million, just as examples.

It’s important that we place you into these buckets so buyers will know which vendor matches to their particular need. We will use your specific revenue numbers for internal research purposes only, and not publish or share outside of our company. If you still have questions email me at jowyang at forrester.com

Update June 10th
A few days ago, I announced the call for White Label Social Networking vendors (I cover the social networking space at Forrester, for the Interactive Marketer) to complete a spreadsheet and send back to me. Thank you all for completing it, the following companies will be in the Vendor Catalog (A report for Forrester clients):

I used to have a list of vendors who submitted to the report, instead, you can now access the report directly on the Forrester site, or read my background info on my blog.

Of course, each of those vendors who submitted will receive a copy of the report, which will be published in late June 08 or sooner.

If you didn’t submit in time, you’ll have a chance to apply for the vendor catalog, watch this post, and my blog for details.

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This entry was posted on Wednesday, May 28th, 2008 at 9:29 am and is filed under Analyst, Forrester, Social Networking, White Label Social Network. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

16 Comments »

[...] Note May 28, 2008: If you’re one of the vendors listed on this page, I’m conducing research for Forrester R… [...]

Posted by List of “White Label” or “Private Label” (Applications you can Rebrand) Social Networking Platforms on May 28th, 2008 at 11:22 am

[...] Jeremiah Owyang on his “Web Strategy by Jeremiah” blog announced Forrester Underway to Catalog the White Label Social Networking Space. Because the white label social networking tools market is exploding with many small vendors, it is [...]

Posted by Examples of analysts using blogs for research purposes « SageCircle Blog on June 13th, 2008 at 8:28 am

It would have been nice of them to reach out to the companies. First we heard about this was today.

Posted by Todd Cochrane on June 20th, 2008 at 8:02 am

Hi Jeremiah,

What about those that have worked with the vendors listed above or researched them on their own for consideration, would you be interested in their experiences (positive and not so positive)?

Thanks!
Betty

Posted by Betty Sanchez on June 20th, 2008 at 8:48 am

Jeremiah,

Any of these that specialize in supporting eCommerce retailers social networking offering?

I notice Bazaarvoice is not incl.

Thanks, Brian

Posted by Brian Walker on June 20th, 2008 at 8:56 am

Todd,

We did reach out to many, but the list is over 80 (could go to 120 depending on how you count) we did what we could.

Also I blogged, it Tweeted it several times, that’s far more than most analysts do. I really hate to say it, but a White Label vendor, or the PR firm representing them, should have the primary analyst, blogger, and tweeter on this space on their radar.

If you Google “white label” (not even white label social network) this post comes up first
http://www.web-strategist.com/blog/2007/02/12/list-of-white-label-social-networking-platforms/

Which I even indicated at the top of the post I was conducting this call for data. What else do you suggest I do?

The good news is, vendors can SUBMIT even after this report goes live.

Vendors will be able to UPDATE even after this report goes live. I also added this to the last line of this post.

Hope that bring some clarity, I really made an effort.

Posted by jeremiah_owyang on June 20th, 2008 at 9:14 am

Betty,

Yes, I absolutely want to know, please email me with your experiences, both positive and negative. I have a follow-up report “wave” coming.

Brian Walker, that will be in this report, they will segment by industry.

Posted by jeremiah_owyang on June 20th, 2008 at 9:16 am

Great, thanks Jeremiah! I’ll forward you my matrix that I’ve kept up over the years related to vendors that I’ve worked with and considered.
Best,
Betty

Posted by Betty Sanchez on June 20th, 2008 at 9:35 am

[...] weeks ago, I made a call for the vendor product catalog in this market, (and via email and twitter) that document, is a detailed index of over 40 vendors in the space, [...]

Posted by Starting the Forrester Wave: White Label Social Networks and Community Platforms on July 4th, 2008 at 12:36 am

How is the report coming along? Has it been published yet?

Posted by Wesley Barrow on July 15th, 2008 at 12:02 pm

Wesley, watch my blog, it’s with my editing team and will publish shortly.

Posted by jeremiah_owyang on July 15th, 2008 at 12:29 pm

[...] few months ago, I put a call out to the industry to submit to this catalog of the Community Platform space (also known as the White Label Social Network space), my interest in this space grew from a list I [...]

Posted by Forrester Report: Vendor Product Catalog of Community Platforms For The Interactive Marketer on August 4th, 2008 at 8:49 am

Thanks for this Jeremiah. But is there any reason why each company’s URL isn’t included? “Forcing” each of us to search for each vendor seems highly inefficient. What am I missing here?

There also doesn’t seem to be any actual analysis. And this space doesn’t seem to be appropriate either.

Therefore, for those who are interested and/or would like to contribute:

http://WhiteLabelSocNetPlatforms.pbwiki.com

Posted by Mark on August 6th, 2008 at 2:05 pm

I agree Mark the URL should be there, I’ll pass that feedback along.

BTW, there’s a big list that I’ve already done

http://www.web-strategist.com/blog/2007/02/12/list-of-white-label-social-networking-platforms/

If you complete the wiki, I’ll be happy to point to it from this post and the link I just posted above.

Regarding analysis, that’s correct, this is just a ‘catalog’ like a Yellow Pages. I’m conducting a “Wave” report which has extensive analysis on a small segment of the market.