I am not just talking about the stock price, although the chart below is pretty sobering.
-66% from the absolute peak about a year ago
We have effectively made a round-trip back to 4 years ago for the buy-and-hodl FB investors. If you bought into the Meta rebranding hype in late 2021, you would also be staring at a 60% loss for a tech “blue-chip”.
On hindsight, the pivot to a metaverse business was a massive sell signal. The Apple IOS privacy change was a huge hammer blow to FB’s advertising business.
You might wonder, perhaps a comeback is on the cards if the fundamentals are still intact? Afterall, Mark is one of the few big name founders left who is still steering what was originally a tech start-up.
Assessing The Facebook Platform
I have taken a one year hiatus from social media (especially FB) in an attempt to break the bad habit of mindlessly scrolling through social media feeds whenever I was bored.
That experiment has ended and I restored the app on my phone about a week ago. After a few days of catching up, I had to admit that I was quite shocked by the drop-off in engagement on the platform.
For example, I was previously quite active on this FB Group: BIGS World (aimed at building wealth and living a good life), moderated by a group of financial bloggers. There was a community of almost 6,000 members. Below is a recent screenshot that I have taken of the group page.
The engagement can be likened to a drying stream. And if you think BIGS World is an exception since it is just a small niche group, here is another screenshot from Seedly which has the biggest personal finance community in Singapore.
At this moment in time, user growth on FB has probably plateaued. Nobody is signing up for a new FB account. There could still be many legacy users who are using the platform to read articles, but engagement has also fallen off the cliff, seen from the screenshots above. This drop is probably even worse than the price chart.
Instagram, if not Tik Tok, has replaced FB as the main social media platform for the majority.
That aside, I am adamant that social media has to be a purposeful tool in your life. Let me reiterate that if you find yourself subconsciously scrolling through feeds/stories/reels as a default multiple times through the day, it might be time for a detox to break the habit.
Would I Switch To Another Social Media Platform?
I do sincerely hope that I have not reached an age where I am reluctant to try new stuff. Maybe I will make an effort to produce some content on Instagram, but downloading Tik Tok a few weeks ago was quite a ‘negative’ experience after I was bombarded with lots of pseudo-porn. Producing content semi-anonymously would also be a challenge.
In the short run, I would probably still stick to the tried-and-tested method of sharing articles and content on FB. It’s still pretty low-effort and a natural extension of sharing a written blog post.
I know it is akin to fighting against a rising tide but if you are still lurking around FB and in particular the BIGS World group, do drop a comment or say hello.
Will do my best to engage with you!
Thanks for reading!
Alot of people are saying FB is for old people. I guessed I am 1 of the old people. To me, FB is not dead yet, but dying a slow death. FB likes to change their interface every now and then, so online guides become outdated very soon as the buttons are moved somewhere else. That annoyed me every now and then but not enough to frustrate me.
How FB operate doesnt bother me for the longest time as I was just a casual user until recently when I started using them for FB marketing. OMG, the customer service is appalling. It has to be the worst customer service experience I ever had. It’s totally out of the world.
Long story short, they dont have humans as their customer service and there’s no hotline to call. The replies are by AI and they reply ridiculous things. It was extremely frustrating and this is something that earns money for them!
I feel that they dont actually care if users leave since their customer base is so big, thats why they didnt bother having a proper customer service. in fact, they are only starting to think about setting up 1.
Ok, enough rant. haha, maybe fb will slowly go the way of friendster, or become the yahoo of social media.
Hi HRI,
Thanks for the comments. I guess now once you are past mid or even early thirties, can be considered old alr. Lol
Sorry for your bad experience with FB marketing team. I hope I never have to spend and market on FB. I guess they might still be scrambling after the Apple Privacy issue.
The Yahoo of social media is a pretty apt parallel. I guess Instagram has already replaced FB as the crown jewel.
My 2 cents,
Will Facebook go bankrupt? No, WhatsApp for business, Instagram, and Facebook are still money making machine.
Hypergrowth? No, until “Metaverse” produces something decent, Tik Tok will continue to eat their lunch.
Conclusion: Facebook is still a money making machine – however, its days of high growth is over. Smart money is valuing it as such, thus the compression of its P/E.
Best,
JW
Hi JW,
Thanks for your sharing. Concur with most of your analysis.
Most social media companies are feeling v threatened by Tik Tok, maybe with the exception of Youtube. I am anticipating a US ban sometime soon that could rejuvenate the FB share price.